The BA Science News Digest - 3 November 2006
This week: the UK gets a Stern warning over global warming, the pioneer of DNA testing expresses his concerns and a key cot death contributor is revealed. Plus, the Hubble telescope gets a reprieve and the footie fans were right all along...
Dominating the news at the start of the week was the publication of the Stern Review. The 700-page report by economist Sir Nicholas Stern, suggests that global warming could shrink the global economy by a fifth but forecasts that it would cost just 1 per cent of the global gross domestic product to take effective action against climate change now. BBC News highlighted the review’s warnings that inaction could result in the displacement of 100 million people due to flooding, water shortages for 1 in 6 of the world’s population, the extinction of up to 40 per cent of the world’s species, and the potential creation by droughts of tens or even hundreds of millions of “climate refugees”. Tony Blair stressed the importance of the report and the disastrous consequences for the planet if we do not take action now. And Sir Nicholas told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, “Unless it’s international, we will not make the reductions on the scale which will be required.” Chancellor Gordon Brown promised that the UK would lead this international effort.
Meanwhile, the Guardian reported that Britain will send Sir Nicholas to lobby American politicians and business people at the end of the year, in an effort to make them understand, and act on, the urgent need to cut carbon emissions.
The Guardian reported that, as part of the battle against climate change, the government is looking into the possibility of banning traditional lightbulbs. The energy-saving alternatives last up to 12 times longer, on average, according to the Energy Saving Trust. Environment minister Ian Pearson told the Commons, “The government is pressing the European commission to make lightbulbs a priority for regulatory action under the recently agreed eco-design of energy-using products framework directive. Our current assessment is that, by removing ordinary incandescent lightbulbs (GLS bulbs) from the UK market and encouraging sales of the most efficient alternatives, we could avoid approximately 1m tonnes of carbon emissions per year by 2020."
Another stark warning was issued this week: if the current rates of fishing continue, by 2048 the world’s seafood stocks will have collapsed. The Daily Telegraph reported that a four-year study of 7,800 marine species around the world has concluded that the long-term trend is clear and predictable. The study was conducted by an international group of ecologists and economists and the results published in Science. The decline of individual species was found to impact on entire ecosystems. In twelve regions, including the shallow part of the North Sea, 29 per cent of exploited marine species had collapsed since 1950. However, one of the scientists involved in the research said there was evidence that wherever protective measures were taken, species recovered rapidly and could cope better with problems such as climate change.
As the Nuffield Council on Bioethics announced that it would carry out a public consultation on legislation relating to the storage of DNA material, Sir Alec Jeffreys, the pioneer who developed DNA testing in the 1980s, revealed his concerns about the national DNA database. Introduced over ten years ago, the database contains 3.6 million entries and is the largest in the world. The Times reported that Sir Jeffreys considers the database “discriminatory”, being socioeconomically and ethnically skewed. And, whereas the tool was intended to catch reoffending criminals, the database now contained samples from “hundreds of thousands of entirely innocent people”. A Home Office report issued in January showed that samples from 139,463 people who had never been charged or cautioned over an offence were on the database. Sir Bob Hepple QC, chairman of the Nuffield Council said, “We want to hear the public’s views on whether storing the DNA profiles of victims and suspects who are later not charged, or acquitted, is justified by the need to fight crime.”
In other news, the Times reported that scientists may have discovered the underlying cause of cot death (also know as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome). A US team examined post-mortem samples from the brainstems of 31 babies who had suffered a cot death, and compared them with samples from ten babies who had died of other causes. This part of the brain is responsible for controlling breathing, heart-rate and temperature, among other things. The cot-death babies examined had double the number of brain cells that manufacture or use serotonin than the other babies, while their serotonin-using cells had significantly fewer serotonin receptors. The researchers hypothesize that the babies with defects in their serotonin system have an impaired ability to detect and respond to high carbon dioxide levels and low oxygen levels, and do not respond to increased carbon dioxide levels by waking, turning over and breathing more quickly, in the way other babies would.
Also this week, NASA announced that the Hubble telescope will be upgraded. Launched in 1990, the orbiting observatory has provided us with amazing pictures of the cosmos, but would be unlikely to last more than a few years if it was not serviced. The US space agency has now said that it is safe to send a crew to work on Hubble, thanks to recent modifications to the shuttle launch system, following the Columbia shuttle disaster in 2003. The mission will replace the batteries and gyroscopes used to aim the telescope, and also install two new instruments which will improve the telescope’s ability to probe faint, distant objects, reported BBC News. The shuttle is expected to launch in 2008 and extend Hubble’s orbital lifetime to at least 2013.
And finally...
If you are a football fan, you may long have suspected it, but now the proof is in: referees’ really are biased towards the home team. A study, to be published in the Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, looked at 2,660 matches over seven seasons. It revealed that players from away teams are more likely to receive yellow or red cards. However, not everyone was impressed with the research: in the Guardian, former top referee Jeff Winter said of the study, "It doesn't tell me anything. I'm sure they had fun watching the matches, but it does not need a university graduate to work out that home teams usually do best."
Dominating the news at the start of the week was the publication of the Stern Review. The 700-page report by economist Sir Nicholas Stern, suggests that global warming could shrink the global economy by a fifth but forecasts that it would cost just 1 per cent of the global gross domestic product to take effective action against climate change now. BBC News highlighted the review’s warnings that inaction could result in the displacement of 100 million people due to flooding, water shortages for 1 in 6 of the world’s population, the extinction of up to 40 per cent of the world’s species, and the potential creation by droughts of tens or even hundreds of millions of “climate refugees”. Tony Blair stressed the importance of the report and the disastrous consequences for the planet if we do not take action now. And Sir Nicholas told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, “Unless it’s international, we will not make the reductions on the scale which will be required.” Chancellor Gordon Brown promised that the UK would lead this international effort.
Meanwhile, the Guardian reported that Britain will send Sir Nicholas to lobby American politicians and business people at the end of the year, in an effort to make them understand, and act on, the urgent need to cut carbon emissions.
The Guardian reported that, as part of the battle against climate change, the government is looking into the possibility of banning traditional lightbulbs. The energy-saving alternatives last up to 12 times longer, on average, according to the Energy Saving Trust. Environment minister Ian Pearson told the Commons, “The government is pressing the European commission to make lightbulbs a priority for regulatory action under the recently agreed eco-design of energy-using products framework directive. Our current assessment is that, by removing ordinary incandescent lightbulbs (GLS bulbs) from the UK market and encouraging sales of the most efficient alternatives, we could avoid approximately 1m tonnes of carbon emissions per year by 2020."
Another stark warning was issued this week: if the current rates of fishing continue, by 2048 the world’s seafood stocks will have collapsed. The Daily Telegraph reported that a four-year study of 7,800 marine species around the world has concluded that the long-term trend is clear and predictable. The study was conducted by an international group of ecologists and economists and the results published in Science. The decline of individual species was found to impact on entire ecosystems. In twelve regions, including the shallow part of the North Sea, 29 per cent of exploited marine species had collapsed since 1950. However, one of the scientists involved in the research said there was evidence that wherever protective measures were taken, species recovered rapidly and could cope better with problems such as climate change.
As the Nuffield Council on Bioethics announced that it would carry out a public consultation on legislation relating to the storage of DNA material, Sir Alec Jeffreys, the pioneer who developed DNA testing in the 1980s, revealed his concerns about the national DNA database. Introduced over ten years ago, the database contains 3.6 million entries and is the largest in the world. The Times reported that Sir Jeffreys considers the database “discriminatory”, being socioeconomically and ethnically skewed. And, whereas the tool was intended to catch reoffending criminals, the database now contained samples from “hundreds of thousands of entirely innocent people”. A Home Office report issued in January showed that samples from 139,463 people who had never been charged or cautioned over an offence were on the database. Sir Bob Hepple QC, chairman of the Nuffield Council said, “We want to hear the public’s views on whether storing the DNA profiles of victims and suspects who are later not charged, or acquitted, is justified by the need to fight crime.”
In other news, the Times reported that scientists may have discovered the underlying cause of cot death (also know as Sudden Infant Death Syndrome). A US team examined post-mortem samples from the brainstems of 31 babies who had suffered a cot death, and compared them with samples from ten babies who had died of other causes. This part of the brain is responsible for controlling breathing, heart-rate and temperature, among other things. The cot-death babies examined had double the number of brain cells that manufacture or use serotonin than the other babies, while their serotonin-using cells had significantly fewer serotonin receptors. The researchers hypothesize that the babies with defects in their serotonin system have an impaired ability to detect and respond to high carbon dioxide levels and low oxygen levels, and do not respond to increased carbon dioxide levels by waking, turning over and breathing more quickly, in the way other babies would.
Also this week, NASA announced that the Hubble telescope will be upgraded. Launched in 1990, the orbiting observatory has provided us with amazing pictures of the cosmos, but would be unlikely to last more than a few years if it was not serviced. The US space agency has now said that it is safe to send a crew to work on Hubble, thanks to recent modifications to the shuttle launch system, following the Columbia shuttle disaster in 2003. The mission will replace the batteries and gyroscopes used to aim the telescope, and also install two new instruments which will improve the telescope’s ability to probe faint, distant objects, reported BBC News. The shuttle is expected to launch in 2008 and extend Hubble’s orbital lifetime to at least 2013.
And finally...
If you are a football fan, you may long have suspected it, but now the proof is in: referees’ really are biased towards the home team. A study, to be published in the Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, looked at 2,660 matches over seven seasons. It revealed that players from away teams are more likely to receive yellow or red cards. However, not everyone was impressed with the research: in the Guardian, former top referee Jeff Winter said of the study, "It doesn't tell me anything. I'm sure they had fun watching the matches, but it does not need a university graduate to work out that home teams usually do best."
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