An interesting article in Scientific American on how the water towers on top of so many NYC building came into being.

(Hint: It’s all the liberal’s fault. ///)

Herbal Menopause Supplement Often Contains Other Species, DNA Bar Coding Reveals: Scientific American

But controlled trials of this supplement have seen mixed results, sometimes showing it to be effective in relieving hot flashes, sleep disruptions, mood swings and other symptoms whereas other times revealing it to be ineffective. And some case reports even suggest that it can be toxic, damaging the liver.

This messy track record gave Damon Little, a bioinformaticist at The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG), and his colleagues an idea: What if patients—in these trials and out in the community—were not always taking pure, actual black cohosh (Actaea racemosa), but one or more related species? Fortunately, they had just the tool on hand to figure that out: DNA barcoding.

Using this technology, which locates and sequences specific areas of a plant’s genome (specifically, two matK gene nucleotides), they were able to determine that one quarter of commercially available “black cohosh” pills were not the herb at all. Their findings were published this July in the Journal of AOAC International.

“Misidentification and adulteration in black cohosh supplements [has been] known for many years as a matter of concern,” notes Rolf Teschke, an internist at the Teaching Hospital of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt and who was not involved in the new research. “The present study confirms—but extends—previous findings.”

Unlike drugs, however, supplements are not required to be tested for safety or efficacy by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration before they hit the market. And testing to make sure the contents match the label are much more lax than it is for pharmaceuticals, opening the opportunity for mislabeling, whether it is accidental or intentional.

scientificamerican.com

Mars will make a close approach to Earth Saturday (March 3), and interested skywatchers can follow the action live online.

Every 26 months, the orbits of Earth and Mars align such that the two planets form a relatively straight line with the sun. This cosmic event is called an opposition, because the Red Planet sits on the exact opposite side of Earth from the sun. 

Mars will be in opposition to Earth Saturday, and it will be visible even to stargazers under the cloudiest of skies. That’s because the online Slooh Space Camera will broadcast a free, real-time feed of the Mars opposition, beginning at 11:00 p.m. EST (0400 GMT on March 4).

Slooh will provide footage from multiple observatories around the world, including Arizona and the Canary Islands off the coast of Africa. The broadcast can be accessed at Slooh’s homepage, found here: events.slooh.com

Though the opposition occurs Saturday, the Red Planet’s actual closest approach to Earth won’t come until Monday (March 5), when the two bodies are separated by about 62.6 million miles (100.7 million kilometers). This discrepancy in dates is caused by Mars’ elliptical path around the sun. [Amazing Mars Photos]

There are reports of the efficacy of capsaicin in crowd control, but little regarding trials of exposures. Perhaps this is because pepper spray is regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency, as a pesticide and not by the FDA.

The concentration of capsaicin in bear spray is 1-2%; it is 10-30% in ‘personal defense sprays.’

While the police might feel reassured by the study, ‘The effect of oleoresin capsicum ‘pepper’ spray inhalation on respiratory function,’ I was not. This study met the ‘gold standard’ of clinical trials, in that it was a ‘randomized, cross-over controlled trial to assess the effect of Oleoresin capsicum (OC) spray inhalation on respiratory function by itself and combined with restraint.’ However, while the OC exposure showed no ill effect, only 34 volunteers were exposed to only 1 sec of Cap-Stun 5.5% OC spray by inhalation ‘from 5 ft away as they might in the field setting (as recommended by both manufacturer and local police policies).’

By contrast, an ACLU report, ‘Pepper Spray Update: More Fatalities, More Questions’ found, in just two years, 26 deaths after OC spraying, noting that death was more likely if the victim was also restrained. This translated to 1 death per 600 times police used spray. (The cause of death was not firmly linked to the OC). According to the ACLU, ‘an internal memorandum produced by the largest supplier of pepper spray to the California police and civilian markets’ concludes that there may be serious risks with more than a 1 sec spray. A subsequent Department of Justice study examined another 63 deaths after pepper spray during arrests; the spray was felt to be a ‘contributing factor’ in several.

A review in 1996 by the Division of Epidemiology of the NC DHHS and OSHA concluded that exposure to OC spray during police training constituted an unacceptable health risk.

Read the whole thing…

via BoingBoing

See also

Psychology of Pepper Spray
Scientific American: About Pepper Spray

scientificamerican.com

When colleagues called the work of Dutch psychologist Diederik Stapel too good to be true, they meant it as a compliment. But a preliminary investigative report (go.nature.com/tqmp5c) released on October 31 gives literal meaning to the phrase, detailing years of data manipulation and blatant fabrication by the prominent Tilburg University researcher.

“We have some 30 papers in peer-reviewed journals where we are actually sure that they are fake, and there are more to come,” says Pim Levelt, chair of the committee that investigated Stapel’s work at the university.

The culture of publish or perish.

scientificamerican.com

Human serum albumin from transgenic rice could ease shortages of donated blood.

One can’t squeeze blood from a turnip, but new research suggests that a bit of transgenic tweaking may make it possible to squeeze blood—or at least blood protein—from a grain of rice. In a study published online today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers describe rice seeds that can produce substantial quantities of a blood protein called human serum albumin, or HSA.

HSA is in high demand around the world, both for its role in drug and vaccine production and for use in treating patients with severe burns and other serious conditions such as haemorrhagic shock and liver cirrhosis. The primary source of therapeutic HSA is donated human blood. To overcome limitations caused by blood shortages and contamination of donated blood by viruses, researchers worldwide have been working to create functional HSA either synthetically, with the help of yeast and bacteria, or in transgenic organisms such as cows and tobacco.

In China, which has suffered from HSA shortages and contaminated blood supplies, the idea of using an abundant crop like rice to supplement or even supplant the current albumin supply is an attractive one. “We could ease demand for HSA and reduce the potential risk of spreading viruses in blood plasma. That’s what prompted me to do something like this,” says Daichang Yang, a plant biotechnologist at Wuhan University, China, who led the research.

scientificamerican.com

The X Prize Foundation today announced the winners of its year-long, US$1.4-million challenge to spur development of improved oil-collection systems for use during spills. The victorious team almost doubled the competition’s minimum threshold for success, and more than tripled previous best efforts.