Video: http://www.democracynow.org/2013/5/20/geoengineering_can_we_save_the_planet
Clive Hamilton, professor of public ethics at Charles Sturt University in Canberra, Australia. He is the author of the new book, Earthmasters: The Dawn of the Age of Climate Engineering.
By Lamar Smith, Published: May 19, 2013
Lamar Smith, a Republican, represents Texas’s 21st District in the U.S. House and is chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology.
Climate change is an issue that needs to be discussed thoughtfully and objectively. Unfortunately, claims that distort the facts hinder the legitimate evaluation of policy options. The rhetoric has driven some policymakers toward costly regulations and policies that will harm hardworking American families and do little to decrease global carbon emissions. The Obama administration’s decision to delay, and possibly deny, the Keystone XL pipeline is a prime example.
The State Department has found that the pipeline will have minimal impact on the surrounding environment and no significant effect on the climate. Recent expert testimony before the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology confirms this finding. In fact, even if the pipeline is approved and is used at maximum capacity, the resulting increase in carbon dioxide emissions would be a mere 12 one-thousandths of 1 percent (0.012 percent). There is scant scientific or environmental justification for refusing to approve the pipeline, a project that the State Department has also found would generate more than 40,000 U.S. jobs.
Contrary to the claims of those who want to strictly regulate carbon dioxide emissions and increase the cost of energy for all Americans, there is a great amount of uncertainty associated with climate science. These uncertainties undermine our ability to accurately determine how carbon dioxide has affected the climate in the past. They also limit our understanding of how anthropogenic emissions will affect future warming trends. Further confusing the policy debate, the models that scientists have come to rely on to make climate predictions have greatly overestimated warming. Contrary to model predictions, data released in October from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit show that global temperatures have held steady over the past 15 years, despite rising greenhouse gas emissions.
Among the facts that are clear, however, are that U.S. emissions contribute very little to global concentrations of greenhouse gas, and that even substantial cuts in these emissions are likely to have no effect on temperature. Data from the Energy Information Administration show, for example, that the United States cut carbon dioxide emissions by 12 percent between 2005 and 2012 while global emissions increased by 15 percent over the same period.
Using data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a Science and Public Policy Institute paper published last month found that if the United States eliminated all carbon dioxide emissions, the overall impact on global temperature rise would be only 0.08 degrees Celsius by 2050.
Further confounding the debate are unscientific and often hyperbolic claims about the potential effects of a warmer world. In his most recent State of the Union address, President Obama said that extreme weather events have become “more frequent and intense,” and he linked Superstorm Sandy to climate change.
But experts at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have told the New York Times that climate change had nothing to do with Superstorm Sandy. This is underscored by last year’s IPCC report stating that there is “high agreement” among leading experts that trends in weather disasters, floods, tornados and storms cannot be attributed to climate change. While these claims may make for good political theater, their effect on recent public policy choices hurts the economy.
Last spring the Environmental Protection Agency proposed emissions standards that virtually prohibit new coal-fired power plants. As we await implementation of these strict new rules, additional regulations that will affect existing power plants, refineries and other manufactures are sure to follow. Analyses of these measures by the American Council for Capital Formation, which studies economic and environmental policy, show that they will raise both electricity rates and gas prices — costing jobs and hurting the economy — even as the EPA admits that these choices will have an insignificant impact on global climate change (a point former EPA administrator Lisa Jackson confessed during a Senate hearing in 2009).
Instead of pursuing heavy-handed regulations that imperil U.S. jobs and send jobs (and their emissions) overseas, we should take a step back from the unfounded claims of impending catastrophe and think critically about the challenge before us. Designing an appropriate public policy response to this challenge will require that we fully assess the facts and the uncertainties surrounding this issue, and that we set aside the hyped rhetoric.
Read more from PostOpinions: Greg Sargent: Now can we talk about climate change? The Post’s View: Carbon tax is best option Congress has Matthew Stepp: The limits of renewable energy Stephen Stromberg: In State of the Union, Obama threatens Congress on climate change. And that’s a good thing.
May 22, 2013 — A new study shows there is a gender gap when it comes to behavior and self-control in American young children — one that does not appear to exist in children in Asia.
Boys will be boys. A new study shows there is a gender gap when it comes to behavior and self-control in American young children — one that does not appear to exist in children in Asia. (Credit: © Vesna Cvorovic / Fotolia)
In the United States, girls had higher levels of self-regulation than boys. Self-regulation is defined as children’s ability to control their behavior and impulses, follow directions, and persist on a task. It has been linked to academic performance and college completion, in past studies by Oregon State University researchers.
In three Asian countries, the gender gap in the United States was not found when researchers directly assessed the self-regulation of 3-6 year olds. The results appear in the new issue of the journal Early Childhood Research Quarterly.
“These findings suggest that although we often expect girls to be more self-regulated than boys, this may not be the case for Asian children,” said Shannon Wanless, lead author of the study.
Wanless began conducting the research during her doctoral studies at Oregon State University under Megan McClelland, an associate professor in OSU’s Hallie E. Ford Center for Healthy Children and Families. Wanless is now on the faculty at the University of Pittsburgh.
One interesting part of the researcher’s findings: Although there were no gender differences in self-regulation when the children were directly assessed using a variety of school-readiness tasks, teachers in Asia perceived girls as performing better on self-regulation even when they actually performed equally to boys.
“Teachers are rating children’s behavior in the classroom environment, which has a lot of distractions and is very stimulating,” Wanless said. “It is possible that boys in the Asian countries were able to self-regulate as well as girls when they were in a quiet space (the direct assessment), but were not able to regulate themselves as well in a bustling classroom environment (teacher ratings).”
In addition, McClelland said cultural expectations of girls’ behavior versus that of their male peers may be influencing teachers’ assessments.
“In general, there is more tolerance for active play in boys than in girls,” McClelland said. “Girls are expected to be quiet and not make a fuss. This expectation may be coloring some teachers’ perceptions.”
The researchers conducted assessments with 814 children in the United States, Taiwan, South Korea and China. Their study showed that U.S. girls had significantly higher self-regulation than boys, but there were no significant gender differences in any Asian societies. In addition, for both genders, directly assessed and teacher-rated self-regulation were related to many aspects of school readiness in all societies for girls and boys.
“We know from previous research that many Asian children outperform American children in academic achievement,” McClelland said. “Increasingly, we are seeing that there is also a gap when it comes to their ability to control their behavior and persist with tasks.”
Wanless said this study paves the way for future research to explore why there is such a large gender gap in the United States, and what can be learned from Asian schools.
“What can we learn from Asian cultural and teaching practices about how we can support girls and boys to be successful in school?” she said. “When we see differences in developmental patterns across countries it suggests that we might want to look at teaching and parenting practices in those countries and think about how they might apply in the United States.”
Both researchers emphasized the importance of working with young children, regardless of gender or culture, on their self-regulation skills. Practicing games such as Simon Says and Red Light, Green Light are a few ways that parents can work with their children to help them learn how to follow instructions, persist on a task, and listen carefully.
“In our study, self-regulation was good for academic achievement for boys and girls,” Wanless said. “That means this skill is important for both genders and we should be supporting self-regulatory development for all children, especially boys. Low self-regulation in preschool has been linked to difficulties in adulthood, so increased focused on supporting young boys’ development can have long-term positive benefits.”
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May 15, 2013 — Two fossil discoveries from the East African Rift reveal new information about the evolution of primates, according to a study published online in Nature this week led by Ohio University scientists.
Artist’s reconstruction of Rukwapithecus (front, center) and Nsungwepithecus (right). (Credit: Mauricio Anton)
The team’s findings document the oldest fossils of two major groups of primates: the group that today includes apes and humans (hominoids), and the group that includes Old World monkeys such as baboons and macaques (cercopithecoids).
Geological analyses of the study site indicate that the finds are 25 million years old, significantly older than fossils previously documented for either of the two groups.
Both primates are new to science, and were collected from a single fossil site in the Rukwa Rift Basin of Tanzania.Rukwapithecus fleaglei is an early hominoid represented by a mandible preserving several teeth. Nsungwepithecus gunnelli is an early cercopithecoid represented by a tooth and jaw fragment.
The primates lived during the Oligocene epoch, which lasted from 34 to 23 million years ago. For the first time, the study documents that the two lineages were already evolving separately during this geological period.
“The late Oligocene is among the least sampled intervals in primate evolutionary history, and the Rukwa field area provides a first glimpse of the animals that were alive at that time from Africa south of the equator,” said Nancy Stevens, an associate professor of paleontology in Ohio University’s Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine who leads the paleontological team.
Documenting the early evolutionary history of these groups has been elusive, as there are few fossil-bearing deposits of the appropriate age, Stevens explained. Using an approach that dated multiple minerals contained within the rocks, team geologists could determine a precise age for the specimens.
“The rift setting provides an advantage in that it preserves datable materials together with these important primate fossils,” said lead geologist Eric Roberts of James Cook University in Australia.
Prior to these finds, the oldest fossil representatives of the hominoid and cercopithecoid lineages were recorded from the early Miocene, at sites dating millions of years younger.
The new discoveries are particularly important for helping to reconcile a long-standing disagreement between divergence time estimates derived from analyses of DNA sequences from living primates and those suggested by the primate fossil record, Stevens said. Studies of clock-like mutations in primate DNA have indicated that the split between apes and Old
World monkeys occurred between 30 million and 25 million years ago.
“Fossils from the Rukwa Rift Basin in southwestern Tanzania provide the first real test of the hypothesis that these groups diverged so early, by revealing a novel glimpse into this late Oligocene terrestrial ecosystem,” Stevens said.
The new fossils are the first primate discoveries from this precise location within the Rukwa deposits, and two of only a handful of known primate species from the entire late Oligocene, globally.
The scientists scanned the specimens in the Ohio University’s MicroCT scanner, allowing them to create detailed 3-dimensional reconstructions of the ancient specimens that were used for comparisons with other fossils.
“This is another great example that underscores how modern imaging and computational approaches allow us to address more refined questions about vertebrate evolutionary history,” said Patrick O’Connor, co-author and professor of anatomy in Ohio University’s Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine.
In addition to the new primates, Rukwa field sites have produced several other fossil vertebrate and invertebrate species new to science. The late Oligocene interval is interesting because it provides a final snapshot of the unique species inhabiting Africa prior to large-scale faunal exchange with Eurasia that occurred later in the Cenozoic Era, Stevens said.
A key aspect of the Rukwa Rift Basin project is the interdisciplinary nature of the research team, with paleontologists and geologists working together to reconstruct vertebrate evolutionary history in the context of the developing East African Rift System.
“Since its inception this project has employed a multifaceted approach for addressing a series of large-scale biological and geological questions centered on the East African Rift System in Tanzania,” O’Connor said.
The team’s research, funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Leakey Foundation and the National Geographic Society, underscores the integration of paleontological and geological approaches that are essential for addressing complex issues in vertebrate evolutionary history, the scientists noted.
Co-authors on the study are Patrick O’Connor, Cornelia Krause and Eric Gorscak of Ohio University, Erik Seiffert of SUNY Stony Brook University, Eric Roberts of James Cook University in Australia, Mark Schmitz of Boise State University, Sifa Ngasala of Michigan State University, Tobin Hieronymus of Northeast Ohio Medical University and Joseph Temu of the Tanzania Antiquities Unit.
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May 15, 2013 — Melbourne scientists have made the surprise discovery that malaria parasites can ‘talk’ to each other — a social behaviour to ensure the parasite’s survival and improve its chances of being transmitted to other humans.
Professor Alan Cowman (left) and Dr Neta Regev-Rudzki have made the surprise discovery that malaria parasites can ‘talk’ to each other. This social behaviour ensures the parasite’s survival and improves its chances of being transmitted to other humans. (Credit: Image courtesy of Walter and Eliza Hall Institute)
The finding could provide a niche for developing antimalarial drugs and vaccines that prevent or treat the disease by cutting these communication networks.
Professor Alan Cowman, Dr Neta Regev-Rudzki, Dr Danny Wilson and colleagues from the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute’s Infection and Immunity division, in collaboration with Professor Andrew Hill from the University of Melbourne’s Bio21 Institute and Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology showed that malaria parasites are able to send out messages to communicate with other malaria parasites in the body. The study was published today in the journal Cell.
Professor Cowman said the researchers were shocked to discover that malaria parasites work in unison to enhance ‘activation’ into sexually mature forms that can be picked up by mosquitoes, which are the carriers of this deadly disease.
“When Neta showed me the data, I was absolutely amazed, I couldn’t believe it,” Professor Cowman said. “We repeated the experiments many times in many different ways before I really started to believe that these parasites were signalling to each other and communicating. But we came to appreciate why the malaria parasite really needs this mechanism — it needs to know how many other parasites are in the human to sense when is the right time to activate into sexual forms that give it the best chance of being transmitted back to the mosquito.”
Malaria kills about 700,000 people a year, mostly children aged under five and pregnant women. Every year, hundreds of millions of people are infected with the malaria parasite,Plasmodium, which is transmitted through mosquito bites. It is estimated that half the world’s population is at risk of contracting malaria, with the disease being concentrated in tropical and subtropical regions including many of Australia’s near neighbours.
Dr Regev-Rudzki said the malaria parasites inside red blood cells communicate by sending packages of DNA to each other during the blood stage of infection. “We showed that the parasites inside infected red blood cells can send little packets of information from one parasite to another, particularly in response to stress,” she said.
The communication network is a social behaviour that has evolved to signal when the parasites should complete their lifecycle and be transmitted back to a mosquito, Dr Regev-Rudzki said. “Once they receive this information, they change their fate — the signals tell the parasites to become sexual forms, which are the forms of the malaria parasite that can live and replicate in the mosquito, ensuring the parasites survives and is transmitted to another human.”
Professor Cowman said he hopes to see the discovery pave the way to new antimalarial drugs or vaccines for preventing malaria. “This discovery has fundamentally changed our view of the malaria parasite and is a big step in understanding how the malaria parasite survives and is transmitted,” he said. “The next step is to identify the molecules involved in this signalling process, and ways that we could block these communication networks to block the transmission of malaria from the human to the mosquito. That would be the ultimate goal.”
This project was supported by the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia, Howard Hughes Medical Institute and the Victorian Government.
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May 22, 2013 — Overexpression of a gene associated with schizophrenia causes classic symptoms of the disorder that are reversed when gene expression returns to normal, scientists report.
Overexpression of a gene associated with schizophrenia causes classic symptoms of the disorder that are reversed when gene expression returns to normal, scientists report. Pictured are (left to right) Drs. Lin Mei, Dongmin Yin and Yongjun Chen, Medical College of Georgia at Georgia Regents University. (Credit: Phil Jones, Georgia Regents University Photographer)
They genetically engineered mice so they could turn up levels of neuregulin-1 to mimic high levels found in some patients then return levels to normal, said Dr. Lin Mei, Director of the Institute of Molecular Medicine and Genetics at the Medical College of Georgia at Georgia Regents University.
They found that when elevated, mice were hyperactive, couldn’t remember what they had just learned and couldn’t ignore distracting background or white noise. When they returned neuregulin-1 levels to normal in adult mice, the schizophrenia-like symptoms went away, said Mei, corresponding author of the study in the journal Neuron.
While schizophrenia is generally considered a developmental disease that surfaces in early adulthood, Mei and his colleagues found that even when they kept neuregulin-1 levels normal until adulthood, mice still exhibited schizophrenia-like symptoms once higher levels were expressed. Without intervention, they developed symptoms at about the same age humans do.
“This shows that high levels of neuregulin-1 are a cause of schizophrenia, at least in mice, because when you turn them down, the behavior deficit disappears,” Mei said. “Our data certainly suggests that we can treat this cause by bringing down excessive levels of neuregulin-1 or blocking its pathologic effects.”
Schizophrenia is a spectrum disorder with multiple causes — most of which are unknown — that tends to run in families, and high neuregulin-1 levels have been found in only a minority of patients. To reduce neuregulin-1 levels in those individuals likely would require development of small molecules that could, for example, block the gene’s signaling pathways, Mei said. Current therapies treat symptoms and generally focus on reducing the activity of two neurotransmitters since the bottom line is excessive communication between neurons.
The good news is it’s relatively easy to measure neuregulin-1 since blood levels appear to correlate well with brain levels. To genetically alter the mice, they put a copy of the neuregulin-1 gene into mouse DNA then, to make sure they could control the levels, they put in front of the DNA a binding protein for doxycycline, a stable analogue for the antibiotic tetracycline, which is infamous for staining the teeth of fetuses and babies.
The mice are born expressing high levels of neuregulin-1 and giving the antibiotic restores normal levels. “If you don’t feed the mice tetracycline, the neuregulin-1 levels are always high,” said Mei, noting that endogenous levels of the gene are not affected. High-levels of neuregulin-1 appear to activate the kinase LIMK1, impairing release of the neurotransmitter glutamate and normal behavior. The LIMK1 connection identifies another target for intervention, Mei said.
Neuregulin-1 is essential for heart development as well as formation of myelin, the insulation around nerves. It’s among about 100 schizophrenia-associated genes identified through genome-wide association studies and has remained a consistent susceptibility gene using numerous other methods for examining the genetics of the disease. It’s also implicated in cancer.
Mei and his colleagues were the first to show neuregulin-1’s positive impact in the developed brain, reporting in Neuron in 2007 that it and its receptor ErbB4 help maintain a healthy balance of excitement and inhibition by releasing GABA, a major inhibitory neurotransmitter, at the sight of inhibitory synapses, the communication paths between neurons. Years before, they showed the genes were also at excitatory synapses, where they also could quash activation. In 2009, the MCG researchers provided additional evidence of the role of neuregulin-1 in schizophrenia by selectively deleting the gene for its receptor, ErbB4 and creating another symptomatic mouse.
Schizophrenia affects about 1 percent of the population, causing hallucinations, depression and impaired thinking and social behavior. Babies born to mothers who develop a severe infection, such as influenza or pneumonia, during pregnancy have a significantly increased risk of schizophrenia.
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May 22, 2013 — Until now, little was scientifically known about the human potential to cultivate compassion — the emotional state of caring for people who are suffering in a way that motivates altruistic behavior.
Investigators trained young adults to engage in compassion meditation, an ancient Buddhist technique to increase caring feelings for people who are suffering. (Credit: © byheaven / Fotolia)
A new study by researchers at the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the Waisman Center of the University of Wisconsin-Madison shows that adults can be trained to be more compassionate. The report, published Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, investigates whether training adults in compassion can result in greater altruistic behavior and related changes in neural systems underlying compassion.
“Our fundamental question was, ‘Can compassion be trained and learned in adults? Can we become more caring if we practice that mindset?'” says Helen Weng, lead author of the study and a graduate student in clinical psychology. “Our evidence points to yes.”
In the study, the investigators trained young adults to engage in compassion meditation, an ancient Buddhist technique to increase caring feelings for people who are suffering. In the meditation, participants envisioned a time when someone has suffered and then practiced wishing that his or her suffering was relieved. They repeated phrases to help them focus on compassion such as, “May you be free from suffering. May you have joy and ease.”
Participants practiced with different categories of people, first starting with a loved one, someone whom they easily felt compassion for, like a friend or family member. Then, they practiced compassion for themselves and, then, a stranger. Finally, they practiced compassion for someone they actively had conflict with called the “difficult person,” such as a troublesome coworker or roommate.
“It’s kind of like weight training,” Weng says. “Using this systematic approach, we found that people can actually build up their compassion ‘muscle’ and respond to others’ suffering with care and a desire to help.”
Compassion training was compared to a control group that learned cognitive reappraisal, a technique where people learn to reframe their thoughts to feel less negative. Both groups listened to guided audio instructions over the Internet for 30 minutes per day for two weeks. “We wanted to investigate whether people could begin to change their emotional habits in a relatively short period of time,” says Weng.
The real test of whether compassion could be trained was to see if people would be willing to be more altruistic — even helping people they had never met. The research tested this by asking the participants to play a game in which they were given the opportunity to spend their own money to respond to someone in need (called the “Redistribution Game”). They played the game over the Internet with two anonymous players, the “Dictator” and the “Victim.” They watched as the Dictator shared an unfair amount of money (only $1 out of $10) with the Victim. They then decided how much of their own money to spend (out of $5) in order to equalize the unfair split and redistribute funds from the Dictator to the Victim.
“We found that people trained in compassion were more likely to spend their own money altruistically to help someone who was treated unfairly than those who were trained in cognitive reappraisal,” Weng says.
“We wanted to see what changed inside the brains of people who gave more to someone in need. How are they responding to suffering differently now?” asks Weng. The study measured changes in brain responses using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) before and after training. In the MRI scanner, participants viewed images depicting human suffering, such as a crying child or a burn victim, and generated feelings of compassion towards the people using their practiced skills. The control group was exposed to the same images, and asked to recast them in a more positive light as in reappraisal.
The researchers measured how much brain activity had changed from the beginning to the end of the training, and found that the people who were the most altruistic after compassion training were the ones who showed the most brain changes when viewing human suffering. They found that activity was increased in the inferior parietal cortex, a region involved in empathy and understanding others. Compassion training also increased activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the extent to which it communicated with the nucleus accumbens, brain regions involved in emotion regulation and positive emotions.
“People seem to become more sensitive to other people’s suffering, but this is challenging emotionally. They learn to regulate their emotions so that they approach people’s suffering with caring and wanting to help rather than turning away,” explains Weng.
Compassion, like physical and academic skills, appears to be something that is not fixed, but rather can be enhanced with training and practice. “The fact that alterations in brain function were observed after just a total of seven hours of training is remarkable,” explains UW-Madison psychology and psychiatry professor Richard J. Davidson, founder and chair of the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds and senior author of the article.
“There are many possible applications of this type of training,” Davidson says. “Compassion and kindness training in schools can help children learn to be attuned to their own emotions as well as those of others, which may decrease bullying. Compassion training also may benefit people who have social challenges such as social anxiety or antisocial behavior.”
Weng is also excited about how compassion training can help the general population. “We studied the effects of this training with healthy participants, which demonstrated that this can help the average person. I would love for more people to access the training and try it for a week or two — what changes do they see in their own lives?”
Both compassion and reappraisal trainings are available on the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds’ website. “I think we are only scratching the surface of how compassion can transform people’s lives,” says Weng.
Other authors on the paper were Andrew S. Fox, Alexander J. Shackman, Diane E. Stodola, Jessica Z. K. Caldwell, Matthew C. Olson, and Gregory M. Rogers.
The work was supported by funds from the National Institutes of Health; a Hertz Award to the UW-Madison Department of Psychology; the Fetzer Institute; The John Templeton Foundation; the Impact Foundation; the J. W. Kluge Foundation; the Mental Insight Foundation; the Mind and Life Institute; and gifts from Bryant Wanguard, Ralph Robinson, and Keith and Arlene Bronstein.
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Novas ferramentas de computação possibilitam fazer ciência de forma melhor, mais rápida e com maior impacto, diz Tony Hey, vice-presidente da Microsoft Research (foto:E.Cesar/FAPESP)
16/05/2013
Por Elton Alisson
Agência FAPESP – Um software de visualização de dados astronômicos pela internet permite que cientistas em diversas partes do mundo acessem milhares de imagens de objetos celestes, coletadas por grandes telescópios espaciais, por observatórios e por instituições internacionais de pesquisa em astronomia.
Por meio desses dados, os usuários podem realizar análises temporais e combinar observações realizadas em vários comprimentos de onda de energia irradiada pelos corpos celestes, como raios X, radiação infravermelha, ultravioleta e gama e ondas de rádio, para elucidar os processos físicos que ocorrem no interior desses objetos e compartilhar suas conclusões.
Denominado World Wide Telescope, o software, que começou a ser desenvolvido em 2002 pela Microsoft Research, em parceria com pesquisadores da Universidade Johns Hopkins, nos Estados Unidos, é um exemplo de como as novas tecnologias da informação e comunicação (TICs) mudaram a forma como os dados científicos passaram a ser gerados, administrados e compartilhados, além da própria maneira como se faz ciência hoje, afirma Tony Hey, vice-presidente da Microsoft Research.
“Os telescópios espaciais, assim como as máquinas de sequenciamento genético e aceleradores de partículas, estão gerando um volume de dados até então nunca visto. Para lidar com esse fenômeno e possibilitar que os cientistas possam manipular e compartilhar esses dados, precisamos de uma série de tecnologias e ferramentas de ciência da computação que possibilitem fazer ciência de forma melhor, mais rápida e com maior impacto. É isso o que chamamos deeScience”, disse Hey durante o Latin American eScience Workshop 2013, realizado nos dias 14 e 15 de maio no Espaço Apas, em São Paulo.
Promovido pela FAPESP e pela Microsoft Research, o evento reuniu pesquisadores e estudantes da Europa, da América do Sul e do Norte, da Ásia e da Oceania para discutir avanços em diversas áreas do conhecimento possibilitados pela melhoria na capacidade de análise de grandes volumes de informações produzidas por projetos de pesquisa.
A cerimônia de abertura do evento foi presidida por Celso Lafer, presidente da FAPESP, e contou com a presença de Michel Levy, presidente da Microsoft Brasil, e de José Tadeu de Faria, superintendente do Ministério da Agricultura, Pecuária e Abastecimento no Estado de São Paulo, representando o ministro.
Também conhecida como ciência orientada por dados, a área de eScience integra pesquisas em computação a estudos nas mais variadas áreas por meio do desenvolvimento de softwares específicos para visualização e análise de informações.
A integração permite a interpretação dos dados, a formulação de teorias, testes por simulação e o levantamento de novas hipóteses de pesquisa com base em correlações difíceis de serem observadas sem o apoio da tecnologia da informação.
“Algumas tecnologias utilizadas na ciência da computação vão ajudar a resolver problemas científicos. Em contrapartida, a utilização dessas ferramentas para solucionar problemas científicos também possibilitará o próprio desenvolvimento da ciência da computação”, disse Hey, que foi professor da Universidade de Southampton, no Reino Unido.
Segundo Hey, a análise, visualização, prospecção (data mining, na expressão em inglês), preservação e compartilhamento de grandes volumes de dados representam grandes desafios não só na ciência hoje, mas também no setor privado.
Por isso, na opinião dele, é preciso treinar os cientistas para lidar com o big data – como é chamado o conjunto de soluções tecnológicas capaz de lidar com a acumulação contínua de dados pouco estruturados, capturados de diversas fontes e da ordem de petabytes (quatrilhões de bytes) – tanto para realização de projetos científicos, como também para atuarem, eventualmente, em empresas. “O data scientist [cientista capaz de lidar com grandes volumes de dados] será um requisito imprescindível para o cientista”, disse Hey.
A ciência intensiva em dados não é nova, mas as escalas espaciais e temporais de estudos realizados atualmente sobre temas relacionados às mudanças climáticas globais, por exemplo, são cada vez maiores, exigindo novas ferramentas. Por meio de novas tecnologias da informação, também é possível analisar dados gerados em tempo real, como no monitoramento de hábitats.
De acordo com Hey, desde 1950 se começou a utilizar computadores para explorar, por meio de simulações, áreas da ciência até então inacessíveis. “No início, no entanto, os cientistas não sabiam o que era ciência da computação e os profissionais da computação não entendiam a complexidade dos problemas científicos”, disse.
“Foi necessária a realização de um trabalho conjunto, de longo prazo, para que os dois lados entendessem qual era a contribuição que cada um poderia dar em suas respectivas áreas, e iniciar o desenvolvimento de novos algoritmos, hardware, software e da programação de linguagens para possibilitar a realização de experimentos em diversas áreas”, contou.
Oportunidades em temas ousados
Durante o evento da FAPESP e da Microsoft Research foram apresentados diversos projetos por pesquisadores que utilizam o eScience em diversos países, em áreas como energias renováveis, mudanças climáticas globais, transformações sociais, econômicas e políticas nas metrópoles contemporâneas, caracterização, conservação, recuperação e uso sustentável da biodiversidade, medicina e saúde pública.
Um desses projetos, coordenado pela professora Glaucia Mendes Souza, coordenadora do Programa FAPESP de Pesquisa em Bioenergia (BIOEN), pretende desenvolver um algoritmo para o sequenciamento do genoma da cana-de-açúcar e, com isso, possibilitar o desenvolvimento de variedades da planta com maior quantidade de sacarose e mais resistente a pragas e às mudanças climáticas.
“A colaboração entre a FAPESP e a Microsoft tem aberto para a comunidade científica do Estado de São Paulo inúmeras oportunidades de realizar pesquisas em temas ousados relacionados com o uso de tecnologias da informação em áreas como a de energia e meio ambiente”, disse Carlos Henrique de Brito Cruz, diretor científico da FAPESP, na sessão de abertura do workshop.
“Temos grandes expectativas em relação à eScience. Se soubermos utilizá-la adequadamente, ela poderá trazer grandes avanços não só em pesquisas mas também na própria maneira de se fazer ciência”, disse Brito Cruz.
Ele disse que a FAPESP planeja lançar em breve um programa voltado para apoiar pesquisas na área de eScience.
“Temos a clara convicção de que um papel importante da FAPESP é estar na vanguarda da inovação e do conhecimento, e consideramos muito importante o apoio à pesquisas em eScience, cuja aplicação em áreas como a de meio ambiente é inequívoca, mas que também apresenta um grande potencial de utilização nas Ciências Humanas, por exemplo”, disse Celso Lafer, presidente da FAPESP.
Levy destacou a parceria da Microsoft com a FAPESP e os investimentos em pesquisa e desenvolvimento realizados pela empresa no país. “A Microsoft tem aumentado seus investimentos na área de pesquisa e desenvolvimento no Brasil nos últimos anos e um dos mais importantes exemplos disso é a parceria bem sucedida que mantemos com a FAPESP”, afirmou.
Of more than 4,000 academic papers published over 20 years, 97.1% agreed that climate change is anthropogenic
Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 16 May 2013 00.01 BST
‘Our findings prove that there is a strong scientific agreement about the cause of climate change, despite public perceptions to the contrary’. Photograph: John McConnico/AP
A survey of thousands of peer-reviewed papers in scientific journals has found 97.1% agreed that climate change is caused by human activity.
Authors of the survey, published on Thursday in the journal Environmental Research Letters, said the finding of near unanimity provided a powerful rebuttal to climate contrarians who insist the science of climate change remains unsettled.
The survey considered the work of some 29,000 scientists published in 11,994 academic papers. Of the 4,000-plus papers that took a position on the causes of climate change only 0.7% or 83 of those thousands of academic articles, disputed the scientific consensus that climate change is the result of human activity, with the view of the remaining 2.2% unclear.
The study described the dissent as a “vanishingly small proportion” of published research.
“Our findings prove that there is a strong scientific agreement about the cause of climate change, despite public perceptions to the contrary,” said John Cook of the University of Queensland, who led the survey.
Public opinion continues to lag behind the science. Though a majority of Americans accept the climate is changing, just 42% believed human activity was the main driver, in a poll conducted by the Pew Research Centre last October.
“There is a gaping chasm between the actual consensus and the public perception,” Cook said in a statement.
Guardian partners Climate Desk interview John Cook on his new paper
The study blamed strenuous lobbying efforts by industry to undermine the science behind climate change for the gap in perception. The resulting confusion has blocked efforts to act on climate change.
The survey was the most ambitious effort to date to demonstrate the broad agreement on the causes of climate change, covering 20 years of academic publications from 1991-2011.
In 2004, Naomi Oreskes, an historian at the University of California, San Diego,surveyed published literature, releasing her results in the journal Science. She too came up with a similar finding that 97% of climate scientists agreed on the causes of climate change.
She wrote of the new survey in an email: “It is a nice, independent confirmation, using a somewhat different methodology than I used, that comes to the same result. It also refutes the claim, sometimes made by contrarians, that the consensus has broken down, much less ‘shattered’.”
The Cook survey was broader in its scope, deploying volunteers from theSkepticalScience.com website to review scientific abstracts. The volunteers also asked authors to rate their own views on the causes of climate change, in another departure from Oreskes’s methods.
The authors said the findings could help close the gap between scientific opinion and the public on the causes of climate change, or anthropogenic global warming, and so create favourable conditions for political action on climate.
“The public perception of a scientific consensus on AGW [anthropogenic, ie man-made, global warming] is a necessary element in public support for climate policy,” the study said.
However, Prof Robert Brulle, a sociologist at Drexel University who studies the forces underlying attitudes towards climate change, disputed the idea that educating the public about the broad scientific agreement on the causes of climate change would have an effect on public opinion – or on the political conditions for climate action.
He said he was doubtful that convincing the public of a scientific consensus on climate change would help advance the prospects for political action. Having elite leaders call for climate action would be far more powerful, he said.
“I don’t think people really want to come around to grips with the fact that climate change is a highly ideological issue and it is not amenable to the information deficit model,” he said.
“The information deficit model, this idea that if you just pile on more information people will get convinced, is just completely inadequate, he said. “It strengthens the people who actually read and pay attention but it is certainly not going to change or shift the opinions of others.”
Jon Krosnick, professor in humanities and social sciences at Stanford university and an expert on public opinion on climate change, said: “I assume that sceptics would say that there is bias in the editorial process so that the papers ultimately published are not an accurate reflection of the opinions of scientists.”
Gene activity changes accompany doglike behavior
Web edition: May 15, 2013
Taming silver foxes (shown) alters their behavior. A new study links those behavior changes to changes in brain chemicals. Tom Reichner/Shutterstock
COLD SPRING HARBOR, N.Y. – Taming foxes changes not only the animals’ behavior but also their brain chemistry, a new study shows.
The finding could shed light on how the foxes’ genetic cousins, wolves, morphed into man’s best friend. Lenore Pipes of Cornell University presented the results May 10 at the Biology of Genomes conference.
The foxes she worked with come from a long line started in 1959 when a Russian scientist named Dmitry Belyaev attempted to recreate dog domestication, but using foxes instead of wolves. He bred silver foxes (Vulpes vulpes), which are actually a type of red fox with white-tipped black fur. Belyaev and his colleagues selected the least aggressive animals they could find at local fox farms and bred them. Each generation, the scientists picked the tamest animals to mate, creating ever friendlier foxes. Now, more than 50 years later, the foxes act like dogs, wagging their tails, jumping with excitement and leaping into the arms of caregivers for caresses.
At the same time, the scientists also bred the most aggressive foxes on the farms. The descendents of those foxes crouch, flatten their ears, growl, bare their teeth and lunge at people who approach their cages.
The foxes’ tame and aggressive behaviors are rooted in genetics, but scientists have not found DNA changes that account for the differences. Rather than search for changes in genes themselves, Pipes and her colleagues took an indirect approach, looking for differences in the activity of genes in the foxes’ brains.
The team collected two brain parts, the prefrontal cortex and amygdala, from a dozen aggressive foxes and a dozen tame ones. The prefrontal cortex, an area at the front of the brain, is involved in decision making and in controlling social behavior, among other tasks. The amygdala, a pair of almond-size regions on either side of the brain, helps process emotional information.
Pipes found that the activity of hundreds of genes in the two brain regions differed between the groups of affable and hostile foxes. For example, aggressive animals had increased activity of some genes for sensing dopamine. Pipes speculated that tame animals’ lower levels of dopamine sensors might make them less anxious.
The team had expected to find changes in many genes involved in serotonin signaling, a process targeted by some popular antidepressants such as Prozac. Tame foxes are known to have more serotonin in their brains. But only one gene for sensing serotonin had higher activity in the friendly animals.
In a different sort of analysis, Pipes discovered that all aggressive foxes carry one form of the GRM3 glutamate receptor gene, while a majority of the friendly foxes have a different variant of the gene. In people, genetic variants of GRM3 have been linked to schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and other mood disorders. Other genes involved in transmitting glutamate signals, which help regulate mood, had increased activity in tame foxes, Pipes said.
It is not clear whether similar brain chemical changes accompanied the transformation of wolves into dogs, said Adam Freedman, an evolutionary biologist at Harvard University. Even if dogs and wolves now have differing brain chemical levels, researchers can’t turn back time to watch the process unfold; they can only guess at how domestication happened. “We have to reconstruct an unobservable series of steps,” he said. Pipes’ study is an interesting example of what might have happened to dogs’ brains during domestication, he said.
May 21, 2013 — A new model of the brain’s thought processes explains the apparently chaotic activity patterns of individual neurons. They do not correspond to a simple stimulus/response linkage, but arise from the networking of different neural circuits. Scientists funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) propose that the field of brain research should expand its focus.
A new model of the brain’s thought processes explains the apparently chaotic activity patterns of individual neurons. They do not correspond to a simple stimulus/response linkage, but arise from the networking of different neural circuits. (Credit: iStockphoto/Sebastian Kaulitzki)
Many brain researchers cannot see the forest for the trees. When they use electrodes to record the activity patterns of individual neurons, the patterns often appear chaotic and difficult to interpret. “But when you zoom out from looking at individual cells, and observe a large number of neurons instead, their global activity is very informative,” says Mattia Rigotti, a scientist at Columbia University and New York University who is supported by the SNSF and the Janggen-Pöhn-Stiftung. Publishing inNature together with colleagues from the United States, he has shown that these difficult-to-interpret patterns in particular are especially important for complex brain functions.
What goes on in the heads of apes
The researchers have focussed their attention on the activity patterns of 237 neurons that had been recorded some years previously using electrodes implanted in the frontal lobes of two rhesus monkeys. At that time, the apes had been taught to recognise images of different objects on a screen. Around one third of the observed neurons demonstrated activity that Rigotti describes as “mixed selectivity.” A mixed selective neuron does not always respond to the same stimulus (the flowers or the sailing boat on the screen) in the same way. Rather, its response differs as it also takes account of the activity of other neurons. The cell adapts its response according to what else is going on in the ape’s brain.
Chaotic patterns revealed in context
Just as individual computers are networked to create concentrated processing and storage capacity in the field of Cloud Computing, links in the complex cognitive processes that take place in the prefrontal cortex play a key role. The greater the density of the network in the brain, in other words the greater the proportion of mixed selectivity in the activity patterns of the neurons, the better the apes were able to recall the images on the screen, as demonstrated by Rigotti in his analysis. Given that the brain and cognitive capabilities of rhesus monkeys are similar to those of humans, mixed selective neurons should also be important in our own brains. For him this is reason enough why brain research from now on should no longer be satisfied with just the simple activity patterns, but should also consider the apparently chaotic patterns that can only be revealed in context.
Journal Reference:
Depois de atirar num boto que estava perturbando sua pescaria Valdecir da Costa Souza, 20, passou a apresentar perturbações psicológicas e afirma que os animais estão o atraindo. Além de ouvir vozes ele vê um homem sentado numa pedra no rio tentando levá-lo para a água e o problema está preocupando os familiares.
Tudo começou quando Valdecir participava de uma pescaria junto com o primo Natanael dos Santos, em uma comunidade do interior do Amazonas e alguns botos rasgavam as redes e comiam o peixe, momento que o pescador resolveu dar um tiro num dos animais.
Segundo conta o primo, imediatamente após o tiro, surgiram vários botos ao redor do barco que tentaram alagar a embarcação e eles não conseguiram continuar a pescaria. Mesmo depois do barco ter sido ancorado nas margens do rio os animais não foram embora, momento em que Valdecir começou a passar mal.
“Comecei a passar mal e apareceu um homem em cima de uma pedra branca no meio do rio que tentava levá-lo para a água. Ele me chamava e dizia que ai me levar”, contou o pescador ainda abatido, que no momento pedia socorro ao primo que afirmou que eram muitos botos e quando eles apareciam Valdecir começava a passar mal.
“Quando eu ficava perto do meu primo, que estava comigo na pescaria, eles se afastavam e o homem desaparecia”, conta ainda assustado em sua residência. Depois que chegou em casa o pescador deu muito trabalho a família que tinha que segurá-lo a força pois ele queria entrar no rio.
Segundo a tia do pescador, Lúcia dos Santos, todas as vezes que Valdecir sentia a presença dos botos ficava com a voz diferente e com muita força. “Não sei o que acontecia, ele começava a desmaiar depois queria entrar no rio. Eram nove homens e três mulheres para poder segurá-lo”, afirmou.
O pai pescador, José Alberto de Souza, 62, conta que também já foi vitima de um boto, quando estava com amigos madeireiros nas margens de um igarapé na fronteira com o Peru. Eles jogavam baralho quando sentiu algo estranho no corpo e via um homem sobre uma pedra no igarapé que tentava levá-lo para a água.
José Alberto afirma que tudo começou depois que seu pai desapareceu nas águas do Rio Juruá, encantado por um boto. “Meu estava numa canoa que naufragou e vários botos começaram a boiar no local, ele nunca foi encontrado. Depois ele apareceu para minha esposa dizendo que estava em um boto e que eu precisava desencantá-lo. Ela me disse antes mesmo dele aparecer três vezes, depois disso nunca mais voltou”, ressaltou.
[Acessado em 23 de maio de 2013]
May 15, 2013 — Men’s upper-body strength predicts their political opinions on economic redistribution, according to new research published inPsychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.
The principal investigators of the research — psychological scientists Michael Bang Petersen of Aarhus University, Denmark and Daniel Sznycer of University of California, Santa Barbara — believe that the link may reflect psychological traits that evolved in response to our early ancestral environments and continue to influence behavior today.
“While many think of politics as a modern phenomenon, it has — in a sense — always been with our species,” says Petersen.
In the days of our early ancestors, decisions about the distribution of resources weren’t made in courthouses or legislative offices, but through shows of strength. With this in mind, Petersen, Sznycer and colleagues hypothesized that upper-body strength — a proxy for the ability to physically defend or acquire resources — would predict men’s opinions about the redistribution of wealth.
The researchers collected data on bicep size, socioeconomic status, and support for economic redistribution from hundreds of people in the United States, Argentina, and Denmark.
In line with their hypotheses, the data revealed that wealthy men with high upper-body strength were less likely to support redistribution, while less wealthy men of the same strength were more likely to support it.
“Despite the fact that the United States, Denmark and Argentina have very different welfare systems, we still see that — at the psychological level — individuals reason about welfare redistribution in the same way,” says Petersen. “In all three countries, physically strong males consistently pursue the self-interested position on redistribution.”
Men with low upper-body strength, on the other hand, were less likely to support their own self-interest. Wealthy men of this group showed less resistance to redistribution, while poor men showed less support.
“Our results demonstrate that physically weak males are more reluctant than physically strong males to assert their self-interest — just as if disputes over national policies were a matter of direct physical confrontation among small numbers of individuals, rather than abstract electoral dynamics among millions,” says Petersen.
Interestingly, the researchers found no link between upper-body strength and redistribution opinions among women. Petersen argues that this is likely due to the fact that, over the course of evolutionary history, women had less to gain, and also more to lose, from engaging in direct physical aggression.
Together, the results indicate that an evolutionary perspective may help to illuminate political motivations, at least those of men.
“Many previous studies have shown that people’s political views cannot be predicted by standard economic models,” Petersen explains. “This is among the first studies to show that political views may be rational in another sense, in that they’re designed by natural selection to function in the conditions recurrent over human evolutionary history.”
Co-authors on this research include Aaron Sell, Leda Cosmides, and John Tooby of the University of California, Santa Barbara.
This research was supported by a grant from the Danish Research Council and a Director’s Pioneer Award from the National Institutes of Health.
Journal Reference:
› Children jump over ground affected by erosion in Newtok. Natural erosion has accelerated due to climate change, with large areas of land lost to the Ninglick River each year. Photograph: Brian Adams
Suzanne Goldenberg in Newtok, Alaska, with video by Richard Sprenger
One afternoon in the waning days of winter, the most powerful man in Newtok, Alaska, hopped on a plane and flew 1,000 miles to plead for the survival of his village. Stanley Tom, Newtok’s administrator, had a clear purpose for his trip: find the money to move the village on the shores of the Bering Sea out of the way of an approaching disaster caused by climate change.
Village administrator Stanley Tom stands at Mertarvik, the site of relocated Newtok. Photograph: Brian Adams Photography
Newtok was rapidly losing ground to erosion. The land beneath the village was falling into the river. Tom needed money for bulldozers to begin preparing a new site for the village on higher ground. He needed funds for an airstrip, He came back from his meetings in Juneau, the Alaskan state capital, with expressions of sympathy – but nothing in the way of the cash he desperately needed. “It’s really complicated,” he said. “There are a lot of obstacles.”
Those obstacles – financial, legal and a supremely frustrating bureaucratic process – had slowed down the move for so long that some in Newtok, which is about 400 miles south of the Bering Strait that separates the US from Russia, feared they would be stuck as the village went down around them, houses swallowed up by the river.
“It’s really alarming,” said Tom, slumped in an armchair a few hours after his return to the village. “I have a hard time sleeping, and I’m getting up early in the morning. I am worried about it every day.”
The uncertainty was tearing the village apart. It also began to turn the village against Tom.
Over the winter, a large group of villagers decided that their administrator was not up to the job. By the time he returned from this particular trip, the dissidents had voted to replace the village council and to sack Tom – a vote that he ignored.
“The way I see it, we need someone who knows how to do the work,” said Katherine Charles, one of Tom’s most vocal critics. “I feel like we are being neglected. We are still standing here and we don’t know when we are going to move. For years now we have been frustrated. I have to ask myself: why are we even still here?”
It’s been more than a decade since Tom took charge of running Newtok, and leading the village out of climate disaster to higher ground.
The ground beneath Newtok is disappearing. Natural erosion has accelerated due to climate change, with large areas of land lost to the Ninglick river each year. A study by the Army Corps of Engineers found the highest point in the village would be below water level by 2017. The proximity of the threat to Newtok means that its villages are likely to be America’s first climate refugees.
Officials in Anchorage say Tom has worked tirelessly to move the village out of the way of a rampaging river. Among the relatively small circle of bureaucrats and lawyers who concern themselves with the problems of small and remote indigenous Alaskan villages, the Newtok administrator has a stellar reputation. He has won leadership awards from Native American groups in the rest of the country.
Tom said he hoped to make a big push this summer, acquiring heavy equipment that locals could use to begin moving some of the existing houses over to the new village site at Mertarvik nine miles to the south.
“It’s really happening right now. The village is sinking and flooding and eroding,” he said. He said he was planning to move his own belongings to the new village site this summer – and that villagers should start doing the same.
But Tom, despite his lobbying missions to Juneau and strong reputation with government officials, has failed to inject federal and state officials with that same sense of urgency.
Melting permafrost, sea-level rise, erosion – these are some of the worst consequences of climate change for Alaska. But none of those elements in Newtok’s slow destruction are recognised as disasters under existing legislation.
That means there is no designated pot of money set aside for those affected communities – unlike cities or towns destroyed by floods or tornados.
We weren’t thinking of climate change when federal disaster relief legislation was passed.
Robin Bronen, a human rights lawyer in Anchorage. ‘This is completely a human rights issue’ Photograph: Richard Sprenger
“We weren’t thinking of climate change when federal disaster relief legislation was passed,” said Robin Bronen, a human rights lawyer in Anchorage who has made a dozen visits to Newtok. “Our legal system is not set up. The institutions that we have created to respond to disasters are not up to the task of responding to climate change.”
In Bronen’s view, Congress needed to rewrite existing disaster legislation to take account of climate change. Communities needed to be able to access those disaster funds — if not to rebuild in place, which is not feasible in Newtok’s case, then to move.
The authorities also had responsibility under the treaty agreements with indigenous Alaskan tribes to guarantee the safety and wellbeing of indigenous communities, she argued.
“This is completely a human rights issue,” Bronen said. “When you are talking about a people who have done the least to contribute to our climate crisis facing such dramatic consequences as a result of climate change, we have a moral and legal responsibility to respond and provide the funding needed so that these communities are not in danger.”
Until then, however, it was up to Tom to find new ways to prise funds out of an unresponsive bureaucracy. It turned out that he had a knack for it.
Government officials praised Tom for finding other sources of funds, such as development grants, and putting them to use for building the new village site. But it has been a laborious process for the remote village to find its way through the different funding agencies and a maze of competing regulations.
As Tom found out, each agency had its own set of rules. The state government would not build a school for fewer than 10 children. The federal government would not build an airstrip at a village without a post office. But the rules, from Newtok’s vantage point, appeared to have at least one point in common. They seemed to conspire against the village ever getting its move off the ground.
In 2011, Alaska’s government published a timetable for Newtok’s move, setting out dates for building an emergency centre, housing, an airstrip – all items on Tom’s list. Two years later, the plan is already behind schedule and the official who oversaw that original timetable said there was little chance of getting back on track.
“Newtok is something that is probably going to play out over several decades unless it reaches a dire point where something has to be done immediately to keep the people safe,” said Larry Hartig, who heads Alaska’s Department of Environmental Conservation.
Officially, the government of Alaska remains committed to helping Newtok and all the other indigenous Alaskan villages that are threatened by climate change.
Almost all of Alaska’s indigenous villages – more than 180 – are experiencing the effects of climate change, including severe flooding and erosion. Some may be able to hold back rivers and sea, but others will have to move. About half a dozen villages, including Newtok, face extreme risks.
A mosaic of sea ice shifts across the Bering Sea, west of Alaska on 5 February, 2008. On either side of the Bering Strait (top centre) the land is blanketed with snow. Anchorage is located in the middle right-hand side of the image, at the top of the Cook Inlet. The village of Newtok is located north of Nunivak Island (middle), close to the coast on the lowland plain of the Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, one of the largest river deltas in the world, which mostly consists of tundra. Photograph: NASA/Aqua/MODIS
“I am not going to tell any community that they are not going to survive. If the residents want to survive, we will help them,” said Mead Treadwell, the state’s lieutenant governor.
But the cost of relocating just one village — Newtok — could run as high as $130m, according to an estimate by the Army Corps of Engineers. That’s more than $350,000 per villager. Multiply that by half a dozen, or several more times, and the cost of protecting indigenous Alaskan villages from climate change soon soars into the billions.
So far, Newtok has received a total of about $12m in state funds over the past four years, according to George Owletuck, a consultant hired by Tom to help with the move. Much of that has already gone, to build a barge landing, a few new homes, and an emergency evacuation centre – in case the village does not manage to move in time.
Officially, federal and state government agencies have spent some $27m getting Mertarvik ready, although a considerable share of that figure, some $6m, did not go directly to the relocation, said Sally Russell Cox, the state official overseeing the move. And there is still no major infrastructure completed at Mertarvik.
Would the government of Alaska commit to picking up the rest of the tab for Newtok and the other villages?
Alaska’s oil revenues have fallen off over the years. In 2012, the state slipped into second place for oil production behind North Dakota. Treadwell admitted the state government would not cover the entire cost of fortifying or moving all of the villages threatened by climate change.
“On the question of is there money to help them with one cheque? That is something there clearly is not,” he said.
Treadwell suggested some of the at-risk villages could raise funds by setting themselves up as hubs for oil companies hoping to drill in Arctic waters.
However, a number of oil companies have put their Arctic drilling plans on hold for 2013 and 2014. Treadwell admitted there was as yet no comprehensive climate change plan for Newtok and other villages. “I think it’s going to be piece by piece with each community and many different pots of money,” he said.
In the case of Newtok, Owletuck, the consultant, had big ideas for financing the move: growing fruit and vegetables hydroponically in green houses, or testing the possibilities of producing biofuels from algae.
He let it be known the village may even have found a mysterious benefactor. Owletuck said he’d had an approach from private individuals, whom he declined to name, wanting to donate $22m to the move.
None of those propositions have materialised, however. And after more than a decade of uncertainty about the future under climate change, the basic infrastructure of Newtok is coming apart.
The rising sea due to erosion and climate change has dramatically altered Newtok Village and by 2027 is expected to cover nearly a third of the village. Historic shorelines digitized from USGS topographic maps and aerial photos. Source: Army Corps of Engineers
Snow covers up a lot of Newtok’s flaws: the open sewage pits, the broken board walk over mudflats, some of the abandoned snowmobile wrecks.
Newtok has for years been considered a “distressed village”, with average income of $16,000, well below the rest of the state. Fewer than half of adults in the village have paid work. But even within those dismal measures, conditions have sharply deteriorated in the years since the village has been planning to move.
Aside from the clinic and the school, most buildings are in a state of advanced dilapidation. The floor in the community hall sags like an old mattress. The community laundry is out of order.
In the cramped offices of the traditional council, where Tom works, the furniture dates from the 1970s or 1980s, mid-brown vinyl chairs where the casing has split open, revealing the dirty foam inside. It’s not unheard of to find families of 10 or 12 children living in houses of less than 800 sq ft – and none of those homes have flush toilets or running water.
Early mornings find the men of the household trudging out of their homes with 5 gallon buckets of waste, which get dumped at various spots on the edges of the village, including a small stream.
The diesel-powered generator was nearing the end of its life span. The water treatment plant was shut down last October after people began getting sick. Tom said there was contamination from leaking jet fuel at the airport.
For now, villagers are drawing water from the school, which had a separate system. But the school principal said he would have to cut that off in May to preserve the system for the schoolchildren.
Tom said there was nothing he could do. Government agencies would not fund improvements at the current village site, because of the plan to move. “There is no money to improve our community,” he said. “We are suspended from federal and state agencies and there is no way of improving our lives over here. The agencies do not want to work on both villages at once.”
By last October, frustration with the stalled move and conditions in the village exploded. Villagers accused their own council of failing to hold regular elections, and raised a petition to throw out the leaders and replace Tom.
Some accused him of presiding over a dictatorship in the village. Others speculated that he and the paid consultant, Oweituck, were plotting to rob the relocation funds.
One of the dissidents, a relative newcomer to the village, posted ferocious criticism of Tom on Facebook calling for rebellion.
The dissidents organised elections, voted out the old council and installed their own leaders. Tom ignored the result. “Let them cry all they want,” he said. “I don’t care. They are not going to help my community. I am way ahead of these guys.”
The upheavals in Newtok are sadly familiar to those who have worked with indigenous Alaskan villages confronting climate change. “I don’t think you would find one community that says they are happy with the pace that’s gone on,” said Patricia Cochran, director of the Alaska Native Science Commission.
“To be honest with you, I think the state and the feds have done a terrible job, not only in assessing the conditions that communities are living within but in responding to them,” she said. “Because these communities are listed as threatened and may potentially be relocated, they are not able to get any funds now for infrastructure that is being damaged right now.”
That leaves communities stuck in a limbo that can carry for years or even decades.
That’s what has become of Newtok. The effects are devastating, said Charles. Beyond all her anger she admitted was an all-enveloping fear. “Sometimes I get scared. I’m scared for my own family. How will I take care of them if the relocation doesn’t start right away?”
She had been waiting for years to see the beginnings of any new settlement in rural Alaska rising up on the rocky hill of Mertarvik: the airport, the barge landing, the school, the houses. None of it was there yet, and Charles said she was coming close to despair.
“It’s been going on for I don’t know how long, and I am beginning to lose hope.”
Master Sgt. Mark Olsen/U.S. Air Force, via Associated Press. Damage in Mantoloking, N.J., after Hurricane Sandy. Natural disasters caused $35 billion in private property losses last year.
By EDUARDO PORTER
Published: May 14, 2013
If there were one American industry that would be particularly worried about climate change it would have to be insurance, right?
From Hurricane Sandy’s devastating blow to the Northeast to the protracted drought that hit the Midwest Corn Belt, natural catastrophes across the United States pounded insurers last year, generating$35 billion in privately insured property losses, $11 billion more than the average over the last decade.
And the industry expects the situation will get worse. “Numerous studies assume a rise in summer drought periods in North America in the future and an increasing probability of severe cyclones relatively far north along the U.S. East Coast in the long term,” said Peter Höppe, who heads Geo Risks Research at the reinsurance giant Munich Re. “The rise in sea level caused by climate change will further increase the risk of storm surge.” Most insurers, including the reinsurance companies that bear much of the ultimate risk in the industry, have little time for the arguments heard in some right-wing circles that climate change isn’t happening, and are quite comfortable with the scientific consensus that burning fossil fuels is the main culprit of global warming.
“Insurance is heavily dependent on scientific thought,” Frank Nutter, president of the Reinsurance Association of America, told me last week. “It is not as amenable to politicized scientific thought.”
Yet when I asked Mr. Nutter what the American insurance industry was doing to combat global warming, his answer was surprising: nothing much. “The industry has really not been engaged in advocacy related to carbon taxes or proposals addressing carbon,” he said. While some big European reinsurers like Munich Re and Swiss Re support efforts to reduce CO2 emissions, “in the United States the household names really have not engaged at all.” Instead, the focus of insurers’ advocacy efforts is zoning rules and disaster mitigation.
Last week, scientists announced that the concentration of heat-trapping carbon dioxide in the atmosphere had reached 400 parts per million — its highest level in at least three million years, before humans appeared on the scene. Back then, mastodons roamed the earth, the polar ice caps were smaller and the sea level was as much as 60 to 80 feet higher.
The milestone puts the earth nearer a point of no return, many scientists think, when vast, disruptive climate change is baked into our future. Pietr P. Tans, who runs the monitoring program at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told my colleague Justin Gillis: “It symbolizes that so far we have failed miserably in tackling this problem.” And it raises a perplexing question: why hasn’t corporate America done more to sway its allies in the Republican Party to try to avert a disaster that would clearly be devastating to its own interests?
Mr. Nutter argues that the insurance industry’s reluctance is born of hesitation to become embroiled in controversies over energy policy. But perhaps its executives simply don’t feel so vulnerable. Like farmers, who are largely protected from the ravages of climate change by government-financed crop insurance, insurers also have less to fear than it might at first appear.
The federal government covers flood insurance, among the riskiest kind in this time of crazy weather. And insurers can raise premiums or even drop coverage to adjust to higher risks. Indeed, despite Sandy and drought, property and casualty insurance in the United States was more profitable in 2012 than in 2011, according to the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America.
But the industry’s analysis of the risks it faces is evolving. One sign of that is how some top American insurers responded to a billboard taken out by the conservative Heartland Institute, a prominent climate change denier that has received support from the insurance industry.
The billboard had a picture of Theodore Kaczynski, the Unabomber, who asked: “I still believe in global warming. Do you?”
Concerned about global warming and angry to be equated with a murderous psychopath, insurance companies like Allied World, Renaissance Re, State Farm and XL Groupdropped their support for Heartland.
Even more telling, Eli Lehrer, a Heartland vice president who at the time led an insurance-financed project, left the group and helped start the R Street Institute, a standard conservative organization in all respects but one: it believes in climate change and supports a carbon tax to combat it. And it is financed largely with insurance industry money.
Mr. Lehrer points out that a carbon tax fits conservative orthodoxy. It is a broad and flat tax, whose revenue can be used to do away with the corporate income tax — a favorite target of the right. It provides a market-friendly signal, forcing polluters to bear the cost imposed on the rest of us and encouraging them to pollute less. And it is much preferable to a parade of new regulations from the Environmental Protection Agency.
“We are having a debate on the right about a carbon tax for the first time in a long time,” Mr. Lehrer said.
Bob Inglis, formerly a Republican congressman from South Carolina who lost his seat in the 2010 primary to a Tea Party-supported challenger, is another member of this budding coalition. Before he left Congress, he proposed a revenue-neutral bill to create a carbon tax and cut payroll taxes.
Changing the political economy of a carbon tax remains an uphill slog especially in a stagnant economy. But Mr. Inglis notices a thaw. “The best way to do this is in the context of a grand bargain on tax reform,” he said. “It could happen in 2015 or 2016, but probably not before.”
He lists a dozen Republicans in the House and eight in the Senate who would be open to legislation to help avert climate change. He notes that Exelon, the gas and electricity giant, is sympathetic to his efforts — perhaps not least because a carbon tax would give an edge to gas over its dirtier rival, coal. Exxon, too, has also said a carbon tax would be the most effective way to reduce emissions. So why hasn’t the insurance industry come on board?
Robert Muir-Wood is the chief research officer of Risk Management Solutions, one of two main companies the insurance industry relies on to crunch data and model future risks. He argues that insurers haven’t changed their tune because — with the exception of 2004 and 2005, when a string of hurricanes from Ivan to Katrina caused damage worth more than $200 billion — they haven’t yet experienced hefty, sustained losses attributable to climate change.
“Insurers were ready to sign up to all sorts of actions against climate change,” Mr. Muir-Wood told me from his office in London. Then the weather calmed down.
Still, Mr. Muir-Wood notes that the insurance industry faces a different sort of risk: political action. “That is the biggest threat,” he said. When insurers canceled policies and raised premiums in Florida in 2006, politicians jumped on them. “Insurers in Florida,” he said, “became Public Enemy No. 1.”
And that’s the best hope for those concerned about climate change: that global warming isn’t just devastating for society, but also bad for business.
22/05/2013 14h24 – Atualizado em 22/05/2013 14h40
Para ele, a palavra ‘índio’ surgiu de maneira equivocada e reduz os povos.
Autor de 43 livros, Daniel Munduruku abriu o evento em Poços de Caldas.
Jéssica BalbinoDo G1 Sul de Minas
Daniel Munduruku é autor de 43 livros e falou durante abertura de Congresso (Foto: Jéssica Balbino/ G1)
Autor de 43 livros, o indígena Daniel Munduruku foi o palestrante convidado para a abertura do 10º Congresso do Meio Ambiente em Poços de Caldas (MG) nesta quarta-feira (22). O índio, que é doutor em educação e cursa pós-doutorado em literatura na Universidade Federal de São Carlos (Ufscar), falou sobre a ‘Mãe Terra e a Questão Indígena’ durante um bate-papo com os congressistas.
Em uma saudação na língua do povo ao qual pertence, abriu a fala e brincando, pediu licença a quem estava no ambiente. “Bom dia a todos os amigos aqui presentes, espero que este encontro seja tão bom para vocês como vai ser para mim”, saudou, em uma referência aos ancestrais. “Nossos avós diziam que quando vamos encontrar alguém, temos que ir com o coração aberto e alegre para que o encontro seja bom, desejando que as pessoas que estão no lugar se sintam da mesma forma”, pontuou, ao lembrar que estar conectado com o meio ambiente é estar conectado com a poesia do universo.
“A luta pelo meio ambiente é a luta de todo povo brasileiro” – Daniel Munduruku, escritor e doutor
“Vou falar de outras tantas coisas que não são meio ambiente, mas também são. Quero olhar nos olhos e conversar. Para começar, vou destacar que não sou índio e que não existem índios no Brasil. O que existem são povos. Eu sou Munduruku e pertencer a um povo é ter participação dentro de uma tradição ancestral brasileira. Quando eu digo que não existem índios, quero dizer que existe uma diversidade muito grande de ancestralidade. São pelo menos 250 povos indígenas e são faladas pelo menos 180 línguas no Brasil”, disse.
Para ele, a palavra ‘índio’ surgiu de maneira equivocada e reduz os povos. “Está ligada a uma série de conceitos e pré-conceitos. Normalmente ela está vinculada a coisas negativas, embora haja muito romantismo na história, a maioria do pensamento quer dizer que o índio é um ser fora de moda, atrasado no tempo e selvagem. Alguém que está atrapalhando o progresso e continuamos reproduzindo um estereótipo que foi sendo passado ao longo da nossa história”, criticou.”
Público vindo de várias partes do Brasil debateuO bate-papo foi permeado por lembranças do indígena, que contou histórias sobre a própria vida, a fase de transição entre infância e adolescência e a perda do avô, que segundo ele, na tradição Munduruku, é quem transmite os ensinamentos dentro de uma família ou tribo. Com isso, ele chegou à dúvida dos presentes que era: como começou a escrever e se tornou acadêmico. “Quando meu avô morreu, me fez entender o que era ser Munduruku e eu sempre quis lembrar dele assim. Queria ser como ele, um contador de histórias. Demorei para saber como seria meu caminho, se seria na tribo ou na cidade, mas optei pela cidade e pela vida acadêmica e hoje estou aqui, transmitindo estas histórias que são tão cheias de sabedoria de vida e de meio ambiente”, pontuou.
Em relação ao meio ambiente e aos questionamentos feitos pelo público, o indígena destacou a questão da evolução humana e no Brasil a construção de barragens. “O povo Munduruku está sofrendo com a construção das barragens, seja em Belomonte, seja em Rondônia, enfim, eles estão lutando para viver. A natureza e o ambiente que os índios vivem fazem parte da humanidade deles. Eles lutam para se manterem e lutam por um Brasil inteiro que não tem a consciência de perceber isso. A luta pelo meio ambiente é a luta de todo povo brasileiro”, finalizou.
21-May-2013
Rapid climate change during the Middle Stone Age, between 80,000 and 40,000 years ago, during the Middle Stone Age, sparked surges in cultural innovation in early modern human populations, according to new research.
The research, published this month in Nature Communications, was conducted by a team of scientists from Cardiff University’s School of Earth and Ocean Sciences, the Natural History Museum in London and the University of Barcelona.
The scientists studied a marine sediment core off the coast of South Africa and reconstructed terrestrial climate variability over the last 100,000 years.
Dr Martin Ziegler, Cardiff University School of Earth and Ocean Sciences, said: “We found that South Africa experienced rapid climate transitions toward wetter conditions at times when the Northern Hemisphere experienced extremely cold conditions.”
These large Northern Hemisphere cooling events have previously been linked to a change in the Atlantic Ocean circulation that led to a reduced transport of warm water to the high latitudes in the North. In response to this Northern Hemisphere cooling, large parts of the sub-Saharan Africa experienced very dry conditions.
“Our new data however, contrasts with sub-Saharan Africa and demonstrates that the South African climate responded in the opposite direction, with increasing rainfall, that can be associated with a globally occurring southward shift of the tropical monsoon belt.”
Linking climate change with human evolution
Professor Ian Hall, Cardiff University School of Earth and Ocean Sciences, said: “When the timing of these rapidly occurring wet pulses was compared with the archaeological datasets, we found remarkable coincidences.
“The occurrence of several major Middle Stone Age industries fell tightly together with the onset of periods with increased rainfall.”
“Similarly, the disappearance of the industries appears to coincide with the transition to drier climatic conditions.”
Professor Chris Stringer of London’s Natural History Museum commented “The correspondence between climatic ameliorations and cultural innovations supports the view that population growth fuelled cultural changes, through increased human interactions.”
The South African archaeological record is so important because it shows some of the oldest evidence for modern behavior in early humans. This includes the use of symbols, which has been linked to the development of complex language, and personal adornments made of seashells.
“The quality of the southern African data allowed us to make these correlations between climate and behavioural change, but it will require comparable data from other areas before we can say whether this region was uniquely important in the development of modern human culture” added Professor Stringer.
The new study presents the most convincing evidence so far that abrupt climate change was instrumental in this development.
The research was supported by the UK Natural Environment Research Council and is part of the international Gateways training network, funded by the 7th Framework Programme of the European Union.
19 May 2013 Last updated at 17:31 GMT
By Matt McGrath – Environment correspondent, BBC News
The impacts of rising temperature are being felt particularly keenly in the polar regions
Scientists say the recent downturn in the rate of global warming will lead to lower temperature rises in the short-term.
Since 1998, there has been an unexplained “standstill” in the heating of the Earth’s atmosphere.
Writing in Nature Geoscience, the researchers say this will reduce predicted warming in the coming decades.
But long-term, the expected temperature rises will not alter significantly.
“The most extreme projections are looking less likely than before” – Dr Alexander Otto, University of Oxford
The slowdown in the expected rate of global warming has been studied for several years now. Earlier this year, the UK Met Office lowered their five-year temperature forecast.
But this new paper gives the clearest picture yet of how any slowdown is likely to affect temperatures in both the short-term and long-term.
An international team of researchers looked at how the last decade would impact long-term, equilibrium climate sensitivity and the shorter term climate response.
Transient nature
Climate sensitivity looks to see what would happen if we doubled concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere and let the Earth’s oceans and ice sheets respond to it over several thousand years.
Transient climate response is much shorter term calculation again based on a doubling of CO2.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reported in 2007 that the short-term temperature rise would most likely be 1-3C (1.8-5.4F).
But in this new analysis, by only including the temperatures from the last decade, the projected range would be 0.9-2.0C.
The report suggests that warming in the near term will be less than forecast
“The hottest of the models in the medium-term, they are actually looking less likely or inconsistent with the data from the last decade alone,” said Dr Alexander Otto from the University of Oxford.
“The most extreme projections are looking less likely than before.”
The authors calculate that over the coming decades global average temperatures will warm about 20% more slowly than expected.
But when it comes to the longer term picture, the authors say their work is consistent with previous estimates. The IPCC said that climate sensitivity was in the range of 2.0-4.5C.
Ocean storage
This latest research, including the decade of stalled temperature rises, produces a range of 0.9-5.0C.
“It is a bigger range of uncertainty,” said Dr Otto.
“But it still includes the old range. We would all like climate sensitivity to be lower but it isn’t.”
The researchers say the difference between the lower short-term estimate and the more consistent long-term picture can be explained by the fact that the heat from the last decade has been absorbed into and is being stored by the world’s oceans.
Not everyone agrees with this perspective.
Prof Steven Sherwood, from the University of New South Wales, says the conclusion about the oceans needs to be taken with a grain of salt for now.
“There is other research out there pointing out that this storage may be part of a natural cycle that will eventually reverse, either due to El Nino or the so-called Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, and therefore may not imply what the authors are suggesting,” he said.
The authors say there are ongoing uncertainties surrounding the role of aerosols in the atmosphere and around the issue of clouds.
“We would expect a single decade to jump around a bit but the overall trend is independent of it, and people should be exactly as concerned as before about what climate change is doing,” said Dr Otto.
Is there any succour in these findings for climate sceptics who say the slowdown over the past 14 years means the global warming is not real?
“None. No comfort whatsoever,” he said.
Dan Fay, diretor da Microsoft Research Connections, afirma que a tecnologia pode ajudar os pesquisadores a expor artigos e atrair mais leitores, sejam eles seus pares, formuladores de políticas ou agências de fomento (foto:Edu Cesar/FAPESP)
Entrevistas
21/05/2013
Por Frances Jones
Agência FAPESP – Com mais de 20 anos de Microsoft, o engenheiro Dan Fay faz parte de um seleto grupo de profissionais que vasculha o mundo científico em busca de parcerias entre a gigante de informática e autores de projetos relacionados às ciências da Terra, energia e meio ambiente.
São projetos como o software World Wide Telescope, desenvolvido em parceria com pesquisadores da Universidade Johns Hopkins, que permite que cientistas de diversas regiões do mundo acessem imagens de objetos celestes coletadas por telescópios espaciais, observatórios e instituições de pesquisa, manipulem e compartilhem esses dados.
“Nosso desafio é encontrar pesquisadores a cuja pesquisa podemos agregar valor e não apenas fornecer mais máquinas”, disse Fay, que, além de ser diretor da divisão de Terra, Energia e Ambiente da Microsoft Research Connections, o braço de pesquisas da Microsoft, integra o conselho consultivo industrial para Computação e Tecnologia da Informação da Purdue University, no estado norte-americano de Indiana.
Fay esteve em São Paulo para participar do Latin American eScience Workshop 2013, promovido pela FAPESP e pela Microsoft Research de 13 a 15 de maio, quando proferiu duas palestras a pesquisadores e estudantes de diversos países sobre avanços em diversas áreas do conhecimento proporcionados pela melhoria na capacidade de análise de grandes volumes de informações. Em uma delas, falou sobre como a ciência pode utilizar a computação em nuvem; na outra, sobre “como divulgar sua pesquisa internacionalmente”. Em seguida, conversou com a Agência FAPESP. Leia abaixo, trechos da entrevista.
Agência FAPESP – O que o senhor espera para o futuro com relação à eScience, a utilização no fazer ciência de tecnologias e ferramentas de computação?
Fay – O interessante sobre a eScience é combinar dados computacionais e novas técnicas nas mais diversas áreas. O que vemos agora é um uso maior da computação, mas o passo seguinte será o cruzamento dos diferentes domínios e o uso combinado dessas informações, como, por exemplo, da biologia e do meio ambiente juntos, fazendo uma análise transversal. Os dois domínios falam línguas diferentes. A passagem entre as áreas será um dos próximos desafios. Não se pode assumir que um dado significa algo. É preciso ter certeza.
Agência FAPESP – Como os pesquisadores podem utilizar a computação em nuvem para seus estudos?
Fay – A computação em nuvem fornece um novo paradigma para enfrentar os desafios da computação e da análise de dados nas mais diversas áreas do conhecimento científico. Diferentemente dos supercomputadores tradicionais, isolados e centralizados, a nuvem está em todos os lugares e pode oferecer suporte a diferente estilos de computação que são adequados para a análise de dados e para colaboração. Nos últimos três anos temos trabalhado com pesquisadores acadêmicos para explorar o potencial desta nova plataforma. Temos mais de 90 projetos de pesquisa que usam o Windows Azure [plataforma em nuvem da Microsoft] e temos aprendido muito. Como em qualquer tecnologia nova, há sempre pessoas que começam antes e outras depois. Há vários pesquisadores que começaram a usá-la para compreender como isso pode mudar a forma com que fazem pesquisa.
Agência FAPESP – O senhor acha que no futuro haverá uma mudança na forma de se divulgar ciência?
Dan Fay – Comentei com os alunos no workshop que sempre haverá os artigos tradicionais, de revistas científicas, que são revisados pelos pares. Com a quantidade de informações que temos hoje, no entanto, para tornar isso mais visível para outras pessoas e para o público em geral, os dados também podem ser apresentados de outra forma. Um artigo que se aprofunda nos detalhes também pode ser acessível a pessoas de diferentes domínios. Produzir fotos e vídeos, entre outros recursos, também pode ajudar.
Agência FAPESP – Esse é um papel dos cientistas?
Fay – Você pode usar os mesmos dados científicos acurados e contar histórias sobre eles. E permitir que as pessoas escutem diretamente de você essa história de forma visual. Essa interação é muito poderosa. É a mesma coisa que ir ao museu e ver várias obras de arte: as pessoas se conectam a elas. Os cientistas querem que seus colegas e as pessoas em geral se conectem dessa forma com suas informações, dados ou artigos. Acho bom encontrar outros mecanismos que possam explicar os dados. Estamos em uma época fascinante na qual há uma preocupação em divulgar a informação de um jeito interessante. Isso é verdade não apenas quando se quer falar para os seus pares, mas especialmente se você quer que os formuladores de políticas, o governo ou as agências de fomento entendam o que é o seu trabalho. Às vezes ele tem de ser apresentado de forma que possa ser consumido com mais facilidade.
Agência FAPESP – A tecnologia ajuda nesse ponto?
Fay – Sim. Parte disso porque essas formas fazem com que as pessoas leiam com mais profundidade os artigos. Há uma pesquisadora em Harvard, uma astrônoma, que criou um desses tours virtuais que temos sobre as galáxias. Ela calcula que mais pessoas assistiram a seus tours do que leram seus artigos científicos. Esse tipo de entendimento está aumentando. Se posso ajudar alguém a ler um artigo ao ver isso em outro lugar, isso é um avanço.
Agência FAPESP – O senhor acha que os cientistas devem entrar em redes sociais digitais, como o Facebook, para expor seus trabalhos?
Fay – Sim. Eles devem sempre se apoiar no rigor científico, mas ajuda empregar técnicas de design ou de marketing. Mesmo em seus pôsteres. É uma forma de divulgar melhor as informações.
Agência FAPESP – E as novas tecnologias promoverão a abertura dos dados científicos?
Fay – Para além da abertura de dados, há um problema social, no qual as pessoas se sentem donas de suas ideias ou informações. Encontrar formas de compartilhar os dados e dar o devido reconhecimento às pessoas que os coletaram, processaram e os tornaram disponíveis é importante. É aí, acredito, que estão vários desafios. Também há a questão dos dados médicos ou de outros dados que você não quer que fiquem soltos por aí.
Trabalho é o primeiro a obter êxito em humanos com a técnica que deu origem à ovelha Dolly
Autores dizem que não se trata de fazer clones humanos, mas sim avançar apenas até a fase de blastocisto para obter as células-tronco
Em 2004, sul-coreano anunciou o mesmo feito mas foi desmentido um ano depois
ROBERTA JANSEN
Publicado:15/05/13 – 16h03; atualizado:15/05/13 – 20h56
Clone de embrião obtido no estudo Divulgação
OREGON. Dezesseis anos depois da clonagem do primeiro mamífero, a ovelha Dolly, cientistas conseguiram, pela primeira vez, clonar um embrião humano em seus primeiros estágios de desenvolvimento. Os protoembriões foram usados para produzir células-tronco embrionárias — capazes de se transformar em qualquer tecido do corpo —, num avanço bastante significativo e há muito tempo esperado para o tratamento de lesões e doenças graves como Parkinson, esclerose múltipla e problemas cardíacos. Especialistas envolvidos no processo garantem que o objetivo não é clonar seres humanos, mas, sim criar novas terapias personalizadas.
Tanto é assim que os embriões humanos clonados usados na pesquisa foram destruídos em estágios ainda muito iniciais de desenvolvimento, logo depois da extração das células-tronco, e não levados ao crescimento, como no caso da ovelha Dolly e de tantos outros animais clonados depois dela. A técnica usada, no entanto, foi bastante similar à que criou a ovelha. Células da pele de um indivíduo foram colocadas em um óvulo previamente esvaziado de seu material genético e estimuladas a se desenvolver. Quando atingiram a fase de blastocisto, as células-tronco embrionárias foram extraídas e os embriões destruídos. O estudo foi publicado na revista “Cell”.
Conseguir gerar grande quantidade de células-tronco do próprio paciente era uma espécie de Santo Graal da atual ciência médica, como comparou o jornalista Steve Connor, no “Independent”. Embora o procedimento tenha sido feito com animais, até agora nunca tinha sido obtido com material humano, a despeito de inúmeras tentativas. Aparentemente, a dificuldade viria da maior fragilidade do óvulo humano.
Em 2004, um grupo coordenado por Woo Suk Hwang, da Universidade Nacional de Seoul, anunciou ter produzido o primeiro embirão humano clonado e, em seguida, obtido células-tronco embionárias a partir dele. Menos de um ano depois, no entanto, o grupo, que já havia clonado um cachorro, foi acusado de fraude e desmentiu os resultados obtidos. Outros grupos tentaram, mas os embriões não passaram do estágio de 6 a 12 células.
A corrida pela obtenção das células-tronco embrionárias faz todo o sentido. Cultivadas em laboratório, essas células podem dar origem a qualquer tecido do corpo humano. Por isso, em tese ao menos, poderiam curar lesões na medula, recompor órgãos, tratar problemas graves de visão, oferecendo tratamentos inéditos para muitas doenças hoje incuráveis. Como os tecidos seriam feitos a partir do material genético do próprio paciente (que, no caso, cedeu as células de sua pele), não haveria risco algum de rejeição. A medicina personalizada alcançaria o seu ápice.
— Nossa descoberta oferece novas maneiras de gerar células-tronco embrionárias para pacientes com problemas em tecidos e órgãos — afirmou o coordenador do estudo, Shoukhrat Mitalipov, da Universidade de Ciência e Saúde do Oregon, nos EUA, em comunicado oficial sobre o estudo. — Essas células-tronco podem regenerar órgãos ou substituir tecidos danificados, levando à cura de doenças que hoje afetam milhões de pessoas.
O grupo também conseguiu observar a capacidade de diferenciação das células obtidas em tecidos específicos
— Um atento exame das células-tronco obtidas por meio desta técnica demonstrou sua capacidade de se converter, como qualquer célula-tronco embrionária normal, em diferentes tipos de células, entre elas, células nervosas, células do fígado e céluas cardíacas — disse Mitalipov, em entrevista ao “Independent”.
No entanto, o estudo já levanta sérias preocupações éticas, sobretudo em relação à criação de clones humanos. Há o temor de que a técnica seja incorporada às oferecidas por clínicas de fertilização in vitro, como alternativa para casais estéreis, por exemplo. Outros grupos argumentam que é simplesmente antiético manipular embriões humanos.
— A pesquisa tem como único objetivo gerar células-tronco embrionárias para tratar doenças graves; e não aumentar as chances de produzir bebês clonados — garantiu Mitalipov. — Este não é o nosso foco e não acreditamos que nossas descobertas sejam usadas por outros grupos como um avanço na clonagem humana reprodutiva.
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Amigos há 32 mil anos, a milenar relação entre as duas espécies tem estudo apresentado por zoólogos chineses
ROBERTA JANSEN
Publicado:17/05/13 – 6h00; Atualizado:17/05/13 – 6h00
Amizade milenar . Um homem e seu cachorro: novo estudo revela que relação já dura 32 mil anos e funciona tão bem porque evoluiu de forma compartilhada John Hart / AP
RIO- Cachorros podem, de fato, ser os melhores amigos do homem porque compartilham uma história evolutiva em comum muito mais longa do que se imaginava. Estudo publicado esta semana na “Nature Communications” revelou que os cães teriam sido domesticados há 32 mil anos — quase o dobro do que se acreditava. Esta duradoura e intensa relação teria, inclusive, um impacto na genética dos animais e dos homens, que foi ficando parecida em alguns aspectos. Na verdade, conclui o estudo, os cães se auto-domesticaram para serem mais aceitos pelos humanos que, por sua vez, também se adaptaram aos animais.
Um grupo de pesquisadores do Instituto de Zoologia da China, coordenados por Ya-Ping Zhang, obteve o genoma completo de quatro lobos cinzentos de diferentes pontos da Ásia e da Europa, três cachorros nativos do sudoeste da China, e três representantes de raças atuais. Geneticistas confirmaram que os cães nativos da China representam o primeiro estágio da domesticação canina — o genoma deles traz informação sobre a transição de lobos para os cachorros ancestrais, tornando-os uma espécie de “elo perdido” da domesticação.
Os lobos se auto-domesticaram
A equipe descobriu também que os lobos apresentam a maior diversidade genética, enquanto que os cachorros modernos ficam com a menor. Analisando a quantidade de mutações, os especialistas conseguiram estabelecer que a separação entre lobos e cães nativos chineses ocorreu na Ásia, há 32 mil anos.
Diferentemente do que se imaginava, dizem os cientistas, os homens não adotaram filhotes de lobos. Teria sido bem o oposto disso.
O processo provavelmente começou com os lobos que rondavam em torno de populações humanas de caçadores-coletores em busca de restos de alimento e carcaças, num processo que os pesquisadores chamam de auto-domesticação.
— A hipótese mais interessante levantada por essa pesquisa é a auto-domesticação — afirmou Zhang em entrevista. — De acordo com essa hipótese, os primeiros lobos teriam sido atraídos para viver e caçar com os humanos. E com sucessivas mudanças adaptativas, esses animais se tornaram progressivamente mais propensos a viver com os homens.
Nesta situação, os lobos mais agressivos teriam se saído muito mal, porque a tendência seria que fossem mortos pelos homens. Os animais mais mansos, no entanto, teriam se adaptado melhor e se multiplicado. Ou seja, os lobos se auto-domesticaram.
A pesquisa conseguiu estabelecer que a domesticação impôs uma determinante força seletiva nos genes envolvidos na digestão e no metabolismo — provavelmente por conta da mudança de uma dieta estritamente carnívora para uma onívora.
Os genes que governam processos neurológicos complexos também sofreram tal pressão, sobretudo devido à necessidade de redução da agressão e do aumento de complexos processos de interação com os seres humanos.
Curiosamente, o grupo descobriu que a contraparte humana de diversos desses genes, particularmente aqueles envolvidos nos processos neurológicos, também sofreram uma forte pressão seletiva ao longo do tempo, refletindo os fatores ambientais similares vivenciados por homens e cachorros ao longo de milhares de anos de uma relação tão próxima.
Mais dóceis e mansos
Alguns dos genes estão associados a doenças similares no homem e no cão. Outros são ativos na região do córtex pré-frontal, onde os mamíferos tomam decisões sobre o comportamento. Alguns genes estão envolvidos no maior número de conexões entre os neurônios. Um gene em particular, o SLC6A4, é responsável pela codificação da proteína que transporta o neurotransmissor serotonina.
— Outros estudos já haviam revelado que o gene é relacionado ao comportamento agressivo e ao transtorno obsessivo-compulsivo não apenas em homens mas também em cachorros — afirmou Zhang.
Mudança semelhante foi também constatada nos homens — indicando que nós também tivemos que nos tornar menos agressivos para tolerar os outros e viver bem em grupos.
Para o cientista, o estudo da base genética de diversas doenças em cães pode ajudar na compreensão de doenças similares em humanos.
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Michael Reynolds/European Photopress Agency – World Bank President Jim Yong Kim attends the Fragility Forum this month in Washington. The forum discussed ways for fragile nations to improve their economies, their infrastructure and the well-being of their citizens.
By Howard Schneider, Published: May 8, 2013
Major hydropower projects in Congo, Zambia, Nepal and elsewhere — all of a scale dubbed “transformational” to the regions involved — are a focus of the bank’s fundraising drive among wealthy nations. Bank lending for hydropower has scaled up steadily in recent years, and officials expect the trend to continue amid a worldwide boom in water-fueled electricity.
“Large hydro is a very big part of the solution for Africa and South Asia and Southeast Asia. . . . I fundamentally believe we have to be involved,” said Rachel Kyte, the bank’s vice president for sustainable development and an influential voice among Kim’s top staff members. The earlier move out of hydro “was the wrong message. . . . That was then. This is now. We are back.”
It is a controversial stand. The bank backed out of large-scale hydropower because of the steep trade-offs involved. Big dams produce lots of cheap, clean electricity, but they often uproot villages in dam-flooded areas and destroy the livelihoods of the people the institution is supposed to help. A 2009 World Bank review of hydropower noted the “overwhelming environmental and social risks” that had to be addressed but also concluded that Africa and Asia’s vast and largely undeveloped hydropower potential was key to providing dependable electricity to the hundreds of millions of people who remain without it.
“What’s the one issue that’s holding back development in the poorest countries? It’s energy. There’s just no question,” Kim said in an interview.
Advocacy groups remain skeptical, arguing that large projects, such as Congo’s long-debated network of dams around Inga Falls, may be of more benefit to mining companies or industries in neighboring countries than poor communities.
“It is the old idea of a silver bullet that can modernize whole economies,” said Peter Bosshard, policy director of International Rivers, a group that has organized opposition to the bank’s evolving hydro policy and argued for smaller projects designed around communities rather than mega-dams meant to export power throughout a region.
“Turning back to hydro is being anything but a progressive climate bank,” said Justin Guay, a Sierra Club spokesman on climate and energy issues. “There needs to be a clear shift from large, centralized projects.”
The major nations that support the World Bank, however, have been pushing it to identify such projects — complex undertakings that might happen only if an international organization is involved in sorting out the financing, overseeing the performance and navigating the politics.
In his speeches, Kim talks passionately about the bank’s ability to “catalyze” and “leverage” the world to action by mobilizing money and ideas, and he says he is hunting for ideas “equal to the challenge” of curbing carbon use. He has criticized the “small bore” thinking that he says has hobbled progress on the issue.
Among the projects likely to cross Kim’s desk in coming months, for example, is a 600-megawatt power plant in Kosovo that would be fired by lignite coal, the bottom of the barrel when it comes to carbon emissions.
The plant has strong backing from the United States, the World Bank’s major shareholder. It also meshes with one of the bank’s other long-standing imperatives: Give countries what they ask for. The institution has 188 members to keep happy and can go only so far in trying to impose its judgment over that of local officials. Kim, who in his younger days demonstrated against World Bank-enforced “orthodoxy” in economic policy, now may be hard-pressed to enforce an energy orthodoxy of his own.
Kosovo’s domestic supplies of lignite are ample enough to free the country from imported fuel. Kim said there is little question that Kosovo needs more electricity, and the new plant will allow an older, more polluting facility to be shut down.
“I would just love to never sign a coal project,” Kim said. “We understand it is much, much dirtier, but . . . we have 188 members. . . . We have to be fair in balancing the needs of poor countries . . . with this other bigger goal of tackling climate change.”
The bank is working on other ideas. Kim said he is considering how it might get involved in creating a more effective world market for carbon, allowing countries that invest in renewable energy or “climate friendly” agriculture to be paid for their carbon savings by industries that need to use fossil fuels. Existing carbon markets have been plagued with volatile pricing — Europe’s cost of carbon has basically collapsed — or rules that prevent carbon trading with developing countries.
“We’ve got to figure out a way to establish a stable price of carbon,” Kim said. “Everybody knows that.”
He has also staked hope for climate progress on developments in agriculture.
Hydropower projects, however, seem notably inside what Kim says is the bank’s sweet spot — complex, high-impact, green and requiring the sort of joint public and private financing Kim says the bank can attract.
The massive hydropower potential of the Congo River, estimated at about 40,000 megawatts, is such a target. Its development is on a list of top world infrastructure priorities prepared by the World Bank and other development agencies for the Group of 20 major economic powers.
Two smaller dams on the river have been plagued by poor performance and are being rehabilitated with World Bank assistance. A third being planned would represent a quantum jump — a 4,800-megawatt, $12 billion giant that would move an entire region off carbon-based electricity.
The African Development Bank has begun negotiations over the financing, and the World Bank is ready to step in with tens of millions of dollars in technical-planning help.
“In an ideal world, we start building in 2016. By 2020, we switch on the lights,” said Hela Cheikhrouhou, energy and environment director for the African Development Bank.
It is the sort of project that the World Bank had stayed away from for many years — not least because of instability in the country. But as the country tries to move beyond its civil war and the region intensifies its quest for the power to fuel economic growth, the bank seems ready to move. Kim will visit Congo this month for a discussion about development in fragile and war-torn states.
Kyte, the World Bank vice president, said the Inga project will be high on the agenda.
“People have been looking at the Inga dam for as long as I have been in the development business,” she said. “The question is: Did the stars align? Did you have a government in place? Did people want to do it? Are there investors interested? Do you have the ability to do the technical work? The stars are aligned now. Let’s go.”
By PASCALE BONNEFOY
Published: May 16, 2013
SANTIAGO, Chile — A judge dismissed an appeal to suspend involuntary manslaughter charges against four government officials accused of failing to issue a tsunami alert after the 8.8-magnitude earthquake that struck Chile in 2010.
“This court believes that not enough was done to avoid the catastrophic results” of the quake, Judge Ponciano Sallés said in his ruling. “Any reasonable analysis would conclude that the risk was greater by not evacuating the population than by doing so,” he said, adding that “information was concealed.”
The investigation into the deaths of 156 people and the disappearance of 25 more during the tsunami seeks to establish responsibility for the confusing and contradictory chain of decisions made by government officials and emergency agencies shortly after the earthquake. The actions resulted in mistaken public assurances that there was no risk of tsunami, despite reports that one had already devastated the Juan Fernández Archipelago in the Pacific, west of the Chilean coast.
The former director of the National Emergency Agency, Carmen Fernández, is accused of providing false information and not issuing a tsunami alert. The former under secretary of the interior, Patricio Rosende, has been charged with “imprudent conduct” in neglecting to warn the population. Both argued that it was up to the navy’s oceanographic service to issue the alert.
According to survivors, many families returned to their homes on the coast after hearing the president at the time, Michelle Bachelet, say on the radio that there was no danger of a tsunami. Raúl Meza, a lawyer for one victim’s family, has formally requested that prosecutors interrogate the former president as a suspect. Ms. Bachelet, who is campaigning for the presidential elections in November, has testified twice, but as a witness.
Three other officials have also been charged but did not appeal. The accusations, filed last year against the seven, include operating with inexperienced personnel, lacking knowledge on the use of technology, leaving shifts vacant at regional emergency agencies and ignoring field reports.
“If the accused had been fulfilling their duties, lives would have been saved,” said the lead prosecutor, Solange Huerta, after the ruling.
A version of this article appeared in print on May 17, 2013, on page A10 of the New York edition with the headline: Chilean Judge Rejects Appeal Of Charges In ’10 Tsunami.
DE SÃO PAULO
A Câmara Municipal de São Paulo aprovou, em primeira votação nesta quinta-feira (16), o projeto de lei que permite que animais domésticos sejam enterrados no mesmo jazigo de seus donos em cemitérios municipais.
Ontem, a proposta já havia sido aprovada pela Comissão de Constituição e Justiça da casa. Agora, o projeto ainda precisa passar por outra votação na Câmara antes de ser sancionado pelo prefeito Fernando Haddad (PT).
Segundo o projeto, dos vereadores Roberto Tripoli (PV) e Antonio Goulart (PSD), o enterro destina-se a bichos de estimação de famílias que já têm jazigo nos cemitérios municipais.
De acordo com Goulart, o objetivo do projeto é solucionar a atual falta de local para destinação de animais mortos na cidade.
Segundo o vereador, muitas pessoas querem enterrar o bicho de estimação no jazigo familiar. “O animal faz parte da família.”
O projeto foi apresentado no plenário da Câmara na semana passada. “O projeto vai passar sem problemas. É um assunto atual”, previu Goulart.
O Serviço Funerário da cidade diz ser preciso um estudo técnico para avaliar a viabilidade da proposta.
Uma (in)certa antropologia 
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