Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire. Men might improve their fertility by reducing how much pollution they breathe in. The dirtier the air, the lower a man's sperm count and the more sperm with fragmented DNA he produces, two new studies suggest.
However, neither report directly links the decline in sperm quality to fertility problems.
"The decrease is not enormous," comments environmental chemist Brian McCarry of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, who was not involved in either study. "There's no evidence that it has an impact on fertility."
In one study, ozone appeared to be a culprit behind diminished sperm counts, suggesting that it's a "sperm toxicant," say Rebecca Z. Sokol of the University of Southern California in Los Angeles and her colleagues. They had looked for a correlation between the quality of semen from 48 local sperm donors and air-quality data for the zip code in which each donor lived. The donors were healthy men who had given 10 or more donations to a sperm bank over at least a year.
Sperm counts were lower when ozone concentrations where the men lived had been high during the previous 90 days, Sokol and her team report in an upcoming Environmental Health Perspectives. Sperm take nearly that long to develop. The researchers took into account the effects that temperature and season have on men's sperm counts. Airborne particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, and carbon monoxide weren't associated with reduced sperm concentrations, the team says.
In the second study, Jiri Rubes and two of his colleagues at the Veterinary Research Institute in Brno, Czech Republic, worked with U.S. scientists. They examined up to seven semen samples from each of 36 men living in a polluted region of the Czech Republic.
Each September for 3 consecutive years, the researchers collected a sample from most of the men. The team took as many as four more samples from each man during the two winters of the study. Wintertime pollutant concentrations in the region can be double to quadruple those measured in September. http://louis9j9sheehan.blog.com
In most winter-air samples, a cubic meter contained 60 to 80 micrograms each of particulate matter, nitrogen oxides, and sulfur dioxide and about 150 nanograms of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, exceeding common regulatory limits. Semen samples had more fragmented DNA at those times than they did in September, the team reports in the October Human Reproduction.
"This is certainly an important finding," says Ashok Agarwal of the Cleveland Clinic. DNA damage to sperm has been linked to low pregnancy rates, although the damage found in the Czech study may not have been enough to impair fertility, he says.http://louis9j9sheehan.blog.com
Despite the heavy pollution, the researchers found no differences in sperm counts or several other measures of sperm quality. But, McCarry notes, "they didn't measure the ozone." Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
champagne 4.cha.0 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . “The Widow Clicquot,” Tilar J. Mazzeo’s sweeping oenobiography of Barbe-Nicole Clicquot Ponsardin, is the story of a woman who was a smashing success long before anyone conceptualized the glass ceiling. Her destiny was formed in the wake of the French Revolution when, Mazzeo suggests, “modern society — with its emphasis on commerce and the freedom of the individual — was invented.” Barbe-Nicole, daughter of a successful textile maker turned Jacobin, is portrayed as someone whose way of doing business helped define the next century.
Fate cursed or blessed her with the mantle of early widowhood. Her husband, a winemaker from whom she learned the craft, died when she was 27, leaving her a single mother — the veuve (widow) Clicquot. Officially, the cause of François Clicquot’s death was typhoid, which was then commonly treated by feeding the patient Champagne, believed to strengthen the body against what was known as malignant fever. “To think that a bottle of his own sparkling wine might have saved François!” Mazzeo writes, going on to speculate that it is also possible he killed himself because business wasn’t good.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . http://louis2j2sheehan2esquire2.wordpress.com
Already savvy about winemaking, Barbe-Nicole plunged into a new life. Despite contemporary mores and the Napoleonic Code, which emphasized a woman’s role at home, she was not alone. She saw the success of such wine merchants as the widow Germon, the widow Robert and the widow Blanc, and understood that widows were the “only women granted the social freedom to run their own affairs.” With the gate open, she was off and running with spectacular results.
What a prescient entrepreneur she was, with a business outlook that sounds more 21st century than 19th. Toward the end of her life, in the 1860s, she wrote to a great-grandchild: “The world is in perpetual motion, and we must invent the things of tomorrow. One must go before others, be determined and exacting, and let your intelligence direct your life. Act with audacity.”
Her audacity was unleashed at the right time. Napoleon’s abdication in 1814 was cause for toasts among both the British and Russians. “Champagne,” Mazzeo writes, “was on its way to becoming another word for mass-culture celebration.” While the war’s naval blockade still paralyzed commercial shipping, Mme. Clicquot conspired to sneak a boat around the armada, delivering 10,000 bottles of high-proof, cork-popping 1811 cuvée Veuve Clicquot to Königsberg, where it sold for the equivalent of $100 per bottle. When the powerhouse 1811 reached St. Petersburg, Czar Alexander declared he would drink nothing else. Within two years the widow Clicquot was “at the helm of an internationally renowned commercial empire — and she was one of the first women in modern history to do it.” People said she had conquered Russia with Champagne; soon, London clubgoers simply asked for a bottle of “the Widow.”
As much about Champagne itself as about the woman who helped elevate it to celebrity status, “The Widow Clicquot” reveals that the wine’s history is as filled with faux folklore as a glass of it is with tiny bubbles. For one thing, Dom Pierre Pérignon did not invent it. The oft-told fable is that Dom Pérignon, the cellar master at the Hautvillers abbey, took a first sip and cried out to his fellow monks: “Come quickly! I am drinking the stars!” A charming tale, but bogus. Mazzeo says that for a decade after 1660, when Dom Pérignon gained fame as a master blender, he steadfastly worked at ways to prevent wine from developing bubbles. “In the 17th century,” she reports, “winemakers were anything but delighted by the voluntary sparkle that developed in their casks come spring.” Champagne did not even originate in France. While Dom Pérignon was struggling to stamp out bubbles, British oenophiles already were drinking sparkling wine made from Champagne grapes. Why? Customers rich enough to buy whole barrels realized they had to do something to keep their prize from turning to vinegar. They put still wine from Champagne into sturdy British bottles, sometimes with a little brandy to act as a preservative. At some point, somebody realized that sugar bottled with the wine would start a secondary fermentation, creating Champagne. Bubbly was not invented; it was discovered by accident.
At its beginning, Champagne scarcely resembled the dry, fine-fizzed champers we know today. Whereas a modern demi sec might contain 20 grams of sugar per bottle, the Champagne of Mme. Clicquot’s time held 10 or 15 times that much and was served as icy as a Slurpee. Nor did the original stuff have elegant little bubbles to tickle your nose. Veuve Clicquot customers complained about bubbles so big and gassy that they left the wine topped with a beery foam. http://louis2j2sheehan2esquire2.wordpress.com Madame Clicquot disparagingly called the unwelcome froth “toad’s eyes,” and was determined to make better bubbles. Although she was head of the company, her devotion to the craft of wine making never wavered; she worked with her cellar master to devise a riddling rack to facilitate remuage, the process by which sediment is drawn from the liquid to the bottle’s neck. Her obsession with creating a beverage as clear as a flawless diamond may well have been her most important achievement. Without it, Mazzeo writes, “Champagne could never have become the world’s most famous wine.” http://louis2j2sheehan2esquire2.wordpress.com
Fate cursed or blessed her with the mantle of early widowhood. Her husband, a winemaker from whom she learned the craft, died when she was 27, leaving her a single mother — the veuve (widow) Clicquot. Officially, the cause of François Clicquot’s death was typhoid, which was then commonly treated by feeding the patient Champagne, believed to strengthen the body against what was known as malignant fever. “To think that a bottle of his own sparkling wine might have saved François!” Mazzeo writes, going on to speculate that it is also possible he killed himself because business wasn’t good.Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . http://louis2j2sheehan2esquire2.wordpress.com
Already savvy about winemaking, Barbe-Nicole plunged into a new life. Despite contemporary mores and the Napoleonic Code, which emphasized a woman’s role at home, she was not alone. She saw the success of such wine merchants as the widow Germon, the widow Robert and the widow Blanc, and understood that widows were the “only women granted the social freedom to run their own affairs.” With the gate open, she was off and running with spectacular results.
What a prescient entrepreneur she was, with a business outlook that sounds more 21st century than 19th. Toward the end of her life, in the 1860s, she wrote to a great-grandchild: “The world is in perpetual motion, and we must invent the things of tomorrow. One must go before others, be determined and exacting, and let your intelligence direct your life. Act with audacity.”
Her audacity was unleashed at the right time. Napoleon’s abdication in 1814 was cause for toasts among both the British and Russians. “Champagne,” Mazzeo writes, “was on its way to becoming another word for mass-culture celebration.” While the war’s naval blockade still paralyzed commercial shipping, Mme. Clicquot conspired to sneak a boat around the armada, delivering 10,000 bottles of high-proof, cork-popping 1811 cuvée Veuve Clicquot to Königsberg, where it sold for the equivalent of $100 per bottle. When the powerhouse 1811 reached St. Petersburg, Czar Alexander declared he would drink nothing else. Within two years the widow Clicquot was “at the helm of an internationally renowned commercial empire — and she was one of the first women in modern history to do it.” People said she had conquered Russia with Champagne; soon, London clubgoers simply asked for a bottle of “the Widow.”
As much about Champagne itself as about the woman who helped elevate it to celebrity status, “The Widow Clicquot” reveals that the wine’s history is as filled with faux folklore as a glass of it is with tiny bubbles. For one thing, Dom Pierre Pérignon did not invent it. The oft-told fable is that Dom Pérignon, the cellar master at the Hautvillers abbey, took a first sip and cried out to his fellow monks: “Come quickly! I am drinking the stars!” A charming tale, but bogus. Mazzeo says that for a decade after 1660, when Dom Pérignon gained fame as a master blender, he steadfastly worked at ways to prevent wine from developing bubbles. “In the 17th century,” she reports, “winemakers were anything but delighted by the voluntary sparkle that developed in their casks come spring.” Champagne did not even originate in France. While Dom Pérignon was struggling to stamp out bubbles, British oenophiles already were drinking sparkling wine made from Champagne grapes. Why? Customers rich enough to buy whole barrels realized they had to do something to keep their prize from turning to vinegar. They put still wine from Champagne into sturdy British bottles, sometimes with a little brandy to act as a preservative. At some point, somebody realized that sugar bottled with the wine would start a secondary fermentation, creating Champagne. Bubbly was not invented; it was discovered by accident.
At its beginning, Champagne scarcely resembled the dry, fine-fizzed champers we know today. Whereas a modern demi sec might contain 20 grams of sugar per bottle, the Champagne of Mme. Clicquot’s time held 10 or 15 times that much and was served as icy as a Slurpee. Nor did the original stuff have elegant little bubbles to tickle your nose. Veuve Clicquot customers complained about bubbles so big and gassy that they left the wine topped with a beery foam. http://louis2j2sheehan2esquire2.wordpress.com Madame Clicquot disparagingly called the unwelcome froth “toad’s eyes,” and was determined to make better bubbles. Although she was head of the company, her devotion to the craft of wine making never wavered; she worked with her cellar master to devise a riddling rack to facilitate remuage, the process by which sediment is drawn from the liquid to the bottle’s neck. Her obsession with creating a beverage as clear as a flawless diamond may well have been her most important achievement. Without it, Mazzeo writes, “Champagne could never have become the world’s most famous wine.” http://louis2j2sheehan2esquire2.wordpress.com
Tuesday, December 30, 2008
ecological 5.eco.0004 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
The Chang Tang Nature Reserve, situated 12,000 feet above sea level in the northwestern part of China's Tibetan Plateau, features bitter cold, sparse vegetation, cutting winds, and little water. Scientists have now obtained preliminary evidence that people nonetheless colonized this forbidding territory near the end of the Stone Age. http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN.NET
The discovery of stone tools and spear points, as well as the remains of temporary camps dated to between 12,000 and 11,000 years ago, indicates that late-Stone Age groups adapted to some of the planet's harshest environments, says archaeologist P. Jeffrey Brantingham of the Santa Fe (N.M.) Institute.
"We've probably underestimated the diversity of hunter-gatherer adaptations to extreme environments during the late Stone Age," Brantingham remarks. He and his colleagues, John W. Olsen of the University of Arizona in Tucson and George B. Schaller of the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York City, describe their new findings in the June Antiquity.
Ecological field surveys, which Schaller directed in the mid-1990s in the Chang Tang Reserve, yielded nearly 400 stone artifacts. Surveyors found the implements lying on the ground at 18 widely separated locations, most in the reserve's eastern section.
http://LOUIS1J1SHEEHAN1ESQUIRE.US
The finds include a variety of sharpened blades and spear points, ranging from about three-fourths of an inch to 3 inches long. Investigators also found round stones from which blades and other implements had been pounded off. The Chang Tang blades bear signs of extensive resharpening and were apparently recycled for different types of jobs, the researchers say.
Brantingham and Olsen conducted initial excavations at several Chang Tang sites last summer. Radiocarbon dates for human occupation come from charcoal found in hearths at these locations.
http://LOUIS1J1SHEEHAN1ESQUIRE.US
When the two scientists return to the sites in September, they'll probe for clues about the late Stone Age's climate and environment. Some researchers, suspecting the area was covered by an ice sheet during the late Stone Age, have doubted that people could have settled there then.
Brantingham proposes, however, that hunter-gatherers lived in this region by successfully contending with severe cold and scant water supplies. The size and shapes of their stone blades and spear points suggest that they hunted available game, such as antelopes and yak, he says.
"I believe that the Tibetan Plateau had a late [Stone Age] human occupation, as the new data suggest," says archaeologist Mark Aldenderfer of the University of California, Santa Barbara. He asserts that researchers should find sites on the plateau with multiple layers showing occupations over time. Aldenderfer is currently traveling to the Tibetan Plateau in an attempt to do just that. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
The discovery of stone tools and spear points, as well as the remains of temporary camps dated to between 12,000 and 11,000 years ago, indicates that late-Stone Age groups adapted to some of the planet's harshest environments, says archaeologist P. Jeffrey Brantingham of the Santa Fe (N.M.) Institute.
"We've probably underestimated the diversity of hunter-gatherer adaptations to extreme environments during the late Stone Age," Brantingham remarks. He and his colleagues, John W. Olsen of the University of Arizona in Tucson and George B. Schaller of the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York City, describe their new findings in the June Antiquity.
Ecological field surveys, which Schaller directed in the mid-1990s in the Chang Tang Reserve, yielded nearly 400 stone artifacts. Surveyors found the implements lying on the ground at 18 widely separated locations, most in the reserve's eastern section.
http://LOUIS1J1SHEEHAN1ESQUIRE.US
The finds include a variety of sharpened blades and spear points, ranging from about three-fourths of an inch to 3 inches long. Investigators also found round stones from which blades and other implements had been pounded off. The Chang Tang blades bear signs of extensive resharpening and were apparently recycled for different types of jobs, the researchers say.
Brantingham and Olsen conducted initial excavations at several Chang Tang sites last summer. Radiocarbon dates for human occupation come from charcoal found in hearths at these locations.
http://LOUIS1J1SHEEHAN1ESQUIRE.US
When the two scientists return to the sites in September, they'll probe for clues about the late Stone Age's climate and environment. Some researchers, suspecting the area was covered by an ice sheet during the late Stone Age, have doubted that people could have settled there then.
Brantingham proposes, however, that hunter-gatherers lived in this region by successfully contending with severe cold and scant water supplies. The size and shapes of their stone blades and spear points suggest that they hunted available game, such as antelopes and yak, he says.
"I believe that the Tibetan Plateau had a late [Stone Age] human occupation, as the new data suggest," says archaeologist Mark Aldenderfer of the University of California, Santa Barbara. He asserts that researchers should find sites on the plateau with multiple layers showing occupations over time. Aldenderfer is currently traveling to the Tibetan Plateau in an attempt to do just that. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Thursday, December 25, 2008
reno 4.ren.0002003 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
More than 30 years ago, Russian investigators dug up the remains of several human camps situated along the Kamchatka River in eastern Siberia and dated them to as early as 14,000 years ago. These ancient settlements, dubbed the Ushki sites, have been viewed as possible launching pads for pioneering treks into North America much earlier than 11,000 years ago, the date at which archaeologists have traditionally assumed the New World was first settled. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire. http://louisjsheehanesquire.blogsavy.com
However, new work doesn't support the idea that people lived at the Ushki camps well before that time. Radiocarbon dating of ancient charcoal found at an Ushki site excavated in 2000 by a joint team from Russia and the United States indicates that residents first arrived at the site between 11,300 and 11,000 years ago, says Ted Goebel of the University of Nevada, Reno. A subsequent occupation occurred around 10,400 years ago, he adds.http://louisjsheehanesquire.blogsavy.com
If comparable dates of human occupation emerge for other Ushki camps, the standard account of Siberians initially entering Alaska about 11,000 years ago via a land bridge may get a boost. Artifacts found at the recently excavated Ushki site resemble those at Alaskan sites of about the same age, Goebel says.
The oldest Ushki material includes notched stone points and two hearths constructed of large stones. The younger artifacts include a hearth and miniature blades. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
However, new work doesn't support the idea that people lived at the Ushki camps well before that time. Radiocarbon dating of ancient charcoal found at an Ushki site excavated in 2000 by a joint team from Russia and the United States indicates that residents first arrived at the site between 11,300 and 11,000 years ago, says Ted Goebel of the University of Nevada, Reno. A subsequent occupation occurred around 10,400 years ago, he adds.http://louisjsheehanesquire.blogsavy.com
If comparable dates of human occupation emerge for other Ushki camps, the standard account of Siberians initially entering Alaska about 11,000 years ago via a land bridge may get a boost. Artifacts found at the recently excavated Ushki site resemble those at Alaskan sites of about the same age, Goebel says.
The oldest Ushki material includes notched stone points and two hearths constructed of large stones. The younger artifacts include a hearth and miniature blades. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
Monday, December 15, 2008
lesbian 2.les.00100 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire. The microscopic aquatic creatures known as bdelloid rotifers are used to enduring dry spells—in more senses than one. In their common habitats of moss, soil, and seasonal pools, these minuscule, transparent animals routinely survive periods of complete dessication that can last from days to years. They also hold the record for celibacy among animals: All 460 known species of bdelloids consist exclusively of egg-laying females that have essentially been cloning themselves for 100 million years. http://louis7j7sheehan7esquire.wordpress.com Their endurance has long posed a kind of scientific mystery, as the majority of asexually reproducing species tend to fade away over time. But a genetic study published in May in Science [subscription required] hints that bdelloids emerging from a drought might have a kind of bizarre sex after all. http://louis7j7sheehan7esquire.wordpress.com
For most life-forms, going for long periods without water spells certain doom. But dehydrated bdelloids somehow reconstitute themselves when moisture returns, even though their metabolic activity stops, their cell membranes rupture, and their DNA probably gets fragmented too. http://louis7j7sheehan7esquire.wordpress.com “You add water, they fix themselves up, and they swim away,” says lead investigator Matthew Meselson of Harvard University.
Meselson’s study suggests that upon patching up their own DNA, the bdelloids simultaneously incorporate random scraps of DNA from other organisms. This so-called horizontal gene transfer is extremely rare among animals, and in the bdelloids’ case can include DNA from almost anything that was in their soupy habitat at the time things dried up, including whatever they just ate. In only 1 percent of the bdelloid genome, Meselson found dozens of foreign genes from bacteria, plants, and fungi inserted among the native nucleotides. It’s likely, he says, that during recovery from dessication, bdelloids pick up genes from members of their own species, too—dead members, that is, whose genes spill out of ruptured cell membranes. That process would provide the kind of genetic reshuffling that other animals achieve through sexual reproduction.
“It may be their form of sex,” Meselson says. “But their partner is essentially dead. So you’d have to call it necrophilia. Actually, since they’re all females, lesbian necrophilia.” Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
For most life-forms, going for long periods without water spells certain doom. But dehydrated bdelloids somehow reconstitute themselves when moisture returns, even though their metabolic activity stops, their cell membranes rupture, and their DNA probably gets fragmented too. http://louis7j7sheehan7esquire.wordpress.com “You add water, they fix themselves up, and they swim away,” says lead investigator Matthew Meselson of Harvard University.
Meselson’s study suggests that upon patching up their own DNA, the bdelloids simultaneously incorporate random scraps of DNA from other organisms. This so-called horizontal gene transfer is extremely rare among animals, and in the bdelloids’ case can include DNA from almost anything that was in their soupy habitat at the time things dried up, including whatever they just ate. In only 1 percent of the bdelloid genome, Meselson found dozens of foreign genes from bacteria, plants, and fungi inserted among the native nucleotides. It’s likely, he says, that during recovery from dessication, bdelloids pick up genes from members of their own species, too—dead members, that is, whose genes spill out of ruptured cell membranes. That process would provide the kind of genetic reshuffling that other animals achieve through sexual reproduction.
“It may be their form of sex,” Meselson says. “But their partner is essentially dead. So you’d have to call it necrophilia. Actually, since they’re all females, lesbian necrophilia.” Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
study 00.stu.110020 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Harvests of corn and other crops are likely to be drawn into a tug of war between people's need for food and their need for fuel, agricultural economists say.
Corn is the most cost-efficient and popular raw material used in the United States to make ethanol. That's important because the fuel has gotten increasingly competitive with gasoline as oil prices have risen.
"The lines between the food economy and the energy economy [are] becoming blurred," says agricultural economist Lester R. Brown, president of the Earth Policy Institute in Washington, D.C. Last week, his organization issued an economic analysis on the subject.
The analysis found an emerging "competition between the 800 million people who own automobiles and the 2 billion low-income people, many of whom already spend over half their income on food," Brown says. Furthermore, he says, "taxpayers may be subsidizing a rise in their own food prices."
To encourage the use of alternative fuels, U.S. law subsidizes ethanol production at 51 cents per gallon and production of other so-called biofuels at up to $1 per gallon. Those incentives tempt farmers to sell crops to biofuel distilleries or, if they instead sell to food manufacturers, to demand higher prices than they otherwise would.
One-fifth of corn and almost one sixth of the U.S. grain harvest overall goes toward ethanol production, according to the institute's report. And while the world's production of grain will grow by about 20 million tons this year, 70 percent of the increase could be used to generate ethanol for U.S. automobiles, Brown says.
Combustion vs. consumption
"Ethanol plants [are] being built, and they're starting to pull more corn their way," comments agricultural economist Chad E. Hart of Iowa State University in Ames. "We're seeing already higher projected prices than normal for the 2007 crop."
Predicting that the growth of the ethanol industry could drive up food prices as early as next year, Hart notes that corn futures are trading at about $3 per bushel, or about 50 cents higher than usual.
With demand for corn rising, production is also likely to increase, Hart says. Higher corn prices will lure farmers to devote more acres to cultivating corn and fewer to other crops. That, he says, will encourage "an across-the-board increase in crop prices"—as well as in the price of animal feed derived from such crops.
"If corn price goes up, you'll probably feel it more in the cost of your steak than the cost of your cornflakes," Hart says.
Processing, packaging, and distribution costs account for more than 90 percent of the commercial price of cornflakes, bread, and other grain-based products. "Most of the cost of [products such as] bread is not in the cost of the raw materials," Hart says.
By contrast, the cost of feed for animals and other expenses incurred on livestock farms account for about half of the commercial price of meat and eggs, and nearly a third of the cost of cheese. Therefore, Hart says, higher corn prices aren't likely to translate into penny-for-penny increases in food costs.
In addition, Hart says, byproducts of ethanol production from corn, such as corn-gluten meal, can be used to feed livestock. That way, not all the corn used to make fuel is diverted from the food supply.
"So the price impact on livestock products will likely be relatively small in comparison to the change in corn prices," he says.
A technological shift away from corn-based ethanol toward ethanol made from non-crop plants could eventually reverse the anticipated rise in crop costs, Hart says.
A scientific study published last week finds that making ethanol from corn generates less new energy than does manufacturing certain other kinds of biofuel, such as biodiesel made from soybeans (see Farm-Fuel Feedback: Soybeans have advantages over corn).
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But if ethanol remains the primary alternative fuel in the United States, a possible replacement for corn could be cellulose from other plants. A weedy plant called switchgrass, for instance, is a productive source of that material, and the plant can be grown in abundance on land unsuitable for crops.
Of a mostly switchgrass-based ethanol industry, Hart says: "While it's technically feasible, it's not commercially viable at this time. For the U.S., corn is the best model going right now." Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Corn is the most cost-efficient and popular raw material used in the United States to make ethanol. That's important because the fuel has gotten increasingly competitive with gasoline as oil prices have risen.
"The lines between the food economy and the energy economy [are] becoming blurred," says agricultural economist Lester R. Brown, president of the Earth Policy Institute in Washington, D.C. Last week, his organization issued an economic analysis on the subject.
The analysis found an emerging "competition between the 800 million people who own automobiles and the 2 billion low-income people, many of whom already spend over half their income on food," Brown says. Furthermore, he says, "taxpayers may be subsidizing a rise in their own food prices."
To encourage the use of alternative fuels, U.S. law subsidizes ethanol production at 51 cents per gallon and production of other so-called biofuels at up to $1 per gallon. Those incentives tempt farmers to sell crops to biofuel distilleries or, if they instead sell to food manufacturers, to demand higher prices than they otherwise would.
One-fifth of corn and almost one sixth of the U.S. grain harvest overall goes toward ethanol production, according to the institute's report. And while the world's production of grain will grow by about 20 million tons this year, 70 percent of the increase could be used to generate ethanol for U.S. automobiles, Brown says.
Combustion vs. consumption
"Ethanol plants [are] being built, and they're starting to pull more corn their way," comments agricultural economist Chad E. Hart of Iowa State University in Ames. "We're seeing already higher projected prices than normal for the 2007 crop."
Predicting that the growth of the ethanol industry could drive up food prices as early as next year, Hart notes that corn futures are trading at about $3 per bushel, or about 50 cents higher than usual.
With demand for corn rising, production is also likely to increase, Hart says. Higher corn prices will lure farmers to devote more acres to cultivating corn and fewer to other crops. That, he says, will encourage "an across-the-board increase in crop prices"—as well as in the price of animal feed derived from such crops.
"If corn price goes up, you'll probably feel it more in the cost of your steak than the cost of your cornflakes," Hart says.
Processing, packaging, and distribution costs account for more than 90 percent of the commercial price of cornflakes, bread, and other grain-based products. "Most of the cost of [products such as] bread is not in the cost of the raw materials," Hart says.
By contrast, the cost of feed for animals and other expenses incurred on livestock farms account for about half of the commercial price of meat and eggs, and nearly a third of the cost of cheese. Therefore, Hart says, higher corn prices aren't likely to translate into penny-for-penny increases in food costs.
In addition, Hart says, byproducts of ethanol production from corn, such as corn-gluten meal, can be used to feed livestock. That way, not all the corn used to make fuel is diverted from the food supply.
"So the price impact on livestock products will likely be relatively small in comparison to the change in corn prices," he says.
A technological shift away from corn-based ethanol toward ethanol made from non-crop plants could eventually reverse the anticipated rise in crop costs, Hart says.
A scientific study published last week finds that making ethanol from corn generates less new energy than does manufacturing certain other kinds of biofuel, such as biodiesel made from soybeans (see Farm-Fuel Feedback: Soybeans have advantages over corn).
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But if ethanol remains the primary alternative fuel in the United States, a possible replacement for corn could be cellulose from other plants. A weedy plant called switchgrass, for instance, is a productive source of that material, and the plant can be grown in abundance on land unsuitable for crops.
Of a mostly switchgrass-based ethanol industry, Hart says: "While it's technically feasible, it's not commercially viable at this time. For the U.S., corn is the best model going right now." Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Sunday, November 23, 2008
absorb 43.abs.02 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Residents of a Chinese region where 80 percent of families include workers who dismantle and recycle electronic devices have high concentrations of flame-retardant chemicals in their blood, researchers report. Inhabitants of a fishing village not far away also carried elevated amounts of the chemicals, called polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs).
Much of the world's electronic waste ends up in China, where most handlers of the materials work without protective gear. http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN-ESQUIRE.US They smash the components and strip out metals, releasing dust laden with deca-BDE, a flame retardant commonly added to plastic components.
In this first study of PBDE occupational exposure in China, researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Guangzhou and Lancaster University in England analyzed blood samples from individuals at two sites in southern China. One group of people lived in Guiyu, an electronic-waste-dismantling area in southern China. People in a comparison group lived in Haojiang, a fishing village 50 kilometers away.
PBDEs come in 209 forms that include different arrangements of up to 10 bromine atoms. Studies in mice and rats have shown that PBDEs with 5 or 8 bromine atoms harm brain development (SN: 10/13/01, p. 238; SN: 10/25/03, p. 266). Growing evidence suggests that deca-BDE, which contains 10 bromine atoms, can cause the same developmental problems either on its own or when it breaks down into PBDEs with fewer bromines, says Linda Birnbaum, director of the Environmental Protection Agency's experimental toxicology division.http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN-ESQUIRE.US
Deca-BDE is widely used in electronics and upholstery. The Guiyu residents had a median concentration of deca-BDE up to 200 times as high as were typically seen in two Swedish studies of industrial workers.
Total PBDE concentrations among individuals in Guiyu had a median value three times as high as did the individuals in Haojiang, the researchers report in the Aug. 15 Environmental Science & Technology. The elevated concentrations of PBDEs in villagers in Haojiang indicate that airborne dust particles might have carried the chemicals to the village, says Gareth Thomas of Lancaster University, a coauthor of the study. The highest deca-BDE contamination ever reported was recorded in a 32-year-old Guiyu man whose blood contained 3,100 parts per billion (ppb) lipid. Lipid molecules, or fat, accumulate these chemicals.http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN-ESQUIRE.US
The astronomical concentrations of deca-BDE, a median of 310 ppb lipid in Guiyu, indicate regular, heavy exposure to the chemical, comments Åke Bergman of Stockholm University. That's because deca-BDE has a half-life in the body of just 15 days. "In order to keep up these very high concentrations, the people need to be continuously exposed," he says.
The overall PBDE concentrations seen in the Guiyu residents are in "a risk region" for exposing a woman's fetus to amounts of the compounds that could damage a developing brain, Bergman adds.
He notes that electronic-waste recycling is done in other countries by workers who may be no better protected than the Guiyu workers are. "We may have a few more areas in the world where we have [elevated] exposure to humans and also to the environment," he says.
Much of the world's electronic waste ends up in China, where most handlers of the materials work without protective gear. http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN-ESQUIRE.US They smash the components and strip out metals, releasing dust laden with deca-BDE, a flame retardant commonly added to plastic components.
In this first study of PBDE occupational exposure in China, researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Guangzhou and Lancaster University in England analyzed blood samples from individuals at two sites in southern China. One group of people lived in Guiyu, an electronic-waste-dismantling area in southern China. People in a comparison group lived in Haojiang, a fishing village 50 kilometers away.
PBDEs come in 209 forms that include different arrangements of up to 10 bromine atoms. Studies in mice and rats have shown that PBDEs with 5 or 8 bromine atoms harm brain development (SN: 10/13/01, p. 238; SN: 10/25/03, p. 266). Growing evidence suggests that deca-BDE, which contains 10 bromine atoms, can cause the same developmental problems either on its own or when it breaks down into PBDEs with fewer bromines, says Linda Birnbaum, director of the Environmental Protection Agency's experimental toxicology division.http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN-ESQUIRE.US
Deca-BDE is widely used in electronics and upholstery. The Guiyu residents had a median concentration of deca-BDE up to 200 times as high as were typically seen in two Swedish studies of industrial workers.
Total PBDE concentrations among individuals in Guiyu had a median value three times as high as did the individuals in Haojiang, the researchers report in the Aug. 15 Environmental Science & Technology. The elevated concentrations of PBDEs in villagers in Haojiang indicate that airborne dust particles might have carried the chemicals to the village, says Gareth Thomas of Lancaster University, a coauthor of the study. The highest deca-BDE contamination ever reported was recorded in a 32-year-old Guiyu man whose blood contained 3,100 parts per billion (ppb) lipid. Lipid molecules, or fat, accumulate these chemicals.http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN-ESQUIRE.US
The astronomical concentrations of deca-BDE, a median of 310 ppb lipid in Guiyu, indicate regular, heavy exposure to the chemical, comments Åke Bergman of Stockholm University. That's because deca-BDE has a half-life in the body of just 15 days. "In order to keep up these very high concentrations, the people need to be continuously exposed," he says.
The overall PBDE concentrations seen in the Guiyu residents are in "a risk region" for exposing a woman's fetus to amounts of the compounds that could damage a developing brain, Bergman adds.
He notes that electronic-waste recycling is done in other countries by workers who may be no better protected than the Guiyu workers are. "We may have a few more areas in the world where we have [elevated] exposure to humans and also to the environment," he says.
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