Bio-batteries that run on sugar to power smartphones for 10 days
Scientists have developed a new battery that consumes sugar to generate electricity enough to power a smartphone for 10 days at a time.

The bio-battery designed by researchers at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University has a greater output per weight than the typical lithium-ion batteries used in most electronics.

The prototype version has the potential to be lighter and more powerful than the batteries typically found in today's portable electronic devices, including smartphones.

In the body, sugar is converted into energy in a process called metabolism, which decomposes sugar into carbon dioxide and water while releasing electrons.

Bio-batteries produce energy though the same conversion process by capturing the electrons that are generated in the decomposition of sugar with the same tools that the body uses.

As bio-batteries use materials that are biologically based, they are renewable and non-toxic, making them an attractive alternative to traditional batteries that need metals and chemicals to operate.

"By using the lithium-ion battery, for example, your phone can only last for one day, but in the future it will use sugar as the fuel then the phone could last 10 days," said Zhiguang Zhu, a researcher at Virginia Tech.

The new bio-battery gets its efficiency by using a novel system of enzymes, which are proteins that help the reaction to take place, Inside Science News Service (ISNS) reported.

The system uses two active enzymes that liberate two pairs of electrons from the sugar, while 10 other enzymes help to reset the reaction inside the bio-battery.

Once the reaction is reset, the active enzymes release another quartet of electrons.

After six cycles, the bio-battery extracts all of the energy bound in the sugar molecule, along with carbon dioxide and water.

The research was published in the journal Nature Communications.

India is home to the largest number of bird species in the world. Preliminary findings of a recent global event — Great Backyard Bird Count — have put India on top of the list of 127 countries which sent their entries through pictures and videos.
In its report, 'Want to see a wide variety of birds? Head to India', the daily said, "India's emergence as a bird-watching hot spot underscores the rising worldwide popularity of the pastime." It put India on top with 765 species. The US came second with 637 species (till February 22).

The GBBC is jointly organized by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, the National Audubon Society and the Bird Studies Canada. Though the US and Canada have been participating in the event since 1998, the first ever such 'global' bird count was organized in 2013 when participants from 110 countries sent their entries during February 15-18 last year.

Bird watchers from all seven continents had last year reported and documented 4,258 species from about 180 bird families. Mexico had topped the 2013 GBBC list with 645 species followed by the US (638), India (544), Costa Rica (508), Colombia (424), Australia (383), Panama (371) and Peru (325).

The second version of the global bird count, updated till February 28, however, showed that participants from 127 counties this time found 4,296 species with India reporting the highest number of 819 species followed by Mexico (683), USA (644), Costa Rica (609), Australia (501), Colombia (397), Panama (278) and Peru (138).

The event was launched in 1998 as the first online citizen-science project to collect data on wild birds and to display results in near real-time. Participants during the event period send snapshots of birds as their entries which are subsequently analyzed and documented by the organizers before displaying final results of the GBBC.

The participants will unite once again next year during February 13-16 to see how many of the world's 10,240 bird species can be found.

Final results of the four-day Great Backyard Bird Count (GBBC), held between February 14 and 17, are yet to be announced but the data analyzed and updated till February 28 shows that the final order may not change India's position.

A US newspaper, The Kansas City Star, flagged the preliminary findings of the global bird count first on February 22.

Jurassic park all over again?

Giant Virus Resurrected from 30,000-Year-Old Ice

Immune cells undergo ‘spontaneous’ changes on a daily basis that could lead to cancers if they were not destroyed by our immune system, scientists have found.
http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/vaop/ncurrent/abs/nm.3442.html
The research team in Australia found that the immune system was responsible for eliminating potentially cancerous immune B cells in their early stages, before they developed into B-cell lymphomas (also known as non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas).

This immune surveillance accounts for the surprising rarity of B-cell lymphomas in the population, given how often these spontaneous changes occur. The discovery could lead to the development of an early-warning test that identifies patients at high risk of developing B-cell lymphomas, enabling proactive treatment to prevent tumors from growing.

Dr Axel Kallies, the senior author of the study, said the discovery provided an answer to why B-cell lymphomas occur in the population less frequently than expected. “Each and every one of us has spontaneous mutations in our immune B cells that occur as a result of their normal function,” Dr Kallies said.

“It is then somewhat of a paradox that B cell lymphoma is not more common in the population.”

“Our finding that immune surveillance by T cells enables early detection and elimination of these cancerous and pre-cancerous cells provides an answer to this puzzle, and proves that immune surveillance is essential to preventing the development of this blood cancer.”

The research team made the discovery while investigating how B cells change when lymphoma develops.

“As part of the research, we ‘disabled’ the T cells to suppress the immune system and, to our surprise, found that lymphoma developed in a matter of weeks, where it would normally take years,” Dr Kallies said.

“It seems that our immune system is better equipped than we imagined to identify and eliminate cancerous B cells, a process that is driven by the immune T cells in our body.”

According to the scientists, the research would enable scientists to identify pre-cancerous cells in the initial stages of their development, allowing early intervention for patients at risk of developing B-cell lymphoma.

The pollution in the sea is taking a heavy toll on the marine life along the coast. Latest in the series of tragedies is death of the 14-foot-long dolphin that choked to death after swallowing plastic.

Prakruti Nature Club's Jignesh Gohil, who was present in the rescue attempt, said, "During the postmortem we found that the dolphin, which was about 20 years old, had died because of chocking. In autopsy, we found four thick plastic bags.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/home/environment/wild-wacky/Dolp...

Scientists have confirmed hot headed people with outbursts of anger are more prone to heart attacks, strokes and other cardiovascular problems in the two hours immediately afterwards.

Five episodes of anger a day would result in around 158 extra heart attacks per 10,000 people with a low cardiovascular risk per year, increasing to about 657 extra heart attacks per 10,000 among those with a high cardiovascular risk.

The Harvard School of Public Health researchers say the risk with a single outburst of anger is relatively low - one extra heart attack per 10,000 people per year could be expected among people with low cardiovascular risk who were angry only once a month, increasing to an extra four per 10,000 people with a high cardiovascular risk.

Oil Pollution is Making Gulf Dolphins Sick
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/thoughtful-animal/2014/03/04/oi...

Red Meat a Ticket to Early Grave, Harvard Says
Harvard scientists have found that daily consumption of red meat — particularly the kind you might like to grill — may significantly increase your risk of premature death.

While this much has long been suspected, perhaps even by you, the Harvard-led study is the first nuanced analysis to calculate the risk that a serving of red meat can have on your longevity compared with other protein sources.

The study measures, for example, how much one could expect to lower their risk of early death by replacing pork and beef with poultry, fish, nuts or beans can lower the risk of early death; they found chicken was at least as healthy an alternative to red meat as beans and whole grains.
http://www.livescience.com/18996-red-meat-premature-death.html

Diet High in Meat Proteins Raises Cancer Risk for Middle-Aged People
For people aged 50 to 65, a high-protein diet increased the risk of cancer fourfold, comparable to the risk associated with smoking

Long-acting Shot Prevents Infection with HIV-Like Virus
Periodic injection of an antiviral drug has been found to keep monkeys virus-free and could confer as long as three months of protection in humans
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/long-acting-shot-prevents...

WHO's guidelines for sugar consumption:

Ghosts of Evolution
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWW5OuxlKec&list=TLlzUv5w2-y2Xdp...

Black holes may shut down stellar factories
Galaxies stop forming stars despite access to raw materials
Supermassive black holes might slowly suffocate galaxies. The suggestion runs counter to astronomers’ notion that galaxies stop forming stars when they run out of cold gas. But researchers have found a cache of galaxies loaded with cold gas that aren’t making stars. The team’s observations suggest that the galaxies’ central black holes stirred up the gas and shut down the stellar assembly lines.

Over the last decade, astronomers have learned that black holes can drive the fates of entire galaxies. “It’s a bit like an orange affecting the Earth,” says Andrew Fabian, an astronomer at the University of Cambridge. “These black holes are enormously powerful. They’re emerging as an important factor in the way galaxies operate.”
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/black-holes-may-shut-down-stell...

Silk-based devices for fracture fixation
Silk bone screws may mend better than metal ones
A silk screw isn’t as stiff as a metal one, and that may be important for putting bones back together.

Implanting the silk screws into rats’ hind limbs showed that the material could successfully pin bones back together over an eight-week period. Because silk has a similar stiffness to bone and can break down in the body, the new screws could be safer and less invasive than metal ones, researchers report March 4 in Nature Communications.
http://www.nature.com/ncomms/2014/140304/ncomms4385/full/ncomms4385...

I am a vegetarian by choice. I am glad i chose this path. Because according to new reports -
Meaty diets may raise risk of dying young
Reducing animal protein can lengthen life, improve health, studies in mice and people suggest
To live longer, lower your protein intake. In two independent studies, people and mice eating diets low in protein were healthier and tended to live longer than those eating protein-rich diets. Both studies, which appear in the March 4 Cell Metabolism, conclude that animal proteins, including those from meat and dairy, are less healthy than plant proteins.

In a study of 6,381 people 50 and older, those age 65 and younger who got less than 10 percent of their calories from protein had lower risks of cancer, diabetes and dying during 18 years of follow-up than those who ate more protein. People who ate moderate amounts of protein — making up 10 to 19 percent of the diet — had, for instance, three times the chance of dying from cancer as those on a low-protein diet. After age 65, though, the pattern reversed with high-protein diets (20 percent or more) carrying lower risks of cancer and dying.

Highlights of this research studies:

• High protein intake is linked to increased cancer, diabetes, and overall mortality
• High IGF-1 levels increased the relationship between mortality and high protein
• Higher protein consumption may be protective for older adults
• Plant-derived proteins are associated with lower mortality than animal-derived proteins

http://www.cell.com/cell-metabolism/retrieve/pii/S155041311400062X

The Neuroscience and Art of Film Scores
http://worldsciencefestival.com/webcasts/art_of_the_score_the_mind_...

How the NFL Worked to Hide the Truth about Concussions and Brain Damage [Excerpt]
The NFL not only publicly denied evidence that long-term brain damage could result from concussions suffered by its players, but worked to undercut it

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-the-nfl-worked-to-hid...

Docs Should Wash Stethoscopes between Patients, Too
Tests for bacteria found that stethoscopes picked up more microbes from patients than did most parts of the doc's hands.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode/docs-should-wash-...

Bracelets can detect people's chemical exposures
Wristbands are the accessory of choice for people promoting a cause. And the next wave of wrist wear might act as a fashionable archive of your chemical exposure.
Researchers at Oregon State University outfitted volunteers with slightly modified silicone bracelets and then tested them for 1,200 substances. They detected several dozen compounds – everything from caffeine and cigarette smoke to flame retardants and pesticides.

The cheap, colorful, rubbery wristbands have been a popular fad over the past decade in promoting charities and other affiliations.

“We were surprised at the breadth of chemicals" on people's wristbands - Kim Anderson, Oregon State

Chemist Kim Anderson initially tried to use silicone pendants attached to necklaces to test for contaminants. But then, at a football game she saw “all kinds of people, even burly men” sporting wristbands. That’s when the idea hit her.

Silicone is porous and acts similar to human cells, so once chemicals are absorbed by the wristband, “they don’t want to go back to the water or the air,” Anderson said. Chemists can measure concentrations, offering a cheap and easy way to monitor people's exposures.

“This study offers some real possibilities to address the weak link in epidemiological studies – which is the exposure science,” said Ted Schettler of the Science and Environmental Health Network.
http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/

Increased temperatures increase Malaria too
In a paper published online recently in the journal Science, Pascual and her collaborators looked at how malaria moved up in elevation with temperature in Ethiopia and Colombia. Tracking year-to-year temperature variations from 1990 to 2005, researchers observed how malaria's range shifted.

Infection rates tend to increase as temperatures go up, since the Plasmodium parasite that causes the disease reproduces faster inside vector mosquitoes when it's warmer, increasing the infection likelihood when the mosquito bites someone, Pascual explained. The Anopheles mosquitoes that spread the disease also thrive in the heat.

The results confirmed for the first time that malaria creeps uphill during warmer years and recedes as temperatures cool, a dangerous effect as the climate warms. "The implication is this will, without any mitigation, result in the increase of the malaria burden," Pascual said.

The findings hold promise for better forecasting. In previous work, Pascual found she could predict malaria up to four months in advance in parts of India by monitoring monsoons (ClimateWire, March 4, 2013)
Source: online publication in Science on March 6, 2014.

When I was young, I used to feel very sleepy whenever I ate the fish curry my mother made. I used to wonder why. Now I know. And recently I found another evidence. According to new research eating oily fish or omega-3 supplements may help children sleep better, a new Oxford study has found. The study suggests that higher levels of omega-3 DHA, the group of long-chain fatty acids found in algae and seafood,
are associated with better sleep.
Researchers from the University of Oxford explored whether 16 weeks of daily 600mg supplements of algal sources would improve the sleep of 362 children. At the outset of the study, the parents filled in a child sleep questionnaire, which revealed that four in 10 of the children in the study suffered from regular sleep disturbances.

Of the children rated as having poor sleep, the researchers fitted wrist sensors to 43 of them to monitor their movements in bed over five nights. The study showed that the children on a course of daily supplements of omega-3 had nearly one hour (58 minutes) more sleep and seven fewer waking episodes per night compared with the children taking the corn or soybean placebo.

The study looked at sleep in 362 healthy seven to nine-year-old UK school children in relation to the levels of omega-3 and omega-6 long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (LC-PUFA) found in fingerstick blood samples. Previous research has suggested links between poor sleep and low blood omega-3 LC-PUFA in infants and in children and adults with behaviour or learning difficulties.

However, this is the first study to investigate possible links between sleep and fatty acid status in healthy children. At the start of the study, parents and carers were asked to rate their child's sleep habits over a typical week. Their responses indicated that 40 per cent of the children had clinical-level sleep problems such as resistance to bedtime, anxiety about sleep and constant waking in the course of the night.

The study finds that higher blood levels of the long-chain omega-3 DHA (the main omega-3 fatty acid found in the brain) are significantly associated with better sleep, including less bedtime resistance, parasomnias and total sleep disturbance.
It adds that higher ratios of DHA in relation to the long-chain omega-6 fatty acid AA (arachidonic acid) are also associated with fewer sleep problems.
- PTI

Pine Tree Branches Turned Into Effective Water Filtration Systems
Water Filtration Using Plant Xylem
Effective point-of-use devices for providing safe drinking water are urgently needed to reduce the global burden of waterborne disease. Here we show that plant xylem from the sapwood of coniferous trees – a readily available, inexpensive, biodegradable, and disposable material – can remove bacteria from water by simple pressure-driven filtration. Approximately 3 cm3 of sapwood can filter water at the rate of several liters per day, sufficient to meet the clean drinking water needs of one person. The results demonstrate the potential of plant xylem to address the need for pathogen-free drinking water in developing countries and resource-limited settings.
Main points of the study:
Plant xylem is a porous material with membranes comprising nanoscale pores. The researchers have reasoned that xylem from the sapwood of coniferous trees is suitable for disinfection by filtration of water. The hierarchical arrangement of the membranes in the xylem tissue effectively amplifies the available membrane area for filtration, providing high flow rates. Xylem filters were prepared by simply removing the bark of pine tree branches and inserting the xylem tissue into a tube. Pigment filtration experiments revealed a size cutoff of about 100 nm, with most of the filtration occurring within the first 2–3 mm of the xylem filter. The xylem filter could effectively filter out bacteria from water with rejection exceeding 99.9%. Pit membranes were identified as the functional unit where actual filtration of the bacteria occurred. Flow rates of about 4 L/d were obtained through ~1 cm2 filter areas at applied pressures of about 5 psi, which is sufficient to meet the drinking water needs of one person. The simple construction of xylem filters, combined with their fabrication from an inexpensive, biodegradable, and disposable material suggests that further research and development of xylem filters could potentially lead to their widespread use and greatly reduce the incidence of waterborne infectious disease in the world.
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone....

Scientific temper on the rise among Indians
Scientific temper amongst Indians has increased, according to scientist and poet Gouhar Raza here on Saturday. Citing a latest survey by National Institute of Science, Technology and Development Studies (NISTADS) carried out during Kumbh Mela of 2013, he said, while scientific temper remained stagnant across the world only China and India has reported a rise.

Raza, a 1979 batch M Tech (Power Apparatus and Systems) from IIT, Delhi is a scientist with NISTADS. He said people's interpretations from cultural and experiential knowledge base have given way to scientific reasoning and questioning. "Indians are getting wiser," he said.

Art and science are no different, Raza said quoting Einstein to make his point. "If a scientific equation is not beautiful it must be wrong. Both art and science, require creativity and have their own aesthetics."

-TNN

I never go anywhere near melas, pushkars etc. Because thousands bathing at a single place on river banks increases a lot of pollution. I ask people I know too not to attend them. These fairs, melas not only might make people sick in the short term but also can bring long term pollution problems. Now even judicial system has taken note of this.
Bombay HC forms panel to check pollution in Godavari for Kumbh fair
The Bombay high court has formed a committee headed by a divisional commissioner to monitor works of authorities concerned who are responsible to check pollution of Godavari river in the pilgrim town of Nashik, which is to host Kumbh festival in July-September next year.

The order was passed by Justices A S Oka and S C Gupte on a petition filed by Nasik residents praying for cleaning of Godavari, the second largest river in India after the Ganga, which is the main source of drinking water for Nashik and also used for disposing of industrial and domestic waste.

The high court-appointed panel would also comprise the commissioner of Nashik municipal corporation (NMC), Nashik district collector, representative of Maharashtra Pollution Control Board, an expert in the field appointed by the divisional commissioner, and a representative of National Environmental Engineering Research Institute.
-PTI

Psychotherapy course to treat severe depression in terminally ill cancer patients.
Scientists have carried out the first controlled medical experiment in 40 years with the hallucinogenic drug LSD which they used as part of a psychotherapy course to treat severe depression in terminally ill cancer patients.

Volunteers given high doses of LSD - which came to prominence in the hippy culture of the 1960s - showed a 20 per cent decline in their symptoms associated with the extreme anxiety of their medical condition, the researchers found.

The small pilot trial, which involved just 12 men and women, also showed that there were no severe side-effects of lysergic acid diethylamide, the psychoactive chemical commonly known as "acid". However, their depressive symptoms did get worse when given only low doses of LSD, the scientists said.
- The Independent

Four new gases that harm ozone layer found, despite bans: Study
Scientists have detected four new man-made gases that damage the Earth's protective ozone layer, despite bans on almost all production of similar gases under a 1987 treaty, a study showed on Sunday { three types of CFCs (chlorofluorocarbon) and one HCFC (hydrochlorofluorocarbon)}.

The experts were trying to pinpoint industrial sources of tiny traces of the new gases, perhaps used in making pesticides or refrigerants that were found in Greenland's ice and in air samples in Tasmania, Australia.

The ozone layer shields the planet from damaging ultraviolet rays, which can cause skin cancer and eye cataracts, and has been recovering after a phase-out of damaging chemicals under the UN's 1987 Montreal Protocol.

In total, the scientists estimated more than 74,000 tonnes of the four had been released to the atmosphere. None was present before the 1960s in Greenland's ice cores, according to the study in the journal Nature Geoscience.

That is only a small fraction of the million tonnes of CFCs produced every year at a 1980s peak, according to the team of scientists in Britain, Germany, Australia, France, the Netherlands and Switzerland.

These new observations do not present concern at the moment, although the fact that these gases are in the atmosphere and some are increasing needs investigation.

The gases are also likely to be powerful greenhouse gases, albeit in tiny amounts. CFCs are often thousands of times more powerful than carbon dioxide at trapping heat in the atmosphere.

- Reuters

A new group of antibiotics to overcome drug-resistant microbes

Scientists have discovered a new class of antibiotics to fight deadly bacteria such as methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus and other drug-resistant bacteria that threaten public health.

The new class, called oxadiazoles , was discovered by University of Notre Dame researchers led by Mayland Chang and Shahriar Mobashery in silico (by computer ) screening and has shown promise in the treatment of MRSA (methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureusis ) in mouse models.

MRSA is a bacterium that has developed resistance to penicillin and certain other groups of antibiotics . Researchers who screened 1.2 million compounds found that the oxadiazole inhibits a penicillin-binding protein, PBP2a, and the biosynthesis of the cell wall that enables MRSA to resist other drugs.

The oxadiazoles are also effective when taken orally. This is an important feature as there is only one marketed antibiotic for MRSA that can be taken orally, researchers said.

MRSA has become a global public-health problem since the 1960s because of its resistance to antibiotics. Only three drugs currently are effective treatments, and resistance to each of those drugs already exists. The researchers have been seeking a solution to MRSA for years.

- Agencies

http://wapo.st/1fjYbSG

The evolution of the first animals may have oxygenated Earth's oceans -- contrary to the traditional view that a rise in oxygen triggered their development. New research led by the University of Exeter contests the long held belief that oxygenation of the atmosphere and oceans was a pre-requisite for the evolution of complex life forms.

The study, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, builds on the recent work of scientists in Denmark who found that sponges -- the first animals to evolve -- require only small amounts of oxygen.
http://esciencenews.com/articles/2014/03/10/first.animals.oxygenate...

A different diet!
Harvard scientists have identified what may be the strangest of them all -- sunlight and electricity. Led by Peter Girguis, the John L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Natural Sciences, and Arpita Bose, a post-doctoral fellow in Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, a team of researchers showed that the commonly found bacterium Rhodopseudomonas palustris can use natural conductivity to pull electrons from minerals located deep in soil and sediment while remaining at the surface, where they absorb the sunlight needed to produce energy. The study is described in a February 26 paper in Nature Communications.
http://esciencenews.com/articles/2014/03/11/a.shocking.diet

Life beyond the lab

Prof. Lim also hopes to dispel the perception that scientists are boring or predictable.

“Scientists are very creative and fun-loving people too! We often have interests in topics outside of our science that range from business to arts and culture, not to mention being multi-talented. Many scientists have hidden artistic talents.”

In fact, she highlights how her job is that of a teacher, writer, business person, motivator and counselor all rolled into one.

“I get to work with people: collaborators and students from different scientific and social backgrounds. The idea exchanges are exhilarating, especially when the ideas crystallize and materialize into scientific projects, and the results are subsequently communicated to the community,” she muses.
http://www.asianscientist.com/features/sierin-lim-scbe-ntu-2014/

Don’t Throw Out Your Garlic Sprouts
garlic sprout

Sprouted garlic contains many antioxidants that may boost the immune system and promote a healthy heart, according to a study.
“Sprouted” garlic — old garlic bulbs with bright green shoots emerging from the cloves — are normally considered to be past their prime and usually end up in the garbage can. But scientists now report that this type of garlic has even more heart-healthy antioxidant activity than its fresher counterparts.

Kim Jong-Sang and colleagues from Kyungpook National University in South Korea note that people have used garlic for medicinal purposes for thousands of years. Eating garlic or taking garlic supplements is touted as a natural way to reduce cholesterol levels, blood pressure and heart disease risk. It even may boost the immune system and help fight cancer
Garlic Sprouting Is Associated with Increased Antioxidant Activity and Concomitant Changes in the Metabolite Profile

http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf500603v

Pathologies of hyperfamiliarity in dreams, delusions and déjà vu

Research from the University of Adelaide has delved into the reasons why some people are unable to break free of their delusions, despite overwhelming evidence explaining the delusion isn’t real.

In a paper published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology, University of Adelaide philosopher Professor Philip Gerrans says dreams and delusions have a common link – they are associated with faulty “reality testing” in the brain’s higher order cognitive systems.

‘Reality testing’ is the ability to challenge and revise thoughts prompted by anomalous experiences, and depends on activity in right dorsolateral prefrontal circuitry.
In someone who has problems with reality testing, that story might persist and may even be elaborated and translated into action. Such people can experience immense mental health difficulties, even to the point of becoming a threat to themselves or to others.
http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00097/full

Even as conservation efforts at various levels continue to show hope for the future, the latest International Union for Conservation of Nature ( IUCN) Red List of Birds (2013) shows that fifteen bird species in India continue to be critically endangered (CR).

Moreover, three other bird species now face greater danger than before. These species have been uplisted to Near Threatened (NT) and Vulnerable (VU) categories. Earlier they were better off and classified under Least Concern (LC) category. In India, organizations such as BNHS-India play a crucial role in researching and collating such information, as the BirdLife International (UK) country partner.

The species falling under the Critically Endangered category in India include migratory wetland species: Baer's Pochard, Siberian Crane and Spoon-billed Sandpiper; non-migratory wetland species: White-bellied Heron; grassland species: Bengal Florican, Great Indian Bustard, Jerdon's Courser and Sociable Lapwing; forest species: Forest Owlet and scavengers: Indian Vulture, Red-headed Vulture, White-backed Vulture and Slender-billed Vulture. Himalayan Quail and Pink-headed Duck are now considered Extinct for all practical purposes.

15 bird species in India critically endangered
-TNN

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Vaccination keeps children from hospitals
Flu Vaccine Keeps Connecticut Kids from Hospitals - study
After flu shot regulations upped Connecticut kids' vaccination rate, their hospitalization risk went down.
Impact of Requiring Influenza Vaccination for Children in Licensed Child Care or Preschool Programs — Connecticut, 2012–13 Influenza Season
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6309a1.htm?s_cid=mm6309a1_e

It only takes a quick jolt of electricity to get a swarm of cells moving in the right direction. Researchers at UC Berkeley found that an electrical current can be used to orchestrate the flow of a group of cells, an achievement that could establish the basis for more controlled forms of tissue engineering and for potential applications such as "smart bandages" that use electrical stimulation to help heal wounds.
Scientists 'herd' cells in new approach to tissue engineering
http://esciencenews.com/articles/2014/03/12/scientists.herd.cells.n...

Global Biogeochemical Cycles
In a study of the ocean’s role in the global carbon cycle, Siegel and his colleagues used nuggets to their advantage. They incorporated the lifecycle of phytoplankton and zooplankton — small, often microscopic animals at the bottom of the food chain —into a novel mechanistic model for assessing the global ocean carbon export. Their findings appear online in the journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/%28ISSN%291944-9224

Spontaneous fluctuations in neural responses to heartbeats predict visual detection
Each heartbeat creates a blip of neural activity in the brain, and that blip may help people better sense their world.

People were more likely to spot a flash of a hard-to-see ring when the image was presented right after a heartbeat, researchers report March 9 in Nature Neuroscience. The neural jolt produced by a heartbeat primes the brain to better detect the ring.

The results are an example of how bodily functions can have a big effect on the brain.
Spontaneous fluctuations of ongoing neural activity substantially affect sensory and cognitive performance. Because bodily signals are constantly relayed up to the neocortex, neural responses to bodily signals are likely to shape ongoing activity.
Using magnetoencephalography, scientists show that in humans, neural events locked to heartbeats before stimulus onset predict the detection of a faint visual grating in the posterior right inferior parietal lobule and the ventral anterior cingulate cortex, two regions that have multiple functional correlates and that belong to the same resting-state network. Neither fluctuations in measured bodily parameters nor overall cortical excitability could account for this finding. Neural events locked to heartbeats therefore shape visual conscious experience, potentially by contributing to the neural maps of the organism that might underlie subjectivity. Beyond conscious vision, the results show that neural events locked to a basic physiological input such as heartbeats underlie behaviorally relevant differential activation in multifunctional cortical areas.
http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nn.3671.html

Zombie virus discovered
After lying dormant in Siberian permafrost for 30,000 years, the largest virus ever discovered is just as deadly as it was when mammoths roamed the Earth.
The virus targets amoebas rather than humans. But thawing, drilling and mining of ancient permafrost could potentially unleash viruses that infect people, say the scientists who discovered the giant virus.

Earth's mantle holds an ocean's worth of water. Scientists have found the first terrestrial sample of a water-rich gem which suggests that large volumes of water exist deep beneath the Earth.

An international team of scientists led by Graham Pearson, Canada Excellence Research Chair in Arctic Resources at the University of Alberta, has discovered the first-ever sample of a mineral called 'ringwoodite'. Analysis of the mineral shows it contains a significant amount of water — 1.5% of its weight — a finding that confirms scientific theories about vast volumes of water trapped 410 to 660 kilometres beneath the Earth, between the upper and lower mantle.

"This sample really provides extremely strong confirmation that there are local wet spots deep in the Earth in this area," said Pearson, a professor in the faculty of science. "That particular zone in the Earth, the transition zone, might have as much water as all the world's oceans put together," Pearson said.

Ringwoodite is a form of the mineral peridot, believed to exist in large quantities under high pressures in the transition zone.

Ringwoodite has been found in meteorites but, until now, no terrestrial sample has ever been unearthed because scientists have not been able to conduct fieldwork at extreme depths. Pearson's sample was found in 2008 in the Juina area of Mato Grosso, Brazil, where artisan miners unearthed the host diamond from shallow river gravels.

The diamond had been brought to the Earth's surface by a volcanic rock known as kimberlite — the most deeply derived of all volcanic rocks. Pearson said the discovery was almost accidental in that his team had been looking for another mineral when they found a three-millimetre-wide, dirty-looking, commercially worthless brown diamond.

- News Agencies

The five second rule to pick up food from the floor:

According to researchers,  final-year students at Birmingham’s Aston University, the 'five-second rule' that many of us think is okay is an actual scientific measure of how long your food is safe to eat for.

(But again I have watched a programme on Discovery channel sometime back that said it depends on the state of food. If it is very wet, it picks up lots of microbes from the floor. If it is dry less number of microbes get attached to it regardless of time it spent on the floor.)

According to this one there is a "significant time factor" on the transfer of bacteria from the floor to food - basically, you have five second window to pick it up before it stops being safe to eat.

The students placed toast, pasta, biscuits and a sweet on the floor to determine that food picked-up straight after being dropped is less likely to contain common bacteria such as E. coli.

They also determined that bacteria is least likely to transfer from carpeted surfaces, and most likely to transfer from laminate or tiled surfaces to moist foods which made contact with the floor for more than five seconds.

"Consuming food dropped on the floor still carries an infection risk as it very much depends on which bacteria are present on the floor at the time; however the findings of this study will bring some light relief to those who have been employing the “five-second rule” for years, despite a general consensus that it is purely a myth," Professor Anthony, who led the study, said.

"We have found evidence that transfer from indoor flooring surfaces is incredibly poor with carpet actually posing the lowest risk of bacterial transfer onto dropped food."

- News Agencies

A team of British and American scientists have taken an important step toward understanding how life arose on Earth. Their work is published in a new paper in the journal Astrobiology.

The Fuel Cell Model of Abiogenesis: A New Approach to Origin-of-Life Simulations
http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/abs/10.1089/ast.2014.1140

Publishers withdraw more than 120 gibberish papers
The publishers Springer and IEEE are removing more than 120 papers from their subscription services after a French researcher discovered that the works were computer-generated nonsense.

Over the past two years, computer scientist Cyril Labbé of Joseph Fourier University in Grenoble, France, has catalogued computer-generated papers that made it into more than 30 published conference proceedings between 2008 and 2013. Sixteen appeared in publications by Springer, which is headquartered in Heidelberg, Germany, and more than 100 were published by the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), based in New York. Both publishers, which were privately informed by Labbé, say that they are now removing the papers.

http://www.decisionsciencenews.com/2014/03/13/publishers-withdraw-1...

How grapevines got acne bacteria
Microbe is the first known animal pathogen to become dependent on a plant host — and could have helped in its domestication.
A common bacterium on human skin that is partly responsible for acne — has made itself at home in the grapevine. It is the first known instance of a human bacterial pathogen that has become dependent on a host from a different kingdom of life. Italian researchers report that a newly found strain of Propionibacterium acnes seems unable to live anywhere else than within grapevine cells, and speculate that this adaptation helped humans to domesticate the plant.
http://www.nature.com/news/how-grapevines-got-acne-bacteria-1.14812