Bush did good?
Friday, Jul. 11, 2008
By BRYAN WALSH
You don't have to be a marine biologist to understand the importance of corals — just ask any diver. The tiny underwater creatures are the architects of the beautiful, electric-colored coral reefs that lie in shallow tropical waters around the world. Divers swarm to them not merely for their intrinsic beauty, but because the reefs play host to a wealth of biodiversity unlike anywhere else in the underwater world. Coral reefs are home to more than 25% of total marine species. Take out the corals, and there are no reefs — remove the reefs, and entire ecosystems collapse.
Unfortunately, that's exactly what appears to be happening around the world. According to a comprehensive survey by the Global Marine Species Assessment (GMSA) published Thursday in Science, one-third of the more than 700 species of reef-building corals are threatened with extinction. Compare that to a decade ago, when only 2% of corals were endangered. Using criteria established by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature — a group that publishes an annual Red List of threatened animals — that makes corals the most endangered species on the Earth. The assessment's results, presented at the annual International Coral Reef Symposium in Fort Lauderdale, come just a week after the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced that more than half of the coral reef ecosystems in U.S. territory are in fair or poor condition. "We're losing the coral in the coral reef," said William Platt, a coral reef expert with NOAA.
The causes of the coral's demise are manifold, but they all come back to one culprit: us. Overfishing — especially the kind that uses dynamite or poison to kill whole schools of fish — destroys the coral directly, while polluted runoff from agriculture simply chokes them. Development in booming coastal economies from the Caribbean to Southeast Asia further threaten the delicate reefs. Tourism — in the form of diving and snorkeling — can also cause damage. As with so many other endangered species around the world, there doesn't seem to be enough space for healthy coral reefs and unchecked human development. "It's just a litany of bad actions," says Brian Huse, the executive director of the Coral Reef Alliance. "Over the past 35 to 50 years, we've lost 25% of our reefs worldwide. Put it altogether, and you can see why."
Disease plays a role as well, with whole coral colonies wiped out by sudden sickness. That rise in illness may be linked to warmer sea temperatures, which is caused by climate change. And it's global warming that poses the most serious threat to the survival of coral. Corals have a symbiotic relationship with a kind of algae that provide nutrients and energy through photosynthesis — not to mention the vivid colors we associate with coral reefs. When corals are stressed by rising temperatures, the algae are expelled by the coral, turning the reefs bone white. That's a "bleaching event," and bleached coral are left weakened and defenseless against disease. Increased carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere also lead to more acidic seas, which impairs the ability of corals to form their skeletal reefs. (In acidic water, the reefs simply dissolve.) "Corals appear to be particularly sensitive to the buildup of CO2," says Kent Carpenter, the lead author of the Science study and the director of GMSA. "The corals will be the canary in the coal mine in terms of the effect climate change will have on our oceans."
In one way, protecting the coral is not that different from protecting any endangered species. First, we need to cut back on activities that ruin their habitat, the shallow waters close to our coast. Agricultural runoff — already responsible for the oceanic "dead zones" seen in the Gulf of Mexico and other heavily built up coasts — has to be curtailed, as does the senselessly destructive fishing practices that have us tossing dynamite or poison into the waters. One of the best strategies is to expand the range of territory protected by marine reserves — national parks of the deep. And here the Bush Administration — usually anything but environmental — deserves real credit. With a stroke of a pen in 2006, President George W. Bush created the Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, a 140,000 sq. mi. protected area northwest of Hawaii. Larger than every other national park in the U.S. combined, the monument protects 10% of the shallow coral reef habitat in U.S. territory. These kind of reserves need to be expanded, to limit the influence of human activity on delicate corals.
But we could make the entire ocean into a marine park and still lose the coral, if we can't stop climate change. As temperatures rise in the ocean, bleaching events will become more and more common. According to a study published in Science late last year, if CO2 levels continue rising unabated, by 2100 coral could be utterly extinct. "If we can't contain the CO2 problem and enact strong coral reef conservation measures, we will lose them," says Carpenter. The depressing fate of the coral could be a reminder that climate change has the power to undo all the work of wildlife conservation over the past century — if we let it.
Andy warhol said “I Want 2 Be Plastic”
Andy warhol said “I Want 2 Be Plastic”
Well, if he were alive today he would be very happy then....
A vast swath of the Pacific, twice the size of Texas, is full of a plastic stew that is entering the food chain. Scientists say these toxins are causing obesity, infertility...and worse.
The more invisible and ubiquitous the pollution, the more likely it will end up inside us. And there’s growing—and disturbing—proof that we’re ingesting plastic toxins constantly, and that even slight doses of these substances can severely disrupt gene activity. “Every one of us has this huge body burden,” Moore says. “You could take your serum to a lab now, and they’d find at least 100 industrial chemicals that weren’t around in 1950.” The fact that these toxins don’t cause violent and immediate reactions does not mean they’re benign: Scientists are just beginning to research the long-term ways in which the chemicals used to make plastic interact with our own biochemistry.
As if the potential for cancer and mutation weren’t enough, Dr. vom Saal states in one of his studies that “prenatal exposure to very low doses of BPA increases the rate of postnatal growth in mice and rats.” In other words, BPA made rodents fat. Their insulin output surged wildly and then crashed into a state of resistance—the virtual definition of diabetes. They produced bigger fat cells, and more of them. A recent scientific paper Dr. vom Saal coauthored contains this chilling sentence: “These findings suggest that developmental exposure to BPA is contributing to the obesity epidemic that has occurred during the last two decades in the developed world, associated with the dramatic increase in the amount of plastic being produced each year.” Given this, it is perhaps not entirely coincidental that America’s staggering rise in diabetes—a 735 percent increase since 1935—follows the same arc.
Please take the tme to read the full 6 page article HERE
you’ll be amazed (and a lil depressed) and then inspired
2 learn the truth about recycling? CLICK HERE
Pull Your Tongue Sugar
Grab a paper towel, use it to grip the tip of your tongue, then pull forward. This stimulates your vagus nerve, which runs from your brain to your stomach, where, when irritated, it causes your diaphragm to spasm.
“Stimulating this nerve causes the daphragm to relax ending the hiccup reflex” says Cuckoo Choudhary, MD, an assistant professor of gastroenterology at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia.
Other Ways of stimulating the vagus nerve include massaging your eyeballs through closed eylids and pouring a teaspoon of sugar onto the back of your tongue, where sour is tasted.
while we’re on SUGAR
My mom has always told me that cinnamon was good for me and my blood sugar. And apparently there is quite a bit of research to back this up.
I just read a story about a recent study conducted by researchers at Malmö University Hospital in Sweden. Their research showed that adding cinnamon to a dessert reduced the post-meal blood sugar spike. They had volunteers consume 300 grams of rice pudding (1.3 cups) with and without 6 grams of cinnamon (just over 1 teaspoon). Each volunteer's blood sugar was measure before and after eating the plain and cinnamon pudding.
Their research and conclusions were published in the June 2007 issue of American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. The full title of the article is a mouthful..."Effect of cinnamon on postprandial blood glucose, gastric emptying, and satiety in healthy subjects."
High-fructose corn syrup: Why is it so bad for me?
High-fructose corn syrup is a sweetener and preservative used in many processed foods. It is made by changing the sugar in cornstarch to fructose — another form of sugar.
High-fructose corn syrup extends the shelf life of foods and is sweeter and cheaper than sugar. For these reasons, it has become a popular ingredient in many sodas, fruit-flavored drinks and other processed foods. Check your food labels. You may be surprised by how many foods contain high-fructose corn syrup.
Some nutrition experts blame increased consumption of high-fructose corn syrup for the growing obesity problem. One theory is that fructose is more readily converted to fat by your liver than is sucrose, increasing the levels of fat in your bloodstream. But this hasn't been proved.
In addition, animal studies have shown a link between increased consumption of high-fructose corn syrup and adverse health effects, such as diabetes and high cholesterol. However, the evidence is not as clear in human studies.
Despite the lack of clarity in research, the fact remains that Americans consume large quantities of high-fructose corn syrup in the form of soft drinks, fruit-flavored beverages and other processed foods. These types of foods are often high in calories and low in nutritional value. This fact alone is reason to be cautious about foods containing high-fructose corn syrup.
To reduce high-fructose corn syrup in your diet, read food labels. Avoid or limit foods that contain high-fructose corn syrup. Some other easy tips for cutting back on high-fructose corn syrup include:
• Buy 100 percent fruit juice instead of fruit-flavored drinks.
• Choose fresh fruit instead of fruit juices. Even 100 percent fruit juice has a high concentration of sugar.
• Choose fruit canned in its own juices instead of heavy syrup.
• Cut back on soda.
Everlasting Lightbulb
Energy: Researchers have developed an environmentally friendly light bulb that uses very little energy and should never need changing
ALTHOUGH
it symbolises a bright idea, the traditional
incandescent light bulb is a dud. It wastes huge
amounts of electricity, radiating 95% of the
energy it consumes as heat rather than light. Its
life is also relatively short, culminating in a
dull pop as its filament fractures. Now a team of
researchers has devised a light bulb that is not
only much more energy-efficient—it is also
expected to last longer than the devices into
which it is inserted. Moreover, the lamp could be
used for rear-projection televisions as well as
general illumination.
The
trick to a longer life, for light bulbs at least,
is to ensure that the lamp has no electrodes.
Although electrodes are undeniably convenient for
plugging bulbs directly into the lighting system,
they are also the main reason why lamps fail. The
electrodes wear out. They can react chemically
with the gas inside the light bulb, making it
grow dimmer. They are also difficult to seal into
the structure of the bulb, making the rupture of
these seals another potential source of failure.
Scientists working for Ceravision, a company
based in Milton Keynes, in Britain, have designed
a new form of lamp that eliminates the need for
electrodes. Their device uses microwaves to
transform electricity into light. It consists of
a relatively small lump of aluminium oxide into
which a hole has been bored. When the aluminium
oxide is bombarded with microwaves generated from
the same sort of device that powers a microwave
oven, a concentrated electric field is created
inside the void.
If
a cylindrical capsule containing a suitable gas
is inserted into the hole, the atoms of the gas
become ionised. As electrons accelerate in the
electric field, they gain energy that they pass
on to the atoms and molecules of the gas as they
collide with them, creating a glowing plasma. The
resulting light is bright, and the process is
energy-efficient. Indeed, whereas traditional
light bulbs emit just 5% of their energy as
light, and fluorescent tubes about 15%, the
Ceravision lamp has an efficiency greater than
50%.
Because the lamp has no filament, the scientists
who developed it think it will last for thousands
of hours of use—in other words, for decades.
Moreover, the light it generates comes from what
is almost a single point, which means that the
bulbs can be used in projectors and televisions.
Because of this, the light is much more
directional and the lamp could thus prove more
efficient than bulbs that scatter light in all
directions. Its long life would make the new
light ideal for buildings in which the
architecture makes changing light bulbs
complicated and expensive. The lamps' small size
makes them comparable to light-emitting diodes
but the new lamp generates much brighter light
than those semiconductor devices do. A single
microwave generator can be used to power several
lamps.
Another environmental advantage of the new design
is that it does not need mercury, a highly toxic
metal found in most of the bulbs used today,
including energy-saving fluorescent bulbs,
fluorescent tubes and the high-pressure bulbs
used in projectors. And Ceravision also reckons
it should be cheap to make. With lighting
accounting for some 20% of electricity use
worldwide, switching to a more efficient system
could both save energy and reduce emissions of
climate-changing greenhouse gases.
