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Saturday, October 22, 2011

Leaf litter ants advance case for rainforest conservation in Borneo

Public release date: 20-Oct-2011
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Contact: Jo Kelly
jo@campuspr.co.uk
44-113-357-2103
University of Leeds

Studies of ant populations in Borneo reveal an unexpected resilience to areas of rainforest degraded by repeated intensive logging, a finding which conservationists hope will lead governments to conserve these areas rather than allow them to be cleared and used for cash crop plantations.

Leaf litter ants are often used to measure the overall ecological health of an area because of the large number of species present and because the health of the leaf litter is a good indication of the overall health of the forest.

It is commonly assumed that repeated logging of rainforests has catastrophic effects on biodiversity. However, studies by Leeds ecologists in northern Borneo, where timber harvests are among the highest globally, have shown that in fact over 80% of ant species found in pristine, unlogged forest were also found in forest that had been logged twice.

The findings have implications for forest conservation as areas of forest where intensive logging has been carried out are typically thought to have little conservation value and are often allowed to be cleared entirely to make way for cash crops such as oil palm.

Keith Hamer, a Reader in Animal Ecology at the Institute of Integrative & Comparative Biology, led the study. He explains: "Rainforests in Borneo are managed through a system called 'selective logging'. In this system, not all the trees are harvested, only the largest, commercially valuable trees. This is supposed to be a sustainable system, but in practice the intensity of harvesting is often too high and areas are then liable to be logged a second time before they have had a chance properly to regenerate.

"These repeatedly logged areas can look awful, with big gaps in the tree canopy which are then invaded by grasses, leading to arguments that such areas are too badly degraded for conservation."

Dr Hamer added: "The logging clearly does have an effect on ant populations but it's not nearly as disastrous as might be expected. These areas are able to support much more diverse communities than oil palm plantations but large areas are still being converted. Preventing this needs to be a priority for policy-makers and conservationists in the region."

The study is part of the Royal Society's Southeast Asia Rainforest Research Programme and is published in a special edition of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. It was supported by a grant from the Leverhulme Trust.

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Leaf litter ants advance case for rainforest conservation in Borneo Public release date: 20-Oct-2011
[ | E-mail | Share ]
Contact: Jo Kelly
jo@campuspr.co.uk
44-113-357-2103
University of Leeds

Studies of ant populations in Borneo reveal an unexpected resilience to areas of rainforest degraded by repeated intensive logging, a finding which conservationists hope will lead governments to conserve these areas rather than allow them to be cleared and used for cash crop plantations.

Leaf litter ants are often used to measure the overall ecological health of an area because of the large number of species present and because the health of the leaf litter is a good indication of the overall health of the forest.

It is commonly assumed that repeated logging of rainforests has catastrophic effects on biodiversity. However, studies by Leeds ecologists in northern Borneo, where timber harvests are among the highest globally, have shown that in fact over 80% of ant species found in pristine, unlogged forest were also found in forest that had been logged twice.

The findings have implications for forest conservation as areas of forest where intensive logging has been carried out are typically thought to have little conservation value and are often allowed to be cleared entirely to make way for cash crops such as oil palm.

Keith Hamer, a Reader in Animal Ecology at the Institute of Integrative & Comparative Biology, led the study. He explains: "Rainforests in Borneo are managed through a system called 'selective logging'. In this system, not all the trees are harvested, only the largest, commercially valuable trees. This is supposed to be a sustainable system, but in practice the intensity of harvesting is often too high and areas are then liable to be logged a second time before they have had a chance properly to regenerate.

"These repeatedly logged areas can look awful, with big gaps in the tree canopy which are then invaded by grasses, leading to arguments that such areas are too badly degraded for conservation."

Dr Hamer added: "The logging clearly does have an effect on ant populations but it's not nearly as disastrous as might be expected. These areas are able to support much more diverse communities than oil palm plantations but large areas are still being converted. Preventing this needs to be a priority for policy-makers and conservationists in the region."

The study is part of the Royal Society's Southeast Asia Rainforest Research Programme and is published in a special edition of the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. It was supported by a grant from the Leverhulme Trust.

###
[ | E-mail | Share ]
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AAAS and EurekAlert! are not responsible for the accuracy of news releases posted to EurekAlert! by contributing institutions or for the use of any information through the EurekAlert! system.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2011-10/uol-lla102011.php
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Friday, October 21, 2011

Pope names US envoy (AP)

VATICAN CITY ? Pope Benedict XVI on Wednesday named an Italian prelate who has served in Vatican diplomatic missions in Iraq, Britain and Nigeria as the new papal ambassador to the United States.

Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, 70, who has been serving as secretary-general of the Vatican city-state, takes the place of Archbishop Pietro Sambi who died in July of complications from surgery.

The Washington post is a key one in the Vatican diplomatic corps both for the importance of the U.S. in world affairs and for its large Catholic population, which is counted on for its financial help to the Holy See and its contributions to papal charities.

The appointment comes during the sensitive time of an election year. Catholics make up about a quarter of the American electorate, but they don't vote as a bloc.

Under Benedict the Vatican has maintained cordial relations with the Obama administration despite deep differences over its support for abortion rights. Some American bishops have taken a harder public stand toward Obama than the Vatican.

Earlier this month, Roman Catholic bishops in the United States released a voter guide for the 2012 election that repeatedly calls abortion "evil" without making revisions that some conservatives had demanded for an even tighter focus on the issue.

Sambi, the late envoy, had helped arrange a meeting between clerical sex abuse victims and Benedict that was one of the focuses of the pope's 2008 visit to the United States.

The Vatican maintains diplomatic relations with 178 countries, most of which maintain two embassies in Rome: one for Italy and one for the Vatican. In addition to normal diplomatic duties, the Vatican envoy to a country plays an important role in the selection of bishops.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/europe/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111019/ap_on_re_eu/eu_vatican_us_envoy

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Thursday, October 20, 2011

Naomi Campbell honored at Gabrielle's Angel Ball (AP)

NEW YORK ? Naomi Campbell put her bad-girl reputation aside as she was honored Monday by the Gabrielle's Angel Foundation.

The supermodel says it meant a lot to be recognized by such an important cause.

Campbell had a few scrapes with the law, and did community service in New York. But on the red carpet, everyone sang her praises. Kim Kardashian called it "very cool," La La Anthony said it was amazing, and Eve blamed the press, saying "the media tries to play her out for something else, but she's a good person."

Former New York Gov. David Patterson empathized, "I've had a whole year of things being positive, it's a lot better on the nerves."

The foundation was created in 1996 by philanthropist Denise Rich after her daughter died of leukemia.

___

Online:

http://www.gabriellesangels.org/

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/celebrity/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111018/ap_en_ce/us_people_naomi_campbell

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Low birthweight infants five times more likely to have autism

Monday, October 17, 2011

Autism researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing have found a link between low birthweight and children diagnosed with autism, reporting premature infants are five times more likely to have autism than children born at normal weight.

The children, some born as small as about a pound, were followed for 21 years making this study, published in the prestigious journal Pediatrics, one of the most remarkable of its kind. The infants were born between September 1984 through July 1987 in Middlesex, Monmouth, and Ocean counties in New Jersey at birthweights from 500 to 2000 grams or a maximum of about 4.4 pounds.

"As survival of the smallest and most immature babies improves, impaired survivors represent an increasing public health challenge," wrote lead author Jennifer Pinto-Martin, MPH, PhD, director of the Center for Autism and Developmental Disabilities Research and Epidemiology (CADDRE) at Penn Nursing. "Emerging studies suggest that low birthweight may be a risk factor for autism spectrum disorders."

Links between low birthweight and a range of motor and cognitive problems have been well established for some time, but this is the first study that establishes that these children are also at increased risk for autism spectrum disorders (ASD).

"Cognitive problems in these children may mask underlying autism," said Dr. Pinto-Martin. "If there is suspicion of autism or a positive screening test for ASD, parents should seek an evaluation for an ASD. Early intervention improves long-term outcome and can help these children both at school and at home."

In future studies, Penn researchers will investigate possible links between brain hemorrhage, a complication of premature birth, and autism by examining brain ultrasounds taken of these children as newborns.

The researchers, including a team at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, followed 862 children from birth to young adulthood finding that five percent of the children were diagnosed with autism, compared to one percent of the general population in what researchers called "the first study to have estimated the prevalence of ASD . . . using research validated diagnostic instruments."

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University of Pennsylvania: http://www.upenn.edu/pennnews

Thanks to University of Pennsylvania for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

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Source: http://www.labspaces.net/114352/Low_birthweight_infants_five_times_more_likely_to_have_autism

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Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Viacom to NY court: Scrap YouTube copyright ruling (AP)

NEW YORK ? A lawyer for Viacom Inc. warned an appeals court panel Tuesday that there will be greater exploitation of copyright material on the Internet if the court lets YouTube get away with a business built on "rampant copyright infringement."

The lawyer, Paul Smith, told a three-judge panel of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan that a lower court judge was wrong to rule that Google Inc.'s popular video service was protected from copyright infringement claims.

"YouTube not only knew there was rampant copyright infringement on the site but welcomed it," Smith said. "These people made this kind of money on somebody else's property."

Google purchased YouTube for $1.76 billion in 2006, comfortable that it was protected by the safe harbor provision of the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act. That provision shields a company from liability if they don't have actual knowledge of copyright infringement. Once notified, the company must eliminate the infringement quickly.

Google attorney Andrew Schapiro countered that YouTube follows the law and always has by taking down video when a copyright owner claims the video infringes its rights.

"There is no evidence, zero, of a single clip in this case that YouTube knew was infringing and failed to take down," he said.

Schapiro said Viacom's chief complaint seemed to be that Google was not screening for copyright violations in the manner Viacom preferred.

"We've done A, B, C and D and plaintiffs are saying, `You should have done E and F,'" he said. "IF we did E and F, they would say, `You should have done G and H.'"

The New York-based Viacom owns popular cable channels such as MTV, Comedy Central and Nickelodeon. In 2007, Viacom brought a $1 billion lawsuit against Google, contending that YouTube was enabling unauthorized viewing of its programming from hits such as "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart."

Google is based in Mountain View, Calif. Viacom is joined in the action with The Football Association Premier League Limited and other plaintiffs.

An appeals ruling could be months away. Through their questions, the judges seemed to be relatively early in the process of deciding what they will do. Sometimes, they asked the most basic questions, such as what the litigants were asking them to do.

"I'm so out of it on these matters," Judge Jose A. Cabranes said when talking about one aspect of the YouTube service.

Since the purchase, YouTube has developed a software program that identifies copyright violations when videos are posted, so much of the litigation relates to whether Viacom should be compensated for what occurred before the program was put in place.

In issuing his ruling last year, Judge Louis L. Stanton noted that Viacom had spent several months accumulating about 100,000 videos violating its copyright and then sent a mass takedown notice on Feb. 2, 2007. The judge said YouTube had removed virtually all of them by the next business day.

The appeals judges seemed open to the idea that some issue in the case might deserve to be heard by a jury, but they also expressed frustration that the possibilities were as limitless as the Internet itself.

Judge Roger Miner asked: "How in the world can damages be computed here?"

Cabranes demanded to know how much damages might be worth.

"The number could be quite large," Smith said.

But when Smith suggested that it could also be not so large, Miner shot back: "Maybe what you're really looking for is a license agreement."

Smith said a license agreement was possible.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/internet/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111018/ap_on_hi_te/us_tec_google_youtube_viacom

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Is It Worth To Get Public Liability Insurance? | vanportlander.com

[unable to retrieve full-text content]Umbrella or Personal Liability Insurance as most companies typically call it offers top degrees of economic reliability and protection to the insurance holder that a standard insurance coverage may not cover.

Source: http://www.vanportlander.com/is-it-worth-to-get-public-liability-insurance/

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