Now, a daily shot of Otelixizumab can halt diabetes in 6 days

Posted on May 12, 2010 by Rashid Faridi

It comes as a new hope for people with type-1 diabetes, fed up of taking lifelong insulin shots in their abdomen and thighs. In what is being termed as a major breakthrough, scientists are clinically trying a new drug which shows potential of stalling and reversing type-1 diabetes in less than one week’s time.

A drug, named Otelixizumab, that has to be given as a daily jab for six days in a row, could help preserve the patient’s natural ability to produce insulin for years. It does so by halting damage to the pancreas, allowing it to carry on producing its own insulin. Type-1 diabetes, which tends to affect young people, more often occurs when the immune system starts to attack healthy tissues such as insulin-producing cells in the pancreas. Once a person suffers from full-fledged type-1 diabetes, there is no other cure but lifelong insulin shots.

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Environmental Refugees

Posted on May 10, 2010 by Rashid Faridi

When major disasters hit or if sea levels rise drastically, millions of people are displaced and left without homes, food, or resources of any kind. These people are left to seek new homes and livelihoods, yet they are not offered international aid due on the reason that they are displaced.

Definition
The term refugee first meant “one seeking asylum” but has since evolved to mean “one fleeing home.” According to the United Nations, a refugee is a person who flees their home country due to a “well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.”

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) defines environmental refugees as “those people who have been forced to leave their traditional habitat, temporarily or permanently, because of a marked environmental disruption (natural and/or triggered by people) that jeopardized their existence and/ or seriously affected the quality of their life.” According to the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), an environmental refugee is a person displaced owing to environmental causes, notably land loss and degradation, and natural disaster.

Permanent and Temporary Environmental Refugees
Many disasters strike and leave areas destroyed and virtually uninhabitable. Other disasters, such as floods or wildfires may leave an area uninhabitable for a short while, but the area regenerates with the only risk being a similar event taking place again. Still other disasters, like long-term drought can allow people to return to an area but don’t offer the same opportunity for regeneration and can leave people without an opportunity for re-growth. In the situations where areas are uninhabitable or re-growth is not possible, individuals are forced to permanently relocate. If this can be done within one’s own country, that government remains responsible for the individuals, but when environmental havoc is wreaked on an entire country, the individuals leaving the country become environmental refugees.

Natural and Human Causes
Disasters that result in environmental refugees have a wide variety of causes and can be attributed to both natural and human reasons. Some examples of natural causes include drought or floods caused by a shortage or excess of precipitation, volcanoes, hurricanes, and earthquakes. Some examples of human causes include over-logging, dam construction, biological warfare, and environmental pollution.

International Refugee Law
The International Red Cross predicts that there are currently more environmental refugees than refugees displaced because of war, yet environmental refugees are not included or protected under the International Refugee Law which developed out of the 1951 Refugee Convention. This law only includes persons who fit these three basic characteristics:

They are outside their country of origin or outside the country of their formal habitual residence;
They are unable or unwilling to avail themselves of the protection of that country owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted; and
The persecution feared is based on at least one of five grounds: race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion.
Since environmental refugees do not fit these characteristics, they are not guaranteed asylum in other more developed countries, as a refugee based on these characteristics would be.

Resources for Environmental Refugees
Environmental refugees are not protected under International Refugee Law and because of this, they are not considered actual refugees. There are few resources, but some resources do exist for those displaced based on environmental reasons. For example, The Living Space for Environmental Refugees (LiSER) Foundation is an organization that is working to put environmental refugee issues on the agendas of politicians and their website has information and statistics on environmental refugees as well as links to ongoing environmental refugee programs.

Source(s) :

About.com

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Posted in Environment | 1 Comment

Coral and Global Warming: Diversity in Some Coral Populations May Affect Their Survival

Posted on May 9, 2010 by Rashid Faridi

An international team of marine biologists has found that existing diversity in some coral populations may significantly influence their response to extreme temperature disturbances — such as those predicted from climate warming. The team demonstrated that natural selection acting on the species of algae living within corals may determine which partnerships will survive when confronted with extreme temperatures changes.Corals form symbiotic relationships with photosynthetic algae in order to survive. The algae provide the corals with nutrients and energy, while the corals provide the algae with nutrients and a place to live. According to the scientists, this delicate symbiosis is sensitive to changes in the environment, and especially to changes in temperature.

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Climate Change and Mountain Building affects Mammal Diversity Patterns

Posted on May 9, 2010 by Rashid Faridi

If you travel from the tropics to the poles,  you’ll notice that the diversity of mammals declines with distance from the equator. Move from lowland to mountains, and you’ll see diversity increase as the landscape becomes more varied. Ecologists have proposed various explanations for these well-known “biodiversity gradients,” invoking ecological, evolutionary and historical processes.

New findings by University of Michigan researchers John A. Finarelli and Catherine Badgley suggest that the elevational patterns of diversity we see today have appeared, disappeared and reappeared over Earth’s history and that these patterns arise from interactions between climate change and mountain building.
The results, published online in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, also have implications for conservation efforts in the face of modern-day global warming, said Finarelli, a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Geological Sciences.
In their study, focused on the Miocene Epoch, which began around 23 million years ago and ended about 5 million years ago, Finarelli and Badgley evaluated diversity for more than 400 rodent species from adjacent regions that differed in geologic history and topography. The geologically “active region,” which extends from the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific coast, has experienced several episodes of mountain-building and volcanic activity, and as a result has a topographically complex landscape. In contrast, the relatively flat Great Plains, has been more stable geologically.
The prevailing notion has been that diversity is greater in mountainous regions than in lowlands simply because the topography is more complex. As mountains rise up, new habitats are created, and areas that once were continuous become fragmented. Such changes offer opportunities for new species to arise, increasing diversity.
But climate also enters in, the new study shows. During the Miocene, long-term, global cooling was interrupted by warm intervals. In the active region, diversity increased during a warm interval from 17 to 14 million years ago that coincided with intensified mountain building and volcanic activity, the analysis revealed. During subsequent cooling, diversity declined in the mountains and increased on the plains.

Source(s) :

Sciencedaily

Posted in BIODIVERSITY, Mountains | Leave a comment