I am constantly, repeatedly reminded how different I am when it comes to priorities. I remember chancing upon a book on endangered species in North America in a dusty library in Toa Payoh. I was enthralled by the beautiful sketches of exotic species, each species drawn ideally in its natural habitat, in all its majesty and dignity at risk of anthropomorphizing these animals. Most importantly, numbers were strewn about the page. Worrying ones.

I borrowed the book, and started making notes, and I remember at that age, and that feeling still grips my heart today, just how harrowing the statistics were. Some species just tenuously hang onto existence by the persistence of just tens of individuals. Much less than, as I know now, the genetic health of any population.

It has been close to 12 years since that cloth-bound book. Some species have rebounded from vigorous conservation activism and political support, while others, most others I suspect, have been lost forever, only to be remembered through photographs or drawings, not unlike those through which I was acquainted.

I suppose I have always had an affinity towards animals, even if I am not consciously aware of it, or if I deliberately go to lengths to their conservation, which I lament. But as an environmentalist/conservationist that has lost hope and motivation, there still lingers a flame that is constantly doused if it grows too big.

I have always wondered, how those that study biology, investigating and learning about life in all its intricacies and beauty can NOT be interested in the preservation of the biodiversity that we see today. It is such a shame, that even a simple discussion on conservation priorities in lectures can be taken with such little concern, attention or interest, seeing as such that this really is a real and difficult problem. Perhaps its the context of education? Perhaps its general apathy? Perhaps its simply boring and lack of awareness? The re-realization that the diversity of human thought and the uniqueness of individual experience is precisely the problem afflicting some or most desired directed action towards global problems is depressing.

Conservation as it seems, is simply something that somebody else is doing something about.

The Marines are righteous?

These terms have always changed throughout the course of history!

Children who have never seen peace, and children who have never seen war, have different values!

Those who stand at the top determine what’s wrong and what’s right! This very place is neutral ground!

Justice will prevail you say? But of course it will!

Whoever wins this war becomes justice“

- Don Flamingo, Shichibukai

The monitor lizard is under threat due to habitat loss and hunting by humans for food. All images: IUCN.

The latest update to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species is in and if you were expecting good news prepared to be disappointed. Of the more than 47,000 species surveyed, about 17,000 are at serious risk — of those 21% of the world’s mammal species, 12% of birds, 28% of reptiles, 30% of amphibians, 35% of invertebrates, 37% of freshwater fish and 70% of plants:

January sees the launch of the International Year of Biodiversity. The latest analysis of the IUCN Red List shows the 2010 target to reduce biodiversity loss will not be met. It’s time for governments to start getting serious about saving species and make sure it’s high on their agendas for next year, as we’re rapidly running out of time.

- Jane Smart, Director, IUCN Biodiversity Conservation Group

One species which has entered the ranks of the extinct in the wild is the Kihansi Spray Toad, pictured above. At one time it had a population about at least 17,000 at the Kihansi Falls in Tanzania. However a dam upstream of the falls reduced water flow downstream by 90%, reducing habitat. It is suspected that a fungal disease finally doomed these amphibians.

This mosaic, taken from a NASA animation, shows altitude measurements of the moon's south pole from the LOLA instrument aboard the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. Some craters, including Cabeus A that will be hit by the LCROSS probe, are named in this view released Sept. 17, 2009. Credit: NASA/GSFC

Source: Space.com

Since man first touched the moon and brought pieces of it back to Earth, scientists have thought that the lunar surface was bone dry. But new observations from three different spacecraft have put this notion to rest with what has been called “unambiguous evidence” of water across the surface of the moon.

The new findings, detailed in the Sept. 25 issue of the journal Science, come in the wake of further evidence of lunar polar water ice by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and just weeks before the planned lunar impact of NASA’s LCROSS satellite, which will hit one of the permanently shadowed craters at the moon’s south pole in hope of churning up evidence of water ice deposits in the debris field.

The moon remains drier than any desert on Earth, but the water is said to exist on the moon in very small quantities. One ton of the top layer of the lunar surface would hold about 32 ounces of water, researchers said.

“If the water molecules are as mobile as we think they are — even a fraction of them — they provide a mechanism for getting water to those permanently shadowed craters,” said planetary geologist Carle Pieters of Brown University in Rhode Island, who led one of the three studies in Science on the lunar find, in a statement. “This opens a whole new avenue [of lunar research], but we have to understand the physics of it to utilize it.”

Finding water on the moon would be a boon to possible future lunar bases, acting as a potential source of drinking water and fuel.

Apollo turns up dry

When Apollo astronauts returned from the moon 40 years ago, they brought back several samples of lunar rocks.

The moon rocks were analyzed for signs of water bound to minerals present in the rocks; while trace amounts of water were detected, these were assumed to be contamination from Earth, because the containers the rocks came back in had leaked.

“The isotopes of oxygen that exist on the moon are the same as those that exist on Earth, so it was difficult if not impossible to tell the difference between water from the moon and water from Earth,” said Larry Taylor of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, who is a member of one of the NASA-built instrument teams for India’s Chandrayaan-1 satellite and has studied the moon since the Apollo missions.

While scientists continued to suspect that water ice deposits could be found in the coldest spots of south pole craters that never saw sunlight, the consensus became that the rest of the moon was bone dry.

But new observations of the lunar surface made with Chandrayaan-1, NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, and NASA’s Deep Impact probe, are calling that consensus into question, with multiple detections of the spectral signal of either water or the hydroxyl group (an oxygen and hydrogen chemically bonded).

Three spacecraft

Chandrayaan-1, India’s first-ever moon probe, was aimed at mapping the lunar surface and determining its mineral composition (the orbiter’s mission ended 14 months prematurely in August after an abrupt malfunction). While the probe was still active, its NASA-built Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) detected wavelengths of light reflected off the surface that indicated the chemical bond between hydrogen and oxygen — the telltale sign of either water or hydroxyl.

Because M3 can only penetrate the top few millimeters of lunar regolith, the newly observed water seems to be at or near the lunar surface. M3′s observations also showed that the water signal got stronger toward the polar regions. Pieters is the lead investigator for the M3 instrument on Chandrayaan-1.

Cassini, which passed by the moon in 1999 on its way to Saturn, provides confirmation of this signal with its own slightly stronger detection of the water/hydroxyl signal. The water would have to be absorbed or trapped in the glass and minerals at the lunar surface, wrote Roger Clark of the U.S. Geological Survey in the study detailing Cassini’s findings.

The Cassini data shows a global distribution of the water signal, though it also appears stronger near the poles (and low in the lunar maria).

Finally, the Deep Impact spacecraft, as part of its extended EPOXI mission and at the request of the M3 team, made infrared detections of water and hydroxyl as part of a calibration exercise during several close approaches of the Earth-Moon system en route to its planned flyby of comet 103P/Hartley 2 in November 2010.

Deep Impact detected the signal at all latitudes above 10 degrees N, though once again, the poles showed the strongest signals. With its multiple passes, Deep Impact was able to observe the same regions at different times of the lunar day. At noon, when the sun’s rays were strongest, the water feature was lowest, while in the morning, the feature was stronger.

“The Deep Impact observations of the Moon not only unequivocally confirm the presence of [water/hydroxyl] on the lunar surface, but also reveal that the entire lunar surface is hydrated during at least some portion of the lunar day,” the authors wrote in their study.

The findings of all three spacecraft “provide unambiguous evidence for the presence of hydroxyl or water,” said Paul Lucey of the University of Hawaii in an opinion essay accompanying the three studies. Lucey was not involved in any of the missions.

The new data “prompt a critical reexamination of the notion that the moon is dry. It is not,” Lucey wrote.

This Mini-RF image from NASA's powerful Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter shows radar imagery of the lunar south pole, a potential reservoir for hidden water ice, in new images released Sept. 17, 2009. Credit: NASA/APL/LPI

Where the water comes from

Combined, the findings show that not only is the moon hydrated, the process that makes it so is a dynamic one that is driven by the daily changes in solar radiation hitting any given spot on the surface.

The sun might also have something to do with how the water got there.

There are potentially two types of water on the moon: that brought from outside sources, such as water-bearing comets striking the surface, or that that originates on the moon.

This second, endogenic, source is thought to possibly come from the interaction of the solar wind with moon rocks and soils.

The rocks and regolith that make up the lunar surface are about 45 percent oxygen (combined with other elements as mostly silicate minerals). The solar wind — the constant stream of charged particles emitted by the sun — are mostly protons, or positively charged hydrogen atoms.

If the charged hydrogens, which are traveling at one-third the speed of light, hit the lunar surface with enough force, they break apart oxygen bonds in soil materials, Taylor, the M3 team member suspects. Where free oxygen and hydrogen exist, there is a high chance that trace amounts of water will form.

The various study researchers also suggest that the daily dehydration and rehydration of the trace water across the surface could lead to the migration of hydroxyl and hydrogen towards the poles where it can accumulate in the cold traps of the permanently shadowed regions.

Mood: Content

Went out for dinner and drinks afterwards with my cousins. Discovered a whole new undiscovered world behind the TCC opposite the road from Somerset MRT.

Oriental style bars, live bands, all inhabiting the Peranakan-style shophouses of yesteryear.

Had a Belvedere Cytrus with Ginger and lime. Not too bad.

This blog was originally created as a proxy for interesting environment-related, science-related, technology-related posts that I find from a wide range of sources. Now, in lieu of my ever changing priorities, I have decided that such frequent posting is taking an ever wider swath of my time, effort and concentration. It is also taking away time that I would normally spend on my reading and my work.

Nobody ever has time to do everything he or she would like. Removing the need for proxy posting would simply free up more time for my academic interests to occupy.

As such, I would like to change the focus of this blog towards a more opinion-based, rant-like, perhaps occasionally essay-format posts that I find is more stimulating than simply news from an array of sources. I might find it prudent to include lists of links should I have the time, but the one that’s certain is that the frequency of posts will definitely drop, perhaps to once a fortnight, or once a month for serious posts, and maybe once a week for personal journals.

I hope you continue to have me on your RSS feeds or in your bookmarks, your readership is greatly appreciated.

Butterfly experts have been angered by the appearance in a top journal of a paper they say is bizarre and unsupported by evidence, claiming it was published only because it was ushered in by a “bigwig” in the field.

The paper, by Donald Williamson, a retired academic from the University of Liverpool, was published in advance online late last month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (PNAS).

Its publication was via a special “communication” mechanism understood to be unique to PNAS. This allows national academy members to bypass normal editorial procedures and submit papers that they consider to be of particular importance without the normal peer-review requirements, although they must obtain two referees.

Dr Williamson’s article was communicated by Lynn Margulis, a well-known professor in the department of geosciences at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

It makes the extraordinary claim that caterpillars and butterflies have different evolutionary histories – that rather than being a single lineage that evolved through two different life stages, they are a hybrid that resulted from the accidental mating of a flying insect with a worm-like species.

But butterfly experts say the idea is unsubstantiated and have called into question the method by which such a seemingly unsupportable theory could end up in one of the world’s most prestigious journals.

In a posting called “Worst paper of the year?” on his blog “Why Evolution Is True”, Jerry Coyne, a professor of biology at the University of Chicago, says the paper’s appearance is an example of a “bigwig” exercising undue influence.

Max Telford, a reader in zoology at University College London, told Times Higher Education that “clearly something has gone wrong”.

“There is no science in it. I don’t think it could possibly have got through on a normal peer-review process,” he said. “It is unique to PNAS that they have got this back-door way of getting things through.”

He added that Professor Margulis was an “incredibly important and highly respected” scientist in evolutionary circles, having come up with the idea, considered dubious at the time but now textbook science, that cell organelles originated as bacteria that were subsequently absorbed by the cell. But extrapolating that thinking to butterflies went too far, he said.

“Maybe there needs to be a forum for off-the-wall ideas, but at the same time, this was not reviewed to the standard that one would expect in PNAS,” he said.

Chris Jiggins, who leads the Butterfly Genetics Group at the University of Cambridge, also rubbished the paper and labelled the PNAS system “quite nepotistic”.

“I think it’s nonsense – there is no data in the paper. It claims to use molecular biology evidence in the abstract, but there isn’t actually anything in there,” he said.

Professor Margulis did not respond to a request from Times Higher Education to comment.

Dr Williamson described Professor Margulis as a “good friend” who had been an “enthusiastic supporter” of his hypothesis over the years.

Saying that he had been studying larvae “considerably longer” than any of his detractors, he challenged the sceptics to refute the hypothesis by DNA analysis. He did note, however, that the paper in question, “Caterpillars evolved from onychophorans by hybridogenesis”, had been rejected by seven journals before being published in PNAS.

Meanwhile, in a September editorial, PNAS announced plans to scrap the communication submission process from June next year.

Source: Times Higher Education, Zoë Corbyn, 13th Sept

Up to eight Fiji petrels were seen over an 11-day period

One of the world’s rarest and most elusive birds has finally been seen flying in its natural habitat.

The Fiji petrel, a seabird that once “went missing” for 130 years, has been sighted flying at sea, near the island of Gua in the Pacific Ocean.

The culmination of a meticulously planned bird hunt, Birdlife International researchers sighted the birds 25 nautical miles south of Gua.

Up to eight individuals were seen and photographed over 11 days.

The 30cm tall dark-brown Fiji petrel (Pseudobulweria macgillivrayi) is one of the most elusive of all birds.

Originally, the species was known from just a single immature specimen, collected in 1855 on Gau Island, Fiji.

But then the bird “went missing” with no further confirmed sightings of it for almost 130 years.

Then in 1984, an adult was caught and photographed on Gua, then released.

Since then, there have been a handful of reports of “grounded” birds that had crashed onto village roofs on the island. Most were immature birds, of which a few died.

Due to the extremely limited number of sightings, the bird is also inferred to be one of the rarest of all bird species.

It is one of 192 bird species which are list as Critically Endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

Stinky lure

But while there have been ten unconfirmed reports of the bird at sea, with the latest a possible Fiji Petrel sighted around 400km north of Bougainville Island, until now there has been no confirmed sightings.

That was until in May, when scientists and volunteers working with Birdlife International and

NatureFiji-MareqetiViti, a partner conservation organisation based in Fiji, set out to find the bird in its natural habitat.

The search for the elusive petrel is described in a paper in the latest Bulletin of the British Ornithologists’ Club.

The researchers lured the bird with a specially made food, made from finely cut fish offal mixed with very dense fish oil.

These were then frozen into 10kg blocks, which persist for over an hour in the water, creating a pungent oil slick which attracts petrels from some miles away.

On the second day of the expedition, the first Fiji Petrel appeared, approaching the chum slick from downwind, slowly zigzagging over the slick, and suddenly changing direction to drop onto a floating morsel.

In all, the expedition team believe they saw eight individuals over eleven days of observations.

“Finding this bird and capturing such images was a fantastic and exhilarating experience,” says ornithologist Hadoram Shirihai, who lead the search team.

In 2008, Mr Shirihai also rediscovered the Critically Endangered Beck’s Petrel (Pseudobulweria becki) a bird that was also only known from two sightings in the Pacific made in the 1920s.

“To see such a little-known bird at such close range was magical,” added fellow expedition member Mr Tony Pym, describing his joy at seeing the Fiji petrel flying over the waves.

More surveys in 2010 are now planned to to locate the breeding area of the Fiji Petrel, says Dick Watling of NatureFiji-MareqetiViti.

“Once we know the location, we can assess what needs to be done to turn around the fortunes of this species,” he says.

Source: BBC Online, Matt Walker

Can’t imagine what robotic technology will look like 10 years from now.

MRSA (Methicillin-Resistant Stapylococcus aureas) "Here we have a short-cut, where we don't have to invent new antibiotics" Dr Evgeny Nudler, Study leader

Source: BBC Online, Photo credit: Wikipedia, CDC/ Janice Carr/ Deepak Mandhalapu, M.H.S

US scientists have uncovered a defence mechanism in bacteria that allows them to fend off the threat of antibiotics.

It is hoped the findings could help researchers boost the effectiveness of existing treatments.

The study published in Science found that nitric oxide produced by the bacteria eliminates some key effects of a wide range of antibiotics.

One UK expert said inhibiting nitric oxide synthesis could be an important advance for tackling tricky infections.

Antibiotic resistance, for example with MRSA, is a growing problem and experts have long warned of the need to develop new treatments.

The latest research, done by a team at New York University, showed that in bacteria the production of nitric oxide – a small molecule made up of one nitrogen and one oxygen atom – increased their resistance to antibiotics.

They found the enzymes responsible for producing nitric oxide were activated specifically in response to the presence of the antibiotics.

They also showed that nitric oxide alleviates damage caused by the drugs as well as helping to neutralise many of the toxic compounds within the antibiotic.

The researchers then showed that eliminating nitric oxide production in the bacteria allowed the antibiotics to work at lower, less toxic doses.

More effective

Study leader, Dr Evgeny Nudler, said developing new medicines to fight antibiotic resistance, such as that seen with MRSA is a “huge hurdle”.

“Here, we have a short cut, where we don’t have to invent new antibiotics.

“Instead we can enhance the activity of well-established ones, making them more effective at lower doses.

Dr Matthew Dryden, consultant in microbiology and communicable disease at Royal Hampshire County Hospital and general secretary of the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy, said if the enzyme which creates nitric oxide could be inhibited, it could suppress the ability of the bacteria to counteract antibiotics.

“This would be a useful therapeutic advance, especially as we are running out of new classes of antibiotics and there is less antibiotic development in general.”

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What I do not understand is that nitric oxide itself is integral in many essential bodily functions, such as vasodilation, neurotransmission as well as being employed by the immune system to kill infecting bacteria.

Any drug or method that decreases nitric oxide synthesis in drug-resistant bacteria must hence be extremely specific to their nitric oxide synthetase enzymes.

Does anybody else know something I don’t about the particular research above? Or understand the process of drug resistance via nitric oxide better than what I can extract from that article?