In the 1980s, Dublin gas network had 100s km of cast iron pipes, some 100 years old. The cast iron pipes were connected together by waxed joints, these joints were stable when moist Town Gas (coal gas) flowed through the pipes but when the city changed over to natural gas, which is dry, the wax dried out and the gas leaked. Town Gas was generated by passing superheated steam over coal, creating a gas containing hydrogen, methane and notoriously, carbon monoxide.
In the late 1980s I could not walk more than 100 feet along suburban street before coming across an overpowering stench of leaking gas. One of the temporary fixes was to drill holes into side-walks to reduce the concentration of gas underground. I don't remember any gas explosions or accidents caused by leaking cast iron pipes then the leaks happened, given the number of leaks we were very lucky.
By the way, almost half of the water supply in Dublin in lost through leaks (worst in Europe).
Maybe they detected carbon, nitrogen and sulphur with an unusual light isotopic signatures. Terrestrial life preferentially accumulates lighter isotopes. Isotopic biomarkers in ancient terrestrial rocks have been used to support the exitance of terrestrial life, 3.8 billion years ago, when Earth and Mars were very similar.
It would be a historic result, quite robust evidence supporting life on an early Mars.
Zuilen, M. van 2008. Stable Isotope Ratios as a Biomarker on Mars. Space Science Reviews 135(1-4), 221–232.
Regardless of what or where he posted his joke, the BBC reports that 50 angry people turned up outside his house and he was arrested at a different address for his own safety.
The problem with these studies is that they don't test the particular conditions people are worried about: long term low level exposure due to radiation inside the body and organs. Nuclear plant workers are the best benchmark we have for that, and sure enough rates of cancer are pretty consistently shown to be higher among that group.
That's not right.
1. The risks of internal radiation are reasonably well understood from observations of patients given injections of ‘Thorotrast’, Radium dial painters exposed to 226 Ra and 228 Ra & patients given 224 Ra for medical conditions, occupational exposure of uranium miners to radon, and residential radon exposure etc.
Harrison, J. & Day, P., 2008. Radiation doses and risks from internal emitters. Journal Of Radiological Protection, J. Radiol. Prot., 28, 137–159.
2. Nuclear plant workers consistently have much better health (e.g. a lower cancer rate) then the general population (McGeoghegan et al. 2008). It's called the Healthy Worker Effect, it's one of the reasons why detecting elevated risks amongst nuclear workers is difficult. However, the few exceptions are subset of rare blood cancers e.g. Leukaemia, possibly lung cancer and heart disease. Even then, the detection of a statistically significant increases are limited to a few workers in the highest dose categories, >100 mSv for rare types of cancers & >300 mSv for Heart Disease. Note that cancer risk varies ~40% due to non-radiation effects (lifestyle and environment) and overwhelm the subtle effects (if any) of very low level radiation (below 100 mSv).
"Even a study of millions of workers exposed to very low doses (below 100 mSv), no matter how carefully conducted, would be inadequate to produce precise and uncertain estimates of risk in part because of the dominating influence of any subtle biases or unknown confounding factors" (UNSCEAR 2008, Land 1980).
The last and biggest study into Nuclear workers, "The 15 country Study" by Cardis et al. 2005 tracked the heath of up to 407,391 workers over 5.2 million person years, was revealed to be flawed by erroneous data in the Canadian cohort (involving 11,907 workers). Cardis et al. claimed, oddly, that all cancers except Leukaemia were elevated due to radiation (and there didn't even seem to the a threshold!). But when the erroneous Canadian data was identified and removed, there was no statistically significant increase in cancer. This fiasco highlights the sensitivity to confounding, bias and error in studies of low statistical certainty. Furthermore, Boice 2010 explained that there may never be another study of nuclear workers of this size, because the permitted exposures to workers are now far more stringent and few workers will ever be exposed to >100 mSv (or even >300 mSv) to detect the effects of radiation with statistical certainty (even considering the recent events in Japan).
So we have no direct evidence that a dose below 100 mSv causes cancer, that's why laboratory studies are so important, where we can investigate cellular repair and defence mechanisms that may cause radiation risk to depart from LNT i.e. threshold or hormesis.
Ashmore, J. P., Gentner, N. E. & Osborne, R. V., 2010. Incomplete data on the Canadian cohort may have affected the results of the study by the International Agency for Research on Cancer on the radiogenic cancer risk among nuclear industry workers in 15 countries. Journal of Radiological Protection 30, 121–129. Boice, J. D. 2010. Uncertainties in studies of low statistical power. J Radiol Prot 30, 115–120. McGeoghegan, D., Binks, K., Gillies, M., Jones, S. & Whaley, S., 2008. The Non-Cancer Mortality Experience of Male Workers at British Nuclear Fuels Plc, 1946–2005. Int. J. Epidemiol. 37, 506–518.
Interesting. But while there were very many experiments carried out in the 1960-70s, the radiation doses applied were generally much higher then the background levels we are interested in now. People are worried over a few extra MiliSieverts a year.
Scientists in the 1960-70s were were not able to observe subtle cellular effects, typical defence and repair mechanisms, that operate at and just above background levels of radiation (20 mSv). They were mostly crude LD50 and cancer frequency tests. Very few experiments investigated doses 0.1 Gy (about 100 mSv & 0.8% increase in human cancer risk). And the few experiments that did involve low doses gave confused results because of poor statistical certainty (some even suggested Radiation Hormesis, as you alluded to).
That's why these resent experiments are so important and interesting, they're finally investigating how organisms cope with low level radiation, and indeed they suggest the risks are grossly overestimated.
Crump, K. S. et al. 2012. A Meta-Analysis of Evidence for Hormesis in Animal Radiation Carcinogenesis, Including a Discussion of Potential Pitfalls in Statistical Analyses to Detect Hormesis. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, Part B 15, 210–231. Tubiana, M., Feinendegen, L. E., Yang, C. & Kaminski, J. M., 2009. The Linear No-Threshold Relationship Is Inconsistent with Radiation Biologic and Experimental Data. Radiology, 251, 13 –22.
Sophisticated molecular and genetic analyses were not available in 1950s - 70s when many experiments investigating the effects of radiation on plants and animals took place; most were crude LD50 and cancer frequency tests conducted at moderate to very high doses, few were conducted at low doses (0.1 Gy) where cells could potentially repair the damage caused. This has all changed in the last ~20 years.
Sophisticated laboratory techniques now detect and observe the defence & repair mechanisms that operate in cells and whole organisms at low doses (100 mSv, ~0.8% increased risk of cancer in humans). For example, healthy people's cells repair all radiation induced DNA Double Strand Breaks (DSBs) within 24-hours after a CAT scan, indicating little or no additional risk of cancer. It is clear from resent experiments that living organisms are not passive accumulators of radiation damage but they actively combat and repair the damage done. After all, life involved with radiation and 3.5-3.8 billion years ago radiation levels were many times greater then now, it was necessary to evolve sophisticated error correction mechanisms. Indeed, it is likely that radiation is far less harmful or harmless below a certain threshold, possibly ~ 20 mSv year.
Crump, K. S. et al. 2012. A Meta-Analysis of Evidence for Hormesis in Animal Radiation Carcinogenesis, Including a Discussion of Potential Pitfalls in Statistical Analyses to Detect Hormesis. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, Part B 15, 210–231. Neumaier, T. et al. 2012. Evidence for Formation of DNA Repair Centers and Dose-Response Nonlinearity in Human Cells. PNAS 109, 443–448. Löbrich, M. et al., 2005. In vivo formation and repair of DNA double-strand breaks after computed tomography examinations. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 102, 8984 –8989 Tubiana, M., Feinendegen, L. E., Yang, C. & Kaminski, J. M., 2009. The Linear No-Threshold Relationship Is Inconsistent with Radiation Biologic and Experimental Data. Radiology 251, 13–22. (Paper available without subscription).
Recent re-analysis of lunar volcanic samples shows the interior of the Moon is allot wetter then we thought. Some parts of the Moon interior, at least, contain as much water as the Earth's upper mantle, far wetter than predicted by the Giant Impact Hypothesis (the water should have boiled off).
Less sophisticated analysis in the 1970s indicated the Moon is very dry (less than 50 parts per million water). But water was lost to the vacuum of space during lunar volcanic eruptions, giving a false impression the Moon was dry. New techniques detected water trapped inside fluid inclusions (bubbles) in olivine crystals, showing the interior of the moon is quite wet. Zhang at al. 2012 is one of several resent studies that calls the Giant Impact Hypothesis into question.
Mantle plumes and mantle processes in general are integral to continental break-up and the development of sedimentary (rift) basins, within continents and along continental margins. Petroleum companies are very interested in mantle processes and basin development (it's a branch of geology called Basin Analysis); some of the worlds largest oil and gas fields are found in sedimentary basins along rifted continental margins.
Near me to the west of Ireland, there's the Corrib, Slyne, Porcupine & Rockall Basins to name a few, these were formed when the North Atlantic opened up in the last 60 million years. That break-up was caused in large part by the Iceland Plume and furthermore, it appears that fluctuations in the strength of the Iceland Plume over time caused land uplift and erosion (and thus production of sediments into those basins i.e. oil/gas trap rock). The reason why there was uplift is poorly understood.
Mantle plumes definitely exist (Iceland would be underwater without it's buoyant plume impinging on and lifting up the crust). The question is, what depth do plumes start? At the core-mantle boundary ~2900 km or near the upper/lower mantle boundary ~660 km depth? The Iceland plume has been imaged to ~400 km depth using seismic tomography. This new project will extend the depth imaged beyond the crucial 660 km boundary.
Certain sexually transmitted viruses cause cancer e.g. human papillomavirus. The HPV vaccine aims to reduce HPV rates and thus cervical cancer. There's also a link strong between HPV, oral cancer and oral sex but there's no plan to give males the HPV vaccine.
1.2 million people lost their ancestral homes when the Three Georges Dam flooded their lands and a 11 million lost their homes (and 170,000 were killed) when the Banqiao Dam collapsed in 1975. I still don't understand why most people disproportionately focus on nuclear.
A good observation, and one that can be extrapolated to future energy saving initiatives. When the world accepts the reality to global warming and fossil fuels start to run out, we can expect a harsh reduction in living standards as people in their homes (mainly) are asked (forced) to use less energy while the wider economy uses the same amount of energy, otherwise provoking a recession.
To put things in perspective, life style choices (poor diet, alcohol, smoking, overweight, lack of exercise, viruses etc.) & occupational exposures (e.g. hexavalent chromium, asbestos) cause 42% of cancers in the UK. However, the Center For Science In The Public Interest (CSPI) publication (that kicked all this off) claims 4-MeI might cause 0.008% of cancers (i.e. 8 times the Californian 1 in 100,000 action level) if everyone drank 12 fl oz of cola a day over 70 years.
If you take this seriously, you really should become an physically fit, teetotal, non-smoking, asexual vegetarian with an ideal BMI. Doing this could be as much as 5250 times more important that giving up cola.
Also, the predictions only work if the handful of very high dose animal experiments (that show carcinogenesis) are naively extrapolated to very low level human exposures... while assuming (without evidence) a strictly linear relationship between dose and cancer risk for 4-MeI i.e. a linear no-threshold response (LNT), ignoring other dose-risk relationships e.g. threshold (harmless) and hormesis (beneficial) responses at very low levels. Indeed, the CSPI admits that researchers are investigating if 4-MeI might reduce certain cancers by modifying hormones. Lastly, judging the toxicity of chemicals in humans from animal experiments is not straightforward, a massive dose of TCDD Dioxin kills lab rats stone dead but gives us humans a nasty case of acne (see Viktor Yushchenko). So all in all, just more evidence that people are rubbish at properly assessing risk when fear gets in the way.
Parkin et al., 2011. 16. The fraction of cancer attributable to lifestyle and environmental factors in the UK in 2010. Br J Cancer 105(S2), S77–S81. Kaiser, J. 2003. HORMESIS: Sipping From a Poisoned Chalice. Science 302(5644), 376–379.
"But the Mauder minimum just happens to coincide really really well with the little ice age."
No it didn't, according to the University of Boulder paper the little ice age (LIA) began ~1275-1300 (Mann says is covered 1400 to 1700) and the Mauder minimum only spanned 1645 to 1715.
But I think you're right that the LIA was a false start of a new ice age, indeed the current Milankovitch cycle should be causing global cooling (not warming). Indeed, under such circumstances the climate might be especially sensitive to negative forcings such as volcanic eruptions. Recall, the Milankovitch cycle involves decreased melting of spring-summer ice i.e. it is an albedo feed back that enhances high latitude cooling that causes the ice ages. Volcanically forced increase in polar ice coverage could result in an albedo feed back during this current current
"We don't yet know what causes ice ages"
Milankovitch cycle causes ice ages, Oh, dear.
Mann, M.E., Zhang, Z., Rutherford, S., Bradley, R.S., Hughes, M.K., Shindell, D., Ammann, C., Faluvegi, G. & Ni, F. 2009. Global Signatures and Dynamical Origins of the Little Ice Age and Medieval Climate Anomaly. Science 326(5957), 1256 -1260
Hays, J.D., Imbrie, J. & Shackleton, N.J. 1976. Variations in the Earth’s Orbit: Pacemaker of the Ice Ages. Science 194(4270), 1121 -1132.
There's no evidence of a georeactor in the Earth's core. We know this by measuring the abundance of geoneutrinos - neutrinos generated by radioactive decay and nuclear fission. The KamLAND, Japan and Borexino, Italy discovered a ~50% deficit in geoneutrinos i.e. 22 of 44 TerraWatts of heat comes from radioactive decay. The rest is primordial, left over from the Earth's cataclysmic formation. If there was a georeactor there would have been an anomalous abundance in geoneutrinos (KamLAND detected fission neutrinos from nearby Japanese nuclear reactors).
The hypothesis of a georeactor, powered by a 16km diameter sphere of Uranium, was put forward by maverick scientist J. Marvin Herndon. He also believes the Earth is expanding and he rejects plate tectonics. Despite that, mainstream science did not ignore him but enthusiastically tested this georeactor theory.
Gando, A. et al., 2011. Partial radiogenic heat model for Earth revealed by geoneutrino measurements. Nature Geoscience 4(9), 647-651.
References: Committee on the Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation (BEIR V), National Research Council 1990. Health Effects of Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing Radiation:BEIR V, Washington, D.C.: The National Academies Press, 436p. Sinclair, W.K., Adelstein, S.J., Carter, M.W., Harley, J.H. & Moeller, D.W. 1987. Report No. 093 - Ionizing Radiation Exposure of the Population of United States, Bethesda, Maryland: National Council on Radiation Protection & Measurements, 85p.
The Japanese have a centralised dosimetry system developed by Chiyoda Technol Corporation, the GD-450 glass badge and FGD-650 reader/central computer server. It's used by the Japanese nuclear industry, hospitals, civilian background monitoring etc. For example, they handed out 230,000 glass badges to civilians last September, so the system can handle large numbers (ave. dose was 0.26 mSv over 3 months). Also, the badges contain an ID printed on the front and hidden inside, to prevent tampering. So it seems the Japanese do have a well organised centralised system to monitor worker doses.
Also, the IAEA released a Fukushima Daiichi status report on 2 November 2011, it contains a table of worker exposures (table 3). The highest doses in September, involved 7 workers who got 20-50 mSv (the ave. dose of 1047 workers was 1.8 mSv). I can't imagine gypsy workers could get substantially higher doses and in much greater numbers (unless they all falsify their glass badges and swim in the spent fuel pools). So I seriously doubt the article's allegations.
See: Fukushima Daiichi Status Report - 2 November 2011 - IAEA
The IAEA Status Report 2 November 2011 contains a table of worker exposures. In March 2011, 98 workers (out of 3742) received more than 100 mSv. But that was related to the initial disaster. By September 2011, 7 workers received between 20-50 mSv, the other 1039 workers received far less. The average dose to workers in September was only 1.80 mSv (people in Denver get 12 mSv a year).
Even if there are "hidden" unmeasured gypsy workers, their doses could not be highly in excess of permanent salaried workers, unless they go swimming the spent fuel pools. The radiation levels at Fukushima Daiichi is now far lower then it was in March, so it's very hard to accumulate high doses unless you enter the reactor buildings. It's likely those few who enter the reactors are the trained staff conducting surveys and they well monitored.
The Japanese introduced the GD-450 (glass badge) radiation dosimeter about 10 years ago, it's manufactured by Chiyoda Technol Corporation and is used throughout Japan's nuclear industry and hospitals etc. Dosimetry measurements are, from what I read, uploaded to a central computer (FGD-650 reader and server computer system). The badges contain the users ID printed on two stickers, one on the front and another on metal frame hidden inside the badge, presumably to prevent tampering.
They handed out 230,000 glass badges to civilians in Fukushima Provence last September, so clearly the centralised system can handle large numbers. For example, 36,767 glass badges handed out in Fukushima City revealed an average dose of 0.26 mSv over 3 months. I'm pretty sure this survey is run by the Japanese Ministry of Health, it would be easy to share the worker data if it's not already.
Refs: The Large Scale Personal Monitoring Service Using The Latest Personal Monitor GLASS BADGE Norimichi Juto IAEA Fukushima Daiichi Status Report 2 November 2011 (see table 3).
University of East Anglia scientists used Tree Rings to infer global temperatures for ca. 1000 years. However, beginning around 1950, tree rings show an erroneous global cooling trend. We know this "global cooling" is erroneous because weather stations show global warming is real. The phenomena is known as the "Divergence Problem". Concerned that the erroneous cooling trend would be misrepresented by climate skeptics, they hid the divergence problem by bolting on 50 years of weather station data to the end of the Tree Ring graph; this is the "trick" that was used to "to hide the decline".
Autism is not irrelevant. Cognitive style of autism can be positively used in employment, once a workplace understands autism's specific strengths. The most salient features are Weak Central Coherence and Need for Routine. If workplace adapts to the autistic cognitive style, everyone will benefit. There is too much focus on deficits rather then splinter skills and cognitive strengths.
Weak Central Coherence - means autistic people are detail obsessed, they observe smallest parts and elements of the environment, and construct the overall picture from individual parts. This is ideal for identifying and spotting anomalies in software, identifying mistakes, dealing with information. For example, it's been known for years that autistic people are far superior in locating hidden features in the Embedded Figures Test.
Need for Routine - repetitive and otherwise boring tasks are soothing, enjoyed and relaxing. Furthermore, attention is not lost nor mistakes made, when autistic person is engaged in repetitive tasks.
Dozens of identical/fraternal twin studies, initially carried out in the 70s, prove unquestionably that autism is up to 92% genetic. While it's been hard to point to specific genetic anomalies that cause it, it does not invalidate its genetic roots. The genetics of autism is more nuanced and complex than we realised, as are other inherited conditions, it's not genes but also involves e.g. copy number variations.
Bailey, A., Le Couteur, A., Gottesman, I., Bolton, P., Simonoff, E., Yuzda, E. & Rutter, M. 1995. Autism as a strongly genetic disorder: evidence from a British twin study. Psychological Medicine 25(1), 63-77.
Glessner, J.T., et al., 2009. Autism genome-wide copy number variation reveals ubiquitin and neuronal genes. Nature 459(7246), 569-573.
Slashdot Mirror
In the 1980s, Dublin gas network had 100s km of cast iron pipes, some 100 years old. The cast iron pipes were connected together by waxed joints, these joints were stable when moist Town Gas (coal gas) flowed through the pipes but when the city changed over to natural gas, which is dry, the wax dried out and the gas leaked. Town Gas was generated by passing superheated steam over coal, creating a gas containing hydrogen, methane and notoriously, carbon monoxide.
In the late 1980s I could not walk more than 100 feet along suburban street before coming across an overpowering stench of leaking gas. One of the temporary fixes was to drill holes into side-walks to reduce the concentration of gas underground. I don't remember any gas explosions or accidents caused by leaking cast iron pipes then the leaks happened, given the number of leaks we were very lucky.
By the way, almost half of the water supply in Dublin in lost through leaks (worst in Europe).
Maybe they detected carbon, nitrogen and sulphur with an unusual light isotopic signatures. Terrestrial life preferentially accumulates lighter isotopes. Isotopic biomarkers in ancient terrestrial rocks have been used to support the exitance of terrestrial life, 3.8 billion years ago, when Earth and Mars were very similar.
It would be a historic result, quite robust evidence supporting life on an early Mars.
Zuilen, M. van 2008. Stable Isotope Ratios as a Biomarker on Mars. Space Science Reviews 135(1-4), 221–232.
"The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of." - Blaise Pascal (1623-1662).
Agreed!
There was 30 people (with pitch forks in hand) in the court's public gallery applauding (shaking their pitch forks) as he was led to prison.
Regardless of what or where he posted his joke, the BBC reports that 50 angry people turned up outside his house and he was arrested at a different address for his own safety.
The problem with these studies is that they don't test the particular conditions people are worried about: long term low level exposure due to radiation inside the body and organs. Nuclear plant workers are the best benchmark we have for that, and sure enough rates of cancer are pretty consistently shown to be higher among that group.
That's not right.
1. The risks of internal radiation are reasonably well understood from observations of patients given injections of ‘Thorotrast’, Radium dial painters exposed to 226 Ra and 228 Ra & patients given 224 Ra for medical conditions, occupational exposure of uranium miners to radon, and residential radon exposure etc.
Harrison, J. & Day, P., 2008. Radiation doses and risks from internal emitters. Journal Of Radiological Protection, J. Radiol. Prot., 28, 137–159.
2. Nuclear plant workers consistently have much better health (e.g. a lower cancer rate) then the general population (McGeoghegan et al. 2008). It's called the Healthy Worker Effect, it's one of the reasons why detecting elevated risks amongst nuclear workers is difficult. However, the few exceptions are subset of rare blood cancers e.g. Leukaemia, possibly lung cancer and heart disease. Even then, the detection of a statistically significant increases are limited to a few workers in the highest dose categories, >100 mSv for rare types of cancers & >300 mSv for Heart Disease. Note that cancer risk varies ~40% due to non-radiation effects (lifestyle and environment) and overwhelm the subtle effects (if any) of very low level radiation (below 100 mSv).
"Even a study of millions of workers exposed to very low doses (below 100 mSv), no matter how carefully conducted, would be inadequate to produce precise and uncertain estimates of risk in part because of the dominating influence of any subtle biases or unknown confounding factors" (UNSCEAR 2008, Land 1980).
The last and biggest study into Nuclear workers, "The 15 country Study" by Cardis et al. 2005 tracked the heath of up to 407,391 workers over 5.2 million person years, was revealed to be flawed by erroneous data in the Canadian cohort (involving 11,907 workers). Cardis et al. claimed, oddly, that all cancers except Leukaemia were elevated due to radiation (and there didn't even seem to the a threshold!). But when the erroneous Canadian data was identified and removed, there was no statistically significant increase in cancer. This fiasco highlights the sensitivity to confounding, bias and error in studies of low statistical certainty. Furthermore, Boice 2010 explained that there may never be another study of nuclear workers of this size, because the permitted exposures to workers are now far more stringent and few workers will ever be exposed to >100 mSv (or even >300 mSv) to detect the effects of radiation with statistical certainty (even considering the recent events in Japan).
So we have no direct evidence that a dose below 100 mSv causes cancer, that's why laboratory studies are so important, where we can investigate cellular repair and defence mechanisms that may cause radiation risk to depart from LNT i.e. threshold or hormesis.
Ashmore, J. P., Gentner, N. E. & Osborne, R. V., 2010. Incomplete data on the Canadian cohort may have affected the results of the study by the International Agency for Research on Cancer on the radiogenic cancer risk among nuclear industry workers in 15 countries. Journal of Radiological Protection 30, 121–129.
Boice, J. D. 2010. Uncertainties in studies of low statistical power. J Radiol Prot 30, 115–120.
McGeoghegan, D., Binks, K., Gillies, M., Jones, S. & Whaley, S., 2008. The Non-Cancer Mortality Experience of Male Workers at British Nuclear Fuels Plc, 1946–2005. Int. J. Epidemiol. 37, 506–518.
Interesting. But while there were very many experiments carried out in the 1960-70s, the radiation doses applied were generally much higher then the background levels we are interested in now. People are worried over a few extra MiliSieverts a year.
Scientists in the 1960-70s were were not able to observe subtle cellular effects, typical defence and repair mechanisms, that operate at and just above background levels of radiation (20 mSv). They were mostly crude LD50 and cancer frequency tests. Very few experiments investigated doses 0.1 Gy (about 100 mSv & 0.8% increase in human cancer risk). And the few experiments that did involve low doses gave confused results because of poor statistical certainty (some even suggested Radiation Hormesis, as you alluded to).
That's why these resent experiments are so important and interesting, they're finally investigating how organisms cope with low level radiation, and indeed they suggest the risks are grossly overestimated.
Crump, K. S. et al. 2012. A Meta-Analysis of Evidence for Hormesis in Animal Radiation Carcinogenesis, Including a Discussion of Potential Pitfalls in Statistical Analyses to Detect Hormesis. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, Part B 15, 210–231.
Tubiana, M., Feinendegen, L. E., Yang, C. & Kaminski, J. M., 2009. The Linear No-Threshold Relationship Is Inconsistent with Radiation Biologic and Experimental Data. Radiology, 251, 13 –22.
Sophisticated molecular and genetic analyses were not available in 1950s - 70s when many experiments investigating the effects of radiation on plants and animals took place; most were crude LD50 and cancer frequency tests conducted at moderate to very high doses, few were conducted at low doses (0.1 Gy) where cells could potentially repair the damage caused. This has all changed in the last ~20 years.
Sophisticated laboratory techniques now detect and observe the defence & repair mechanisms that operate in cells and whole organisms at low doses (100 mSv, ~0.8% increased risk of cancer in humans). For example, healthy people's cells repair all radiation induced DNA Double Strand Breaks (DSBs) within 24-hours after a CAT scan, indicating little or no additional risk of cancer. It is clear from resent experiments that living organisms are not passive accumulators of radiation damage but they actively combat and repair the damage done. After all, life involved with radiation and 3.5-3.8 billion years ago radiation levels were many times greater then now, it was necessary to evolve sophisticated error correction mechanisms. Indeed, it is likely that radiation is far less harmful or harmless below a certain threshold, possibly ~ 20 mSv year.
Crump, K. S. et al. 2012. A Meta-Analysis of Evidence for Hormesis in Animal Radiation Carcinogenesis, Including a Discussion of Potential Pitfalls in Statistical Analyses to Detect Hormesis. Journal of Toxicology and Environmental Health, Part B 15, 210–231.
Neumaier, T. et al. 2012. Evidence for Formation of DNA Repair Centers and Dose-Response Nonlinearity in Human Cells. PNAS 109, 443–448.
Löbrich, M. et al., 2005. In vivo formation and repair of DNA double-strand breaks after computed tomography examinations. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 102, 8984 –8989
Tubiana, M., Feinendegen, L. E., Yang, C. & Kaminski, J. M., 2009. The Linear No-Threshold Relationship Is Inconsistent with Radiation Biologic and Experimental Data. Radiology 251, 13–22. (Paper available without subscription).
And it's therefore ironic that the development of Skype on Linux has been abandoned, it's been stuck at version 2.2 Beta for over a year now.
Looks like Tanya Steele is still at it, now on Youtube...
"Blackfella's Guide to ..." This video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Tanya Steele.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tLTZgqSAjQs
Recent re-analysis of lunar volcanic samples shows the interior of the Moon is allot wetter then we thought. Some parts of the Moon interior, at least, contain as much water as the Earth's upper mantle, far wetter than predicted by the Giant Impact Hypothesis (the water should have boiled off).
Less sophisticated analysis in the 1970s indicated the Moon is very dry (less than 50 parts per million water). But water was lost to the vacuum of space during lunar volcanic eruptions, giving a false impression the Moon was dry. New techniques detected water trapped inside fluid inclusions (bubbles) in olivine crystals, showing the interior of the moon is quite wet. Zhang at al. 2012 is one of several resent studies that calls the Giant Impact Hypothesis into question.
Hauri et al., 2011. "High Pre-Eruptive Water Contents Preserved in Lunar Melt Inclusions" 333(6039), 213-215.
Mantle plumes and mantle processes in general are integral to continental break-up and the development of sedimentary (rift) basins, within continents and along continental margins. Petroleum companies are very interested in mantle processes and basin development (it's a branch of geology called Basin Analysis); some of the worlds largest oil and gas fields are found in sedimentary basins along rifted continental margins.
Near me to the west of Ireland, there's the Corrib, Slyne, Porcupine & Rockall Basins to name a few, these were formed when the North Atlantic opened up in the last 60 million years. That break-up was caused in large part by the Iceland Plume and furthermore, it appears that fluctuations in the strength of the Iceland Plume over time caused land uplift and erosion (and thus production of sediments into those basins i.e. oil/gas trap rock). The reason why there was uplift is poorly understood.
Mantle plumes definitely exist (Iceland would be underwater without it's buoyant plume impinging on and lifting up the crust). The question is, what depth do plumes start? At the core-mantle boundary ~2900 km or near the upper/lower mantle boundary ~660 km depth? The Iceland plume has been imaged to ~400 km depth using seismic tomography. This new project will extend the depth imaged beyond the crucial 660 km boundary.
An Iceland hotspot saga by Ingi orleifur Bjarnason
The oil industry won't spend money researching depths they can't drill to.
However, diamond exploration companies will.
Torsvik et al., 2010. Diamonds sampled by plumes from the core-mantle boundary. Nature 466(7304), 352–355.
Certain sexually transmitted viruses cause cancer e.g. human papillomavirus. The HPV vaccine aims to reduce HPV rates and thus cervical cancer. There's also a link strong between HPV, oral cancer and oral sex but there's no plan to give males the HPV vaccine.
1.2 million people lost their ancestral homes when the Three Georges Dam flooded their lands and a 11 million lost their homes (and 170,000 were killed) when the Banqiao Dam collapsed in 1975. I still don't understand why most people disproportionately focus on nuclear.
A good observation, and one that can be extrapolated to future energy saving initiatives. When the world accepts the reality to global warming and fossil fuels start to run out, we can expect a harsh reduction in living standards as people in their homes (mainly) are asked (forced) to use less energy while the wider economy uses the same amount of energy, otherwise provoking a recession.
To put things in perspective, life style choices (poor diet, alcohol, smoking, overweight, lack of exercise, viruses etc.) & occupational exposures (e.g. hexavalent chromium, asbestos) cause 42% of cancers in the UK. However, the Center For Science In The Public Interest (CSPI) publication (that kicked all this off) claims 4-MeI might cause 0.008% of cancers (i.e. 8 times the Californian 1 in 100,000 action level) if everyone drank 12 fl oz of cola a day over 70 years.
If you take this seriously, you really should become an physically fit, teetotal, non-smoking, asexual vegetarian with an ideal BMI. Doing this could be as much as 5250 times more important that giving up cola.
Also, the predictions only work if the handful of very high dose animal experiments (that show carcinogenesis) are naively extrapolated to very low level human exposures... while assuming (without evidence) a strictly linear relationship between dose and cancer risk for 4-MeI i.e. a linear no-threshold response (LNT), ignoring other dose-risk relationships e.g. threshold (harmless) and hormesis (beneficial) responses at very low levels. Indeed, the CSPI admits that researchers are investigating if 4-MeI might reduce certain cancers by modifying hormones. Lastly, judging the toxicity of chemicals in humans from animal experiments is not straightforward, a massive dose of TCDD Dioxin kills lab rats stone dead but gives us humans a nasty case of acne (see Viktor Yushchenko). So all in all, just more evidence that people are rubbish at properly assessing risk when fear gets in the way.
Parkin et al., 2011. 16. The fraction of cancer attributable to lifestyle and environmental factors in the UK in 2010. Br J Cancer 105(S2), S77–S81.
Kaiser, J. 2003. HORMESIS: Sipping From a Poisoned Chalice. Science 302(5644), 376–379.
"But the Mauder minimum just happens to coincide really really well with the little ice age."
No it didn't, according to the University of Boulder paper the little ice age (LIA) began ~1275-1300 (Mann says is covered 1400 to 1700) and the Mauder minimum only spanned 1645 to 1715.
But I think you're right that the LIA was a false start of a new ice age, indeed the current Milankovitch cycle should be causing global cooling (not warming). Indeed, under such circumstances the climate might be especially sensitive to negative forcings such as volcanic eruptions. Recall, the Milankovitch cycle involves decreased melting of spring-summer ice i.e. it is an albedo feed back that enhances high latitude cooling that causes the ice ages. Volcanically forced increase in polar ice coverage could result in an albedo feed back during this current current
"We don't yet know what causes ice ages"
Milankovitch cycle causes ice ages, Oh, dear.
Mann, M.E., Zhang, Z., Rutherford, S., Bradley, R.S., Hughes, M.K., Shindell, D., Ammann, C., Faluvegi, G. & Ni, F. 2009. Global Signatures and Dynamical Origins of the Little Ice Age and Medieval Climate Anomaly. Science 326(5957), 1256 -1260
Hays, J.D., Imbrie, J. & Shackleton, N.J. 1976. Variations in the Earth’s Orbit: Pacemaker of the Ice Ages. Science 194(4270), 1121 -1132.
There's no evidence of a georeactor in the Earth's core. We know this by measuring the abundance of geoneutrinos - neutrinos generated by radioactive decay and nuclear fission. The KamLAND, Japan and Borexino, Italy discovered a ~50% deficit in geoneutrinos i.e. 22 of 44 TerraWatts of heat comes from radioactive decay. The rest is primordial, left over from the Earth's cataclysmic formation. If there was a georeactor there would have been an anomalous abundance in geoneutrinos (KamLAND detected fission neutrinos from nearby Japanese nuclear reactors).
The hypothesis of a georeactor, powered by a 16km diameter sphere of Uranium, was put forward by maverick scientist J. Marvin Herndon. He also believes the Earth is expanding and he rejects plate tectonics. Despite that, mainstream science did not ignore him but enthusiastically tested this georeactor theory.
Gando, A. et al., 2011. Partial radiogenic heat model for Earth revealed by geoneutrino measurements. Nature Geoscience 4(9), 647-651.
Table 7: Background Radiation in Denver: Average Annual Dose Equivalent of Ionizing Radiation and Risk
Radiation Exposure in Denver:
Radon 10.4 mSv/yr
Cosmic 0.50 mSv/yr
Terrestrial 0.46 mSv/yr
Internal 0.39 mSv/yr
sub-total 11.8 mSv/yr
References:
Committee on the Biological Effects of Ionizing Radiation (BEIR V), National Research Council 1990. Health Effects of Exposure to Low Levels of Ionizing Radiation:BEIR V, Washington, D.C.: The National Academies Press, 436p.
Sinclair, W.K., Adelstein, S.J., Carter, M.W., Harley, J.H. & Moeller, D.W. 1987. Report No. 093 - Ionizing Radiation Exposure of the Population of United States, Bethesda, Maryland: National Council on Radiation Protection & Measurements, 85p.
The Japanese have a centralised dosimetry system developed by Chiyoda Technol Corporation, the GD-450 glass badge and FGD-650 reader/central computer server. It's used by the Japanese nuclear industry, hospitals, civilian background monitoring etc. For example, they handed out 230,000 glass badges to civilians last September, so the system can handle large numbers (ave. dose was 0.26 mSv over 3 months). Also, the badges contain an ID printed on the front and hidden inside, to prevent tampering. So it seems the Japanese do have a well organised centralised system to monitor worker doses.
Also, the IAEA released a Fukushima Daiichi status report on 2 November 2011, it contains a table of worker exposures (table 3). The highest doses in September, involved 7 workers who got 20-50 mSv (the ave. dose of 1047 workers was 1.8 mSv). I can't imagine gypsy workers could get substantially higher doses and in much greater numbers (unless they all falsify their glass badges and swim in the spent fuel pools). So I seriously doubt the article's allegations.
See: Fukushima Daiichi Status Report - 2 November 2011 - IAEA
The IAEA Status Report 2 November 2011 contains a table of worker exposures. In March 2011, 98 workers (out of 3742) received more than 100 mSv. But that was related to the initial disaster. By September 2011, 7 workers received between 20-50 mSv, the other 1039 workers received far less. The average dose to workers in September was only 1.80 mSv (people in Denver get 12 mSv a year).
Even if there are "hidden" unmeasured gypsy workers, their doses could not be highly in excess of permanent salaried workers, unless they go swimming the spent fuel pools. The radiation levels at Fukushima Daiichi is now far lower then it was in March, so it's very hard to accumulate high doses unless you enter the reactor buildings. It's likely those few who enter the reactors are the trained staff conducting surveys and they well monitored.
The Japanese introduced the GD-450 (glass badge) radiation dosimeter about 10 years ago, it's manufactured by Chiyoda Technol Corporation and is used throughout Japan's nuclear industry and hospitals etc. Dosimetry measurements are, from what I read, uploaded to a central computer (FGD-650 reader and server computer system). The badges contain the users ID printed on two stickers, one on the front and another on metal frame hidden inside the badge, presumably to prevent tampering.
They handed out 230,000 glass badges to civilians in Fukushima Provence last September, so clearly the centralised system can handle large numbers. For example, 36,767 glass badges handed out in Fukushima City revealed an average dose of 0.26 mSv over 3 months. I'm pretty sure this survey is run by the Japanese Ministry of Health, it would be easy to share the worker data if it's not already.
Refs:
The Large Scale Personal Monitoring Service Using The Latest Personal Monitor GLASS BADGE Norimichi Juto
IAEA Fukushima Daiichi Status Report 2 November 2011 (see table 3).
University of East Anglia scientists used Tree Rings to infer global temperatures for ca. 1000 years. However, beginning around 1950, tree rings show an erroneous global cooling trend. We know this "global cooling" is erroneous because weather stations show global warming is real. The phenomena is known as the "Divergence Problem". Concerned that the erroneous cooling trend would be misrepresented by climate skeptics, they hid the divergence problem by bolting on 50 years of weather station data to the end of the Tree Ring graph; this is the "trick" that was used to "to hide the decline".
Autism is not irrelevant. Cognitive style of autism can be positively used in employment, once a workplace understands autism's specific strengths. The most salient features are Weak Central Coherence and Need for Routine. If workplace adapts to the autistic cognitive style, everyone will benefit. There is too much focus on deficits rather then splinter skills and cognitive strengths.
Weak Central Coherence - means autistic people are detail obsessed, they observe smallest parts and elements of the environment, and construct the overall picture from individual parts. This is ideal for identifying and spotting anomalies in software, identifying mistakes, dealing with information. For example, it's been known for years that autistic people are far superior in locating hidden features in the Embedded Figures Test.
Need for Routine - repetitive and otherwise boring tasks are soothing, enjoyed and relaxing. Furthermore, attention is not lost nor mistakes made, when autistic person is engaged in repetitive tasks.
Dozens of identical/fraternal twin studies, initially carried out in the 70s, prove unquestionably that autism is up to 92% genetic. While it's been hard to point to specific genetic anomalies that cause it, it does not invalidate its genetic roots. The genetics of autism is more nuanced and complex than we realised, as are other inherited conditions, it's not genes but also involves e.g. copy number variations.
Bailey, A., Le Couteur, A., Gottesman, I., Bolton, P., Simonoff, E., Yuzda, E. & Rutter, M. 1995. Autism as a strongly genetic disorder: evidence from a British twin study. Psychological Medicine 25(1), 63-77.
Glessner, J.T., et al., 2009. Autism genome-wide copy number variation reveals ubiquitin and neuronal genes. Nature 459(7246), 569-573.