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work to disrupt the mitochondria to push cell death." Heaney says that the amount of DHA used in the experiments resulted in an intracellular buildup similar to what could be |
seen in cancer patients using large supplemental doses of vitamin C. Researchers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center have long been researching the connection between vitamin C and cancer therapy, and |
these new findings expand on their earlier observation that vitamin C seems to accumulate within cancer cells more than in normal cells. "We recognized that DHA is the form of |
vitamin C that gets into cells, and that the tumor microenvironment allows cancer cells to convert more vitamin C into DHA," he said. "Inside the cell, DHA is converted back |
into ascorbic acid, and it gets trapped there and so is available to safeguard the cell." Heaney says that he suspects that vitamin C is good for the cells of |
normal tissue because it provides more protection for the mitochondria, and thus probably extends cell life. "But that isn't what you want when you are trying to eliminate cancer cells," |
said Heaney, who notes that cancer patients should eat a healthy diet, which includes foods rich in vitamin C. It is use of large doses of over-the-counter vitamin C that |
is worrisome, he says. Other social bookmarking and sharing tools: Note: Materials may be edited for content and length. For further information, please contact the source cited above. Note: If |
Nov. 8, 2010 Astronomers have discovered a new way of locating a natural phenomenon that acts like a zoom lens and allows astronomers to peer at galaxies in the distant and early Universe. These results are from the very first data taken as part of the "Herschel-ATLAS" project, the largest imaging survey conducted so far with the European Space Agency's Herschel Space Observatory, and |
are published in the journal Science. The magnification allows astronomers to see galaxies otherwise hidden from us when the Universe was only a few billion years old. This provides key insights into how galaxies have changed over the history of the cosmos. Dr Loretta Dunne from the School of Physics and Astronomy at The University of Nottingham is joint-leader of the Herschel-ATLAS survey. Dr |
Dunne said: "What we've seen so far is just the tip of the iceberg. Wide area surveys are essential for finding these rare events and since Herschel has only covered one thirtieth of the entire Herschel-ATLAS area so far, we expect to discover hundreds of lenses once we have all the data. Once found, we can probe the early Universe on the same physical |
scales as we can in galaxies next door. "The data from the area of sky used for this work has now been released to the astronomical community and we hope that now astronomers not directly involved in H-ATLAS will dive into this data set and exploit the wealth of science which is bursting to be done with it." A century ago Albert Einstein showed |
that gravity can cause light to bend. The effect is normally extremely small, and it is only when light passes close to a very massive object such as a galaxy containing hundreds of billions of stars that the results become easily noticeable. When light from a very distant object passes a galaxy much closer to us, its path can be bent in such a |
way that the image of the distant galaxy is magnified and distorted. These alignment events are called "gravitational lenses" and many have been discovered over recent decades, mainly at visible and radio wavelengths. As with a normal glass lens the alignment is crucial, requiring the position of the lens -- in this case a galaxy -- to be just right. This is very rare |
and astronomers have to rely on chance alignments, often involving sifting through large amounts of data from telescopes. Most methods of searching for gravitational lenses have a very poor success rate with fewer than one in 10 candidates typically being found to be real. Herschel looks at far-infrared light, which is emitted not by stars, but by the gas and dust from which they |
form. Its panoramic imaging cameras have allowed astronomers to find examples of these lenses by scanning large areas of the sky in far-infrared and sub-millimetre light. Dr Mattia Negrello, of the Open University and lead researcher of the study, said: "Our survey of the sky looks for sources of sub-millimetre light. The big breakthrough is that we have discovered that many of the brightest |
sources are being magnified by lenses, which means that we no longer have to rely on the rather inefficient methods of finding lenses which are used at visible and radio wavelengths." The Herschel-ATLAS images contain thousands of galaxies, most so far away that the light has taken billions of years to reach us. Dr Negrello and his team investigated five surprisingly bright objects in |
this small patch of sky. Looking at the positions of these bright objects with optical telescopes on the Earth, they found galaxies that would not normally be bright at the far-infrared wavelengths observed by Herschel. This led them to suspect that the galaxies seen in visible light might be gravitational lenses magnifying much more distant galaxies seen by Herschel. To find the true distances |
to the Herschel sources, Negrello and his team looked for a tell-tale signature of molecular gas. Using radio and sub-millimetre telescopes on the ground, they showed that this signature implies the galaxies are being seen as they were when the Universe was just 2-4 billion years old -- less than a third of its current age. The galaxies seen by the optical telescopes are |
much closer, each ideally positioned to create a gravitational lens. Dr Negrello commented that "previous searches for magnified galaxies have targeted clusters of galaxies where the huge mass of the cluster makes the gravitational lensing effect unavoidable. Our results show that gravitational lensing is at work in not just a few, but in all of the distant and bright galaxies seen by Herschel." The |
magnification provided by these cosmic zoom lenses allows astronomers to study much fainter galaxies, and in more detail than would otherwise be possible. They are the key to understanding how the building blocks of the Universe have changed since they were in their infancy. Professor Rob Ivison of the Royal Observatory, Edinburgh, part of the team that created the images, said "This relatively simple |
technique promises to unlock the secrets of how galaxies like our Milky Way formed and evolved. Not only does the lensing allow us to find them very efficiently, but it helps us peer within them to figure out how the individual pieces of the jigsaw came together, back in the mists of time." Professor Steve Eales from Cardiff University and the other leader of |
the survey added: "We can also use this technique to study the lenses themselves. This is exciting because 80 per cent of the matter in the Universe is thought to be dark matter, which does not absorb, reflect or emit light and so can't be seen directly with our telescopes. With the large number of gravitational lenses that we'll get from our full survey, |
we'll really be able to get to grips with this hidden Universe." The University of Nottingham has broad research portfolio but has also identified and badged 13 research priority groups, in which a concentration of expertise, collaboration and resources create significant critical mass. Key research areas at Nottingham include energy, drug discovery, global food security, biomedical imaging, advanced manufacturing, integrating global society, operations in |
a digital world, and science, technology & society. Through these groups, Nottingham researchers will continue to make a major impact on global challenges. Other social bookmarking and sharing tools: - M. Negrello, R. Hopwood, G. De Zotti, A. Cooray, A. Verma, J. Bock, D. T. Frayer, M. A. Gurwell, A. Omont, R. Neri, H. Dannerbauer, L. L. Leeuw, E. Barton, J. Cooke, S. Kim, |
E. da Cunha, G. Rodighiero, P. Cox, D. G. Bonfield, M. J. Jarvis, S. Serjeant, R. J. Ivison, S. Dye, I. Aretxaga, D. H. Hughes, E. Ibar, F. Bertoldi, I. Valtchanov, S. Eales, L. Dunne, S. P. Driver, R. Auld, S. Buttiglione, A. Cava, C. A. Grady, D. L. Clements, A. Dariush, J. Fritz, D. Hill, J. B. Hornbeck, L. Kelvin, G. Lagache, M. |
Lopez-Caniego, J. Gonzalez-Nuevo, S. Maddox, E. Pascale, M. Pohlen, E. E. Rigby, A. Robotham, C. Simpson, D. J. B. Smith, P. Temi, M. A. Thompson, B. E. Woodgate, D. G. York, J. E. Aguirre, A. Beelen, A. Blain, A. J. Baker, M. Birkinshaw, R. Blundell, C. M. Bradford, D. Burgarella, L. Danese, J. S. Dunlop, S. Fleuren, J. Glenn, A. I. Harris, J. Kamenetzky, |
R. E. Lupu, R. J. Maddalena, B. F. Madore, P. R. Maloney, H. Matsuhara, M. J. Michaowski, E. J. Murphy, B. J. Naylor, H. Nguyen, C. Popescu, S. Rawlings, D. Rigopoulou, D. Scott, K. S. Scott, M. Seibert, I. Smail, R. J. Tuffs, J. D. Vieira, P. P. van der Werf, J. Zmuidzinas. The Detection of a Population of Submillimeter-Bright, Strongly Lensed Galaxies. Science, |
Oct. 1, 2012 Whether human or baboon, it helps to have friends. For both species, studies have shown that robust social networks lead to better health and longer lives. Now, |
a team of University of Pennsylvania researchers has helped show that baboon personality plays a role in these outcomes, and, like people, some baboons' personalities are better suited to making |
and keeping friends than others. The research was conducted by psychology professor Robert Seyfarth and biology professor Dorothy Cheney, both of Penn's School of Arts and Sciences. They collaborated with |
the Arizona State University's Joan Silk. Their work was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Seyfarth and Cheney, along with their colleagues and students, have spent |
the last 17 years observing a group of baboons living in the Moremi Game Reserve in Botswana, studying the biological roots of their social dynamics. As with many other primates, |
baboon societies are strongly hierarchical. Females "inherit" their dominance ranks from their mothers and enjoy priority of access to food and mates. But high-ranking females do not always have greater |
reproductive success than low-ranking females. This suggests that, when it comes to evolutionary success, the inherited advantage of high rank can't explain everything. "If you look at a baboon society," |
Seyfarth said, "and see the ranked, matrilineal families, you would think that whatever traits put an individual at the top of the hierarchy, that's what natural selection is going to |
favor. But that turns out not to be the case. "In fact, dominance rank is not as good a predictor of reproductive outcomes as a close network of social relationships |
and stable relationships over time. So our question became 'What predicts having a strong network?'" Baboon females actively work to maintain close social bonds, but, like humans, some baboons seemed |
to be better at it than others. With such traits closely tied to fitness and reproductive success, the Penn researchers wanted to get at the root of this variation. During |
seven years of observations in the animals' natural habitat, the researchers measured individual female baboons on their sociability. They measured the number of grooming partners a baboon had, as well |
her tendency to be friendly or aggressive toward others. They also measured reproductive and fitness benefits they accrued: how long individuals and their offspring lived, as well as their stress |
levels, as determined by the presence of certain hormones in their droppings. The researchers found that strength of an individual's social bonds was not fully predicted by seemingly obvious factors, |
such as the female's rank or the size of the family she was born into. "Even when a female has a lot of relatives," Cheney said, "sometimes she's a loner, |
but some females who have no relatives do just fine. It suggests that you have to be both lucky and skilled to have these networks." And, again like humans, these |
skills came down to individual personality traits. To determine a female's personality, the researchers paid close attention to grunting behavior. For baboons, grunting greases the social wheels. If a lower-ranking |
female grunts when approaching a higher-ranking female, the grunt acts as a kind of appeasement, reducing the chance of receiving aggression. Conversely, if a higher-ranking female grunts to a lower-ranking |
female, the grunt puts her at ease, increasing the chance of a friendly social interaction. And females of all ranks grunt when approaching a mother with an infant, because grunts |
increase the likelihood that the mother will allow the grunter to interact with her child. Working bottom up from the trends they found in the baboon's behavior, the researchers grouped |
the baboons into three distinct personality profiles: "nice," "aloof" and "loner." Nice females were friendly to all others and often grunted to lower-ranking females to signal reassurance. They formed strong |
and enduring social bonds with fairly consistent partner preferences over time. Aloof females were more aggressive and less friendly, and they grunted primarily to higher-ranking females who had infants. They |
formed weaker bonds but had very consistent partner preferences. Loner females were often alone and relatively unfriendly; they grunted primarily to appease higher-ranking females without infants. They formed weak bonds |
with changing partners. Of the three, the loners had the highest stress levels, the weakest social bonds and the least stable social partners over time. Both of these measures were |
correlated with lower offspring survival and shorter lifespans. Both nice and aloof females showed the health and reproductive benefits associated with strong social bonds. "This belies the idea that everything |
is competition and conflict," Cheney said. While the mechanisms that make both "nice" and "aloof" effective strategies remains unclear, the study shows that cooperative personalities are adaptive. "These results have |
allowed us to, for the first time in a wild primate, link personality characteristics, social skill and reproductive success," Seyfarth said. "By being a nice baboon, you increase the likelihood |
of having strong social bonds, which in turn translates to a better chance of passing on your genes." The research was supported by the National Institutes of Health, Leakey Foundation |
Central Arizona Project The Central Arizona Project (CAP) is a 336-mile long system of aqueducts, tunnels, pumping plants and pipelines and is the largest single resource of renewable water supplies |
in the state of Arizona. The system designed to bring about 1.5 million acre-feet of Colorado River water per year to water users in Pima, Pinal and Maricopa counties. CAP |
carries water from Lake Havasu near Parker to the southern boundary of the San Xavier Indian Reservation southwest of Tucson. The primary purpose of the CAP is to help Arizona |
conserve its groundwater supplies by importing surface water from the Colorado River, whose supply is renewed yearly by rainfall and snowmelt. The water significantly reduces reliance on groundwater sources. The |
City’s current CAP allocation is approximately 81,281 acre-feet. This represents approximately two-thirds of the City’s total water supply at build-out. The City began using CAP water in 1987. CAP water |
LESSER KNOWN LAWS OF PHYSICS AND MATHEMATICS The Einstenian Hillbilly Theory of Marriage: It’s all relative. Fermat’s First Theorem: The one he made in pre-school that showed why bullies are idiots. The High School Uncertainty Principle: You can never simultaneously tell how fast you should be moving in a relationship or at what position you are currently in. Central Limit |
Theorem as Applied To Dancing: In large populations, the drunkest people tend to congregate in the middle of the dance floor. Law of Large Numbers as Applied to Nerds: Just because that girl will go out on a date with you doesn’t mean you got skills. That’s called luck. Ohm’s Law as Applied to Relationships: You are currently in a |
Farm Bill + Global Ag Report = Deeper Ag Policy Stories On Apr. 15, 2008, an international group of more than 400 agricultural scientists and experts released a major report on the outlook for global agriculture - really a series of reports. The nut graph: If government, industry, and farmers don't halt environmentally harmful farming processes, chronic food scarcity will become a way of |
life for more people than ever before. The skyrocketing of prices for basic food commodities has complex causes that go beyond environmental degradation and ag policy itself- climate change, the energy crunch, and a weakening dollar, to name just a few. But as food riots become more common, "more of the same" policies do not seem to be working. - International Assessment of Agricultural |
Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development, release. Press: +44 (0) 20 7608. Announcement webcast. Report downloads. - On Apr. 21, 2008, ENN.com published a good overview of this report and the issues it raises. The report recommends immediate and fundamental change not just to agricultural practices, but also social policy and economics. An Apr. 29, 2008, Des Moines Register letter to the editor by |
reader Patrick Bosold sums it up fairly well: "This report was commissioned in partnership with the United Nations after a group of biotech companies asked the World Bank what it thought of genetic-engineering technology as an agricultural strategy for developing countries. The IAASTD Global Report roundly rejects biotechnology and modern-industrial farming as a viable solution to the problems of soaring food prices, hunger, social |
injustice and environmental degradation. The IAASTD report calls for a major paradigm shift that would place strong focus on small-scale farming and agro-ecological farming methods to feed local communities, address social inequities and protect the environment while scaling back energy-intensive, chemical agriculture and addressing trade imbalances that hurt the rural poor." Meanwhile in Congress, the Farm Bill debate is finally heating up after last |
November's Senate stalemate. The bill is now in conference, with meetings held this week. - House Committee on Agriculture, Farm Bill info. Release. Press: April Demert Slayton, 202-225-6872; and Scott Kuschmider, 202-225-1496. - Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry. Farm bill documents. Press: 202-224-2035. - Open Congress info on Farm bill: Senate (S 2302). House (H 2419). In the US, both the farm |
bill and global food crisis are getting significant news coverage - including a major Washington Post multimedia series, currently in progress. However, the new IAASTD reports could add an interesting new wrinkle for environmental reporters - perhaps on the level of how the IPCC reports shaped public discourse and news coverage of global warming. Here are a range of perspectives worth considering as you |
flesh out these angles: - CropLife America, a major pesticide and biotech trade organization, has strongly criticized and questioned IAASTD's findings and recommendations. Rex A. Runyon, 202-872-3884. - In January 2008, the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (a "national alliance of family farm, rural, and conservation organizations supporting long-term economic and environmental sustainability of agriculture, natural resources, and rural communities") published five Farm Bill fact sheets |
in Grist.org. It includes a matrix comparing the House and Senate Bill versions. Press: Aimee Witteman, 202-547-5754. - The blog FarmPolicy.com (produced by experienced ag journalists) provides an excellent ongoing overview and analysis of current farm bill developments. - A harsh economic criticism of IAASTD reports ran in the Apr. 25 Toronto Globe & Mail by Douglas Southgate, OH State Univ. professor of agricultural |
Posted on Jun 25, 2012 | Comments 0 Cognitive therapy for depression is one of the most effective ways to combat this mood disorder. Cognitive therapy is a type of psychotherapy developed by psychiatrist Aaron T Beck in the 1960s. It is widely used today for resolving mood disorders in |
conjunction with medications or when patients do not respond to medication. What is cognitive therapy for depression? The way that depression is thought to work is like this: certain false self-belief influence moods and hence behaviors. So it is negative thoughts that lead to a bad mood, a person’s sense |
of self, their physical state and their behavior. It works on the belief that distortions of thought processes and beliefs are what give rise to depression and not unconscious forces (the Freudian theory). The aim of cognitive therapy is to change negative self-belief and replace that with positive self-belief and |
mainly to replace negative thoughts with positive ones. Cognitive therapy for depression is an option for those who have tried pharmacological interventions but found them to be unsuccessful. Or it is a desire to avoid drugs that makes some people opt for this treatment if it is compatible with the |
type of depression they have. This therapy is also effective for adolescents with depression. How cognitive therapy for depression works According to Aaron Beck, depressed people are depressed because they have acquired a negative aspect of the world in their childhood and/or adolescence. It could have been early life incidents |
such as a bereavement (such as the loss of a parent or other important person), bullying, abuse, harsh criticism from an authority figure such as a teacher or parent, rejection by peers, negative parental attitude that could lead to depression later in life. So events that resemble those past traumas |
even slightly are likely to trigger negativity in the person and that they are likely to view the world, themselves and their future in a negative way. For instance, a person who has depressive tendencies may blame themselves for everything that happens. “I am not good enough” or “I will |
never be good enough” is the refrain. So cognitive therapy for depression works to change this dysfunctional thinking and change it to positive thinking. The therapist will try and reorient the depressed person’s thought processes to more positive and realistic ones. The “problems” as perceived by the individual are disassembled |
In keeping with the Azusa Unified School District's emphasis on healthy living, each of the district's schools spent the week decked out in red and hosted various events for Red Ribbon Week. Established by Congress in 1988, Red Ribbon Week aims to raise awareness of the personal and community impact |
of drug use. Families and community leaders are encouraged to promote drug-free lifestyles and the red ribbons are a reminder of the commitment to reduce drug use in the community. Red Ribbon Week was inspired after the 1985 death of Drug Enforcement Administration Special Agent Enrique Camarena, who was killed |
by drug traffickers. Residents from his hometown of Calexico began wearing the ribbons as a symbol of their stance against illegal drugs. For the students at Powell Elementary, Red Ribbon Week started off with an interactive presentation on addictive substances. "We talk about how to respond to certain choices the |
students will face as they get older," said Steve Acosta, a recovery specialist at the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence in Covina. "At that age group, they don't know a lot about drugs so we don't want to expose them to drugs, we focus on gateway drugs" like |
alcohol and tobacco. The students learned about refusal skills and even went over a role-play scenario of issues that they might actually face. At a "slumber party sleep over," the students role-played saying no to cigarettes. "The questions the students "For being so young, they had a lot of real |
questions." The NCADD is an organization that promotes prevention and awareness of alcoholism and drug dependence. Outreach programs target both students and their families and cover everything from anger management to unruly teenagers, Acosta said. To learn more about NCADD, go to ncadd.org or call 626-331-5316. "It's better to target |
younger children because people don't tell them anything, but they watch TV or hear songs that promote drug use," he said. "When all of their friends are using drugs and they know it's wrong, they end up regretting it later." |
Nihewan basin is famous for its lacustrine deposits, animal fauna and occupied evidence of early humans. All of the discovered Palaeolithic sites are distributed along ancient lakeside or on the terraces of the Sangganhe river and its tributaries. However, the authors discovered a stone flake from the central part of the ancient Nihewan lake in an outcrop section on the right bank of the |
and a fresh plane formed along a joint. The flake is unearthed at 50.73 m under the lacustrine platform surface in perfectly laminated beds of Mid-Pleistocene. The feafures of the flake do not rule out the possibility of natural origin. But combined with the sedimentary features of the horizon where it is unearthed, the most reasonable explanation is that the flake may be the |
Ed note: Today’s story is the second of two in which Brandale look at how the educational system is failing black students, which does not bode well for the younger generation’s future success. Part 1 examined the damage to income and homeownership for the Black middle class. Based on recently released reports, there is a slim chance that many Black children will be able |
to join or increase the size of the Black Middle Class. Becoming lower middle class is the bare minimum for the standard of life that anyone would wish for these children but it is a bar that can be set. The lowest level of income to be considered middle class is around $35,000. In many major cities an annual income of $35,000 per year |
is barely enough to make ends meet or to feed a family of four. For a single person, it should be enough to maintain a certain level of self-sufficiency. This lower middle class threshold of $35,000 is a level of income that should be attainable through earning a college diploma. However, since most entry-level positions that pay a wage or a annual salary equivalent |
to $35,000 per year require at least a college degree, the focus must be placed on education. Let look at how this develops through the grades… Around fourth grade is when many students will begin to form the foundation of their education through reading and math. In these two areas, black children and particular black boys have fallen woefully behind. Based on the Call |
for Change Report, only 11 percent of Black boys in the fourth grade can read at or above grade level. In fact, the average reading test score was almost even to the scores of severely disabled white male children. Hopefully over time, these children can catch up to their comparts but the mental scarring is occurring now. How can 89 percent of these boys |
be asked to compete when these scores and possibly their environment has painted them at 8 or 9 years old as dumbest of all of the kids? Will they even want to learn how to read? How many of the kids will be pressed to keep trying and how many will simple give up? In ten years what will this generation of kids be |
like? In five years, the Black eight graders will be young adults. Sadly, according to the Call for Change report, only 8 percent of black males are reading at or above an eighth grade level. Eight grade black females scored much better than both black and Hispanic males but still below Hispanic females. Ninety-two percent of this generation is falling woefully behind. The mental |
scarring seems to be settling in when these children are around 14. In two more years, how many will drop out? How many will continue and push through? 16 Year Olds However, education is not the only indicator for success. Early signs of work ethic can also be an indicator of success during adulthood. Typically, many successful people began working and earning a wage |
around the age of 16. While many teenagers began working by getting jobs, during this past summer the unemployment rate among blacks aged 16 to 18 years old averaged 57 percent. Did many of these children even apply for jobs? Did they have to compete for jobs with their adult counterparts? Or more importantly, did these children even want to work? Work ethic typically |
comes from what children are being shown at home. However, according to US Census report on poverty, 43 percent of black children live in homes where neither parent has a full time or year round place of employment. Children imitate what they see. If the parents and adults in these households are struggling to find full time year round employment, what are they to |
perceive about their prospects for doing the same? The most recent unemployment rate for all blacks was 17.3 percent. That is, 17.3 percent of Blacks qualify for unemployment benefits, but one has to wonder how many blacks are not working and don’t qualify for unemployment benefits. Who will they want to grow up to be if very few people in their households are working? |
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