Elisabeth • Author at Council Chronicle

New Monsanto Cancer Cases Lawsuit

May 16, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

Monsanto Cancer Cases lawsuit related to Roundup ingredient glyphosate

Monsanto receives allegations of public misleading in new Monsanto cancer cases lawsuit.

An agronomist named Frank Pollard, and three Nebraska farmers, Larry Domina, Robert Dickey and Royce Janzen, are suing Monsanto for offering misleading information about the safety of the probably most used herbicide in the world – Monsanto’s Roundup.

All of the four accusers are suffering from cancer, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

The new Monsanto Cancer Cases lawsuit was filed Wednesday in the Lincoln U.S. District Court and asks for unspecified damages.

Herbicide Roundup’s main ingredient is glyphosate, an ingredient Monsanto markets as being safe to humans and able to kill all weeds. Roundup Ready, another Monsanto brand, is a pack of seeds that according to the agrochemical company can be securely sprayed with Roundup.

A 2010 New York Times report says 90% of all United States grown soybeans and 70% of corn come from Roundup Ready seeds.

Glyphosate was labeled in March 2015 by the World Health Organization as a likely cause of cancer and other malign cell growth diseases like leukemia, non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma or multiple myelomas.

The most vulnerable and at risk for the cancerous diseases are farmers and other workers exposed to Roundup.

The Monsanto Cancer Cases lawsuit alleges Monsanto has campaigned “to convince government agencies, farmers and the general population that Roundup is safe” and it is doing so to the date of the complaint.

On its website, Monsanto shifts the blame on the Environmental Protection Agency and other regulatory organizations stating that labeling Monsanto products as possible carcinogens is in conflict with the rules imposed by these agencies.

Probable, goes on Monsanto on the website, doesn’t imply causality. They say even 100 more times the regular exposure to glyphosate is not harmful to humans. The product inhibits an enzyme plants have and use it to grow, but such enzyme doesn’t exist in humans, nor animals.

Several countries like France, the Netherlands, Sri Lanka and Bermuda have banned the product since the International Agency for Research on Cancer has declared glyphosate as a possible carcinogen.

California has been sued by Monsanto in an attempt to keep the product off the black list of carcinogens.

Agricultural workers in California and Delaware have brought similar allegations in other lawsuits against Monsanto. Hopefully, there will be no more Monsanto Cancer Cases lawsuits or other health related problems tied to Monsanto as the harmful chemicals will be soon eliminated from the public.

Image source: Flickr

This Rocky Alien Planet Is also a Molten Lava World

March 31, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

Artist’s rendition of exoplanet Cancri 55 e (foreground) alongside parent star (background).

A recently-released thermal map of a remote exoplanet suggests that the rocky space object has two sides with the most contrasting temperature variations scientists have ever seen.

Astronomers believe that one side of the planet is so hot that lava continuously flows on its surface, while the temperature difference on the other side can reach a mind-boggling 1,027 degrees Celsius.

The rocky planet, which was spotted 40 light-years from Earth, is in fact a Super-Earth. Astronomers estimate that 55 Cancri e is as massive as eight Earths, and needs just 18 hours to complete a trip around its host star.

NASA/ESA’s Hubble Space Telescope recently analyzed the planet and found signs of helium and hydrogen in its atmosphere. It was the first time astronomers got detailed info on a Super-Earth’s atmospheric makeup. So far, only Jupiter-sized planets have been studied due to their gigantic size.

Additionally, the team compiled the first meteorological map of a Super-Earth, and published a study this week in the journal Nature.

Brice-Olivier Demory, lead author of the research paper and astronomer at Cavendish Laboratory in England, noted that the alien planet has extremely high temperatures on its surface, but the temperature differences between its two ‘faces’ are staggering.

Scientists explained that the Super-Earth is tidally locked like our moon. This means that it has a side which eternally faces the sun and a side that is permanently shrouded in darkness.

Researchers believe that the planet displays volcanism, lava flows and other geological phenomena just like our planet does, only that the temperatures can reach 2,427 degrees Celsius on the dayside surface.

But the contrasting temperatures on the planet triggered some strange weather and geological conditions. Astronomers found a bizarre ‘hot spot’ on the side facing the sun. They do not yet know for sure what that may suggest but they have at least two theories.

The research team believes that the hot spot may be either produced by tremendous winds or by molten lava flows. For the first theory to hold water, the nightside temperatures need to drop below zero so that gases in the atmosphere can condense. But the weather map invalidated this scenario.

The other possibility is more likely since at average surface temperatures of 2,427 degrees Celsius the silicate-rich crust on the exoplanet can easily melt and morph into countless streams of molten rock. By contrast, the nightside is relatively cool enough to remain solid, researchers think.

Image Source: Wikimedia

US: Lost-and-Found Japanese Space Satellite was Not Smashed by Debris

March 31, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

U.S. space investigators said Tuesday that they found no evidence that Japan’s satellite Hitomi was struck by space debris.

The U.S. Air Force recently announced that Japan’s lost astronomy satellite Hitomi was not taken offline by space debris. Instead, the U.S. agency suspects that an internal technical malfunction may have caused the shutdown.

“We have seen nothing that says it was struck by debris,”

Cpt. Nicholas Mercurio, a spokesperson for the U.S. Air Force, recently told reporters.

On Mar. 27, Japan said that it had lost communications with the satellite the day before at around 3.40 Eastern. Half an hour later, investigators at the U.S. Air Force’s Joint Space Operations Center (JSpOC) reported five bits of space debris floating dangerously close to the space observatory.

Further analysis showed that the event must have happened six hours before the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) lost contact with Hitomi. JAXA recently announced that it planned to recover the research probe by using the ‘very short’ signals coming from the space telescope.

JAXA said that the Japan-based Uchinoura Ground Station and Chile-based Santiago Tracking Station detected the faint signals on Mar. 28.

As of Tuesday the status of the satellite remained unclear. The Japanese said that they were analyzing the space debris around Hitomi with powerful radars located at the Kamisaibara Space Guard Center and ground telescopes at the Bisei Space Guard Center.

Japan declined to comment on the possible cause that caused the breakup. It said that its space agency was investigating the issue. But Air Force clearly stated that there was no evidence of an orbital debris collision.

In the case of a possible debris strike, JSpOC experts try to figure out what happened by ‘rewinding the tape.’ For this purpose, they request additional data that may hold clues to the cause of the malfunction from other space agencies and international partners.

Tuesday morning, Air Force investigators analyzed the existing radar and sensor data and found no proof that Hitomi was hit by space debris as they had initially suspected. Mercurio noted that the agency found ‘nothing’ that may point in that direction.

Hitomi, also known as Astro-H, was launched on Feb 17, 2016. It reached orbit with help from an H-2A rocket on the same day. The 6,000-pound research satellite is equipped with state-of-the-art tools designed to study black holes and other extremely energetic space objects. Some of the instruments were offered by the ESA, NASA, and Canadian Space Agency.

Image Source: Shuttershock

Rare Sacred Text May Hold Clues to Long-Lost Ancient Language

March 30, 2016 By Elisabeth 1 Comment

Fresco of Etruscan dancers found in a tomb from 470 BC.

Archeologists have recently unearthed an ancient sandstone slab bearing a rare religious text belonging to the Etruscan civilization. The 2,500 year-old slab discovered at an Italian dig site could offer powerful hints about the long-gone Etruscan language, culture, and religion.

Archeology professor Ingrid Edlund-Berry of the University of Texas at Austin noted that such a lengthy text is a rare sight since Etruscans, though they were a highly educated people, had left very little evidence of their language. Edlund-Berry expressed his hopes that the inscription could provide precious details about the lost language.

“[…] any text, especially a longer one, is an exciting addition to our knowledge,”

the researcher added.

So far, archeologists have unearthed only short writings on funerary inscriptions such as dates, names, and titles. Moreover, an Etruscan religious text is also a rare finding, so archeologists now expect it to help them better understand the type of worshiping practiced by the ancient people.

The 500-pound slab was unearthed on the site of an Etruscan temple and dates back to the 6th century BC.

Gregory Warden of the Franklin University Switzerland, senior researcher running the Mugello Valley Archaeological Project, and head of the team that made the find stated that the inscription was probably a sacred text. He also said that it could hold clues to a lost culture that was essential to the development of Western traditions.

Warden noted that his team identified at least 70 characters and punctuation marks on the slab. Other scholars said that the religious text could yield new knowledge on Etruscan culture that shaped ancient Rome’s language, religion, politics, art and architecture.

The dig site is located in the Mugello Valley northeast of the city of Florence in Italy.

Warden also said that the text could help Etruscan language experts ‘make inroads’ in the lost language. He explained that the slab could contain new words since it is longer than previous texts and does not belong to a funerary context.

Experts already know how Etruscan grammar worked, but the newly found religious artifact could reveal new elements of the vocabulary such as names of god goddesses and religious practices, according to Warden.

In the meantime, researchers at the University of Florence’s architecture department were assigned to perform laser scans of the inscribed slab, which is also known as a stele, and document all its details through photogrammetry.

Image Source: Wikimedia

77% of World’s Fisheries May Fully Recover within a Decade

March 30, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

A new study suggests that most global fish stocks could be restored to maximum health in 10 years’ time.

A recent research shows that dwindling fish populations worldwide could be fixed within a decade if proper measures are taken. Furthermore, global fish stocks could double by 2050 if governments take action.

As of now, some fish stocks are not looking too good. For instance, mackerel and tuna stocks plunged 74 percent over the last four decades. But despite the grim situation researchers believe that they may fully recover by 2026.

Amanda Leland, co-author of the study and senior researcher at the Environmental Defense deemed the study results ‘surprising’ and ‘inspiring.’ She recently said in an interview that we do have a positive story, and that story is that “we can have our fish and eat it too.”

Leland noted that solving the issues related to world’s fisheries may be the easiest environmental challenge we currently have to face.

For the recent research, scientists sifted through data on 4,713 fisheries worldwide, which account for 77 percent of world’s fish capture. The analysis revealed that the current methods are not sustainable and thus will lead to a “continued collapse” of fish stocks worldwide.

Researchers, however, found that adopting a sustainable approach such as limiting the fish catch on a scientific basis could boost seafood population by 16 million metric tons annually, which could translate into $53 billion annual profits for fishermen globally.

The study concluded that environmental reforms would not only benefit the inhabitants of our sea and oceans but also fishermen and coastal communities. Chris Costello of University of California, Santa Barbara, and lead author of the study noted that his team’s findings show that we can have the fish in the sea, enough food on the plate, and thriving fishing communities at zero environmental costs.

The new findings represent a glimmer of hope in what seems to be hopeless times for the environment. Few past studies had been so optimistic. For example, World Wildlife Fund published in 2015 a study showing that global fish stocks were on the brink of collapse.

Furthermore, earlier this year the World Economic Forum researchers revealed that the planet’s oceans would hold more plastic waste than fish in the next 35 years. But Costello’s team is positive that a turnaround can happen. Yet, that could be achieved if people in key leadership position will take the best decisions.

The new study was published Mar.28 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Image Source: Flickr

Team Finds Hot Jupiter with Bizarre Orbit 190 Light Years Away

March 29, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

Artist rendition of a hot Jupiter alongside its host star.

A joint team of U.S. researchers detected a gas giant the size of Jupiter with a highly eccentric orbit 190 light years from our planet. The exoplanet, which was spotted in Ursa Major constellation, routinely performs a weird dance around its host star, which ends with the planet being nearly scorched to death every 111 days

Planet HD 80606 b is as large as Jupiter but four times as massive. But the major point of attraction is its orbit, which is unlike anything scientists have seen in other planets outside our solar system.

HD 80606 b has the habit of getting so close to its star that its surface can boil up to temperatures of 2,000 degrees F or 1,093 degrees C. The planet was discovered by astronomers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, University of California-Santa Cruz, and a few others.

The team noticed that it takes 100 days for the planet to complete a full orbit before having a steamy encounter with its star. The exoplanet needs about 20 hours to sweep around the stellar companion and get blasted with a mind-boggling amount of energy and heat. Researchers estimate that in those hours, HD 80606 b receives a thousand times more energy than the Earth usually get from the Sun on a daily basis.

Scientists believe that hot Jupiters are planets located far from their host star, but a massive object such as a planet or other star pushes into an orbit that gets them a lot closer to their stars. Because of their proximity to the host star, they contract from all the energy and gravity into dense balls.

University of California-Santa Cruz ’s Greg Laughlin, one of the astronomers involved in the finding, likened the process to taking a Nerf ball and squeezing it repeatedly until it warms up. He explained that the mechanical energy gets converted into heat.

Astronomers believe that the newly found hot Jupiter is on the course of developing a more regular orbit. But that won’t happen for the next hundreds of millions of years. According to some more pessimistic estimates, it may take as long as 10 billion years.

The hot Jupiter could also provide researchers with valuable information on how planets change orbits and how solar systems shape. The team is confident that such changes in orbit may make some exoplanets habitable.

Image Source: Flickr

Antarctic Birds with a Temper Can Recognize Human Intruders

March 29, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

Gentoo Penguin guards its chick against an aggressive brown skua.

South Korea scientists found that brown skuas (Stercorarius antarcticus), a bird species endemic in Antarctica, can recognize humans on a later encounter, a feat only more intelligent birds like magpies and crows are able to pull off.

The research team noted that these birds apparently could tell which humans had been near their nests before.

A study detailing the findings was published this week in the journal Animal Cognition.

In field tests, researchers got near the skuas’ nests once a week to see whether their eggs hatched. But each passing week, the birds got more and more aggressive, screeching, following intruders, and even pecking the humans’ heads.

The research team had the idea of an experiment to see whether the Antarctic creatures could tell one human intruder from another. Two researchers volunteered to visit the nests and each one of them to turn in an opposite direction afterwards.

Footage of the experiment shows that skuas showed a particular interest and were clearly more aggressive with the human that had been before at their nests. The birds were more vocal with the researcher that turned to the right since he had visited their breeding grounds prior and assessed their nestlings.

Scientists are not quite sure how birds, which lack language function and the ability to think in words, can recognize a specific figure. Biologists believe that they either have a pre-existing intelligence or they simply learn the skill of recognizing humans as they get in contact more often.

The research team believes that skuas acquire the skill as they occasionally meet with human intruders. Since the Antarctic is dotted with research stations inhabited by humans, the feathered creatures had plenty of occasions to interact with people.

Won Young Lee, lead author of the study and bird expert at the Korea Polar Research Institute, noted that the Antarctic birds learned the skill in a relatively short time as Antarctic research stations haven’t been around since forever.

Lee and his team are surprised that brown skuas can detect humans after just three or four visits to their nests though they may have never met one before. The team concluded that the birds must have very high cognitive skills.

As a follow-up the South Korean team plans to study other Antarctic denizens with similar abilities to see whether a high IQ is associated with such capabilities.

Image Source: Wikimedia

Mazda’s MX-5 Miata Steals the Show at New York

March 28, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

Seventy-three international experts agreed Mazda’s new hardtop convertible should grab the World Car of the Year award.

Last week, the latest generation of retractable hardtop Miata was the star of the show at New York as it managed to win two awards World Car of the Year and World Design of the Year in just one night.

Miata RF, “Retractable Fastback”, stunned audience with an ingenious way of folding its roof. Apparently, the new vehicle drew inspiration from Ferrari 599 with its rear window that gets lowered along with the hardtop, but it also has an appearance of a high-class supercar such as McLaren 650S.

The car maker announced that the hard top version’s trunk would stay the same as in the soft top model. Yet, the latest model would weight an extra 100 lbs due to the complicated system of the hard rooftop, which is now placed a bit higher than the soft top.

The extra load will definitely lift the center of gravity of the roadster, though it doesn’t seem too much over Miata’s overall weight of 2,332 lb.

Unlike other Japanese auto makers, Mazda focuses first on looks just like Italian sports car manufacturers do. Julien Montousse, the company’s design director for North America, said in a recent interview that the team had always dreamed of doing the RF.

Montousse explained that designers first ‘shoot for the moon’ with their projects and expect engineers to make it happen. This is how Mazda’s unique and astounding looks have been perfected over the years so that customers remain connected with their favorite car brand.

The Miata RF was designed using “reflection based surfacing,” i.e. the vehicles draw attention by reflecting back the car’s surrounding rather than showcasing edge detail. Montousse noted that a well-designed car is usually based on proportion, so expect ‘highly graphic’ vehicles to try and hide something.

“Sometimes the strongest expression is not the loudest voice in the room.”

he added.

Montousse also said that the new model was especially designed to win fastback enthusiasts’ hearts. In order to achieve this goal, the team reportedly worked three months on the car’s buttress C-pillars alone, which by the way no longer change position when the roof is retracted.

The company wouldn’t disclose an official release date or pricing but expect for the roadster to land in showrooms late this year or early 2017.

Image Source: YouTube

Storks no Longer Migratory due to Terrible Junk-Food Addiction

March 18, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

Storks in Europe would now rather stay home and feed on junk-food than engage in a dangerous trip to their wintering grounds.

A group of researchers found that white storks in Spain and Portugal apparently completely forgot about their annual winter migration to gorge on trash in landfills. Apparently, the strange phenomenon is due to the fact that the big birds may have developed a full-blown junk-food addiction.

Aldina Franco of the University of East Anglia and lead researcher involved in the study noted that it is highly unusual for storks to skip their annual trip to their wintering grounds in Africa. She added that before the 1980s there was no such thing as a staying bird in winter.

But after that date, more and more storks forgot about their annual trip, and now the number of these birds reached unprecedented levels. For example, in Portugal alone though stork population jumped from 1,187 to 14,000 individuals in just two decades, 80 percent of the birds that decide to ditch migration live in the country’s landfills.

Study authors explained that birds no longer see migration necessary for survival as they have a stable and reliable food source just under their nose.

The team tracked 48 storks through GPS loggers. The data showed that for several years the birds stayed in the landfill sites they now call home all year round.

Plus, their behavior was also greatly altered because of their life in the landfills. For instance, many birds that had their nests in the landfill would only leave their nests to grab food. Other birds living farther would travel up to 30 miles to feast on garbage.

Andrew Farnsworth, a bird researcher with the Cornell Lab of Ornithology who did not participate in the research, was thrilled to learn how the large birds exploited new resources. Farnsworth was also eager to find how living in a landfill would further affect stork population in the two European countries.

Franco noted that skipping migration may have some benefits. For instance, storks can reproduce easier now since they have their nests at their disposal and a constant food source. So they are ready to breed when they find a mate.

But researchers are puzzled by the storks that are not skipping migration, and they plan a separate study.

Nevertheless, storks are not the only animals that canceled their migratory trips for good. The turkey vulture and Canada goose are two other examples.

But white storks are not staying at home just because they have enough food to eat year-round. The climate is now milder due to climate change, researchers explained, so their life is easier in winter.

Image Source: Pixabay

Backpack-Equipped Pigeons Tell Londoners How Polluted their City Is

March 16, 2016 By Elisabeth Leave a Comment

Londoners and tourists feeding pigeons in Trafalgar Square.

A London-based tech company came with the idea of fitting a squad of ten pigeons with miniaturized backpacks that can sense air pollution and beam collected data to the public in real time.

The Pigeon Air Patrol’s mission will last just three days, and London’s Twitter users are invited to tweet their location in the city to @PigeonAir to learn just how polluted their area is.

Project managers explained that three of the ten birds named Norbert, Coco, and Julius will ‘reply’ instantly to people tweeting their location.

Furthermore, the data collected by all the birds will be used to create a live map that gets constant updates as pigeons carry their air-monitoring backpacks around London.

The flock was deployed on Monday in Brick Lane.

Pierre Duquesnoy of the DigitasLBi who is involved in the project noted that there is nothing ‘sexy’ about air pollution. But in order to make people more aware on the issue the team had to find a way to make the problem more “accessible and relevant.”

Duquesnoy noted that people showed a lively interest in air pollution after they were introduced to the Pigeon Air Patrol through a compelling storytelling. Duquesnoy’s team joint forces with Plume Labs, a startup that develops air pollution tracking devices.

Romain Lacombe, CEO of the firm, explained that air pollution is the silent killer that claims the lives of 10,000 people annually in The Old Smoke alone. Lacombe added that strapping air sensors on racing pigeons was not only meant to raise awareness on the topic, but also help people better understand the implications of the serious environmental issue.

Helen Lawrence of Twitter explained that it is not the first time when animals and elements tweet live information to the microblogging platform’s users. There are rivers that tweet when water level is too high and sharks that tweet when they or their peers move dangerously close to the shore.

The birds involved in the campaign were not harmed. Plus they had a team of vets that checked their health status on a regular basis. After the three days have passed, they are free to return to their normal daily routine. Plus, the tiny backpacks they now carry are as light as a feather.

The tech company plans to convince more Londoners to become testers of a device similar to the pollution-monitoring backpacks under a new project called Air Patrol. The team hopes to lure in especially bicycle riders, people who engage regularly in jogging and even pram pushing.

Image Source: Wikimedia

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