Lecture by Marc Van Ranst, Belgian Flu Commissioner, at the ESWI/Chatham House Influenza Pandemic Preparedness Stakeholders Conference on 22 January 2019.
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What is the Relationship Between a Positive PCR and Infectivity?
WUHAN, May 5, 2020 -- The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, was shut on January 1, 2020 by Chinese authorities. The common narrative told to us by the WHO, who got their information from Chinese authorities, is that the market was “ground zero”, or origin, of the novel coronavirus outbreak. The story has been told that the virus jumped from bats to humans, with the “patient zero” being identified as a shrimp vendor in that wet market. Chinese scholars saw otherwise. Here's a Q&A, with answers based on available, published papers: Q: What triggered Dr Wain-Hobson's warning? Dr Wain-Hobson gave a stark warning: “If transposable to humans, this would constitute a novel virus with a case fatality rate ~30 greater than that of Spanish flu.” "The controversial experiments confer aerosol transmission on avian influenza virus strains that can infect humans, but which are not naturally transmitted between humans. Some of the newer strains are clearly highly pathogenic for man.
"It will be shown here that the benefits of the work are erroneous and overstated while the risk of an accident is finite, if small. The consequence of any accident would be anywhere from a handful of infections to a catastrophic pandemic." Q: Who funded those GOF studies? US and European tax-payers, among others, as well as China, among others. Dr Wain-Hobson decried this fact: "Despite US and EU government funding, no risk-benefit analysis has been published, which again is surprising. This research can be duplicated readily in many labs and requires little high tech. It falls under the definition of DURC without the slightest shadow of a doubt and constitutes the most important challenge facing contemporary biology." Dr. Wain-Hobson decried the fact that "there has (only) been a single open international meeting in this period, which is surprising given that openness and discussion are essential to good science." Q: Did anyone listen to Dr Wain-Hobson's warning? Sort of. In 2014 the administration of US President Barack Obama called for a “pause” on funding (and relevant research with existing US Government funding) of GOF experiments involving influenza, SARS, and MERS viruses in particular. With this pause, the US Government also launched a “deliberative process” regarding risks and benefits of GOF research to inform future funding decisions. It tasked the US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) to make recommendations to the US Government on this matter. The ban was lifted on December 19 2017, according to Science. Q: What is the risk of directly infecting humans with a chimera virus? The same warning, authored by Felix Rey, Olivier Schwartz, Simon Wain-Hobson was also published by the journal Science in October 2013. They said the risks were "unknown". Q: Is SARS-CoV-2, which is causing such deadly run around the world, a chimera virus? It's hard to say. The jury is still out. It could very well be result of an accident of nature, human error, or an unintended result of a lab work that stretched for years. Q: Are chimeric viruses used as a bioweapon? Combining two pathogenic viruses increases the lethality of the new virus. which is why there have been cases where chimeric viruses have been considered a number of times for use as a bioweapon. For example, the Soviet Union's Chimera Project attempted to combine DNA from Venezuelan equine encephalitis, smallpox and Ebola virus in the late 1980s. A combination smallpox and monkeypox virus has also been studied. That's the downside. Q: What's the upside? On the upside, the 21st century is the so-called "Golden Age" of genetic engineering. It's a sort of a gold rush powered by cheaper, better sequencing technology. Many hope this would help alleviate various types of genetic disorders or cure genetically-triggered diseases. As the technology has improved exponentially, the cost to sequence a genome has fallen dramatically. For example, the first human genome (declared complete in April 2003) took $2.7 billion and almost 15 years to complete. Then cost of genome sequencing and analysis started falling drastically around 2008, from about $10 million. Based on data collected from genome-sequencing groups funded by the Maryland-based National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI), the cost to generate a high-quality 'draft' whole human genome sequence in mid-2015 was just above $4,000; by late in 2015, that figure had fallen below $1,500. In a 2019 report, NHGRI stated that the cost to generate a "whole-exome sequence was generally below $1,000". Q: Can chimeric viruses be used for medical treatment? Yes. Studies have shown that chimeric viruses can also be developed to have medical benefits. For example, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has recently approved the use of chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) to treat relapsed non-Hodgkin Lymphoma. By introducing a chimeric antigen receptor into T cells, the T cells become more efficient at identifying and attacking the tumor cells. Studies are also in progress to create a chimeric vaccine against four types of Dengue virus, however this has not been successful yet. Q: What is the similarity between the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein and the HIV 'exoprotein'? Researchers have used public-domain genetic sequence of the SARS-CoV-2 virus. It was first published by Chinese researchers from the Shanghai lab on January 11. That lab, was shut down on January 12, 2020. The same genetic sequence, however, was used by researchers in different countries to develop a test kit to identify the virus using a highly-reliable reverse transcription PCR (polymerase chain reaction). Indian researchers have compared the S (spike) Protein sequence between SARS-CoV-2 (or 2019-nCoV, or Wuhan coronavirus), and SARS. What they found is startling: An uncanny similarity of unique inserts in the 2019-nCoV spike protein to HIV-1 gp120 and Gag. Gag, or group specific antigen, is the major structural protein (of HIV-1 and all other retroviruses) and comprises about 50 per cent of the mass of a viral particle. The Indians discovered the 2019-nCoV (SARS-CoV-2) had 2 new sequences inserted — all of which can be found in HIV genetic sequences. This similarity was found through a simple search in GenBank (a genetic sequence database run by the US National Institutes of Health, NIH). The GenBank sequence database is an open-access, annotated collection of all publicly- available nucleotide sequences and their protein translations. It is produced and maintained by the US National Center for Biotechnology Information as part of the International Nucleotide Sequence Database Collaboration.) The supposed HIV genetic insertions on SARS-CoV-2 gene are:
Q: The Wuhan coronavirus, does it have HIV genes that make it highly transmissible? In 2009, Dr. Frank Ruscetti, one of the founders of the field of human retrovirology, and Dr. Judy Anne Mikovits' labs isolated for the first time a new family of human retroviruses then identified as XMRV strongly associated with neuroimmune disease and cancer (a family of pathogenic human retroviruses is now called HGRV). For her part, Dr. Mikovits has co-authored more than 50 peer reviewed-publications and wrote the book Plague: One Scientist’s Intrepid Search for the Truth about Human Retroviruses and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Autism, and Other Diseases. Dr. Mikovits told The Epoch Times that an analysis and comparison of the virus of the SARS-Cov-2 (the virus that causes the COVID-19): “(it) apparently has genes that come from other human and other species including some envelope—the one from HIV." Q: What is the HIV’s gp41? Gp41 (transmembrane glycoprotein, composed on 345 amino acids) is known to virologists as a sub-unit of the envelope (or spike) protein complex of retroviruses, including human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Among HIV researchers, this spike made of protein is well-known as the “key” to infecting human cells, resulting in the functional failure of the immune system. Gp41, on the other hand, is a transmembrane protein that contains several sites within its ectodomain (parts of proteins that initiate contact with surfaces) that are required for infection of, and rapid replication within, host cells.
Among HIV researchers, these gp120 and pp41 has received much attention as a potential target for HIV-zapping vaccines. Q: Why is the HIV gp120 important for researchers? HIV is highly transmissible in humans. The functions of both Gp120 and Gp41 had been sliced and diced by virologists for years. For example, in a breakthrough study in 1990, Philip Berman and colleagues reported in Nature the development of a vaccine based on the HIV glycoprotein gp120, which binds CD4 and chemokine receptors on target cells, but protected lab chimpanzees from HIV-1 infection. The work eventually led to tests of recombinant-gp120-based vaccines in HIV-infected humans. If the observation by Dr Judy Mikovits is validated, it would mean something damning: the mechanism of infection, or “shedding”, of the deadly coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 is quite deadly. It's now a well understood mechanism in cell biollogy: The key to its virulence is the S Protein (also known as "viral key”), which unlocks the ACE-2 receptor in human lung cells, that results in a deadly infection. But one research can disprove another, before another one disproves it. One claim can follow another. Q: What's the takeaway? The jury is still out on this story. If it's proven that SARS-CoV-2 is indeed a product of franken-virus that tinkered with life at the cellular level, a kind of science for its own sake, or a DURC gone horribly wrong, then the full course of the affliction it has brought upon humanity is indeed "unknown". Then it would prove that fears which prompted the warnings about its potential pandemic virulence were spot on. The current picture is pretty murky: Members of the elite scientific community around the world don't always see each other eye to eye. And we all know science can be a force for good or bad — the fire generated by nuclear energy can either power an entire country for years, or toast entire cities in a flash. In the global viral sweepstakes now emerging, there's a complex web of big egos, big pharma and big powers with conflicting ethos and motives at play. WUHAN, May 3, 2020 -- The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, was shut on January 1, 2020 by Chinese authorities. The common narrative told to us by the WHO, who got their information from Chinese authorities, is that the market was “ground zero”, or origin, of the novel coronavirus outbreak. The story has been told that the virus jumped from bats to humans, with the “patient zero” being identified as a shrimp vendor in that wet market. Chinese scholars saw otherwise. Here's a Q&A, with answers based on available, published papers: Q: Was the S protein on the SARS-CoV-2 lab generated, and that it's a chimeric virus modified from the original SARS-CoV, with the addition of the desired S protein to make them more bind easily to human cells, thus amplifying their virulence and transmissibility? It's hard to say. There's no perfect knowledge on tnis virulent enemy. One study, (a pre-print, non-peer-reviewed and has been reportedly withdrawn) in January 2020 shows the supposed link, claiming SARS-CoV-2 exhibited an "uncanny similarity of unique inserts in the 2019-nCoV spike protein to HIV-1 gp120 and Gag." This kicked up a trail of conspiracy theories. Another study, titled "HIV-1 did not contribute to the 2019-nCoV genome", published on February 14, 2020 in "Emerging Microbes and Infections", disputed it, saying there's no direct link. Both studies made use of comparative genetic sequences of the viruses they investigated. Gene editing, a super specialised field, is an exclusive domain of highly specialised few. It may be a perpetual challenge to figure out the real cause or cure for SARS-CoV-2. What's clear is that there's a group of US Federal government-funded researchers who made a lab-generated virus that examined the disease-causing potential of SHC-014-CoV, described as a "SARS-like virus". In the abstract, the researchers stated that they "generated and characterized a chimeric virus expressing the spike of bat coronavirus SHC014 in a mouse-adapted SARS-CoV backbone." Caption written by researchers on 'Nature': Coronavirus strains are maintained in quasi-species pools circulating in bat populations. (a,b) Traditional SARS-CoV emergence theories posit that host-range mutants (red circle) represent random and rare occurrences that permit infection of alternative hosts. The secondary-host paradigm (a) argues that a nonhuman host is infected by a bat progenitor virus and, through adaptation, facilitates transmission to humans; subsequent replication in humans leads to the epidemic viral strain. The direct paradigm (b) suggests that transmission occurs between bats and humans without the requirement of an intermediate host; selection then occurs in the human population with closely related viruses replicating in a secondary host, permitting continued viral persistence and adaptation in both. (c) The data from chimeric SARS-like viruses argue that the quasi-species pools maintain multiple viruses capable of infecting human cells without the need for mutations (red circles). Although adaptations in secondary or human hosts may be required for epidemic emergence, if SHC014 spike–containing viruses recombined with virulent CoV backbones (circles with green outlines), then epidemic disease may be the result in humans. Existing data support elements of all three paradigms. Q: Chimeric virus: Double meaning? It's a well-known term used in the virology community. A chimeric virus has a double meaning. One, it refers to dormat viruses revived by scientists after being unearthed in the frozen wasteland of Siberia. Two, it denotes research by virologists to allow viruses to "gain" -- or improve -- "function", by combining parts of other viruses or other organisms. There had been at least one scientific conference among hundreds of biotech, epidemiology and virology experts that saw fierce debates on the merits of developing chimeric or "franken-viruses". Q: What is the "mechanism of virulence" (MOV) of SARS-CoV(1)? The SARS virus and its structural proteins are well known to exclusive community of biotech, virology and genetic engineering experts around the world. These structural proteins of the SARS-CoV (1) have been targetted by researchers for new "treatment" options.
Q: What is the function of spike glycoprotein (or S gp) of the SARS-CoV(1)? Intra- and extracellular proteases often cleave the S protein into S1 and S2 domains (or a cell), with the cleavage process often increasing infectivity of the virus. Molecular modelling has been performed for the S1 and S2 units of the SARS-CoV spike protein. "The spike proteins of coronaviruses are reported to bind to receptors on their target cells and the domains responsible for receptor-binding are commonly situated in the N-terminal region of S1. The spikes consist of oligomeric structures, that are formed by heptad repeats of the S2 domain which also represent a fusion peptide sequence. This peptide is responsible for the coronavirus fusion activity." WUHAN, May 2, 2020 -- The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, was shut on January 1, 2020 by Chinese authorities. The common narrative told to us by the WHO, who got their information from Chinese authorities, is that the market was “ground zero”, or origin, of the novel coronavirus outbreak. The story has been told that the virus jumped from bats to humans, with the “patient zero” being identified as a shrimp vendor in that wet market. Chinese scholars saw otherwise. Here's a Q&A, with answers based on available, published papers: Q: How many types of human coronavirus are known to science? "Coronaviruses" are called such for the crown-like spikes on their surface. The CDC has identified 4 main sub-groupings of coronaviruses, known as alpha, beta, gamma, and delta. Common human coronaviruses:
Other human coronaviruses:
Q: What are the most common causes of human coronavirus infection? People around the world commonly get infected with human coronaviruses 229E, NL63, OC43, and HKU1. Sometimes coronaviruses that infect animals can evolve and make people sick and become a new human coronavirus. Three recent examples of this are SARS-CoV-2 (or 2019-nCoV), SARS-CoV(1), and MERS-CoV. Q: Has there ever been a lab-engineered coronavirus from bats? Yes. On November 12, 2015, the highly-respected scientific journal Nature published an article about one. In the explanatory note, researchers stated: “An experiment that created a hybrid version of a bat coronavirus — one related to the virus that causes SARS (severe acute respiratory syndrome) — has triggered renewed debate over whether engineering lab variants of viruses with possible pandemic potential is worth the risks.” Q: What is the research and who were the authors of this 'chimeric virus'? The researchers examined the disease potential of a SARS-like virus, SHC014-CoV, which was identified as circulating in Chinese horseshoe bat populations. Using what they described as "SARS-CoV reverse genetics system", the reseachers said that they generated and characterised a "chimeric virus expressing the spike of bat coronavirus SHC014 in a mouse-adapted SARS-CoV backbone." The researchers and their affiliations are the following:
Q: What's a key highlight of this study? One of the results highlighted in the study states: “…we generated and characterized a chimeric virus expressing the spike of coronavirus SHC014 in a mouse-adapted SARS-CoV backbone." "The results indicate that group 2b viruses encoding the SHC014 spike in a wild-type backbone can efficiently use multiple orthologs of the SARS receptor human angiotensin converting enzyme II (ACE2), replicate efficiently in primary human airway cells and achieve in vitro titers equivalent to epidemic strains of SARS-CoV." "Additionally, in vivo experiments demonstrate replication of the chimeric virus in mouse lung with notable pathogenesis.” WUHAN, May 1, 2020 -- The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, was shut on January 1, 2020 by Chinese authorities. The common narrative told to us by the WHO, who got their information from Chinese authorities, is that the market was “ground zero”, or origin, of the novel coronavirus outbreak. The story has been told that the virus jumped from bats to humans, with the “patient zero” being identified as a shrimp vendor in that wet market. Chinese scholars saw otherwise. Here's a Q&A, with answers based on available, published papers: Q: Did the SARS-CoV-2 virus jump from animals (believed to be bats, and other 'intermediate hosts') to humans in Wuhan’s Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market? No. Clinical data from China clearly dispute this claim. Chinese authorities and experts are at odds about the real origin of the ongoing coronavirus outbreak. Q: What’s the evidence showing where it started? At least two clinical studies, published six days apart in January 2020 (January 24 and January 30, 2020) disprove this Huanan-Seafood-Wholesale-Market-was-the-origin-of-SARS-CoV-2 narrative. The studies were prepared by top-level Chinese clinical researchers. Q: Who are the researchers? They are mostly Chinese medical doctors and clinicians. The first group, published a study in The Lancet on January 24, 2020, studied 41 patients — and showed that only 27 of the 41 initial patients confirmed to have contracted the infection, then known as 2019-nCoV, were exposed to Huanan market. This study was funded by Ministry of Science and Technology, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, National Natural Science Foundation of China, and the Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission. A second team, which published their work in The Lancet on January 30, 2020, studied 99 patients, all confirmed cases of 2019-nCoV, in Wuhan Jinyintan Hospital from January 1 to January 20, 2020. All cases were confirmed by real-time RT-PCR, the most reliable RNA/DNA-based test today. Of the 99 patients in the second study (with “2019-nCoV pneumonia”, later known as SARS-CoV-2), only 49 (49%) had a history of exposure to the Huanan seafood market. Interestingly, it did not identify the geographical origins of the 50 other cases. The second was authored by the following:
Q: What do the numbers mean? It means NO scientific evidence supports the claim that SARS-CoV-2 (virus that causes COVID-19) came from the Wuhan market. The market's shrimp vendor identified as "patient zero", is just a descriptive phrase that holds no scientific value. In the initial clinical research prepared by top Chinese experts (Prof. Choalin Huang, Dr Yeming Wang and Prof. Xingwang Li) in the The Lancet, only 27 patients (66 per cent) of initial 41 found cases were known to have had exposure to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale market. The rest, 33 per cent, were not. Q: Why is it wrong to say the novel coronavirus came from Wuhan market? It's misleading. The clinical data does not support such claim, 2 million people had been infected and nearly 130,000 dead, many of them buried in mass graves. If it's not mass murder, caused by this unseen enemy, then the phrase has no meaning. It has shut down the world, too, to say nothing about the reported long-term damage to the lungs of those who recovered. Indeed, the Chinese researchers themselves cited major "gaps" in their study, saying: "Major gaps in our knowledge of the origin, epidemiology, duration of human transmission, and clinical spectrum of disease need fulfilment by future studies." Q: How different is the novel coronavirus (SARS-Cov-2) from SARS-CoV(1) and MERS, and how deadly is the new virus to humans? They're all deadly. The Chinese clinicians identified two highly pathogenic viruses, SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV, as they cause severe respiratory syndrome in humans. In contrast, they also mentioned four other human coronaviruses (HCoV-OC43, HCoV-229E, HCoV-NL63, HCoV-HKU1), which only induce mild upper respiratory disease. Lora Smith BAIKONUR, August 22 -- A Soyuz-2.1a carrier rocket took off from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan on Thursday to deliver to the International Space Station (ISS) the Soyuz MS-14 manned spacecraft with a Russian humanoid robot on board. The rocket took off from the Gagarin Start launch pad at 6:38 Moscow time. Approximately nine minutes after the takeoff, Soyuz separated from the third stage and embarked upon a two-day journey to the ISS. At about 6:47 Moscow time, the spacecraft unfurled its solar batteries. Although there will be no humans on board this time, the Soyuz-MS spacecraft will carry Russia’s Skybot F-850 android robot and cargo to the International Space Station (ISS). The docking is scheduled for 08:31 Moscow time on August 24. The Soyuz-2 rocket will replace Soyuz-FG, which has delivered international crews to the ISS since 2002. Russian space industry switched to a next-generation rocket after Ukrainian partners stopped deliveries of analog control systems installed on Soyuz-FG. As the two countries suspended cooperation in the space industry, Russia was left with a limited number of Soyuz-FG. The last launch of this type of rocket will take place on September 21. Soyuz-2.1a rockets are equipped with Russian-made digital control systems. Lora Smith VIENNA, July 29 -- Iran looking at further reduction of its commitments under JCPOA by September 4-5 as part of less-for-less approach, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Sunday after a meeting of the Joint Commission of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). "Further we are in early September, with September 4-5 being a reference date, when Iran plans to take the so-called third step to reduce its commitments as part of the less-for-less approach," he said. "We called on the Iranians to refrain from that after all," he said, adding that it is necessary to see to it that Iran really has the economic possibilities that were provided by the deal and lost due to the US sanctions. "Some participants in the deal think that Iran must get back to the implementation of its commitments in full without any additional reservations or conditions," he said. "But in the current situation, it looks absolutely unrealistic." Modernization of reactor at Iran’s Arak Ryabkov added that the project for the modernization of the heavy water reactor at Iran’s Arak is nearing the equipment purchasing stage. "Progress has been made on the Arak project," he said. "It is not nominal. The stage of practical, purchasing activities is nearing. It is a separate question who will supply equipment there and what kind of equipment. But as a matter of fact, it is not a political question. It is a question to the designers." According to the Russian diplomat, the prospects for handing over equipment for the modernization of the reactor at Arak are seen as quite sensitive in some countries. "Anyway, we have an indirect relation to this project," he noted. "We are not going to supply any equipment there. All we can do is to offer our consultancy.". INSTEX vehicleThe European special purpose vehicle INSTEX aiming at facilitating trade between the European Union and Iran is operating in the pilot mode and a series of procedures are needed to make fully operational, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister noted. "INSTEX is operating in the pilot regime. To make it fully operational certain political and bureaucratic procedures are to be finalized, in particular, to sign additional documents between ISTEX and a similar structure set up in Iran," Ryabkov said. The European Union announced the launch of the INSTEX (Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges) vehicle at a previous meeting of political directors on June 28. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on July 17 that a number deals with several millions of US dollars had been executed via INSTEX but, in his words, it was not enough. Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said earlier on Sunday that the EU’s vehicle was not yet operational. Lora Smith HELSINKI, July 23 -- A new paper published by researchers form the University of Turku in Finland suggests that even though observed changes in the climate are real, the effects of human activity on these changes are insignificant. The team suggests that the idea of man made climate change is a mere miscalculation or skewing the formulas by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Jyrki Kauppinen and Pekka Malmi, from the Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Turku, in their paper published on 29th June 2019 claim to prove that the “GCM-models used in IPCC report AR5 fail to calculate the influences of the low cloud cover changes on the global temperature. That is why those models give a very small natural temperature change leaving a very large change for the contribution of the green house gases in the observed temperature.” Thus, in order to come to the results matching the actual climate change the IPCC has to “use a very large sensitivity to compensate a too small natural component. Further they have to leave out the strong negative feedback due to the clouds in order to magnify the sensitivity.” In addition, Kauppinen and Malmi claim that their paper proves that “the changes in the low cloud cover fraction practically control the global temperature.” The authors argue that the IPCC has used computational results which can not be considered experimental evidence, and site this as the reason for contradictory conclusions. “The IPCC climate sensitivity is about one order of magnitude (i.e. 10 times) too high, because a strong negative feedback of the clouds is missing in climate models. If we pay attention to the fact that only a small part of the increased CO2 concentration is anthropogenic, we have to recognise that the anthropogenic climate change does not exist in practice, write Kauppinen and Malmi. “The major part of the extra CO2 is emitted from oceans, according to Henry‘s law. The low clouds practically control the global average temperature. During the last hundred years the temperature is increased about 0.1℃ because of CO2. The human contribution was about 0.01℃.” The paper has been criticised for not being peer reviewed and other climate scientists have refuted the conclusions reached by Kauppinen and Malmi. Critics have said that in addition to not being peer reviewed, Malmi and Kauppinen fail to provide correct physical explanation, have not linked to- or sited to enough sources to support their claims and although they denounce climate models, they use one themselves to prove their own points. In a previous paper by the same scientists published last December, they discuss the effects of cloud cover and relative humidity on the climate change. In a separate study, Japanese scientists have also suggested a much more important role for low clouds cover caused by an increase in cosmic rays resulting form the weakening of the earths magnetic filed. Prof. Masayuki Hyodo and his team Yusuke Ueno, Tianshui Yang and Shigehiro Katoh from the University of Kobe in Japan in their paper published this month in propose that the “umbrella effect” is the main factor behind climate change. “When galactic cosmic rays increased during the Earth’s last geomagnetic reversal transition 780,000 years ago, the umbrella effect of low-cloud cover led to high atmospheric pressure in Siberia, causing the East Asian winter monsoon to become stronger. This is evidence that galactic cosmic rays influence changes in the Earth’s climate.” “The Intergovernmental IPCC has discussed the impact of cloud cover on climate in their evaluations, but this phenomenon has never been considered in climate predictions due to the insufficient physical understanding of it”, comments Professor Hyodo. “This study provides an opportunity to rethink the impact of clouds on climate. When galactic cosmic rays increase, so do low clouds, and when cosmic rays decrease clouds do as well, so climate warming may be caused by an opposite-umbrella effect. The umbrella effect caused by galactic cosmic rays is important when thinking about current global warming as well as the warm period of the medieval era.” Scientists have suspected that the Earth’s magnetic filed is showing signs of flipping. The magnetic filed is moving erratically out of the Canadian Arctic and towards Siberia so unpredictably that it has taken scientists by surprise so that they need to update the model they released only four years ago. Lora Smith MIAMI, July 22 -- American crocodiles, once headed toward extinction, are thriving at an unusual spot — the canals surrounding a South Florida nuclear plant. Last week, 73 crocodile hatchlings were rescued by a team of specialists at Florida Power & Light’s Turkey Point nuclear plant and dozens more are expected to emerge soon. Turkey Point’s 168-mile (270 kilometers) of man-made canals serve as the home to several hundred crocodiles, where a team of specialists working for FPL monitors and protects them from hunting and climate change. From January to April, Michael Lloret, an FPL wildlife biologist and crocodile specialist, helps create nests and ponds on berms for crocodiles to nest. Once the hatchlings are reared and left by the mother, the team captures them. They are measured and tagged with microchips to observe their development. Lloret then relocates them to increase survival rates. “We entice crocodiles to come in to the habitats FPL created,” Lloret said. “We clear greenery on the berms so that the crocodiles can nest. Because of rising sea levels wasting nests along the coasts, Turkey Point is important for crocodiles to continue.” The canals are one of three major US habitats for crocodiles, where 25% of the 2,000 American crocodiles live. The FPL team has been credited for moving the classification of crocodiles on the Endangered Species Act to “threatened” from “endangered” in 2007. The team has tagged 7,000 babies since it was established in 1978. Temperature determines the crocodiles’ sex: the hotter it is the more likely males are hatched. Lloret said this year’s hatchlings are male-heavy due to last month being the hottest June on record globally. Because hatchlings released are at the bottom of the food chain, only a small fraction survives to be adults. Lloret said they at least have a fighting chance at Turkey Point, away from humans who hunted them to near-extinction out of greed and fear even though attacks are rare. Only one crocodile attack has ever been recorded in the U.S. - a couple were both bitten while swimming in a South Florida canal in 2014, but both survived. “American crocodiles have a bad reputation when they are just trying to survive,” Lloret said. “They are shy and want nothing to do with us. Humans are too big to be on their menu.” Linda Lim The Daini complex was also hit by tsunami waves in the 2011 disaster and temporarily lost reactor cooling functions. But unlike the Daiichi plant, it escaped meltdowns. Since the disaster, the decommissioning in Japan of 21 nuclear reactors, including those at Daini, has been decided. For the Tokyo-headquartered power company, the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant in Niigata Prefecture will be its only nuclear complex. In June last year, TEPCO President Tomoaki Kobayakawa told the governor that the company is leaning toward scrapping all four reactors at the Daini plant. A project team was later formed at the utility and looked into whether that is possible, according to the source. The prefecture has demanded the utility scrap the reactors, saying their existence would hamper its reconstruction efforts.
Lora Smith CAPE CANAVERAL, July 17 -- Fifty years ago, astronaut Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong, took the first steps on the moon. The moment unified hundreds of millions of people worldwide in a way never seen before or since. People tuned in to radios or watched on their television screens on July 20, 1969, as Armstrong, who took the first steps 18 minutes before Aldrin, declared, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind". The launch took place four days earlier on July 16, 1969. Astronaut Michael Collins, who orbited the moon as Armstrong and Aldrin explored the surface, recently told the Associated Press, "how often can you get people around our globe to agree on anything? Hardly ever." The now-88-year-old added, "It was a wonderful achievement in the sense that people everywhere around the planet applauded it: north, south, east, west, rich, poor, Communist, whatever." The moment, aimed at winning the space race and beating the Soviet Union to the moon, was the result of eight years of work by more than 400,000 people and billions of dollars. After six more missions, the Apollo programme was ended in 1972. Fifty years later, the United States is at it again. This time, aiming to send astronauts back to the moon by 2024, four years earlier than initially planned. Pete McGee TOKYO, July 16 -- Toyota Motor Corp. and Japan's space exploration agency said Tuesday they have signed a three-year agreement to jointly research and develop a rover to be sent to the Moon in 2029. Under the agreement covering the period through March 2022, Toyota and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency will develop, manufacture and test a prototype rover capable of running on the surface of the Moon using fuel cell power. Toyota and JAXA first unveiled the project in March this year. They said the rover would enable astronauts to live inside it for a certain amount of time without wearing space suits, the first such development in the world. Following testing of the prototype rover, Toyota and JAXA will start designing the actual flight model from 2024, and commence its manufacturing and testing from 2027, they said. JAXA plans to send the rover to the Moon on an American rocket in 2029 amid growing international competition in lunar exploration. Pete McGee NEW DELHI, July 14 -- The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said on Sunday that it was all set to launch second lunar mission Chandrayaan-2. The heavy-lift rocket GSLV-Mark-3 carrying Chandrayaan-2 will be launched from Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota, off the Bay of Bengal coast in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, at 2:51 a.m. local time on Monday. "The launch countdown of GSLV MkIII-M1/Chandrayaan-2 commenced today at 6:51 a.m. (local time). The launch is scheduled at 2:51 a.m. (local time) on July 15 (Monday)," ISRO said. "UH25 (fuel) filling of liquid core stage (L110) of GSLV MkIII-M1 completed. Propellant filling of liquid core stage (L110) of GSLV MkIII-M1 completed." Officials said the powerful 3.85-ton rocket will put Chandrayaan-2 in a highly elliptical orbit around the earth, following which its orbit will be raised through a series of maneuvers by remote by the ISRO scientists. Eventually, it will be taken out of the earth's orbit and made to reach the sphere of influence of the moon. Officials said the entire mission has a life of one year. According to the state-run broadcaster All India Radio, President Ram Nath Kovind is scheduled to witness the launch from Sriharikota. Reports said if India succeeds in this endeavour, it will become the fourth country to soft-land spacecraft on the lunar surface after the United States, Russia and China. Israel tried earlier this year but failed. |
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