Chemical key to cell division revealed

In each of our cells, most of the genetic material is packaged safely within the nucleus, which is protected by a double membrane. The biochemistry behind how this membrane transforms when cells divide has finally been unravelled, offering insights that could provide new ways of fighting cancer and some rare genetic disorders.

During cell division, the membrane that surrounds the nucleus breaks down and reforms in the two daughter cells. Researchers have been split on the precise mechanisms that govern membrane reformation. One view is that proteins alone control the membrane's transformations. Another possibility is that changes in lipids – a vast group of fat-related compounds – are responsible.

Experiments had failed to show which of these two ideas was right, because it was difficult to alter lipid levels in specific compartments of cells without affecting other cellular processes.

Banafshe Larijani at Cancer Research UK's London Research Institute and her colleagues have now overcome that hurdle. They came up with a technique that transforms a type of lipid called a diacylglycerol (DAG) into another lipid, within the nuclear membrane.

Chemical cascade

The technique involves inserting two fragments of DNA into the nucleus of a cell. This causes the cell to make two proteins: the first attaches itself to the nuclear membrane, the second floats around the cell. Adding a drug – rapalogue – to the mix causes the second protein to stick to the first, which in turn causes a chemical cascade that transforms the DAG into a different kind of lipid.

Crucially, they targeted a form of DAG that does not bind to proteins, so converting it into a different lipid does not affect any processes involving proteins in the cell.

The team tested the effect of this lipid manipulation on cell division in monkey and human cancer cells. The lower the level of DAG present in the nuclear membrane, the greater the membrane malformation and chance of cell death.

This demonstrates that lipids play a role in nuclear membrane reformation that does not depend on proteins.

Larijani says it "opens the door to finding ways to kill cancerous cells" by focusing on lipids that are important to the nuclear membrane's development.

Sausage pieces

As the nucleus divides, sausage-shaped fragments of its membrane float around the cell. The fragments have curved ends, and Larijani says that changes in lipid composition generate these curves, without which the fragments cannot reassemble correctly into new membranes.

More than a dozen rare genetic conditions such as Hutchinson-Gilford progeria syndrome, which is characterised by premature ageing in children, have been linked to irregularities in cell division. A better understanding of the way the nuclear membrane forms when cells divide could be key to treating these disorders.

The research also offers a new focus for preventing the irregular cell division that underlies many cancers.

"As a result of this work we now know with confidence that DAG plays a structural role in membrane dynamics," says Vytas Bankaitis, at the Texas A&M Health Science Center in College Station, who was not involved in the study. "If we could find a molecule with suitable characteristics, this manipulation could be done [in humans], which is something that has not really been considered before."

Journal reference: PLoS ONE DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0051150

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US sends offers aid after deadly Typhoon Bopha

WASHINGTON: The United States offered disaster relief and sent condolences Wednesday to the Philippines and Palau in the wake of Typhoon Bopha, which left hundreds dead.

At least 325 people were killed and hundreds remain missing in the Philippines following the deadliest typhoon to hit the country this year, the Philippines civil defence chief said in Manila.

"The United States offers condolences for the destruction and loss of life in the southern Philippines and the widespread damage to populated areas in Palau caused by Typhoon Bopha," deputy State Department spokesman Mark Toner said in a statement.

"Our embassies in Manila and Koror have offered immediate disaster relief assistance, and we are working closely with authorities in both countries to offer additional assistance as needed. Our thoughts and prayers are with all those affected by this tragedy."

Philippines civil defence chief Benito Ramos warned that the toll was expected to rise because hundreds of people are still missing.

- AFP/ck

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Zeus botnet steals $47M from European bank customers

A new version of the Zeus botnet was used to steal about $47 million from European banking customers in the past year, security researchers report.

Dubbed "Eurograbber" by security vendors Versafe and Check Point Software Technologies in a report (PDF) released today, the malware is designed to defeat the two-factor authentication process banks use for transactions by intercepting bank messages sent to victims' phones.

A variant of the Zeus malware used to steal more than $100 million, Eurograbber typically launched its attack when a victim clicked on a malicious link most likely included in a phishing attempt. After installing customized variants of the Zeus, SpyEye, and CarBerp Trojans Trojans to the victim's computer, victims would be prompted by the malware during their first visit to the bank site after infection to enter their mobile phone number.

The report illustrates how the attack works.

(Credit:
Check Point/Versafe)

During that first visit, Eurograbber would offer a "banking software security upgrade" that would infect victims' phones with a variant of the "Zeus in the mobile" (ZITMO) Trojan, which was specifically designed to intercept the bank's text message containing the bank's transaction authorization number (TAN), the key element of the bank's two-factor authorization. Eurograbber would then quietly use the TAN to quietly transfer funds out of the victim's account.

"To date, this exploit has only been detected in euro zone countries, but a variation of this attack could potentially affect banks in countries outside of the European Union as well," said in the report, which said it has notified affected banks of the malware.

First detected in Italy earlier this year, Eurograbber is responsible for the theft of 36 million euros from about 30,000 commercial and personal bank accounts by initiating transfers ranging from 500 euros ($656) to 250,000 euros ($328,000), according to the report.

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A 2020 Rover Return to Mars?

NASA is so delighted with Curiosity's Mars mission that the agency wants to do it all again in 2020, with the possibility of identifying and storing some rocks for a future sample return to Earth.

The formal announcement, made at the American Geophysical Union's annual fall meeting, represents a triumph for the NASA Mars program, which had fallen on hard times due to steep budget cuts. But NASA associate administrator for science John Grunsfeld said that the agency has the funds to build and operate a second Curiosity-style rover, largely because it has a lot of spare parts and an engineering and science team that knows how to develop a follow-on expedition.

"The new science rover builds off the tremendous success from Curiosity and will have new instruments," Grunsfeld said. Curiosity II is projected to cost $1.5 billion—compared with the $2.5 billion price tag for the rover now on Mars—and will require congressional approval.

While the 2020 rover will have the same one-ton chassis as Curiosity—and could use the same sky crane technology involved in the "seven minutes of terror"—it will have different instruments and, many hope, the capacity to cache a Mars rock for later pickup and delivery to researchers on Earth. Curiosity and the other Mars rovers, satellites, and probes have garnered substantial knowledge about the Red Planet in recent decades, but planetary scientists say no Mars-based investigations can be nearly as instructive as studying a sample in person here on Earth.

(Video: Mars Rover's "Seven Minutes of Terror.")

Return to Sender

That's why "sample return" has topped several comprehensive reviews of what NASA should focus on for the next decade regarding Mars.

"There is absolutely no doubt that this rover has the capability to collect and cache a suite of magnificent samples," said astronomer Steven Squyres, with Cornell University in New York, who led a "decadal survey" of what scientists want to see happen in the field of planetary science in the years ahead. "We have a proven system now for landing a substantial payload on Mars, and that's what we need to enable sample return."

The decision about whether the second rover will be able to collect and "cache" a sample will be up to a "science definition team" that will meet in the years ahead to weigh the pros and cons of focusing the rover's activity on that task.  

As currently imagined, bringing a rock sample back to Earth would require three missions: one to select, pick up, and store the sample; a second to pick it up and fly it into a Mars orbit; and a third to take it from Mars back to Earth.

"A sample return would rely on all the Mars missions before it," said Scott Hubbard, formerly NASA's "Mars Czar," who is now at Stanford University. "Finding the right rocks from the right areas, and then being able to get there, involves science and technology we've learned over the decades."

Renewed Interest

Clearly, Curiosity's success has changed the thinking about Mars exploration, said Hubbard. He was a vocal critic of the Obama Administration's decision earlier this year to cut back on the Mars program as part of agency belt-tightening but now is "delighted" by this renewed initiative.

(Explore an interactive time line of Mars exploration in National Geographic magazine.)

More than 50 million people watched NASA coverage of Curiosity's landing and cheered the rover's success, Hubbard said. If things had turned out differently with Curiosity, "we'd be having a very different conversation about the Mars program now."

(See "Curiosity Landing on Mars Greeted With Whoops and Tears of Jubilation.")

If Congress gives the green light, the 2020 rover would be the only $1 billion-plus "flagship" mission—NASA's largest and most expensive class of projects—in the agency's planetary division in the next decade. There are many other less ambitious projects to other planets, asteroids, moons, and comets in the works, but none are flagships. That has left some planetary scientists not involved with Mars unhappy with NASA's heavy Martian focus.

Future Plans

While the announcement of the 2020 rover mission set the Mars community abuzz, NASA also outlined a series of smaller missions that will precede it. The MAVEN spacecraft, set to launch next year, will study the Martian atmosphere in unprecedented detail; a lander planned for 2018 will study the Red Planet's crust and interior; and NASA will renew its promise to participate in a European life-detection mission in 2018. NASA had signed an agreement in 2009 to partner with the European Space Agency on that mission but had to back out earlier this year because of budget constraints.

NASA said that a request for proposals would go out soon, soliciting ideas about science instruments that might be on the rover. And as for a sample return system, at this stage all that's required is the ability to identify good samples, collect them, and then store them inside the rover.

"They can wait there on Mars for some time as we figure out how to pick them up," Squyres said. "After all, they're rocks."

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Fiscal Cliff: Do You Trust the Polls?

Dec 5, 2012 4:49pm

National polls show that Republicans would take the brunt of the blame for a dive over the so-called fiscal cliff.  A Washington Post/Pew Research Survey released this week found that a majority of the public (53 percent) would point the finger at Republicans if Congress fails to reach a deal on taxes and government spending. Just 27 percent would blame President Obama.

But are national polls really the right tools with which to understand the political consequences of this latest legislative limbo? After all, the Romney and the Obama campaign both eschewed national polling during the campaign, focusing instead on the battleground states that would deliver the Electoral College.

And, when it comes to the House, a national sample isn’t particularly predictive either. There are very few Democrats or Republicans who sit in “swing districts.” Just 81 members of the House — less than 20 percent — won their seats with less than 55 percent of the vote.

In other words, what the general public thinks is not necessarily indicative of what the voters in the individual districts think. In fact, most Republicans are much more worried about a challenge from their right in a primary than a challenge from a Democrat.

“National polls in a Presidential race are useless for sure, and they are useless to members of Congress trying to make decisions about their own personal politics,” says Democratic pollster Jefrey Pollock. “But that doesn’t make them totally worthless. Just because the congressional folks are reelected by large margins, it’s still important to take temperatures of national sentiment. It’s very interesting/important to note what people nationally think about who should be blamed because that drives media coverage and the narrative.”

Republican strategist Jon Lerner agrees that national polling drives the national discussion, which in turn drives the national mood.

“National polls are necessarily broad, and they are therefore informative in a broad sense about the political environment and about national policy questions,” says Lerner. “If national polls say the Iraq war, or Obamacare, are broadly unpopular, it says something about the direction the national political discussion will take on those issues and on others that might have less energy behind them.”

Democratic pollster Geoff Garin says that you can actually use national data in “situations like now, when there is a national policy debate going on,” to gauge voter sentiment in individual districts.

“If you believe, as I do, that the high ground in politics is being able to capture the high ground in the center, national polls tell you a lot about where the center is,” Garin told me.  “And if your sample is large enough so you can understand responses by partisanship, geography (region of country, type of area), race, other demographics, etc., you can take a pretty good guess about the driving forces and what they would look like in a particular state or CD. And it is just a lot more cost efficient to do a large sample national survey than a bunch of state surveys.”

But, while national polls can be of some value in understanding the mood of the country going into the fiscal cliff debate, what they can’t predict is the response of voters if we indeed fall off that cliff. How voters assess blame today may be very, very different from who they hold responsible in the aftermath of a crisis.

SHOWS: World News

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When is a baby too premature to save?

It was never easy, but trying to decide whether to save extremely premature babies just got harder.

A study called EPICure compared the fates of babies born 22 to 26 weeks into pregnancy in the UK in 1995 with similar babies born in 2006. In this 11-year period, the babies surviving their first week rose from 40 to 53 per cent. But an accompanying study comparing the fate of survivors at age 3 found that the proportion developing severe disabilities was unchanged, at just under 1 in 5.

"We've increased survival, but it's confined to the first week of life," says Kate Costeloe of Queen Mary, University of London, author of the first study. "Yet the pattern of death and health problems is strikingly similar between the two periods."

The absolute numbers of premature babies born over the 11 year period increased by 44 per cent, from 666 in 1995 to 959 in 2006. This meant that the absolute numbers of children with severe disabilities such as blindness, deafness or lameness also rose, increasing the burden on health, educational and social services.

Lifelong disability

"As the number of children that survive preterm birth continues to rise, so will the number who experience disability throughout their lives," says Neil Marlow of University College London, who led the second study.

By far the worst outcomes were for the youngest babies, with 45 per cent of those born at 22 or 23 weeks in 2006 developing disabilities compared with 20 per cent of those born at 26 weeks. In 1995 only two babies survived after being born at 22 weeks. In 2006, three did.

In 2006, a panel of UK ethicists concluded that babies born at 22 weeks should be allowed to die, as with babies born at or before 23 weeks in France and Holland.

Journal references: BMJ, Costeloe et al, DOI: 10.1136/bmj.e7976; Marlow et al, DOI: 10.1136/bmj.e7961

If you would like to reuse any content from New Scientist, either in print or online, please contact the syndication department first for permission. New Scientist does not own rights to photos, but there are a variety of licensing options available for use of articles and graphics we own the copyright to.

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Philippines rescuers scramble as 82 dead in typhoon

MANILA - The death toll from a powerful typhoon that ravaged the southern Philippines rose to 82 Wednesday, as rescuers battled to reach areas cut off in flash floods and mudslides.

Typhoon Bopha churned across the island of Mindanao, toppling trees and blowing away homes on Tuesday before weakening overnight as it headed towards the South China Sea.

It was however expected to dump more rain as it passes over the western island of Palawan on Wednesday morning, with the potential to wreak further destruction, officials said.

Interior Minister Mar Roxas said after an inspection visit to the storm-hit south that the confirmed death toll had risen from 52 to 82, with another 21 people missing.

There were 49 fatalities in a mudslide in the mountainous town of New Bataan alone, and another 33 died in rural settlements elsewhere in Mindanao.

Among the fatalities was a soldier who was part of a troop deployment sent to New Bataan in anticipation of the storm.

"It is quite sad and tragic. They were actually there to be ready to help our countrymen who may be in trouble," Roxas said.

The military was scrambling helicopters and heavy equipment Wednesday to New Bataan, where rainwater had gushed down from nearby slopes, creating a deadly swirl of rainwater, logs and rocks that crushed everything in its path.

The narrow mountain pass leading to the town was littered with fallen trees and boulders, virtually cutting it off from traffic, said Major General Ariel Bernardo, commander of the 10th Infantry Division which covers Mindanao.

"We are hoping to fly our helicopters to conduct reconnaissance and search and recovery," he said.

Parts of Mindanao remained without power and communications, with food and clean water in limited supply after Bopha carved a path of destruction.

"Three of our coastal municipalities remain isolated," said Governor Corazon Malanyaon of Davao Oriental province on the eastern coast of the island where the storm made landfall.

"Roads to these towns remain impassable. There are many fallen trees and debris and the bridge going there had collapsed."

She said rescuers were slowly trying to reach the stricken areas, using everything from heavy equipment to their bare hands and chain saws to clear the roads.

"It's like we're running an obstacle course," she said on local radio.

Malanyaon said initial reports said that nearly every building in the agricultural town of Cateel, one of the three towns isolated in Davao Oriental, had been damaged.

"About 95 per cent of the town centre's structures including hospitals, private homes, private buildings had their roofs blown away," she said.

Bernardo said the military was dispatching two companies to help in the search and rescue operations, but that it was also "a victim of the storm" after an army patrol base and a rescue truck were washed away in New Bataan.

"In one of our headquarters, no bunkers were left standing and all our communication equipment has been destroyed,' he said.

Bopha made landfall on the eastern coast of Mindanao early Tuesday, bringing driving rain and strong winds that forced more than 56,000 to seek refuge in emergency shelters.

It was the sixteenth storm this year to ravage the Philippines, which is hit with about 20 cyclones annually.

In December last year Mindanao was pummelled by tropical storm Washi which killed more than 1,200 and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

- AFP/ck

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Apple looks to double its N.C. biogas fuel cell farm

Apple's Maiden, N.C., data center could have up to 50 fuel cells running on renewable biogas.

(Credit:
Apple)

Ten megawatts of electricity is enough energy to power more than 6,000 homes. It is also the same amount of electricity that Apple is looking to produce with its biogas fuel cell project at its North Carolina data center.

The tech giant has filed a request with the N.C. Utilities Commission to double the size of its local fuel cell farm, according to the Charlotte Observer.

Currently, the data center has enough fuel cells to pump out 4.8 megawatts of electricity. Apple is asking to bump those numbers up to 50 fuel cells, which should be able to produce 10 megawatts of electricity.

If Apple is given approval to enlarge its farm, this data center would hold the country's largest fuel cell project not run by an electric utility, according to the Charlotte Observer.

Apple announced in May that it intended to have its $1 billion data center in Maiden, N.C., run entirely off renewable energy by the end of the year. The company said it was building two solar array installations in the area, which when combined will bring in 84 million kilowatt-hours of power annually. And, it was also at work on a biogas fuel cell installation.

By using biogas rather than natural gas to power its fuel cells, Apple is tapping into what many consider a renewable resource -- namely trash piling up in landfills that creates methane gas.

"The use of biogas, which displaces conventional natural gas, to generate electricity will reduce greenhouse gas emissions and smog-forming pollutants while also diversifying the fuel used to generate electricity," Apple said in its May filing.

Earlier this year, Apple's North Carolina data center became the target of attacks from Greenpeace, which launched a campaign to pressure cloud-computing providers to use more clean energy. In response, Apple said the Maiden facility would be one of the most efficient data centers in the country, with 60 percent of its power to be supplied by its on-site renewable-energy power sources and with the remaining 40 percent coming from renewable "local and regional sources."

The start-up and testing phase of Apple's North Carolina fuel cell project got underway last month, according to the Charlotte Observer. And, if the company gets approval to expand, it hopes to have its fuel cell electricity output at 10 megawatts by January.

CNET contacted Apple for comment. We'll update the story when we get more information.

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Scientific Results From Challenger Deep

Jane J. Lee

The spotlight is shining once again on the deepest ecosystems in the ocean—Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench (map) and the New Britain Trench near Papua New Guinea. At a presentation today at the American Geophysical Union's conference in San Francisco, attendees got a glimpse into these mysterious ecosystems nearly 7 miles (11 kilometers) down, the former visited by filmmaker James Cameron during a historic dive earlier this year.

Microbiologist Douglas Bartlett with the University of California, San Diego described crustaceans called amphipods—oceanic cousins to pill bugs—that were collected from the New Britain Trench and grow to enormous sizes five miles (eight kilometers) down. Normally less than an inch (one to two centimeters) long in other deep-sea areas, the amphipods collected on the expedition measured 7 inches (17 centimeters). (Related: "Deep-Sea, Shrimp-like Creatures Survive by Eating Wood.")

Bartlett also noted that sea cucumbers, some of which may be new species, dominated many of the areas the team sampled in the New Britain Trench. The expedition visited this area before the dive to Challenger Deep.

Marine geologist Patricia Fryer with the University of Hawaii described some of the deepest seeps yet discovered. These seeps, where water heated by chemical reactions in the rocks percolates up through the seafloor and into the ocean, could offer hints of how life originated on Earth.

And astrobiologist Kevin Hand with the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, spoke about how life in these stygian ecosystems, powered by chemical reactions, could parallel the evolution of life on other planets.

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Tasting DNA-Altered Salmon That May Hit US Plates

Deep in the rain forests of Panama, in a secret location behind padlocked gates, barbed-wire fences and over a rickety wooden bridge, grows what could be the most debated food product of our time.

It may look like the 1993 hit movie "Jurassic Park," but at this real-life freshwater farm scientists are altering the genes not of dinosaurs -- but of fish.

They are growing a new DNA-altered saltwater fish in the mountains, far from the sea -- a salmon that could be the first genetically altered animal protein approved for the world to eat. If it is approved, this would be a landmark change for human food.

But it is one critics call "Frankenfish."

"The idea of changing an animal form, I think, is really creepy," said Gary Hirshberg, founder of Stonyfield Farm, an organic dairy farm. "When you move the DNA from a species into another species ... you create a new life form that's so new and so unique that you can get a patent for it."

And until now, AquaBounty, the multinational biotech company that for 20 years has been developing this giant fish, has kept it under close wraps.

The press has never been invited to its Prince Edward Island laboratory on the Canadian maritime coast, and its fish farm location in Panama has been kept secret out of fear of sabotage.

The Food and Drug Administration has seen it, but few from the outside. In fact, the last public tour of any kind was four years ago.

AquaBounty Creates 'Fort Knox for Fish'

ABC News was given exclusive access to see the facilities up close and an opportunity to taste this mysterious fish that FDA scientists say "is as safe as food from conventional Atlantic salmon," although have yet to officially approve it for public sale.

Ron Stotish, the president and CEO of AquaBounty Technologies, the company that created and hopes to market the eggs of this salmon to independent fish farms around the world, told ABC News it has employed bio-security measures, creating a "Fort Knox for fish," to ensure safety for the fish and prevent cross-contamination with the wild.

Entry to both facilities begins with body suits and iodine baths for shoes, which serves to keep the fish safe from germs.

Inside these protected tanks, America gets the first up-close look at the final product, the fish that has the food police up in arms.

"These are very healthy, beautiful Atlantic salmon," Stotish said.

With one big difference -- the growth rate of a regular salmon compared to that of an AquaBounty genetically modified fish.

While the AquaBounty fish do not grow to a size larger than normal salmon, they get to full size much faster, cutting costs for producers.

A normal-size 1-year-old Atlantic salmon averages 10 inches long, while the genetically modified fish at the same age is more than two times larger, coming in at 24 inches.

Salmon is the second most popular seafood in America. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the average size of an Atlantic salmon is 28 inches to 30 inches and 8 pounds to 12 pounds after two years at sea.

How do they accomplish the accelerated growth?

"They differ by a single gene," Stotish said.

But, it's that single gene change that makes the DNA-altered salmon grow much faster than a normal Atlantic salmon, because it's really three fish in one.

AquaBounty scientists have taken a growth gene from the Chinook salmon and inserted it into the DNA of the Atlantic salmon because Chinooks grow fast from birth, while Atlantics do not.

"Salmon in their first two years of life grow very slowly," Stotish said.

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