Everest mice to solve doping
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IF YOU want to build the world’s largest laboratory for studying foot-and-mouth disease, put it on an island. That’s the latest advice to the US government, which is keen to site a “National Bio and Agro- Defense Facility” on one of five potential sites on the mainland. The mega-lab would replace the ageing Plum Island Animal Disease Center, which researches foot-and-mouth disease and other serious animal pathogens on an island close to New York. But in a scathing report issued on 22 May, the General Accountability Office accused the Department of Homeland Security of failing to conduct proper risk assessment studies for the planned move. “The bottom line is that we don’t think the DHS has sufficient evidence to say it can be built safely on the mainland,” says Nancy Kingsbury, author of the report. The GAO says mainland sites are too risky because a virus could escape and easily spread to nearby farms. That happened last year when foot-and-mouth virus escaped from a faulty pipe at a high-containment lab at the Institute for Animal Health in Pirbright, UK, causing outbreaks at eight neighbouring farms. GAO cites this as “the best evidence in favour of an island location”. THE childhood obesity epidemic in the US may have peaked, but its detrimental effects on health have barely begun. The proportion of US children and adolescents who were unusually heavy for their height rose by about 20 per cent from 1999 to 2004, but didn’t change between 2003 and 2006. These latest figures are from Cynthia Ogden and colleagues at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Hyattsville, Maryland, who surveyed 8000 young people (Journal of the American Medical Association, vol 299, p 2401). XINHUA/GETTY NEWS EVEREST MICE TO SOLVE DOPING Edmund Hilary may have been the first man to conquer Everest but soon his feat will be repeated by a band of mice. As well as making history, the mice may reveal the natural biochemical changes that take place at high altitude, which could lead to a test for athletes who have had their genes manipulated. High-altitude training benefits athletes by stimulating production of erythropoietin (EPO), a hormone that allows blood to carry more oxygen. Yet it is possible to cheat by artifically boosting EPO levels, either by taking supplements or maybe by manipulating athletes’ genes. While today’s tests can identify athletes who have taken artificial EPO, they cannot distinguish between EPO occurring naturally and as a result of gene interference. “Gene doping isn’t yet in widespread use but it is important for those involved in anti-doping to stay one step ahead,” says a spokesman for the anti-doping authority UK Sport. Tejvir Khurana and colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, who began ascending Everest on Monday with the mice in tow, hope to find molecular “signatures” in the mice’s tissue and blood that are only present if EPO is produced in the normal way. If present in humans, such markers could help develop a gene-doping test. “The practical challenges they will face are fascinating,” says Mike Grocott, an expert in extreme- environment physiology at University College London. “Parts of the ascent are technically difficult, particularly if you are carrying a mouse.” –Let’s hope it’s a dope-free Olympics– 60 SECONDS Weedy weather US farmlands will get weedier over the next few decades, as climate change is expected to give a bigger boost to weeds than to crop plants. The prediction is one of many in a study of the effects of climate change on US ecosystems released this week by the US Department of Agriculture. Who cares what happens? The more Democrats know about global warming, the more concerned they are. But Republicans who consider themselves well informed on the topic seem no more worried than those who profess ignorance. This is because conservative news sources are often highly sceptical of climate science, say a pair of political psychologists at Stanford University. Monkey-robot harmony A monkey has made a robotic arm convey tasty treats to its mouth using thought alone. The arm’s creators, led by Andrew Schwartz at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania, say this is the first practical task performed by a brain-controlled robotic arm and a big step towards a device that could help amputees and paraplegics (Nature, DOI: 10.1038/nature06996). First micro-RNA trial A drug that knocks out the “micro RNAs” that usually halt protein production has entered clinical trials as a possible treatment for hepatitis C. Other forms of RNA interference work by silencing genes, but this approach increases the amount of protein that gets translated, providing a new way to treat disease. How the snowball melted An outpouring of methane 635 million years ago may have ended “snowball Earth” – a time when ice shrouded the globe. According to Martin Kennedy’s team at the University of California at Riverside, instability in the ice sheets or local warming may have triggered the release. The gas’s warming effect released yet more methane, quickly melting the ice (Nature, vol 453, p 642). Disease lab risk Fat figures flatten www.newscientist.com 31 May 2008 | NewScientist | 7 Institute of Technology in Zurich and David Wilcove of Princeton University found that more than half the palm plantations came at the expense of forests – largely pristine, intact forest in Indonesia and previously logged forest in Malaysia. The rest of the expansion covered pre- existing cropland (Conservation Letters, DOI: 10.1111/j.1755- 263X.2008.00011.x). The European Commission is drafting a law to ban imports of palm oil crops grown on intact tropical forests. But logged forests support nearly as much biodiversity as primary forests, say the researchers, and should also be protected. Even so, there’s no reason to celebrate yet, as the epidemic has peaked at worrying levels: 32 per cent of US children are overweight and 16 per cent are obese. “The public health toll of childhood obesity will continue to mount,” warn Cara Ebbeling and David Ludwig, obesity researchers at the Children’s Hospital Boston, in an editorial accompanying the study. “It can take many years for an obese child to develop life- threatening complications.” “It can take many years for an obese child to develop life- threatening complications”
Transcript of Everest mice to solve doping
IF YOU want to build the world’s largest laboratory for studying foot-and-mouth disease, put it on an island. That’s the latest advice to the US government, which is keen to site a “National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility” on one of five potential sites on the mainland.
The mega-lab would replace the ageing Plum Island Animal Disease Center, which researches foot-and-mouth disease and other serious animal pathogens on an island close to New York. But in a scathing report issued on 22 May, the General Accountability Office accused the Department of Homeland Security of failing to conduct proper risk assessment studies for the planned move.
“The bottom line is that we don’t think the DHS has sufficient evidence to say it can be built safely on the mainland,” says Nancy Kingsbury, author of the report.
The GAO says mainland sites are too risky because a virus could escape and easily spread to nearby farms. That happened last year when foot-and-mouth virus escaped from a faulty pipe at a high-containment lab at the Institute for Animal Health in Pirbright, UK, causing outbreaks at eight neighbouring farms. GAO cites this as “the best evidence in favour of an island location”.
THE childhood obesity epidemic in the US may have peaked, but its detrimental effects on health have barely begun.
The proportion of US children and adolescents who were unusually heavy for their height rose by about 20 per cent from 1999 to 2004, but didn’t change between 2003 and 2006. These latest figures are from Cynthia Ogden and colleagues at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Hyattsville, Maryland, who surveyed 8000 young people (Journal of the American Medical Association,vol 299, p 2401).
XIN
HUA
/GET
TY N
EWS
EVEREST MICE TO SOLVE DOPINGEdmund Hilary may have been the first man to conquer Everest but soon his feat will be repeated by a band of mice. As well as making history, the mice may reveal the natural biochemical changes that take place at high altitude, which could lead to a test for athletes who have had their genes manipulated.
High-altitude training benefits athletes by stimulating production of erythropoietin (EPO), a hormone that allows blood to carry more oxygen. Yet it is possible to cheat by artifically boosting EPO levels, either by taking supplements or maybe by manipulating athletes’ genes.
While today’s tests can identify athletes who have taken artificial EPO, they cannot distinguish between EPO occurring naturally and as a result of gene interference. “Gene doping isn’t yet in
widespread use but it is important for those involved in anti-doping to stay one step ahead,” says a spokesman for the anti-doping authority UK Sport.
Tejvir Khurana and colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, who began ascending Everest on Monday with the mice in tow, hope to find molecular “signatures” in the mice’s tissue and blood that are only present if EPO is produced in the normal way. If present in humans, such markers could help develop a gene-doping test.
“The practical challenges they will face are fascinating,” says Mike Grocott, an expert in extreme-environment physiology at University College London. “Parts of the ascent are technically difficult, particularly if you are carrying a mouse.”
–Let’s hope it’s a dope-free Olympics–
60 SECONDS
Weedy weather
US farmlands will get weedier over the next few decades, as climate change is expected to give a bigger boost to weeds than to crop plants. The prediction is one of many in a study of the effects of climate change on US ecosystems released this week by the US Department of Agriculture.
Who cares what happens?
The more Democrats know about global warming, the more concerned they are. But Republicans who consider themselves well informed on the topic seem no more worried than those who profess ignorance. This is because conservative news sources are often highly sceptical of climate science, say a pair of political psychologists at Stanford University.
Monkey-robot harmony
A monkey has made a robotic arm convey tasty treats to its mouth using thought alone. The arm’s creators, led by Andrew Schwartz at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania, say this is the first practical task performed by a brain-controlled robotic arm and a big step towards a device that could help amputees and paraplegics (Nature, DOI: 10.1038/nature06996).
First micro-RNA trial
A drug that knocks out the “micro RNAs” that usually halt protein production has entered clinical trials as a possible treatment for hepatitis C. Other forms of RNA interference work by silencing genes, but this approach increases the amount of protein that gets translated, providing a new way to treat disease.
How the snowball melted
An outpouring of methane 635 million years ago may have ended “snowball Earth” – a time when ice shrouded the globe. According to Martin Kennedy’s team at the University of California at Riverside, instability in the ice sheets or local warming may have triggered the release. The gas’s warming effect released yet more methane, quickly melting the ice (Nature, vol 453, p 642).
Disease lab risk
Fat figures flatten
www.newscientist.com 31 May 2008 | NewScientist | 7
Institute of Technology in Zurich and David Wilcove of Princeton University found that more than half the palm plantations came at the expense of forests – largely pristine, intact forest in Indonesia and previously logged forest in Malaysia. The rest of the expansion covered pre-existing cropland (Conservation Letters, DOI: 10.1111/j.1755-263X.2008.00011.x).
The European Commission is drafting a law to ban imports of palm oil crops grown on intact tropical forests. But logged forests support nearly as much biodiversity as primary forests, say the researchers, and should also be protected.
Even so, there’s no reason to celebrate yet, as the epidemic has peaked at worrying levels: 32 per cent of US children are overweight and 16 per cent are obese.
“The public health toll of childhood obesity will continue
to mount,” warn Cara Ebbeling and David Ludwig, obesity researchers at the Children’s Hospital Boston, in an editorial accompanying the study. “It can take many years for an obese child to develop life-threatening complications.”
“It can take many years for an obese child to develop life-threatening complications”
