TIZER'S SCIENCE NEWS

[Stanley]

Peter, I had the same thoughts when I heard that R4 programme on rare earths and was, like everyone else surprised.
Putin's strategy starts to make sense if you think of the range of essential commodities his 'Greater Russia' could control. I think we are in more trouble than I thought and you have been right all along about the importance of the conflict in Ukraine. I thought you were a bit over the top at first but I can see what was driving you now.

[Tizer]

You could argue (oil in Ajerbajan aside) that Ukraine was the key driver in the Soviet Union industry and technology post WW2.

We should also remember that before the 1990s Ukraine was also the the location for the major part of Russia's strategic nuclear deterrent. When it became independent in the `90s it agreed to dispose of all the nuclear weapons on its soil in exchange for Russia, the US and the UK agreeing to protect Ukraine against aggression by any foreign power. Putin has conveniently forgotten the pact but it does provide a credible argument for the West intervening in the present war.

[Tizer]

`Nobel Prize goes to Svante Paabo for Neanderthal work' https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-63116304
The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine has gone to Sweden's Svante Paabo for his work on human evolution. The Prize committee said he achieved the seemingly impossible task of cracking the genetic code of one of our extinct relatives - Neanderthals. He also performed the "sensational" feat of discovering the previously unknown relative - Denisovans. His work helped explore our own evolutionary history and how humans spread around the planet.'...

[Stanley]

I always find it surprising when I discover the esoteric subjects that are being researched and even more importantly, recognised by bodies like the Nobel Committee.

[plaques]

It looks like if they can get hold of bones however much they are degraded it may be possible to extract DNA from them and determine extended family trees. If this is true then we may be seeing new laws to stop people doing tests on bones that may or may not have some Royal connections.

[Tizer]

Bones and teeth are the main sources for what they call aDNA `ancient DNA'. LINK

This is a valuable step forward in our attempts for find ways to deal with waste polyethylene...
`'Humble' worm saliva can break down tough plastic' LINK

[Stanley]

I like the news about the worms Peter. What it says to me is that when Mother Nature has got rid of the problem of man polluting the earth she has the tools to quietly get on with a millennia long clean up. I've read elsewhere of insects that can clean up even toxic pollution in soils.
When you think about it we're pretty useless as a race when it comes to looking after our environment.... When do we reach a point where it's recognised that we have failed miserably?

[Tizer]

The fungi and bacteria do a good job too!

[Stanley]

That's true Peter. Everything in nature is cleaning up after us but that still won't protect us from the consequences of our own greed and stupidity....
(I keep thinking about those enormous trucks moving iron ore autonomously up in the Pilbara controlled by operators in Perth and Sydney.)

[Tizer]

I keep thinking about those enormous trucks moving iron ore autonomously up in the Pilbara controlled by operators in Perth and Sydney.

And yet NASA and other space colonisation supporters say we need to send humans to the Moon and the other planets because machines and AI can't do the job!

[Stanley]

They ought to have a word with 3M and the other mining companies.....
Interesting that our first reaction to the present energy crisis was more resource exploitation. I understand the reason why but it's like an addict reaching for the poison of choice..... (Gas CH makes my life style possible....)

[Tizer]

This is fascinating and it shows how much more we can see with the JWST that we didn't know about before....
`James Webb telescope solves dusty star mystery' LINK
`...WR 140. It's a double star system, or a binary, some 5,000 light-years from Earth. Those rings are dust shells that extend outwards over 10 trillion km. That's a distance that's hard to comprehend. Put another way, it's 70,000 times the distance between Earth and our Sun. "Previous observations of WR 140 revealed the presence of up to three shells. To see 17 like this is amazing, and shows the power of James Webb," said Dr Olivia Jones from the UK Astronomy Technology Centre (UK ATC) in Edinburgh which helped to build the telescope. The WR in the name of the system refers to "Wolf-Rayet". It's a type of star. A big one that's reaching the end of its life. Wolf-Rayets are unwieldy. They billow huge gaseous winds into space.'...

Further down the article is this, which is quite a surprise. Usually we expect dust in space to be rock material, silicates and the like. But this dust is made of rings of carbon and hydrogen...
`The shells are dominated by polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, PAHs. These are very carbon-rich compounds. You find them on burnt toast and in the exhaust from motor vehicles. PAHs produced by stars are thought to enrich the carbon content throughout the Universe.'

By the way anyone interested in the universe will find the latest episode of Sky at Night very interesting: LINK
An audience puts questions to a panel of astronomers. It's great to see some of the kids asking great questions!

[Stanley]

"Those rings are dust shells that extend outwards over 10 trillion km. That's a distance that's hard to comprehend. "
You can say that again! It's beyond my comprehension.....

[Stanley]

See THIS Guardian report of an unexpected consequence of climate change.
"The next pandemic may come not from bats or birds but from matter in melting ice, according to new data. Genetic analysis of soil and lake sediments from Lake Hazen, the largest high Arctic freshwater lake in the world, suggests the risk of viral spillover – where a virus infects a new host for the first time – may be higher close to melting glaciers. The findings imply that as global temperatures rise owing to climate change, it becomes more likely that viruses and bacteria locked up in glaciers and permafrost could reawaken and infect local wildlife, particularly as their range also shifts closer to the poles.".
I can't find anything on the web about it but I have just heard a report from Australia that they have found a new recreational drug based on Ketamine that has not been described in any of the literature. They suspect it is a recent import.

[Tizer]

I'm glad someone is studying the potential for dangerous microorganisms to be released from ancient ice and permafrost. I remember the 2014 story about the `giant virus' referred to in the article. It's another reason for spending less on putting people on Mars and more on making them safe on Earth.

I searched and found this on the new ketamine drug - thanks for raising the issue!..
`‘Canberra ketamine’: new recreational drug discovered at Australian pill-testing service: ‘As far as we’re aware, this is the first detection of a new drug by a drug-checking service anywhere in the world,’ says professor'
`A new recreational drug dubbed CanKet, similar to ketamine but with unknown side effects, has been found by scientists at Australia’s first fixed pill-testing site. CanTEST, a face-to-face drug-checking service, was launched in Canberra in August. Since then, almost 200 people have brought their recreational drugs in for analysis and advice based on the results. Some people choose to discard their drugs if the service finds they are laced with harmful or unexpected substances. The chemistry lead at CanTEST, Associate Prof Malcolm McCleod, said someone brought in a small plastic bag of crystals and powder, and while they thought the drug was ketamine, the side effects were different.'....

[Stanley]

Thanks Peter. Why would anyone ingest these unknown substances in the first place? Beats me....

[Stanley]

See THIS article in the journal Nature that suggests that The 14th century Black Death was the trigger for changes in the human immune response that can still be identified today. Totally fascinating.....

[plaques]

See THIS article in the journal Nature that suggests that The 14th century Black Death was the trigger for changes in the human immune response that can still be identified today. Totally fascinating.....

On the other hand our DNA contains so much 'junk' DNA that we don't know what it does or why its there. Some theorist think that its leftover DNA from events far in the past. The survivors of the Black Death may have been lucky enough to have some of this 'Junk' DNA.

[Tizer]

I wrote in detail about the suspected link between the Black Death (caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis) and modern day autoimmune disease, especially inflammatory bowel disease, some years ago on OGFB. It was on the old site unfortunately and I can't access it. With my own gut inflammation problems I found it a fascinating theory.

[Whyperion]

See THIS article in the journal Nature that suggests that The 14th century Black Death was the trigger for changes in the human immune response that can still be identified today. Totally fascinating.....

On the other hand our DNA contains so much 'junk' DNA that we don't know what it does or why its there. Some theorist think that its leftover DNA from events far in the past. The survivors of the Black Death may have been lucky enough to have some of this 'Junk' DNA.

Apparently some (?this?) from Neanderthals

[Tizer]

`New ground as tech aims to help boost soil health' LINK
You have to scroll down a long way and then you find this...
"Much of the tech focus in farming has been on the chemical [pesticides] and physical [machinery], but now it is time to start thinking about biology," he says. Currently it is believed that scientists have identified only around 10% of soil life. Prof Montgomery says that for too long "the whole world that is below ground was kind of invisible to science". He adds: "Soil is one of the last big frontiers of science - to understand what is going on in it."

This is another example of why we should shift funding away from putting people on Mars and tourists on the Moon and start properly studying the soil on Earth.

[Stanley]

As you know Peter that has been a hobby horse of mine for a long while. Not just the biological elements (and these include Merlin Sheldrake's fungi) but microscopic amounts of minerals as well. We know so little about them and their importance to nutrition.
I've cited it before but when BSE was at its height an amateur scientist pointed out the connection between the disease and Manganese content in soils. His work was dismissed by the 'professional' scientists but I thought it was an interesting observation that deserved more consideration.

[Stanley]

Difficult to decide which thread this should go into but here is as good as anywhere as it is the result of applied science...
See THIS report from the UN that the percentages of polluting greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are still increasing.
“The continuing rise in concentrations of the main heat-trapping gases, including the record acceleration in methane levels, shows that we are heading in the wrong direction,”
What hope can there be for reducing temperature rise? We are in the last chance saloon.

[Tizer]

`Why lasers are being used to write inside diamonds' LINK

[Stanley]

I thought they had been marking diamonds for a long time now Peter but this must be a better method. From what I can see the trade in diamonds is manipulated by people like de Beers to keep the price artificially high and that will only encourage the trade in 'blood diamonds'.