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Short Sharp Science: A New Scientist blog

August 2009 archive

Michael Marshall, reporter

Teetotallers and heavy drinkers are more likely to be anxious or depressed than moderate drinkers, says the Telegraph - but why, exactly?

The research, published in Addiction, looks at alcohol consumption in over 38,000 people, all of whom live in a region of central Norway.

The finding that teetotallers are at greater risk of health problems isn't new, but this paper tries to sort out a major problem with previous studies: many teetotallers are former alcoholics, which means their former lifestyles may be the cause of their problems.
Shanta Barley, reporter

There will soon be no place like home for the people of Kansas, according to a new interactive map launched by environmental charity The Nature Conservancy.

As reported in the Huffington Post, the Climate Wizard lets you explore how temperatures will change in each of the 50 US states - and other parts of the world - over the next 100 years. You can select your level of pessimism or optimism according to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's high, medium or low emissions scenarios.

According to the map, key farming states such as Kansas, Nebraska and Iowa will be hardest hit in the US, with temperatures soaring by over 5 °C under a middle-of-the-road scenario. In contrast, Hawaii will "only" warm up by 2.8 °C.

Shanta Barley, reporter

The US Chamber of Commerce, the world's largest federation of businesses, has demanded that the Environment Protection Agency hold a public hearing to put the science of global warming on trial, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times.

The Chamber apparently envisages the lawsuit as a 21st Century Scopes trial, the 1925 legal case that overturned the Butler Act, a law forbidding the teaching of evolution in US schools.

Nora Schultz, Berlin

Germany's academic community is being shaken by doubts cast on the integrity of around one hundred professors.

The professors, working across all academic disciplines at many major German universities, are suspected to have accepted thousands of euros in bribes from the now-insolvent Institute for Scientific Consulting ("Institut für Wissenschaftsberatung") in Bergisch-Gladbach, near Cologne.

The scandal is the latest in a series of investigations into the Institute's business practices. Public prosecutors searched its offices back in 2005 and again in March 2008, after malpractice accusations first emerged.
Rowan Hooper, news editor

If you're a fan of David Bowie, you might want to take a few deep breaths before watching this video.


"I looked at the link between the language used and how long Bowie's albums had spent in the charts," says Troop. "I found that the songs with positive emotion and social processes were more successful than the songs that talked about mortality."

Armed with this information, Troop ventured to write what he modestly calls the "ideal" Bowie song: the catchily titled "Team, Meet Girls; Girls, Meet Team".
Ewen Callaway, reporter

Has intelligent design passed peer review?



Pandemic - the game

Deborah MacKenzie, consultant

Bored of waiting to see how the current swine flu pandemic will pan out?

Then why not play The Great Flu, the first online flu pandemic game, free at
Ewen Callaway, reporter

Our wallets brim with dirty money, suggests a widely covered study of cocaine-contaminated bank notes.

"Researchers from the American Chemical Society in Washington have discovered that the practice of consuming cocaine through rolled up paper money is far more than just a cinematic cliché. They found that in big cities in the US, up to 90% of the notes tested positive for traces of the drug," reports the Guardian. Scientific American had a similar story.

The BBC notes that figure is up from a study performed 2 years ago that found that two-thirds of bank notes were contaminated with cocaine: "Researchers at the University of Massachusetts in Dartmouth tested notes from more than 30 cities worldwide. They say the rise observed in the US may be due to increased drug use caused by higher stress levels linked to the global economic downturn."

Really? I have a tough time buying the argument that stressed-out, possibly unemployed, workers are going to turn to one of the most expensive illicit drugs on the market.
Palin.jpgJim Giles, correspondent

How did the debate over US healthcare descend into crazy rumours about "death panels" and bizarre rants about Britain's "socialised" medicine?

It wasn't meant to be like this. In June, the New Yorker ran a superb piece on US healthcare. It described how doctors are using tests and treatments that have not shown to be effective, in part because they are paid every time they do so. The article is said have become "required reading" in the White House.

But discussion about the overuse of medicine, which we covered in this video, has been sidelined. Sarah Palin caused a storm earlier this month by falsely claiming that Barack Obama wants to create a "death panel" of bureaucrats to decide who is worthy of healthcare.

Trees are going up in the world

Michael Marshall, reporter

Global warming ought to mean that trees can live at higher altitudes, as the warmer temperatures should allow saplings to establish themselves further up on mountainsides than their parents.

As it turns out, this is true only around half the time (Ecology Letters, DOI: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2009.01355.x).

Researchers looked at 166 sites around the world where treelines have been tracked since 1900. Treelines advanced at 87 of the sites, stayed where they were at 77, and moved downwards at 2 (there're always one or two awkward ones, aren't there).

This is a bit surprising, given that 111 of the sites showed increases in mean annual temperature. What was wrong with some of the sites that kept the trees from moving up the slopes?

US military engages climate change

BlackHAwk2.jpgShanta Barley, environment reporter

The Pentagon has trained its sights on its greatest enemy yet: climate change. 

The New York Times reports military experts as saying that "climate-induced crises could topple governments, feed terrorist movements or destabilise entire regions".

What's more, the resulting food and water shortages could "demand an American humanitarian relief or military response". You've got to hope that they choose carefully between the two.

Startling news from a government that has been criticised for not doing enough to combat rising carbon dioxide levels. But is it really the first time the US government has taken a "serious look at the national security implications of climate change", as the NYT so boldly claims?

13 things that do make sense

darkmatterT.jpgMichael Marshall, reporter





Ewen Callaway, reporter





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Tom Simonite, online technology editor



1025358038_e0fb20be58.jpgAndy Coghlan, reporter

Anti-vivisectionists in Austria are thought to be behind a string of attacks on the Swiss-based pharmaceuticals giant Novartis.

In the most recent attack, on Monday in the Austrian town of Bach, activists are believed to have set fire to the holiday home of the company's chief executive officer, Daniel Vasella. A fire accelerant was found at the scene, suggesting it was started deliberately, reports Reuters.

Last week, activists desecrated the graves of Vasella's parents, stealing an urn containing the remains of his mother. That echoes a similar incident in the UK in 2004, when activists dug up a coffin and stole the remains of a woman whose family had run a business breeding guinea pigs for research.

(Image: Andrew Hecht / Flickr)

apple_pic.pngPaul Marks, technology correspondent



Why whales don't have gills

Blow.jpgMichael Le Page, biology features editor

If you live in the sea, it makes sense to have gills, right? Wrong. No. 1 on a recent list of evolutionary mistakes was the fact that whales have blowholes, not gills. Like pretty much everything on the list, it's not an evolutionary mistake at all - though to be fair, I don't think the list was intended to be taken too seriously.

The reason whales and dolphins don't have gills is simple: it's because the sea is full of water.
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