Sunday, January 23, 2011

Scientists Successfully Use Sedation to Help Disentangle North Atlantic Right Whale

Scientists Successfully Use Sedation to Help Disentangle North Atlantic Right Whale

ScienceDaily (Jan. 22, 2011) — Scientists from NOAA Fisheries Service and its state and nonprofit partners successfully used at-sea chemical sedation to help cut the remaining ropes from a young North Atlantic right whale on January 15 off the coast of Cape Canaveral, Fla. The sedative given to the whale allowed the disentanglement team to safely approach the animal and remove 50 feet of rope which was wrapped through its mouth and around its flippers.

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Earth & Climate

Geography

Environmental Policy

Ecosystems

Reference

Bowhead Whale

Baleen whale

Whale shark

Gray Whale

This is only the second time a free-swimming whale has been successfully sedated to enable disentanglement efforts. The first time a whale was successfully sedated and disentangled was in March 2009 off the coast of Florida.

"Our recent progress with chemical sedation is important because it's less stressful for the animal, and minimizes the amount of time spent working on these animals while maximizing the effectiveness of disentanglement operations," said Jamison Smith, Atlantic Large Whale Disentanglement Coordinator for NOAA's Fisheries Service. "This disentanglement was especially complex, but proved successful due to the detailed planning and collective expertise of the many response partners involved."

The young female whale, born during the 2008-2009 calving season and estimated to be approximately 30 feet long, was originally observed entangled on Christmas Day by an aerial survey team. On December 30, a disentanglement team of trained responders from Georgia Department of Natural Resources and Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission were able to remove 150 feet of rope from the whale, but additional rope remained. NOAA and its partners continued to track the animal via satellite tag to determine if the animal would shed the remaining gear on its own. Calm weather conditions were necessary before attempting further intervention on January 15.

During this response, scientists used for the first time a special digital monitoring tag which recorded the whale's behavior before, during, and after sedation. Sedating large whales at sea is in its infancy and data collected from the digital archival tag will be used to inform future sedation attempts that may be necessary. After disentangling the whale, scientists administered a dose of antibiotics to treat entanglement wounds and drug to reverse the sedation. The whale will be tracked up to 30-days via a temporary satellite tag.

The disentanglement and veterinarian team consisted of scientists from: NOAA Fisheries Service, Georgia Department of Natural Resources, Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, University of Florida, EcoHealth Alliance, and Coastwise Consulting. The Provincetown Center for Coastal Studies and the New England Aquarium also provided offsite support.

Fishing gear removed from this whale included ropes and wire mesh material, similar to what is found in the trap or pot fisheries for fish, crab and lobster along the mid-Atlantic, northeast U.S., and Canadian coasts. However, the specific fishery and its geographic origin are pending examination by experts at NOAA's Fisheries Service.

With only 300-400 in existence, North Atlantic right whales are among the most endangered whales in the world. They are protected under the U.S. Endangered Species Act of 1973 and the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972. Vessel strikes and entanglement in fixed fishing gear are the two greatest threats to their recovery.

NOAA Fisheries Service encourages people to report sightings of dead, injured, or entangled whales to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission at 1-888-404-FWCC (3922) or the Georgia Department of Natural Resources at 1-800-2-SAVE-ME (272-8366). All live right whale sightings should be reported to the USCG via Channel 16.

Thursday, January 20, 2011

VIMS team glides into polar research

Seaglider autonomous undersea glider at surfac...

Image via WikipediaEurekAlert! - Technology/Engineering/Computer Science

VIMS team glides into polar research

Underwater glider sets 2 Antarctic firsts



		IMAGE: Researchers prepare to deploy the SG503 "Ice Dragon " glider into the open waters of the Ross Sea. In the background is Mt. Erebus (an active volcano). Click here for more information.

Researcher Walker Smith of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, College of William and Mary, has been conducting shipboard studies of biological productivity in Antarctica's Ross Sea for the last three decades. This year he's letting underwater robots do some of the work.

Smith and graduate student Xiao Liu are using a two-year grant from the National Science Foundation

to deploy and test a free-swimming underwater glider in the frigid waters of the Ross Sea near the U.S. McMurdo Research Station. The grant also funds efforts by fellow VIMS professor Marjorie Friedrichs to use glider data to help improve computer models of the Ross Sea's physics and biology.

Smith deployed the team's glider—SG503, also know as the Ice Dragon—for its first mission on November 29, 2010. He and colleagues, including investigators from Old Dominion University

, launched the 114-pound vehicle through a whale breathing-hole, and then directed it into the open waters of the "polynya" that forms each austral summer when seasonal sea-ice melts from the Ross Sea.

The launch, at a latitude of 77°S, is the most southerly glider deployment ever. A short (and unintentional) jog off course also made it the first-ever glider to successfully dive beneath the Ross Ice Shelf.

The Ice Dragon glider in the waters of the Ross Sea.The glider has now—as of January 19, 2011—completed 783 dives to depths as great as 700 meters (2,330 feet), traveling a total of 1,402 kilometers (871 miles). It is scheduled to continue yo-yoing back and forth across the Ross Sea polynya until the researchers retrieve it in early February.

Each of the glider's dives lasts about 120 minutes, during which sensors on its fiberglass hull measure water temperature, salinity, levels of dissolved oxygen, and chlorophyll concentrations (the latter a measure of photosynthesis and phytoplankton abundance). At the end of each dive, the glider flips its tail into the air so that its antenna can send the collected data to researchers and receive guidance for its next dive. Data is transmitted via the Iridium satellite network.

The potential of gliders

Lacking a motor or propeller, gliders zigzag up and down through the water using a set of fins to translate changes in buoyancy into lateral motion. Their top speed is about one-half mile per hour. A small battery powers the buoyancy changes by forcing mineral oil in and out of an inflatable bladder. Moving the battery fore or aft within the hull shifts the center of gravity to control pitch, rotating it from side to side controls roll.

Smith says that gliders bring several potential benefits to ocean research. For one, because they're propelled by buoyancy changes rather than an energy-hungry motor, they can remain in the water for months at a time before needing a recharge (the current world record is a 4,500-mile transatlantic crossing that lasted 221 days, using the equivalent power of just 3 Christmas tree lights). Motor-driven underwater robots are limited to missions of a few days at most.

A glider's small size and simplicity (with only a few moving parts) also makes it relatively inexpensive to own and operate, especially compared to the costs of ship-based ocean research. Smith's glider—developed at the Applied Physics Laboratory at the University of Washington and now sold commercially by iRobot, Inc. (maker of the Roomba© vacuum cleaning robot)—cost $150,000. A single ship-day, including costs for fuel and crew, can run up to $60,000.

Dr. Mark Patterson, head of the Autonomous Systems Laboratory at VIMS and developer of the Fetch autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV), notes that gliders and other AUVs hold great promise for solving one of the oldest problems in oceanography: the fact that "the ocean changes faster than we have the ability to observe."

"Traditional ship-based studies can only provide snapshots of the constantly changing ocean ecosystem," says Patterson. He says "that's like trying to figure out what's going on in a TV series like 'Lost' by watching just one or two episodes per year." By sampling the ocean almost continually for months at a time, gliders allow researchers to better understand and model short-term physical changes and how they influence ocean biology.

Gliders in the Ross Sea

Previous studies by Smith and other polar researchers suggest that short-term physical variations—changes in sunlight, wind speed and direction, and current patterns—play a key role in controlling the magnitude, timing, and duration of phytoplankton blooms in the Ross Sea. These blooms sustain the Antarctic food web, from krill up to fish, seabirds, and marine mammals.

But a comprehensive understanding of how these short-term changes impact the polar ecosystem has so far remained elusive. That's where gliders come in.

"Our glider will help detail the physical and biological oceanography of the southern Ross Sea by sampling the region continuously through the growing season," says Smith. "Given its ability to repeatedly sample specific areas, it holds great promise for resolving short-term and seasonal trends."

Mission & Modeling

During the team's upcoming retrieval mission, which sets sail on January 19, Smith and Liu will first spend several weeks comparing their shipboard measurements of water temperature, salinity, dissolved oxygen, and chlorophyll to those recorded by the glider. That's to ensure that the glider's sensors are still accurately calibrated after more than two months in the water. The retrieval team will be aboard the research vessel Nathaniel B. Palmer.

Friedrichs will feed the glider's high-resolution data into computer models of physical and biological processes in the Ross Sea, with the long-term goal of making model predictions more accurate.

"Current models are difficult to evaluate using data that are appropriate on the same space and time scales," says Friedrichs. "Data collected by gliders over shorter time-scales are what we need to drive the next generation of circulation and ecosystem models. Improving the modeling and predictability of dynamic systems like the Ross Sea is our ultimate goal."

SCIENTISTS GENERATE MEGAWATT-CLASS LASER BEAMS FOR THE NAVY'S NEXT-GENERATION WEAPON SYSTEM

Seal of the Office of Naval Research departmen...

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US Office of Naval Research achieves milestone

Scientists generate megawatt-class laser beams for the Navy's next-generation weapon system



		VIDEO: This is the Free Electron Laser video. Click here for more information.

ARLINGTON, Va.-Scientists at Los Alamos National Lab

, N.M., have achieved a remarkable breakthrough with the Office of Naval Research's Free Electron Laser (FEL) program, demonstrating an injector capable of producing the electrons needed to generate megawatt-class laser beams for the Navy's next-generation weapon system.

The Dec. 20 milestone, which occurred months ahead of schedule, will be the highlight of a two-day preliminary design review scheduled Jan. 20-21 in Virginia.

"The injector performed as we predicted all along," said Dr. Dinh Nguyen, senior project leader for the FEL program at the lab. "But until now, we didn't have the evidence to support our models. We were so happy to see our design, fabrication and testing efforts finally come to fruition. We're currently working to measure the properties of the continuous electron beams, and hope to set a world record for the average current of electrons."

Quentin Saulter, FEL program manager for ONR, said the implications of the FEL's progress are monumental. "This is a major leap forward for the program and for FEL technology throughout the Navy," Saulter said. "The fact that the team is nine months ahead of schedule provides us plenty of time to reach our goals by the end of 2011."

The research is a necessary step for the Department of the Navy to one day deploy the megawatt-class FEL weapon system, revolutionizing ship defense, Saulter said. "The FEL is expected to provide future U.S. Naval forces with a near-instantaneous laser ship defense in any maritime environment throughout the world."

ONR's FEL project began as a basic science and technology program in the 1980s and matured into a working 14-kilowatt prototype. In fiscal 2010, it graduated from basic research to an Innovative Naval Prototype, earning the backing needed by senior Navy officials to ensure its evolution to advanced technology and potential acquisition.

The laser works by passing a beam of high-energy electrons generated by an injector, through a series of strong magnetic fields, causing an intense emission of laser light. ONR hopes to test the FEL in a maritime environment as early as 2018.

###

About the Office of Naval Research

The Office of Naval Research provides the science and technology necessary to maintain the Navy and Marine Corps' technological advantage. Through its affiliates, ONR is a leader in science and technology with engagement in 50 states, 70 countries, 1,035 institutions of higher learning and 914 industry partners. ONR employs approximately 1,400 people, comprising uniformed, civilian and contract personnel with additional employees at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, D.C.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Mad cow disease airborne

Image via WikipediaMad cow disease airborne

14 January 2011
Mad cow disease airborne
by Kate Melville

University of Zurich researchers have discovered that prions - the infectious proteins that can cause Creutzfeldt-Jakob (mad cow) disease - can be transmitted through the air. Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease is characterized by a progressive and invariably lethal breakdown of brain cells. The surprising finding will likely mean a whole new raft of precautionary measures for scientific labs, slaughterhouses and animal feed plants.
It was previously known that prions could be transmitted through contaminated surgical instruments and blood transfusions but prions were not generally considered to be airborne until now. Details of how inhalation of prion-tainted aerosols induced disease are published in the journal PLoS Pathogens.
In the new study, the researchers exposed mice to prion-containing aerosols which induced disease. Exposure to the aerosols for one minute was sufficient to induce disease in 100 percent of the mice. The researchers note that the longer the exposure, the shorter the incubation time in the recipient mice, after which they developed the clinical signs of a prion disease.
Interestingly, the prions appeared to transfer from the airways and colonize the brain directly, since various immune system defects - known from previous experiments to prevent the passage of prions from the gut to the brain - did not prevent infection.
The precautionary measures against prion infections have not typically included stringent protection against aerosols. Study leader Adriano Aguzzi recommends precautionary measures to minimize the risk of a prion infection in scientific laboratories, slaughterhouses and animal feed plants but he also emphasizes that the findings stem from laboratory conditions and that Creutzfeldt-Jakob patients do not exhale infectious prions.

Related:
Prions capable of evolutionary change
Scientists create species-jumping hybrid prions
Surgery linked to Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease
Mad cow disease... sans cow!

Journal home : Nature

'Goldilocks' planet lost in translation › News in Science (ABC Science)

Image via Wikipedia'Goldilocks' planet lost in translation › News in Science (ABC Science)

News in Science

'Goldilocks' planet lost in translation

Friday, 14 January 2011Darren Osborne
ABC

Artist's impression of the planetary system around the red dwarf Gliese 581. (ESO)

An Earth-like planet orbiting a star 20 light-years away may not exist after all, according to a new study.

In September last year, a team of astronomers led by Dr Steven Vogt of the University of California, Santa Cruzannounced the discovery of a fifth planet orbiting the star Gliese 581.

Known as Gliese 581g, it was found orbiting in a region of space known as the 'Goldilocks zone' - where temperatures on the surface may allow liquid water to exist.

They detected the planet in data collected by the Keck telescope's HIRES instrument and the HARPS instrument attached to the European Southern Observatory's La Silla telescope.

But two weeks after the announcement, a team of Swiss astronomers claimed they could not detect Gliese 581g in the HARPS data.

A new analysis of data, appearing on the pre-press website arXiv.org and submitted to the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, backs the Swiss finding.

Emeritus Professor Phil Gregory of the University of British Columba in Vancouver, Canada, says according his research it is most likely four planets orbit the star - ruling out Gliese 581g.

"If you combine the two data sets then the most probable hypothesis is four planets," he says.

"The extra two planets that Vogt et al claimed ... the grounds don't exist any longer for me to support that."

Gregory believes one of the reasons Vogt and colleagues 'detected' Gliese 581g was that they underestimated the level of uncertainty in their measurements.

He calculated the uncertainty to be 1.8 metres per second, several times greater than the 0.5 metres per second quoted by Vogt and colleagues.

"I can't make sense of their data unless I find there is an additional noise they haven't accounted for," says Gregory.

Another assumption made by the US researchers was that the orbits of all the planets are circular. But according to Gregory, and the Swiss team of astronomers, one of the planets appears to have a highly elliptical orbit, which may be skewing the data.

Not ruled out completely

Dr Steve Vogt says he and his colleagues "stand solidly" by their original findings.

"I have studied [the paper] in detail and do not agree with his conclusions," he says.

Vogt is concerned that Gregory has unfairly manipulated the HIRES data.

"By doing so, he finds a solution that is more consistent with the HARPS data only," he says.

Vogt also dismisses the claim that one of the planets orbiting Gliese 581 has a highly eccentric orbit. He says this inflates the uncertainties in the HIRES data, making it impossible to detect Gliese 581g.

Gregory says while his study failed to detect Gliese 581g, future data may support it.

"I don't want to take away or underestimate the challenge of disentangling six-planet signals all buried in noisy, very sparse collection of data, it's really an amazing challenge," he says. "With more data it [Gliese 581g] may, sometime in the future, become reality."

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