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PM David Cameron meets in NYC with 12 top US life science companies

British Prime Minister David Cameron met with US life sciences industry leaders to emphasise the UK’s ongoing and long-term commitment to life sciences and to acknowledge the value and investment that the US companies bring to the UK. The PM highlighted genomic medicine and dementia research as priority areas he would like the companies to consider for future investment.

Companies included Abbvie, Amgen, Baxter, Biogen Idec, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Covance, Eli Lilly, Gilead, Johnson & Johnson, Merck, Pfizer, and Thermo Fisher Scientific.

Read more.

This View of Life: A New Look at the First Footprints on Land

Fossils from a quarry in a region of central Wisconsin known as Blackberry Hill show that the first footprints on land were made by an extinct arthropod known as a euthycarcinoid, and this occurred in the Cambrian period, roughly 500 million years ago. The authors of the study, Joseph Collette of the University of California – Riverside, Kenneth Gass, a researcher from Wisconsin, and James Hagadorn of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, published their findings in the May 2012 issue of the Journal of Paleontology.

The suggestion that extinct arthropods had been walking about on land in what is now called Cambrian times is not a new one. Sir Richard Owen had published that idea in 1852, based on fossil footprints that he named Protichnites from Cambrian beach sandstone of Quebec.

via www.thisviewoflife.com

Should "show that the first footprints on land were made by an extinct arthropod...euthycarcinoid" read "show that the earliest known footprints on land were made by an extinct arthropod...euthycarcinoid"?

Apparently not. The article seems to suggest that whatever type of life may have first put footprints upon the earth, the certitude is very high that it wasn't a fish or amphibian.

What drove them to land? Best guess so far: Sex.

Photo: Joseph Collette

Father of all humankind is 340,000 years old

DNA evidence has revealed that the oldest known common male ancestor is 340,000 years old, more than twice as old as previous estimates.

New Scientist reports that the sample comes from a recently deceased man named Albert Perry. After the African-American South Carolina man died, one of his relatives submitted a sample of his DNA to a company called Family Tree DNA for analysis.

The findings were published in the The American Journal of Human Genetics and may require researchers to adjust the known timeline of humankind’s evolution.

via news.yahoo.com

Evidence for an earlier common genetic ancestry--i.e. evidence for an earlier time to MRCA (TMRCA, time to most recent common ancestor, a.k.a. the time to Y-chromosomal Adam)--has been growing. See Dienekes' Anthropology blog's post on May 20, 2011, "The father of us all: 142 thousand years ago." The estimate of 142,000 years ago was itself was a far cry from the then widely disseminated estimate of 60,000 years years ago.

Nothing like being more than 400% off, huh? Well, that's in part how science works: hopefully cumulatively increased precision and understanding attained by increments of new knowledge and refinements of knowledge and occasional massive leaps, and with no guarantee--it might be added--that some of those increments along the way may be a step backward. But, it's the net result of all the efforts/findings (the increments) along the way that matters. 142,000 years ago or 340,000 years ago.... It's not that the difference doesn't matter, but the difference has a significance that's profoundly minor in light of greater reality they're addressing: the story of us all.

(Photo: An X and a Y chromosome. Univ. of Arizona.)

It's Darwin Day! Go ape!

Go ape! It's Darwin Day!

And the Center for Inquiry provides a short list of resources for campus organizations or anyone else who wants to sponsor an event. In particular, you may contact their speakers bureau to find speakers on evolution, creationism, and intelligent-design creationism (it is a complete mystery why hardly anyone from Panda’s Thumb is on that list, but we will not go into that now). Additionally, Center for Inquiry directs you to the International Darwin Day Foundation, where you may find a list of activities near you, and, of course, the National Center for Science Education.

 

CFI recommends that you try to teach someone about evolution or other scientific principles and notes that the Public Broadcasting System has a wealth of material on evolution, science, and Darwin. The Understanding Evolution Web page is likewise an excellent resource.

 

via pandasthumb.org

via www.blogfordarwin.com

And the Center for Inquiry provides a short list of resources for campus organizations or anyone else who wants to sponsor an event. In particular, you may contact their speakers bureau to find speakers on evolution, creationism, and intelligent-design creationism (it is a complete mystery why hardly anyone from Panda’s Thumb is on that list, but we will not go into that now). Additionally, Center for Inquiry directs you to the International Darwin Day Foundation, where you may find a list of activities near you, and, of course, the National Center for Science Education.

 

CFI recommends that you try to teach someone about evolution or other scientific principles and notes that the Public Broadcasting System has a wealth of material on evolution, science, and Darwin. The Understanding Evolution Web page is likewise an excellent resource.

 

via pandasthumb.org

Lawrence Krauss: Stop Validating Ignorance | Big Think

The last thing we want to do is water down the teaching of biology because some people don’t recognize that evolution happened. Evolution is the basis of modern biology and, in fact, if a lot of people don’t believe it, it only means we have to do a better job teaching it. So once again, I repeat, the purpose of education is not to validate ignorance, but to overcome it. And to overcome a situation where a United States Senator can speak such manifest nonsense with impunity is vitally important to the healthy future of our society.  

via bigthink.com

Thank you, Lawrence Krauss. I think rejection of evolutionary realities--in effect, the rejection of most of biology, genetics, geology, and more--is a singular disqualification for public office. If someone can be so conspiracy-minded and willfully ignorant as to not "believe" in evolution as the only scientific explanation for the origin of species, what other realities will he or she fail to see or understand, a consequence of their epistemological and psychological contortions?

Every time a fossil is found it proves evolution all over again, every time a geneticist observes genetic recombination it proves evolution all over again. Relative to the latter point: That's why genetics in and of itself is the ultimate proof for evolution. Darwin didn't know how heredity worked, not that it had to be part of the larger picture of evolution: no heredity, no evolution through natural selection. That mechanism of heredity was, eventually, discovered: heredity works through units we call genes. It was the great discovery of biology after evolution itself.

This is why the emergence of genetics brought about what is called the new synthesis or modern evolutionary synthesis. Genetics + Darwinian Evolution = a wondrous foundation for our understanding of life, an understanding that is an exciting adventure for 100,000's of scientists who investigate, challenge, confirm, refute, validate, invalidate, observe, expand, refine, enhance, reform and predict about biological evolution on a daily basis, as well as about other realms of science that the theory of evolution incorporates--geology, population genetics, chemistry, ecology, etc.

The theory of evolution isn't "just" a theory. In formal scientific nomenclature, theory doesn't mean a guess, but means an overarching concept that synthesizes myriad laws and observations. It's the same notion of theory at work in the germ theory of disease, the theory of general relativity, or the theory of plate tectonics. Because plate techtonics is a theory, do you doubt that the earth has continental plates and instead believe that earthquakes are caused by gnomes burrowing underground? No, you don't. Relative to plate tectonics, no one asserts that it's "just a theory." No, that is reserved for evolution, and it is one of the oldest and most misguided of evolution-denial's canards.

Here are a few of this blog's blasts from the past about evolution:
Defending Science Education,
"Root and Branch",
Big Picture on Evolution,
Happy Darwin Day (2011),
On the Origin of Species.
.

Happy Christmas - Wishing you a Higgs with bows on (BBC Radio 4 - The Infinite Monkey Cage, Series 7, Christmas Special)

Brian Cox and Robin Ince get into the Christmas spirit as they look at the science of Christmas behaviour with actor/writer Mark Gatiss, geneticist Steve Jones, psychologist Richard Wiseman and emeritus Dean of Guildford Cathedral Victor Stock.

via www.bbc.co.uk

Epigenetics may underlie homosexuality, study finds

A working group at the National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis (NIMBioS), based at UT, used mathematical modeling that found the transmission of sex-specific epi-marks may signal homosexuality.

According to the study, published online today in The Quarterly Review of Biology, sex-specific epi-marks, which are "erased" and thus normally do not pass between generations, can lead to homosexuality when they escape erasure and are transmitted from father to daughter or mother to son.

via www.sciencedaily.com

Epigenetics' role in homosexuality finally gets some evidentiary underpinnings--even if via mathematical modeling. The reports' language sounds too definitive though. It's early. But...I've been saying for years--with in utero endocrinological possibilities in mind--that "born this way" and "it's genetic" were potentially problematic declarations because of how people take them to mean inevitability. Genetics is complex. The possibility of homosexuality someday being made a thing of the past in developed countries through medical monitoring and intervention during pregnancy is by no means beyond the realm of possibility.

It's also further evidence that at least as far as male same-sex sexual attraction is concerned, it's maternal-line heredity that's most critical--other studies about sexually antagonistic traits have suggested this is the case.

Click the image from Wikipedia to enlarge.

The same plant from Tasmania has been cloning itself for at least 43,600 years - King's Lomatia (Lomatia tasmanica)

King's Lomatia is unusual because all of the remaining plants are genetically identical. Because it has three sets of chromosomes (a triploid) and is therefore sterile, reproduction occurs only vegetatively: when a branch falls, that branch grows new roots, establishing a new plant that is genetically identical to its parent.

Although all the plants are technically separate in that each has its own root system, they are collectively considered to be one of the oldest living plant clones. Each plant's life span is approximately 300 years, but the plant has been cloning itself for at least 43,600 years (possibly up to 135,000 years). This estimate is based on the radiocarbon dating of fossilised leaf fragments that were found 8.5 km away. The fossilised fragments are identical to the contemporary plant in cell structure and shape, which indicates that both plants are triploid and therefore clones due to the extreme rarity of the occurrence of triploidy.

via en.wikipedia.org

Kings Lomatia deserves its own beautiful plate by a master ceramicist.

It's Global Warming, Stupid - Businessweek. (And it comes with a cost)

Yes, yes, it’s unsophisticated to blame any given storm on climate change. Men and women in white lab coats tell us—and they’re right—that many factors contribute to each severe weather episode. Climate deniers exploit scientific complexity to avoid any discussion at all.

via www.businessweek.com

If you've followed the decades-long innanity of science-deniers who target the Theory of Evolution (yes, all of geology, biology, and genetics is wrong--magic, indeed), you'll not be surprised that science-deniers exploit scientific complexity, nor that they often exploit and sometimes simply misinterpretent or misunderstand the role of disagreements within the scientific community, disagreements that quite often exist within the context of overarching, fundemental scientific consensus.

Back to the cost perspective given in the graphic (click on the above) designed by Jennifer Daniel: The number of U.S. natural disasters costing more than $1bn was 46 in 1980-1995 and 90 from 1996-2012. (Inflation plays a very small role in that increase.)

Yet, an October 2012 Pew Research Center poll

found that two-thirds of Americans say there is solid evidence the earth is getting warmer. That’s down 10 points since 2006. Among Republicans, more than half say it’s either not a serious problem or not a problem at all."

The graphic by Jennifer Daniel doesn't include a cost estimate (it's yet to to determined) for this year's U.S. drought, which was the worst in a generation.

Also from the article:

On Aug. 30, [Romney] belittled his opponent’s vow to arrest climate change, made during the 2008 presidential campaign. “President Obama promised to begin to slow the rise of the oceans and heal the planet,” Romney told the Republican National Convention in storm-tossed Tampa. “My promise is to help you and your family.” Two months later, in the wake of Sandy, submerged families in New Jersey and New York urgently needed some help dealing with that rising-ocean stuff.

Yes, it's global warming, stupid, and it comes with a cost--one that in the future could grow worse than need be if science-deniers' influence continues to rise. 

Dienekes’ Anthropology Blog: Wide-bodied early Holocene north Americans

the remains of the five most complete North American male early Holocene skeletons to examine patterns of human morphology at the earliest observable time period.... Results indicate that early Holocene males have variable postcranial morphologies, but all share the common trait of wide bodies. This trait, which is retained in more recent indigenous North American groups, is associated with adaptations to cold climates. Peoples from the Americas exhibit wider bodies than other populations sampled globally. This pattern suggests the common ancestral population of all of these indigenous American groups had reduced morphological variation in this trait. Furthermore, this provides support for a single, possibly high latitude location for the genetic isolation of ancestors of the human colonizers of the Americas.

via www.blogfordarwin.com