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Lead is a ubiquitous metal in the environment, and its adverse effects on human health are well documented. Lead interacts at multiple cellular sites and can alter protein function in part through binding to amino acid sulfhydryl and carboxyl groups on a wide variety of structural and functional proteins. In addition, lead mimics calcium and other divalent cations, and it induces the increased production of cytotoxic reactive oxygen species. Adverse effects associated with lead exposure can be observed in multiple body systems, including the nervous, cardiovascular, renal, hematologic, immunologic, and reproductive systems. Lead exposure is also known to induce adverse developmental effects in utero and in the developing neonate.

Lead poses an occupational health hazard, and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) developed a lead standard for general industry that regulates many workplace exposures to this metal. The standard was promulgated in 1978 and encompasses several approaches for reducing exposure to lead, including the establishment of a permissible exposure limit (PEL) of 50 μg/m3 in air (an 8-hour time-weighted average [TWA]), exposure guidelines for instituting medical surveillance, guidelines for removal from and return to work, and other risk-management strategies. An action level of 30 μg/m3 (an 8-hour TWA) for lead was established to trigger medical surveillance in employees exposed above that level for more than 30 days per year. Another provision is that any employee who has a blood lead level (BLL) of 60 μg/dL or higher or three consecutive BLLs averaging 50 μg/dL or higher must be removed from work involving lead exposure. An employee may resume work associated with lead exposure only after two BLLs are lower than 40 μg/dL. Thus, maintaining BLLs lower than 40 μg/dL was judged by OSHA to protect workers from adverse health effects. The OSHA standard also includes a recommendation that BLLs of workers who are planning a pregnancy be under 30μg/dL.

In light of knowledge about the hazards posed by occupational lead exposure, the Department of Defense (DOD) asked the National Research Council to evaluate potential health risks from recurrent lead exposure of firing-range personnel. Specifically, DOD asked the National Research Council to determine whether current exposure standards for lead on DOD firing ranges protect its workers adequately.The committee also considered measures of cumulative lead dose. Potential Health Risks to DOD Firing-Range Personnel from Recurrent Lead Exposure will help to inform decisions about setting new air exposure limits for lead on firing ranges, about whether to implement limits for surface contamination, and about how to design lead-surveillance programs for range personnel appropriately.

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Research, Response for Future Oil Spills: Lessons Learned from Deepwater Horizon

A special collection of articles about the Deepwater Horizon oil spill provides the first comprehensive analysis and synthesis of the science used in the unprecedented response effort by the government, academia, and industry. Papers present a behind-the-scenes look at the extensive scientific and engineering effort—teams, data, information, and advice from within and outside the government—assembled to respond to the disaster. And, with the benefit of hindsight and additional analyses, these papers evaluate the accuracy of the information that was used in real-time to inform the response team and the public.

For the most part, information presented publically during the spill was accurate. Oil was rapidly consumed by bacteria, seafood was not contaminated by hydrocarbons or dispersants, and the oil budget was by and large accurate. The only part of the oil budget that was later found to be inaccurate was the fraction of oil that was chemically dispersed versus naturally dispersed. That information had no impact on public safety, seafood safety or the response effort, but understanding the amount of oil that was dispersed chemically vs. naturally is important for future such efforts.

One of the most controversial issues concerned the rate at which hydrocarbons were spewing forth from the damaged well. The lengthy time it took for the scientific team to determine the flow rate led to considerable speculation that the government was withholding information. In reality, as described by the papers, the government/academic team charged with determining flow rate took the time they needed to get it right. The accuracy of the flow rates improved with time as more and better in situ data were acquired and more independent methods reported results.

Valuable lessons were learned, with preparation and knowledge being two key elements needed to respond to disasters such as the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, one of the worst environmental emergencies in the history of the U.S. and one that also took the lives of 11 oil rig workers.

Two overview papers and 13 specialty papers constitute a special section of the prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. Of the 15 papers, three are newly published: two introductory papers and one specialty paper provide an inside look at the scientific and engineering aspects of stopping the flow of oil, guaranteeing the integrity of the well once it was shut in, estimating the amount of oil spilled, capturing and recovering oil, tracking and forecasting surface oil, protecting coastal and oceanic wildlife and habitat, managing fisheries and protecting the safety of seafood. The papers describe the process underway to determine the impact of the spill on the natural resources and ecosystems of the Gulf of Mexico, but because those analyses are not completed, no conclusions are presented. The remaining 12 papers have been previously published online.

“While the federal family was well versed in oil response and remediation, and we brought many resources to bear, the scale and complexity of Deepwater Horizon taxed our organizations in unprecedented ways,” said Jane Lubchenco, Ph.D., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator. “We learned much during this extraordinary disaster and we hope the lessons learned will be implemented before and used during any future events.”

In one of the papers—“Science in support of the Deepwater Horizon response”—lead author Lubchenco and her co-authors suggest future oil spill response preparedness include:

• Gather adequate environmental baselines for all regions at risk;
• Develop new technologies for rapid precise reconnaissance and sampling to support a timely and robust response effort;
• Fill large information gaps regarding biological effects of oil, changing climate, and other simultaneous drivers of variability in coastal and aquatic ecosystems;
• Require future oil extraction permits be conditional on having mechanisms in place to rapidly assess flow rate; and
• Conduct research on the impacts of dispersants and dispersants-plus-oil on a wide range of species and life stages.

Another paper—”Application of science and engineering to quantify and control the Deepwater Horizon oil spill”—describes the unprecedented collaboration among government, academic, and industry scientists and engineers. Lead author Marcia McNutt, Ph.D., director of the USGS, explains how scientific and engineering information was crucial to guide decision-making for questions never before encountered, especially during the tense hours after the well was capped, but might still be leaking underground.

“Although we all hope ‘Never again!’ will there be an oil spill like the Deepwater Horizon, there will always be some risk as we move into deeper water and more difficult environments in our quest for the planet’s remaining fossil fuels,” said McNutt. “A significant drawback in addressing many of the issues we confronted in Deepwater Horizon was the lack of peer-reviewed scientific publications from prior marine-well blowouts to help guide our actions; we will not make that mistake again by neglecting to publish for posterity the scientific lessons from this tragedy.”

The event also showed the value of federal partnerships with academic institutions.

“The coordination within and across agencies was impressive, but so too was the engagement of academic scientists in a joint effort to respond to the disaster” said Steve Murawski, a co-author on both introductory papers, chief scientist at NOAA Fisheries during the response effort and now a professor at the University of South Florida. “Through these partnerships, new scientific discoveries were made such as estimating flow rate from atmospheric measurements, testing for dispersant in seafood, understanding the behavior of the loop current, and discovering novel microbial communities in the Gulf.”

A final paper—“Scientific basis for safely shutting in the Macondo well after the April 20, 2010 Deepwater Horizon blowout”—further points to the unprecedented level of coordination among scientists, engineers, and emergency response officials in the public and private sectors.  In this paper, scientists describe the geological hazards of shutting in the well and the conditions under which this could safely and successfully be done.

“Without this level of cooperation and round-the-clock engagement by people from many disciplines, it would not have been possible to carry out the continual scientific analyses needed to ensure the well was not leaking below the sea floor once the capping stack was closed,” explained lead author Steve Hickman, USGS research geologist. “For the government scientists onsite at BP headquarters, rapid acquisition and analysis of critical data sets and open exchange of ideas and possible outcomes was essential to ensuring the well had enough integrity to remain safely shut in until it was killed and sealed with cement.”

USGS provides science for a changing world. Visit USGS.gov, and follow us on Twitter @USGS and our other social media channels.

NOAA’s mission is to understand and predict changes in the Earth’s environment, from the depths of the ocean to the surface of the sun, and to conserve and manage our coastal and marine resources. Join us on Facebook, Twitter and our other social media channels.

Within a matter of weeks, we’ll be seeing the official launch of BlackBerry 10 and here’s a first look at the features of the new BlackBerry 10 camera. It’s got a nifty feature that allows you to take multiple shots. You can then highlight faces and using a circular wheel, select the point where your subject is smiling. When completed, tap the check mark and you’ve got an improved photo. Here’s a video detailing the process.

Final Book Now Available

Recent well documented reductions in the thickness and extent of Arctic sea ice cover, which can be linked to the warming climate, are affecting the global climate system and are also affecting the global economic system as marine access to the Arctic region and natural resource development increase. Satellite data show that during each of the past six summers, sea ice cover has shrunk to its smallest in three decades. The composition of the ice is also changing, now containing a higher fraction of thin first-year ice instead of thicker multi-year ice.

Understanding and projecting future sea ice conditions is important to a growing number of stakeholders, including local populations, natural resource industries, fishing communities, commercial shippers, marine tourism operators, national security organizations, regulatory agencies, and the scientific research community. However, gaps in understanding the interactions between Arctic sea ice, oceans, and the atmosphere, along with an increasing rate of change in the nature and quantity of sea ice, is hampering accurate predictions. Although modeling has steadily improved, projections by every major modeling group failed to predict the record breaking drop in summer sea ice extent in September 2012.

Establishing sustained communication between the user, modeling, and observation communities could help reveal gaps in understanding, help balance the needs and expectations of different stakeholders, and ensure that resources are allocated to address the most pressing sea ice data needs. Seasonal-to-Decadal Predictions of Arctic Sea Ice: Challenges and Strategies explores these topics.

[Read the full report]

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Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is part of a team led by Argonne National Laboratory that will receive $120 million from the Department of Energy to establish a new batteries and energy storage research hub called the Joint Center for Energy Storage Research, or JCESR. PNNL will receive $15 million over five years. The announcement was made earlier today by DOE.

JCESR will combine the R&D firepower of five DOE national laboratories, five universities and four private firms in an effort aimed at achieving revolutionary advances in battery performance. Advancing next generation battery and energy storage technologies for electric and hybrid cars and the electrical grid are critical to help reduce America’s reliance on foreign oil and lower energy costs for U.S. consumers.

PNNL will tap into its extensive experience in fundamental and applied sciences, including advanced materials synthesis, characterization and modeling, as well as electrical grid infrastructure, grid storage and management, to help improve the performance, reliability and life-span of batteries. PNNL will also play an important role in developing new technologies for stationary storage to enable widespread use of renewable energy.

Unique research tools and imaging expertise from researchers in EMSL, DOE’s Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory at PNNL, will help the team understand complex electrochemical reactions as they occur within working batteries, as well as determine why batteries ultimately fail.

PNNL’s expertise in materials synthesis and processing will also contribute to the development of low-cost, high-capacity electrode materials for advanced batteries with unprecedented energy density and power.

“This is a partnership between world leading scientists and world leading companies, committed to ensuring that the advanced battery technologies the world needs will be invented and built right here in America,” said Energy Secretary Steven Chu. “Based on the tremendous advances that have been made in the past few years, there are very good reasons to believe that advanced battery technologies can and will play an increasingly valuable role in strengthening America’s energy and economic security by reducing our oil dependence, upgrading our aging power grid, and allowing us to take greater advantage of intermittent energy sources like wind and solar.”

JCESR will integrate efforts at several successful independent research programs into a larger, coordinated effort designed to push the limits on battery advances. Advancements in batteries and energy storage technology are essential for continued efforts to develop a fundamentally new energy economy with decisively reduced dependence on imported oil. Improved storage will be vital to fully integrating intermittent renewable energy sources such as wind and solar into the electrical grid. It will also be critical to transitioning the transportation sector to more flexible grid power.

Selected through an open national competition with a rigorous merit review process that relied on outside expert reviewers, JCESR is the fourth Energy Innovation Hub established by the Energy Department since 2010. Other Hubs are devoted to modeling and simulation of nuclear reactors, achieving major improvements in the energy efficiency of buildings, and developing fuels from sunlight. A fifth Hub focused on critical materials research was announced earlier this year and is still in the application process.

JCESR will be centered at Argonne, outside of Chicago. The State of Illinois will provide $35 million to construct a 45,000-square-foot home for JCESR.

JCESR will bring together some of the most advanced energy storage research programs in the U.S. today. JCESR partners include:

• DOE research centers: Argonne National Laboratory, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, Sandia National Laboratories and the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory.
• Research universities: Northwestern University, University of Chicago, University of Illinois, Chicago, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign and the University of Michigan.
• Industry: Applied Materials, Clean Energy Trust, Dow and Johnson Controls.

From Washington’s Congressional delegation

Congressman Doc Hastings: “PNNL’s world-class scientists and unparalleled facilities like EMSL will make significant contributions to this project. Whether it’s in the fields of energy, national security or Hanford cleanup the Lab’s work here in the Tri-Cities is important to our community and our nation — and this mission is no exception.”

Senator Patty Murray: “Energy storage is a transformational technology that can help bring new clean resources onto the grid,” said Senator Murray. “Competition for this award was stiff, and I’m thrilled the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory is part of the winning team. I’m proud to have supported federal funding for this effort, because I know America will lead the world in developing this game-changing innovation for our energy system and our economy.”

Senator Maria Cantwell: “I applaud the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and its partners for submitting the winning proposal for the Department of Energy’s new Batteries and Energy Storage Innovation Hub. Improving energy storage is an essential building block of a smarter, cleaner, and more diverse electricity system. I strongly support developing new and innovative ways to increase U.S. energy capacity and reliability. This significant investment into PNNL’s efforts will help ensure Washington state continues to be at the vanguard of this emerging economic opportunity.”

Four Pacific Northwest National Laboratory scientists have been elected fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science for their efforts to advance science or its applications.

The PNNL honorees and the AAAS sections that elected them are: Nigel Browning, physics; Allison Campbell, chemistry; Anthony Peurrung, physics; and Douglas Ray, chemistry.

The four will be honored at an induction ceremony Feb. 16, 2013 at the AAAS annual meeting in Boston, Mass. The four selections bring the Richland-based Department of Energy national laboratory’s total of AAAS fellows to 56.

Nigel Browning

AAAS is honoring Browning for his work in electron microscopy, a type of microscopy that can zoom in to see the features of molecules. Browning has been pushing the limits of electron microscopy and spectroscopy since the early 1990s, when he succeeded in applying new technology to determine the composition of individual planes of atoms — an unexpected feat, given the state of the field at that time.

While at University of California, Davis in 2008, he received an R&D 100 award for developing dynamic transmission electron microscopy, or DTEM. This technology can zoom in on objects as small as a few nanometers big (a few billionths of a meter wide) and can catch a moment in time to reveal what happens over about 15 nanoseconds (15 billionths of a second long). This high resolution in time and space allows researchers to take snapshots of what is happening during chemical reactions, information that usually has to be inferred based on the final product. In one such determination, researchers revealed a never-before-seen chemical intermediate that blew in and out of existence in about 5000 nanoseconds, something they hadn’t been able to see before.

Browning joined PNNL in 2011 with a particular goal of making DTEM, which requires the samples to be in a vacuum, work at normal pressures and temperatures. He earned a bachelor’s degree in physics and mathematics from the University of Reading, United Kingdom in 1988 and a doctorate in physics from the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom in 1992.

Allison Campbell

AAAS honored Campbell for her work in the “synthesis of thin films for ceramics and biomaterial development.” Trained as a physical chemist, Campbell has been the director of EMSL, a DOE scientific user facility at PNNL, since 2005. As EMSL director, she leads the development of programs, instrumentation and facilities required to tackle problems of interest to DOE and the nation — and brings together scientists from around the world to address those problems. With more than 700 scientists from national labs and universities worldwide using EMSL resources yearly for collaborative research in energy and the environment, Campbell ensures EMSL is influential, innovative and provides unique capabilities to a wide variety of researchers.

Campbell has earned multiple awards for her work in basic science and applied biomedical research. She studied the fundamentals of bone and teeth mineralization and invented a coating that helps artificial joints bond to bone. Her research has resulted in numerous publications, several patents, an Award for Excellence in Technology Transfer from the Federal Laboratory Consortium and an R&D 100 Award. She has also testified before the House of Representatives Committee on Science and Technology regarding the value of research at DOE labs.

Campbell earned a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Gettysburg College in Pennsylvania in 1985 and a doctorate in chemistry from the State University of New York at Buffalo in 1990.

Anthony Peurrung

For contributions to “radiation and nuclear material detection, and leadership in advancing the science and impact of national laboratories,” AAAS is honoring Peurrung, an associate laboratory director who oversees PNNL’s national security programs. One of his earliest accomplishments was in the field of plasma physics. Soon after he arrived at PNNL, he realized two independent groups of scientists were studying the same physics without realizing it. By bringing together mass spectrometrists and plasma physicists, Peurrung significantly improved the understanding of how ions behave in mass spectrometers — an insight that has led to significant improvements to the technology and a wide variety of applications.

He invented an instrument that can detect buried explosives such as mines by exploiting an energy signature known as “neutron backscatter.” Also, he discovered a new way to detect enriched uranium based on the unique radiation signature uranium gives off. Other work helped clarify plutonium oxide’s radiation signature, which influenced nuclear arms control technology. After moving into management at PNNL, Peurrung led research to find new materials to better detect radiation. As associate lab director for national security, Peurrung has strengthened PNNL’s expertise in cyber security, non-proliferation technologies, nuclear fuels and materials, and explosives detection.

Peurrung earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Rice University in Texas in 1987 and a doctorate in physics from the University of California at Berkeley in 1992.

Douglas Ray

AAAS will induct Ray into its next class for “distinguished contributions to physical chemistry and molecular spectroscopy, and for building a world-class chemistry organization at PNNL.” Trained as a laser spectroscopist, Ray’s most significant research used lasers and ion beams to determine the structure and dynamics of molecular clusters. For the past decade, he has been leading teams of scientists at PNNL, first as deputy director of EMSL and then as the director of PNNL’s Chemical Sciences Division. In chemical sciences, he led the establishment of the Institute for Integrated Catalysis, currently the largest non-industrial catalysis research and development effort in the United States.

In 2006, he became the associate laboratory director for Fundamental & Computational Sciences. In this position, he leads more than 600 scientists in research ranging from earth system science to biological systems science, chemical and materials sciences, applied mathematics and computer science, and nuclear and particle physics focused on DOE’s missions. He is especially enthusiastic about developing new tools for research. Current areas of emphasis include chemical imaging and analysis to understand how biological systems function and to understand and control how chemical processes occur, as well as the development of new computational methods to handle the vast amounts of data generated by extreme-scale simulations and new instrumentation.

Ray earned a bachelor’s degree in physics from Kalamazoo College Michigan in 1979 and a doctorate in chemistry from the University of California at Berkeley in 1985.

The American Association for the Advancement of Science is an international non-profit organization dedicated to advancing science around the world by serving as an educator, leader, spokesperson and professional association. In addition to organizing membership activities, AAAS publishes the journal Science, as well as many scientific newsletters, books and reports, and spearheads programs that raise the bar of understanding for science worldwide.

No person or place is immune from disasters or disaster-related losses. Infectious disease outbreaks, acts of terrorism, social unrest, or financial disasters in addition to natural hazards can all lead to large-scale consequences for the nation and its communities. Communities and the nation thus face difficult fiscal, social, cultural, and environmental choices about the best ways to ensure basic security and quality of life against hazards, deliberate attacks, and disasters. Beyond the unquantifiable costs of injury and loss of life from disasters, statistics for 2011 alone indicate economic damages from natural disasters in the United States exceeded $55 billion, with 14 events costing more than a billion dollars in damages each.

One way to reduce the impacts of disasters on the nation and its communities is to invest in enhancing resilience–the ability to prepare and plan for, absorb, recover from and more successfully adapt to adverse events. Disaster Resilience: A National Imperative addresses the broad issue of increasing the nation’s resilience to disasters. This book defines “national resilience”, describes the state of knowledge about resilience to hazards and disasters, and frames the main issues related to increasing resilience in the United States. It also provide goals, baseline conditions, or performance metrics for national resilience and outlines additional information, data, gaps, and/or obstacles that need to be addressed to increase the nation’s resilience to disasters. Additionally, the book’s authoring committee makes recommendations about the necessary approaches to elevate national resilience to disasters in the United States.

Enhanced resilience allows better anticipation of disasters and better planning to reduce disaster losses-rather than waiting for an event to occur and paying for it afterward. Disaster Resilience confronts the topic of how to increase the nation’s resilience to disasters through a vision of the characteristics of a resilient nation in the year 2030. Increasing disaster resilience is an imperative that requires the collective will of the nation and its communities. Although disasters will continue to occur, actions that move the nation from reactive approaches to disasters to a proactive stance where communities actively engage in enhancing resilience will reduce many of the broad societal and economic burdens that disasters can cause.

Scientific evidence shows that most glaciers in South Asia’s Hindu Kush Himalayan region are retreating, but the consequences for the region’s water supply are unclear, this report finds. The Hindu Kush Himalayan region is the location of several of Asia’s great river systems, which provide water for drinking, irrigation, and other uses for about 1.5 billion people. Recent studies show that at lower elevations, glacial retreat is unlikely to cause significant changes in water availability over the next several decades, but other factors, including groundwater depletion and increasing human water use, could have a greater impact. Higher elevation areas could experience altered water flow in some river basins if current rates of glacial retreat continue, but shifts in the location, intensity, and variability of rain and snow due to climate change will likely have a greater impact on regional water supplies.

Himalayan Glaciers: Climate Change, Water Resources, and Water Security makes recommendations and sets guidelines for the future of climate change and water security in the Himalayan Region. This report emphasizes that social changes, such as changing patterns of water use and water management decisions, are likely to have at least as much of an impact on water demand as environmental factors do on water supply. Water scarcity will likely affect the rural and urban poor most severely, as these groups have the least capacity to move to new locations as needed. It is predicted that the region will become increasingly urbanized as cities expand to absorb migrants in search of economic opportunities. As living standards and populations rise, water use will likely increase-for example, as more people have diets rich in meat, more water will be needed for agricultural use. The effects of future climate change could further exacerbate water stress.

Himalayan Glaciers: Climate Change, Water Resources, and Water Security explains that changes in the availability of water resources could play an increasing role in political tensions, especially if existing water management institutions do not better account for the social, economic, and ecological complexities of the region. To effectively respond to the effects of climate change, water management systems will need to take into account the social, economic, and ecological complexities of the region. This means it will be important to expand research and monitoring programs to gather more detailed, consistent, and accurate data on demographics, water supply, demand, and scarcity.

During the past century the major causes of morbidity and mortality in the United States have shifted from those related to communicable diseases to those due to chronic diseases. Just as the major causes of morbidity and mortality have changed, so too has the understanding of health and what makes people healthy or ill. Research has documented the importance of the social determinants of health (for example, socioeconomic status and education) that affect health directly as well as through their impact on other health determinants such as risk factors. Targeting interventions toward the conditions associated with today’s challenges to living a healthy life requires an increased emphasis on the factors that affect the current cause of morbidity and mortality, factors such as the social determinants of health. Many community-based prevention interventions target such conditions.

Community-based prevention interventions offer three distinct strengths. First, because the intervention is implemented population-wide it is inclusive and not dependent on access to a health care system. Second, by directing strategies at an entire population an intervention can reach individuals at all levels of risk. And finally, some lifestyle and behavioral risk factors are shaped by conditions not under an individual’s control. For example, encouraging an individual to eat healthy food when none is accessible undermines the potential for successful behavioral change. Community-based prevention interventions can be designed to affect environmental and social conditions that are out of the reach of clinical services.

Four foundations – the California Endowment, the de Beaumont Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation – asked the Institute of Medicine to convene an expert committee to develop a framework for assessing the value of community-based, non-clinical prevention policies and wellness strategies, especially those targeting the prevention of long-term, chronic diseases. The charge to the committee was to define community-based, non-clinical prevention policy and wellness strategies; define the value for community-based, non-clinical prevention policies and wellness strategies; and analyze current frameworks used to assess the value of community-based, non-clinical prevention policies and wellness strategies, including the methodologies and measures used and the short- and long-term impacts of such prevention policy and wellness strategies on health care spending and public health. An Integrated Framework for Assessing the Value of Community-Based Prevention summarizes the committee’s findings.

MAYAGÜEZ, Puerto Rico— Non-native boa constrictors, which can exceed 10 feet and 75 pounds, have established a breeding population in Puerto Rico, one that appears to be spreading, according to research published in the journal Biological Invasions.

While boa constrictors and two species of pythons have established invasive populations in Florida, this research is the first to document a large constrictor species established in the United States or its territories outside of Florida. The new population appears to be spreading from its likely point of origin in the western part of the island around the city of Mayagüez. In the last year alone, more than 150 boas have been found in the wild on the island.

The established boa constrictor population likely originated with the pet trade. Genetic studies conducted by the researchers indicate that individual boas on the island are highly related and that the population probably originated with a small number of snakes. First-hand accounts from local officials suggest that newborn boas were released in Mayagüez in the early 1990s.

“Experience has shown that island ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to snake invasions, and unfortunately Puerto Rico has no natural predators that can keep the numbers of these prolific, snakes in check,” said USGS Director Marcia McNutt. “Humans were responsible for introducing this scourge to the island, and are the only hope for mitigating the problem before it is too late for the native species.”

Two snakes found some distance from the expanding Mayagüez population share genetic markers with that population, suggesting that people might be intentionally or unintentionally moving the snakes around the island. Such movement could potentially increase the rate of spread of this invasive snake. Because the snakes are secretive and difficult to spot, the researchers suspect the population size is large.

“We’ve learned from dealing with other invasive snakes that understanding the source of these populations and preventing spread as soon as possible is important to protect ecosystems,” said USGS scientist and study co-author Bob Reed. “Once non-native snakes become established across a large area, especially in densely forested areas, they become much more difficult to find and almost impossible to eradicate.”

Private ownership of boa constrictors and most other snake species is prohibited in Puerto Rico because of fears of non-native snakes becoming established.

The paper, “Genetic Analysis of a Novel Invasion of Puerto Rico by an Exotic Constricting Snake,” was authored by R.G. Reynolds, University of Massachusetts, Boston; A.R. Puente-Rolón, Universidad Interamericana de Puerto Rico, R.N. Reed, U.S. Geological Survey; and L.J. Revell, University of Massachusetts, Boston.

Final Book Now Available

No person or place is immune from disasters or disaster-related losses. Infectious disease outbreaks, acts of terrorism, social unrest, or financial disasters in addition to natural hazards can all lead to large-scale consequences for the nation and its communities. Communities and the nation thus face difficult fiscal, social, cultural, and environmental choices about the best ways to ensure basic security and quality of life against hazards, deliberate attacks, and disasters. Beyond the unquantifiable costs of injury and loss of life from disasters, statistics for 2011 alone indicate economic damages from natural disasters in the United States exceeded $55 billion, with 14 events costing more than a billion dollars in damages each.

One way to reduce the impacts of disasters on the nation and its communities is to invest in enhancing resilience–the ability to prepare and plan for, absorb, recover from and more successfully adapt to adverse events. Disaster Resilience: A National Imperative addresses the broad issue of increasing the nation’s resilience to disasters. This book defines “national resilience”, describes the state of knowledge about resilience to hazards and disasters, and frames the main issues related to increasing resilience in the United States. It also provide goals, baseline conditions, or performance metrics for national resilience and outlines additional information, data, gaps, and/or obstacles that need to be addressed to increase the nation’s resilience to disasters. Additionally, the book’s authoring committee makes recommendations about the necessary approaches to elevate national resilience to disasters in the United States.

Enhanced resilience allows better anticipation of disasters and better planning to reduce disaster losses-rather than waiting for an event to occur and paying for it afterward. Disaster Resilience confronts the topic of how to increase the nation’s resilience to disasters through a vision of the characteristics of a resilient nation in the year 2030. Increasing disaster resilience is an imperative that requires the collective will of the nation and its communities. Although disasters will continue to occur, actions that move the nation from reactive approaches to disasters to a proactive stance where communities actively engage in enhancing resilience will reduce many of the broad societal and economic burdens that disasters can cause.

[Read the full report]

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The number of new drug approvals has remained reasonably steady for the past 50 years at around 20 to 30 per year, while at the same time the total spending on health-related research and development has tripled since 1990. There are many suspected causes for this trend, including increases in regulatory barriers, the rising costs of scientific inquiry, a decrease in research and development efficiency, the downstream effects of patient expirations on investment, and the lack of production models that have successfully incorporated new technology. Regardless, this trajectory is not economically sustainable for the businesses involved, and, in response, many companies are turning toward collaborative models of drug development, whether with other industrial firms, academia, or government. Introducing greater efficiency and knowledge into these new models and aligning incentives among participants may help to reverse the trends highlighted above, while producing more effective drugs in the process.

Genome-Based Therapeutics explains that new technologies have the potential to open up avenues of development and to identify new drug targets to pursue. Specifically, improved validation of gene-disease associations through genomics research has the potential to revolutionize drug production and lower development costs. Genetic information has helped developers by increasing their understanding of the mechanisms of disease as well as individual patients’ reactions to their medications. There is a need to identify the success factors for the various models that are being developed, whether they are industry-led, academia-led, or collaborations between the two.

Genome-Based Therapeutics summarizes a workshop that was held on March 21, 2012, titled New Paradigms in Drug Discovery: How Genomic Data Are Being Used to Revolutionize the Drug Discovery and Development Process. At this workshop the goal was to examine the general approaches being used to apply successes achieved so far, and the challenges ahead.

In anticipation of future environmental science and engineering challenges and technologic advances, EPA asked the National Research Council (NRC) to assess the overall capabilities of the agency to develop, obtain, and use the best available scientific and technologic information and tools to meet persistent, emerging, and future mission challenges and opportunities. Although the committee cannot predict with certainty what new environmental problems EPA will face in the next 10 years or more, it worked to identify some of the common drivers and common characteristics of problems that are likely to occur.

Tensions inherent to the structure of EPA’s work contribute to the current and persistent challenges faced by the agency, and meeting those challenges will require development of leading-edge scientific methods, tools, and technologies, and a more deliberate approach to systems thinking and interdisciplinary science. Science for Environmental Protection: The Road Ahead outlines a framework for building science for environmental protection in the 21st century and identified key areas where enhanced leadership and capacity can strengthen the agency’s abilities to address current and emerging environmental challenges as well as take advantage of new tools and technologies to address them. The foundation of EPA science is strong, but the agency needs to continue to address numerous present and future challenges if it is to maintain its science leadership and meet its expanding mandates.

The aim of this report is to encourage enhanced richness and relevance of the undergraduate engineering education experience, and thus produce better-prepared and more globally competitive graduates, by providing practical guidance for incorporating real world experience in US engineering programs. The report, a collaborative effort of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (AMD), builds on two NAE reports on The Engineer of 2020 that cited the importance of grounding engineering education in real world experience. This project also aligns with other NAE efforts in engineering education, such as the Grand Challenges of Engineering, Changing the Conversation, and Frontiers of Engineering Education.

This publication presents 29 programs that have successfully infused real world experiences into engineering or engineering technology undergraduate education. The Real World Engineering Education committee acknowledges the vision of AMD in supporting this project, which provides useful exemplars for institutions of higher education who seek model programs for infusing real world experiences in their programs. The NAE selection committee was impressed by the number of institutions committed to grounding their programs in real world experience and by the quality, creativity, and diversity of approaches reflected in the submissions. A call for nominations sent to engineering and engineering technology deans, chairs, and faculty yielded 95 high-quality submissions. Two conditions were required of the nominations: (1) an accredited 4-year undergraduate engineering or engineering technology program was the lead institutions, and (2) the nominated program started operation no later than the fall 2010 semester. Within these broad parameters, nominations ranged from those based on innovations within a single course to enhancements across an entire curriculum or institution.

Infusing Real World Experiences into Engineering Education is intended to provide sufficient information to enable engineering and engineering technology faculty and administrators to assess and adapt effective, innovative models of programs to their own institution’s objectives. Recognizing that change is rarely trivial, the project included a brief survey of selected engineering deans concern in the adoption of such programs.

In 1996, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released its report Telemedicine: A Guide to Assessing Telecommunications for Health Care. In that report, the IOM Committee on Evaluating Clinical Applications of Telemedicine found telemedicine is similar in most respects to other technologies for which better evidence of effectiveness is also being demanded. Telemedicine, however, has some special characteristics-shared with information technologies generally-that warrant particular notice from evaluators and decision makers.

Since that time, attention to telehealth has continued to grow in both the public and private sectors. Peer-reviewed journals and professional societies are devoted to telehealth, the federal government provides grant funding to promote the use of telehealth, and the private technology industry continues to develop new applications for telehealth. However, barriers remain to the use of telehealth modalities, including issues related to reimbursement, licensure, workforce, and costs. Also, some areas of telehealth have developed a stronger evidence base than others.

The Health Resources and Service Administration (HRSA) sponsored the IOM in holding a workshop in Washington, DC, on August 8-9 2012, to examine how the use of telehealth technology can fit into the U.S. health care system. HRSA asked the IOM to focus on the potential for telehealth to serve geographically isolated individuals and extend the reach of scarce resources while also emphasizing the quality and value in the delivery of health care services. This workshop summary discusses the evolution of telehealth since 1996, including the increasing role of the private sector, policies that have promoted or delayed the use of telehealth, and consumer acceptance of telehealth. The Role of Telehealth in an Evolving Health Care Environment: Workshop Summary discusses the current evidence base for telehealth, including available data and gaps in data; discuss how technological developments, including mobile telehealth, electronic intensive care units, remote monitoring, social networking, and wearable devices, in conjunction with the push for electronic health records, is changing the delivery of health care in rural and urban environments. This report also summarizes actions that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) can undertake to further the use of telehealth to improve health care outcomes while controlling costs in the current health care environment.

• Helping patients form very specific plans to achieve their health goals — for example, identifying the time when they will take their medicines, having them determine what they will do if their prescriptions run out and they don’t have a doctor’s appointment, and giving them a place to record whether they took the medicines.

• Breaking big goals into smaller tasks that get patients to their ultimate goal step-by-step — useful for goals like extreme weight loss, adhering to medication regimens and checking blood sugar every day, or exercising several times a week.

• Using cash payments to patients as a motivator to get them on track but supplementing that with strategies that will increase their desire to stay healthy and live longer.