www.Liveintheearth.blogspot.com
get hot news about the medical world on this blog
SALT LAKE CITY – So maybe there was no dinosaur dancing after all.
Paleontologists say there are no signs of dinosaur tracks at a remote spot along the Utah-Arizona border that was previously described by University of Utah geologists as a "dinosaur dance floor" for its density of tracks.
"We didn't observe a single footprint," said Andrew Milner, paleontologist at the St. George Dinosaur Discovery Site at Johnson Farm in southwestern Utah.
He was one of four paleontologists who hiked into the area last week after a heavily publicized study claiming there were more than 1,000 previously unknown dinosaur tracks crammed onto less than an acre in the Arizona portion of Vermillion Cliffs National Monument.
"We went up there optimistic, really hoping we were going to find footprints," Milner said Friday.
They quickly determined there were none. Instead, it was a dense collection of potholes caused by erosion in the sandstone, they said.
And the supposed tail-drag marks in the rock? Probably another result of erosion, the paleontologists said.
Marjorie Chan, a University of Utah researcher who co-authored the "dinosaur dance floor" study, said she's open to the paleontologists' views and says she'll team up with other researchers for another examination of the site.
"I'm interested in the truth, no matter what the outcome is," Chan said.
..read more...
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – An approaching cold front could thwart NASA's plans to launch space shuttle Endeavour on Friday on a flight to the international space station.
But the seven astronauts arrived Tuesday ahead of the countdown start and hopeful for an on-time liftoff.
"This mission is all about home improvement, home improvement both inside and outside," shuttle commander Christopher Ferguson said after arriving from Houston with his crew.
During the 15-day mission, the astronauts will deliver a new bathroom, kitchenette, two bedrooms and exercise machine, as well as a water recycling system — and a new resident for the space station. A new astronaut will replace one of the three space station residents.
The plan is to expand the living quarters of the space station so the crew can be doubled to six by next June.
"On the inside of the space station, the walls are largely up," Ferguson said. "... Well, it's moving day. It's time to fill them up."
Ferguson also noted the never-before-attempted repairs that are planned for outside the space station. Three of the crew will take turns going outside to clean and lubricate a clogged joint that is preventing one set of solar wings from turning automatically toward the sun, and they'll replace its bearings.
This will be NASA's first shuttle launch since the end of May.
"We haven't had a launch for a while, so we're really excited to be back in the saddle again," said test director Jeff Spaulding.
The threatening cold front was moving across the central part of the nation Tuesday and was expected to bring rain and thick clouds to the launch site by week's end.
Shuttle weather officer Kathy Winters said there was a 60 percent chance of acceptable conditions at the 7:55 p.m. Friday liftoff time and only a 40 percent chance on Saturday.
"The timing of the front will be critical," she said.
NASA has a shuttle launch window until Nov. 25.
..read more...
NEW ORLEANS – Obese children as young as 10 had the arteries of 45-year-olds and other heart abnormalities that greatly raise their risk of heart disease, say doctors who used ultrasound tests to take a peek inside.
"As the old saying goes, you're as old as your arteries are," said Dr. Geetha Raghuveer of Children's Hospital in Kansas City, who led one of the studies. "This is a wake-up call."
The studies were reported Tuesday at an American Heart Association conference.
About a third of American children are overweight and one-fifth are obese. Many parents think that "baby fat" will melt away as kids get older. But research increasingly shows that fat kids become fat adults, with higher risks for many health problems.
"Obesity is not benign in children and adolescents," said Dr. Robert Eckel, a former heart association president and cardiologist at the University of Colorado-Denver. It is why the American Academy of Pediatrics recently recommended cholesterol-lowering drugs for some kids, he noted.
Raghuveer wanted to see if early signs of damage could be documented. She and colleagues used painless ultrasound tests to measure the thickness of the wall of a major neck artery in 70 children, ages 10 to 16. Almost all had abnormal cholesterol and many were obese.
No one knows how thick a 10-year-old's artery should be, since they're not regularly checked for signs of heart disease, so researchers used tables for 45-year-olds, who often do get such exams.
The kids' "vascular age" was about 30 years older than their actual age, she found.
A separate study tied childhood obesity to abnormal enlargement of the left atrium, one of the chambers of the heart. Enlargement is a known risk factor for heart disease, stroke and heart rhythm problems.
Julian Ayer, a researcher at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital Sydney Australia, did ultrasound exams on 991 seemingly healthy children ages 5 to 15. He saw a clear link between rising weight and size of the left atrium.
A third study by Dr. Walter Abhayaratna of Australian National University in Canberra, Australia, also used ultrasound tests and found impairment in the heart's ability to relax between beats in children who were overweight or obese.
The study involved the first 150 children participating in a larger community-based study.
Earlier research he helped conduct found more rigid arteries in such children — a possible sign of plaque deposits starting to form.
"Even at this young age of 10, you can have children who have got arterial stiffness who are comparable to 30- and 40-year-olds," he said.
Dr. Michael Schloss, a New York University heart disease prevention specialist, said the evidence shows obesity is more than a cosmetic issue for children.
"If you've seen what's on the menu for most school lunches, these findings are no surprise," he said. "The time has come to seriously deal with the issue of childhood obesity and physical inactivity on a governmental and parental level."
..read more...
SALT LAKE CITY – So maybe there was no dinosaur dancing after all.
