Today's Scan

21 May 2013, Paris, France: Results from a large observational study reported at EuroPCR 2013 today question whether bivalirudin is superior to heparin in the absence of GPIIb/IIIa blockade, showing similar 30-day mortality in patients with non-ST segment elevation acute coronary syndromes (NSTE-ACS) undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI).

European and US NSTE-ACS guidelines currently recommend bivalirudin alone as an alternative to unfractionated heparin plus GP IIb/IIIa receptor inhibitors in patients undergoing an intended urgent or early invasive strategy.

Researchers compared 30-day mortality with heparin alone to that with bivalirudin alone in patients with NSTE-ACS undergoing PCI between 2005 and 2011 in the Swedish coronary angiography and angioplasty registry (SCAAR). The registry records all coronary angiographies and PCIs carried out in Sweden. Results were analysed for 31,351 patients treated with heparin alone and 10,186 given bivalirudin.

Oskar Angerås, Consultant Cardiology at Sahlgrenska University Hospital, Gothenburg, Sweden, reported that the adjusted odds ratio for 30-day mortality favoured heparin (1.53 for complete case analysis).

"One should be very careful when interpreting the results, however none of our models show that treatment with bivalirudin improves outcome. The results therefore question the superiority of bivalirudin to heparin in the absence of GP IIb/IIIa blockade in patients with NSTE-ACS undergoing PCI," concluded Angerås. "The clinical implication is that if we use heparin alone, we can be assured that it's enough. For those using bivalirudin, switching to heparin achieves similar outcomes and will reduce the cost of procedures." He said that a prospective, randomised trial comparing bivalirudin with heparin in this group of patients is warranted. He added that his group has started the registry-based randomised VALIDATE-SWEDEHEART trial comparing bivalirudin to heparin in patients pretreated with novel ADP-receptor blockers, with the aim of recruiting a total of 6,000 patients.

Commenting on the data, William Wijns, Chairman of PCR and Course Director of EuroPCR, said, "This new data comparing heparin with bivalirudin in NSTE-ACS patients undergoing PCI is very interesting and we await results from new trials looking at this further."



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In a world where everyone's new motto is to "Get Rich or Die Trying", sometimes we fail to realize that our greatest asset and source of wealth is our health.  It definitely makes sense to secure one's health while pursuing everything else in life.

But how exactly do we preserve our health? Well there are some common sense approaches that we can employ:

Don't Smoke: I usually tell people it's the best thing they can do for their health.  From smelling better to reducing your risk of lung cancer, you just can't go wrong.

Maintain a healthy weight/BMI(body mass index): Ideally, one's BMI should be less than 25. Anything over is considered overweight and over 30 is classified as obese. Check your BMI here!

Exercise: Usually, this seems like a daunting task, but even 30 minutes of brisk walking a day can make a difference in one's weight management and overall wellness.

Good Diet: Choose a diet low on animal fat and sodium but high in fruits, vegetables, whole grains.  Eat at least two serving of fish a week. Try limiting the carbohydrate servings.

Moderate Alcohol Intake: Avoid excessive drinking. No more than one drink a day for the ladies and two for the gentlemen.

Avoid Substance Abuse: Avoid illegal drugs and substances. Use prescription and over-the-counter drugs only as directed. More is not necessary better or more effective, and can be harmful to the body.

Car Safety: Click those seatbelts on! It can truly save your life, especially given the conditions of our roads.

Dental Hygiene: Brush the teeth, chew that chewing stick, whatever you need to do to keep those pearly whites, well, white. Don't ignore that toothache for too long; see a dentist to ensure you are not missing an eroding cavity.

Sleep: It's the time of your life, but you need your rest. In fact, studies confirm that proper sleep is essential to maintain good health. On average, one needs at least 6-8 hours of sleep a day.

Sexual Health:  Hey, we are all adults. If you are sexually active, be responsible and practice safe sex. Talk to your doctor about contraception, sexual transmitted disease prevention and HIV screening.

Mental Health: Now we all know stress is real.  Be in tune with your feelings. If you are feeling down a lot, you might be depressed and it may be best to discuss with a qualified health care provider.  If you are just stressed, don't let yourself get overwhelmed: get a hobby, create balance, seek a spiritual path, build on your relationships and make time to do things that matter to you.

Get Checked: Although the popular adage says, "if it aint broke, don't fix it", going to the doctor should not be limited to when one is sick. In order take control of one's health, it is advisable to get checked at least once in a year or two.  What to check? Blood pressure, cholesterol levels and sexual transmitted disease screening along with HIV screening. Ladies should additionally get pap smears for cervical cancer screening.

If you take these tips to heart, you can sing welcome to the good life!

Adesuwa Okesanya is a Family medicine physician in New York City. Apart from the art of medical practice, she practices the art of parenting with two active toddlers. She can be contacted at Doc.Okey@gmail.com

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Self-harm now takes more lives than war, murder, and natural disasters combined. Why are we killing ourselves, and how can we stop it?

By Tony Dokoupil

New research at The University of Nottingham aimed at preventing harmful blood clots associated with heart disease and stroke has recently received a major funding boost from the British Heart Foundation.

Grants totalling more than £1.2m have been awarded to the University's School of Pharmacy and are aimed at gaining a deeper understanding and selectively targeting coagulation X factors from the blood's contact system.

The contact system recognises foreign surfaces, including bacteria, whereby it then becomes activated triggering a number of processes. These include the release of a peptide bradykinin which can affect changes in blood pressure. Anti-bacterial peptides are also released and blood coagulation is activated.

Recent research in the last five years has shown that inappropriate activation of the contact system can be linked to serious health problems such as heart disease or stroke.

These new projects focus on proteins termed factor XI and factor XII (X-factors) that contribute to blood coagulation. Factor XI is the 'newest' X factor in evolutionary terms only occurring in mammals but not present in fish, amphibians, reptiles or even mammals that lay eggs (monotremes) such as the platypus.

Professor Jonas Emsley at The University of Nottingham's Centre for Biomolecular Sciences, has previously made a breakthrough by determining the molecular structures of factor XI and factor XII in studies funded by the British Heart Foundation.

Professor Emsley said: "Disease models of stroke have shown a significant role for activation of X factors which seem to be central to the pathology of the disease. Thus factor XII and factor XI are of great therapeutic interest in the drive to discover novel anticoagulant therapies to replace heparin and warfarin.

"These currently available treatments target multiple coagulation proteins which have a more central role in healthy blood clotting and hence are more prone to side effects such as bleeding."

The groups of Professor Peter Fischer and Dr Lodewijk Dekker have expertise in drug discovery and have developed a platform for developing new medicines within the School of Pharmacy.

They use drug design methods based on high resolution structures determined using protein crystallography by the group of Jonas Emsley. They also make use of The University of Nottingham's fully automated state-of-the-art Managed Chemical Compound Collection (MCCC) with more than 80,000 compounds for high through-put screening. This facility is key for identifying lead compounds capable of inhibiting the activity of coagulation factor XII.

If crystal structures of lead inhibitors bound to factor XII can be obtained, the observed interactions with the target protein can speed up the process for discovery of new therapies.

This project also benefits from collaboration with Professor Philip Bath (Division of Stroke Medicine, University of Nottingham) who is an expert in clinical trials and the treatment of stroke.

Professor Jeremy Pearson, Associate Medical Director at the BHF said: "Through research like Professor Emsley's we're fighting for every heartbeat, so one day we can put an end to the devastation heart disease brings. This pioneering research project is one of thousands across the UK bringing us a step closer to winning the battle against heart disease.

"We couldn't fund the research team here at The University of Nottingham without your support; donate today so we can fund more projects like this and eradicate heart disease for good."

Provided by
University of Nottingham

A few months ago, West Hawaii Today had an article about the National Restaurant Association's top trends in the restaurant industry. The No. 1 trend decided by over 1,800 professional chefs nationally is locally sourced meat and fish. When it comes to wild fresh fish, Hawaii chefs prepare and showcase better than anyone. After talking to many local chefs, I believe that the premier cuisine in Hawaii is the large selection of wild fresh fish we have to offer.

I doubt that the islands' tourists come to Hawaii knowingly to eat chemically treated and soy-fed, farm-raised fish. The restaurant association defines "locally sourced" as organic, fresh, natural. And the University at Albany did the first global study on salmon — just published in "Science," and by far the largest and most comprehensive done to date — which found significantly more concentration of cancer-causing substances in farmed salmon compared to wild salmon.

My question is: What about all other offshore-farmed ocean fish that are fed the same or similar fish food? You can only hope that some of these researches will begin to test all ocean-farmed fish for some of these same toxicants.

It is well known that intensive fish culture has been involved in the introduction and/or amplification of pathogens and disease in wild fish population. Actually, this is easy to understand. When a wild fish becomes ill, it is likely to starve or be eaten by predators. But sea-cage fish are protected and fed daily, living a long time and retransmitting disease and parasites to other fish in the cage and to wild fish. Farm fish are known to escape, impacting wild fish by increasing competition for food and breeding sites, and reducing the fitness of wild fish by interbreeding.

There are healthy and clean aquacultures that I support, such as filter-feeders (clams, scallops, oysters and mussels), recirculating aquaculture systems, aquaponics, and marine-based integrated multitrophic aquaculture.

In November 2012, professor Roz Naylor (Stanford) and others have released a study on these aquacultures, titled: "Searching for Solutions in Aquaculture; Charting a Sustainable Course."

There are no easy solutions to protect the wild fish we love to eat, but let's not desecrate what we have by choosing large scale, open ocean pens, the most harmful form of aquaculture.

Tom Kapp

Ulva, commonly known as 'sea lettuce,' forms big thin blades that float in mats throughout Narragansett Bay. (Melissa Palmisciano)Red tendrils and green blades churn in the waves like a giant salad in a spinner. Thin, wiry branches ensnare the ankles of those who are brave enough to wade through the shallows. The water is lovely — you just have to make it past all the seaweed.

Most Rhode Island beach-goers and waterfront property owners have had at least one unpleasant experience with heavy seaweed deposits along shore, which attract bugs and emit a rotten egg scent. However, the problem of excessive seaweed growth is not unique to Narragansett Bay. During the past 50 years, many coastal ecosystems have suffered from chronic blooms of seaweeds, also known as macroalgae. Macroalgae are divided into three phylogenetic groups of similarly colored species — chlorophytes (green seaweeds), rhodophytes (red seaweeds) and phaeophytes (brown seaweeds).

In Narragansett Bay, the most common blooming offenders include fast-growing natives in the sea lettuce family, and wiry, branching rhodophytes; however, blooms of brown seaweeds can also occur. In addition to creating aesthetic problems, seaweed blooms have consequences for economics and human health. Macroalgal mats deposited on crescent-shaped beaches physically entrap trash and pollutants such as fecal coliform, prolonging water impairment and beach closures.

For example, seaweed has been blamed for extended closure and revenue loss at Easton's Beach in Newport following rainstorms that flushed pollution into Narragansett Bay. Thick mats of decomposing seaweeds release potent hydrogen sulfide gas, which can cause nausea and other ailments at high concentrations.

Although seaweeds occur naturally in marine ecosystems, the addition of excessive nutrients such as nitrogen to bodies of water can trigger nuisance algal blooms. Nitrogen enters estuaries through ecosystem processes such as atmospheric deposition, but coastal human settlements greatly increase loads by discharging agricultural runoff and wastewater. High concentrations of nitrogen fertilize macroalgae and phytoplankton, causing these fast-growing organisms to proliferate. Dense mats of seaweed and clouds of tiny phytoplankton prevent light from reaching benthic eelgrass beds, killing these essential fish nurseries.

In the process of decomposing algae, bacteria consume so much oxygen that there is not enough left in the water for other organisms to survive. These low oxygen — or hypoxic — events can trigger fish kills, such as the infamous Greenwich Bay fish kill of 2003, when more than a million dead juvenile menhaden washed ashore.

But let us consider this macroalgae problem from a different perspective — are seaweeds really such an undesirable byproduct of eutrophication? Spa-goers pay upwards of $100 for luxurious seaweed wraps, which are said to detoxify the skin. In nature, macroalgae play a large role in extracting nitrogenous pollutants from the water, which they store in their cells and use to create new tissue. Seaweeds deprive phytoplankton of nutrients and can therefore prevent toxic, harmful algal blooms such as red tides, cyanobacteria blooms and brown tides.

It is true that macroalgae are both a source and a sink of nitrogen in the ocean, decomposing rapidly at temperatures above 86 degrees Fahrenheit and releasing stored nitrogen back into the water column. However, if seaweed mats are washed ashore and deposited during high tides, nitrogen is recycled as fertilizer for land plants. And, like all photosynthesizing organisms, macroalgae capture and sequester atmospheric carbon, helping to mitigate the negative effects of climate change.

If seaweeds are harvested and put to some commercial use before they decompose, then the nutrients they contain can be removed from the estuary and recirculated to the land. Nutrient bioextraction, or the removal of nutrients from an aquatic ecosystem through the harvest of its increased biological production, is based on this concept. Integrated aquaculture systems often rely on aquatic plants or shellfish to absorb waste products created by fish stock. Oysters, for example, can filter up to 2 gallons of nutrient-rich water an hour.

Bioremediation shouldn't replace preventative management actions, and several important steps have already been taken to reduce nitrogen discharge into Narragansett Bay. Nearly 70 percent of the nitrogen inputs into upper Narragansett Bay originate from the 22 wastewater treatment facilities (WWTFs) in the bay's watershed. In response to the Greenwich Bay fish kill, the General Assembly mandated a 50 percent reduction in wastewater discharge by Rhode Island's 11 coastal WWTFs, to be implemented by 2014.

Several plants have already converted to tertiary treatment to remove additional nitrogen from WWTF discharge. Unfortunately, non-point sources of anthropogenic nitrogen, such as individual homes, cesspools, septic systems, pet waste, and lawn and agricultural fertilizers, also contribute significant quantities of nitrogen and are much more difficult to regulate. Actions such as cesspool removal, reduction of industrial fertilizer use and stormwater mitigation are important to limit these sources.

One significant step toward managing non-point runoff came in 2008, when the Narragansett Bay Commission officially opened its combined sewer overflow (CSO) abatement tunnel. This $359 million tunnel captures excess runoff during heavy rain events, allowing the facility to treat it once it has the capacity.

Although preventative action should be prioritized, nitrogen reduction from the source has its limitations. By destroying wetlands and overfishing filter feeders, humans have diminished ecosystems' natural capacities for nitrogen assimilation. Restoring wetlands and shellfish beds and employing bioextractive technologies would help rebuild Narragansett Bay's natural resistance to nitrogen pollution.

Bioextraction complements source control programs and provides a method to remove nitrogen after it has already entered the water. By implementing incentive programs and the commercializing collected products such as seaweeds, bioextraction can be a low-cost, even profitable, business endeavor. Bioextraction provides a sustainable supplement that accounts for both human needs and ecological integrity.

Plenty of uses

Collected macroalgae would certainly not go to waste. For some 20,000 years, beginning even before the dawn of arable farming, humans have used macroalgae for food, medicine and composted fertilizer. In the present day, seaweeds have an astonishing number of commercial uses and are key ingredients in everything from foods such as ice cream to pharmaceuticals and cosmetics.

Macroalgae's rapid decomposition and high nitrogen content make them a highly effective fertilizer for crops and gardens, comparable in quality to cow manure and other natural fertilizers. Seaweeds also display impressive potential as biofuels, and scientists are developing methods to transform their sugars into ethanol.

Unlike most plants, macroalgae contain no lignin, a complex, woody molecule that microorganisms have trouble breaking down, making it possible to yield high quantities of biofuel per each unit of seaweed. Seaweeds have even permeated the foodie community, where these "sea vegetables" are being rediscovered as super foods. Seaweeds are low in calories and high in minerals such as potassium, iron, manganese and vitamin B12, making them the perfect snack for the health-conscious.

Internationally, countries such as Chile, China and Sweden are exploring the use of bioextractive technologies. An ongoing pilot study in Long Island Sound will help determine the feasibility of implementing these practices in the United States. Already, the state of Rhode Island has taken small steps toward bioextraction. The state Department of Environmental Management (DEM) bought a specialized tractor called the Barber Surf Rake to remove nuisance macroalgae at common bloom sites such as Conimicut Point, Stillhouse Cove and Riverside. In 2009, the city of Newport bought a seaweed rake to remove blooming red species from Easton's Beach.

Newport received grant money in 2010 to investigate the potential of recycling collected seaweed in an innovative biofuel program; unfortunately, the Office of Energy Resources determined that the project was unfeasible given current available technologies.

Furthermore, several aquaculturalists and wild seaweed foragers already harvest and sell seaweed in Rhode Island.

If bioextraction, macroalgae aquaculture and collection programs continue to expand, it will be important to ensure that seaweed harvesting is managed sustainably. Moderate quantities of seaweed serve as essential food sources for marine animals, and provide nursery habitat for juvenile crabs and fish. Those foraging for wild seaweed must be sure to follow traditional wildcrafter guidelines, harvesting only a third of each bed of seaweed and leaving spore-producing parts behind to allow continued reproduction.

Collection for personal use is particularly easy in Rhode Island, where the Constitution stipulates citizens' right to collect seaweed from public access points along the shoreline. Macroalgae foragers must be certain to avoid polluted waters by collecting only in areas open to shellfishing.

Melissa Palmisciano was a research intern for the Narragansett Bay Estuary Program. This article originally was published in the Spring 2013 Narragansett Bay Journal.

Twice a week, John Platt shines a light on endangered species from all over the globe, exploring not just why they are dying out but also what's being done to rescue them from oblivion. Follow on Twitter @johnrplatt.





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Twice a week, John Platt shines a light on endangered species from all over the globe, exploring not just why they are dying out but also what's being done to rescue them from oblivion. Follow on Twitter @johnrplatt.




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Contact John R. Platt via email.

Follow John R. Platt on Twitter as @johnrplatt.

Don't feel bad if you've never seen a caecilian, let alone don't know how to pronounce the word. These rare, legless amphibians—which look like a cross between a worm and a snake—spend most of their time underground, far from the prying eyes of scientists and other humans. Although some of the 190 or so known caecilian (think "Sicilian") species can reach massive lengths—1.9 meters in some cases—they are rarely studied and very little is known about them.

Here's something we do know: Caecilians, like the frogs and salamanders to which they are related, are apparently now at risk from the deadly chytrid fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd), which has already caused hundreds of amphibian extinctions around the globe.

This news of the chytrid fungus's spread comes from scientists in England with the Natural History Museum and the Zoological Society of London, who caught more than 200 caecilians and tested them for Bd. The scientists traveled to five countries in Africa and South America and studied 29 different species. They found the chytrid fungus living in the skin on 58 individual caecilians, many of which later died from the infections. The results are detailed in the May 2013 issue of EcoHealth.

"The fungus was known to infect and potentially kill both the other major groups of amphibians, but we did not know if it definitively could infect caecilians in the wild, and whether it could potentially also kill them," museum zoologist and lead researcher David Gower said in a prepared statement. "We now know both of these are the case, and so this potentially major threat needs to be taken into consideration in caecilian conservation biology."

Bd is a particularly nasty fungus for amphibians. It infects and damages the skin, which amphibians use to breathe and absorb water. Once the fungus takes hold it causes a disease called chytridiomycosis, which is usually fatal. Although recent evidence shows that the chytrid fungus is probably more than 40,000 years old, its exact origins are unknown. The fungus probably didn't start spreading around the world until sometime in the latter half of the 20th century. It has now been blamed for close to 300 amphibian species extinctions. By most estimates, as many as a third of all known amphibians now carry the fungus and face declining populations or even possible extinction as a result.

There is no known cure for Bd at this time nor do scientists know exactly how it spreads. Previous research has shown that the fungus often arrives in new areas via the commercial frog trade, which distributes the animals for uses as food, pets, dissection learning tools or pregnancy tests. It has even been shown to travel from pond to pond on the legs of birds. We already knew that the fungus can stay viable in water, but the new research into caecilians seems to indicate that Bd can also live in and spread via soil.

The authors of this study point out that the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species currently lists most of the 190 caecilian species as "data deficient," meaning there is not enough scientific information to assess their conservation status. With chytrid now known to be present in these little-understood species, it may be time to learn what we can, while we can, before it is too late.

Photo: Geotrypetes seraphini, a caecilian from Cameroon that tested positive for the chytrid fungus. Courtesy of the National History Museum

About the Author: Twice a week, John Platt shines a light on endangered species from all over the globe, exploring not just why they are dying out but also what's being done to rescue them from oblivion. Follow on Twitter @johnrplatt.




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The views expressed are those of the author and are not necessarily those of Scientific American.

VENEZUELA - The Socialist Institute of Fishing and Aquaculture (Insopesca) has started the first phase of the Register of fishing, aquaculture and related activities from 22 May to 5 June in order to protect food security.

The process of registration is divided into four phases, the first starting from 22 May to 5 June in Cojedes, Lara, Portuguesa and Yaracuy.

This process will break down the barriers between people and institutions as automated data collection will allow Insopesca to improve throughput and response time of applications.

This automated system will condense all the information relating to natural or legal persons authorised to engage in fishing, aquaculture and related activities in the country.

Insopesca will be deployed throughout the territory to establish a direct contact to allow the registration.

US - Exploring the opportunity to bring a feed mill dedicated to producing fish feed to Indiana in hopes of building a new market for Hoosier soybean farmers is the intent of a new grant recently awarded to Indiana Soybean Alliance (ISA).

ISA, the state soybean checkoff organization, received a Value-Added Producer Grant from the US Department of Agriculture earlier this month to conduct a feasibility study on locating a feed mill focusing on aquaculture feeds in Indiana.

"Our Hoosier soybean farmers are committed to helping grow our state's soybean industry by supporting our state's aquaculture industry," said Jeanette Merritt, chair of ISA's aquaculture committee from Peru, Ind. "Aquaculture is a promising and growing market for our soybeans and our board is committed to supporting this industry within the state as we continue to look to help build strong markets for our soybeans."

Currently, most Indiana aquaculture producers import their fish feed from Utah, Pennsylvania or Louisiana. This study will show if it makes sense economically to eliminate the transportation costs associated with shipping soybeans from Midwestern states, like Indiana, to be manufactured into fish feed and then shipping the fish feed to Indiana.

"This grant will allow us to take the next step in determining if Indiana could have enough volume of fish production to justify a feed mill dedicated to aquaculture," said Shelia Lingle, director of aquaculture for the Indiana Soybean Alliance.

If the grant shows that a feed mill focusing on serving the aquaculture industry would be viable in Indiana, it would not only grow a new market for Indiana soybeans, but it could also grow the state's aquaculture industry as well.

"As part of our long-term strategic plan, ISA has a goal to triple Indiana aquaculture production and build a feed mill in Indiana," said Lingle. "A feed mill closer to the actual commodity for local aquaculture producers just makes sense, especially as soy-based fish feeds become more widely used."

The Indiana soybean checkoff has funded several studies showing soybean meal to be a good substitute for fish meal in various fish species diets. Additionally, ISA has commissioned a study to survey the volume of fish currently produced in a 20-state area touching Indiana. Both of these efforts will provide valuable information for the feed mill feasibility study.

"Industry representatives have been helpful in providing information on ranges of production it would take to justify a dedicated feed mill, but this study will help us refine those numbers," Lingle added. "If the results of the study say that Indiana can support this type of feed mill, the study itself can be a tool for others to use to go out and secure funding – both private and other USDA grants – to help build a feed mill here."

The USDA Value-Added Producer Grant provides $15,000 for the feasibility study with ISA providing matching funds for the study. The USDA grants focus on supporting rural producers and local economies. The ISA grant was one of 110 awarded by USDA in May, including three others in Indiana.

"I am pleased the USDA has recognized the hard work the Hoosier ag community does for their communities and our entire state," said Senator Joe Donnelly in a recent release about this program. "The ag community is the backbone of Indiana's economy, and the investment in these business owners will allow them to develop better products and create more opportunities for hardworking Hoosiers who want a job close to home."

To learn more about ISA's aquaculture initiative, click here.

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&nbsp5月18日，在大丰城区二卯酉河中漂浮起大量死鱼，沿着二卯酉河边走就会发现，河面呈现五颜六色的油样物质，随处可见死鱼漂浮在水面上，以小鱼居多，也有少数三、四指宽的大鱼，靠近水体可以闻到一股异味。 据了解，位 ...

A Pia, en challenge de France (match retour), les minimes de Pias se sont imposés devant ceux du SAV XIII par 46 à 8. Après cette nouvelle défaite, les minimes du SAV XIII sont éliminés du challenge de France.

A Saint-Estève, en championnat de France première division (match retour), les cadets du SAV XIII ont été nettement battus par Saint-Estève sur le score de 50 à 8. Les Villeneuvois ont surtout manqué de rigueur défensive et de motivation.

Le programme du week-end

Ce samedi 25 mai, à Villeneuve, au stade de la Myre-Mory (terrain n. 3), à 15 heures, les cadets du SAV XIII accueilleront ceux de Carcassonne (match retour). En espérant qu'ils seront motivés pour finir la saison en beauté.

Ce dimanche 26 mai, les minimes du SAV XIII se déplaceront à Tonneins, contre La Réole, en demi-finales du championnat Aquitaine. Le vainqueur de ce match rencontrera en finale l'équipe de Tonneins.

La Dépêche du Midi

Objectives: The aim of the present study was to determine the early and long-term outcomes of coronary artery bypass grafting in patients with acute coronary syndrome and stable angina pectoris.

Methods: From September 2004 to September 2011, 382 patients with acute coronary syndrome (unstable angina pectoris and non–ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction) and 851 patients with stable angina pectoris underwent first-time isolated coronary artery bypass grafting at our institute. The early and long-term outcomes were compared between the 2 groups.

Results: Patients with acute coronary syndrome were older, were more likely to be women, had a smaller body surface area, and were more likely to have left main coronary artery disease. In both groups, bilateral internal thoracic artery grafts were used in approximately 89% of the patients, and off-pump techniques in approximately 97% of the patients. The acute coronary syndrome group had a greater operative death rate (2.6% vs 0.1%) and a greater incidence of low output syndrome (3.1% vs 1.2%) and hemodialysis requirement (2.9% vs 1.1%). Multivariate regression analysis demonstrated that age, acute coronary syndrome, lower ejection fraction, and higher creatinine level before surgery were independent predictors of operative death. However, among the hospital survivors, no differences were seen in freedom from all death (85.4% ± 2.5% vs 87.7% ± 2.0%), cardiac death (97.4% ± 0.9% vs 96.5% ± 0.9%), or major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events (78.0% ± 2.9% vs 78.1% ± 2.3%) at 7 years between the patients with acute coronary syndrome and stable angina pectoris.

Conclusions: Although acute coronary syndrome is an independent predictor of early mortality in patients undergoing coronary artery bypass grafting, the long-term outcomes after surgery were similar between patients with acute coronary syndrome and stable angina pectoris who survived the early postoperative period.

"Our data suggests the possibility of drugs that can prevent and treat Alzheimer's. It's just mouse data but extremely encouraging mouse data," said by the lead author professor and lab principal Christian Pike of USB Davis School of Gerontology.

TSOP ligands are drugs currently used for male mice that were genetically modified to develop Alzheimer's disease. TSPO's key mechanism is to increase production of steroid hormones to ensure mice had low levels of testosterone and related hormones before any treatment.



"We looked at the effects of TSPO ligand in young adult mice when pathology was at an early stage and in aged mice when pathology was quite severe. TSPO ligand reduced measures of pathology and improved behaviour at both ages," according to Christian Pike.

The findings suggest a possibility of TSPO ligand to reverse components of Alzheimer's and has very high potential to be useful in treatment.

"TSPO ligands are currently used in humans in certain types of neuroimaging. Newer TSPO ligands are at the clinical trials stage of development for treatment of anxiety and other conditions. There is a strong possibility that TSPO ligands similar to the ones used in our study could be evaluated for therapeutic efficacy in Alzheimer's patients within the next few years," Christian Pike said.

With this new light in the study of Alzheimer's disease, Pike and his team will next focus on understanding how TSPO ligands reduce Alzheimer's disease pathology and increase the production of neuroactive hormones in the brain.

Alzheimer's Disease

It is the most common form of dementia and currently no cure yet has been developed for the disease. Alzheimer's progresses and eventually leads to the death of the patient.

Symptoms of Alzheimer's Disease

Forgetfulness of recent events the most common symptom associated with the disease. Diagnosis includes evaluation of behaviour, thinking abilities and then brain scanning. Advance stage symptoms include confusion, irritability, aggression, mood swings, language trouble and long-term memory loss.

Causes of Alzheimer's Disease

There is no concrete explanation about the real cause of the disease except for the small percentage in genetic differences. Hypothesis such as cholinergic related to neuroinflammation, amyloid which is considered to be a fundamental cause, tau proteins causing abnormalities and herpes simplex playing a causative role to the disease.

No definitive prevention yet supports effectiveness against Alzheimer's disease. Risk factors such as hypertension, diabetes and smoking is associated with the disease.

In diet, Alzheimer's risk may be reduced by fruits, vegetables, bread, wheat, olive oil, fish and red wine. Some vitamins such as C, E, B12, and B9 are not supported as recommended preventive measures due to lack of evidence.

New Study: Vitamin B

A latest study shows that elderly people at risk of AD may take vitamin B supplements and folic acid to reduce brain atrophy which is associated to 90 per cent of Alzheimer cases. Preventing Alzheimer's disease-related gray matter atrophy by B-Vitamin Treatment is the published journal determining the effects of high dosage consumption of vitamins B6, B12 and folic acid.

The study found out that these vitamins taken in high dosage protects an individual from brain shrinkage which mostly occurring on Alzheimer development. Initial results revealed 50 per cent less whole-brain shrinkage in 156 patients with ages 70 years old or more consuming high doses of vitamin B compared to patients taking placebo pills.

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MYSTERY RECREATED: The Bermagui Marine Rescue unit recently helped with a recreation of the Mystery Bay mystery undertaken by the Montreal Goldfields group towing a small boat out of the harbour.

RETIRED Narooma High School history and English teacher Bill Drury was inspired to write the following article after a recent visit to the Bermagui Museum where he and a museum volunteer had a long session revisiting the Mystery Bay mystery.

Mr Drury together with fellow teacher Bob Yapp made the mystery part of his curriculum back when he was teaching, with students encouraged to develop their own theories what happened.

Coincidentally, the Montreal Goldfields group also recently called in the Bermagui Marine Rescue unit to assist with a recreation and filming of the surveyor Lamont Young's fateful journey.

FIVE men vanished without trace on October 10, 1880, at what is now known as Mystery Bay.

Apart from clothing and other effects found in a small green boat, which was either washed or dragged onto a small reef of coastal rocks at Mutton Fish Point, as it was then known, approximately 9 miles from their point of departure in Bermagui Harbour, little evidence was produced to explain what had happened.

Despite an immediate and extensive search no physical or written evidence has subsequently been found and the incident remains unresolved.

However much the disappearance of five men might be expected to excite police local interest and investigation, it could not be expected to be their only concern.

At best, serious official investigation could be expected for a short period of time before other and less puzzling incidents would have warranted official interest. And yet this investigation continued for three years.

In 1882 on February 11, a letter was sent from the Colonial Office, Downing Street London to the Foreign Office addressed to Her Majesty, Queen Victoria.

The letter was signed by a Mrs Emma Gosset Young, the mother of Lamont Henry Graeme Young one of the missing men from Bermagui.

In her letter Emma personally addresses the Queen asking for her intervention in Emma's call for an official enquiry into the disappearance of her son.

Such a petition would normally carry very little weight as it moved along the slow arms of government. To actually reach regal levels reveals that whoever Mrs Young was she had some good cause for others to promote her case.

In 1883, so successful was her appeal that the results of an official NSW Parliamentary inquiry were published after a year of investigation by a variety of people and groups.

How did the death of five men warrant so much official interest? Who was Emma Young and why did she merit such attention? How was she able to access such dignitaries and draw them to her cause?

Emma was actually born Emily Catherine Gossett, the daughter of Isaac Gossett III and Dorothea Sophia Banks Lind, in 1821.

Her grandmother was Lady Dorothea Banks, the wife of the famous, Sir Joseph Banks who accompanied Cook on his voyage of discovery in 1770 and who was instrumental in championing the progress of the new colonies they discovered.

Another relative, her grandfather, Dr James Lind, accompanied Banks on a voyage to Iceland in 1772. Lind socialised with the likes of David Hume, James Watt and Benjamin Franklin as he moved through London's social and academic life.

Lind was to prove to be a most remarkably well connected figure especially as he could claim kinship with royalty through marriage as a second cousin to George III.

Lind also was influential in the early life of the poet P.B Shelley and latterly his wife, Mary to such an extent that she described Lind as a "name well known among the professors of medical science."  Percy immortalised him in one of his poems as Zonoras. He was therefore part of the London crowd of socialites and celebrities for many years.

Lind was also interested in the revitalisation of life, a practice he explored through his experiments with electricity and dead frogs. He was successful in getting dead muscles to react to electric shocks. He was, he believed, creating life.

His renown was so great in this field that he was confident enough to declare that King George, who to all intents and purposes was mad, might let Lind use his electrical skills to "… be of service in that disorder and appears to me to merit a fair trial."

The practice of "Resurrectionism", the stealing of bodies for dissections as it was to be more commonly called, was rampant in London at the time as medical colleges struggled to acquire bodies for student practical learning.

Lind was inevitably drawn into this practice whether fairly or not and Mary, when she began writing her famous novel "Frankenstein", based her main character, the mad doctor, on Lind and subsequently he has achieved a type of fame if at times undeserved. Lind has subsequently also appeared as a body snatcher in The Phantom comic "The Grave Robbers" and so his influence  still echoes today.

So it is easy to understand why there was so much attention and official concern into what was for the times a quite common seafaring mishap.

Lamont Young was not just a government geologist   who two days after arriving at his latest assignment disappeared. He was royally connected and his case warranted serious attention. His mother ensured that this was the case.

A grieving mother, the Queen of England, mad scientists, Frankenstein monsters, parliamentary inquiries and an assortment of colourful local characters who were all drawn into the Bermagui mystery are part of what continues today to be an intriguing local history.

Seven people have been admitted to hospitals with a fever, cough and shortness of breath in recent weeks, Alabama Department of Public Health spokeswoman Mary McIntyre said in a statement.

Two of the seven have died. The Alabama Department of Public Health and the Centers for Disease Control Respiratory Laboratory are analyzing lab tests from all seven patients. McIntyre says officials hope to have preliminary results on the samples back by Wednesday or Thursday morning.

The illness was first reported late last week and the last of the seven patients was hospitalized Monday, McIntyre said.

It wasn't immediately clear which municipalities the illnesses were concentrated in.

"We're only aware of the Southeast, but we don't know — we haven't received reports from anywhere else," McIntyre said. "That's why we're trying to get the information out."

McIntyre said it's unclear what's causing the illness but some of the seven patients also had the flu. Authorities are urging hospital staff to wear masks when caring for patients who appear to be suffering from respiratory illnesses.

The Centers for Disease Control referred all questions to Alabama health officials.



More Associated Press.

MOSINEE, Wisc (WSAU) The DNR says this year's fish kill on the Big Eau Plaine reservoir is not as bad as expected. Still, the fish population is down dramatically this year.

The DNR has completed an electro-survey. It's where an electrical current is sent into the water that temporarily stuns the fish so they can be counted. This year's Walleye count per hour was 35, down from 144 a year ago.

Based on a more serious fish-kill in 2009, the DNR says the fish population will recover. Volunteers are also working to re-stock the area over the next three years.

The DNR report also says the new aerator is working properly.

..Sav Killz comes thru with a set of visuals for his Biggie tribute "Kick in The Door." This is from DJ J-Ronin\'s All Elements Freestyle Files vol.2 "Everybody Who\'s Anybody."..Video Directed and Edited by Erinn Clancy....

This is a discussion on Please Help! Betta Fins Clamped, But Healthy Water?? within the Freshwater Fish Disease forums, part of the More Freshwater Aquarium Topics category; Hi! I posted this as a different thread, so I'm copying and pasting: I'm worried about my crowntail betta . I have had him for 2.5 months and he has been healthy until now. For the past few days he ...

Aquarium Fish Forum Thread Tools

Show Printable Version







Hi! I posted this as a different thread, so I'm copying and pasting:

I'm worried about my crowntail betta. I have had him for 2.5 months and he has been healthy until now. For the past few days he has been holding his tail (slightly clamped) and is becoming less active. Today I noticed that he will hang by the surface, stop or even hold his pectoral fins to his body, then swim to the other side of the tank, or down amongst the plants, hang out, move again... You get the idea. Sometimes his position looks worrying, and then later I will see him swim with his fins okay.

He used to always be moving about, and he used to hold out his tail. I'm worried about this new behavior.

5 gallon aquarium, Tetra Whisper PF 10 filter, cycled (3 months old), heavily planted with elodea, bogwood, skull.

weekly PWC (I remove 1 gallon at a time).

ammonia 0, nitrite 0, nitrate 0, pH 7.8 - 8.0. Temp. Between 74-78, depends on the day (I live in the tropics so I don't have a heater, however my other bettas are fine and he has been fine before).

One ghost shrimp, recently had four healthy baby platies that were housed in temporarily. I removed them today.

The water is healthy and the other bettas I won are fine, so what's up?

As for the pictures, these are the worst positions I have actually seen him in. His fins aren't normally that clamped.

I hope you can help me!



Hmmm... his fins don't look all that clamped. He does seem a little listless tough. Any idea how old he might be? Seems like all your water parameters are perfect.



Mine got really mopey and paced back and forth in one spot and wouldn't eat for days once.. I thought he was sick. Turns out it was just teenage angst and he finally built his first bubble nest and was fine after that. Still is fine. Hopefully that's your boy's problem, he's got beautiful colors.

-//- ... ... School blazes a low-key but effective energy conservation trail ... ... Ontario set to weaken its Endangered Species Act ... ... Canada a world leader in freshwater quality ... ... Garment industry a boon for poorer countries ... ... Star Trek: Into Oblivion ... ... Canada is not an energy superpower ... ... Science in the dock: experts, climate change and evidence ... ... What's wrong with Quantitative Easing? ... ... 5 keys to achieving an Aboriginal engagement strategy ... ... Your success is pretty much in the BHAG

Canada a world leader in freshwater quality

Part 3 of our 5 part series

This is part 3 in the series The state of Canada's environment - 2013



Some critics frequently excoriate Canada's environmental record and imply that it is becoming more polluted and less environmentally healthy. But a new report from the Frontier Centre for Public Policy doesn't support that conclusion: Canada's natural environment, in fact, is becoming cleaner and greener. The report was written by Senior Policy Analyst Ben Eisen and intern Romy Yourex. Today: a look at freshwater quality.

May 21, 2013

WINNIPEG, MB, May 21, 2013/ Troy Media/ - Freshwater loses its utility and value when polluted. Many types of water pollution can render freshwater resources useless for most economic purposes and dangerous for human consumption.

This pollution can have negative health effects on human beings and animal life. For example, the release of large quantities of plant nutrients including phosphorus and nitrogen can create toxic algal blooms in fresh water.

Large concentrations of mercury and industrial chemicals can have negative effects on human health and threaten the survival of marine life. Measuring water quality is not completely straightforward, however.

Aquatic ecosystems are complex, and there are many factors to consider in the assessment of water quality. For this reason, a number of international organizations and governing bodies have developed composite measures designed to provide an overall assessment of water quality.

Using this data, we can compare Canada's performance with peer countries. Among the most widely respected and cited measures used in cross-country analysis of water quality is the Environmental Performance Index of Water Quality (EPI).

Academics at Yale and Columbia developed the EPI, which assigns each country that it monitors a rating based on measurements from water sites. As the chart below illustrates, the quality of fresh water in Canada as measured by the EPI is among the best in the world. This chart compares Canada to nine other similarly affluent countries.

Graph

Within this peer group, Canada has the second-highest EPI rating, trailing only Sweden. Canada's performance in this area is better than a number of countries that enjoy strong reputations for environmental protection including Germany, France and Japan.

These numbers suggest that Canada's performance in maintaining the environmental health of its lakes and rivers is among the best in the world.

To provide a straightforward way to make an overall assessment of water quality in Canada and the extent to which water quality is changing, the federal government uses a composite measure known as the Water Quality Index (WQI). The WQI allows experts to convert a wide variety of complex water-quality data into a single rating for specific freshwater sites. The WQI measures how often pollutant levels exceed government guidelines and by how much, and it is a useful overall measure of water quality.

The WQI rates freshwater sites as excellent, good, fair, marginal or poor. High ratings (excellent and good) mean pollutant measurements rarely exceed water quality guidelines, and when they do, it is usually by a small margin.

For this indicator, Environment Canada examines freshwater quality in rivers in populated regions. One hundred and seventy-three stations were measured in 16 drainage regions where human activity is especially intensive. As the chart below shows, the majority of stations across Canada were assigned a score of either fair or good, the second- and third-highest ratings on the five-level scale for 2007 to 2009.

Graph

Freshwater quality in populated parts of Canada was rated either excellent or good at 71 monitoring stations, which constituted 41 per cent of all stations. By comparison, water quality was assessed as either marginal or poor at only 35 stations, which represented 20 per cent of the total. This means that twice as many stations across Canada received a positive score as received a negative score.

According to the WQI, there was little change in national freshwater quality since the last set of measurements in 2003 to 2005 (which were reported upon in the 2009 FCPP environmental indicators study). Only seven stations showed a significant improvement in water quality from the last measurement period, and only four stations showed a significant decline in water quality. For the remainder, there was no significant change. This is to be expected, given that freshwater quality indicators tend to change slowly over time.

Canada has enormously abundant freshwater resources. Protecting this extraordinarily valuable environmental endowment should be a top priority for Canadian policymakers.

Happily, the data suggest that Canada is a world leader in terms of freshwater quality. According to the most recent EPI statistics, Canada has the cleanest fresh water in the G8. There is no evidence that Canada's high level of water quality is declining, as Canada's strong performance in this area is mostly unchanged since the last major measurement period overseen by Environment Canada.

While the status of Canada's fresh water is very good by international standards, there is still reason to hope water quality will continue to improve. Major steps have been taken to reduce the harmful impact of municipal wastewater, a major source of water pollution. In 1983, fully 20 per cent of the population's wastewater received no treatment whatsoever. By 2009, this was reduced to just 3 per cent. Secondary and tertiary treatment can further reduce the likelihood of environmental harm from wastewater. In 1983, 40 per cent of the Canadian population benefitted from at least secondary wastewater treatment. By 2009, this number had grown to 68 per cent.

Canada has made significant progress in providing thorough treatment to a larger percentage of wastewater. As more of Canada's municipal wastewater systems receive superior treatment, the potential for water contamination by wastewater continues to decline.

Canadians should view the preservation of this country's abundant fresh water as one of the most important ways of ensuring the continued environmental sustainability of our natural environment. Canada's strong record in this area indicates that its fresh water is protected from pollution in a way that is likely to ensure the continued quality and utility of its freshwater resources for future generations.

Next: Soil quality

This report is FREE to use on your websites or in your publications. However, www.troymedia.com MUST be credited.  

Editor's suggestions

Canada doing well when it comes to curbing greenhouse gases





Some critics frequently excoriate Canada's environmental record and imply that it is becoming more polluted and less environmentally healthy. But a new report from the Frontier Centre for Public Policy ...

Some critics frequently excoriate Canada's environmental record and imply that it is becoming more polluted and less environmentally healthy. But a new report from the Frontier Centre for Public Policy ...

This is a discussion on Please Help! Betta Fins Clamped, But Healthy Water?? within the Freshwater Fish Disease forums, part of the More Freshwater Aquarium Topics category; Hi! I posted this as a different thread, so I'm copying and pasting: I'm worried about my crowntail betta . I have had him for 2.5 months and he has been healthy until now. For the past few days he ...

Aquarium Fish Forum Thread Tools

Show Printable Version







Hi! I posted this as a different thread, so I'm copying and pasting:

I'm worried about my crowntail betta. I have had him for 2.5 months and he has been healthy until now. For the past few days he has been holding his tail (slightly clamped) and is becoming less active. Today I noticed that he will hang by the surface, stop or even hold his pectoral fins to his body, then swim to the other side of the tank, or down amongst the plants, hang out, move again... You get the idea. Sometimes his position looks worrying, and then later I will see him swim with his fins okay.

He used to always be moving about, and he used to hold out his tail. I'm worried about this new behavior.

5 gallon aquarium, Tetra Whisper PF 10 filter, cycled (3 months old), heavily planted with elodea, bogwood, skull.

weekly PWC (I remove 1 gallon at a time).

ammonia 0, nitrite 0, nitrate 0, pH 7.8 - 8.0. Temp. Between 74-78, depends on the day (I live in the tropics so I don't have a heater, however my other bettas are fine and he has been fine before).

One ghost shrimp, recently had four healthy baby platies that were housed in temporarily. I removed them today.

The water is healthy and the other bettas I won are fine, so what's up?

As for the pictures, these are the worst positions I have actually seen him in. His fins aren't normally that clamped.

I hope you can help me!



Hmmm... his fins don't look all that clamped. He does seem a little listless tough. Any idea how old he might be? Seems like all your water parameters are perfect.



Mine got really mopey and paced back and forth in one spot and wouldn't eat for days once.. I thought he was sick. Turns out it was just teenage angst and he finally built his first bubble nest and was fine after that. Still is fine. Hopefully that's your boy's problem, he's got beautiful colors.

YADGIR: Thirty-two fishermen families have been worrying as the Arakera Lake where they do fishery has completely dried up and thousands of fish have died. This is the first time that the lake has gone dry.

The fishermen have all taken loan and now they fear the financial burden the death of the fish will cause. A related problem is that the dead fish have raised a stink in the area, posing health risks to the people.

The drying up of the lake is a warning signal to the people and animals that the groundwater level is decreasing. The fishes have come out due to heat and less water in the lake.

Narasappa, a fisherman and resident of Arakera village, said he took a loan to do rear the fish in the lake which covers an area of 42 acres of land. Narasappa and other villagers took to fishery business a couple of decades ago after they lost their land.

Mahadevappa, another fisherman, said he took loan from private money lenders and put it in fishery as he faced a loss in agriculture. But now he is worried as to how he will repay the loan.

Vijaykumar, a resident, said that the district administration should immediately remove all the dead fish before it becomes a health hazard, and make the area stink-free.

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Par : Farid Belgacem Ce projet qui a été baptisé SAS, acronyme anglais pour "Stand Alone Service" signifiant littéralement "Atelier Seul", comprenez concession avec SAV, mais sans showroom pour la vente de véhicules neufs.

Soucieux de répondre à la demande croissante de sa clientèle en termes de service après-vente (SAV), Sovac, représentant officiel des marques du groupe Volkswagen, développe cette année son réseau de SAV en Algérie, plus particulièrement dans la capitale Alger, en lançant un nouveau concept inédit de concessionnaires spécialisés.

Le PDG de Sovac, Mourad Oulmi, a chargé une équipe de spécialistes du SAV interne à l'entreprise, afin de développer ce projet qui a été baptisé SAS, acronyme anglais pour "Stand Alone Service" signifiant littéralement "Atelier Seul", comprenez concession avec SAV, mais sans showroom pour la vente de véhicules neufs. Le réseau SAS comportera dix concessionnaires sur l'Algérois.

Ces agents agréés SAV seront badgés Volkswagen et adopteront dans leur architecture la charte de la marque mère du groupe. Toutefois, ils pourront accueillir dans leurs infrastructures les clients propriétaires des véhicules des autres marques sœurs de Volkswagen dans le groupe, à savoir Audi, Seat, Skoda et Volkswagen utilitaires. Deux concessions SAS ont déjà ouvert leurs portes à la clientèle, dont Easy Motors à Baraki, au sud-est d'Alger, et GMEX Auto implantée à Douéra, au sud-ouest de la capitale. Ces deux concessions représentent à eux seules les deux variantes que le concept SAS englobe en termes d'activité. La variante S ou 1S, la lettre S ici indiquant le mot anglais "Service" signifiant les prestations classiques de l'après-vente (vidange, filtration, freinage, distribution et climatisation).

La concession GMEX Auto à Douéra est catégorisée 1S, sachant que cette concession offre aux clients des prestations de service pour la maintenance de leur véhicule en s'abstenant de vendre au comptoir de la pièce de rechange aux clients. La variante S&S ou 2S, les deux lettres S pour indiquer les mots en anglais "Service et Spare Parts", le mot service désignant là aussi les prestations classiques de maintenance et "Spare Parts" pour signifier que la concession est habilitée à vendre de la pièce de rechange d'origine au détail au client (Spare Parts = pièces détachées). La concession Easy Motors sise à Baraki est catégorisée 2S, car disposant des infrastructures nécessaires à ces deux activités. Sovac, à travers ces ateliers de proximité, cherche à augmenter la fidélité de ses clients à la marque allemande en instaurant via ces concessionnaires, implantés dans des zones urbanisées, une relation de confiance que le client retrouve dans son quotidien avec son médecin, son coiffeur, son épicier et, désormais, avec sa concession Volkswagen.

Cap sur la proximité

Sovac a aussi considéré dans le développement de ce projet la satisfaction de sa clientèle féminine, en cherchant à implanter ces concessions SAS dans un voisinage comportant des commodités qui intéressent les femmes en particulier (magasin et autres). Cette catégorie de clientèle étant souvent désemparée en se retrouvant chez des concessionnaires isolés du réseau de transport de la ville, rendant l'attente de son véhicule très longue et la logistique compliquée, lorsque ce même véhicule doit être immobilisé et que l'on doit rentrer chez soi par ses propres moyens. Volkswagen veut aussi marquer l'urbanisme des localités dans lesquelles seront implantées ces concessions SAS, en adoptant des architectures à la fois simples et modernes, marquant ainsi l'esprit des riverains, des passants et surtout des clients de la marque. Pour l'exemple, la première concession Easy Motors sise à Baraki a transcendé l'urbanisme de localité qui en avait fortement besoin. Autre objectif, la création de postes d'emplois pour les jeunes diplômés du secteur automobile et la diversification des canaux de distribution de la pièce de rechange d'origine du constructeur à travers ces nouveaux points de service, rendant ainsi cette pièce accessible partout pour le client. Dans le courant de l'année 2014, le projet des ateliers de proximité SAS sera étendu aux autres villes du pays. Comme première étape, les grandes villes comme Oran, Constantine et Sétif seront pourvues de concessions avec ce concept. D'autres villes bénéficieront de ces points de services selon le plan de développement stratégique du réseau Sovac. A noter que Sovac lancera bientôt deux campagnes de communication, l'une pour annoncer la première vague d'ouverture des concessions SAS à Alger et une autre pour chercher et recruter, toujours dans la capitale, des investisseurs intéressés à devenir des concessionnaires SAS et ainsi représenter la prestigieuse marque.



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C'était le 20 mars passé. Dans ce même espace, nous écrivions ceci : "Maintenant que les présomptions impliquent des responsabilités hors et "au-dessus" de Sonatrach, il serait injuste de continuer à parler d'affaire "Sonatrach"…" Dimanche dernier, le ministre de l'Énergie et des Mines, faisant allusion aux affaires Sonatrach et aux soupçons concernant certains marchés de réalisation de centrales électriques, déclarait ...

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For patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome, prolonged prone positioning during mechanical ventilation is associated with significantly reduced mortality at 28 and 90 days, according to a study published online May 20 in the New England Journal of Medicine to coincide with presentation at the annual meeting of the American Thoracic Society, held from May 17 to 22 in Philadelphia.

(HealthDay)—For patients with acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), prolonged prone positioning during mechanical ventilation is associated with significantly reduced mortality at 28 and 90 days, according to a study published online May 20 in the New England Journal of Medicine to coincide with presentation at the annual meeting of the American Thoracic Society, held from May 17 to 22 in Philadelphia.

Claude Guérin, M.D., Ph.D., from the Hôpital de la Croix-Rousse in Lyon, France, and colleagues examined the effect of early application of prone positioning on outcomes in a multicenter prospective randomized trial involving 466 patients with severe ARDS. Participants were randomized to undergo prone positioning of at least 16 hours (237 patients) or to be left in a supine position (229 patients).

The researchers found that 28-day mortality was significantly lower in the prone group (16.0 percent) compared with the supine group (32.8 percent; hazard ratio for death with prone positioning, 0.39). The unadjusted 90-day mortality was significantly lower in the prone versus the supine group (23.6 versus 41.0 percent; hazard ratio, 0.44). There was no significant between-group difference in the incidence of complications, with the exception of cardiac arrest incidence, which was higher in the supine group.

"In patients with severe ARDS, early application of prolonged prone-positioning sessions significantly decreased 28-day and 90-day mortality," the authors write.

Several authors disclosed financial ties to the pharmaceutical and health care industries.

Osteoporosis and low bone density (osteopenia) — conditions characterized by loss of bone mass — are major health concerns in the United States. Throughout our lifespan, bone is constantly broken down and rebuilt, usually in a balanced way that results in bone growth and mineral accumulation in bones ("bone mineral density") that supports a strong skeleton. As we age, this accumulation reaches its highest point ("peak bone mineral density") and gradually shifts towards bone loss. Osteopenia occurs when bone mineral density declines below a healthy value; osteoporosis is its more severe manifestation, and both increase the risk of bone fractures.

The most recent national survey estimates that 9% of people over age 50 have osteoporosis, while 49% have osteopenia. In other words, more than half of the aging U.S. population has a chronic bone disease that puts them at risk for bone fractures. When bone fractures occur in older people with osteopenia or osteoporosis, patients often require surgery, usually followed by a prolonged recovery period, often in a skilled nursing facility. They may still experience significant pain and/or a permanent decline in function, or even death — an estimated 20% of individuals with osteoporosis-related fractures die within a year.

You Can Reduce Your Risk

All is not hopeless, however! In fact, there are many lifestyle changes that everyone at any age can make to help reduce their risk of osteopenia, osteoporosis and bone fractures:

• Get an adequate amount of vitamin D and calcium from your diet

• Engage in consistent weight-bearing and muscle-strengthening physical activity

• Avoid tobacco and excess alcohol consumption

Maintaining Bone Health

Vitamin D and calcium are the superstars of bone health. Most of the body's calcium is stored in the bones, and adequate calcium intake is essential for healthy bone formation. Vitamin D is important for calcium absorption from the gastrointestinal tract and helps maintain the balance between calcium deposited in the bones and the calcium in body fluids. Adequate dietary intake of both nutrients is important for achieving peak bone mineral density in early life (for most people by age 30, with adolescence being the most important time for building strong bones) and maintaining bone mineral density in later years.

• 1,200 mg for women 51 years and older and men 71 years and older

Dietary Sources

Consuming a healthy, well-balanced diet generally provides adequate amounts of calcium from food sources:

• Dairy — About 3 servings daily of low- or non-fat dairy products (1 serving = 8 oz. of milk or 6 oz. of yogurt or 1o oz. of cheese) can provide the majority of daily needs.

• Non-Dairy — For people who do not consume dairy products, there is a wide variety of good non-dairy food sources, including dark green leafy vegetables, the soft bones of fatty fish, such as salmon and sardines, and calcium-fortified foods.

If adequate calcium intake still cannot be obtained from dietary intake, a calcium supplement with vitamin D may be considered. These should be taken with food and in quantities of less than 500 mg of calcium per dose, to optimize absorption.

The human body can produce its own vitamin D through sun exposure, and this contributes to a person's vitamin D status. Unfortunately, there are currently no guidelines as to an appropriate amount of sun exposure for this purpose.

Supplements

Individuals at risk for vitamin D deficiency, including the elderly, individuals with limited sun exposure, obese individuals and people with dark skin, may benefit from vitamin D supplements.

For More Information

Check out the websites for the National Osteoporosis Foundation and the NIH Osteoporosis and Related Bone Diseases National Resource Center for more information on osteoporosis prevention and maintaining bone health.

To find an excellent doctor who is right for you, please call our Physician Referral Service at 866.804.1007.

Information provided by Simone Walters, MS, RD, a Clinical Nutritionist at Beth Israel Medical Center.

Boys who are diagnosed with ADHD in elementary school are more likely to be obese adults than those who don't have the condition, a new study suggests.

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Alexis Normand is charged with singing the Canadian and American anthems and she has the unfortunate honor of her disaster preserved for YouTube eternity.

VietNamNet Bridge – The Central Hospital for Tropical Diseases recently received a 40-year-old male patient from Thai Binh Province who was in the state of shock, gangrene on his left arm, caused by infection of the flesh-eating bacteria Aeromonas hydropila.

Previously, the patients had a fever and one day later his left forearm was swollen. That symptom spread across the arm and the shoulder. After 10 days of treatment, he got out of shock and sepsis, but the skin of his left arm was necrotized. He was transferred to the National Institute of Burns for skin grafts.

Dr. Nguyen Trung Cap, Deputy Director of the Emergency Ward of the Central Hospital for Tropical Diseases said this patient (hospitalized on April 12) had full clinical symptoms of infection with those who were infected with the flesh-eating bacteria. But he was treated by antibiotics so tests did not find the presence of the bacteria.

Since 2009, the hospital has received dozens of cases of sepsis due to Aeromonas hydropila bacteria. The bacteria quickly cause necrosis so they are called "flesh eating bacteria".

Recently the United States also discovered patients with the flesh-eating bacterial. Some of them had their limbs amputated or even died. The disease makes people panic.

Dr. Nguyen Hong Ha, Deputy Director of the Central Tropical Disease Hospital, said the cases in Vietnam showed typical characteristics of necrotic neck, chest, arms and legs but this is not the disease in many patients in the United States.

Aeromonas hydrophila is a heterotrophic, Gram-negative, rod-shaped bacterium mainly found in areas with a warm climate. This bacterium can be found in fresh or brackish water. It can survive in aerobic and anaerobic environments, and can digest materials such as gelatin and hemoglobin. Aeromonas hydrophila was isolated from humans and animals in the 1950s. It is the most well known of the six species of Aeromonas. It is resistant to most common antibiotics and cold temperatures.

Aeromonas hydrophila is not as pathogenic to humans as it is to fish and amphibians. One of the diseases it can cause in humans is gastroenteritis. This disease can affect anyone, but it occurs most in young children and people who have compromised immune systems or growth problems. This bacterium is linked to two types of gastroenteritis. The first type is a disease similar to cholera, which causes rice-water diarrhea. The other type of disease is dysenteric gastroenteritis, which causes loose stools filled with blood and mucus. Dysenteric gastroenteritis is the most severe out of the two types, and can last for multiple weeks. Aeromonas hydrophila is also associated with cellulitis, an infection that causes inflammation in the skin tissue. It also causes diseases such as myonecrosis and eczema in people with compromised or suppressed (by medication) immune systems. In very rare cases, Aeromonas hydrophila can cause necrotizing fasciitis.

By Victoria Klesty

OSLO | Tue May 21, 2013 8:25am EDT



OSLO (Reuters) - Norwegian fish farmer Cermaq (CEQ.OL) has failed to win enough shareholder support to buy Peruvian fish feed maker Copeinca (COPE.OL), opening the door to a $1.7 billion takeover of Cermaq by bigger rival Marine Harvest (MHG.OL).

Most Cermaq shareholders backed the deal to buy Copeinca at a meeting on Tuesday, but the company was short of the two-thirds support it needed. That result sent Cermaq shares sharply higher as investors bet Marine Harvest would now come back with a sweetened offer to secure a deal.

Marine Harvest, the world's biggest fish farmer, said earlier on Tuesday it would be willing to offer $1.7 billion for Cermaq, or possibly more, but only if the company dropped its own $730 million bid for Copeinca.

"We just have to accept the shareholder vote," Cermaq Chief Financial Officer Tore Valderhaug said. "We still think (the Marine Harvest) offer is low but it's positive they say they are willing to raise it."

Salmon farmers have been among the hottest stocks recently as global demand is rising sharply at a time when supply growth is limited and Chile, a top global supplier, is facing renewed signs of disease.

Marine Harvest, which recently purchased a major processing firm, is aiming to create a global fish giant that would be a top player in everything from feed to processing.

Shares in Marine Harvest, controlled by shipping tycoon John Fredriksen, are up 92 percent over the past year, giving it a market capitalisation of about $4 billion, while Cermaq shares are up over 60 percent.

Cermaq shares surged once again on Tuesday, rising to 110 crowns apiece after the shareholder vote, well above Marine Harvest's 105 crown offer and indicating investors expect an improved bid. Marine Harvest shares also rose over 3 percent.

Marine Harvest's initial proposal was rejected by Cermaq's biggest shareholder, the Norwegian state, which has a holding of 43.5 percent.

Marine Harvest, which has not made a formal bid, said it would now need a few days to put its offer together and that it was willing to consider a higher bid.

"We could be prepared to improve both the price and composition of our offer in order to find an amicable solution acceptable to all parties," it said.

The rejection may also be good news for Copeinca itself as China Fishery Group (CNFG.SI), which had also bid for the firm, said it would be willing to raise its own bid, if Cermaq's shareholders rejected the deal on Tuesday.

Still, a deal between Marine Harvest and Cermaq could be an uphill struggle.

Fredriksen, estimated to be worth $11.5 billion by Forbes magazine, is a controversial figure in Norway, particularly with the centre-left Labour government.

Having traded his Norwegian passport for Cypriot citizenship for tax purposes, he has been moving many of his companies away from Norway's prosperous oil-based economy, prompting some criticism.

(Writing by Balazs Koranyi; Editing by Mark Potter)

Lake Michigan, west of St. Ignace. Photo courtesy of Michigan Sea Grant.The two-year grants of up to $50,000 will support diverse projects, including efforts to track the remediation of harmful algae blooms; assess the effectiveness of techniques to control non-native weedy plant invasions; study chromosomal damage in tree swallow nestlings; and monitor fish responses to restoration activities.

The grants were awarded to multidisciplinary teams led by researchers at universities across the Great Lakes region and beyond. Fifty-four proposals were submitted for the first round of Water Center research grants. A second round of larger grants, of up to $500,000 each, will be awarded later this year.

"These initial grants are to an exceptional few projects that really addressed our goals and clearly identified outcomes that matter to the region's resource management community. They are going to fill key gaps in our restoration knowledge," said Water Center Director Allen Burton.

The $9 million U-M Water Center was formed in October with an initial focus on providing a solid scientific framework for more efficient and effective Great Lakes restoration. As a center of U-M's Graham Sustainability Institute, the Water Center was made possible by a $4.5 million, three-year grant from the Fred A. and Barbara M. Erb Family Foundation and additional funds from the university.

"The Erb Family Foundation is pleased to support the important work of U-M's new Water Center to demonstrate the effectiveness of investments in Great Lakes restoration," said foundation President John Erb. "The lakes are a unique and precious ecosystem that we must steward for the benefit of current and future generations."

During its first three years, the center will focus on identifying and filling critical science gaps in the four focus areas of the federal Great Lakes Restoration Initiative: removing toxic contamination and restoring regions of environmental degradation known as areas of concern; combating invasive species; protecting and restoring wildlife and their habitats; and ridding nearshore waters of polluted runoff.

In selecting the first 12 grants, special emphasis was given to proposals that integrated one or more GLRI focus areas or that evaluated the potential effects of climate change on Great Lakes restoration efforts. In all cases, the U-M funding will be used to support existing restoration and protection efforts in the Great Lakes, not to establish new projects.

"Our goal is to provide that additional boost to existing restoration projects that will enable them to conduct an analysis of their outcomes that can demonstrate the value of a particular method or approach," said Water Center Deputy Director Jennifer Read. "We don't often have the necessary resources to do this kind of synthesis, and it's key to understanding what we're doing right and what we need to tweak."

The 12 selected projects and their principal investigators are:

"Birds as indicators of contaminant exposure in the Great Lakes: Chromosomal damage assessment via flow cytometry," Cole Matson, Baylor University. Goal: Assess chromosomal damage in tree swallow nestlings collected from contaminated areas across the Great Lakes region.

"Monitoring fish community responses to restoration activities in the Rouge River watershed," Emily Saarinen, University of Michigan-Dearborn. Goal: Characterize the fish community composition in southeast Michigan's highly urbanized Rouge River watershed to understand how it is impacted by watershed-level restoration efforts.

"Development of indicators to track the remediation of harmful algal blooms in Sodus Bay, Lake Ontario," Gregory Boyer, State University of New York-Syracuse. Goal: Field-test a suite of indicators that can be used throughout the Great Lakes basin to track progress in the remediation of harmful algae blooms.

"Application of geospatially enabled geographic response plans for oil spill response in the western basin of Lake Erie," David Dean, Michigan Technological University. Goal: Allow the analysis, display and distribution of geospatial data in a manner that meets the needs of planners, responders and incident managers in the event of oil or chemical spills.

"Coupling mercury, lead and strontium isotopes in archived Great Lakes precipitation samples to improve pollutant source apportionment with new and novel techniques," J. Timothy Dvonch, University of Michigan. Goal: Measure mercury, lead and strontium isotopes in previously collected rainfall samples to develop a new method to "fingerprint" emissions of these metals and link sources with atmospheric deposition sites across the Great Lakes region.

"Assessing ecosystem services provided by restored wetlands under current and future climate and land-use scenarios," Kenneth Elgersma, University of Northern Iowa. Goal: Augment an existing computer model to assess the effectiveness of techniques—including herbicide application, burning and mowing—to control non-native weedy plant invasions.

"Performance data collection for GLRI SWIF project assessment in Lucas County, Ohio," Cyndee Gruden, University of Toledo. Goal: Performance monitoring of innovative storm-water management demonstration projects including rain gardens, wetlands, permeable pavement and biofiltration.

"Assessing the bioavailability of HOCs during habitat restoration," Nathan Johnson, University of Minnesota-Duluth. Goal: Evaluate the bioavailability of sediment-associated contaminants before and after restoration efforts using dredged materials from the Duluth-Superior Harbor.

"Monitoring stream ecosystem function responses to stamp sand stabilization in tributaries of Lake Superior," Amy Marcarelli, Michigan Technological University. Goal: Monitor stream ecosystem functions at a project to stabilize and revegetate floodplain habitat buried by copper-rich stamp sands, a significant source of water pollution to lakes and streams of Michigan's western Upper Peninsula.

"A Bayesian hierarchical modeling approach for comparing water quality measurements from different sources," Song Qian, University of Toledo. Goal: Develop models linking Lake Erie water-quality data collected by different institutions using different sampling methods.

"Water quality benefit assessment of Lake Erie coastal wetlands," Justin Saarinen, University of Michigan-Dearborn. Goal: Identify alternative restoration scenarios for western Lake Erie by assessing whether coastal and diked wetlands provide a significant water-quality benefit to the lake.

"Extended and novel monitoring of climate, nutrients and ecosystem dynamics in the Green Bay ecosystem, 2013," J. Val Klump, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. Goal: Provide an additional season of physical and chemical data that will lead to improved ecosystem modeling to assess the efficacy of best management practices designed to address beneficial use impairments under a suite of changing climate scenarios.



The Great Lakes hold 20 percent of the world's surface freshwater. The region includes 10,000 miles of coastline and numerous globally rare plant and animal species. In addition, the Great Lakes support a wide range of recreational and economic activities, including vibrant tourism and a sport fishery industry that contributes $4 billion to the economy.

Related Links:

UK - Overfishing has reduced fish populations and biodiversity across much of the world's oceans. In response, fisheries are increasingly reliant on a handful of highly valuable shellfish. However, new research by the University of York shows this approach to be extremely risky.

The research, published in the journal Fish and Fisheries, shows that traditional fisheries targeting large predators such as cod and haddock, have declined over the past hundred years. In their place, catches of shellfish such as prawns, scallops and lobsters have rocketed as they begin to thrive in unnaturally predator-low environments often degraded by the passage of trawls and dredges.

In many places, including the UK, shellfish are now the most valuable marine resource. The research by the Environment Department at York suggests that although a shellfish-dominated ecosystem appears beneficial from an economic perspective, it is highly risky.

Like simplified agricultural systems, these shellfisheries are unstable in the long-term and at great risk of collapse from disease, species invasions and climate change. Warming and acidification of our oceans due to greenhouse gas emissions is expected to affect shellfish worst. Ocean acidification, in particular, will limit the ability of scallops and other shellfish to form proper shells, and lead to widespread mortality.

Lead author, Leigh Howarth, says: "Prawns are now the most valuable fishery in the UK, with catches currently worth over £110 million a year. But this fishery has come to exist only after we overexploited populations of cod, haddock and other predators. If shellfish now collapsed the social consequences for fishermen would be devastating. There are simply very few remaining species left to target."

The study reports similar findings from all over the world. In the United States and Canada, catches of lobster, scallops and crab have also come to dominate following the collapse of cod. However, disease and climate change again put these species at great risk. While in the Black Sea, Baltic and off the west coast of Africa, overfishing of large predators have caused the ecosystems to become overrun with jellyfish, resulting in severe oxygen depletion and eruptions of hydrogen sulphide, thereby wiping out important food chains across 100,000 square kilometres of seabed.

Co-author Dr Bryce Stewart adds: "Shellfish make a valuable contribution to our fisheries. But we cannot just assume everything is rosy. There is an urgent need for continued improvements in management of finfish fisheries, and an ecosystem approach which rebuilds the diversity, resilience and productivity of our oceans into the future."

Co-author Professor Callum Roberts concludes: "The rise of shellfish has been welcomed by many as a lifeline for the fishing industry. However, such changes are not a result of successful management, but rather a result of management failure, a failure to protect stocks and their habitats in the face of industry innovation and overfishing. This study highlights why the UK needs to urgently act to protect our seas. We need more marine protected areas to stop our seas from becoming a wasteland and to restore the diversity and productivity of fisheries well into the future".

TheFishSite News Desk

CO2 Group is pleased to advise the market that its wholly-owned subsidiary Western Australian Resources Limited (WARL or the 'Company') has entered into option agreements for the lands required for the entire Project Sea Dragon development.

The Company has been investigating and analysing properties across Northern Australia to identify the best locations for the establishment of its world scale aquaculture project. After shortlisting a select number of high quality properties, the Company has optioned its preferred sites for development of grow-out ponds and is in advanced negotiations on other suitable properties and ancillary infrastructure sites required for Project Sea Dragon.

"This is another significant milestone for Project Sea Dragon as it enables the next stage of Project Feasibility to be undertaken. It dramatically assists the Company in securing a Joint Venture partner to take the project to Bankability," said Andrew Grant, CEO of CO2 Group.

Whilst the locations of the preferred sites are subject to confidentiality agreements and cannot be disclosed at this stage, the properties represent world class development sites and have been chosen after rigorous site analysis, assessing factors such as physical features, environmental qualities, production value, land tenure, social licence to operate, proximity to relevant infrastructure and capital demand.

Managing Director of WARL, Robert Bell commented "These sites represent some of the best locations for large scale land-based aquaculture in the world and the land areas are of sufficient size to develop – subject to government approvals – the full scale of 10,000 hectares of grow-out ponds proposed for Project Sea Dragon. They also provide importantly, optionality for the Project's other required infrastructure and scalability into additional projects into the future".

The Company is very satisfied with progress to date on Project Sea Dragon and is confident of securing third party investors. Preliminary discussions with Australian and international investors have been held and the interest to date in the project has been very high. Shortlisted parties have this week been invited into a project data room and are now progressing with investment due diligence.

WARL is also in discussions with several parties regarding offtake agreements for its high grade Black Tiger Prawn product which command premium prices in markets in the USA, Japan, the EU and China.

CO2 Group will continue to keep the market appraised of additional milestones as they are achieved.

Please refer any queries to Rob Bell (WARL Managing Director) on 08 9321 4111.

晨报讯(主任记者刘果园)怀疑丈夫外面有人，两人大闹一场后，妻子孙某将俩人共同经营的鱼塘里的5000条地图鱼毒死。 昨日，记者从海城法院了解到，孙某被判处有期徒刑一年六个月，缓刑二年。 女子怀疑丈夫外遇当街暴 ...

一位村民对记者说：“村里养鱼的人不是很多，也就两三户，前几天兰女士家的事情刚发生的时候，鱼塘上漂浮着大片白花花的死鱼，这几天经过打捞，水塘已经基本清理干净了。”记者在鱼塘边仍然发现了零星的死鱼。“这些鱼是刚 ...

连日来，南昌经开区黄家湖南岸出现大面积死鱼，湖面上弥漫的腥臭味让附近的居民和学生苦不堪言，也让养殖户们心痛不已。据养殖户介绍，湖里养殖的鱼已基本死亡，经济损失十分严重。而鱼大面积死亡的原因，养殖户认为是雨 ...

Animal advocates were outraged when Russia announced they were sending mice, lizards, fish and other species to space for a 30 day mission. Now, the journey is over and the animals are back on earth, but not all of them made it. And even worse than that, the ones who did come back alive will be killed as part of the research.

Out of the 53 mice that Russia sent into space, less than half came back alive. No details have been released on how the mice died. According to the AP, Vladimir Sychov, deputy director of the Institute of Medical and Biological Problems, said that this was to be expected. Sychov noted on Russian television, "This is the first time that animals have flown in space for so long on their own." The research was designed to better help scientists understand the impacts of space travel (such as weightlessness) on cell structure.

Nicole Rayl, project manager for NASA's portion of the mission, had said before the launch that in order to gather the data from the animals upon their return, they would need to be "humanely euthanized." What we'd like to know is what caused the mice to perish while traveling 575 kilometers above the earth. Food? Stress? Air quality? Something else? Did they suffer? The only small consolation for the returning animals is that their death will likely be quick and relatively painless.  We doubt information will be released on why many of the mice in particular didn't make make it. The lizards all came back alive. (Again, their survival will sadly be short lived.) We just hope this is the last time any animal that didn't dream of growing up to be an astronaut gets sent up to space.

Photo Credit: Shutterstock

Ali Berman is a writer, teacher and activist. She works as a humane educator for HEART teaching kids about issues affecting people, animals and the environment. Ali is also a fiction writer. Her published work can be found on her website at aliberman.com. In early 2012 Ali co-founded flipmeover, a production company with the mission to use media to raise awareness of social issues.

View all posts by Ali Berman →

Sad, surely, but then this is how scientific progress is made. They didn't rocket these animals up there at $10,000 per pound (or whatever crazy number it takes to get something into orbit) for no reason than to get off on some bizarre and expensive form of animal torture. It's called research, and sometimes it means breaking eggs in order to make the omelet.

So long as their methodology isn't purposefully more inhumane than is inherently necessary, quit the bitching.

Urging you to take a look at the Alternatives and the world-wide push to switch to them! This is a very informative site on Reducing Refining and Replacing (the 3R's of Alternatives to Animal Experimentation)

Better a few mice, lizards and fish die than all life on the planet die because we were unwilling to develop technology. With or without humans, life on earth has an expiration date. It takes intelligent species to overcome that limitation. If it is not humans, than the next intelligent species to evolve would do it or perish.

And how does the author know that mice don't dream of going into space?

And how does the author know that captured mice didn't dream to die.

Animal research is the foundation of nearly all biological scientific advances throughout the history of mankind.

Crazy.. everyday thousands of mice are getting killed in laboratories, clinical trials and schools yet this is a story? 50 mice… shite, I think in my old shop I may have killed 50 mice within a 24hr period once

What a crock, sensational media at its finest. What animal activists were outraged? did you interview them?

So should we send up Humans instead and see if they survive the tests? These animal rights people are complete idiots. They've probably never watched a single nature show or have the slightest clue of how nature works. I don't see them protesting the sale of rat poison, bug spray, and ant traps.

So does that give us the LD-50 for exposure to Russian space travel? PEL would ostensibly be much lower.

Oh yeah! You gotta love people that love their animals/pests more than other people.

Poor article, lame reporting.

better than being a troll i suppose… why are you on this site exactly???

Live things reveal more info. Sure, there would have to be complex methodology but that's cheap compared to the costs of orbit. Live animal evaluation must surely be better than the limited data gleaned from chemical testing of dead animals.

When alive, variations of all sorts of chemicals AND actions would have been slightly different, such as adrenalin and mating habits. Sided with "control" species may have even identified either problematic or even improved respiratory or psychological traits caused from ZG…

Seems like much valuable info was wasted by killing them afterwards! Besides, what good info comes from dead animals (that we don't already know about).

Mice are to be killed at home, not in space, lol.

Where does it show ANYONE was 'outraged.' Is this an attempt to troll?

I say we send up those on death row. Why aren't we asking those people to donate their bodies to science? At least they can actually give consent…

Stephen Hawking and a group of top scientists made the Cambridge Declaration of Consciousness of all-animals. The evidence has tipped the scales to think otherwise, and it is time to ramp up the 3R's of Alternatives to animal research (reduction, refinement, and replacement). It's time to evolve!!

One of the most powerful ads we've seen. Adrien Brody narrates in @peta's new captive ape ad - http://t.co/9IyToeMkd7 about 45 minutes ago from HootSuite Reply Retweet Favorite

WATCH: Adrien Brody Voices Powerful New Ape Ad http://t.co/XUJvCSzRjm That ending @PETA - gave us chills. #animalrights about 49 minutes ago from web Reply Retweet Favorite

RT @MelissaRowley: Growing list RT @HuffPostImpact How to help Oklahoma http://t.co/Pu2rwvhnPr about 14 hours ago from web Reply Retweet Favorite

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May 19, 2013 — Overfishing has reduced fish populations and biodiversity across much of the world's oceans. In response, fisheries are increasingly reliant on a handful of highly valuable shellfish. However, new research by the University of York shows this approach to be extremely risky.

Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd) is the deadly chytrid fungus killing amphibians worldwide. Researchers have tracked the fungus to African clawed frogs (Xenopus laevis) in South Africa back to 1934, but how did it leave Africa and those frogs to cause the recent decline and extinction of 200 frog species worldwide?

Vance Vredenburg of San Francisco State University wants to know. In 2008, he witnessed a population of frogs he studied in Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park drop 99.9% due to Bd.

So working with a team of researchers at Stanford, Vredenburg began looking at the herpetology collection here at the Academy. Our own Jens Vindum offered the team several specimens of African clawed frogs to swab for DNA samples. The scientists focused on specimens collected from wild populations in California between 2001 and 2010.

African clawed frogs were imported to the US between the 1930s and 1950s for use in pregnancy tests. The frogs ovulate when injected with a pregnant woman's urine.

"Today, these frog populations are often found in or near urban areas, probably because hospitals released them into the wild when new pregnancy testing methods were invented in the 1960s," Vredenburg says. Since then, the frogs have established feral populations throughout North America, including Golden Gate Park.

Sure enough, the Academy's California specimens of African clawed frogs carried Bd. "This is the first evidence of the disease among introduced feral populations in the US, and it suggests these frogs may be responsible for introducing a devastating, non-native disease to amphibians in the United States," says Vredenburg.

And while the species is a known Bd carrier, these amphibians don't succumb to the fungus. "It's amazing that more than half a century after being brought to California, these frogs are still here, and they still carry this highly infectious disease," remarks Vredenburg. "This implies that there must be a stable relationship between the pathogen and the frogs, whereas there are other frog species, for example in the Sierra Nevada, which have been wiped out by the pathogen."

The team also tested archived Academy specimens collected in Africa between 1871 and 2010 and found evidence confirming that Bd was present among indigenous populations of this species before they were exported worldwide.

Although no longer used in pregnancy testing, African clawed frogs are still imported to the US for use in biomedical and basic science research. Because of their suspected role as a carrier of the Bd fungus and other potential pathogens, eleven states have already restricted the importation of these frogs, by requiring special permits and not allowing them to be sold as pets.

The study was published last week in PLoS One.

Stay tuned—this summer, Science Today will document Vredenburg's and Academy researcher Dave Blackburn's fight against Bd.

Image: Michael Linnenbach/Wikipedia

Today, many scientists believe we are on the cusp of a sixth mass extinction which could wipe out most life on Earth as we know it. Here are seven signs that they could be right.

Image of Australian wildfires from space, via NASA

A mass extinction happens when over 75 percent of all species on the planet die in a period of less than two million years. That may sound long to you, but it's the blink of an eye in geologic time. There have been five mass extinctions on Earth over the past 540 million years, sometimes caused by catastrophic disasters, and sometimes by quiet, insidious events like invasive species taking over the planet.

7. Earth Is Bubbling with Super Volcanoes

Yellowstone Park in the United States is actually a volcano caldera, a thin cork of earth that sits on top of a massive cache of broiling magma. And this super-volcano could blow any time. The last time Earth witnessed an explosion of this size was in 1812, when Mount Tambora in Indonesia erupted so profusely that the Earth's climate cooled for several years afterwards. Even more frightening is the prospect that another kind of super volcano, called a large igneous province (LIP), could become active sometime in the future. A now-inactive LIP, called the Siberian Traps, erupted 250 million years ago. It spewed so much sulfur, carbon other greenhouse gases into the air that the Earth experienced a climate change catastrophe, vacillating wildly between extreme heat and cold until 95 percent of all life had died. This mass extinction was so bad it's been nicknamed "the Great Dying" by geologists. Yellowstone is not a LIP, but if it explodes into a super eruption, the damage will be incredible. Super volcanoes are an ever-present threat, that have haunted the Earth for millions of years.

6. Invasive Species Are Everywhere

On Earth, humans have aggressively invaded every continent except Antarctica, swelling our population to over 7 billion individuals and eating everything in sight. Like rats and cockroaches, we are the ultimate invasive species, pushing many creatures out of their native habitats — which could, ultimately, kill those creatures on a huge scale. Our population could grow a lot bigger before humans are endangered, but that doesn't mean we wouldn't harm other species. About 359 million years ago, 75 percent of all species on Earth died during the Devonian mass extinction. Geologist Alicia Stigall has evidence that this horrific slaughter was the result of invasive species like sharks (yes, there were sharks hundreds of millions of years ago) aggressively eating all the food in every environment — slowly starving all the creatures who depended on local food sources and couldn't move to new feeding regions.



The Arctic ice cap is shrinking. Temperatures are rising. Scientists across many disciplines and countries are united in their belief that the climate on Earth is getting hotter. The good news is that humans might not be the only cause of this climate change — the planet has suffered through dramatic shifts in temperature many times over its history. The bad news is that pretty much every time that happens there's a mass extinction. The Great Dying was caused by climate change. The very first mass extinction 540 million years ago, called the Ordovician Extinction, was set off by a rapid ice age followed by a rapid greenhouse period. Another mass extinction, at the end of the Triassic, was set in motion by an undersea super volcano and massive wildfires (like the ones in Australia, pictured from space in the image at the top of this post) that smothered the planet in smoke and ash. The meteorite that smashed into the planet before the dinosaurs were wiped out in a mass extinction? Nope, didn't kill those big guys with fire. It killed them by throwing so much debris into the atmosphere that the climate changed. Most geologists agree that when the climate changes, mass extinctions follow.



Acid levels in the Earth's oceans are going up, which is what's killing all those reefs and making life hard for shellfish. Ocean acidification is also one major reason that the Great Dying was so, well, great. It was also a major part of the Triassic mass extinction 200 million years ago, which wiped out 80 percent of the planet's species — especially in the oceans. When the waters are too acidic, calcium levels go down. That means shelled creatures simply can't build their shells, and they die even before they have a fighting chance. When shelled creatures die, the predators who feed on them also die. And the more dead bodies you've got in the ocean, the more acidic everything gets. If Earth's oceans continue to become more acidic, mass extinction could be next.

3. Extinctions Are Happening At A Higher Than Average Rate

Extinctions are normal. In fact, statisticians who study extinction have figured out a typical "background extinction rate," which is the normal number of creatures who are going extinct at any given time. So a mass extinction is like a big statistical spike of death sticking up far over that background rate. And, unfortunately, there is a lot of evidence that the extinction rate we've experienced over the past 500 years is above the typical rate. No, this rate is nowhere near mass extinction levels. But it is going up. Which is exactly what you'd expect to see at the beginning of a mass extinction.



2. All the Megafauna Are Dead

One way scientists figure out rates of extinction is by looking at the diversity of fossils. Based on this evidence, they can figure out how many creatures and plants were alive at a given time, plus how quickly (or slowly) they disappeared from the fossil record. In recent fossil records, from the past 50,000 years, we can easily see a steep decline in species diversity. The Earth was recently home to many species of so-called megafauna, from mastodons and giant wallabies, to giant sloths, and today they are entirely gone. When you see an entire category of creatures wink out that quickly (in geological time), it suggests more than just typical extinction patterns.

1. Amphibians Are Dying Out

Today, we are witnessing another giant group of species going extinct so rapidly we can actually measure it in human time, rather than geologic time. Amphibians, especially frogs, are dying out at such a fast pace that some have called the twenty-first century a time of "biodiversity crisis." Most have been felled by a fast-spreading, deadly fungus that kills whole communities of frogs in weeks. It's likely the fungus has reached pandemic proportions because frogs are being forced out of their habitats, and coming into contact with new species they might never have seen otherwise. Just as human pandemics spread more quickly due to travel, amphibian pandemics are spread when frogs move into a new area and infect previously unexposed communities. The more we lose our animal diversity, the closer we get to a world dominated by invasive species. And that scenario really didn't end well in the Devonian mass extinction. It probably won't end well for us, either.

Still, as I explain in my book, Scatter, Adapt, and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction, there is hope. These are early signs of a possible mass extinction, and we still have plenty of time to do something about it. We can curb fossil fuel emissions to prevent climate change from getting worse, and we can preserve biodiversity by maintaining natural areas where animals won't be edged out by human settlements. As for megavolcanos and meteorite impacts? Well, that's going to be a little harder. But it's not impossible. We can't bring the mastodons back, but we can still prevent most of the species around us (including humans) from dying out.

If you want to know more about mass extinctions, you can learn about it in my new book, Scatter, Adapt and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction.

Also, I'll be on book tour this month! You can see me in tomorrow night in Phoenix, at Changing Hands Bookstore. That's followed by appearances in Seattle (this Wednesday night!), Chicago, Atlanta, San Francisco, and Berkeley. Click here for dates and places!

Primary sources linked within the post. A previous version of this io9 flashback was published in October 2012.



Among paleontologists, it's sometimes called the "Great Dying." Roughly a quarter of a billion years ago, 90-95 percent of all life on … Read…



What will really happen when the Yellowstone supervolcano erupts?

Lurking beneath Yellowstone National Park is a massive underground reservoir of magma, capped by the park's famous caldera. 640,000 years ago, a … Read…

Has Humanity's Explosion Become a Population Bomb?

The world's population has exploded over the past century, growing from less than 2 billion to 7 billion people. And it's not stopping. The … Read…

What the Hell is happening to the Arctic Sea Ice?

The Arctic Sea Ice extent this September was far smaller than the previous record, set in 2007. At 3.4 million square kilometers of ice coverage,… Read…



America just endured its hottest 12 month period on record. Again.

It's deja vu all over again. Sweaty, sweltering deja vu. For the third consecutive month, the mainland United States has experienced its hottest … Read…

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MY MOTHER and grandmother both died of breast cancer. For years, I resisted having a mammogram because I couldn't bear the thought of having to live through my own demise — should it indeed be thrust upon me. My resolution was to jump out of a window should I ever be diagnosed with cancer, and to that end, I always rented apartments in high-rise buildings near the top floors. This was easy to do in Toronto; there are lots of cheap low-income high-rises.

After a four-year battle, my mother succumbed to cancer when I was 16 years old; she was 49. I was on my own and immediately assumed the role of an adult. No siblings, no father, and relatives that have probably all drank themselves to death by now. Suffice it to say that losing both my mother and grandmother to a lengthy and horrible disease affected how I perceive my life and the world around me. For instance, I decided to never have children since I couldn't be sure whether or not I would pass this disease on to my own child. Secondly, we were poor, and my mother's death plunged me into a peripheral existence — always one step away from poverty. Thankfully, I am now an expert at negotiating a downwardly mobile lifestyle.

Because we were Canadian citizens living in Toronto, my mother's illness and repeated hospital stays were fully subsidized by the horrible socialist Canadian government. If we had been in America, she would have been left to die — maybe in a home and maybe in a hovel — and who knows where I would have ended up. I survived and moved to New York in 1982, full of anticipation and resolve, and completely ignorant of the miserable state of health care in this country; youth is sustained by resilience and fury.

The fear and anger and resentment all came back to me when I witnessed the media pounce on Angelina Jolie's public announcement that she had undergone a double mastectomy. My heart wrenched for her. This could not have been an easy choice. Her decision will feed the frenzied entrails of news copy and be dissected and commented upon ad nauseam. On the other hand, her op-ed piece opened up a conversation that has lacked sufficient scrutiny. Namely, what choices are available to women who have neither the funds nor the means to endure extended medical procedures?

What happens to the single parent who has no partner — like my mother — and who is the sole breadwinner in a family? Can this woman undergo the extensive tests and treatments, and finally afford the recovery time necessary? Will she be able to afford reconstructive surgery? Currently, reconstruction is not covered by HMOs. Will Obamacare cover this procedure? Will some agitated, righteous contingent of the upwardly mobile intervene and determine that preventative care should not be covered? Without a strong support base, including a health care system that treats all economic communities with equal provision, cancer remains untreatable.

The issue of affordability has been swept under the carpet. The media has instantly polarized the debate in terms of women who may or may not entreat medical intervention, as pointed out by Denise Grady, Tara Parker-Pope and Pam Belluck in the New York Times: "But some doctors also expressed worry that her disclosure could be misinterpreted by other women, fueling the trend toward mastectomies that are not medically necessary for many early-stage breast cancers." Yes, this is part of the issue, but the bigger issue is that many women in America simply cannot afford to be sick.

Last week, House Republicans voted — for the 37th time — on repealing Obamacare. That a universal health care system is not viewed as an optimal condition for one of the richest countries of the world is a harrowing foreshadowing of what is to come. The unfortunate reality is that we are not all equal. A health care system embodies not only a medical team but also a more permeating support system that all women — all people — do not enjoy.



More Deborah Johnstone.

They made the admission after the Salmon and Trout Association (STA) filed a formal complaint with the Advertising Standards Authority and Trading Standards over "erroneous claims" concerning the geographic origin of the fish.

The STA said fish advertised as being from "fast-flowing sea-

water locations off the isles of Skye, Lewis and Uist", were instead from Loch Fyne, in Argyll on the Scottish mainland.

This, the STA claims, is from "less fast-flowing waters" more prone to diseases such as sea lice.

A spokesman for the supermarket admitted: "Unfortunately, there has been an error in the information on the packaging of some our Taste the Difference salmon products in recent months.

"We are now resolving this and sincerely apologise to customers, who can be reassured that there has been no impact on our industry-leading sourcing standards."

She added: "We are very proud of our record on responsible sourcing of fish. Sainsbury's is the country's largest retailer of RSPCA Freedom Food Salmon and all our Scottish salmon is farmed to a number of independent standards."

Guy Linley-Adams, solicitor to the STA aquaculture campaign, welcomed the admission by Sainsbury's, and invited supermarket bosses to now "enter into a discussion about sourcing standards of farmed salmon".

He said: "The STA's complaint shows that it is time for the supermarkets to take responsibility for what they are selling and how they market it.

"This complaint to the Advertising Standards Authority and Trading Standards is about Sainsbury's and the claims made on its packaging and on its website. Quite apart from issues of identifying exactly where its farmed salmon comes from, the STA believes Sainsbury's must substantiate its 'responsible sourcing' assertions with hard facts about named farms and not just general assurances. Without this, discerning consumers may not have confidence in what they are being asked to buy."

He added: "All the producers and supermarkets put a premium on salmon sourced from the Hebrides. These were marketed as being from fast-flowing seawaters off Skye, Lewis and Uist. But they were stamped as being from Loch Fyne, which has a reputation for sea lice."

Hughie Campbell Adamson, chairman of STA Scotland, said: "Supermarkets have a duty to be honest and transparent about the food they sell. Farmed salmon, grown in open-net marine cages, can come at a heavy environmental cost, not least in its impact on wild salmon and sea trout."

VANCEBORO — Craven County prawn farmers Don and Kim Ipock stocked Carolina's Freshwater Prawn Farm's three ponds with juveniles last weekend to grow a fall harvest that has a committed buyer — a first in their seven-year aquaculture venture.

Economic development consultants hired this year by Craven County to help draft a strategic growth plan included aquaculture in a recent report building Craven's agricultural offerings.

The Ipocks and Charlene Jacobs, president of the American Prawn Cooperative, agree it has real possibilities.

But for the Ipocks and other family farmers building the cooperative prawn marketing group since incorporating in 2008, it has not been easy.

Prawn are basically a freshwater shrimp belonging to the genus Macrobrachium, which have been farmed mostly in the rivers of Malaysia and Thailand for years and are now farmed in Hawaii, China, India and many subtropical areas of the world.

Don Ipock boasts that his Spruill Town Road farm's pond-raised, grain-fed, pollution and chemical free, prawn are environmentally friendly, of jumbo size and lobster-like texture, resulting in a clean and high quality meat. The controlled and free range environment also contributes to the quality and demand for the product that's low in fat, iodine and sodium.

Jacobs' family will seed its two-pond prawn operation near Clinton in Sampson County this weekend, and she said, "We've had to do a lot of educating the public here just about what prawns are although we have clients in California, Chicago and New York who already know what a prawn is and who want it and need it."

Cooperative Extension programs at North Carolina State University and Mississippi State University have helped to research and develop the best prawn for regional production, Don Ipock said, and, along with the N.C. Department of Agriculture, guide owners of farms where tobacco was once its cash crop to transition to a new crop.

The cooperative members help each other with various parts of production including the harvesting and together have used rural development grant money to build a processing center in Walstonsburg in Green County to fast freeze the catch.

Jacobs said there are other prawn farms in the area "and we could have had more farms but are very particular. We don't need anyone who won't follow our best management practices. It's very strategic in harvesting and processing."

Setting up the business, cost wise, is small scale enough that it is possible for smaller farmers, he said. "The cost is within the thousands, rather than millions of dollars," Jacobs said.

The attraction to prawn farming in part is because the cost could allow some small farms that lost tobacco allotment money to remain in farming. There is also the ecological impact of freshwater prawn farming, which has less waste products than some other animal agricultural and even aquaculture operations so the water can be recycled.

Jacobs said that although the less densely populated prawn ponds produce less waste, they also produce fewer numbers, but they grow a bigger prawn.

The commitment Ipock recently brought back from California brokers is that they will take every prawn the farm can grow that are 12-count to a pound or bigger.

"We are not interested in mega numbers, because we now have the Californiamarket and we also have buyers in New Yorkwho want to come and get them live off the pond bank," Jacobs said.

There are several restaurants and bed and breakfast operations that are steady local buyers and APC member farmers are hoping they continue to buy and spread the word locally about this relatively new domestic crop.

Although temperatures are not consistently warm enough for more than one crop a year in Eastern North Carolina, Jacobs said, "our harvest is growing yearly. 2012 was our best year yet."

She said each of their 16, two-acre ponds should produce at least 800 to 1,000 pounds per acre, or a total of about 29,000 pounds.

VANCEBORO — Craven County prawn farmers Don and Kim Ipock stocked Carolina's Freshwater Prawn Farm's three ponds with juveniles last weekend to grow a fall harvest that has a committed buyer — a first in their seven-year aquaculture venture.

Economic development consultants hired this year by Craven County to help draft a strategic growth plan included aquaculture in a recent report building Craven's agricultural offerings.

The Ipocks and Charlene Jacobs, president of the American Prawn Cooperative, agree it has real possibilities.

But for the Ipocks and other family farmers building the cooperative prawn marketing group since incorporating in 2008, it has not been easy.

Prawn are basically a freshwater shrimp belonging to the genus Macrobrachium, which have been farmed mostly in the rivers of Malaysia and Thailand for years and are now farmed in Hawaii, China, India and many subtropical areas of the world.

Don Ipock boasts that his Spruill Town Road farm's pond-raised, grain-fed, pollution and chemical free, prawn are environmentally friendly, of jumbo size and lobster-like texture, resulting in a clean and high quality meat. The controlled and free range environment also contributes to the quality and demand for the product that's low in fat, iodine and sodium.

Jacobs' family will seed its two-pond prawn operation near Clinton in Sampson County this weekend, and she said, "We've had to do a lot of educating the public here just about what prawns are although we have clients in California, Chicago and New York who already know what a prawn is and who want it and need it."

Cooperative Extension programs at North Carolina State University and Mississippi State University have helped to research and develop the best prawn for regional production, Don Ipock said, and, along with the N.C. Department of Agriculture, guide owners of farms where tobacco was once its cash crop to transition to a new crop.

The cooperative members help each other with various parts of production including the harvesting and together have used rural development grant money to build a processing center in Walstonsburg in Green County to fast freeze the catch.

Jacobs said there are other prawn farms in the area "and we could have had more farms but are very particular. We don't need anyone who won't follow our best management practices. It's very strategic in harvesting and processing."

Setting up the business, cost wise, is small scale enough that it is possible for smaller farmers, he said. "The cost is within the thousands, rather than millions of dollars," Jacobs said.

The attraction to prawn farming in part is because the cost could allow some small farms that lost tobacco allotment money to remain in farming. There is also the ecological impact of freshwater prawn farming, which has less waste products than some other animal agricultural and even aquaculture operations so the water can be recycled.

Jacobs said that although the less densely populated prawn ponds produce less waste, they also produce fewer numbers, but they grow a bigger prawn.

The commitment Ipock recently brought back from California brokers is that they will take every prawn the farm can grow that are 12-count to a pound or bigger.

"We are not interested in mega numbers, because we now have the Californiamarket and we also have buyers in New Yorkwho want to come and get them live off the pond bank," Jacobs said.

There are several restaurants and bed and breakfast operations that are steady local buyers and APC member farmers are hoping they continue to buy and spread the word locally about this relatively new domestic crop.

Although temperatures are not consistently warm enough for more than one crop a year in Eastern North Carolina, Jacobs said, "our harvest is growing yearly. 2012 was our best year yet."

She said each of their 16, two-acre ponds should produce at least 800 to 1,000 pounds per acre, or a total of about 29,000 pounds.

Options for customers outside rollout Vet urges watch for post-drought illness Aquaculture focus for Cawthron scientist Trees boost ailing incomes Exploring alternatives to quad bikes Surprising amount of stock for sale Minister expects China meat fix in days China's meat block still unexplained $50,000 prize lures creatures great and small Marlborough farmers vie for place in nationals



The Cawthron Institute has boosted its science and aquaculture capability with the appointment of senior scientist Dr Jacquie Reed to the new position of head of aquaculture.

Institute chief executive Professor Charles Eason said Reed was an accomplished scientist with extensive, proven scientific expertise and specialist knowledge of the commercial aquaculture sector.

"She will complement and enhance our existing research, while bringing a fresh approach, new energy and drive to this important role."

Reed would lead the aquaculture group, manage the further development of the Cawthron Aquaculture Park, and spearhead research and development to support new and existing partners, including SPATnz, Kono and Aotearoa Fisheries Limited.

She was formerly aquaculture and business development manager at Northland INC, Northland's economic development agency, and before that was a group manager at Niwa for six years.

Reed said she was looking forward to working with a range of sectors to establish a strong seafood industry for New Zealand.

"The greatest opportunity for New Zealand's seafood sector is to position itself as the premier source of high quality, safe seafood. I see my role as working with Government, industry, iwi and researchers to help make that happen."

Originally from London, Reed began her science career at the United Kingdom's prestigious Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science where she was research programme leader of coastal and freshwater environments focusing on shellfish and fish health research.

Her responsibilities included heading multimillion-dollar research programmes and providing expert advice to the British and Dutch governments on risks associated with contaminants in shellfish, fish sediments and water in estuaries and marine environments.

While at Niwa, Reed developed and led millions of dollars in research for commercial projects, identified new commercial opportunities and drove its science business in freshwater and estuarine systems. As head of aquaculture at Northland INC she designed and launched the regional aquaculture strategy for Northland, working closely with local iwi to support Maori aquaculture.

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- The Marlborough Express

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for standing by. Welcome to the Sino Agro Food Incorporated first quarter 2013 Results Conference Call. At this time all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later there will be an opportunity for questions and comments and instructions will be given at that time. As a reminder this call is being recorded.

I would now like to turn the conference call over to our host. Mr. Solomon Lee, Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Sino Agro Foods. Solomon, please go ahead.

Solomon Lee

Thank you Christie, and thank you everyone who is attending today's conference call. I would like to now take the opportunity to read to you a statement from the Company regarding quarter 1, 2013 results. The Company set a revenue record for the fifth consecutive quarter, achieving $55.1 million in revenue, a 245% increase over 2012. Net income from operations of $16.4 million, a 191% increase, and basic earnings per share of $0.16; a 100% increase.

In my opening remarks, I will briefly put these results into a strategic perspective. Then I will turn to exchange listing and financing issues, and then to 2013 financial guidance; before turning the call over for questionings.

In 2012 the Company's business concentration grew (inaudible) from consulting and services and from overall wholesale operations. Now we are seeing the business (inaudible) the wholesale level, the business that offset at the wholesale level are making quite significant incremental contributions.

The fish and cattle wholesale operations continue to grow in the first quarter sufficient to support expanding the wholesale and distribution level. In accordance to organic fertilizer division contributed revenues of 8.1 million in the first quarter and the import-export segments of the distribution division contributed 5.7 million. To put these in perspective, the total of 13.8 million for these two business that barely existed one year ago amount to 86% of the total first quarter revenue from 2012.

With the upstream support of the pre-wholesale activities the Company believes the downstream operation at the wholesale distribution and retail levels (inaudible) 0each making the whole stronger. I am particularly pleased with the progress in the distribution wing. The two Wholesale Center and the new Trading Center provide a scale of infrastructure for distribution, not originally envisioned in the five year plan. As such this level is ahead of schedule.

In addition new business opportunities to broaden the distribution level and across the whole spectrum of our businesses are becoming available across a number of continents. The Company has set in motion the construction of facilities in Madagascar to supplement import from South East Asia. Within China, the Company is currently establishing a Cattle Station and related facilities within the Central Cattle Market and Facility of Beijing City, to distribute its own aromatic beef to top hotels and restaurants. This is the first in a broader interstate wholesale distribution development plan.

The layering of businesses creates operational synergy. Why overall net margins will decline with the incremental lower margin distribution activities. Total earnings per share will increase. Perhaps as beneficial to sustain the liberty of earning is enhanced as the underlying strength of interoperating business activities is realized, thus providing strategic advantage.

This globalization of the Company distribution operation is mirrored by the expected upcoming exchange trading on two continents. And by the new composition of the board of directors we are seeing the influence of the later due for affectation for listing in Sweden and with evolving thinking about financing alternatives that are more likely available aboard.

These geographical broadening gratifies me personally as I see the direct benefits to the Company which ought to accrue to the shareholder as not only improve financial result wise but also the more international scale and scope of the company is appreciated. If you haven't already, all shareholders and interested parties are encouraged to read the 10-Q file, May 15, and associated press release of May 16. The company has more and more intra-operating parts and they are plenty of details in the filing and release.

Of note, net income in the first quarter would have been higher by approximately $0.02 per share at the price of sleepy cod remain the same as in the fourth quarter of 2012. Our results will always be sensitive to prices of our products. Throughout 2013 and beyond, a greater portion of wholesale revenue will come from more varieties of fish and prawns and from beef. All these prices are trending up.

My experience tells me the following. Sitting between wholesale and retail, sales and marketing are the heart of our business. When we have this sector fully organized and fully functional, our primary and very-aided producing sector will come to life and blossom. At this point, our own variety of wholesale and very-aided product will fulfill our own distribution system some into our own retail sector. We saw the very beginning of this last quarter.

The primary producing sector will always be subject to multiple, unpredictable, seasonal inferences and variations. That might have occurred or played economic impacts. As such the company must be quick with capacity to adapt and to change as quickly and efficiently as possible to capitalize on the good times and prices. Likewise, when bad times of prices arise, the company's wholesale divisions must support the market and sales sector with diverse varieties of marketable products, flexibly adjusting the mix as much as practical to sustain profitability.

Our Q4 2012 and Q1 2013 performances now clearly evidence that our business is gradually and surely gear with the flexibility and the ability to sustain and to capitalize.

Of course, operations are the life hood of every company and this has in a way we have concentrate our efforts, although, we are in a dynamic business environment with constantly changing variables and new opportunities arising. Until we are well along the way towards the vertical integrated set of diverse operations that land themselves to reliability and good visibilities.

Subject to normal business and government constraints, the company is in control of the timetable for operational growth and maturity. We have been (inaudible) one downside the company's global reach is the timing of nonoperational activities and sometimes outside the company's direct control. The lawyers, government agencies, banks in several country in which we are now dealing often determine timing. We do not control both side of the process.

Examples are (inaudible) we did the good job in our disclosure in the S1 registration statements; however, we still end-up having to find time to respond to many questions and corresponding answers.

The amendment to our 2011 cash flow statement is another example of approved vision requested in the late process. For this reason, the First North (inaudible) at first we were over optimistic about the timing of the process. We are now moving closer and still fully expect the approval having comprised with all request for clarifications today.

We will meet with our certified advisor and our lawyers during last week in May in Stockholm with the intent to expertise the process and expectation to get a more accurate timetable. It is important to note that we as the company would prefer a quicker pace. Whenever we have made application, we have achieved our aims. The Form 10 Process was a good example.

Since late April 2013, the company has been working with professionals in Hong Kong, U.S.A. and Singapore on bond offering. Although, it is still too early to give concrete directions, we are working on relentlessly indication are positive again within the context of third party controlling the timetables. Please bear in mind that the company is undertaking the time, effort and expenses of these two major steps the first law of listing and pursuing multiple bond offerings on behalf of its shareholders. Please realize also that both steps are unprecedented for the Chinese OTCBB company. With positive indications today, we believe that all efforts will be successful and you can find (inaudible) and recognitions to the betterment of the company and its shareholders.

This now brings us to the 2013 guidance. We have gained momentum moving steadily forward in Q1 2013 performance, exceeding our quarter 4 2012 performance. This is an encouragement to all of us at Sino Agro Food. We all know that the company usually performance better, in Q3 and Q4 each year and it should not be much different this year. As the company continues to gain improvements in all existent profit centers and add new ones within our 5 reporting divisions mainly fishery, cattle, beef, organic fertilizer, HU plantation and the corporate divisions.

We target record revenue of between 240 million to 280 million in 2013, proactively from the five divisions and their respective profit centers. The variation between revenue of 240 million and 280 million will depends on variable operational and marketing factors, this representing yearly growth of 73% to 102%. At the same time, the target earning of between 87 million to 104 million representing yearly growth rate of 51.3% to 80.8% and targeting net asset between 304 million to 321 million representing yearly growth rate of 40% to 48%.

Now, our two new Board members are with me on today's call Mr. Nils Sandberg and Mr. George Yap. So, without further delay, I would like to open the door to you, our shareholders who may have question for us to answer.

Question-and-Answer Session

Operator



(Operator Instructions). Caller, please go ahead.

Unidentified Analyst



I'm just curious just why shareholders or potential shareholders should be buying a stock and you know the financial years (inaudible) amount of shares to build and there is a massive offering in the range.

Solomon Lee



I didn't get this question, sorry, didn't hear.

Unidentified Analyst



Question is, why should people be buying the stock right now when we all know that financial years have millions and millions of shares to sell plus is a huge offering in the range, what's the incentive?

Solomon Lee



Why people want to buy our shares when there is million shares out there to be sold? That's what you mean, is it?

Unidentified Analyst



Yes. I mean, why would anybody want to buy the stock right here when the stock will not move due to finance years selling millions of shares plus there is a new offering in the (inaudible).

Solomon Lee



Well, I don't think this is keep moving all the time, right. At a certain circumstances it would have to be like that, but there are limitation, we already said before in the last quarter up to certain amount of share we will have for this year and after Q1 2014 there will be no more.

Unidentified Analyst



Well, how about we have heard about growth and promises before such as the (inaudible) dividend?

Solomon Lee



Well, I don't think we have booked any promises before but anyway our idea is the company growth, we have not lost anything. Yet not lost, we gain everyday on the shares, we cannot help to. I already said many times, you should not be a trader, when we invested in our company.

Unidentified Analyst



Yes. Be invested (inaudible). Yes, that works.

Solomon Lee



No. But, if you are trading every day, that's not the position you should be in.

Operator



All right. I will go ahead and ask for next question in the queue. Caller, please go ahead.

Bob Rosenberry

My name is Bob Rosenberry I'm an investor, a journalist who writes about shrimp farming and I plan to post a note to my webpage about your terrific first quarter earnings, shortly I finish this call. I have three very quick questions for you; they all regard your prawn farming operation. The first one, in your new release May 16th on PR Newswire you mentioned the Mexican white shrimp and then you mentioned green prawns; do you know the species name for the green prawns?

The green prawns is like (inaudible) but it's a Chinese native and an Asian native prawns, I do not know their technical names, but they are the one with a very big body and very big head prawn, with very large claws. We usually call them the green prawns here in the Asian country.

Bob Rosenberry

All right good, I think I do know the scientific name and I've also heard them referred to as flower prawns, I believe and I'm guessing here that the scientific name is Penaeus semisulcatus, but I'll have to do a little more research on that.

Yes, I get confused by them myself. Also, in your news release you mentioned that you were going to place 500,000 prawn flies in prawn farm number 1, instead of the word flies, fries, f-r-i-e-s, instead of f-l-i-e-s.

Solomon Lee

You're correct f-r-i-e-s, sorry about that.

Bob Rosenberry

Yes, not a problem, and it was logical as to what you meant. In Southeast Asia right now, shrimp farms or prawn farms as you call them are being devastated by a new disease called Early Mortality Syndrome, or EMS, do you have any sign of that disease in your prawn farm 1 or your prawn farm 2?

No in our prawn farm we have been very lucky so far. But we know this has been a tremendous disease this season, very growing. That's why the prawn prices are coming up very fast this season. But in our farms so far so good. But you see our system in view with the disinfecting and disease treatment chambers, such that I think we'd be pretty safe from a strong, when we get our fries, luckily the fries come from our own hatchery. We can quarantine all these before we reach the (inaudible) farm. So I don't expect this problem will hit us this year at all.

Bob Rosenberry

Okay good, that's good news. Can you give me any information on how this new disease, early mortality syndrome, is affecting other shrimp farms in China?

Yes, a lot of them because when they were one week old fries, this disease doesn't surface, but once when they release it into the pond, then they start to come, you can see white patches, you can see the mortality rate going very fast in the prawns. And this is what happened now, in a lot of these dams in the Guangdong district.

Operator

We'll go ahead on our line for our next question.

Solomon, this is Brian from the States, I've spoken to you from the last call and I agree with Bob, congratulations on a fabulous quarter and it's very nice to see the model taking fruit and continued success. So I want to state that up front. One of the questions I had last quarter and wanted to see if there was an update on my question was the search for a bilingual and a top tier CFO for the company that I think would help with your accuracy on your filings and also your timeliness on your filings, have you given thought to that.

Solomon Lee

Yes, the board has consented to nomination of CFO, in fact we have a lot of qualified staff here in accounting and the financial department qualified for that. By June we should make a nomination.

Unidentified Analyst

And this CFO does he come from a top accounting firm or is he internal?

Well they are well qualified and they definitely would be able to perform their duties.

Unidentified Analyst

Okay, the other question, I know that you project your earnings in I would call gross net income, can you project what your net income would be translated in terms of earnings per share for 2013 with the range you're looking at?

In this sector, we already quoted on the last quarter that our share would not be at the (inaudible) would be 130 million and so because of a number variables, so we tend to announce a more accurate earnings per share, a little bit later instead of today. We'll give you a guideline on the earnings and we'll give you guideline on the number of shares on the last quarter's conference call. I think at this moment if I quoted the figure, it might have this upside and downside so please give me until might be in June sometime, we'll do the quarter then we can make the more accurate announcement on earnings per share.

Unidentified Analyst

Okay fair enough. The question is now that I would like to get some colors or some details on after your First North listing or (inaudible) with your First North listing, what your plans will be for investor relations especially trying to get institutional investors on board which I think would be a big help in terms of getting, you have a fabulous story to tell and I think, the value of the company would really improve if we can get more investors, know the story. So has there been a definite plan with the new investor relations team in terms of how we're going to go about telling a story?

Actually that's because we under the S1 although we try to improve the website now, number one, but because under the S1 registration our lawyer wants us not to change anything, so to answer your question, yes, after that after we get to First North we would improve number one the website number, two improve their IR and the PR positions in the state and the last week of May, we're going over to Sweden to look at the appointment of couple of (inaudible) reportable IR agents and services company over there, and I think that appointment will be done while we're there, so from there we will make our a number of program but as it is we already quietly moving in that directions.

Unidentified Analyst

Okay, you had mentioned that your First North listing is in the hands of third parties and you have answered most of the questions from the third parties as they presented themselves, is there any other outstanding issues that must be answered to this point in time or could you give some color on that so that we at least understand what needs to be done for the approval to take place?

You're way in big too fast.

Unidentified Analyst

Sorry, I'll slow down I'm sorry, so the First North listing you said that it is in the hands of third parties and that's why you can't give an accurate forecast on when it will be approved, but as you're confident that eventually will be approved, so my question is, is there any outstanding issues that haven't been addressed that you know of from third party that still need to be addressed, can you give some…

Yes, in fact there is no, we have answered all clarification satisfactorily so far. We have done everything that is requested of us, but I think we'll be going to Sweden by next week. We our self also want to fix a more accurate timing, timetable if possible.

Unidentified Analyst

And what third party is not giving the approval at this point? It seems that you've answered all...

This is a discussion on First Time Ich, Ticked Off. within the Freshwater Fish Disease forums, part of the More Freshwater Aquarium Topics category; For the 8+ years of having fish I have NEVER gotten ICH . I am very ticked off because the 10x Neon, Black Neon tetras I got from a dealer I really trusted and buy from all the time has ...

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For the 8+ years of having fish I have NEVER gotten ICH.

I am very ticked off because the 10x Neon, Black Neon tetras I got from a dealer I really trusted and buy from all the time has gotten my tank infested with ich. I did examine them at the store but they did not have ANY signs of these nor did the other fish.

Right now its just the tetras and am not going to move them to QT yet because they are the only things in the tank.

Can I treat them without dosing a bunch of meds? I have a unopened bottle of anti ich but I hate dosing with chemicals unless its super necessary.

I read up about curing ich, I've raised the temp to 86 F, I am doing 30% water changes weekly.

Right now its just white flecks like itty bitty dandruff.

Is there anything else I can do?



Water movement would be a good thing, for raising the temp affects the level of O2 in the tank.

Otherwise, patience!!!

Oh, and if you do not like meds, I used a natural ICH treatment.

Kordon's ich attack herbal formula!

It did save most of my fishes!!!

Good luck...



I just got done treating an ich infestation brought on by the painted platy, or Patient Zero as he is now known, in my 29G. Aside from slowly raising the temp over 3 days to 86F, I added approximately 1 teaspoon of aquarium salt per gallon, to bring my SG to 1.005 (using an Instant Ocean hydrometer). I've read this is the 'sweet spot' for destroying free-floating trophonts, and boy howdy did it work like a charm. I kept the treatment up for 2 full weeks, with weekly water changes and vigorous gravel vacuuming, and the ich cleared right up with no signs of re-infection.

MOVE YOURSELF — Tai chi chuan is a slow and meditative practice, good for relaxation and self-defense. Classes for beginners and the experienced run from 11 a.m.-1 p.m. at the Liberty Parks and Recreation Center, Main Street, Liberty. All ages welcome. 794-3378.

MORNING READ — Take a break for a story at the Greenville Resource Center, 1539 Route 6, Greenville. Children are invited to story hour. Alternate story hours are 6 p.m. Wednesday, 10 a.m. Thursday and 10 a.m. Saturday. 856-7172.

ZOONOSIS — Zoonosis is an infectious disease transmitted between humans and animals. Carries include dogs, cats and fish. Find out more about zoonosis at this program starting at 6 p.m. at Mount Saint Mary College, Desmond Campus, 6 Albany Post Road, Newburgh. $15. Call 565-2076, email desmondcampus@msmc.edu or visit msmc.edu.

PJ PARTY — The Fallsburg Library at 12 Railroad Plaza, South Fallsburg, hosts a Daddy and Me Pajama Night. A night of stories is promised, along with light snack. 6:30 p.m. Free. 436-6067.

STRING'S THE THING — The popular American chamber jazz ensemble the String Trio of New York (John Lindberg, James Emery, Billy Bang) will perform compositions on violin, guitar and bass at 7 p.m. at the Port Jervis Free Library, 138 Pike St., Port Jervis. Free. All ages welcome. Call 856-7313.

LOOKING GLASS — Join Alice and her friends for an encore performance of the Royal Ballet's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland." This HD-to-cinema experience takes place at 7:15 p.m. at the Rosendale Theatre, 408 Main St., Rosendale. $10, $6 age 12 and younger. 658-8989.

BASIC CANNING — Learn how to prepare a seasonal jelly, a freezer jam, and a cooked jam during "Learn the Basics: Canning Jams & Jellies at Home." The workshop, held at 5:30 p.m at the Gerald J. Skoda Extensio Education Center, 64 Ferndale-Loomis Road, Liberty, will allow participants to go home with a prepared food sample. $25. To register, call 292-6180.

Researchers are closer to understanding what animals need to regrow their body parts, after Australian scientists established the key role of the immune system in salamanders.

Also known as Mexican walking fish, salamanders can regenerate their own limbs, tails, jaws, retina and heart. But the researchers found that if certain immune cells were blocked, the amphibians were unable to regrow limbs, though healing did occur.

"It means that we have turned this perfect process of regenerating a limb into a failure of the kind you would normally see in mammals," said lead researcher James Godwin, of Monash University's Australian Regenerative Medicine Institute.

Published in the Pro-ceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Tuesday, the research explains the previously unknown role of immune cells, known as macrophages, in the amphibian's ability to regrow arms and legs.

The results have implications for humans, who also have these immune cells – it could lead to ways to tweak the human immune system, putting it on a more regenerative path for both limbs and other body parts.

In salamanders, the new tissue is scar-free. This has benefits for liver and heart disease, which are linked to fibrosis or scarring.

"Now we have a really good idea of what is required for perfect regeneration," Dr Godwin said of his work with colleagues Nadia Rosenthal and Alexander Pinto. "We have a smoking gun. If we can find out what they deliver to make regeneration occur, then we might be able to tweak the human wound-healing scenario."

Dr Godwin calls macrophages "the guardian angels of the body". The highly mobile immune cells can communicate with other cells and gobble up debris or harmful bacteria. They arrive at the wound site within six days of amputation. "If the macrophages are not present in the early phases of healing, regeneration does not occur," he said.

The researchers used "poisoned lipids" to block the immune cells in salamanders. With the immune cells disabled, the animal lost the ability to regrow limbs and instead the wound healed as an amputation would in humans.

"You get a limb stump with lots of scarring at the tip," Dr Godwin said. "It shows that those immune cells are required to be there to oversee and manage the early stages of wound resolution. If they're not there then the whole thing goes wrong."

The goal is to make a drug that when applied to a wound would make the human response more like a salamander's.

"Humans, like salamanders, grow limbs – we can do it," Dr Godwin said. "It's just that it's been turned off and we have to work out if we can turn it on so we can regenerate our own limbs."

Until now, the only way to find out what people in the United States eat and how many calories they consume has been government data, which can lag behind the rapidly expanding and changing food marketplace.

Researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill are trying to change that by creating a gargantuan map of what foods Americans are buying and eating.

Part of the uniqueness of the database is its ability to sort one product into what it really is – thousands of brands and variations.

Take the chocolate milk.

The government long has long classified chocolate milk with 2 percent fat as one item. But the UNC researchers, using scanner data from grocery stores and other commercial data, found thousands of different brands and variations of 2 percent chocolate milk and averaged them out. The results show that chocolate milk has about 11 calories per cup more than the government thought.

The researchers led by professor Barry Popkin at the UNC School of Public Health, are figuring out that chocolate milk equation over and over, with every single item in the grocery store. It's a massive project that could be the first evidence of how rapidly the marketplace is changing, and the best data yet on what exact ingredients and nutrients people are consuming.

That kind of information could be used to better target nutritional guidelines, push companies to cut down on certain ingredients and even help with disease research.

"The country needs something like this, given all of the questions about our food supply," says Popkin, the head of the UNC Food Research Program. "We're interested in improving the public's health and it really takes this kind of knowledge."

The project first came together in 2010 after a group of 16 major food companies pledged, as part of first lady Michelle Obama's campaign to combat obesity, to reduce the calories they sell to the public by 1.5 trillion. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation agreed to fund a study to hold the companies accountable, eventually turning to UNC with grants totaling $6.7 million.

Aided by supercomputers on campus, Popkin and his team have taken existing commercial databases of food items in stores and people's homes, including the store-based scanner data of 600,000 different foods, and matched that information with the nutrition facts panels on the back of packages and government data on individuals' dietary intake.

The result is an enormous database that has taken almost three years so far to construct and includes more detail than researchers have ever had on grocery store items – their individual nutritional content, who is buying them and their part in consumers' diets.

The study will fill gaps in current data about the choices available to consumers and whether they are healthy, says Susan Krebs-Smith, who researches diet and other risk factors related to cancer at the National Cancer Institute.

Government data, long the only source of information about American eating habits, can have a lag of several years and neglect entire categories of new types of products – Greek yogurt or energy drinks, for example.

With those significant gaps, the government information fails to account for the rapid change now seen in the marketplace. Now more than ever, companies are reformulating products on the fly as they try to make them healthier or better tasting.

While consumers may not notice changes in the ingredient panel on the back of the package, the UNC study will pick up small variations in individual items and also begin to be able to tell how much the marketplace as a whole is evolving.

"When we are done we will probably see 20 percent change in the food supply in a year," Popkin says. "The food supply is changing and no one really knows how."

For example, the researchers have found that there has been an increase in using fruit concentrate as a sweetener in foods and beverages because of a propensity toward natural foods, even though it isn't necessarily healthier than other sugars. While the soda and chocolate milk have more calories on average than the government thought, the federal numbers were more accurate on the calories in milk and cereals.

Popkin and his researchers are hoping their project will only be the beginning of a map that consumers, companies, researchers and even the government can use, breaking the data down to find out who is eating what and where they shop. Is there a racial divide in the brand of potato chips purchased, for example, and what could that mean for health? Does diet depend on where you buy your food – the grocery store or the convenience store? How has the recession affected dietary intake?

"It's only since I've really started digging into this that I have realized how little we know about what we are eating," says Meghan Slining, a UNC nutrition professor and researcher on the project.

Steven Gortmaker, director of the Harvard School of Public Health Prevention Research Center, says the data could help researchers figure out how people are eating in certain communities and then how to address problems in those diets that could lead to obesity or disease.

"The more information we have, the more scientists can be brainstorming about what kinds of interventions or policy changes we could engage in," Gortmaker said.

But the information doesn't include restaurant meals and some prepared foods, about one-third of what Americans eat. If the project receives continued funding, those foods eventually could be added to the study, a prospect that would be made easier by pending menu labeling regulations that will force chain restaurants to post calories for every item.

Popkin and his researchers say that packaged foods have long been the hardest to monitor because of the sheer volume and rapid change in the marketplace.

The Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation, an industry group representing the 16 companies that made the pledge to reduce 1.5 trillion calories, says it will report this summer on how successful they've been, according to Lisa Gable, the group's president. The first results from Popkin's study aren't expected until later this year.

Marion Nestle, a New York University professor of nutrition, food studies and public health, says the data could be useful in pressuring companies to make more changes for the better. Companies often use "the research isn't there" as a defense against making changes recommended by public health groups, she notes, and it can be hard to prove them wrong.

"What people eat is the great mystery of nutrition," Nestle says. "It would be wonderful to have a handle on it."

When health experts say to eat fish a couple of times a week, they don't mean any and all fish. Not only are certain types healthier for you (and the environment), but how the fish is prepared also makes a big difference, with fried dishes of course being the worst offenders. No one expects fish and chips to be a healthy choice, but Applebee's New England Fish & Chips has a jaw-dropping 138 grams of fat, about the same as one and a half sticks of butter and more than enough fat for three days. Flickr photo by jayneandd

Sneaky Salads

You can't go wrong choosing the salad, right? Not quite. Whether you're creating your own or ordering one at a restaurant, beware of piling on too many toppings like bacon, fried chicken, tortilla chips, creamy dressings, croutons, cheese and eggs. IHOP serves a Crispy Chicken Salad that's guilty of many of the above no-nos: It's topped with fried chicken, bacon, two kinds of cheese and a hard-boiled egg, and served with garlic bread, clocking in at 95 grams of fat. Applebee's serves an Oriental Chicken Salad that illustrates another common problem: dressing. Without the vinaigrette, this mix of greens, chicken, almonds and crispy noodles clocks in at 41 grams of fat -- which on its own is nearing the lower end of the suggested daily intake range. But with the dressing? That'll be 99 grams of fat! Flickr photo by manu flickr2010

Burgers That Overdo It On The Meat

This American staple can be part of a healthy diet -- when toppings, cooking method and bread type are taken into consideration. But one of the biggest problems with today's burgers is their sheer size. A serving of meat is generally considered to be three ounces, about the size of a deck of cards. You might make an appropriately-sized patty at home to throw on the grill, but when's the last time you saw a three-ounce burger on a restaurant menu? One particularly scary option: Hardee's 2/3-lb. Monster Thickburger. With two 1/3-lb. patties, four strips of bacon, three slices of cheese and mayo, it'll set you back 92 grams of fat -- as much as that stick of butter. Flickr photo by kalleboo

Burgers That Overdo It On The Toppings

Pizza burgers, quesadilla burgers, burgers that have doughnuts for buns -- our cravings for fatty foods have led us to try all sorts of wacky combinations. But, like salad toppings, burger toppings, especially when they are really piled high, can cause fat counts to suddenly skyrocket. TGIFriday's Southwestern Burger is a serious offender, with cheese, spread, avocado and fried onion strings, rounding this mega-meal out to 100 grams of fat. Flickr photo by Tavallai

You've probably heard that you generally don't want to drink your calories. Well, you probably don't want to drink your fat, either. While shakes and smoothies can be healthy, they are often loaded with hidden sugars and fats. You probably wouldn't expect to find a healthy shake at an ice cream store, but Cold Stone Creamery's PB&C Shake blows regular ice cream out of the water. This indulgent sip has made headlines around the world after Men's Health named it the worst beverage in America. At the time, the chocolate ice cream, milk and peanut butter concoction was listed at 131 grams of fat -- the equivalent of about 68 strips of bacon, Men's Health wrote. Today, Coldstone's website clocks the large size at well over a stick of butter, with 118 grams of fat. (Even the small has an entire day's worth, at 74 grams!) Flickr photo by gemsling

Fried Chicken Meals

This southern splurge became trendy in late 2009 and has enjoyed a lengthy 15 minutes of fame over the last few years. For the time being, the fried chicken buzz may have settled down, but the dish will remain a standby on comfort-food and southern-style menus. You can healthy up this pick by opting for veggie sides, white meat chicken and by removing the crispy skin. You can also trim back the portions. The Popeye's website depicts a meal consisting of three pieces of chicken, plus a biscuit and a side. We calculated that a similar meal, topped off with a slice of pecan pie for dessert, would add up to 108 grams of fat. Flickr photo by delgaudm

All that ooey-gooey cheese, sour cream and guacamole really add up. Other ingredients, like chicken, may be deep-fried. And tortillas are often coated in butter to get that perfectly-toasted appearance. Of course, portion size is a factor here again. If you're craving a quesadilla, opt for an appetizer-sized one. Ruby Tuesday's Baja Chicken Quesadilla sounds innocent enough -- it's stuffed with grilled peppers and onions, and topped with a chile-lime sauce. But one order costs you 95 grams of fat! Flickr photo by mallydally

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