Polar Bear Attacks Surprisingly Rare

Emily F. -- Last Friday, a polar bear attacked on the Norwegian archipelago of Svllbard, resulting in 4 injuries, one death. There was a group of campers with approximately 80 people, that were camping on the Van Postbreen Glacier.  This is the second year in a row, a camper has been attacked at the site. Last year, a camper who was asleep in his tent, was “hunted” down by a polar bear, and attacked. The polar bear dragged the camper out of the tent by his head, and continued to maul the camper. His expedition partner, then grabbed a rifle, and began shooting at the bear. Unfortunately it was too late.

                Polar bears instinct is too hunt (them being carnivores), so the fact a polar bear attacked, comes to no surprise.  Although, polar bears don’t attack humans very often, they have been noted to killing 8 people in Canada and 2 in Alaska. Polar bear expert Tom Smith of Brigham Young University says "People talk about polar bears stalking and hunting humans, If that's the case, they're doing a pretty poor job of it."

My thought on this article is that, it seems many average people see polar bears as some kind of horrid creature out to kill. Polar bears natural instinct is to kill, so that’s what they do. Yes, it’s a tragedy when someone is killed like that, but I find it odd when people take it over the top. People who talk about polar bears as things that are stalking humans, and killing us, seems a bit crazy. Like Tom Smith of Brigham Young University says “If that’s the case, they’re doing a pretty poor job of it. The polar bear is just hunting in general. They’re not out to get us.

Link:  Polar Bear Attacks Surprisingly Rare 

Hot Birds Have Large...Beaks

Eddie W. -- Recently, scientists reasearched Salt Marsh Sparrows and found out that their beaks help them stay cool. The head of the National Zoo’s Migratory Bird Center learned about these birds for more than ten years and found out how they live through wet areas by the ocean. He found out that the birds that ate and lived in places like other birds than they were different birds. ’’Rather than focusing on their similarities, I started focusing on their differences,’’ ( Russel Greenberg). This quote is evidence that the birds needed to be different in order to be the same bird type. If birds shared an Ecosystem, how large their beaks were was a huge difference. A Salt Marsh Sparrow is strong because it lives someplace where the tree’s leaves keep them cool by giving them shade, they get food that they eat, and salty water. ’’Greenberg and his fellow researchers took their cues from previous studies that showed the famously-beaked toucan has an active vascular system, or blood flow, to its bill that change as regularly as, well, the weather,”( Amy Enchelmyer) . This quote is evidence that the bird has something inside it that controls its adaptations. Birds cool off differently than people sweat to cool their bodies, they get in the shade to cool off. The scientist Russel Greenberg thinks if the beak is bigger, they can stay cooler so they don’t get dehydrated.

                This article really was interesting to me because it was about birds and how they maintained Homeostasis. I didn’t know that they cooled off differently than people. This article was very helpful to me because it showed how Salt Marsh Sparrows control how hot they would get. I agree with the Article because it has quotes from a scientist and involves his studies in the Article. The Article had Scientific words in it relating to Biology. When there are quotes it says who the quote is by. There are deatails that readers would need to know in the Article.


Link:  Hot Birds Have Large...Beaks

Attacking Malaria with Spermless Mosquitoes

Niko A. -- Malaria is a deadly disease that can kill a full-grown man in less then a few hours after first showing signs of symptoms. The possibly fatal disease is caused by one of our most annoying pests… mosquitoes. In the tropics mosquito’s kill about one million people a year - small bug, big bite. Scientists have been trying to eliminate the infected mosquitoes with insecticides but the bugs became immune too fast so scientists had to try a different approach. The only mosquito that actually bite you are pregnant female mosquitoes so the researchers experimented with “silencing” some male mosquitoes gene that is required for making healthy sperm cells. The researchers then bred them with some female mosquitoes so she laid un-fertilized eggs. After mating once mosquitoes never mate again and because the male is just as competent at attracting females this practice of turning off the males ability to produce offspring is a big success.  Meaning 100 fewer mosquitoes to give you malaria. Even if this process takes too much time outside of the lab it’s another milestone in trying to stop the 5^th cause of death from disease worldwide, malaria.

            This article was extremely interesting to me because I didn’t know many of the things they explained in it, for example I didn’t know that our technology was sophisticated enough to let us control the genes of other organisms. Another interesting fact in this article was that only one animal carries malaria, the mosquito.  I was always aware that they carried the disease but I always figured that there were other animal carriers as well. I thought that this article was very helpful not so much for me but for someone having to deal with the fear of malaria because it might give them hope that the disease wasn’t a permanent thing. After reading this article I felt very grateful for having a home in a place that wasn’t plagued by a disease of some sort because a lot of people aren’t that lucky. I was also thankful that people research this kind of thing because if it weren’t for them we wouldn’t know a lot of the biologic facts we know.  For example, I learned that mosquitoes actually eat plants, only when a female is pregnant do they go for blood. I thought it was very interesting that female mosquitoes would be tricked by a male mosquito who didn’t have healthy sperm because it seems like there would be other things affected in turning off a gene but I guess that our technology if far enough along so we can avoid that kind of thing. I found that this article was very appealing to me due to its interesting facts and the subject matter itself.

Link:  Attacking Malaria with Spermless Mosquitoes  (includes video) 

Jellyfish cells 'diagnose' cancer, York scientists say

** Note:  this post is meant to provide a model for current NYOS Biology students to view & learn from, as they are developing their own article-reviewing skills.  Plus, it's an awesome article!  This review was written during the 2010-11 school year.**


Lauren G. -- The luminous cells of jellyfish contain a green fluorescent protein (GFP) that allows them to glow in the dark. Though a procedure developed at the Yorkshire Cancer Research Laboratory at York University, these proteins can be inserted into human cancer cells in order to make them visible to a specialized camera. This process may potentially revolutionize the way certain cancers are diagnosed because the luminescent proteins allowed visuals of tissues deep within the body, something that x-ray technology was incapable of. This will allow for earlier diagnosis and detection of small clusters of cancerous cells. The scientists expect the process to be ready for clinical trials within the next 5 years. However, the camera equipment is quite pricy and not widely available. Only one U.S. company has built a camera with the desired resolution for detecting the luminous cells.   
 

This is incredible – definitely makes my top 5 article list. Who knew jellyfish could be so useful? What I’m wondering is if there are any harmful side effects of inserting the proteins into your body. How do they insert the proteins into just the cancerous cells, especially if they are so deep within the tissue? Does it harm the jellyfish at all? Does it work with all forms of cancer? I am looking forward to hearing more on this revolutionary process in the near future.

Link:  Jellyfish cells 'diagnose' cancer 

Taste Buds Found In Lungs

** Note:  this post is meant to provide a model for current NYOS Biology students to view & learn from, as they are developing their own article-reviewing skills.  Plus, it's an awesome article!  This review was written during the 2010-11 school year.**


Morgan D. -- Scientists from the University of Maryland and Johns Hopkins recently found that lungs have “taste buds.” However, they are different than taste buds in your mouth. They can only “taste” (or rather “detect”) bitter flavors. These detections, also unlike taste buds in your mouth, do not send signals to our brains. However, the bitter flavors seemed to “[relax] the lung tissue tremendously,” The scientists believe that this may help those who suffer from asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease by relaxing and opening the airways. But they do caution people to not try out this hypothesis, as it was found by accident and has not yet been truly tested.

I found this article to be incredibly interesting! The concept that we have “taste buds” on our lungs has never entered my head. It is insane and ridiculous, impossible, even. And yet it is a true scientific discovery (unless the researchers made a mistake, which I doubt). To think that we as humans are trying more and more to look at the BIG PICTURE, and asking questions about life on other planets. And here we are on Earth, still making new and impossible discoveries about our own bodies! It is truly amazing to witness our species continue to grow and learn, ever seeking knowledge (while we school kids hate learning at school. Ironic, isn’t it?).

Link:  Taste Buds Found In Lungs

Black Wolves: Descendants of black dogs

Ashley C. -- Black wolves have never been seen as a hybrid breed, but in this article it shows how, the black wolf was really engineered by a cross between a wolf and a black dog. The black coat of the wolf has proven to be a helpful trait, considering how the wolves artic habitat is shrinking. Researchers have traced the dominant gene which is responsible for the black coat, they found the gene came from black dogs, and was passed to wolves, and even coyotes. It was passed by hybridization. They say it could have happened as early as the arrival of the European dogs as long as 14,000 years ago, when people migrated to north America across the Bering Strait. Now black fur is a very common thing among wolf packs, probably because there are not a lot of snow covered environments. Researchers show the wolves coat color and habitat often vary on adaption and natural selection. Researchers say that the black coloration may help wolves survive, because of their always changing environment.

I liked this article because I never knew that black wolves were a cross between a dog and a wolf, I always thought they were just another color variation of a wolf. What drew me to this article was its headline “Black Wolves Descendents of dogs”  I have always been interested in wolves ever since i was little, I was always watching animal planet, and the wolf documentaries were my favorite. I think people should read this article because I do not think a lot of people know black wolves are not just wolves, their wolves-dogs. 

Link:  Black Wolves: Descendants of black dogs

Nuclear Forensic Analysis: It's the bomb!!!

** Note:  this post is meant to provide a model for current NYOS Biology students to view & learn from, as they are developing their own article-reviewing skills.  Plus, it's an awesome article!  This review was written during the 2010-11 school year.**


Marnie H. -- Recently a US team was sent to study Trinitite, the remains of the first nuclear explosion ever to be tested.  Researchers in Alamogordo, New Mexico, used advanced scientific methods and equipment to analyze the site that was demolished in July of 1945.  The original testing occurred only weeks before the bombing of Nagasaki and Hiroshima during World War II.  Using nuclear forensic analysis on a piece of trinitite, scientists were able to identify materials used in the making of the bomb.  This same information could be used to discover where it came from.  Since the current threat of terrorism is becoming very real in our country, nuclear testing analysis would be incredibly useful to us.  We would be able to find out more about the bomb from the small fragments left behind, potentially leading us to the location and identity of the culprit(s). 

I found it extremely interesting that so much could be discovered from so little starting information.  Forensics itself is astounding, but this is taking it to the next level.  Even though the last time anything happened in the desert at Alamogordo was more than sixty years ago, a little piece of glass left at the site tells all of its history.  The material was able to identify what was in the bomb, where it came from and who made it.  It’s because of this that science never ceases to amaze me.  Trinitite can aid our exploration in the future while still providing us with the past and all it once held.  Peoples’ fears of terrorism can be put to a sort of ease, knowing that in the end, science will get us through any threat it conveys.

Link:  Nuclear debris could reveal clues of bomb's origin

Brain link lets people choose images by thought alone

** Note:  this post is meant to provide a model for current NYOS Biology students to view & learn from, as they are developing their own article-reviewing skills.  Plus, it's an awesome article!  This review was written during the 2010-11 school year.**

Stephen C. -- Twelve epilepsy patients who had previously had electrodes implanted in the medial temporal lobes (among other areas) of their brains for monitoring purposes were brought in to be part of an experiment testing the feasibility of a groundbreaking new neuroscience technology. This technology monitors minute patterns in brain activity that relate to specific topics. The researchers at the California Institute of Technology that lead the experiment talked to the test subjects to find out what subjects would ring the loudest mental bells with them. These topics were used as templates for the selection of 100 images per person. The subjects were then shown the images so that the system might learn. Later, the subjects were shown two of the images superimposed against each other, and were told to, without using anything but their minds, choose one of the images and bring it to the foreground. The neural patterns their brains expressed were identified by the computer and used to determine which image to show. The volunteers were successful 70% of the time.


The implications of something like this are amazing. While we have for some time now been able to tap into the less meticulous signals sent by the motor cortex to in order to help someone control a robotic limb, never before have individual neurons been isolated and associated with specific concepts. Unlike some other recent breakthroughs, there is no real negative side to this. It’s not like some criminal could sneak into your house, implant electrodes in your brain, and hook you up to a super advanced computer rig to monitor what you’re thinking without your knowledge. Trust me, you’d notice. However, this does present several possibilities for helping disabled people interact with modern technology such as computers and cell phones. Think about it, someone with no use of their hands could type on a computer or dial a phone just by thinking of the letters/numbers they want to type. If the system was made to be smaller, soldiers on the battlefield could use their minds to trigger weapons or explosives, removing the need to be right near the danger. It would also allow for split-second action as opposed to having to take the time to fiddle around with switches and buttons. Overall, this will create a whole new meaning for the term “hands-free.”


Link:  Brain link lets people choose images by thought alone

The X Factor: Solar storms and life as we know it

Marcus G. -- This past week we have gone through an X class solar storm. There are three different classes of solar storms, C, M, X class. The two that are most dangerous to us are M and X classes. These classes are known to cause long and big power outs, melt electrical transformers, and cost millions of dollars of damage. The event in 1989 of an X class caused all of this. A solar storm that is estimated to happen in February 9^th 2012 with equal amount of power and will cause damage all around, costing around 1-2 trillion dollars in damage. Although these phenomenon's may help lead us to finding planets that are Earth like and/are in habited by biotic organisms. If we look at suns 1/2 the mass of ours and radius means radial velocity and transit planet survey could help us find lower massed planets.

            This article for one is really shocking but also fascinating too. At first I was kind of shocked at the fact their might be a big enough solar storm to cause so much damage that it could change our view of how we see the sun. I don't know if it will happen, but I sure don't want to be around when a solar storm of such level hits us with all this technology that has not been tested against these solar storms. Although I like how the publisher ties up all this horror with something so fascinating. How that this destruction could help us find life on other planets. That if an atmosphere could survive the pounding of the solar storms from the star. Maybe these storms aren't as bad as they may seem then.

Link:  The X Factor: Solar Storms and life as we know it

Abused baby boobies grow up to abuse other chicks

Natalie R. -- The Nazca Booby, a colonial seabird, has been studied, and it’s been found that they have a “cycle of violence” throughout their life. Like some humans, young birds that are abused grow up to abuse other chicks. Two parents usually raise one baby bird every year, but when they are out colleting food for their young, other adult birds that aren’t breeding try to interact with the chicks. Some of the interaction can be good and positive but a lot are abusive. They usually try to sexually assault the young birds or physically harm them in some other form. Scientists kept an eye on the abused chicks and watched them grow up to abuse other young chicks once they became an adult bird. Scientists believe this is not genetically inherited but instead inherited by watching other adults and how they act.

            This is just as sad as humans abusing children. It shows that all species have child abuse in some way or another. Children who are abused as a child by their parent usually grow up to abuse their own children. This is showed with the Nazca Booby as well as humans. They learn that that is something they should do and do it when they get older. It’s sad that even animals abuse younger animals in their species and then they grow up to live that way. I wish there was something that could be done to stop all forms of child abuse.

Link:  Abused baby boobies grow up to abuse other chicks