Culture | Page 2843 | Science Codex

Using water to understand human society, from the industrial revolution to global trade

Water shapes societies, but it is a factor only just beginning to be appreciated by social scientists.

The Norwegian professor, writer and film maker Terje Tvedt, of the Universities of Oslo and Bergen, argues that water has played a unique and fundamental role in shaping societies throughout human history. Speaking at a European Science Foundation and COST conference in Sicily in October, Tvedt proposed that social scientists and historians have long made a serious error by not taking natural resources into account in their attempts to understand social structures.

Politics and technical concerns thwart efforts to use carbon markets to halt deforestation

Carbon credit politics and misplaced technical concerns are impeding efforts to encourage sustainable land use practices in tropical regions, such as better forest management and growing more trees on farms, that could curtail up to 20 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions while also boosting incomes of the rural poor, according to a new analysis by the Nairobi-based World Agroforestry Centre.

A more rational and scientific approach to AIDS is needed, says expert

The Secretariat of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) has lost valuable ground by ignoring for years the contribution of long-term concurrent relationships to Africa's AIDS epidemic, claims an expert ahead of World AIDS Day on bmj.com today.

UNAIDS may be "contributing to the mystification of AIDS in Africa by promoting a needlessly overcomplicated view of the epidemic", says Helen Epstein, an independent consultant on public health in developing countries.

How to improve email communication

In a new article in the current issue of American Journal of Sociology authors Daniel A. Menchik and Xiaoli Tian (both of the University of Chicago) study how we use emoticons, subject lines, and signatures to define how we want to be interpreted in email. The authors find that "a shift to email interaction requires a new set of interactional skills to be developed."

Understanding donor-recipient genetics could decrease early kidney transplant complications

PHILADELPHIA – Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have found an association between the genetics of donor-recipient matches in kidney transplants and complications during the first week after transplantation.

Synthetic virus supports a bat origin for SARS

SARS – severe acute respiratory syndrome – alarmed the world five years ago as the first global pandemic of the 21st century. The coronavirus (SARS-CoV) that sickened more than 8,000 people – and killed nearly 800 of them – may have originated in bats, but the actual animal source is not known.

Meteorite hits on Earth: There may be a recount

Edmonton—Meteorite craters might not be as rare as we think. A University of Alberta researcher has found a tool that could reveal possibly hundreds of undiscovered craters across Canada and around the world.

The discovery of a meteorite crater near Whitecourt, 200 kilometers west of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada prompted Chris Herd to examine the site from the air using existing aerial surveys. A computer program, applied to aerial images taken by a forestry company, stripped away the images of trees to expose the landscape, revealing the meteorite crater.

Solar-powered sea-slugs live like plants, prof says

COLLEGE STATION, Nov. 25, 2008 — The lowly sea slug, "Elysia chlorotica," may not seem like the most exciting of creatures, but don't be fooled: it behaves like a plant and is solar-powered, says a Texas A&M University biologist who has been studying these tiny creatures for the past decade and, along with collaborators from several universities, has identified a possible cause of their ability to behave like plants.

Superglue from the sea

SALT LAKE CITY – Sandcastle worms live in intertidal surf, building sturdy tube-shaped homes from bits of sand and shell and their own natural glue. University of Utah bioengineers have made a synthetic version of this seaworthy superglue, and hope it will be used within several years to repair shattered bones in knees, other joints and the face.

"You would glue some of the small pieces together," says Russell Stewart, associate professor of bioengineering and senior author of the study to be published online within a week in the journal Macromolecular Biosciences.

International food aid alone cannot solve the global malnutrition crisis

In an editorial in this week's PLoS Medicine, the journal's editors discuss some of the controversies surrounding international food aid, and conclude that "donor-supported food programs are not enough as a long term strategy" for addressing malnutrition.

COPI complex is a regulator of lipid homeostasis

Magazine articles describing ways to burn fat, lose weight, etc. are omnipresent in Western culture, but science's understanding of the way fat is stored in the cells of the human body is rather slimmer. In this week's issue of PLoS Biology, a new paper by Dr. Mathias Beller, Carole Sztalryd, and colleagues investigates some of the mysteries surrounding how our bodies store and release fat.

Robo-lizards help prove long-standing signaling theory

Like teachers who rap a ruler before announcing homework in noisy classrooms, Puerto Rican anole lizards perform eye-catching pushups before beginning head-bobbing displays that advertise their territory and status, according to a new study by researchers at the University of California, Davis.

New economic woes hit boomers, seniors hardest

Millions of older Americans stand at the epicenter of the current financial crisis and the implications must be confronted, said experts today during a symposium at The Gerontological Society of America's (GSA) 61st Annual Scientific Meeting.

Developing a neighborhood watch for the Internet

Internet network performance problems are not only annoying to users -- they are costly to businesses and network operators. But since the Internet has no built-in monitoring system, network problems often go unnoticed.

To help fix this problem, researchers at the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science at Northwestern University have developed a new way to detect and report such problems in real time through their Network Early Warning System.

Expert says layoffs could worsen economic woes

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Widespread layoffs that stem corporate financial losses but leave workers out in the cold would deepen the looming recession that sparked them, a University of Illinois labor expert warns.

Displaced workers with no paychecks or prospects could add a potentially catastrophic drag to a U.S. economy already facing its worst downturn in decades, says Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld, the dean of the School of Labor and Employment Relations.