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Bloodless Worms Yield Insight on Human Blood, Parasites & Iron Deficiency

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — Using a tiny bloodless worm, University of Maryland Associate Professor Iqbal Hamza and his team have discovered a large piece in the puzzle of how humans, and other organisms, safely move iron around in the body. The findings, published in the journal Cell, could lead to new methods for treating age-old scourges – parasitic worm infections, which affect more than a quarter of the world’s population, and iron deficiency, the world’s number one nutritional disorder. (more…)

Exploring The Dark Side of Happiness

Health

As a researcher, Yale psychologist June Gruber has confirmed the many positive physical, social and psychological benefits of human happiness. (more…)

Species Extinction Rates Have Been Overestimated, New Study Claims

Nature

However, researchers say, global extinction crisis remains very serious

The most widely used methods for calculating species extinction rates are “fundamentally flawed” and overestimate extinction rates by as much as 160 percent, life scientists report May 19 in the journal Nature. (more…)

NASA’s WISE Mission Offers a Taste of Galaxies to Come

Science

PASADENA, Calif. — An assorted mix of colorful galaxies is being released today by NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer mission, or WISE. The nine galaxies are a taste of what’s to come. The mission plans to release similar images for the 1,000 largest galaxies that appear in our sky, and possibly more.

“Galaxies come in all sorts of delicious flavors,” said Tom Jarrett, a WISE team member at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center, California Institute of Technology, in Pasadena, who studies our Milky Way’s neighboring galaxies. “Our first sample shows what WISE is capable of. We can produce spectacular high-resolution images of the largest galaxies.” (more…)

Significant Role of Oceans in Onset of Ancient Global Cooling

Environment

Evidence that early Antarctic Circumpolar Current development affected global climate

Thirty-eight million years ago, tropical jungles thrived in what are now the cornfields of the American Midwest and furry marsupials wandered temperate forests in what is now the frozen Antarctic. (more…)

New Study Suggests Link Between Estrogen, Blood Pressure

Health

EAST LANSING, Mich. — While recent studies have shown long-term exposure to estrogen can be a danger to women – overturning physicians’ long-held beliefs that the hormone was good for their patients’ hearts – the process by which estrogen induces high blood pressure was unclear.

In a new study, Michigan State University researchers found long-term estrogen exposure generates excessive levels of the compound superoxide, which causes stress in the body. The buildup of this compound occurs in an area of the brain that is crucial to regulating blood pressure, suggesting that the estrogen-induced buildup causes increased blood pressure. (more…)

Aggressive Efficiency and Electrification Needed to Cut California Emissions

Environment

*Berkeley Lab joint report offers a variety of scenarios to reduce emissions to 80% below 1990 levels.*

Berkeley, CA — In the next 40 years, California’s population is expected to surge from 37 million to 55 million and the demand for energy is expected to double. Given those daunting numbers, can California really reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050, as required by an executive order? Scientists from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who co-wrote a new report on California’s energy future are optimistic that the target can be achieved, though not without bold policy and behavioral changes as well as some scientific innovation.

The report, titled “California’s Energy Future—The View to 2050,” draws a series of energy system “portraits” showing how California can meet its ambitious emissions targets using a combination of measures and energy sources that may include electrification, enhanced efficiency, nuclear energy, renewable energy sources, grid modernization, and carbon capture and sequestration (CCS). (more…)

Scientists Discover Fossil of Giant Ancient Sea Predator

Science

Paleontologists have discovered that a group of remarkable ancient sea creatures existed for much longer and grew to much larger sizes than previously thought, thanks to extraordinarily well-preserved fossils discovered in Morocco. (more…)