‘Man flu’ may be all a matter of evolution

‘Man flu’ may be all a matter of evolution, Cambridge scientists say - Anguished complaints from men afflicted with seemingly minor ailments are often attributed to “man flu”. Now scientists say that men may have been left by evolution less well-equipped to fend off disease.

In an evolutionary twist, it appears that there is a trade-off between high testosterone levels and being able to produce a robust immune response.

The theoretical study, by University of Cambridge scientists, looked at various scenarios to test whether environmental and behavioural factors could have led men and women to evolve slightly different immune systems.

Clinical studies have found that males are more susceptible to certain infections, such as malaria, and there is some evidence for men suffering more severe symptoms and higher mortality. However, until now scientists had struggled to find an evolutionary explanation for the apparent lower level of immunity in males.

The latest study, published in the Royal Society journal Proceedings B, suggested that in some cases there could be a trade-off between developing a strong immune system and being reproductively competitive. Because males tend to compete more fiercely, this trade-off is likely to be exaggerated in men.

"If you are devoting a lot of resources to producing proteins and cells in the immune system, you may be limiting your resources for reproduction," said Olivier Restif, who led the research.

In particular, testosterone has been shown to interfere with the immune response, meaning that men with high testosterone levels are potentially at greater risk of infection. In theory, this should help females select the best men — only the strongest and healthiest would be able to afford the risk of producing lots of testosterone.

However, from time to time genetic mutations would arise that allowed males with the mutation to produce larger than normal amounts of testosterone. Although this would put carrier males at greater risk of infection, it would also make them more attractive, meaning that during times of fierce reproductive competition their genes could be passed on.

Over evolutionary timescales, the aggregate effect of such mutations could lead males to have a slightly less robust immune response than women.

“Women seem to be able to respond more robustly to immune challenges. Maybe men aren’t just playing sick, but really are more susceptible,” said Leslie Knapp, a biologist at the University of Cambridge.

There may be additional reasons why strong immune systems are selected for more strongly in women. Previous research has found that the female sex hormone oestrogen helps women fight off infection.

Kevin Maloy, an immunologist at the University of Oxford, said: “There could be a completely different explanation, like that women just have a higher pain threshold, possibly linked to pregnancy and the menstrual cycle." ( timesonline.co.uk )

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World's First Programmable Quantum Computer Created

World's First Programmable Quantum Computer Created. Using a few ultracold ions, intense lasers and some electrodes, researchers have built the first programmable quantum computer. The new system, described in a paper to be published in Nature Physics, flexed its versatility by performing 160 randomly chosen processing routines.

Earlier versions of quantum computers have been largely restricted to a narrow window of specific tasks. To be more generally useful, a quantum computer should be programmable, in the same way that a classical computer must be able to run many different programs on a single piece of machinery.

The new study is "a powerful demonstration of the technological advances towards producing a real-world quantum computer," says quantum physicist Winfried Hensinger of the University of Sussex in Brighton, England.

Researchers led by David Hanneke of the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder, Colo., based their quantum computer on two beryllium ions chilled to just above absolute zero. These ions, trapped by a magnetic field on a gold-plated aluminum chip, formed the quantum bits, or qubits, analogous to the bits in regular computers represented by 0s and 1s. Short laser bursts manipulated the beryllium ions to perform the processing operations, while nearby magnesium ions kept the beryllium ions cool and still.

Hanneke and colleagues programmed the computer to do operations on a single beryllium ion and on both of the beryllium ions together. In the quantum world, a single qubit can represent a mixture of 0 and 1 simultaneously, a state called a superposition. A laser pulse operation could change the composition of the mixture within the qubit, tipping the scales to make the qubit more likely to become a 1 when measured.

Both of the qubits together could be entangled, a situation where the two qubits are intimately linked, and what happens to one seems to affect the fate of the other. Different combinations of one- and two-qubit operations made up various programs. "We put all these pieces together and asked, what can we do with the circuit?" Hanneke says.

Hanneke and colleagues chose 160 programs for the quantum computer to run. "We picked them, quite literally, at random," Hanneke says. "We really wanted to sample all possible operations."

The researchers ran each program 900 times. On average, the quantum computer operated accurately 79 percent of the time, the team reported in their paper, which was published online November 15. "Getting this kind of control over a quantum system is really interesting from a physics perspective," Hanneke says.

Earlier research has estimated that to be useful, a quantum computer must operate accurately 99.99 percent of the time. Hanneke says that with stronger lasers and other refinements, the system's fidelity may be improved.

Experimental physicist Boris Blinov says that one of the most exciting things about the new study is that the quantum computer may be scaled up. "What's most impressive and important is that they did it in the way that can be applied to a larger-scale system," says Blinov, of the University of Washington in Seattle. "The very same techniques they've used for two qubits can be applied to much larger systems." ( sciencenews.org )

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Extreme Global Weather

Extreme Global Weather: ‘the Unprecedented Is the New Normal’ - A rising death toll, the catastrophic flooding and destruction of entire neighborhoods, and billions of dollars in property damage. The impact of Hurricane Sandy, which hit the East Coast earlier this week, will be felt for years, both in the United States and in the Caribbean region where it had earlier killed more than 70 people.

Sandy is being called the "Storm of the Century" but floods, droughts, heat waves and storms are only expected to get worse — with every part of the world facing deadlier and costlier weather disasters.

Much of the world has experienced devastating weather conditions this year. Across eastern and western Africa, a one-two punch of severe drought followed by torrential rains resulted in flash flooding and the deaths and displacement of hundreds of thousands. Drought was also the worst it's been in a quarter century in the United States, shriveling corn crops and boosting prices worldwide. And over the last week, typhoon Son-Tinh has wreaked havoc on Southeast Asia, killing dozens and damaging homes and crops.

So what's causing these extreme weather events and their widespread devastation? A special report issued earlier this year by the IPCC — the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change — points to a combination of human-caused global warming, shifts in population, and poverty. And though political wrangling over global warming continues in the United States, 7 in 10 Americans now believe in the science behind climate change and how it can alter global weather conditions.

This week, Christiane discusses these weather extremes with Michael Oppenheimer, a professor at Princeton University. He is also one of the authors of the IPCC report. ( yahoo.com )

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How Many Americans Can't Swim?

How Many Americans Can't Swim? - Six teenagers drowned after slipping from a wading area into the deep water of a Louisiana river on Tuesday. None of the victims could swim, nor could the adult bystanders who watched helplessly as the children went under. What percentage of Americans can't swim?

Somewhere between one-third and around one-half. In a 1994 CDC study, 37 percent of American adults said they couldn't swim 24 yards, the length of a typical gymnasium lap pool. A 2008 study conducted by researchers at the University of Memphis found that almost 54 percent of children between 12 and 18 can do no more than splash around the shallow end of a pool. The difference between the two studies is somewhat surprising, as the CDC study suggested that children tend to be better swimmers than adults.


The Memphis study broke the data down demographically. White children were the most likely to self-report (or have their parents report) strong swimming skills, with 58 percent of those between the ages of 4 and 18 claiming the ability to traverse more than a pool length. Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders came in a close second at 55 percent.


Forty-two percent of Hispanic and Latino children are strong swimmers. Asian-American and Native American children came in at 34 percent and 32 percent, respectively. African-Americans reported the fewest strong swimmers at 31 percent. Accident rates largely conform to these data. Black children between 5 and 14 years old are more than three times as likely to drown as their white peers. The six children who died in Louisiana were African-American.


A child's ability to swim is also strongly correlated with his parents' income. Sixty-seven percent of poor swimmers have a household income less than $49,999. Only 29 percent of skilled swimmers fall below that income level. In the second phase of the University of Memphis study, researchers looked more closely at income and found that 12 percent of children who participate in a reduced-cost school lunch program—an easier piece of data for a child to report than household income—said they don't even feel comfortable in the shallow end of a pool, compared with just 6 percent of wealthier children. ( slate.com )

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Years of Experience But No Degree

Years of Experience But No Degree. Seven Ways to Beat the Job Search Pitfall. After years on the job, you feel you've definitely platueaued and think it's time for a change. There's one catch: you don't have a college degree. You graduated from the University of Life and have plenty of professional experience to show for it, but no formal degree. Are you still marketable?

George C. found him in that very position last year. After several years as a designer and art director, he was laid off after budget cuts. He seemed to be the perfect fit for one particular employer, but the company required a degree for the position. Thus, he was passed over even though the hiring manager expressed regrets. A few months later and the hiring manager contacted him. The original, "degreed" candidate who was hired didn't work out and they wanted to extend the job to George on a trial basis. Today, he's a full-time employee with that company.

If you find yourself with tons of job experience but hitting the "no degree" dead end, there are some things you can do to accentuate the positive.

1. Let Your Experience Do the Talking

Make sure you highlight your professional accomplishments, technical skills, results and industry knowledge on your résumé. These all help to demonstrate your expertise in your field. Also, try calling attention to any leadership positions you've held, including those with community, volunteer or military organizations, suggests career counselor Susan Guarneri.

2. Articulate Association Activity

Take advantage of career development offerings through your industry association and become active in the organization. "Go to local chapter meetings and join high visibility committees, such as membership, community outreach and publications," Guarneri advises. Not only will this give you additional skills and experience, it will help you make a name for yourself in your field, further enhancing your qualifications.

3. Include Glowing References

Include references from respected colleagues or high ranking industry professionals. These letters of recommendation will speak volumes about your personal character and professional standing. Don't wait for the employer to contact you, but include them in your initial application.

4. Show Alternative Learning

Guarneri stresses it's important to show that you are interested in professional development and continued learning. List any certification programs and professional seminars you have completed. These additional credentials demonstrate your intent to keep your knowledge and skills up-to-date.

5. Apply Experience to a Degree

Search nearby colleges and universities for programs related to your line of work. Many colleges have programs that offer course credit with proof of proficiency in a particular area. It's a terrific way to gain college credit for real life work experience.

6. Earn a Degree

Higher education caters to working professionals in a number of ways. "A lot of traditional academic outlets have online components," Guarneri says. Online courses allow you to work around your schedule. Also look into fast-track programs for adults which allow you to complete a degree at an accelerated pace, usually with less classroom time. There's also the College Level Examination Program assessment to test out of specific courses, while still earning credit for those classes.

7. Show Education In Progress

If you are in the process of earning a degree, make sure you note that on your résumé, along with an estimated date of completion. ( msn.com )

READ MORE - Years of Experience But No Degree

Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama - ( 3 )

‘Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama. Best-selling author on U.S. war in Afghanistan: Listen to the locals - Nonprofit activist Greg Mortenson, co-author of the 2006 international best-seller "Three Cups of Tea," knows firsthand about the challenges of nation-building in Afghanistan, and he’s got some advice for the Obama administration: Open your ears more to the locals, or risk shooting yourselves in the boots.

Q: Gen. Petraeus is a huge fan of yours and "Three Cups of Tea" and has invited you to speak to troops. What do you say to them?

Mortenson: I visit about two dozen military bases a year and I also visit many of the senior commanders, and the first thing I tell the troops is, it’s imperative you put the elders in charge. The elders need to be affirmed that they are in charge. The second is, I say we need to spend more time listening and the third is we need to build relationships. I guess Gen. Petraeus could sum it up better than me, but he sent me an e-mail last year and he had read "Three Cups of Tea," and he said there were three lessons from the book that he wanted to impart to his troops. No. 1, he said, we need to listen more; No. 2, we need to have respect, meaning we are there to serve the good people of Afghanistan; and No. 3, we need to build relationships. "Three Cups of Tea" now is mandatory reading for all senior U.S military commanders, and all special forces deploying to Afghanistan are required to read it.

Q: How do you feel about that?

Mortenson: It’s pretty humbling, but having spent a lot of time now with the troops, I feel the troops are just like our brothers and sisters, just like us, nothing different. I also feel there’s tremendous dedication in the military. I can’t speak for Iraq, but I know Afghanistan. Many of the troops have volunteered to keep going back three or four times. I think that perhaps some of our best ambassadors, and those who ultimately will help bring the road for peace over there, will be our veterans who fought and served in Afghanistan. I also have tremendous admiration for the troops, soldiers who have this almost impossible task of trying to be warriors and diplomats and humanitarians simultaneously, and they’re trying the best they can to really do their job. It’s not easy.

I also think it’s a little hard sometimes because you hear the Western aid groups complaining, saying it’s not fair now how DOD is getting all the money and USAID and the other aid groups aren’t getting money. But you know, the aid groups refuse to go work in areas where they feel it isn’t secure, and my contention is if you work with local people, you can even go into the most volatile area where the Taliban are and be very successful with school projects but you have to involve the local community. And we can’t just be handing out money over there with no reciprocity or some type of input from the government or the provinces or the districts. These are cultures over there that expect to negotiate and barter. If you just go over there and start throwing money at people without asking anything of them in return, they think you’re kind of nuts.

I know it can be done, whether it’s at the micro or macro scale. It’s something we still have a hard time learning as Americans. It’s like tough love with your kids. You can tell them they can stay out late but you also have to tell them they need to clean their room first.

Q: What more can you say about President Obama’s decision this week?

Mortenson: I’m glad there’s been a decision made. I still think it’s very unfortunate that the shura were never consulted and I do hope that as we move forward that they will be brought to the table and that their voices will be heard. I’m going to keep insisting on that. And I also feel that it’s been a great blessing to be able to help the shura meet with some of the U.S. military generals so that their voice is at least being heard by somebody.

But I also really admire the fact that President Obama says he’s open to dialogue with Iran and other countries, because I really think that the real road to peace is regional and involves Iran and Russia and the whole region. I’m also a ferocious believer that ultimately, education should be our top priority, especially girls’ education. We can drop bombs and hand out condoms and build roads or put in electricity but if we don’t educate girls, nothing will change in society.

Q: What is your message to other philanthropists and social entrepreneurs in the region?

Mortenson: Listen, listen and listen even more. Often, when we Americans or Westerners have an idea and we want to go try to do something in other regions, I’ve found that in so many cases, people don’t listen to the people they’re serving. During the massive earthquake in Pakistan in 2005, for example, Americans sent tons of clothing over but most of the women burned it, using it instead for fuel. Most women simply wanted kerosene; I saw $200 tweed jackets from Manhattan being burned. Also, tens of thousands of tents were sent over to Pakistan and most of the tents were very expensive and highly implosive. Most people huddled together, five to 20 in a tent, and they had candles and kerosene lanterns and they burned outside the tents and hundreds of the tents imploded and hundreds of people died, and thousands were burned. But had anybody from the West asked them what they wanted, they would have said they could make their own tents out of canvas, and to send them canvas and sewing machines to make them.

I believe in putting local people in charge of things. Our staff at Pennies for Peace is a group I call the Dirty Dozen. A third of them are illiterate, most have very little educational background but they are willing to risk their lives, do anything, to promote education in the region. Three of our teachers are former Taliban. People in the United States gasp when I tell them this but these ex-Taliban are our biggest advocates, and we’ve learned from them how young men and boys can easily be turned around. The Taliban want these former members dead because they advocate education, but again, it always comes back that educated people are more independent.

I find it somewhat amazing how very nimble and small, poor organizations are able to exploit the lack of education very quickly and use ignorance to feed their own agenda. I think that’s why I feel that educating girls is so important. If you educate a boy, you educate an individual but if you educate a girl, you educate a whole community. There is a proverb in Afghanistan that, roughly translated, says that the ink of a scholar is holier than the blood of a martyr. And I believe that. Education is our greatest weapon. ( msn.com )

READ MORE - Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama - ( 3 )

‘Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama - ( 2 )

‘Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama. Best-selling author on U.S. war in Afghanistan: Listen to the locals - Nonprofit activist Greg Mortenson, co-author of the 2006 international best-seller "Three Cups of Tea," knows firsthand about the challenges of nation-building in Afghanistan, and he’s got some advice for the Obama administration: Open your ears more to the locals, or risk shooting yourselves in the boots.

Q: President Obama’s decision to send 30,000 more troops into the region — will this help or hinder your efforts to educate Afghan civilians?

Mortenson: Our work will continue, regardless, because of our nonprofit’s relationships with the Afghani elders. I was quite angry that there were nine meetings held behind closed doors in secrecy between President Obama and several of our commanders and advisers in the run-up to the president’s decision this week to send in more troops; the one thing that was never considered in any of the factoring-in was: What do the Afghan elders, or the shura, want? I feel that they should have had at least 50 percent of the voice in those meetings with the president.

The only place where the shuras were able to have some say, at least a little bit, was in the dozens of meetings our nonprofit helped to organize and facilitate between the shura and Gen. McChrystal since the general was appointed in April. There have been probably 35 or so meetings between him and some 200 shura from many of the different rural areas in Afghanistan. Our nonprofit has done this all on its own; we don’t receive any federal money and we don’t have any agenda. We’ve done this primarily on behalf of the elders who really wanted to meet the generals, and the generals who wanted to meet the shura.

Deirdre Eitel

Greg Mortenson greets schoolchildren in the town of Jafarabad in Shegar Valley, northern Pakistan, in July 2007.

Q: And who are the shura, specifically?

Mortenson: They are not elected. They’re pretty much people who have risen through the ranks of society in Afghanistan and are held in high esteem by the people locally. They’re successful businessmen or warriors or poets, and they are seen as being very wise and the real power in the country. And unfortunately, the Afghani government is fairly fragile and to some degree is also fairly corrupt, and so to the shura, it’s very humiliating and also very angering that nobody ever talked with them and asked them what their consensus is or how they feel about their own country.

I was able to sit in on some of these meetings, which would include Gen. McChrystal. One of the very strong points that came out in these meetings was that elders are very opposed to bombings. That’s their No. 1 complaint. The problem is that if you bomb, you kill civilians and if you do bomb, you need intelligence and the only way you can have good intelligence is to have more boots on the ground.

Q: What other things did the shura say in those meetings?

Mortenson: I think our government has done a poor job telling the public that about a third to half of those troops Obama is sending over are trainer troops. Of the 22,000 troops announced in February, 8,000 of those are trainer troops — from the National Guard and reservists. They’re teachers and engineers, bankers, dentists, horticulturalists, civil engineers and veterans. And roughly about a third or more of the new 30,000 troops he is sending will be trainer troops.

This is in line with what the shura have been saying for years — that they don’t need firepower but brainpower. They say, 'We want you to help us out but we don’t need help to go fight the Taliban or to kill and capture al-Qaida, but we do need some help to get us on our feet again so if you want to send over some of your special soldiers, like veterinarians and doctors and dentists and nurses, we’d love to have those come over. But if you’re just going to send over troops for fighting, then we don’t want those, we don’t really need those troops.' That’s what the shura are telling McChrystal when I’ve heard him talking to them.

In "Three Cups of Tea," I was actually fairly critical of the military. But now I think that, in many ways, they’re ahead of the State Department and our political leaders because they’ve been on the ground numerous times now. Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen, Gen. David Petraeus and U.S. Maj. Gen. Eric Olson, the special forces commander, have — combined — been in Pakistan and Afghanistan 35 times in the last 14 months. Compare that with, for example, Hillary Clinton, who went over to Pakistan for a few hours last week. I’m hoping ultimately that all of the top military and American diplomatic and political leaders of will spend more time and get to know people and talk to them and listen to them more now going forward.

Q: What else do you think Americans should know about Afghanistan?

Mortenson: Some of the things the elders will talk about that you don’t hear about in the public are, for example, that in 2000, there were 800,000 kids in school in Afghanistan, and this was during the height of the Taliban. The kids were nearly all boys. Today, there are 8.4 million children in school in Afghanistan, including 2.5 million females. So it’s the greatest increase in school enrollment in any country in modern history and the goal is 13 million. So what I’m saying is that there are some really good things happening in Afghanistan, as well. There’s also a central banking system now in Afghanistan that wasn’t there and which was put in in 2006. That’s had a huge impact on the country. There also is an Eisenhower-era road-building program so the roads are about 60 percent done. ...

You can’t plug in a democracy; you have to build one. The real key is not only education but also land ownership. You go into the district courts now in Afghanistan and it’s mind-boggling how many women are going in and filing their titles for land ownership. I just try to tell people that yes, there are a lot of bad things happening and it’s very frightening but there are also some very amazing things going on and pretty much this all happened at a time when we put Afghanistan on the back seat. Just imagine what could happen if we devoted serious effort over the next two to four years to help the people of Afghanistan.( msn.com )

READ MORE - ‘Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama - ( 2 )

‘Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama - ( 1 )

‘Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama. Best-selling author on U.S. war in Afghanistan: Listen to the locals - Nonprofit activist Greg Mortenson, co-author of the 2006 international best-seller "Three Cups of Tea," knows firsthand about the challenges of nation-building in Afghanistan, and he’s got some advice for the Obama administration: Open your ears more to the locals, or risk shooting yourselves in the boots.

In interviews this week, Mortenson, 51, the former K-2 mountain climber-turned-philanthropist whose nonprofit Central Asia Institute has established 130 schools and promoted girls' education in rural Afghanistan and Pakistan, urged the U.S. to include input from Afghani tribal elders in the Pentagon's expanded military effort in the region, or risk failure.

In the deliberations preceding President Barack Obama’s announcement Tuesday that he is sending 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, Mortenson said, “there were nine meetings held behind closed doors, in secrecy, between Obama and military leaders but Afghanistan’s provincial elders were not considered in any of those meetings — even though they are the real power in the country.”

Mortenson urged the administration to expand its push to promote education of women and girls in the region. “Ultimately, education should be our top priority, as well as relationship-building with local elders and civilians,” he said in an interview. “We can drop bombs and hand out condoms and build roads or put in electricity but if we don’t educate children, and especially girls, nothing will change in society."

Mortenson is someone the military's top brass listens to — and has often consulted with. "Three Cups of Tea" has become required reading for U.S. commanders and troops deploying to Afghanistan, making Mortenson a valued but unofficial adviser to the Pentagon. Mortenson's follow-up book, "Stones into Schools: Promoting Peace with Books, Not Bombs," was released Monday.

'I now think the military gets it'

In an interview, Mortenson, a former U.S. Army medic and mountain climber from Bozeman, Mont., retracted earlier remarks that the U.S. Army were all “laptop warriors … who don’t have a clue what was going on locally, on the ground.” Now, he says, “despite a steep learning curve on the part of the U.S. military, I now think the military gets it.”

Since April, Mortenson has facilitated more than 35 meetings in Afghanistan between local shura, or tribal leaders, and U.S. military commanders, including Gens. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, and David Petraeus, the head of U.S. Central Command. In those meetings, he says, more than 200 shura from dozens of provinces in Afghanistan conveyed that they want less military might and more brainpower from Americans in their push to rebuild after years of conflict. “They want us to know that it’s not just about fighting the Taliban but also about relationship-building with Afghan civilians and helping the Afghanis build schools and the infrastructure that they want and need.”

When asked what nonprofits can teach the Pentagon, Mortenson said in the interview that aid groups must do more listening, rather than deciding for people what’s best.

I caught up with Mortenson in New York City on Tuesday, at the start of his U.S. book tour for "Stones into Schools":

Teru Kuwayama

Mortenson with students from Lalander Primary School in Lalander village, Char Asiab valley, Afghanistan, in 2005

Q: Gen. Petraeus is a fan of "Three Cups of Tea" and has had you speak to the U.S. troops in Afghanistan. What have you said to them and do you find it odd that you’ve become a kind of unofficial advisor to the U.S. military in the region?

Mortenson: What I tell U.S. troops when I’ve spoken to them is that it’s critical to listen more to the local people, to be respectful of them — that Americans are there to serve the good people of Afghanistan, and that third, we need to build relationships with the people. It’s my contention that if you work with local people, you can go into the most volatile areas and be very successful, but you have to involve the community.

What needs to be done and which still is not being done is that we have to insist, as a nation, there be some kind of reciprocity, some kind of mutual payback from the Afghani communities being helped. So far, [congressional] legislation has contained money to the region but it doesn’t include the input of the local people on the ground and doesn’t insist on reciprocity, that the local people also must contribute and help contribute to the help they are getting from the outside.

Q: Your latest book, "Stones Into Schools," also about Afghanistan, just came out. Why did you write it?

Mortenson: Mainly because of our significant expansion into Afghanistan, and also because I’m in that country for half the year and I wanted my kids to know why their dad has been gone for half their childhood. But there is also a third reason I wrote it. After writing "Three Cups of Tea," I visited 120 cities, and everywhere I went, Americans expressed to me a yearning for global peace. I think it’s really important that we reach out and share that yearning that Americans have with the rest of the world.

Q: Where did the title of your new book come from?

Mortenson: I’ve worked for 17 years in rural Afghanistan and Pakistan, and particularly in the tribal areas. In Afghanistan, there is what I call a warrior culture, and one of the things I’ve had the great honor to do is spend a lot of time with the mujahedeen, or the warriors. Some are shady and they have different backgrounds but there is a very common theme to the visits, and that’s where the title to my latest book comes from.

When you are visiting a mujahedeen, they will often invite you to their compound, and then, in the evening, they will sit you on the roof and as the swallows are flying around in the sky and you see the great panorama of the Hindu Kush, the premier mountain range in the region, sweeping before you. They will then serve you green tea and then start telling you war stories. And then they’ll ask, 'Do you see those boulders up there, the stones in the mountains? And then they’ll point out where their different skirmishes took place, and their battles, and then they’ll tell you that every one of those stones is a shahid, or a martyr, who died fighting the Taliban or the Russians or their other nemeses.

Now, they say, they must turn those stones into schools and make the sacrifices of their dead warriors worthwhile. You know, Afghanistan, for over two millennia, has been at the crossroads of civilization and has had different invading armies come and go, and the waxing and waning of empires. This is not my interpretation, but it’s how they perceive it — that they are a warrior culture and want now to make their war against ignorance. ...

There’s a saying the elders often repeat, and roughly translated, it’s that God created the world and it was good, and then he took the leftovers and threw them into a pile and cobbled the bits together and that became Afghanistan. When you hear that, it’s very sad, but at the same time, the Afghan people take great pride in knowing that it’s the last best place, the place where the bits and pieces have come together to become these very resilient and beautiful people. ( msn.com )

READ MORE - ‘Three Cups of Tea’ advice for Obama - ( 1 )

China must show leadership on climate change

China must show leadership on climate change – The European Union said Monday that cataclysmic climate change cannot be averted without Chinese leadership but Beijing stood firm in pushing for the rich world to take the lead.

"We cannot solve the climate challenge to mankind without China taking on leadership and responsibility," Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said in his capacity as EU president at a summit in the eastern city of Nanjing.

"So far our belief is the global effort put on the table for mitigation is not enough... more needs to be done," he said in a post-summit address with host Premier Wen Jiabao and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso. Related article: Barroso calls for more effort

He spoke after a summit that reinforced the relationship between China and the EU, its largest trading partner, after US President Barack Obama's visit to China fuelled talk of a "G2" world dominated by Washington and Beijing.

The two sides stressed Monday the importance of a multipolar world and agreed to work together to "actively meet global challenges and strive for a peaceful, sustainable and prosperous world", according to a joint statement.

While acknowledging efforts made by China -- the world's largest greenhouse gas emitter -- Reinfeldt raised questions about a Chinese plan to slow its carbon emissions growth announced last week ahead of Copenhagen climate talks.

"What does it mean when it's compared to business-as-usual? What kind of measures are being put into the Chinese economy to be able to deliver on these?" he said.

Barroso told reporters late Sunday that the European Union had urged China to maximise its efforts to help tackle climate change and do all it can, exploring the "outer limits" of its position.

Wen, however, defended China's offer, saying it marked "a major contribution to global efforts" on the issue.

"China places high importance on the upcoming Copenhagen conference," said Wen, who will lead the Chinese delegation at the talks.

"China is willing to work to move the conference in the right direction."

Beijing said last week that by 2020 it would curb emissions per unit of gross domestic product by between 40 and 45 percent compared to 2005 levels.

The pledge was essentially a vow to increase energy efficiency but would see China's fast-growing emissions continue to grow along with its economy.

In a low-profile weekend meeting of developing nations in Beijing, participants reiterated the Chinese position that developed countries must shoulder most carbon emissions cuts.

The official People's Daily newspaper said the meeting of representatives from China, India, Brazil, South Africa and Sudan agreed to ask "developed countries to assume responsibility for emissions reduction targets".

Wen also said each nation's burden should depend on its development level.

"This is the key to success of the (Copenhagen) conference," he said.

World leaders gather in Copenhagen from December 7 for UN talks on tackling global warming beyond 2012.

Leaders have said that, at best, the meeting is likely to yield a framework accord whose legally binding details would be hammered out next year.

At Monday's joint news appearance, Barroso said major players "can always negotiate with numbers, but we cannot negotiate with science, with physics".

The European Union has offered to cut its 2020 emissions to 20 percent below 1990 levels, and by 30 percent if an ambitious world agreement can be reached.

The White House last week said Obama would offer to cut carbon emissions by 17 percent by 2020, based on 2005 levels.

Reinfeldt said the European Union was also urging Washington to do more.

(AFP)

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Malaria Shows Signs of Resisting Primary Drug Used to Fight It

Malaria Shows Signs of Resisting Primary Drug Used to Fight It—Malaria that is resistant to the best available drug is more widespread in Southeast Asia than previously reported, new research shows. The worrisome finding poses a risk that travelers could carry this strain of the malaria parasite to other parts of the globe and unwittingly spread it, scientists reported November 19 at a meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.

The frontline drug in question is called artemisinin, the most potent medication currently in use against malaria. Signs of malarial resistance to artemisinin have surfaced over the past several years in Cambodia (SN: 11/22/08, p. 9). The new findings confirm that resistant malaria has now cropped up beyond a spot on the border of Thailand and Cambodia where it was initially detected. Now it has appeared in Vietnam and in two spots along the Burma border with Thailand and China.

“Things are changing. There’s no doubt the signs are concerning,” said Robert Newman, director of the Global Malaria Programme at the World Health Organization in Geneva. But he added that these signals are early and need further verification.

Patients in these areas take longer on average to overcome a malaria infection when given a standard combination of artemisinin and another antimalarial. This lag results from slower clearance of the malaria parasites from the blood, said WHO’s Pascal Ringwald, a medical officer who presented the update.

Patients who remain ill for longer stretches despite treatment need extra medication to recover from malaria and are also more likely to have severe or fatal cases, Ringwald said.

Malaria is caused by a single-celled parasite that infects the blood. Symptoms include fever, headache, chills, anemia and a swollen spleen. Of the more than 350 million people who come down with malaria worldwide each year, up to 1 million die. Mosquitoes spread the parasite from person to person.

Malaria has a history of becoming resistant to drugs, and artemisinin now risks becoming the most recent addition to that list. The new reports are disheartening to doctors because artemisinin normally packs a considerable wallop. Although artemisinin is a short-acting drug that gets cleared from the body in a few hours, it makes the most of its time — driving down parasite levels dramatically.

Using artemisinin alone invites resistance. So the standard therapy teams it with one of the longer-acting drugs, which perform mop-up duty on the remaining parasites, said Christopher King, a physician and epidemiologist at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.

The new flashes of resistance may have arisen because combination treatment isn’t always available. And since artemisinin can be bought over the counter in many parts of Asia, people seeking relief don’t always follow the WHO guidelines of pairing artemisinin with another drug, King said.

Also, taking artemisinin for a fever that isn’t caused by malaria can allow resistant strains of the parasite to take hold, Newman said.

In the past, malaria’s resistance to other drugs has been linked to specific genetic changes in the parasite. The precise mechanism underlying resistance to artemisinin is still unsolved, King said.

Artemisinin is derived from extracts of the sweet wormwood bush. The bush’s leaves have been used as a folk remedy against fevers for roughly 2,000 years in Asia but fell out of use in the 20th century with the introduction of modern antimalarial drugs such as chloroquine.

During the Vietnam War, North Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh appealed to China for traditional remedies for soldiers who had malaria. Tea made from sweet wormwood leaves worked and ultimately became the basis for artemisinin drugs. It’s not clear whether parasites in Southeast Asia are the first to become resistant because they have had a long history with artemisinin, or if other factors are involved, Newman said. ( sciencenews.org )

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Breaking the Human Speed Limit

Breaking the Human Speed Limit. Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt secured his claim as the world’s fastest human in August when he ran 100 meters in 9.58 seconds, reaching a top speed of nearly 28 miles per hour. One day, no doubt, someone will sprint faster still. Perhaps by then, scientists may better understand why all speed records made have eventually been broken.

Statisticians have long tried to calculate the upper limits of human speed. One recent estimate, published last year in the Journal of Experimental Biology, put the quickest possible time for 100 meters at 9.48 seconds. That prediction was based largely on past performance and the pace at which current records are falling. But while statistical exercises provide fodder for speculation, no one really knows the limit of human speed —both because scientists still can’t fully explain the blend of biology and physics that separates athletes like Bolt from the rest of the world, and because unforeseen technologies can push athletic achievement beyond the merely human.

“The more you understand biomechanics, and the more technologically advanced you become, the more you become capable of intervening,” says physiologist and biomechanics expert Peter Weyand of Southern Methodist University in Dallas. Those interventions have become both hailed and dreaded, as they often end up casting a shadow over organized sports. This summer, when little-known German swimmer Paul Biedermann beat Olympic champion Michael Phelps in the 200-meter freestyle, Biedermann seemed unsure whether to credit his swimming or his newfangled polyurethane swimwear: “I hope there will be a time when I can beat Michael Phelps without the suit,” Biedermann told sportswriters, some of whom dubbed the new swimsuits “doping by wardrobe.”

Technological innovations that confer a competitive edge have paralleled advances in understanding the physiology of human athletic performance, says Rick Neptune, a mechanical engineer at the University of Texas at Austin. “When they intersect, you start to see world records get broken,” he says. “We can’t say in the future which will matter more, as the rules of competition adjust.” In the current issue of Annual Review of Biomedical Engineering, Neptune chronicles how improvements in equipment design have a history of pushing racing past its natural boundaries.

“It’s not clear where that boundary is until you’ve crossed it,” he says. For example, in 1997 he witnessed one of the first international speed skating competitions with widespread use of klapskates, which reduce friction and maximize muscle force by allowing the boot of the skate to pivot away from the blade. At a single World Cup competition in Calgary, Canada, he watched 14 world records devoured, one heat after another — all owing to the new skates. The International Skating Union ultimately allowed klapskates to remain, saying they had revolutionized the sport and were widely available to any competitor.

Future conflicts might be avoided as scientists better define the basis for human ability. “It’s surprising how little we understand when it comes to tying performance to our physiology and anatomy,” says evolutionary biologist Thomas Roberts of Brown University in Providence, R.I. “We don’t completely understand the basis for top speed.” ( sciencenews.org )

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When Green Paint Isn't So "Green"

When Green Paint Isn't So "Green". It seems we're literally painting the air -- from the Great Lakes to Antarctica -- with persistent pollutants. Including at least one whose safety has never been studied.

Last year, University of Iowa scientists reported the discovery of a novel contaminant in urban air -- a polychlorinated biphenyl, or PCB, that had never been intentionally manufactured. Especially perplexing: Despite having no known sources, it was the fifth most abundant PCB in Chicago’s air. At once, chemists began puzzling over where this PCB-11 might be coming from. The solution – or at least one answer – emerged today. It’s paint. The type we slather on interior walls and outdoor trim.

The first clue to PCB-11’s source was its idiosyncratic abundance, which Keri Hornbuckle described at the Society of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry annual meeting, last year. While the pollutant could be found almost anywhere that her team had sampled in Chicago and Cleveland, concentrations varied. Indeed, their data identified a fairly large number of hot spots in each town. Such as the waste water from a paint-manufacturing plant.

Over the past year, others have turned up the anomalous PCB-11 as well -- polluting air from Philadelphia to Antarctica.

Hornbuckle’s team returned to SETAC this year with data that now firmly indicts paint. Not the base paint, actually – that can of goop to which tint is added. The PCB instead laces pigments: especially greens – but also some blues, yellows, oranges and reds.

This was a rather painstaking study, explains Dingfei Hu. There are 209 different species of PCBs. They tend to persist in the environment for long periods of time, allowing them to travel long distances from where they were released. The Iowa scientist collected various types of base paint and colors from several local retailers: Sherwin Williams, PPG Pittsburgh and Vogel. Every tint these companies offer is mixed from some combination of roughly 10 starting colors. Hu sampled all of those starting-ingredient colors from each company – 33 in all – and analyzed each for the presence of any and every PCB.

Fifteen pigments contained PCBs – yes, multiple ones -- in concentrations ranging from 2 to 200 parts per billion. Where these pollutants turned up, PCB-11 was almost invariably present, often in the company of PCB-209 (which sometimes greatly dwarfed PCB-11’s concentrations).

Further probing showed that the PCBs’ presence was anything but random. Pigments belong to two general classes. The inorganic ones derive from minerals or are manufactured synthetically. None of the sampled inorganic pigments, including titanium dioxide, iron oxide, raw umber or carbon black contained PCBs. The unwanted contaminants did show up in two families of organic pigments, Hu found -- the phthalocyanines, which impart a deep blue or green color, and the azo pigments, which are used to color some paints yellow, red or orange.

In a paper slated to come out in Environmental Science & Technology within a few months, the Iowa group will describe their findings and offer hypotheses on how the production of some pigments unwittingly cooks up PCBs along the way.

Of course, the burning question about these unusual airborne PCBs is: So what? Are they toxic? If they are, at what concentrations? Hu says there are no answers yet. Indeed, until now, there hadn’t really been a reason to investigate.

Now that we’ve learned these pollutants get out of paint and accumulate in the air, it’s time to start investigating whether they pose any risks to health. Fortunately, Hu says he’s got colleagues at Iowa who are just about to embark on such studies. (Some PCBs are suspected carcinogens, but those tend to be ones that – unlike PCB-11 and -209 – mimic the biological action of dioxins.)

As for tips to apply at the paint store . . . Hu recommends avoiding green, blue, red and orange paint. Actually, to play it safe, he says: “I would stay with white and black.”

Not me – I’m allergic to both. And that’s why I’m hoping green chemists will take an interest in formulating recipes for PCB-free tints. ( sciencenews.org )

READ MORE - When Green Paint Isn't So "Green"

Big Bang Atom Smasher Records First Proton Hits

Big Bang Atom Smasher Records First Proton Hits —The world's largest atom smasher made another leap forward Monday by circulating beams of protons in opposite directions at the same time and causing the first particle collisions in the $10 billion machine after more than a year of repairs, organizers said.

The true test of the Large Hadron Collider will come in the first two months of 2010, when scientists plan to start deliberately crashing protons into each other to see what they can discover about the makeup of the universe and its tiniest particles.

(Image: German Rolf-Dieter Heuer, right, Director General of CERN, and Steve Myers, left, CERN's Director for Accelerators and Technology, during a press conference on the LHC restart at CERN)

The collisions — seen by massive detectors — were a side effect of the quick advances being made by the LHC during its startup phase, which began Friday night, said Rolf Heuer, director-general of the European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN.

"It's a great achievement to have come this far in so short a time," said Heuer. "But we need to keep a sense of perspective — there's still much to do before we can start the LHC physics program."

Collisions were recorded in all four of the main detectors at "experiments" in rooms the size of cathedrals about 100 meters (300 feet) underground around the collider.

"This is great news, the start of a fantastic era of physics and hopefully discoveries after 20 years' work by the international community to build a machine and detectors of unprecedented complexity and performance," said Fabiola Gianotti, who represents the Atlas partical physics experiment for about 2,000 other scientists.

"It was standing room only in the ALICE control room and cheers erupted with the first collisions," said Juergen Schukraft, spokesman for that experiment, which involves heavy ion physics. "This is simply tremendous."

A CERN statement said the simultaneous beams and collisions demonstrate the excellent performance of the control system.

While the initial collisions were a side effect, intentional hits could begin within the next 10 days, mainly to check how the machine is working, said CERN spokesman James Gillies.

Ultimately, the collider aims to create conditions like they were 1 trillionth to 2 trillionths of a second after the Big Bang — which scientists think marked the creation of the universe billions of years ago. Physicists also hope the collider will help them see and understand other suspected phenomena, such as dark matter, antimatter and supersymmetry.

The collider was started with great fanfare Sept. 10, 2008, only to be heavily damaged by an electrical fault nine days later. It took 14 months to repair and add protection systems to the machine before it was restarted.

The protons were traveling Monday at almost the speed of light — 11,000 times a second in each direction around the 27-kilometer (17-mile) tunnel under the Swiss-French border at Geneva.

Initial signs are very good, physicists told a news conference. The beam is of superb quality, with the protons tightly packed into hairlike lines and guided by some 1,600 superconducting magnets — 15 meters (50 feet) long — operating at temperatures colder than outer space for maximum electrical efficiency.

So far the machine is operating at 450 billion electron volts of energy, which is relatively low compared with its design capability of more than 14 times that. It soon will overtake the world's current most powerful accelerator, the Tevatron at Fermilab outside Chicago, which operates at 1 trillion electron volts, or TeV.

Myers said the CERN collider should be ramped up to 1.2 TeV by Christmas. CERN might decide to make the first collisions at the current low energy or at 1.2 TeV, but that will be more for calibration purposes than for making scientific discoveries, he said.

Physicists said the discoveries could begin in the first half of next year when the collider reaches 3.5 TeV. CERN is hoping to have the first collisions at that energy in January or early February, said Gillies.

"That would really mark the start of the research program," he said.

Myers said the collider may even go up to 5 TeV before the end of 2010.

Tejinder S. Virdee, a physicist from London's Imperial College who represents more than 2,000 scientists on CMS, another of the experiments with its own detectors at CERN, said it could take several years before the collider discovers the elusive Higgs boson, a particle that theoretically gives mass to other subatomic particles, and thus everything in the universe.

That is because the Higgs boson is believed to be hard to see and needs powerful energy to be revealed, Virdee said.

"This is going to take a few years," he said.

Director-General Heuer said CERN was being as cautious as a driver would be with the first production model of a new car.

"We'll never accelerate this the first time with a kick-start to its maximum velocity," he said.

Once it is tested out, he added, "we can open windows into new physics and that could happen already next year. It depends on how kind nature is to us." ( AP )

READ MORE - Big Bang Atom Smasher Records First Proton Hits

Bioengineers Produce Plastic Without the Use of Fossil Fuels

Bioengineers Produce Plastic Without the Use of Fossil Fuels. A team of pioneering South Korean scientists have succeeded in producing the polymers used for everyday plastics through bioengineering, rather than through the use of fossil fuel based chemicals. This groundbreaking research, which may now allow for the production of environmentally conscious plastics, is published in two papers in the journal Biotechnology and Bioengineering to mark the journal's 50th anniversary.

Polymers are molecules found in everyday life in the form of plastics and rubbers. The team, from the prestigious KAIST University and the Korean chemical company LG Chem, led by Professor Sang Yup Lee focused their research on Polylactic Acid (PLA), a bio-based polymer which holds the key to producing plastics through natural and renewable resources.

"The polyesters and other polymers we use everyday are mostly derived from fossil oils made through the refinery or chemical process," said Lee. "The idea of producing polymers from renewable biomass has attracted much attention due to the increasing concerns of environmental problems and the limited nature of fossil resources. PLA is considered a good alternative to petroleum based plastics as it is both biodegradable and has a low toxicity to humans."

Until now PLA has been produced in a two-step fermentation and chemical process of polymerization, which is both complex and expensive. Now, through the use of a metabolically engineered strain of E.coli, the team , have developed a one-stage process which produces polylactic acid and its copolymers through direct fermentation. This makes the renewable production of PLA and lactate-containing copolymers cheaper and more commercially viable.

"By developing a strategy which combines metabolic engineering and enzyme engineering, we've developed an efficient bio-based one-step production process for PLA and its copolymers," said Lee. "This means that a developed E. coli strain is now capable of efficiently producing unnatural polymers, through a one-step fermentation process,"

This combined approach of systems-level metabolic engineering and enzyme engineering now allows for the production of polymer and polyester based products through direct microbial fermentation of renewable resources.

"Global warming and other environmental problems are urging us to develop sustainable processes based on renewable resources," concluded Lee. "This new strategy should be generally useful for developing other engineered organisms capable of producing various unnatural polymers by direct fermentation from renewable resources". ( nsf.org )

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New Hydrogen-Storage Method Discovered

New Hydrogen-Storage Method Discovered - Scientists at the Carnegie Institution have found for the first time that high pressure can be used to make a unique hydrogen-storage material.

The discovery paves the way for an entirely new way to approach the hydrogen-storage problem. The researchers found that the normally unreactive, noble gas xenon combines with molecular hydrogen (H2) under pressure to form a previously unknown solid with unusual bonding chemistry.

The experiments are the first time these elements have been combined to form a stable compound. The discovery debuts a new family of materials, which could boost new hydrogen technologies. The paper is published in the November 22, 2009, advanced online publication of Nature Chemistry.

Xenon has some intriguing properties, including its use as an anesthesia, its ability to preserve biological tissues, and its employment in lighting. Xenon is a noble gas, which means that it does not typically react with other elements.

(This schematic shows the structure of the new material, Xe(H2)7. Freely rotating hydrogen molecules (red dumbbells) surround xenon atoms (yellow).

As lead author Maddury Somayazulu, research scientist at Carnegie's Geophysical Laboratory, explained: "Elements change their configuration when placed under pressure, sort of like passengers readjusting themselves as the elevator becomes full. We subjected a series of gas mixtures of xenon in combination with hydrogen to high pressures in a diamond anvil cell. At about 41,000 times the pressure at sea level (1 atmosphere), the atoms became arranged in a lattice structure dominated by hydrogen, but interspersed with layers of loosely bonded xenon pairs. When we increased pressure, like tuning a radio, the distances between the xenon pairs changed–the distances contracted to those observed in dense metallic xenon."

The researchers imaged the compound at varying pressures using X-ray diffraction, infrared and Raman spectroscopy. When they looked at the xenon part of the structure, they realized that the interaction of xenon with the surrounding hydrogen was responsible for the unusual stability and the continuous change in xenon-xenon distances as pressure was adjusted from 41,000 to 255,000 atmospheres.

Why was the compound so stable? "We were taken off guard by both the structure and stability of this material," said Przemek Dera, the lead crystallographer who looked at the changes in electron density at different pressures using single-crystal diffraction. As electron density from the xenon atoms spreads towards the surrounding hydrogen molecules, it seems to stabilize the compound and the xenon pairs.

"Xenon is too heavy and expensive to be practical for use in hydrogen-storage applications," remarked Somayazulu. "But by understanding how it works in this situation, researchers can come up with lighter substitutes."

"It's very exciting to come up with new hydrogen-rich compounds, not just for our interest in simple molecular systems, but because such discoveries can be the foundation for important new technologies," commented Russell Hemley, director of the Geophysical Laboratory and a co-author. "This hydrogen-rich solid represents a new pathway to forming novel hydrogen storage compounds and the new pressure-induced chemistry opens the possibility of synthesizing new energetic materials." ( nsf.org )

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