BBC Medical Science — Nanotechnology has been used for the first time to destroy cancer cells with a highly targeted package of “tumour busting” genes. The technique, which leaves healthy cells unaffected, could potentially offer hope to people with hard-to-treat cancers where surgery is not possible. Although it has only been tested in mice so far, the researchers hope for human trials in two years.

The UK study is published online by the journal Cancer Research.

The genes were wrapped up in microscopic nano-particles, 80,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair, which were taken up by cancer cells, but not their healthy neighbours. Once inside, the genes stimulated production of a protein which destroys the cancer. The researchers say the technology could potentially be particularly relevant for people with cancers that are inoperable because they are close to vital organs. They hope it will eventually also be used to treat cancer that has spread.

Lead researcher Dr Andreas Schatzlein, from the School of Pharmacy in London, said: “Gene therapy has a great potential to create safe and effective cancer treatments but getting the genes into cancer cells remains one of the big challenges in this area. “This is the first time that nanoparticles have been shown to target tumours in such a selective way, and this is an exciting step forward in the field. Once inside the cell, the gene enclosed in the particle recognises the cancerous environment and switches on. The result is toxic, but only to the offending cells, leaving healthy tissue unaffected. We hope this therapy will be used to treat cancer patients in clinical trials in a couple of years.” (03/10/09)
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BBC Animal Science — A male chimpanzee in a Swedish zoo planned hundreds of stone-throwing attacks on zoo visitors, according to researchers.

Keepers at Furuvik Zoo found that the chimp collected and stored stones that he would later use as missiles. Further, the chimp learned to recognise how and when parts of his concrete enclosure could be pulled apart to fashion further projectiles.

The findings are reported in the journal Current Biology. There has been scant evidence in previous research that animals can plan for future events. Crucial to the current study is the fact that Santino, a chimpanzee at the zoo in the city north of Stockholm, collected the stones in a calm state, prior to the zoo opening in the morning. The launching of the stones occurred hours later - during dominance displays to zoo visitors - with Santino in an “agitated” state.

This suggests that Santino was anticipating a future mental state - an ability that has been difficult to definitively prove in animals, according to Mathias Osvath, a cognitive scientist from Lund University in Sweden and author of the new research.

“We’ve done experimental studies, and the chimps in my mind show very clearly that they do plan for future needs, but it has been argued that perhaps this was an experimental artefact,” Dr Osvath told BBC News. “Now we have this spontaneous behaviour, which is always in some sense better evidence.” (03/10/09)
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BBC Environmental Science — The global sea level looks set to rise far higher than forecast because of changes in the polar ice-sheets, a team of researchers has suggested. Scientists at a climate change summit in Copenhagen said earlier UN estimates were too low and that sea levels could rise by a metre or more by 2100.

The projections did not include the potential impact of polar melting and ice breaking off, they added. The implications for millions of people would be “severe”, they warned. Ten per cent of the world’s population - about 600 million people - live in low-lying areas.

The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in its 2007 Fourth Assessment Report, had said that the maximum rise in sea level would be in the region of 59cm.

Professor Konrad Steffen from the University of Colorado, speaking at a press conference on Tuesday, highlighted new studies into ice loss in Greenland, showing it has accelerated over the last decade.

Professor Steffen, who has studied the Arctic ice for the past 35 years, told me: “I would predict sea level rise by 2100 in the order of one metre; it could be 1.2m or 0.9m. “But it is one metre or more seeing the current change, which is up to three times more than the average predicted by the IPCC. It is a major change and it actually calls for action.”

Dr John Church of the Centre for Australian Weather and Climate Research added: “The most recent research showed that sea level is rising by 3mm a year since 1993, a rate well above the 20th century average.”

Professor Eric Rignot, a senior research scientist at Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said that results gathered since the IPCC showed that melting and ice loss could not be overlooked. “As a result of the acceleration of outlet glaciers over large regions, the ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are already contributing more and faster to sea level rise than anticipated.” (03/10/09)
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Jeff Vail writes: I’ve been predicting the collapse of the Mexican Nation-State since 2006. It turns out that was a bit premature. But with violence flaring, the potential for collapse in Mexico is once again in the headlines. Oil production continues to fall, border violence is up, and the government is preparing for a showdown with the drug cartels. I’ll argue below that the government will keep the wheels on through 2009, but that the Mexican state will collapse shortly thereafter, ushering in the beginning of the end of the Nation-State.

It’s been difficult to read a paper or watch the news recently without hearing about the growing troubles in Mexico. The US military’s Joint Forces Command issued their Joint Operating Environment 2008 report recently that listed Mexico and Pakistan as the most likely states to collapse in the immediate future (PDF, see p.35 for analysis of Mexico). Even 60 minutes ran a segment about the rising drug violence.

Of course, readers are probably already aware that a root cause of the problems in Mexico is the precipitous decline of Mexican oil production and an even faster decline in the level of oil exports. Add to that declining remittance incomes being sent home by migrant workers in America, declining tourist revenues, and lower revenue per barrel of oil exported, and the Mexican state is experiencing a severe financial crunch.

While the fiscal stability of the Mexican state is impacted by continually declining oil production and oil exports that are declining even faster, this impact is mitigated to some extent because PEMEX hedged the majority of its oil production through 2009 at roughly $70/barrel. Depending on the price of oil in 2010, Mexican oil revenues stand to drop off a cliff as PEMEX loses hedge coverage.

Does this mean the Mexican state is finished? The current crack-down by the Mexican military and federal police is, I think, best seen as a last-ditch effort to save the state. But it is also evidence that, by the very existence of this pitched battle, the state retains enough viability to pose a threat, and therefore to be targeted.

In military theory, pitched battles are only consciously joined by both sides when both have an incentive to risk the main body of their force—-either because they think they can win a decisive victory or because they are running out of the political, logistical, or economic ability to sustain their army in the field and must seek a decisive action while they can. (03/10/09)
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Phil Harris writes: While there has never been more food around, modern production is not really a ‘success’ story. In the face of a long term decline in fossil energy, there is significant doubt whether production relying on nitrogen fertilizer can ramp-up to feed the expected world population, or can even maintain existing levels. Similarly, in almost wholly urbanized industrial countries, ‘Western’ production equates to mechanized farming, which requires very significant fossil fuel. Future problems are potentially exacerbated by the spread of the up-market ‘Western’, urban, dietary pattern. Already much of global primary calories and protein are diverted to the meat sector. In addition, this dietary pattern exacts a high price on health.

Through the years, most of the world has lived in village ecosystems, and produced most of its food locally through those ecosystems. An important part of this farming is recycling the nutrients and exporting only relatively little outside the system, unlike the demands made on farming by our urban world. …

Modern agriculture as developed in the ‘West’ requires large amounts of fertilizer and other critical ‘system-ingredients’ including pesticides. Much of the rest of the world in recent decades has also significantly increased production using these inputs, and must rely on fertilizer, even in countries where the total requirement for fossil energy, fuel and fertilizer, and for example, herbicides, can be significantly lower than required for a Western farm.

Since the 1960s, new varieties of cereal have enabled much larger yields because they can use higher soil nitrogen N (NH4 and NO3 ions maintained in soil solution), and thereby make use of more synthetic N fertilizer. According to a publication of the International Fertilizer Industry Association, nitrogen fertilizer production requires perhaps 5% of world natural gas; 1.2% of total energy.

The energy budget for a fully mechanized crop is difficult to compute, but one example in Scotland suggests that N fertilizer accounts for 10 – 43% energy input into oil seed production on any one farm. A lot of energy is used directly by machinery. Farming in fully industrialized countries is almost wholly mechanized. …

Cereal grains are increasingly used for livestock feed. Most, for example, of the huge USA corn (maize) and soybeans crops goes for animal feed. When this use is combined with the increased demand for biofuels, it puts a serious strain on resources such as fertilizer that underpin grain supply. Asia—with 57% of the world’s population–is now attempting to adopt more of a Western style diet as well. This pattern is not sustainable, especially if oil and natural gas supplies are expected to decline over the long term. …

According to The Fertilizer Institute, world nitrogen demand grew by 17 percent, phosphate demand grew by 18 percent and potash demand grew by 23 percent from fiscal year 2000/2001 to 2006/2007. China, India and Brazil are the three largest contributors to the growth.

Thus, cereal grains are not rising as rapidly as Dyson predicted, but fertilizer use is still growing rapidly. With the growth in biofuels and meat, much of the additional grain does not proportionally feed more people.

Trends have been driven by profitability, and in the USA most of the monetary value of agriculture is ‘up-market’ in the livestock sector. Slightly over half is provided by livestock, slightly less than a quarter by horticultural crops and, less than a quarter by primary production, grain and oilseed crops (the remainder comes from cotton and other commodity crops).

Expanding the global ‘business as usual’ approach appears to guarantee poor success in the future. (03/10/09)
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