Knowledge Update

New York, April 1 (IANS) Asia, the continent that houses roughly half the world's population, will face a "high risk of severe water stress" by 2050 if the current environmental, economical and population growth persists, warns a new study.

The study points out that water shortages are not simply the results of climate change and environmental stress. 

"It's not just a climate change issue. We simply cannot ignore that economic and population growth in society can have a very strong influence on our demand for resources and how we manage them," said one of the researchers Adam Schlosser, a senior research scientist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in US.

"And climate, on top of that, can lead to substantial magnifications to those stresses," Schlosser added.

The findings, published in the journal PLOS One, showed that the median amounts of projected growth and climate change in the next 35 years in Asia would lead to about 1 billion more people becoming "water-stressed" compared to the present time.

To conduct the study, the scientists built upon an existing model developed previously at MIT, the Integrated Global Systems Model (IGSM), which contains probabilistic projections of population growth, economic expansion, climate, and carbon emissions from human activity. 

They then linked the IGSM model to detailed models of water use for a large portion of Asia encompassing China, India, and many smaller nations.

The scientists then ran an extensive series of repeated projections using varying conditions. 

In what they call the "just growth" scenario, they held climate conditions constant and evaluated the effects of economic and population growth on the water supply. 

In an alternate "just climate" scenario, the scientists held growth constant and evaluated climate-change effects alone. And in a "climate and growth" scenario, they studied the impact of rising economic activity, growing populations, and climate change.

The study gave the researchers a "unique ability to tease out the human (economic) and environmental" factors leading to water shortages and to assess their relative significance, Schlosser said.

The IGSM model also allowed the team to look at how, under the same variables, scenarios change according to countries. This is particularly useful to come up with country-specific strategies, in order to avoid water stress.

"For China, it looks like industrial growth (has the greatest impact) as people get wealthier. In India, population growth has a huge effect. It varies by region," explained lead author Charle Fant, researcher at MIT.

Other variables, such as water supply networks into and out of the different areas, and the way population is distributed around said supplies should be examined, the researchers said. 

"We are assessing the extent to which climate mitigation and adaptation practices - such as more efficient irrigation technologies - can reduce the future risk of nations under high water stress," Schlosser said.​

Washington, April 1 (IANS) Delving deep into the heart of our Milky Way galaxy, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has revealed a rich tapestry of more than half a million stars at its core.

Except for a few blue foreground stars, the stars are part of the Milky Way's nuclear star cluster - the most massive and densest star cluster in our galaxy. 

So packed with stars, it is equivalent to having a million suns crammed between us and our closest stellar neighbour Alpha Centauri. 

At the very hub of our galaxy, this star cluster surrounds the Milky Way's central supermassive black hole which is about four million times the mass of our sun.

Astronomers used Hubble's infrared vision to pierce through the dust in the disk of our galaxy that obscures the star cluster. 

Hubble's sharp vision allowed astronomers to measure the movements of the stars over four years. 

Using this information, scientists were able to infer important properties such as the mass and structure of the nuclear star cluster. 

The motion of the stars may also offer a glimpse into how the star cluster was formed -- whether it was built up over time by globular star clusters that happen to fall into the galaxy's centre, or from gas spiraling in from the Milky Way's disk to form stars at the core.

The picture, spanning 50 light-years across, is a mosaic stitched from nine separate images from Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3. 

The centre of the Milky Way is located 27,000 light-years away. 

Astronomers estimate that about 10 million stars in this cluster are too faint to be captured in this image.​

​London, April 1 (IANS) Forgetting can be the result of an active deletion process in the brain rather than a failure to remember -- a mechanism that helps us adapt our behaviour according to the surroundings, says a new study.

The findings could point towards new ways of tackling memory loss associated with conditions such as Alzheimer's disease and other types of dementia.

"Our study looks at the biological processes that happen in the brain when we forget something,” said Oliver Hardt from University of Edinburgh in Scotland.

"The next step is to work out why some memories survive whilst others are erased. If we can understand how these memories are protected, it could one-day lead to new therapies that stop or slow pathological memory loss," Hardt said.

The findings were published in The Journal of Neuroscience.

The study conducted in rats could also help scientists to understand why some unwanted memories are so long-lasting - such as those of people suffering from post-traumatic stress disorders.

Memories are maintained by chemical signalling between brain cells that relies on specialised receptors called AMPA receptors. 

The more AMPA receptors there are on the surface where brain cells connect, the stronger the memory.

The team found that the process of actively wiping memories happens when brain cells remove AMPA receptors from the connections between brain cells.

Over time, if the memory is not recalled, the AMPA receptors may fall in number and the memory is gradually erased.

Blocking the removal of AMPA receptors with a drug that keeps them at the surface of the cell stopped the natural forgetting of memories, the study found.​

​New York, April 1 (IANS) Drinking black, decaf or even instant coffee daily can lower the risk of developing colorectal cancer, finds a study.

Moderate coffee consumption, between one to two servings a day, was associated with a 26 percent reduction in the odds of developing colorectal cancer after adjusting for known risk factors.

Moreover, the risk of developing colorectal cancer continued to decrease to up to 50 percent when participants drank more than 2.5 servings of coffee each day. 

"We found that drinking coffee is associated with lower risk of colorectal cancer and the more coffee consumed, the lower the risk," said lead researcher Stephen Gruber from University Of Southern California.

The study, published in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, examined over 5,100 participants who had been diagnosed with colorectal cancer within the past six months, along with an additional 4,000 participants with no history of colorectal cancer to serve as a control group. 

A questionnaire also gathered information about many other factors that influence the risk of colorectal cancer, including family history of cancer, diet, physical activity and smoking.

The indication of decreased risk was seen across all types of coffee, both caffeinated and decaffeinated.

Caffeine and polyphenol compounds present in coffee can act as antioxidants, limiting the growth of potential colon cancer cells. 

"The good news is that our data presents a decreased risk of colorectal cancer regardless of what flavor or form of coffee you prefer," said study co-author Stephanie Schmit. 

"While the evidence certainly suggests this to be the case, we need additional research before advocating for coffee consumption as a preventive measure," said Gad Rennert from Clalit National Israeli Cancer Control Center in Haifa, Isreal.​

​Beijing, March 31 (IANS) The Chinese central bank on Thursday injected liquidity of $15.4 billion into its financial system to boost lending.

The People's Bank of China (PBOC) carried out the operation through seven-day reverse repurchase agreements, or repos, at an interest rate of 2.25 percent, Xinhua news

​New Delhi, March 29 (IANS) The global real estate market is pegged to cross $1 trillion in 2016 - 6 percent higher than in 2015 - and India's property sector is likely to benefit out of it too, a survey said on Tuesday.

​Hyderabad, March 29 (IANS) German luxury car manufacturer Mercedes-Benz on Tuesday launched the S400, a new variant of its flagship luxury model, the S-Class.

It also plans to launch nine more models in India during the current year.

​Moscow, April 29 (IANS) Russia has become the world leader in wheat export, surpassing the US and Canada.

"Russia supplies about 25 million tons of wheat on the external market by the end of the agricultural 2016 year. We became the world's leading wheat exporter, surpassing the

​New York, March 29 (IANS) Patients with skin infections are less likely to take all their prescribed antibiotic doses after leaving the hospital, resulting in new infection or needing additional treatment for the existing skin infection, says a study.

The researchers found that patients with S. aureus skin and soft tissue infections took, on average, just 57 percent of their prescribed antibiotic doses after leaving the hospital.

"These findings suggest that we need better methods to have patients receive antibiotics for skin infections, such as counselling them on the importance of adhering to the medication dosing or by using newer antibiotics that require only once-weekly dosing," said lead researcher Loren Miller from Harbor-UCLA Medical Centre in California, US.

The study, published in the journal Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, followed 188 patients who had been hospitalised and suffered S. aureus associated skin and soft tissue infections. 

The researchers measured antibiotic dosing by using medication containers fitted with electronic caps that reported when the patient opened the antibiotic container. 

By using this measurement system, the researchers found a large discrepancy in patient reports and the electronic measurement. 

Patients reported taking, on average, 96 percent of their medication, or nearly twice the 57 percent reported by the electronic caps.

The researchers were able to obtain complete records on 87 out of the 188 patients. Of the 87 patients, 40 needed additional treatment within 30 days of leaving the hospital. They had a new skin infection, required incision and drainage of their infections or new antibiotics.​

New Delhi, March 29 (IANS) India on Tuesday permitted conditional foreign equity in the retail e-commerce segment when the products sold are also manufactured in the country, as also for single-brand foreign entities with physical retail chains that want to go for online merchandise.