The Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Bill

On November 2, 1971, Senator Metcalf introduced the Deep Seabed Hard Mineral Resources Bill, drafted by the American Mining Congress. The Bill is designed to provide the Secretary of the Interior with authority to promote the orderly development of the hard mineral resources of the deep seabed pending adoption of an international regime. According to Senator Metcalf, it is structured to order only the affairs of U.S. nationals. The introduction of the Bill, whether it becomes law or not, represents a major advance in the seabed debate requiring detailed analysis. If the Bill does not become law, there can be little doubt that similar legislation will soon be requested. This may be shown from a brief review of the circumstances preceding the presentation of the Bill

Viral respiratory infections at the Hajj: comparison between UK and Saudi pilgrims

ABSTRACTA high incidence of respiratory infection, including influenza, has been reported at the Hajj in Mecca, Saudi Arabia. Reported rates of influenza have been higher among UK than among domestic pilgrims, but this could be explained by methodological differences among studies. Accordingly, the present study compared the frequencies of respiratory viruses among UK and Saudi pilgrims using the same study design. Pilgrims with upper respiratory tract symptoms were recruited from Mecca and the neighbouring valley Mina during the Hajj 2006. Nasal swabs were used for point-of-care influenza testing and real-time RT-PCR (rtRT-PCR) tests for influenza virus, rhinovirus, parainfluenza virus, adenovirus, human metapneumovirus and respiratory syncytial virus. Of 260 pilgrims investigated, 150 were from the UK and 110 were Saudi; of these, 38 (25%) UK pilgrims and 14 (13%) Saudi pilgrims had respiratory infections detectable by rtRT-PCR (p 0.01). In the UK group, there were 19 (13%) cases of rhinovirus infection, 15 (10%) cases of influenza virus infection, two (1%) cases of dual infections with influenza virus and rhinovirus, one (3%) case of parainfluenza virus infection, and one (1%) case of respiratory syncytial virus infection. Fifty-six (37%) UK pilgrims had been vaccinated against influenza virus, with the rates of influenza in the vaccinated and unvaccinated group being 7% and 14%, respectively (p 0.19). In the Saudi group, there were three (3%) cases of rhinovirus infection and 11 (10%) cases of influenza. Only four (4%) Saudi pilgrims had been vaccinated against influenza virus, and none of these was infected with influenza virus. Overall, a significantly higher proportion of the UK pilgrims had detectable respiratory infections (25% vs. 13%, p 0.01). Influenza rates were similar in both groups, but the reported rates of influenza vaccination differed

Natural Wormholes as Gravitational Lenses

Visser has suggested traversable 3-dimensional wormholes that could plausibly form naturally during Big Bang inflation. A wormhole mouth embedded in high mass density might accrete mass, giving the other mouth a net *negative* mass of unusual gravitational properties. The lensing of such a gravitationally negative anomalous compact halo object (GNACHO) will enhance background stars with a time profile that is observable and qualitatively different from that recently observed for massive compact halo objects (MACHOs) of positive mass. We recommend that MACHO search data be analyzed for GNACHOs.Comment: 4 pages; plus 4 figures; ReV_TeX 3.0; DOE/ER/40537-001/NPL94-07-01

Allele Copy Number and Underlying Pathology Are Associated with Subclinical Severity in Equine Type 1 Polysaccharide Storage Myopathy (PSSM1)

Equine type 1 polysaccharide storage myopathy (PSSM1), a common glycogenosis associated with an R309H founder mutation in the glycogen synthase 1 gene (GYS1), shares pathological features with several human myopathies. In common with related human disorders, the pathogenesis remains unclear in particular, the marked phenotypic variability between affected animals. Given that affected animals accumulate glycogen and alpha-crystalline polysaccharide within their muscles, it is possible that physical disruption associated with the presence of this material could exacerbate the phenotype. The aim of this study was to compare the histopathological changes in horses with PSSM1, and specifically, to investigate the hypothesis that the severity of underlying pathology, (e.g. vacuolation and inclusion formation) would (1) be higher in homozygotes than heterozygotes and (2) correlate with clinical severity. Resting and post-exercise plasma creatine kinase (CK) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) enzyme activity measurements and muscle pathology were assessed in matched cohorts of PSSM1 homozygotes, heterozygotes or control horses. Median (interquartile range (IR)) resting CK activities were 364 (332–764) U/L for homozygotes, 301 (222–377) U/L for heterozygotes and 260 (216–320) U/L for controls, and mean (+/− SD) AST activity for homozygotes were 502 (+/116) U/L, for heterozygotes, 357 (+/−92) U/L and for controls, 311 (+/−64) U/L and were significantly different between groups (P = 0.04 and P = 0.01 respectively). Resting plasma AST activity was significantly associated with the severity of subsarcolemmal vacuolation (rho = 0.816; P = 0.01) and cytoplasmic inclusions (rho = 0.766; P = 0.01). There were fewer type 2× and more type 2a muscle fibres in PSSM1-affected horses. Our results indicate that PSSM1 has incomplete dominance. Furthermore, the association between plasma muscle enzyme activity and severity of underlying pathology suggests that physical disruption of myofibres may contribute to the myopathic phenotype. This work provides insight into PSSM1 pathogenesis and has implications for related human glycogenoses

Using CF11 cellulose columns to inexpensively and effectively remove human DNA from Plasmodium falciparum-infected whole blood samples

ABSTRACT

No association between the Plasmodium vivax crt-o MS334 or In9pvcrt polymorphisms and chloroquine failure in a pre-elimination clinical cohort from Malaysia with a large clonal expansion

Increasing reports of resistance to a frontline malaria blood-stage treatment, chloroquine (CQ), raises concerns for the elimination of Plasmodium vivax. The absence of an effective molecular marker of CQ resistance in P. vivax greatly constrains surveillance of this emerging threat. A recent genetic cross between CQ sensitive (CQS) and CQ resistant (CQR) NIH-1993 strains of P. vivax linked a moderate CQR phenotype with two candidate markers in P. vivax CQ resistance transporter gene (pvcrt-o): MS334 and In9pvcrt. Longer TGAAGH motif lengths at MS334 were associated with CQ resistance, as were shorter motifs at the In9pvcrt locus. In this study, high-grade CQR clinical isolates of P. vivax from a low endemic setting in Malaysia were used to investigate the association between the MS334 and In9pvcrt variants and treatment efficacy. Among a total of 49 independent monoclonal P. vivax isolates assessed, high-quality MS334 and In9pvcrt sequences could be derived from 30 (61%) and 23 (47%), respectively. Five MS334 and six In9pvcrt alleles were observed, with allele frequencies ranging from 2 to 76% and 3 to 71%, respectively. None of the clinical isolates had the same variant as the NIH-1993 CQR strain, and none of the variants were associated with CQ treatment failure (all P > 0.05). Multi-locus genotypes (MLGs) at 9 neutral microsatellites revealed a predominant P. vivax strain (MLG6) accounting for 52% of Day 0 infections. The MLG6 strain comprised equal proportions of CQS and CQR infections. Our study reveals complexity in the genetic basis of CQ resistance in the Malaysian P. vivax pre-elimination setting and suggests that the proposed pvcrt-o MS334 and In9pvcrt markers are not reliable markers of CQ treatment efficacy in this setting. Further studies are needed in other endemic settings, applying hypothesis-free genome-wide approaches, and functional approaches to understand the biological impact of the TGAAGH repeats linked to CQ response in a cross are warranted to comprehend and track CQR P. vivax

SnoopCGH: software for visualizing comparative genomic hybridization data

Summary: Array-based comparative genomic hybridization (CGH) technology is used to discover and validate genomic structural variation, including copy number variants, insertions, deletions and other structural variants (SVs). The visualization and summarization of the array CGH data outputs, potentially across many samples, is an important process in the identification and analysis of SVs. We have developed a software tool for SV analysis using data from array CGH technologies, which is also amenable to short-read sequence data