Summers In Northern And Southern Hemispheres ‘Melted Ice Age’

LONDON: It wasn’t only warm summers in the northern hemisphere, but also in the southern hemisphere that melted the ice age, a new study has revealed.
An international team, led by Dr Russell Drysdale of Newcastle University, has found that warm summers in both the northern and southern hemispheres may have ended the ice age, the ‘Science’ journal reported.
Previous research had identified precisely when these orbital “wobbles” occurred, but it had not been possible to accurately date the records of the Earth’s response to them, which are found in marine sediment on the ocean floors.
Dr Drysdale said ocean sediment cores contain a wealth of information about past global climate but beyond about 50,000 years ago it is difficult to determine the exact age of these sediments.
“To overcome this, we studied isotope variations in three stalagmites collected from an Italian cave, and found that these variations relate to ocean temperature changes recorded in sediment cores from the nearby sea floor.
“Stalagmites from limestone caves can be very precisely dated using trace amounts of uranium incorporated within their structure.
“We applied the accurate timescale of the stalagmite record to the sea floor sediment data. A key property of sea-floor sediments is that they detect the growth and decay of ice sheets,” Dr Drysdale said

Bacteria Can Help Convert Waste To Power

WASHINGTON: Bacteria that generate power could be used in microbial fuel cells to convert waste into electricity, according to the latest research.
University of Massachusetts researchers isolated bacteria with large numbers of tiny projections called pili which transfer electrons to generate power in fuel cells, more efficiently than counterparts with a smooth surface.
The researchers isolated a strain of Geobacter sulfurreducens which they called KN400 that grew prolifically on the graphite anodes of fuel cells.
The bacteria formed a thick bio-film on the anode surface, which conducted electricity. The researchers found large quantities of pilin, a protein that makes the tiny fibres that conduct electricity through the sticky bio-film.
“The filaments form microscopic projections called pili that act as microbial nanowires,” said Derek Lovley, U-M professor. “Using this bacterial strain in a fuel cell to generate electricity would greatly increase the cell’s power output.”
Microbial fuel cells can be used in monitoring devices in environments where it is difficult to replace batteries if they fail but to be successful they need to have an efficient and long lasting source of power.

Scientists Find Three New Gene Links To Alzheimer’s

LONDON: Scientists have found three new major genetic links to Alzheimer’s, affecting up to 20% of people with the brain-wasting disease. They
said it was the most significant such discovery in 15 years.
Two large studies found that the three new genes join the better known APOE4 gene as significant risk factors for the most common cause of dementia.
“If we were able to remove the detrimental effects of these genes through treatments, we could reduce the proportion of people developing Alzheimer’s by 20%,” said Julie Williams, a professor of Neuropsychological Genetics at Britain’s Cardiff University.
Alzheimer’s disease affects more than 26 million people globally, and has no cure or good treatment. The need for effective remedies is pressing, with the number of cases forecasted to go beyond 100 million by 2050.
Current drugs can only delay the symptoms endured by patients, who lose their memories, the ability to find their way around and to care for themselves.
Williams, who led one of the two studies published in Nature Genetics, said that in Britain alone, eradicating the effects of the three new genes would mean almost 100,000 people could avoid the disease. She said the findings were the most significant genetic discoveries for Alzheimer’s in the 15 years since APOE4 was found to be linked, and said drug companies had shown a keen interest in their research.
Williams and colleagues at Cardiff’s Medical Research Council Center for Neuropsychiatric Genetics and Genomics carried out a genome wide association study – a scan of the entire genetic map – involving more than 16,000 people from eight countries. They identified two new genes: Clusterin and PICALM – that increase the risk of developing Alzheimer’s.
A second genome wide study conducted by Philippe Amouyel and colleagues at the Institut Pasteur de Lille in France, studied more than 6,000 people with Alzheimer’s and nearly 9,000 healthy people in France, Belgium, Finland, Italy and Spain. They identified Clusterin and a third gene called CR1.
Amouyel said the disease risks associated with each gene were difficult to quantify, and said all three genes were relatively common. The scientists also stressed that a yet unknown combination of many genetic and other environmental factors also cause Alzheimer’s.
The researchers said Clusterin may explain 10% of Alzheimer’s cases, PICALM around 9% and CR1 4%. By comparison, 20 to 25% of Alzheimer’s cases are linked to APOE.Three gene variations have also been associated with rare, early-onset forms of Alzheimer’s that run in families. Identifying the genes can help researchers understand the underlying causes of a disease and design drugs to fight them.
Michael Owen, director of the Cardiff center, said their study also found evidence that other genes could play a role in the risk of developing Alzheimer’s. “It’s a bit like we have been fishing with a fishing net and we’ve pulled out some fish.

Google Hiring After Layoffs

 

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Google (GOOG.O) is hiring to fill about 360 jobs, even after it announced plans this week to lay off almost 200 sales and marketing employees in its third round of job cuts this year. The openings listed on Google’s website range from software
engineers to sales and marketing positions, to one opening for a Foodservices Supply Chain Manager at Google’s Mountain View, California headquarters.
The Internet search giant has acknowledged over-hiring in certain areas when it announced the 200 layoffs on Thursday. In January, Google said it would eliminate 100 full-time recruiters and it said the shuttering of its broadcast radio advertising business could result in 40 layoffs in February.
Google is an organisation of more than 20,000 people doing an incredibly diverse array of jobs, said spokesman Matt Furman.
“Overlapping organizations in one part of the company, doesn’t affect the limited need for more people in another part of the company,” he added.
He confirmed the job listings on Google’s website are currently open and said the openings were not inconsistent with Thursday’s layoffs.
Half of the roughly 360 job openings are in Google’s U.S. operations, while the rest are in far-flung locations, including Ireland and Australia.
Google’s headcount has swelled in recent years, reaching 20,222 employees at the end of 2008 compared with 10,674 at the end of 2006.
But the company has slowed hiring in recent quarters as new finance chief Patrick Pichette made controlling costs a bigger priority. In the fourth quarter, Google’s headcount grew less than 100 employees after jumping by between 400 and more than 2,000 employees per quarter during the past couple of years.
Part of the change may owe to the fact Google has sharply reduced its pace of acquiring outside companies.
And Google has also pulled the plug on certain projects that were not as successful as hoped, such as its decision to shutter initiatives to sell advertising on broadcast radio and in print media.
“I imagine they’re probably shifting resources in certain areas,” said Gabelli & Co analyst Robert Haley, who has a “Buy” rating on Google.
While the industry-wide slowdown in advertising spending is affecting all online Internet companies, including Yahoo Inc (YHOO.O) and Time Warner Inc’s (TWX.N) AOL, Haley said he expects Google’s revenue to continue to grow this year.
And as long as Google’s revenue growth outpaced its growth in operating expenses, Haley said he was not worried the continued hiring would work against preserving profit margins.