Follow The ‘Green’ Brick Road?

Researchers have found that bricks made from fly ash — fine ash particles captured as waste by coal-fired power plants — may be even safer than predicted. Instead of leaching minute amounts of mercury as some researchers had predicted, the bricks apparently do the reverse, pulling minute amounts of the toxic metal out of ambient air.

Each year, roughly 25 million tons of fly ash from coal-fired power plants are recycled, generally as additives in building materials such as concrete, but 45 million tons go to waste. Fly ash bricks both find a use for some of that waste and counter the environmental impact from the manufacture of standard bricks.

“Manufacturing clay brick requires kilns fired to high temperatures,” said Henry Liu, a longtime National Science Foundation (NSF) awardee and the president of Freight Pipeline Company (FPC), which developed the bricks. “That wastes energy, pollutes air and generates greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. In contrast, fly ash bricks are manufactured at room temperature. They conserve energy, cost less to manufacture, and don’t contribute to air pollution or global warming.”

Once colored and shaped, the FPC bricks are similar to their clay counterparts, both in appearance and in meeting or exceeding construction-material standards.

Supported by NSF’s Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program, Liu has been working since 2004 to develop the bricks. The first phase of support enabled him to make fly ash bricks more durable by engineering them to resist freezing and thawing due to weather. Liu is now working from a second-phase SBIR award to test the brick material’s safety and prepare it for market.

“Green manufacturing is a focus for the nation,” said Tom Allnutt of NSF’s SBIR program, who oversaw Liu’s award. “Liu’s innovative use of fly ash to manufacture high quality building materials will potentially decrease some of the negative environmental impact of coal-fired power generation while meeting increasing demands for greener building materials.”

While researchers need to study the bricks further to determine how the mercury adsorption occurs and how tightly the metal is trapped, the new findings suggest the bricks will not have a negative impact on indoor air quality.

On average, air contains low amounts of mercury that can range from less than 1 nanogram per cubic meter (ng/m3) to tens of ng/m3 — a small fraction of the Environmental Protection Agency limit for continuous exposure.

Inside a confined experimental chamber, the bricks did not raise the mercury levels in the surrounding air (originally more than one nanogram), and instead appeared to lower the concentration down to roughly half a nanogram.

Engineers from FPC of Columbia, Mo., developed the bricks with NSF support and reported their findings on mercury leaching at the May 7-10, 2007, World of Coal Ash Conference in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Four Or More Cups Of Coffee A Day May Help Prevent Gout

Coffee is a habit for more than 50 percent of Americans, who drink, on average, two cups per day. This widely consumed beverage is regularly investigated and debated for its impact on health conditions from breast cancer to heart disease. Among its complex effects on the body, coffee or its components have been linked to lower insulin and uric acid levels on a short-term basis or cross-sectionally. These and other mechanisms suggest that coffee consumption may affect the risk of gout, the most prevalent inflammatory arthritis in adult males.

To examine how coffee consumption might aggravate or protect against this common and excruciatingly painful condition, researchers at the Arthritis Research Centre of Canada, University of British Columbia in Canada, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and Harvard School of Public Health in Boston conducted a prospective study on 45,869 men over age 40 with no history of gout at baseline. Over 12 years of follow-up, Hyon K. Choi, MD, DrPH, and his associates evaluated the relationship between the intake of coffee and the incidence of gout in this high risk population. Their findings, featured in the June 2007 issue of Arthritis & Rheumatism, provide compelling evidence that drinking four or more cups of coffee a day dramatically reduces the risk of gout for men.

Subjects were drawn from an ongoing study of some 50,000 male health professionals, 91 percent white, who were between 40 and 75 years of age in 1986 when the project was initiated. To assess coffee and total caffeine intake, Dr. Choi and his team used a food-frequency questionnaire, updated every four years. Participants chose from nine frequency responses - ranging from never to two to four cups per week to 6 or more per day - to record their average consumption of coffee, decaffeinated coffee, tea, and other caffeine-containing comestibles, such as cola and chocolate.

Through another questionnaire, the researchers documented 757 newly diagnosed cases meeting the American College of Rheumatology criteria for gout during the follow-up period. Then, they determined the relative risk of incident gout for long-term coffee drinkers divided into four groups - less than one cup per day, one to three cups per day, four to five cups per day, and 6 or more cups per day - as well as for regular drinkers of decaffeinated coffee, tea, and other caffeinated beverages. They also evaluated the impact of other risk factors for gout - body mass index, history of hypertension, alcohol use, and a diet high in red meat and high-fat dairy foods among them - on the association between coffee consumption and gout among the study participants.

Most significantly, the data revealed that the risk for developing gout decreased with increasing coffee consumption. The risk of gout was 40 percent lower for men who drank four to five cups a day and 59 percent lower for men who drank 6 or more cups a day than for men who never drank coffee. There was also a modest inverse association with decaffeinated coffee consumption. These findings were independent of all other risk factors for gout. Tea drinking and total caffeine intake were both shown to have no effect on the incidence of gout among the subjects. On the mechanism of these findings, Dr. Choi speculates that components of coffee other than caffeine may be responsible for the beverage’s gout-prevention benefits. Among the possibilities, coffee contains the phenol chlorogenic acid, a strong antioxidant.

While not prescribing four or more cups a day, this study can help individuals make an informed choice regarding coffee consumption. “Our findings are most directly generalizable to men age 40 years and older, the most gout-prevalent population, with no history of gout,” Dr. Choi notes. “Given the potential influence of female hormones on the risk of gout in women and an increased role of dietary impact on uric acid levels among patients with existing gout, prospective studies of these populations would be valuable.”

Bush grants presidency extraordinary powers

President Bush has signed a directive granting extraordinary powers to the office of the president in the event of a declared national emergency, apparently without congressional approval or oversight.

The "National Security and Homeland Security Presidential Directive" was signed May 9, notes Jerome R. Corsi in a WND column.

It was issued with the dual designation of NSPD-51, as a National Security Presidential Directive, and HSPD-20, as a Homeland Security Presidential Directive.

The directive establishes under the office of the president a new national continuity coordinator whose job is to make plans for "National Essential Functions" of all federal, state, local, territorial and tribal governments, as well as private sector organizations to continue functioning under the president's directives in the event of a national emergency.

"Catastrophic emergency" is loosely defined as "any incident, regardless of location, that results in extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage, or disruption severely affecting the U.S. population, infrastructure, environment, economy, or government functions."

See the rest of the story here.

Do Chip Implants Protect or Violate Privacy?

Care Facility Will Electronically Tag Alzheimer's Patients Despite Protests

A Florida adult-care facility is going ahead with plans to implant identity chips into patients with Alzheimer's disease who are in its care, despite protests that it is a form of branding.

Alzheimer's Community Care in West Palm Beach will implant a radio frequency identification chip into Alzheimer's patients with the consent of their families or the patients themselves if they are deemed competent.

The chip, which is slightly larger than a grain of rice, is implanted under the skin of the right forearm. Each chip will contain a unique 16-digit number that, when scanned in an emergency room, will link to the patient's medical records.

Mary Barnes, the president and CEO of Alzheimer's Community Care, said the RFID chips, manufactured by VeriChip Corp., provided the best means of giving medical personnel access to a patient's medical history, since people with Alzheimer's often cannot relay that information themselves.

"Our patients are the most fragile and vulnerable of any population," Barnes said.

While the RFID implants have been approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, VeriChip is testing the effectiveness of the chips in a real-world situation to see if Alzheimer's patients with the chip receive "quicker and better treatment" than those without, said VeriChip CEO Scott Silverman.

See the rest of the article here.

Powered By Sound — Revolutionary Stove Could Help Reduce Poverty

It’s a cooker, a fridge, and a generator in one — and it could have a huge impact on the lives of people in the world’s poorest communities.

The £2m SCORE (Stove for Cooking, Refrigeration and Electricity) project brings together experts from across the world to develop a wood-powered generator capable of both cooking and cooling food. By developing an affordable, versatile domestic appliance SCORE aims to address the energy needs of rural communities in Africa and Asia, where access to power is extremely limited.

Across the world, two billion people use open fires as their primary cooking method. These fires have been found to be highly inefficient, with 93 percent of the energy generated lost. And when used in enclosed spaces, smoke from the fires can cause health problems.

Led by the School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering at The University of Nottingham, the project team will use thermoacoustic technology for the first time to convert biomass fuels into energy, powering the stove, fridge and generator.

Thermoacoustics refers to the generation of sound waves through the non-uniform heating of gas — illustrated by the ’singing’ of hot glass vessels which can be heard during the glass blowing process. This phenomena has been known for centuries, but could offer new possibilities in the energy conversion process.

The concept of the proposed device is based on proven thermoacoustic engines and refrigerators developed for applications such as combustion-fired natural gas liquefaction and radioisotope-fuelled electric power generation. Los Alamos Laboratories, in collaboration with several industrial partners, has played a lead role in the development of thermoacoustic technology.

Using thermoacoustic technology is a more efficient way of using wood as a fuel than using an open fire to cook. It produces less pollutants. The device will also have few moving parts making in more reliable.

This moving part, the linear alternator, would be developed at The University of Nottingham in conjunction with GP Acoustics, a company which produces loudspeaker equipment.

Professor Mark Johnson of the University’s School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering said: “Two things excite me about this project: first we’re taking technology concepts from satellite and military applications to deliver appropriate technology to some of the world’s poorest rural communities and second we’re integrating technologies in a novel way to deliver a totally new concept in energy conversion. One of the biggest engineering challenges will be to ensure that the majority of the developed system can be built and maintained within the community that uses it.”

Mark Dodd, Research Manager GP Acoustics, said: “We at GP Acoustics and our manufacturing partner Dai-ichi in the Philippines are delighted that technology originally created for the leisure market is being used to help improve the lives of people in developing countries.”

The University of Manchester, Imperial College London and Queen Mary, University of London are partners in the project — from researching engine design to the manufacture and distribution of the stove in the developing world. The project will work with governments, universities and civil organisation across Africa and Asia, many of whom have already offered support. This collaboration will ensure the device is affordable, socially acceptable and that there is scope for communities to develop businesses to manufacture and repair locally.

Professor Maksud Helali, Head of the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology has offered his support. “Bangladesh’s energy infrastructure is relatively small and inefficient, even to low income standards, and its access to energy is difficult,” he said.

“An efficient, expanding energy system is essential for accelerated economic growth and poverty alleviation. Industry and commerce depend on readily available, reliable, reasonably-priced energy to operate and expand. It will improve the quality of people’s lives.”

Researchers from Los Alamos Laboratories are also supporting the project, along with Practical Action, a charity which promotes the development of sustainable technology to tackle poverty in developing countries. The SCORE consortium is funded by grants from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council as part of its initiative on energy and international development.

Confirmed — Deforestation Plays Critical Climate Change Role

Dr. Pep Canadell, from the Global Carbon Project and CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research, says today in the journal Science that tropical deforestation releases 1.5 billion tonnes of carbon each year into the atmosphere.

“Deforestation in the tropics accounts for nearly 20 per cent of carbon emissions due to human activities,” Dr. Canadell says. “This will release an estimated 87 to 130 billion tonnes of carbon by 2100, which is greater than the amount of carbon that would be released by 13 years of global fossil fuel combustion. So maintaining forests as carbon sinks will make a significant contribution to stabilising atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations.”

In the first study of its kind, Dr. Canadell joined an international team of experts from the US, UK, Brazil, and France to compare data from 11 climate-carbon computer models. The results show that tropical forests continue to accumulate carbon through to the end of the century, although they may become less efficient at higher temperatures.

“The new body of information shows considerable value in preserving tropical forests such as those in the Amazon and Indonesia as carbon sinks, that they do not release the carbon back into the atmosphere as has been suggested,” Dr. Canadell says. “However, it also demonstrates the need to avoid higher levels of global warming, which could slow the ability of forests to accumulate carbon.”

He says that while tropical deforestation will continue, slowing the amount of clearing will make significant impacts. “If by 2050 we slow deforestation by 50 per cent from current levels, with the aim of stopping deforestation when we have 50 per cent of the world’s tropical forests remaining, this would save the emission of 50 billion tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere. This 50/50/50 option would avoid the release of the equivalent of six years of global fossil fuel emissions.”

Reducing deforestation is just one of a portfolio of mitigation options needed to reduce concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

“Globally, we need a range of actions to reduce the build up of carbon in the atmosphere,” Dr. Canadell says. “This study ensures we have a sound scientific basis behind the consideration of deforestation reduction.”

SongSlide - Sliding Scale Pricing For Indie Music

Devin Brewer of SongSlide writes:

I thought you might be interested in blogging about a new site that I’ve co-founded called SongSlide that lets consumers pick the prices they pay for independent music. You can check out the site at songslide.com. We’re a small startup founded by two musicians, but we’ve recently been blogged about by Stephen J. Dubner, co-author of Freakonomics, and we have our first celebrity selling music on SongSlide: Coconut Records, aka Jason Schwartzman (star of the movie “Rushmore” and a great songwriter).

Our approach to selling independent music is to let the consumer control the price, and also to pay much higher percentages to the artists. When you buy digital songs or albums on SongSlide, you can slide the price up or down. The higher the price, the higher the percentage that goes to the artist.

The idea came out of an experience my co-founder John Hurd and I had as independent musicians. Every time we let our fans choose how much to pay for our shows and CDs, we made more money than when we used a fixed price model.

The Consumerist wrote that SongSlide, “may be a glimpse into the future of online music.” (Pay What You Want For Independent Music With SongSlide)

Mitch Ratcliffe also wrote a great post about us on ZD Net: Consumer-Generated Pricing: Foundations of a Democratic Patronage

Since we launched our beta site in January 2007, the average price paid for a song is $1.66 (even though the minimum price is $0.59). We feel this demonstrates that artists on the far right of the Long Tail have small but extremely passionate fanbases who want to see them succeed and are willing to pay more to help make that happen.

We’re calling this new pricing method Consumer-Generated Pricing, and we feel it’s a way to empower fans to become patrons of their favorite artists, even on a small scale. We’ve also filed a patent on this invention/business method and believe the pricing method can be applied to many other types of digital media and other products.

Devices Of The Soul

In Steve Talbott’s widely anticipated and thought-provoking new book — Devices of the Soul: Battling for Our Selves in an Age of Machines — the former software engineer and current Senior Researcher at The Nature Institute in Ghent, NY delves into society’s seemingly insatiable lust for and addiction to technology.

Talbott’s timely exploration of our technological cravings has already garnered enthusiastic praise from one of the nation’s most acclaimed thinkers, Michael Pollan. The bestselling author of The Omnivore’s Dilemma and The Botany of Desire calls Devices of the Soul an “urgent and important work.” Adds Pollan, “Nothing is as rare or sorely needed in our tech-enchanted culture right now as intelligent criticism of technology, and Steve Talbott is exactly the critic we’ve been waiting for: trenchant, sophisticated, and completely original.”

In Devices Of The Soul, Talbott challenges readers to critically examine society’s ever-increasing detachment from its physical surroundings and reflect on its growing dependence on techno-wizardry. Why? In an era when 65 percent of American consumers spend more time with their PCs than with their loved ones, according to a recent study, Talbott insists something vital can all too easily slip away — our selves, the human spirit from which technology stems. At the same time, if we accept in the right spirit the challenge presented by our machines, we have an unprecedented opportunity for gaining self-mastery. Everything depends on our wakefulness as we sit in front of the ubiquitous screens mediating so many of our interactions with the world.

“Self-forgetfulness is the reigning temptation of the technological era. This is why we so readily give our assent to the absurd proposition that a computer can add two plus two, despite the obvious fact that it can do nothing of the sort — not if we have in mind anything remotely resembling what we do when we add numbers,” writes Talbott. “In the computer’s case, the mechanics of addition involve no motivation, no consciousness of the task, no mobilization of the will, no metabolic activity, no imagination. And its performance brings neither the satisfaction of accomplishment nor the strengthening of practical skills and cognitive capacities.”

While the differences between human and machine performance in simple addition may seem unimportant, these differences become crucial when, for example, the machine’s arithmetic rises to the sophistication of spreadsheet software. Remembering what makes us human is the only way we can redeem such software, bringing its disensouled operations into proper connection with our own affairs. Remembering is what Talbott helps us to do. As award-winning computer scientist Peter Denning puts it, “Chapter after chapter, he [Talbott] shows how to draw on the powers of technology without losing your soul or breaking your heart.”

Talbott devotes chapters to topics as diverse as the role of technology in threatening or saving our natural environment; the effort to endow computers with emotions and other human attributes; the corresponding endowment of social contexts with machine attributes; why technical guarantees of privacy are always self-defeating; how every genuine success in humanizing technology is an invitation to a deeper dehumanization; the frightening ways computers are being used in grade school classrooms; how computers threaten the existence of not only the university, but also of the student; what “primitive” Amazonian tribes can teach us about our own relation to technology; and how certain special communities for the disabled can help us rise above high-tech foolishness.

Talbott’s lucid evaluation of the roots and enticements of modern technology makes reading his book a pleasure. Those who join Talbott on this illuminating tour are sure to think more clearly about how they consume technology and how they allow it to consume them long after they close the covers of this soulful, satisfying read.

Electronic Displays That Fit On Clothing Could Power Revolution In Lighting

A thin film of plastic which conducts electricity and produces solar power could be the basis for a revolution in the way we light our homes and design clothes.

An international research project has begun that could help bring to mass-market organic light emitting devices (OLEDs), which could have far reaching technological implications and cut the cost of lighting by billion of pounds each year.

Because the devices are thin and flexible, lighting and electronic display screens could for the first time be created on almost any material, so that clothes and packaging can display electronic information.

The devices’ uses could vary from lighting that is many times more efficient than current bulbs to clothes whose colour can be changed at will and beer cans that display the latest football results.

At present, the devices are used as displays in some mobile phones and MP3 players, but they are not reliable enough for larger screens such as in TVs and computers as they stop working after a few months.

But now an international consortium of researchers, led by the University of Bath, UK, has begun an £850,000 ($1,700,000), three-year project to put the science behind the devices on a firmer basis, so helping make them efficient enough to be worth producing for the mass market.

The consortium, called Modecom, consists of 13 groups from nine universities and two companies. Three groups are from the UK, six from the USA, and one each from China, Belgium, Italy and Denmark. The European Union is funding the European and Chinese partners.

The devices exploit a discovery made around 15 years ago that some polymers have the unusual property of either turning electricity into light, or light into electricity, depending on how the devices are made.

Because these polymers are thin and flexible, they could be used in a multiplicity of ways:

• as a transparent window. This is like a conventional window during the day, but when it gets dark a switch is turned on and the entire window area emits light in a more efficient way than conventional or energy saving bulbs, promising huge savings
• in garments which could change colour at the press of a button
• in clothing which displays strips of the polymer which run off solar power, allowing electronic messages to be displayed which can be updated. This could be useful for the emergency services such as police or ambulance
• in packaging for common goods that could be made to display electronic messages such as health warnings and recipes, or could emit light
• as a source of solar power to top up mobile phones batteries
• as lightweight, solar power sources that could be rolled up and stored and which would also be ideal for people requiring electricity in remote locations, such as field researchers, mountaineers, sailors and military personnel.

The consortium is co-ordinated by Dr Alison Walker, of the University of Bath’s Department of Physics, who said: “This is a long-term project, and the contributions of many scientists are needed for its success.

“The experimentalists make measurements to test the efficiency of the devices, but it’s hard to get a clear picture of what is going on at present. This project is about making that picture clearer using computer models to develop the theory.

“Success in achieving the goals of cheap, efficient and long lasting devices is essential as we must do everything we can to reduce our energy costs.”

The polymer is made from chains of molecules, and is called organic because these contain carbon. Electrons and holes injected into the polymer film form bound states called excitons that break down under electrical current, emitting light as they do so.

Dr Walker’s part of the consortium’s research uses a mathematical technique called Monte Carlo analysis in which computer-generated random numbers are used to plot the paths of electrons, holes and excitons as they move across the film.

The results from this can be used to calculate how the chemical structure and impurities affect the device’s performance. Chemists can use this data to design more efficient materials.

The Modecom consortium will work on the molecular level and also look at the workings of the device as a whole. This research will also aid the understanding of the polymer materials used in plastic electronics in applications such as electronic paper and intelligent labels on groceries.

Device Uses Solar Energy To Convert Carbon Dioxide Into Fuel

Chemists at the University of California, San Diego have demonstrated the feasibility of exploiting sunlight to transform a greenhouse gas into a useful product.

Many Earth Week activities will draw attention to the increasing concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the resulting impact on global climate. Now Clifford Kubiak, professor of chemistry and biochemistry, and his graduate student Aaron Sathrum have developed a prototype device that can capture energy from the sun, convert it to electrical energy and “split” carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide (CO) and oxygen.

Because their device is not yet optimized, they still need to input additional energy for the process to work. However, they hope that their results, which they presented at last month’s meeting of the American Chemical Society, will draw attention to the promise of the approach.

“For every mention of CO2 splitting, there are more than 100 articles on splitting water to produce hydrogen, yet CO2 splitting uses up more of what you want to put a dent into,” explained Kubiak. “It also produces CO, an important industrial chemical, which is normally produced from natural gas. So with CO2 splitting you can save fuel, produce a useful chemical and reduce a greenhouse gas.”

Although carbon monoxide is poisonous, it is highly sought after. Millions of pounds of it are used each year to manufacture chemicals including detergents and plastics. It can also be converted into liquid fuel.

“The technology to convert carbon monoxide into liquid fuel has been around a long time,” said Kubiak. “It was invented in Germany in the 1920s. The U.S. was very interested in the technology during the 1970s energy crisis, but when the energy crisis ended people lost interest. Now things have come full circle because rising fuel prices make it economically competitive to convert CO into fuel.”

The device designed by Kubiak and Sathrum to split carbon dioxide utilizes a semiconductor and two thin layers of catalysts. It splits carbon dioxide to generate carbon monoxide and oxygen in a three-step process. The first step is the capture of solar energy photons by the semiconductor. The second step is the conversion of optical energy into electrical energy by the semiconductor. The third step is the deployment of electrical energy to the catalysts. The catalysts convert carbon dioxide to carbon monoxide on one side of the device and to oxygen on the other side.

Because electrons are passed around in these reactions, a special type of catalyst that can convert electrical energy to chemical energy is required Researchers in Kubiak’s laboratory have created a large molecule with three nickel atoms at its heart that has proven to be an effective catalyst for this process.

Choosing the right semiconductor is also critical to making carbon dioxide splitting practical say the researchers. Semiconductors have bands of energy to which electrons are confined. Sunlight causes the electrons to leap from one band to the next creating an electrical energy potential The energy difference between the bands — the band gap — determines how much solar energy will be absorbed and how much electrical energy is generated.

Kubiak and Sathrum initially used a silicon semiconductor to test the merits of their device because silicon is well-studied. However, silicon absorbs in the infrared range and the researchers say it is “too wimpy” to supply enough energy. The conversion of sunlight by silicon supplied about half of the energy needed to split carbon dioxide, and the reaction worked if the researchers supplied the other half of the energy needed.

They are now building the device using a gallium-phosphide semiconductor. It has twice the band gap of silicon and absorbs more energetic visible light. Therefore, they predict that it will absorb the optimal amount of energy from the sun to drive the catalytic splitting of carbon dioxide.

“This project brings together many scientific puzzle pieces,” said Sathrum. “Quite a bit of work has been done on each piece, but it takes more science to mesh them all together. Bringing all the pieces together is the part of the problem we are focused on.”

The research is supported by the Department of Energy.

Ethanol Vehicles Pose A Significant Risk To Human Health, Study Finds

Ethanol is widely touted as an eco-friendly, clean-burning fuel. But if every vehicle in the United States ran on fuel made primarily from ethanol instead of pure gasoline, the number of respiratory-related deaths and hospitalizations would likely increase, according to a new study by Stanford University atmospheric scientist Mark Z. Jacobson. His findings are published in the April 18 online edition of the journal Environmental Science & Technology (ES&T).

‘’Ethanol is being promoted as a clean and renewable fuel that will reduce global warming and air pollution,'’ said Jacobson, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering.”But our results show that a high blend of ethanol poses an equal or greater risk to public health than gasoline, which already causes significant health damage.'’

Gasoline vs. ethanol
For the study, Jacobson used a sophisticated computer model to simulate air quality in the year 2020, when ethanol-fueled vehicles are expected to be widely available in the United States.

‘’The chemicals that come out of a tailpipe are affected by a variety of factors, including chemical reactions, temperatures, sunlight, clouds, wind and precipitation,'’ he explained.”In addition, overall health effects depend on exposure to these airborne chemicals, which varies from region to region. Ours is the first ethanol study that takes into account population distribution and the complex environmental interactions.'’

In the experiment, Jacobson ran a series of computer tests simulating atmospheric conditions throughout the United States in 2020, with a special focus on Los Angeles.”Since Los Angeles has historically been the most polluted airshed in the U.S., the testbed for nearly all U.S. air pollution regulation and home to about 6 percent of the U.S. population, it is also ideal for a more detailed study,'’ he wrote.

Jacobson programmed the computer to run air quality simulations comparing two future scenarios:

• A vehicle fleet (that is, all cars, trucks, motorcycles, etc., in the United States) fueled by gasoline, versus
• A fleet powered by E85, a popular blend of 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gasoline.

Deaths and hospitalizations
The results of the computer simulations were striking.

‘’We found that E85 vehicles reduce atmospheric levels of two carcinogens, benzene and butadiene, but increase two others-formaldehyde and acetaldehyde,'’ Jacobson said.”As a result, cancer rates for E85 are likely to be similar to those for gasoline. However, in some parts of the country, E85 significantly increased ozone, a prime ingredient of smog.'’

Inhaling ozone-even at low levels-can decrease lung capacity, inflame lung tissue, worsen asthma and impair the body’s immune system, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. The World Health Organization estimates that 800,000 people die each year from ozone and other chemicals in smog.

‘’In our study, E85 increased ozone-related mortalities in the United States by about 200 deaths per year compared to gasoline, with about 120 of those deaths occurring in Los Angeles,'’ Jacobson said.”These mortality rates represent an increase of about 4 percent in the U.S. and 9 percent in Los Angeles above the projected ozone-related death rates for gasoline-fueled vehicles in 2020.'’

The study showed that ozone increases in Los Angeles and the northeastern United States will be partially offset by decreases in the southeast.”However, we found that nationwide, E85 is likely to increase the annual number of asthma-related emergency room visits by 770 and the number of respiratory-related hospitalizations by 990,'’ Jacobson said.”Los Angeles can expect 650 more hospitalizations in 2020, along with 1,200 additional asthma-related emergency visits.'’

The deleterious health effects of E85 will be the same, whether the ethanol is made from corn, switchgrass or other plant products, Jacobson noted.”Today, there is a lot of investment in ethanol,'’ he said.”But we found that using E85 will cause at least as much health damage as gasoline, which already causes about 10,000 U.S. premature deaths annually from ozone and particulate matter. The question is, if we’re not getting any health benefits, then why continue to promote ethanol and other biofuels?

‘’There are alternatives, such as battery-electric, plug-in-hybrid and hydrogen-fuel cell vehicles, whose energy can be derived from wind or solar power,'’ he added.”These vehicles produce virtually no toxic emissions or greenhouse gases and cause very little disruption to the land-unlike ethanol made from corn or switchgrass, which will require millions of acres of farmland to mass-produce. It would seem prudent, therefore, to address climate, health and energy with technologies that have known benefits.”

Will Mobile Phones Bee The Death Of Us All?

Bees are needed to pollinate crops and keep the production of food going. In recent years, massive bee populations have been mysteriously disappearing, causing concern that world harvests could be disrupted. Some scientists are suggesting a correlation in this phenomenon, called Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), and radiation given off by the newly ubiquitous mobile phone.

The theory is that radiation from mobile phones interferes with bees’ navigation systems, preventing the famously homeloving species from finding their way back to their hives. Improbable as it may seem, there is now evidence to back this up. [Source: The Independent]

States Reach Renewable Energy Milestone

The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) projects that 21 states and the District of Columbia that have adopted renewable electricity standards are on track to reduce their global warming emissions by 108 million metric tons (MMT) of carbon dioxide by 2020, an amount equivalent to taking 17.7 million cars off the road. Recent increases in the amount of renewable electricity required under existing standards in Colorado, Minnesota and New Mexico put the states over the 100 MMT milestone.

By 2020, UCS projects the state standards will produce more than 46,000 megawatts of clean, renewable power, enough to meet the needs of 28.5 million typical homes. State renewable electricity standards are expanding, with at least 10 more states considering adopting a requirement or raising existing targets. The success of state renewable energy standards is helping build momentum for a federal standard of 20 percent renewable energy by 2020. The federal standard would increase renewable energy output nearly four times over current state standards.

To help track and compare state standards, UCS has developed a new, one-stop resource, the Renewable Electricity Standards Toolkit.

The toolkit includes summaries of all 22 standards, as well as maps illustrating existing standards and projections for future renewable energy development. In addition, the toolkit features a database with detailed information about state standards, ranging from how renewable energy technologies are defined to how standards are enforced.

UCS experts are available to comment on the politics, economics and environmental benefits of renewable energy and the traditional fossil fuels that it can replace.

Low-Acid Options for Coffee Drinkers

The title alone of this article raises a sizable number of questions.

For example: What is acidity in coffee? The tart yet sweet sensation that animates the sensory character of the finest coffees and keeps them from falling into woody neutrality? An edgy sourness that messes up our tummies? Prime contributor to coffee's newfound status as the leading contributor to cancer-fighting antioxidant activity in American diets?

All of the above, it seems. Including the last, perhaps unfamiliar definition. Because to further complicate the acidity issue, it turns out that organic acids in coffee, particularly those broadly described as chlorogenic acids, are major contributors to coffee's antioxidant, cancer-fighting activity, which current research indicates considerably exceeds the antioxidant properties of beverages like green tea.

Read the rest of the article here...

Major breakthrough in solar technology by New Zealand scientists

One of the major drawbacks of solar power over the years has been its low efficiency and relatively high cost. But scientists from New Zealand may change all that. It’s only in the early stages at the moment, but their technology does sound very promising.

Basically, what they have done is wipe the silicon-cell completely, and instead use a variety of dyes and chemicals. This includes some found in nature such as haemoglobin (found in red blood cells), and chlorophyll (the green pigment that plants use to convert solar energy into material).

This method will likely do away with the large, inefficient (and aesthetically displeasing) solar cells found on rooftops etceteras. The chemicals can even be impregnated into material, so people may one day find themselves using their clothing to recharge their iPods or mobile phones.

It is believed that the new method will produce power for only one-tenth of the cost of producing it via silicon-based solar panels.

You can read more about this technology breakthrough at: Solar power breakthrough at Massey - New Zealand news on Stuff.co.nz.

Radio Shack - Dumps Thousands Of Customer Records In Dumspter - Texas Sues

It wasn’t bad enough that a Radio Shack store dumped thousands of customer records in a dumpster, but the information contained not only personal information of the customers but also social security and credit/debit card information as well. The Attorney Generals office for the State Of Texas has filed a suit against Radio Shack which is based in Fort Worth which alleges the records dumping was in violation of state statute.

One of the fines carries a penalty of $50,000 which amounts to a slap on the wrist for a company that owns over 4500 stores in the US. Isn’t it time that penalties be increased to reflect the seriousness of carelessly deposing of such a treasure trove of information that could of potentially fallen into the hands of criminals?

What is annoying about this is that no matter how hard we consumers try to protect our personal information, we have ‘idiots’ in control who don’t have the brains given to a pigeon, who have access to our records. This is disturbing following the break in a TJ Maxx which I had just reported which further supports the notion that we consumers need to speak up more and force all companies, big or small, to better secure our personal data.

I am sure we all agree that data theft and identity theft have taken on a more important part of our daily lives in that we all recognize that this crime has now reached epidemic proportions and that all of us are being exposed in some way or another. But what really is starting to become irritating is the fact that no one really seems to care. There is so much money being spent by consumers who charge purchases on their debit or credit cards, that even the banking system appears to have accepted data loss as a necessary evil that is beyond their control.

What do you think? Are we all doomed to a life where our identities are up for sale to the highest bidder?

Help Save Internet Radio

As you know, the future of internet radio is in serious jeopardy. Thanks to all your letters and calls to Congressional representatives the “Internet Radio Equality Act ", H.R. 2060, has been co-sponsored by over 70 Representatives in just 2 short weeks!

Now internet radio needs your help again: Due to the amazing momentum of the Internet Radio Equality Act in the House of Representatives, Senators Ron Wyden of Oregon and Sam Brownback of Kansas have introduced a companion bill in the Senate, S. 1353, also named “The Internet Radio Equality Act.”

We ask that you take a moment to now call your Senators to ask them to co-sponsor S. 1353, The Internet Radio Equality Act, introduced by Senators Ron Wyden of Oregon and Sam Brownback of Kansas.

In addition, if you have not called your representative in the House yet, we ask that you make this call as well to ask your representative to co-sponsor H.R. 2060, The Internet Radio Equality Act, introduced by Rep. Jay Inslee of Washington.

To find the phone numbers for your Senators and for your Congressional representative, as well as talking points for the calls, please visit http://capwiz.com/saveinternetradio/home/ and enter your zip code.

As you can see from the speed at which the House bill is picking up co-sponsors, your phone calls are an extremely effective way to pressure your representatives in Congress to lend their support to internet radio.

Your opinion matters to your representatives, and it matters to us. Without your support these bills could not have been introduced and without your continued support they cannot be passed.

Using Online File Backup Services?

There is one major problem with most computer backup procedures. Usually after a backup is made, all of the information and data stays in the same place as it always was. However, there are many disasters that could befall your data and computer that make it worthwhile to look into online backups as a precautionary measure. Online data backups will allow you to save a copy of your file or files in a hard drive that cannot be destroyed at the same time as your computer. This way, even if you experience theft or a natural disaster such as a fire or flood you will still have your data.

Is it safe? Many people are a little bit unsure of putting their data online. After all, if the information can be accessed by them from any computer, doesn’t that mean that the data can be accessed by everybody? Yes and no. While it is theoretically possible for a different person to get into your data as it is stored through an online data backup, the chances of this actually happening are slim to none as long as you’re using a reputable service.

You also have the option of doing something on your end to make sure that the data stays secure. If you can get your hands on any backup software that can encrypt the data, then you should do this. Encrypted data cannot be stolen without considerable effort. Just make sure that you remember what program you used to encrypt it in the first place.

Are online backups easy to use? Yes! Online data backup services generally only require that you upload the files that you want saved. Then, the files are saved for you, and that’s it! As you can imagine, online data backup services are becoming more and more widespread. You should also be able to access your online data backup from anywhere in the world. While I do not recommend using this as your only form of data backup I highly recommend using an online data back solution as part of a holistic approach to data security.

How fast are they? This is going to depend by and large on the type of Internet connection that you have. If you are still going online with a dialup connection, then you should not look into this type of data backup. It will just take far too long to get your backup done, and during that time, you could easily have just put all the files onto DVDs and give them to a friend for safekeeping. If you have a high-speed internet connection - either cable or DSL, then you’re in luck and this will not be a problem at all. Just log in, get an account, and upload to your heart’s content.

How much space will you have? This is going to depend on the backup service that you choose in the end. However, most of the spaces available range between about 100MB and several GB of space with most of them offering at least 1GB of storage space to get started with.

Online data backups are going to become an absolute necessity for the smart computer owner. I wouldn’t live without one and use mine every single day at the very least.

New Research Links Blood Sugar Levels And Cancer Risk

A recent study revealed a newly discovered link between elevated blood sugar levels and the risk of developing cancer. Further research is needed to confirm this preliminary finding, but I think we’ll be hearing much more about this in the near future. In the meantime, though, it gives us one more reason to pay attention to how dietary choices affect blood sugar levels. Maintaining a healthy blood sugar level also lowers your risk of diabetes, heart disease, and obesity.

But some of the commentary that accompanied this news story points out just how much confusion and misunderstanding there is on this topic. For example, the news media quoted a physician who recommended that people who wanted to maintain healthy blood sugar levels switch from white rice to brown rice because whole grains are thought to cause a smaller rise in blood sugar than refined grains.

But as I commented on the ND Blog, the difference in the effects of whole grains and refined grains on blood sugar is much less than most people think! When it comes to high-carbohydrate foods such as breads, pastas, and grains, the size of the portion is far more important than whether the food is whole grain or not.

ND can help you understand how foods affect blood sugar levels. As a start, read our articles about the glycemic index and glycemic load. We also have tools that will help you manage this aspect of your diet. For every food, recipe, and total consumption report, ND includes the estimated glycemic load as part of its complete nutritional analysis.

Arsenic In Chicken Feed May Pose Health Risks To Humans

Pets may not be the only organisms endangered by some food additives. An arsenic-based additive used in chicken feed may pose health risks to humans who eat meat from chickens that are raised on the feed, according to an article in the April 9 issue of Chemical & Engineering News, the weekly news magazine of the American Chemical Society.

Roxarsone, the most common arsenic-based additive used in chicken feed, is used to promote growth, kill parasites and improve pigmentation of chicken meat. In its original form, roxarsone is relatively benign. But under certain anaerobic conditions, within live chickens and on farm land, the compound is converted into more toxic forms of inorganic arsenic. Arsenic has been linked to bladder, lung, skin, kidney and colon cancer, while low-level exposures can lead to partial paralysis and diabetes, the article notes.

Use of roxarsone has become a topic of increasing controversy. A growing number of food suppliers have stopped using the compound, including the nation’s largest poultry producer, Tyson Foods, according to the article. Still, about 70 percent of the 9 billion broiler chickens produced annually in the U.S. are fed a diet containing roxarsone, the article points out.

Complicating the issue is the fact that no one knows the exact amount of arsenic found in chicken meat or ingested by consumers who frequently eat chicken. “Neither the Food and Drug Administration nor the Department of Agriculture has actually measured the level of arsenic in the poultry meat that most people consume,” according to the article.

The National Chicken Council, a trade association that represents the U.S. chicken industry, claims there is “no reason to believe there are any human health hazards” associated with the use of roxarsone.

Life-Long Learning - Nature Provides Natural Inspiration For Education

Three billion years of evolution can’t be wrong and scientists are observing Nature’s own adaptations to find solutions to human problems. This relatively new field of Biology is called Biomimetics and Biologists have been investigating its application to fabric development, new structural materials, even behaviour in organisations and education. Researchers will meet to present their latest progress at the Society for Experimental Biology’s Annual Main Meeting in Glasgow (31st March - 4th April 2007).

Biomimetics applied to Education and Knowledge Transfer

The interdisciplinary nature of Biomimetics, which can combine natural sciences, engineering, architecture and design is being used for the first time in German schools to promote the value of knowledge transfer and life-long learning. By introducing modules which teach the use of Biomimetic product development, students are also exposed to the concept of incorporating scientific, social, economic and ecological aspects. In this way, scientists aim to expose students to a holistic approach to teaching science, rather than teaching each subject in isolation and to increase their understanding of interdisciplinary research and knowledge transfer. Dr Thomas Speck (University of Freiburg, Germany) will show how his research on the Technical Plant Stem and the theoretical background in its development may be used to teach students from primary level up to A-level on Wednesday 4th April.

Jefferson Scientists Find Rabies-Based Vaccine Could Be Effective Against HIV

Rabies, a relentless, ancient scourge, may hold a key to defeating another implacable foe: HIV. Scientists at Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia have used a drastically weakened rabies virus to ferry HIV-related proteins into animals, in essence, vaccinating them against an AIDS-like disease. The early evidence shows that the vaccine - which doesn’t protect against infection - prevents development of disease.

Reporting April 1, 2007 in the Journal of Infectious Diseases, the scientists showed that two years after the initial vaccination, four vaccinated non-human primates were protected from disease, even after being “challenged” with a dangerous animal-human virus. Two control animals developed an AIDS-like disease.

Matthias Schnell, Ph.D., professor of microbiology and immunology at Jefferson Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University, and his co-workers tested the effects of inserting two different viral proteins into the rabies virus genome, and using such viruses-based vaccines in preventing disease in rhesus macaques. One was a glycoprotein on the surface of HIV, while the other was an internal protein from simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV). They used the latter because HIV does not cause disease in monkeys.

The idea was that such rabies vehicles, or “vectors,” would help attract a strong response from the animal’s immune system, though the rabies virus used cannot cause disease. Such vectors are based on a type of rabies vaccine strain that has been used for more than 20 years in oral vaccines against rabies in wildlife in Europe. The study was aimed at studying the safety and effectiveness of the rabies vaccine approach against HIV and related diseases.

Four macaques were immunized with both vaccines, while two animals received only a weakened rabies virus. After they gave the animals an initial vaccination, they then tried two different immune system boosts, but didn’t see enhanced immune responses. They then developed a new vector, a viral surface protein from another virus, vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV). Two years after the initial immunization, they gave a booster vaccine with the rabies-VSV vector, and saw SIV/HIV-specific immune responses.

The group then challenged the animals with SIV and measured various parameters of infection, such as immune system CD4 cell count, amount of virus in the bloodstream and immune system antibody response. They found that those animals that were given the test vaccine could control the infection. The control animals without the experimental vaccine had high levels of virus and a loss of CD4 cells.

“We still need a vaccine that protects from HIV infection, but protecting against developing disease can be a very important step,” Dr. Schnell says, noting that he and his colleagues aren’t sure how long the viral immunity will last.

According to Dr. Schnell, the study demonstrated a “proof of principle” - that is, that the method used is technically possible. He says that the results indicate the need for future studies in larger groups of animals, and that these currently are underway. In addition, one key question remains unanswered: Is such a rabies-based vaccine feasible as an HIV vaccine in humans?

How Big is Your Ecological Footprint?

Ever wonder how much of the earth’s resources you consume? Thanks to technology you can confirm your worst suspicions, with the handy Ecological Footprint Quiz.