The BA Science News Digest - 24 November 2006
In the science news this week: humans are not so genetically similar after all, an ambitious nuclear fusion project gains international support and experts call for improved flu pandemic plans. Plus, wasps commit chemical warfare and its not 'fruitless' when flies fight...
Humans vary far more at the genetic level than was previously thought, four important studies published this week revealed. The discovery could have huge implications for studies of disease and evolution, reported the Daily Telegraph. Genes usually occur in two copies, one inherited from each parent, and the current dogma is that our DNA is 99.9 per cent identical. The new research utilised a gene chip technology able to study bigger DNA differences than usual methods. DNA from 270 individuals from four populations with European, African or Asian ancestry was analysed for copy number variation (CNV) – that is duplication or deletion of larger areas (in the region of one thousand letters). It was found that more than 10 per cent of genes contained variations in the number of copies of specific DNA segments, far more than anticipated.
According to Dr Matthew Hurles, a leader of one of the projects at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute: ‘Each one of us has a unique pattern of gains and losses of complete sections of DNA and one of the real surprises of these results was just how much of our DNA varies in copy number. The copy number variation that researchers had seen before was simply the tip of the iceberg.’ 11 per cent of CNVs account for population differences and analysis of striking differences will lead to an understanding of what allowed populations to adapt to their different surroundings. In addition, copy number differences are associated with many different diseases, it is emerging, and are already implicated in Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, schizophrenia and susceptibility to the Aids virus.
It seems we’ve underestimated fish. The idea that they can remember for only seconds is a myth – studies indicate they can in fact remember for anything up to three years. And now new research has demonstrated that they exhibit varied personality types and can alter their behaviour based on what they learn from other fish.
In the new research, reported the Times, scientists first categorised rainbow trout as shy or bold based on their response to foreign objects in their tank. The researchers then put fish in a tank with a larger or smaller trout, provoking a territorial fight. When the fish were retested for their response to strange objects, they found that shy fish who had repeatedly won the fights became bolder, whereas originally bold fish who had lost multiple fights became more cautious. Another experiment allowed trout to observe another of the opposite personality type through a one-way mirror. Bold fish who watched shy ones became more reserved.
Arsenic poisoning resulting from contaminated water supplies affects up to 100 million people worldwide. But hope is in sight: a simple, colour-coded test to detect the presence of arsenic in water supplies has been developed by students at Edinburgh University and would cost around 50 pence to manufacture, reported BBC News. The test uses modified E. coli bacteria that release acid in response to arsenic. The water turns blue when there is no contamination, doesn’t change colour when a small amount of arsenic is present, and becomes red in response to a major contamination.
A golfing space stunt - where a Russian astronaut made a tee shot from the International Space Station – went ahead after NASA ensured the ball would not come back and damage the station. It is just one of the fundraising tactics that the Russian space agency has allowed, reported the BBC.
While large galaxies usually only produce three supernovae per century, two have been observed within months of each other in the galaxy NGC 1316A, bringing its total to four in 26 years. A massive elliptical galaxy about 80 million light-years from Earth, NGC 1316 recently merged with a spiral galaxy and scientists are now investigating whether the high incidence of supernovae is just coincidence or due to the merger, reported BBC News.
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at Cern will be the world’s biggest particle collider when successfully constructed and will offer a chance to beat the US in the 42-year race to find the Higgs boson, a sub-atomic particle crucial to the understanding of the Universe. This month, the Compact Muon Solenoid, a 12.500-tonne detector, will be lowered 100 metres into the ground. Our own 2006 BA Lord Kelvin Award winner, Brian Cox, was quoted in the Times as saying that the future of particle physics depended on finding the theoretical particle. Without it, physicists will need to devise new theories to explain why matter has mass. Dr Cox added: ‘If it’s there, and I think it is, we’ll find it.’
The UN Climate talks which have been taking place in Nairobi for the past couple of weeks settled for a minimal review of the Kyoto Protocol (see last week's Science News Digest). Agreement was reached on all outstanding matters, reported BBC News, and decisions were taken to allocate more clean technology and adaptation resources to Africa. UK Environment Secretary David Miliband said, ‘I come away from this conference with two senses: one, the world community can make progress when it puts its mind to it, but two, my goodness we really need to up the momentum, we need to increase the acceleration.’
BBC News also reported that, according to new research, the concentration of atmospheric methane – one of the gases contributing to the greenhouse effect – rose significantly in the last century but has remained stable for the past seven years. The findings suggest that measures adopted around the world to curb the release of methane into the atmosphere are working. These include sealing gas pipelines to prevent leaks, capturing and using methane from farm effluent and landfill sites, and reducing emissions from rice paddies by changing farming practices.
An international treaty to launch a seven billion pound nuclear fusion energy research project was signed by the US, India, China, Japan, South Korea, Russia and the 25 countries of the European Union. Fusion, which replicates the Sun’s energy source, could provide a source of power that doesn’t emit greenhouse gases and produces a relatively low amount of radioactive waste. The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (Iter) will be built in France and a demonstration power plant could be ready by 2040 if everything proceeds according to plan, announced the Guardian.
In other news, the Times reported that leading influenza experts fear Britain is inadequately prepared for a pandemic because the government plans rely on a single antiviral agent. Currently only Tamiflu is stockpiled, and there are signs that the H5N1 virus can become resistant to it. A panel of ten flu specialists urged the Government to consider increasing its Tamiflu supply, as current stocks would not be enough for preventative action, and recommended that a leading specialist be appointed to advise specifically on pandemic planning.
And finally…
Insect fight clubs have revealed that wasps have their own equivalent of pepper spray and a single gene can make male flies ‘fight like a girl’.
The Daily Telegraph reported the chemical warfare tactics of female bethylid wasps observed by scientists at the University of Nottingham. It seems the wasps are poor losers: when defeated in battle by another female they spray a volatile compound which incapacitates the winner. The compound may also prompt other females to disperse from the vicinity. Since they kill the larvae of many insects that attack crops, the wasps are used as a cheap pest control. Scientists now hope to discover how to reduce the release of the spray so that more wasps will remain and attack further crop pest larvae.
Meanwhile, the Guardian reported research using fighting flies which may provide an insight into the genetic component of aggression. Neurobiologists at Harvard Medical School spend five years scoring fruit fly contests. Using slow-motion video, they found that male and female flies exhibit different fight behaviours: males rear up and lunge, while females butt and shove. However, when a single male gene was transferred to females, they began to lunge like the males. Removal of the same gene, which governs courtship and is known as ‘fruitless’, from male flies caused them to adopt the female fighting tactics. A key researcher in the study, Dr Edward Kravitz, said: ‘We hope the study will let us get an idea of how behaviour gets into the nervous system and what roles genes play in that. There will be genes that will function in a similar way in humans and if we can learn how they work in a simple organism like the fruit fly then that will at least give us an idea of where to look in more complex animals."
Humans vary far more at the genetic level than was previously thought, four important studies published this week revealed. The discovery could have huge implications for studies of disease and evolution, reported the Daily Telegraph. Genes usually occur in two copies, one inherited from each parent, and the current dogma is that our DNA is 99.9 per cent identical. The new research utilised a gene chip technology able to study bigger DNA differences than usual methods. DNA from 270 individuals from four populations with European, African or Asian ancestry was analysed for copy number variation (CNV) – that is duplication or deletion of larger areas (in the region of one thousand letters). It was found that more than 10 per cent of genes contained variations in the number of copies of specific DNA segments, far more than anticipated.
According to Dr Matthew Hurles, a leader of one of the projects at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute: ‘Each one of us has a unique pattern of gains and losses of complete sections of DNA and one of the real surprises of these results was just how much of our DNA varies in copy number. The copy number variation that researchers had seen before was simply the tip of the iceberg.’ 11 per cent of CNVs account for population differences and analysis of striking differences will lead to an understanding of what allowed populations to adapt to their different surroundings. In addition, copy number differences are associated with many different diseases, it is emerging, and are already implicated in Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, schizophrenia and susceptibility to the Aids virus.
It seems we’ve underestimated fish. The idea that they can remember for only seconds is a myth – studies indicate they can in fact remember for anything up to three years. And now new research has demonstrated that they exhibit varied personality types and can alter their behaviour based on what they learn from other fish.
In the new research, reported the Times, scientists first categorised rainbow trout as shy or bold based on their response to foreign objects in their tank. The researchers then put fish in a tank with a larger or smaller trout, provoking a territorial fight. When the fish were retested for their response to strange objects, they found that shy fish who had repeatedly won the fights became bolder, whereas originally bold fish who had lost multiple fights became more cautious. Another experiment allowed trout to observe another of the opposite personality type through a one-way mirror. Bold fish who watched shy ones became more reserved.
Arsenic poisoning resulting from contaminated water supplies affects up to 100 million people worldwide. But hope is in sight: a simple, colour-coded test to detect the presence of arsenic in water supplies has been developed by students at Edinburgh University and would cost around 50 pence to manufacture, reported BBC News. The test uses modified E. coli bacteria that release acid in response to arsenic. The water turns blue when there is no contamination, doesn’t change colour when a small amount of arsenic is present, and becomes red in response to a major contamination.
A golfing space stunt - where a Russian astronaut made a tee shot from the International Space Station – went ahead after NASA ensured the ball would not come back and damage the station. It is just one of the fundraising tactics that the Russian space agency has allowed, reported the BBC.
While large galaxies usually only produce three supernovae per century, two have been observed within months of each other in the galaxy NGC 1316A, bringing its total to four in 26 years. A massive elliptical galaxy about 80 million light-years from Earth, NGC 1316 recently merged with a spiral galaxy and scientists are now investigating whether the high incidence of supernovae is just coincidence or due to the merger, reported BBC News.
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at Cern will be the world’s biggest particle collider when successfully constructed and will offer a chance to beat the US in the 42-year race to find the Higgs boson, a sub-atomic particle crucial to the understanding of the Universe. This month, the Compact Muon Solenoid, a 12.500-tonne detector, will be lowered 100 metres into the ground. Our own 2006 BA Lord Kelvin Award winner, Brian Cox, was quoted in the Times as saying that the future of particle physics depended on finding the theoretical particle. Without it, physicists will need to devise new theories to explain why matter has mass. Dr Cox added: ‘If it’s there, and I think it is, we’ll find it.’
The UN Climate talks which have been taking place in Nairobi for the past couple of weeks settled for a minimal review of the Kyoto Protocol (see last week's Science News Digest). Agreement was reached on all outstanding matters, reported BBC News, and decisions were taken to allocate more clean technology and adaptation resources to Africa. UK Environment Secretary David Miliband said, ‘I come away from this conference with two senses: one, the world community can make progress when it puts its mind to it, but two, my goodness we really need to up the momentum, we need to increase the acceleration.’
BBC News also reported that, according to new research, the concentration of atmospheric methane – one of the gases contributing to the greenhouse effect – rose significantly in the last century but has remained stable for the past seven years. The findings suggest that measures adopted around the world to curb the release of methane into the atmosphere are working. These include sealing gas pipelines to prevent leaks, capturing and using methane from farm effluent and landfill sites, and reducing emissions from rice paddies by changing farming practices.
An international treaty to launch a seven billion pound nuclear fusion energy research project was signed by the US, India, China, Japan, South Korea, Russia and the 25 countries of the European Union. Fusion, which replicates the Sun’s energy source, could provide a source of power that doesn’t emit greenhouse gases and produces a relatively low amount of radioactive waste. The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (Iter) will be built in France and a demonstration power plant could be ready by 2040 if everything proceeds according to plan, announced the Guardian.
In other news, the Times reported that leading influenza experts fear Britain is inadequately prepared for a pandemic because the government plans rely on a single antiviral agent. Currently only Tamiflu is stockpiled, and there are signs that the H5N1 virus can become resistant to it. A panel of ten flu specialists urged the Government to consider increasing its Tamiflu supply, as current stocks would not be enough for preventative action, and recommended that a leading specialist be appointed to advise specifically on pandemic planning.
And finally…
Insect fight clubs have revealed that wasps have their own equivalent of pepper spray and a single gene can make male flies ‘fight like a girl’.
The Daily Telegraph reported the chemical warfare tactics of female bethylid wasps observed by scientists at the University of Nottingham. It seems the wasps are poor losers: when defeated in battle by another female they spray a volatile compound which incapacitates the winner. The compound may also prompt other females to disperse from the vicinity. Since they kill the larvae of many insects that attack crops, the wasps are used as a cheap pest control. Scientists now hope to discover how to reduce the release of the spray so that more wasps will remain and attack further crop pest larvae.
Meanwhile, the Guardian reported research using fighting flies which may provide an insight into the genetic component of aggression. Neurobiologists at Harvard Medical School spend five years scoring fruit fly contests. Using slow-motion video, they found that male and female flies exhibit different fight behaviours: males rear up and lunge, while females butt and shove. However, when a single male gene was transferred to females, they began to lunge like the males. Removal of the same gene, which governs courtship and is known as ‘fruitless’, from male flies caused them to adopt the female fighting tactics. A key researcher in the study, Dr Edward Kravitz, said: ‘We hope the study will let us get an idea of how behaviour gets into the nervous system and what roles genes play in that. There will be genes that will function in a similar way in humans and if we can learn how they work in a simple organism like the fruit fly then that will at least give us an idea of where to look in more complex animals."
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