Donations made by the UK public to charity rose by £400 million last year to a total of £10.6 billion, says a report published Thursday by the National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) and the Charities Aid Foundation.
“UK Giving 2010”, the most comprehensive research yet on the nation’s charitable giving habits, found the number of people giving has also risen to 56 percent, an increase of two percentage points on the previous year.
Rwanda has become one of the cleanest countries in the world — as clean as Switzerland — thanks to new laws requiring every citizen to pick up litter.
President Paul Kagame decreed one morning each month in the capital city of Kigali and around the countryside, to be a public clean-up day.
Forty-two deserving kids got the chance to shop with a cop on Saturday as part of a Riverside-area California police department charitable effort.
Kids were escorted in stretch limousines to a catered breakfast and afterward were given a $100 Walmart shopping spree.
The program is a copy of the community effort in San Diego and other cities.
NASA-funded astrobiology research has changed the fundamental knowledge about what comprises all known life on Earth.
Researchers conducting tests in the harsh environment of Mono Lake in California have discovered the first known microorganism on Earth able to thrive and reproduce using the toxic chemical arsenic. The microorganism substitutes arsenic for phosphorus in its cell components.
“The definition of life has just expanded,” said Ed Weiler, NASA’s associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at the agency’s Headquarters in Washington. “As we pursue our efforts to seek signs of life in the solar system, we have to think more broadly, more diversely and consider life as we do not know it.”
This finding of an alternative biochemistry makeup will alter biology textbooks and expand the scope of the search for life beyond Earth. The results will inform ongoing research in many areas, including the study of Earth’s evolution, organic chemistry, biogeochemical cycles, disease mitigation and Earth system research. These findings also will open up new frontiers in microbiology and other areas of research.
Phosphorus is a central component of the energy-carrying molecule in all cells (adenosine triphosphate) and also the phospholipids that form all cell membranes. Arsenic, which is chemically similar to phosphorus, is poisonous for most life on Earth. Arsenic disrupts metabolic pathways because chemically it behaves similarly to phosphate.
“We know that some microbes can breathe arsenic, but what we’ve found is a microbe doing something new — building parts of itself out of arsenic,” said Felisa Wolfe-Simon, a NASA astrobiology research fellow in residence at the U.S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, Calif., and the research team’s lead scientist. “If something here on Earth can do something so unexpected, what else can life do that we haven’t seen yet?”
The newly discovered microbe, strain GFAJ-1, is a member of a common group of bacteria, the Gammaproteobacteria. In the laboratory, the researchers successfully grew microbes from the lake on a diet that was very lean on phosphorus, but included generous helpings of arsenic. When researchers removed the phosphorus and replaced it with arsenic the microbes continued to grow. Subsequent analyses indicated that the arsenic was being used to produce the building blocks of new GFAJ-1 cells.
The key issue the researchers investigated was when the microbe was grown on arsenic did the arsenic actually became incorporated into the organisms’ vital biochemical machinery, such as DNA, proteins and the cell membranes. A variety of sophisticated laboratory techniques were used to determine where the arsenic was incorporated.
The team chose to explore Mono Lake because of its unusual chemistry, especially its high salinity, high alkalinity, and high levels of arsenic. This chemistry is in part a result of Mono Lake’s isolation from its sources of fresh water for 50 years.
“The idea of alternative biochemistries for life is common in science fiction,” said Carl Pilcher, director of the NASA Astrobiology Institute at the agency’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. “Until now a life form using arsenic as a building block was only theoretical, but now we know such life exists in Mono Lake.”
The research is published in this week’s edition of Science Express. The research team included scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey, Arizona State University in Tempe, Ariz., Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif., Duquesne University in Pittsburgh and the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource in Menlo Park.
Source: www.nasa.gov
NASA-funded astrobiology research has changed the fundamental knowledge about what comprises all known life on Earth.
Researchers conducting tests in the harsh environment of Mono Lake in California have discovered the first known microorganism on Earth able to thrive and reproduce using the toxic chemical arsenic. The microorganism substitutes arsenic for phosphorus in its cell components.
“The definition of life has just expanded,” said Ed Weiler, NASA’s associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at the agency’s Headquarters in Washington. “As we pursue our efforts to seek signs of life in the solar system, we have to think more broadly, more diversely and consider life as we do not know it.”
This finding of an alternative biochemistry makeup will alter biology textbooks and expand the scope of the search for life beyond Earth. The results will inform ongoing research in many areas, including the study of Earth’s evolution, organic chemistry, biogeochemical cycles, disease mitigation and Earth system research. These findings also will open up new frontiers in microbiology and other areas of research.
Phosphorus is a central component of the energy-carrying molecule in all cells (adenosine triphosphate) and also the phospholipids that form all cell membranes. Arsenic, which is chemically similar to phosphorus, is poisonous for most life on Earth. Arsenic disrupts metabolic pathways because chemically it behaves similarly to phosphate.
“We know that some microbes can breathe arsenic, but what we’ve found is a microbe doing something new — building parts of itself out of arsenic,” said Felisa Wolfe-Simon, a NASA astrobiology research fellow in residence at the U.S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, Calif., and the research team’s lead scientist. “If something here on Earth can do something so unexpected, what else can life do that we haven’t seen yet?”
The newly discovered microbe, strain GFAJ-1, is a member of a common group of bacteria, the Gammaproteobacteria. In the laboratory, the researchers successfully grew microbes from the lake on a diet that was very lean on phosphorus, but included generous helpings of arsenic. When researchers removed the phosphorus and replaced it with arsenic the microbes continued to grow. Subsequent analyses indicated that the arsenic was being used to produce the building blocks of new GFAJ-1 cells.
The key issue the researchers investigated was when the microbe was grown on arsenic did the arsenic actually became incorporated into the organisms’ vital biochemical machinery, such as DNA, proteins and the cell membranes. A variety of sophisticated laboratory techniques were used to determine where the arsenic was incorporated.
The team chose to explore Mono Lake because of its unusual chemistry, especially its high salinity, high alkalinity, and high levels of arsenic. This chemistry is in part a result of Mono Lake’s isolation from its sources of fresh water for 50 years.
“The idea of alternative biochemistries for life is common in science fiction,” said Carl Pilcher, director of the NASA Astrobiology Institute at the agency’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. “Until now a life form using arsenic as a building block was only theoretical, but now we know such life exists in Mono Lake.”
The research is published in this week’s edition of Science Express. The research team included scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey, Arizona State University in Tempe, Ariz., Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif., Duquesne University in Pittsburgh and the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource in Menlo Park.
Source: www.nasa.gov
The device known as the “ReWalk” which helps paralyzed patients stand and walk will soon become commercially available.
When Israeli entrepreneur Amit Goffer was paralyzed in a car crash in 1997, he went on a quest to help other victims walk again. He invented an alternative to the wheelchair: robotic “pants” that use sensors and motors to allow paralyzed patients to stand, walk and even climb stairs.
The upright walking assistance tool, even enables wheelchair users with lower-limb disabilities to climb stairs.
Watch a demonstration video from the company, or READ the full story at PhysOrg.com…
Grupo Bimbo, one of the world’s biggest breadmakers, will build a $200 million wind farm to supply almost all of the electric power needed for its Mexican operations, enough to run 65 plants and offices in Mexico.
The company announced the renewable energy plan Thursday estimating the total capacity to be around 90 megawatts.
(READ the story at Reuters)
Did you see the TV ad by GM over the Thanksgiving holiday? General Motors created a poignant video in which the company gives thanks to the American people for helping them back to their feet.
After a short montage of historical failures and triumphant returns, the commercial ends with the two simple lines:
“We all fall down”
“Thank you for helping us get back up”
Kanye West dropped by a New York City charity this week to help with their foster kids gift drive. He spent 90 minutes gift-wrapping presents donated by WalMart for hundreds of young children in the city’s foster care system.
He surprised a roomful of busy volunteers at the Eighth Annual “Wrap to Rap” holiday event organized by New Yorkers For Children.
Kanye West dropped by a New York City charity this week to help with their foster kids gift drive. He spent 90 minutes gift-wrapping presents donated by WalMart for hundreds of young children in the city’s foster care system.
He surprised a roomful of busy volunteers at the Eighth Annual “Wrap to Rap” holiday event organized by New Yorkers For Children.
The race was supposed to have been a moment of glory for the top runner of a northern California high school track team.
But instead of crossing the finish line ahead of the pack and earning another state championship for the girl’s team, the 16-year-old junior collapsed just feet from that line and stunned onlookers by stubbornly crawling to the end, despite being in obvious pain.
Supporting an initiative to end chronic and veteran homelessness in Los Angeles County within five years, the Conrad Hilton Foundation announced Wednesday a gift of $13 million in grants to fund key components of the campaign.
The grants include: $9 million for the creation of 2,500 new permanent supportive housing units; $3.6 million to identify 4,500 of the most vulnerable people on the streets and provide housing; $330,000 for an innovative pilot program to ease the transition into housing; and $200,000 to engage faith leaders and communities in the campaign.
Today, environmentalists are celebrating the 40th anniversary of the founding of the United States Environmental Protection Agency, but all citizens should take a moment to appreciate the breadth of this federal agency’s achievements over such a short span of time.
EPA has protected — and many times brought back from the brink — the air that we breathe, the water we drink, and the ecosystem that keeps us and our animal friends alive.
President Nixon created the agency that would ban DDT, phase out leaded gasoline, halt the use of cancer-causing PCBs, and launch the Brownfields Program to clean up abandoned, contaminated sites, returning them to productive community use. It curbed Acid Rain and — under George W. Bush — established new regulations requiring truck diesel engines and fuel to be 90 percent cleaner.
President Johnson declared that, “Either we become a nation wearing gas masks, or we clean up the air.”
(Watch an excellent video montage of news headlines that highlights the US environmental movement of the last 40 years.)
Today, environmentalists are celebrating the 40th anniversary of the founding of the United States Environmental Protection Agency, but all citizens should take a moment to appreciate the breadth of this federal agency’s achievements over such a short span of time.
EPA has protected — and many times brought back from the brink — the air that we breathe, the water we drink, and the ecosystem that keeps us and our animal friends alive.
The third busiest Atlantic storm season officially drew to end on Tuesday but the United States shoreline and its key energy producing hubs were mostly untouched by any of the year’s major storms, thwarting meteorologists’ predictions that as many as five storms would strike American coastlines.
(READ the report at Reuters)
Cracker Barrel will soon feature electric vehicle chargers in their parking lots. Their “old country stores” will jettison into the 21st century as part of a pilot project to install ECOtality chargers, at 24 of their restaurants across Tennessee.
Customers can be charged-up within 30 minutes, as part of ECOtality’s bid to bring charging stations to more places around the country.
(READ the AP story at The News Tribune)
African nations can break dependence on food imports and produce enough to feed a growing population within a generation despite extra strains from climate change, according to a study unveiled today.
All it would take is more research into new resistant crops, support for small-scale farmers and greater involvement by national leaders in the sector of transportation.
(READ the story from Reuters)
Few things rile a teacher more than seeing a pupil chewing gum in class, but a primary school in southern Germany is now actively encouraging them to do so — in order to improve their grades.
(READ the AFP story at France24.com)
He’s the city’s newest hero, but Carlos Flores said it didn’t feel real until he was reunited Monday with the man he saved from an oncoming No. 6 train and saw he was okay.
“People kept asking me if I felt like a hero,” Flores said. “I didn’t feel like a hero. But to see you – I feel better now,” Flores, 36, said.
The Senate voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to launch the biggest overhaul of the nation’s food safety laws since the 1930s. The bill passed 73 to 25 and would give new authority to the Food and Drug Administration and — for the first time – sets safety standards for imported foods.
The law would place new responsibilities on agri-business to prevent food contamination, like those which responsible for recent egg and spinach episodes.
Small and local farms may be exempt from the final bill’s provisions.
President Obama is optimistic the House will pass a similar bill.
(READ a report in the Washington Post)
