New Delhi, Mar.23 (ANI): The Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) on Monday joined other people’s movements in saluting the services and contributions of Smitu Kothari to what it called the anti-poor agenda of privatization, globalization and liberalization.

A widely respected scholar, visiting academic at the Cornell and Princeton Universities, author of several publications on contemporary socio-political and economic discourses and above all an indomitable activist, Smitu Kothari, 59 passed away this morning after a cardiac attack.

She was cremated at a crematorium in South Delhi this afternoon. Kothari was a vocal supporter of adivasis, farmers, labourers, fish workers, potters and all people affected by the Narmada Dam project. (ANI)

London, Feb 10 (ANI): The “Not tonight darling, I’ve got a headache” syndrome is usually associated with women when they’re not in the mood, but lately the excuse is increasingly being used by UK men to put off sex, according to a survey.

The new poll by independent charity the Men’s Health Forum has found that 15 per cent of men aged between 18 and 59 admitted to a “lack of interest in sex”.

Relationship-counselling service Relate has revealed that there’s a 40 percent increase in the number of men saying they had gone off sex, compared with 10 years ago.

All the above men with low libido don’t face any physical problems; it’s just that they do not want to have sex.
Research has found that the growing trend of the drop in male desire is a direct result of women’s changing role in society.

Men get overwhelmed with the modern woman, who is confident and comfortable with her own sexual needs and desires.
Apart from that men are bombarded with an overload of sexual images on the Internet, cable TV and in magazines, so much so, that it may be leading them to prefer the ever-ready fantasy to the reality.

Renowned Chicago-based relationships therapist Michele Weiner-Davis caused a furore in the US by claiming that at least 25 per cent of all men suffer from low desire.

It was, “America’s best-kept secret,” the Sun quoted her as saying.

Michael Gilbert, author of The Disposable Male, said: “Western men feel marginalised.

“In a third of American homes where both partners work, women earn more than men. This tears at the fabric of male sexuality.”

And the problem is further worsened by the number of overworked men who are turning to alcohol to relax after work, and it has been revealed earlier that booze interferes with testosterone.
Phillip Hodson, a psychotherapist and author of Men: An Investigation Into The Emotional Male, said: “Sex is all about play. Libido comes out of a moment of idleness and down time. But British men work the longest hours in Europe. Sex and the clock don’t go well together.

“Men drink because it’s a short-cut to relaxation – but alcohol dampens the libido. (ANI)

Washington, Feb 10 (ANI): Ever wondered why we catch flu mostly in the winters? Well, Oregon researchers claim to have found the answer.

They have found that influenza virus survives and travels best when “absolute” humidity is low.

According to lead author Jeffrey Shaman, an Oregon State University, It has long been suspected that there is a link between humidity and flu transmission and prevalence; however, these efforts have focused on relative humidity.

During the study the researchers analysed data from a 2007 study published in PLoS Pathogens, which found a tenuous relationship between influenza transmission and relative humidity.

Shaman used the team’s research data and substituted absolute humidity for relative humidity in analysing potential correlations with flu transmission.

“The correlations were surprisingly strong,” Shaman said.

“When absolute humidity is low, influenza virus survival is prolonged and transmission rates go up,” he added.

The researchers showed that relative humidity only explains about 36 percent of influenza virus survival.

The Oregon researchers retested the data using absolute humidity and found a dramatic rise in accounting for both transmission (50 percent, up from 12 percent) and survival (90 percent, up from 36 percent).

The transmission rates increased from 12 pct to 50 pct while the survival increased to 90 percent from 36 percent.

The potential explanations for influenza peaks during the winter in temperate regions are that people spend more time indoors and thus transmit the virus more easily;

Moreover, less sunlight may have a chemical effect on the virus and/or people’s immune response or there might be an unknown environmental control.

“In some areas of the country, a typical summer day can have four times as much water vapour as a typical winter day – a difference that exists both indoors and outdoors,” Shaman said.

“Consequently, outbreaks of influenza typically occur in winter when low absolute humidity conditions strongly favour influenza survival and transmission,” he added.

The results are published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).(ANI)

Washington, February 6 (ANI): Blue colour boosts the brain’s ability to think creatively, and red to notice detail.

Well, these are the findings of a new University of British Columbia study, which was aimed at determining which of the two colours most improves the brain’s performance and receptivity to advertising.

The study showed that both colours could improve the brain’s performance and receptivity to ads, depending upon the nature of the task or message.

Those behind the study say that advertisers and interior designers may find their findings interesting.

“Previous research linked blue and red to enhanced cognitive performance, but disagreed on which provides the greatest boost. It really depends on the nature of the task,” says Juliet Zhu of UBC’s Sauder School of Business, author of the study which will appear in the journal Science Express.

For their study, the researchers tracked over 600 participants’ performance on six cognitive tasks between 2007 and 2008, which required either detail-orientation or creativity.

The team revealed that most of the experiments were conducted on computers, with a screen that was red, blue or white.

The researchers noted that red colour boosted the participants’ performance on detail-oriented tasks, such as memory retrieval and proofreading, by as much as 31 per cent compared to blue.

Conversely, according to them, for creative tasks such as brainstorming, blue environmental cues prompted participants to produce twice as many creative outputs as when under the red colour condition.

Zhu says that the variances were caused by different unconscious motivations that red and blue activate, noting that colour influences cognition and behaviour through learned associations.

The researcher revealed that a series of fictional ads and product packages were used to during the study, with a view to exploring how colour impacts receptivity to consumer packaging and advertising.

The study showed that when the background colour was red, people formed more favourable evaluations of products when its ad featured specific product details as opposed to evocative, creative messaging.

However, when the background was blue, the opposite pattern of results emerged.

Similarly, people were more receptive to a new, fictional brand of toothpaste that focused on negative messages such as “cavity prevention” when the background colour was red, whereas people were more receptive to aspirational messages such as “tooth whitening” when the background colour was rendered in blue. (ANI)

Washington, Feb 7 (ANI): A new study has identified Pakistan and Bangladesh as some of the countries that are most economically vulnerable to the effects of global warming on fisheries.

The study, by a team of scientists at the WorldFish Center, the University of East Anglia, Simon Fraser University, the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science, the University of Bremen, and the Mekong River Commission, is the first to identify individual nations that are “highly vulnerable” to the impact of climate change on fisheries.

It determined that with climate change threatening to destroy coral reefs, push salt water into freshwater habitats and produce more coastal storms, millions of struggling people in fishery-dependent nations of Africa, Asia and South America could face unprecedented hardship.

The authors of the report examined 132 national economies to determine which are the most vulnerable, based on environmental, fisheries, dietary and economic factors.
ountries that need the most attention, they said, are those where fish play a large role in diet, income and trade, yet there is a lack of capacity to adapt to problems caused by climate change, such as loss of coral reef habitats to the bleaching effects of warmer waters and lakes parched by an increase in heat and a decrease in precipitation.

Both coastal and landlocked countries in Africa, including Malawi, Guinea, Senegal and Uganda, four Asian tropical countries-Bangladesh, Cambodia, Pakistan and Yemen-and two countries in South America, Peru and Colombia, were identified as the most economically vulnerable to the effects of global warming on fisheries.

Overall, of the 33 countries that were considered highly vulnerable, 19 are already classified by the United Nations as “least developed” due to their particularly poor socioeconomic conditions.

The world’s fisheries provide more than 2.6 billion people with at least 20 percent of their average annual per capita protein intake, according to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

The “highly vulnerable” countries identified in the WorldFish study, which was funded by the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DFID), produce 20 percent of the world’s fish exports (by value).

The researchers note that these countries should be a priority for adaptation efforts that will allow them to endure the effects of climate change and maintain or enhance the contribution that fisheries can make to poverty reduction.

According to Edward Allison, director of policy, economics and social science at WorldFish and the research paper’s lead author, economically, people in the tropics and subtropics likely will suffer most, because fish are so important in their diets and because they have limited capacity to develop other sources of income and food. (ANI)

Washington, Feb 7 (ANI): A new study has identified Pakistan and Bangladesh as some of the countries that are most economically vulnerable to the effects of global warming on fisheries.

The study, by a team of scientists at the WorldFish Center, the University of East Anglia, Simon Fraser University, the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science, the University of Bremen, and the Mekong River Commission, is the first to identify individual nations that are “highly vulnerable” to the impact of climate change on fisheries.

It determined that with climate change threatening to destroy coral reefs, push salt water into freshwater habitats and produce more coastal storms, millions of struggling people in fishery-dependent nations of Africa, Asia and South America could face unprecedented hardship.

The authors of the report examined 132 national economies to determine which are the most vulnerable, based on environmental, fisheries, dietary and economic factors.
ountries that need the most attention, they said, are those where fish play a large role in diet, income and trade, yet there is a lack of capacity to adapt to problems caused by climate change, such as loss of coral reef habitats to the bleaching effects of warmer waters and lakes parched by an increase in heat and a decrease in precipitation.

Both coastal and landlocked countries in Africa, including Malawi, Guinea, Senegal and Uganda, four Asian tropical countries-Bangladesh, Cambodia, Pakistan and Yemen-and two countries in South America, Peru and Colombia, were identified as the most economically vulnerable to the effects of global warming on fisheries.

Overall, of the 33 countries that were considered highly vulnerable, 19 are already classified by the United Nations as “least developed” due to their particularly poor socioeconomic conditions.

The world’s fisheries provide more than 2.6 billion people with at least 20 percent of their average annual per capita protein intake, according to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO).

The “highly vulnerable” countries identified in the WorldFish study, which was funded by the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development (DFID), produce 20 percent of the world’s fish exports (by value).

The researchers note that these countries should be a priority for adaptation efforts that will allow them to endure the effects of climate change and maintain or enhance the contribution that fisheries can make to poverty reduction.

According to Edward Allison, director of policy, economics and social science at WorldFish and the research paper’s lead author, economically, people in the tropics and subtropics likely will suffer most, because fish are so important in their diets and because they have limited capacity to develop other sources of income and food. (ANI)

Washington, Jan 17 (ANI): Researchers at National Jewish Health and the University of Colorado Denver have identified a gene linked to improved survival among patients with acute lung injury.

Acute lung injury (ALI) is often caused by a respiratory infection and results in low oxygen levels in the blood, and fluid in the lungs.

“This discovery could benefit patients in two ways,” said James Crapo. MD, senior author and Professor of Medicine at National Jewish Health.

“By learning how this specific gene can alter the course of acute lung injury, we can gain insight into the biology of the disease, which could lead to better therapies.

“It also could become a tool in personalized medicine; by screening for this protective genotype and ones that make a person more susceptible to ALI, we can potentially tailor our treatment individual patients with respiratory infections and ALI to minimize the potential harm,” he added.

During the study, the researchers looked at the gene for extracellular superoxide dismutase (EC-SOD), a powerful antioxidant that has been associated with reduced lung injury in animal models, and better patient outcomes in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.

The researchers then looked at the various forms of the EC-SOD gene in two groups of patients with infection-associated ALI.

They found that patients with a specific combination of four single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), had an 75 percent reduced risk of being on a ventilator as all other ALI patients, and an 85 percent reduced risk of dying.

“This specific set of SNPs, which we call the GCCT haplotype, appears to reduce inflammation in the lung, thereby decreasing the severity of lung injury and ultimately protecting patients from mortality associated with ALI,” said John J. Arcaroli, PhD, first author and a post-doctoral fellow at the University of Colorado at Denver.

“Although We are not yet sure how these particular SNPs alter the action of the EC-SOD, these findings gives us a good starting point to learn more about possible protective mechanisms in ALI and other lung diseases,” he added.

The study appears in American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. (ANI)

Washington, Jan 13 (ANI): Ecologists have revealed that removing cats, which were considered an invasive species in the sub-Antarctic Macquarie Island in Australia, a World Heritage Site, has caused environmental devastation that will cost more than 24 million dollars (Australian) to remedy.

Using population data, plot-scale vegetation analyses and satellite imagery, the ecologists from the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD), the University of Tasmania, Blatant Fabrications Pty Ltd and Stellenbosch University found that after cats were eradicated from Macquarie in 2000, the island’s rabbit population increased so much that its vegetation has been devastated.

According to the study’s lead author, Dr Dana Bergstrom of the Australian Antarctic Division, “Satellite images show substantial island-wide rabbit-induced vegetation change. By 2007, impacts on some protected valleys and slopes had become acute.”

“We estimate that nearly 40 percent of the whole island area had changed, with almost 20 percent having moderate to severe change,” she added.

Rabbits were introduced to Macquarie Island in 1878 by sealing gangs.

After reaching large numbers, the rabbits became the main prey of cats, which had been introduced 60 years earlier.

Because the rabbits were causing catastrophic damage to the island’s vegetation, Myxomatosis and the European rabbit flea (which spreads the Myxoma virus) were introduced in 1968.

As a result, rabbit numbers fell from a peak of 130,000 in 1978 to less than 20,000 in the 1980s and vegetation recovered.

However, with fewer rabbits as food, the cats began to eat the island’s native burrowing birds, so a cat eradication programme began in 1985.

Since the last cat was killed in 2000, Myxomatosis failed to keep rabbit numbers in check, and their numbers bounced back and in little over six years, with rabbits substantially altering large areas of the island.

According to Bergstrom, “Increased rabbit herbivory has caused substantial damage at both local and landscape scales including changes from complex vegetation communities, to short, grazed lawns or bare ground.”

“Our study shows that between 2000 and 2007 there has been widespread ecosystem devastation and decades of conservation effort compromised,” he added.

“The lessons for conservation agencies globally is that interventions should be comprehensive, and include risk assessments to explicitly consider and plan for indirect effects, or face substantial subsequent costs. On Macquarie Island, this cost will be around 24 million dollars (Australian),” he further added. (ANI)