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POPSA friend or a crow ?-) "After their experiments on campus, Marzluff and his students tested the effect with more realistic masks. Using a half-dozen students as models, they enlisted a professional mask maker, then wore the new masks while trapping crows at several sites in and around Seattle. The researchers then gave a mix of neutral and dangerous masks to volunteer observers who, unaware of the masks' histories, wore them at the trapping sites and recorded the crows' responses. The reaction to one of the dangerous masks was "quite spectacular," said one volunteer, Bill Pochmerski, a retired telephone company manager who lives near Snohomish. "The birds were really raucous, screaming persistently," he said, "and it was clear they weren't upset about something in general. They were upset with me."
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POPSFuture for clean energy lies in 'big bang' of evolution For humans now there is the tantalising possibility of tweaking the photosynthetic reactions of cyanobacteria to produce fuels we want such as hydrogen, alcohols or even hydrocarbons, rather than carbohydrates. Progress at the research level has been rapid, boosting prospects of harnessing photosynthesis not just for energy but also for manufacturing valuable compounds for the chemical and biotechnology industries. Such research is running on two tracks, one aimed at genetically engineering real plants and cyanobacteria to yield the products we want, and the other to mimic their processes in artificial photosynthetic systems built with human-made components. Both approaches hold great promise and will be pursued in parallel, as was discussed at a recent workshop focusing on the photosynthetic reaction centres of cyanobacteria, organised by the European Science Foundation (ESF).
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POPSOn Law and Neuroscience An interesting read describing the influence of evolution theory and neuroscience on basic legal and moral concepts such as responsibility and free will.
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POPSExploding chromosomes fuel research about evolution of genetic storage
Dinoflagellates are stuffed at the core with tightly compacted chromosomes, yet these organisms contain neither histones nor nucleosomes. "What takes care of neutralizing DNA, to allow chromosomes to condense?" Levi-Setti asked. "Most biology books do not tell you." Other scientists had already identified positively charged atoms called cations as neutralizing factors. They found that dinoflagellate chromosomes explode upon the removal of calcium and magnesium cations. Levi-Setti has produced the first images of the distribution of these cations in dinoflagellate chromosomes. These images verify that cations, mainly of calcium and magnesium, neutralize DNA's enormous negative charge, and further suggest a critical role in folding the protein as well. The finding raises questions about the evolution of chromosomes, Rizzo said. "Did dinoflagellates once have histones and then lost them? Or did dinoflagellates never have histones and just 'figured out' a different way to fold lar
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POPSTransformers - The Nature of Alien Life The driving factor is a pragmatic desire to improve mental capacity. Alien beings may have already reached a point in their evolution where, having exhausted the potential of their biological brains, they have taken the next logical step and opted for robotic brains equipped with artificial intelligence. This brain swap may not be as far off for humans as one might think. In only a few decades, the computer revolution here on Earth has produced supercomputers capable of performing more than a quadrillion calculations per second. According to research by Hans Moravec, an artificial-intelligence expert at Carnegie Mellon University, that rate trumps the human brain’s estimated top speed of 100 trillion calculations per second. Some scientists speculate that in a few decades, an event called the technological singularity will occur, and machines armed with computer brains will become sentient and surpass human intelligence. Civilizations equipped with technology light-years ahead
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POPSThe Moral Instinct "the science of the moral sense can advance it, by allowing us to see through the illusions that evolution and culture have saddled us with and to focus on goals we can share and defend. As Anton Chekhov wrote, “Man will become better when you show him what he is like.”
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POPSdo animals feel greif? according to my dog, they do! you should see the way she reacts if I leave her for more then my working day!
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POPSOn looks and attraction... This new research identifies an explanation for the correlation between bodily shape and attractiveness: your body proportions, shape and stature are signals that conspicuously advertise your good development or health and therefore the degree to which you are a desirable reproductive partner. In many species fewer departures from perfect symmetry are associated with good development, health and reproductive success.” We begin to see that there is a program embedded deep in our perception. this is the time to reveal it. :)
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POPSBody Language of Winners and Losers Could be Innate "In the end, it’s all about evolution. The discovery by psychologists suggests that these gestures of pride and shame are hard wired into the human brain, probably because they were universal signs of dominance and submission among our ape relatives and ancestors . So when you see arms raised in victory at the Beijing Olympics, you might really be seeing an symbol of dominance that humans developed long ago."
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POPSDo You Love This Face? Evolutionary biology holds that in any given population, extreme characteristics tend to fall away in favor of average ones. Birds with unusually long or short wings die more often "in storms. Human babies who are born larger or smaller than average are less likely to survive. The ability to form an average-mate template would have conveyed a singular survival advantage."
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POPSEscaping extinction It is a sad story, the cancer in this specie is infectious, probably due to parasitic disease. again some say it is related to humans since in population that leaves away the cancer is rarer. yet the biological stress has created a partial fast response that answers the demand partially.
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POPSScientists map Neanderthal maternal DNA 38,000 years wasn't that long ago. They became extinct shortly afterward (as far as we know) after dwindling around Western Europe. It's easy to wonder what may have happened if they were isolated in an area that was free of Homo sapiens sapiens (So smart that we have to repeat it to ourselves to remove any doubt.)
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POPSWhere size makes a difference :) "To further confirm their model the researchers calculated the daily bone marrow production of HSC in several mammals to find that the number of cells found by them were compatible with those obtained by directly working in animals, with the number of cells produced by a mouse during its lifetime (around 2 years) similar to the ones produced by humans in one day, and cats in a week. "
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POPSWere Ancient Viruses a Key to Human Evolution? Heidmann believes that without endogenous retroviruses mammals might never have developed a placenta, which protects the fetus and gives it time to mature, which eventually led to live birth, one of the hallmarks of human evolutionary success over birds, reptiles, and fish. Eggs cannot eliminate waste or draw the maternal nutrients required to develop the large brains that have made mammals so versatile. “These viruses made those changes possible. It is quite possible that, without them, human beings would still be laying eggs.”
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POPSWere Ancient Viruses a Key to Human Evolution? These viral fragments are fossils that reside within each of us, carrying a record that goes back millions of years. Because they no longer seem to serve a purpose or cause harm, these remnants have often been referred to as “junk DNA.” Although many of these evolutionary relics still manage to generate proteins, scientists have never found one that functions properly in humans or that could make us sick. That is until Thierry Heidmann who runs the laboratory at the Institut Gustave Roussy, on the southern edge of Paris, brought one to life. Heidmann long suspected that if a retrovirus happens to infect a human sperm cell or egg, which is rare, and if that embryo survives—which is rarer still—the retrovirus could have the evolutionary power to influence humans as a species becoming part of the genetic blueprint, passed from mother to child, and from one generation to the next, much like a gene for eye color or asthma.
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POPS"How Your Brain Can Control Time ??" "Even in a healthy brain, time is elastic. Staring at an angry face for five seconds feels longer than staring at a neutral one. It may be no coincidence that the pulse-generating neurons are directly wired into regions of the brain that handle emotionally charged sights and sounds. And recent experiments by Amelia Hunt at Harvard University hint that we may actually backdate our mental time line every time we move our eyes."
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POPSSmelling a good partner. From the site: "With genetically highly compatible people we feel that rare sensation of perfect chemistry. This is the body’s receptive and welcoming response when immune systems harmonise and fit together. The effects of genetic compatibility Genetic compatibility results in an increased likelihood of forming an enduring and successful relationship. Research has also shown that the sex lives of genetically compatible partners are more satisfying than average. Additionally, fertility rates are higher in genetically compatible couples and they have healthier children. " and it cost only 199$ :)
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POPSHow a simple mathematic formula is starting to explain the bizarre prevalence of altruism in society This new mathematic model for society’s evolution is particularly interesting because not only it reveals a logic behind the large numbers of cooperators that we know exist in all human societies, but also it gives us a glimpse of the principles that can help “pushing” them into a better, fairer, path. Evolutionary game theory is a mathematical approach used to study (and predict) the evolution of social interactions, in which the study of conflict and decision-making is treated – like its name indicates – as a game.
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POPSFuture Human: The Evolution of Immediate Emotion Humans, apparently, are still in the early stages of evolving extended response mechanisms. But it seems likely that by the time we portion more of our brain to long-term dangers, there will be few grizzly bears around to worry about, and a whole lotta global warming.
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