In 2014 a former judge from San Diego County approached the UCLA Kidney Transplant Program with an unusual request: If the judge donated a kidney to a stranger now, could his then-4-year-old grandson, who suffered from chronic kidney disease, receive priority for a future kidney transplant if needed later in life? (more…)
TORONTO, ON – Co-authored with PEN Canada and PEN International, report calls for Honduran government to end lethal violence against journalists and its climate of impunity, and for donor states such as the UK and Canada to work with Honduras on these issues
Journalists who cover organized crime, government corruption and other sensitive issues are increasingly facing threats and lethal attacks in Honduras, with almost complete impunity for perpetrators, said PEN International in a new report released today in partnership with PEN Canada and the International Human Rights Program (IHRP) at the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. (more…)
Comet 2013 A1 (Siding Spring) will make a very close approach to Mars in October 2014.
The latest trajectory of comet 2013 A1 (Siding Spring) generated by the Near-Earth Object Program Office at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., indicates the comet will pass within 186,000 miles (300,000 kilometers) of Mars and there is a strong possibility that it might pass much closer. The NEO Program Office’s current estimate based on observations through March 1, 2013, has it passing about 31,000 miles (50,000 kilometers) from the Red Planet’s surface. That distance is about two-and-a-half times that of the orbit of outermost moon, Deimos.
Scientists generated the trajectory for comet Siding Spring based on the data obtained by observations since October 2012. Further refinement to its orbit is expected as more observational data is obtained. At present, Mars lies within the range of possible paths for the comet and the possibility of an impact cannot be excluded. However, since the impact probability is currently less than one in 600, future observations are expected to provide data that will completely rule out a Mars impact. (more…)
Three in Five Israelis Now View Obama Favorably
COLLEGE PARK, Md. – A new University of Maryland poll shows that in the aftermath of November’s round of fighting with Hamas and other groups in the Gaza Strip, only 36% of Israelis think that Israel is better off than it was before the escalation, while a majority feel Israel is either about the same (38%) or worse off (21%).
40% said Israel won the combat in the Gaza Strip. A majority said either that no side won (45%) or that Hamas won (11%). (more…)
ANN ARBOR — It’s a sad but familiar scene near the grounds of many medical campuses: hospital-gowned patients, some toting rolling IV poles, huddled in clumps under bus shelters or warming areas, smoking cigarettes.
Smoking causes 30 percent of all cancer deaths and 87 percent of all lung cancer deaths. Yet, roughly 50 percent to 83 percent of cancer patients keep smoking after a cancer diagnosis, through treatment and beyond, says Sonia Duffy, University of Michigan School of Nursing researcher. For patients who quit on their own, relapse rates (as in the general population) are as high as 85 percent. (more…)
Berkeley Lab and JBEI Researchers Develop a Biology-Friendly Robot Programming Language
Teaching a robot a new trick is a challenge. You can’t reward it with treats and it doesn’t respond to approval or disappointment in your voice. For researchers in the biological sciences, however, the future training of robots has been made much easier thanks to a new program called “PaR-PaR.”
Nathan Hillson, a biochemist at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI), led the development of PaR-PaR, which stands for Programming a Robot. PaR-PaR is a simple high-level, biology-friendly, robot-programming language that allows researchers to make better use of liquid-handling robots and thereby make possible experiments that otherwise might not have been considered. (more…)
EAST LANSING, Mich. — A few minutes of exercise can help children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder perform better academically, according to a new study led by a Michigan State University researcher.
The study, published in the current issue of the Journal of Pediatrics, shows for the first time that kids with ADHD can better drown out distractions and focus on a task after a single bout of exercise. Scientists say such “inhibitory control” is the main challenge faced by people with the disorder. (more…)
Warmer waters flowed to shelfbreak south of New England
At a meeting with New England commercial fishermen last December, physical oceanographers Glen Gawarkiewicz and Al Plueddemann from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) were alerted by three fishermen about unusually high surface water temperatures and strong currents on the outer continental shelf south of New England.
“I promised them I would look into why that was happening,” Gawarkiewicz says. (more…)
