Knowledge Update

New York, Dec 13 (IANS) Breeding rice to require less flooding, altering feed for livestock to lessen intestinal processes that create methane, promoting less meat-intensive diets and deploying more farm bio-digesters can be possible solutions for reducing the polluting gas from food production, a study has shown.

In the journals Earth System Science Data and Environmental Research Letters published on Monday, a group of international researchers reported that emissions of methane have jumped dramatically in recent years and are approaching an internationally recognised worst-case scenario for greenhouse gas emissions, thus speeding sea level rise and more extreme weather.

While most climate change mitigation efforts have focused on carbon dioxide, methane's warming potential is about 28 times greater on a 100-year horizon, and its lifespan in the atmosphere is much shorter, Xinhua news agency reported.

"Methane presents the best opportunity to slow climate change quickly," said Rob Jackson, the papers' co-author and chair of Stanford University's Earth System Science Department. "Carbon dioxide has a longer reach, but methane strikes faster".

Unlike carbon dioxide, the bulk of methane emissions are human-driven. Chief among those, according to the analysis, are agricultural sources such as livestock, which emit methane through bodily functions and manure, and rice fields, which emit methane when flooded.

Natural sources of methane, which account for 40 per cent of all methane emissions, are more uncertain than human-driven ones, which are responsible for 60 per cent of all methane emissions globally. Examples include methane leaking out of natural faults and seeping on the ocean floor, and the potential for increased emissions as permafrost warms.

Besides efforts proposed to curb emissions from agriculture, the researchers said opportunities in other areas include venting and flaring of methane in coal mines, detecting and removing natural gas leaks from oil and gas drilling operations and covering landfills to capture methane emissions.

"We still need to cut carbon dioxide emissions," Jackson said, "but cutting methane provides complementary benefits for climate, economies and human health".

​London, Dec 19 (IANS) Skin plays a significant role in harbouring and transmitting trypanosomes -- the parasite that causes the Human African Trypanosomiasis, more commonly known as African sleeping sickness, which is often fatal if left untreated, a new research has found.

The findings could have a major impact on the way the disease is diagnosed, treated and potentially eradicated.

The disease, which kills thousands in Sub-Saharan Africa every year, is primarily transmitted to humans via the bite of an infected tsetse fly as it takes a blood meal, with diagnosis then confirmed through the presence of parasites in the blood.

The current study, published recently in the journal eLife, showed that substantial quantities of trypanosomes that cause the disease can exist within the skin and can be transmitted back to the tsetse fly vector.

"Our results have important implications with regard to the eradication of sleeping sickness. Firstly, our findings indicate that current diagnostic methods, which rely on observing parasites in the blood, should be re-evaluated and should include examining the skin for parasites," said lead researcher Annette MacLeod from University of Glasgow in Britain.

"In terms of treatment, it may also be necessary to develop novel therapeutics capable of targeting sources of infection outside the blood circulation and in the reservoirs underneath the skin," MacLeod noted.

The team of researchers from University of Glasgow's Wellcome Trust Centre for Molecular Parasitology and the Institut Pasteur in Paris were also able to observe the presence of parasites in human skin biopsies from individuals who displayed no symptoms. 

The study's findings suggest skin-dwelling parasites could be sufficiently abundant in the skin to be ingested, transmitted and so able to spread the disease further.

​London, Dec 11 (IANS) Cancer patients who also suffer from diabetes also risk heart damage because of chemotherapy, a study has found.

The study found that cardiotoxicity induced by chemotherapy with anthracyclines is being increasingly reported, mainly because a smaller proportion of patients now die from cancer.

"In the coming years this cardiotoxicity looks set to increase the burden of heart failure in cancer survivors," said Ana Catarina Gomes, cardiologist in training at the Hospital Garcia de Orta in Almada, Portugal.

"The good news is that cardiotoxicity can be reversible in the early stages before overt heart failure develops. Surveillance programmes are hugely beneficial, particularly in the first year of treatment when up to 80 per cent of the systolic dysfunction develops," Gomes added.

The research investigated factors that could affect the likelihood of patients having heart damage after treatment with anthracyclines.

Of 83 patients included in the surveillance programme, 54 had breast cancer, 20 had lymphoma and nine had gastric cancer.

"Patients with diabetes had a significantly greater decrease in global longitudinal strain during treatment, despite having baseline levels similar to non-diabetics," the research noted.

According to Gomes, sub-clinical reduction in global longitudinal strain is an early predictor of heart failure and was particularly pronounced in patients with diabetes.

"It is possible that the trend for greater reduction in patients with hypertension might become statistically significant in a larger study," Gomes added.

The researchers hypothesised that cancers themselves could have direct cardiotoxic effects induced by cytokines.

The cardiotoxic effects may vary with the type of cancer, study noted.

Researchers suggested that cancer patients should strictly control cardiovascular risk factors with lifestyle changes and, if necessary, with medication.

The findings were presented at EuroEcho-Imaging 2016 in Leipzig, Germany.

​Washington, Dec 11 (IANS) Monkeys have the vocal tracts to produce human speech sounds, but what they lack is a speech-ready brain, a new study has found.

The study, conducted by researchers from the US and Europe and published this week in the US journal Science Advances, used X-ray video to see within the mouth and throat of macaque monkeys induced to vocalise, eat food or make facial expressions, Xinhua news agency reported.

The scientists then used these data to build a computer model of a monkey vocal tract, allowing them to answer the question "what would monkey speech sound like, if a human brain were in control?"

The results showed that monkeys could easily produce many different sounds, enough to produce thousands of distinct words.

For example, monkeys could produce comprehensible vowel sounds -- and even full sentences -- with their vocal tracts if they had the neural ability to speak.

However, the researchers noted that while monkeys would be understandable to the human ear, they would not sound precisely like humans.

Therefore, the researchers concluded that previous research -- largely based on plaster casts made from the vocal tracts of a monkey cadaver -- underestimates primate vocal abilities and that evolution of human speech capabilities required neural changes rather than an adaptation of vocal anatomy.

"Now nobody can say that it's something about the vocal anatomy that keeps monkeys from being able to speak -- it has to be something in the brain," said Asif Ghazanfar, Professor of psychology at the Princeton University and one of the study leaders.

"Even if this finding only applies to macaque monkeys, it would still debunk the idea that it's the anatomy that limits speech in nonhumans."

Thore Jon Bergman, Assistant Professor of psychology and ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Michigan, who is familiar with the research but was not involved in it, said the research could help narrow down the origin of human speech.

"It looks like mainly neuro-cognitive -- as opposed to anatomical -- differences contribute to the broader range of sounds we produce relative to other primates," Bergman said in a statement released by the Princeton University.

"An important part of understanding human uniqueness is to know what our relatives do," he said.

"This study shows the anatomical capability to make a variety of sounds, as we do with speech, was present long ago. This is useful for understanding the starting point for the evolution of language."

​New York, Dec 11 (IANS) Bestowing considerable power in the CEOs may not create value for the firm during industry-wide downturns, a study led by Indian-origin scientist has found.

"We look at severe industry downturns. The essential idea is, when you have concentrated power in the hands of the CEO or a small group of decision-makers, does that lead to better decision-making or worse?" said Vikram Nanda, Professor at the University of Texas - Dallas, US.

The study found that for innovative firms with powerful CEOs, an industry downturn results in a notable decrease in the firm's value, or book-to-market ratio, relative to a less powerful CEO.

Conversely, for competitive industries and high-discretion industries with powerful CEOs, a downturn results in a decrease in firm value.

In the study, the team wanted to look at crisis situations in which urgency -- the speed of making a decision -- could potentially be really important.

They found that a small concentration of power does not work well, even in times of crisis.

Although decisions may be made faster because only one or two persons need to weigh in, but it could be detrimental if the CEO does not get input from other sources.

Instead, companies should keep their information channels open. The search for more information should not be sacrificed by urgency, the study suggested.

Regulatory response has been to increase the power of the board or make the board independent of the CEO. Although there is some skepticism about the benefits of intervention, such as independent audit committees, on average, these regulations have helped, Nanda said.

"CEOs can actually benefit from having a board of independent members, or having different voices in the boardroom. That can lead to better decision-making. It would be positive for the firm to view it from that perspective. Many of them do, but there are always people who want more power and more authority, and don't want to have people looking over their shoulder. On the other hand, that may be what helps a firm deal with a crisis," Nanda noted.

The study was published online in the journal Group & Organization Management.

​New York, Dec 11 (IANS) Corn and soyabeans that are close to wind turbines grow in more favourable conditions as turbulence created by wind influences temperature and carbon dioxide concentration, a new research has revealed.

The researchers from the Iowa State University (ISU) installed research towers on a 200-turbine wind farm in Iowa and collected data from 2010 to 2013 on wind speeds and directions, temperature, humidity, turbulence, gas content and precipitation.

"Tall wind turbines disbursed throughout a field create air turbulence that may help plants by affecting variables such as temperature and carbon dioxide concentrations," said Gene Takle, professor at the Iowa State University, US.

The research revealed that turbines can lower the temperature about a half degree during the day and make it half to full degree warmer at night.

"That is because the turbulence mixes air at different elevations. That mixing cools the ground level during the daylight hours, like a fan blowing on a wet surface. But at night, as the ground loses heat, the mixing brings warmer air aloft down to ground level, resulting in a net warming effect," Takle said in a university statement.

The turbulence also suppresses the formation of dew and dries the crops, Takle said, which could combat harmful molds and fungi, the research found.

Researchers noted that the turbulence, enrich the carbon dioxide content in the air surrounding crops that can favour the growing condition of the plants.

However, it remains a challenge for the researchers to figure out if the changes actually improve plant performance.

"The next step would be to answer if this turbulence changes biomass uptake of plants, or if it affects plant size or functions or yield," Takle added.

​Beijing, Dec 11 (IANS) China launched a weather satellite at 12:11 a.m. local time on Sunday, marking an upgrade of China's meteorological satellites in geostationary orbit.

The Fengyun-4 satellite, the first of China's second-generation weather satellites in geostationary orbit to have been launched, is also the country's first quantitative remote-sensing satellite in high orbit, Xinhua news agency reported.

The satellite, launched from the Xichang Satellite Launch Centre in southwest China's Sichuan Province, was taken into orbit by a Long March-3B carrier rocket. The launch marked the 242nd mission of China's Long March series of rockets.

The satellite will make high time, spatial and spectral resolution observations of the atmosphere, clouds and space environment of China and surrounding regions, significantly improving capabilities of weather and climate forecasts, according to the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense. 

The China Meteorological Administration is the primary user of the satellite.

Previously, China had successfully launched 14 weather satellites, seven of which are still in orbit.

​New York, Dec 10 (IANS) A $15 prosthetic hand created by a student at Ithaca College here can offer a helping hand to a person who still has the ability to move their wrist.

By moving their wrist, they can control and use the hand's fingers to grab and hold various objects.

Unlike electronic hands, which are typically made from metal and are generally expensive, Ryan Bouricius's prosthetic hand is mostly plastic.

"The nice thing about 3D printing is that the price only has to do with the amount of plastic used, not the complexity of the piece," Bouricius said. 

Bouricius derived the idea for his innovation from a YouTube video but through testing and tinkering, he made changes to the original design to give the hand more functionality.

"So even though my modified pieces are trickier shapes, since it is the same amount of plastic, it's the same amount of money," Bouricius noted in a statement released by Ithaca College.

This is especially important for families with children who need prostheses. Because children outgrow them quickly, the costs of prostheses can be considerable over time. 

With 3D printing, however, Bouricius' model can be affordably re-printed in larger sizes as the child grows.

Bouricius is working with eNABLE, a non-profit organisation that matches 3D-printed prostheses with those in need of them, to find a recipient for his printed hand.

​London, Dec 10 (IANS) Researchers in Belgium have found that 20 to 40 per cent of patients with the multiple myeloma type of leukaemia have a defect in the ribosome, the protein factory of the cell.

Multiple myeloma (MM, also known as Kahler's disease) is a blood cancer in which the plasma cells in the bone marrow start proliferating malignantly. 

The disease cannot be cured and is most common among older people. Various treatments exist to temporarily suppress the disease, but the challenge is determining to which treatment the patient will respond best.

The researchers believe that the new findings - published in the journal Leukemia - can lead to tests to identify defects in the protein factory and also determine an effective therapy. 

"The ribosome is the protein factory of a cell. In MM patients, one part of the ribosome is produced less in 20 to 40 percent of the patients, depending on how aggressive the cancer is. We suspect that their cells are still producing protein, but that the balance is somewhat disrupted," said Kim De Keersmaecker, Professor at University of Leuven (KU Leuven) in Belgium. 

"On the basis of these findings, we can now develop tests to identify defects in the ribosome and thus determine which therapy will have most effect in a specific patient," she said. 

The notion that cancer is related to ribosome defects is a relatively new concept in science.

"A few years ago, we discovered defects in the ribosome of patients with acute lymphatic leukaemia. Now we know that the same applies to MM," De Keersmaecker said.

In all likelihood, this will also hold true for other types of cancer, she noted.