SciNews20070903

Public Release: 24-Aug-2007
TAU researchers discover correlation between birth month and short-sightedness
Does a summertime baby mean a myopic child?
Contact: George Hunka
ghunka@aftau.org
212-742-9070
American Friends of Tel Aviv University
Crushed Glass to Be Spread on Beaches
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: August 26, 2007
Picture a beautiful beach spanning miles of coastline, gently lapped by aqua-colored water -- and sprinkled with glass. Ouch? Think again. It feels just like sand, but with granules that sparkle in the sunlight.
Through Analysis, Gut Reaction Gains Credibility
By CLAUDIA DREIFUS
Published: August 28, 2007
Two years ago, when Malcolm Gladwell published his best-selling “Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking,” readers throughout the world were introduced to the ideas of Gerd Gigerenzer, a German social psychologist.
A Daddy Longlegs Tells the Story of the Continents’ Big Shifts
By CARL ZIMMER
These sesame seed sized creatures carry a record of hundreds of millions of years of geological history.
Findings
A World of Eloquence in an Upturned Palm
By JOHN TIERNEY
An anthropologist looks into the roots of the open-hand shrug gesture and finds they run deep.
Video: Chimps Using the Palm Up Gesture
Useful Mutants, Bred With Radiation
By WILLIAM J. BROAD
Public fears aside, scientists mimic nature’s genetic scrambling to bolster fruits and vegetables, as well as beer and whiskey.
Personal Health
The Solvable Problem of Organ Shortages
By JANE E. BRODY
Although willingness to donate organs has risen in recent years, major hurdles remain.
Public Release: 28-Aug-2007
Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry
Mothers' baby cradling habits are indicator of stress, suggests new research
Mothers who cradle their baby to their right hand side are displaying signs of extreme stress, a new study suggests.
Contact: Alex Thomas
media.relations@durham.ac.uk
01-913-346-075
Durham University
Public Release: 28-Aug-2007
Gender Issues
Men choose romance over success
Men may be more willing than women to sacrifice achievement goals for a romantic relationship, according to a new study by Catherine Mosher of Duke Medical Center and Sharon Danoff-Burg from the University of Albany. Their findings challenge our preconceptions that women are more likely to prioritize people and relationships while men are more focused on themselves and their achievements. Their paper will be published in the next issue of the Springer journal, Gender Issues.
Contact: Joan Robinson
joan.robinson@springer.com
49-622-148-78130

Springer
Sensor rise powers life recorders
By Liz Seward
Science reporter
There could be one million sensors per UK resident by 2057 A person's entire life from birth to death could one day be recorded by a network of intelligent sensors, according to a senior scientist.
Orchids date to time of the dinos
Ancient orchid pollen found attached to a bee trapped in amber suggests the "supermodels of the plant world" were blooming at the time of the dinosaurs.
NASA refutes claim that astronauts flew drunk
The agency made the assertion after interviewing hundreds of personnel and reviewing records going back 20 years
23:41 29 August 2007
Public Release: 28-Aug-2007
Evolutionary Psychology
Not all risk is created equal
A camper who chases a grizzly but won't risk unprotected sex. A sky diver afraid to stand up to the boss. New research shows that not all risk is created equal and people show a mixture of both risky and non-risky behaviors.
Contact: Laura Bailey
baileylm@umich.edu
734-647-1848
University of Michigan
Public Release: 28-Aug-2007
Emerging Infectious Diseases
Study confirms limited human-to-human spread of avian-flu virus in Indonesia in 2006
In the first systematic, statistical analysis of its kind, infectious disease modeling experts at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center confirm that the avian influenza A (H5N1) virus in 2006 spread between a small number of people within a family in Indonesia.
NIH/National Institute of General Medical Sciences MIDAS network, NIH/National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
Contact: Kristen Woodward
kwoodwar@fhcrc.org
206-667-5095
Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center
Public Release: 29-Aug-2007
Neurology
Removing ovaries before menopause leads to memory and movement problems
Women who have their ovaries removed before menopause are at an increased risk of developing memory problems or dementia and movement disorders such as Parkinson's disease, according to two studies published Aug. 29, 2007, in the online edition of Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
Contact: Angela Babb
ababb@aan.com
651-695-2789
American Academy of Neurology
Public Release: 29-Aug-2007
BMC Genomics
Smoking turns on genes -- permanently
Smoking tobacco is no longer considered sexy, but it may prove a permanent turn on for some genes. Research published today in the online open access journal BMC Genomics could help explain why former smokers are still more susceptible to lung cancer than those who have never smoked.
Contact: Charlotte Webber
press@biomedcentral.com
44-020-763-19980
BioMed Central
Public Release: 29-Aug-2007
Nature
Volcanoes key to Earth's oxygen atmosphere
A switch from predominantly undersea volcanoes to a mix of undersea and terrestrial ones shifted the Earth's atmosphere from devoid of oxygen to one with free oxygen, according to geologists.
National Science Foundation, NASA, Australian Research Council
Contact: Andrea Elyse Messer
aem1@psu.edu
814-865-9481
Penn State
Public Release: 29-Aug-2007
Journal of the Society for Integrative Oncology
Flaxseed shows potential to reduce hot flashes
Data from a new Mayo Clinic study suggest that dietary therapy using flaxseed can decrease hot flashes in postmenopausal women who do not take estrogen. The findings from the pilot study are published in the summer 2007 issue of the Journal of the Society for Integrative Oncology.
Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation
Contact: Elizabeth Zimmermann
newsbureau@mayo.edu
507-284-5005
Mayo Clinic

Public Release: 29-Aug-2007
American Journal of Public Health
Brown study finds link between depression and household mold
A groundbreaking public health study, led by Brown University epidemiologist Edmond Shenassa, has found a connection between damp, moldy homes and depression. Results are published in the American Journal of Public Health.
Contact: Wendy Lawton
Wendy_Lawton@brown.edu
401-863-1862
Brown University
Public Release: 29-Aug-2007
Journal of Clinical Investigation
Inhaling nitric oxide helps transplant success
Giving tranplant patients nitric oxide gas boosts post-surgical liver function.
INO Therapeutics
Contact: Troy Goodman
tdgoodman@uab.edu
205-934-8938
University of Alabama at Birmingham
Supersonic 'rain' pelts planet-forming disc
Water from space is lashing a dusty disc around a young star – the observations could help settle a debate about how planets form
18:00 29 August 2007
Mesopotamian city grew regardless of kingly rule
Six-thousand-year-old pottery from the site of Tell Brak challenges the notion that such cities expanded outwards as a result of dictates from a central authority
19:00 30 August 2007
Strange Martian feature not a 'bottomless' cave after all
An extremely dark feature on Mars is probably just a pit – not the entrance to a deep cavern that future astronauts could call home
20:49 30 August 2007
Public Release: 30-Aug-2007
Journal of Political Economy
How much will you pay to live near people like you?
Using restricted-access Census data, a new study examines a quarter-million households on a block-by-block basis to yield new results about the correlation between household attributes and school quality. The researchers find that, conditional on income, households prefer to self-segregate on the basis of both race and education.
Contact: Suzanne Wu
swu@press.uchicago.edu
773-834-0386
University of Chicago Press Journals
Public Release: 30-Aug-2007
General Dentistry: Academy of General Dentistry
Human Papilloma Virus vaccines may decrease chances of oral cancer
The Centers for Disease Control report that nearly 25 million women are infected with some form of the Human Papilloma Virus. HPV is linked to oropharyngeal cancer and may be linked to oral cancers as well, and vaccines that have been developed to treat HPV might decrease the risk of these cancers, according to a study in the May/June issue of General Dentistry, the clinical, peer-reviewed journal of the Academy of General Dentistry.
Contact: Stefanie Schroeder
media@agd.org
Academy of General Dentistry
Public Release: 30-Aug-2007
Journal of Trauma
Star Trek medical device uses ultrasound to seal punctured lungs
The first experiment using ultrasound to treat lung injuries shows promising results. High-intensity ultrasound rays stopped air and blood leaks in punctured lungs.
National Institutes of Health, US Department of Defense, National Space Biomedical Research Institute
Contact: Hannah Hickey
hickeyh@u.washington.edu
206-543-2580
University of Washington

Supplement
Why superheroes always win
An analysis of the social networks within the fictional universe of Marvel comics reveals superheroes are better connected than villains
10:13 01 September 2007
World facing 'arsenic timebomb'
By Richard Black
Environment correspondent, BBC News website
About 140 million people, mainly in developing countries, are being poisoned by arsenic in their drinking water, researchers believe.
Public Release: 31-Aug-2007
Psychological Science
Ability to 'tell the difference' declines as infants age
A new article published in the August issue of Current Directions in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science, suggests that infants fine-tune their visual and auditory systems to stimuli during the first year of life, essentially "weeding out" unnecessary discriminatory abilities.
Contact: Jesse Erwin
jerwin@psychologicalscience.org
202-783-2077
Association for Psychological Science
Got Arachnophobia? Here’s Your Worst Nightmare
By GRETEL C. KOVACH
The discovery of a vast web crawling with millions of spiders spreading across several acres of a North Texas park is causing a stir.
Public Release: 31-Aug-2007
Paleobiology
When bivalves ruled the world
Fraiser's work supports a relatively new theory for the cause of the massive extinction that occurred as the Permian period ended and the Triassic period began: toxic oceans created by too much atmospheric carbon dioxide. The theory is important because it could help scientists predict what would happen in the oceans during a modern "C02 event."
Contact: Margaret Fraiser
mfraiser@uwm.edu
414-229-3827
University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee
Public Release: 31-Aug-2007
American Journal of Health Promotion
Girls who begin dieting twice as likely to start smoking
University of Florida researchers analyzing the dieting and smoking practices of 8,000 adolescents found dieting is a significant predictor of initiation of regular smoking among females.
Contact: April Frawley Birdwell
afrawley@ufl.edu
352-273-5817
University of Florida