Happy New Year 2011

May our life journey on this Earth happily .............. Happy New Year 2011 for everyone !!!.

Photo credit : Flickr.com / Satyajit Basu.

Henrietta Lacks - Pioneering the Cure Cancer

 ‘Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks’ Tells a True Story of Science, Ethics and Family

 20 July 2010

Photo: nih.gov                                                                      HeLa cells as seen through a powerful microscope

STEVE EMBER: I’m Steve Ember.

FRITZI BODENHEIMER: And I’m Fritzi Bodenheimer with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. Today we tell about one of the most important scientific discoveries of the last century -- the development of HeLa cells. Reporter Rebecca Skloot explores this in her book “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.” The book is a history of science, professional morals and the human story behind a famous line of cells.
(MUSIC)
STEVE EMBER: For much of his career, a researcher at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland had been working to find a way to grow human cells outside the body. George Gey and his team of researchers wanted to grow cancer cells in a laboratory. They believed scientists could study this illness to understand its causes and find a cure.
Dr. Gey tested many different human cells in many kinds of liquid. But the cells always died quickly. However, one day in nineteen fifty-one, his search came to an end. Cancer cells from a patient at the university’s hospital were more than just surviving. These cells were growing faster than anyone had ever seen before.

Bird are dying - fell from the top

Birds are dropping in droves. The thing is, it's perfectly normal.
In recent days, 5,000 blackbirds dropped dead in Arkansas. Dozens of jackdaws in Sweden fell from the sky as well. So did a few hundred turtle doves in Italy.

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Associated Press

Hundreds of dead birds cover the Morganza Highway in Pointe Coupee Parish, La., on Monday.

The natural questions: Are these deaths somehow linked by a common cause, a sign of an impending apocalypse or the result of a common environmental trigger? Biologists say it's unlikely.
"Large mortality events in wildlife aren't that uncommon," says Paul Slota, spokesman for the U.S. Geological Survey's National Wildlife Health Center in Madison, Wis., which has been tracking mass animal deaths since the 1970s. "In the last 10 years we have logged 188 cases just involving birds with mortality exceeding 1,000 animals per event."
The causes vary. Some animals starve. Others eat toxic food or get poisoned by people. Many die in severe weather, or succumb to pollution or bacterial and viral illnesses. In many causes, though, the cause remains a mystery.

Place the clock

This day I try to place the Clock onto my Blogsite, I learned it for several weeks before, try it several times and get failed, but now I can place it on my Blogsite with safe.

Growing Trees in the desert, with the aid of " Waterboxx "

Photo : groasis.com

This is the VOA Special English Agriculture Report.

Pieter Hoff used to export lilies and tulips from the Netherlands. He retired from the flower export business seven years ago. Now, he is trying to help people grow trees and plants in the desert -- and save water.
In many places, much of the freshwater supply is used for irrigation. Yet most of that water may be lost through evaporation into the air. So Pieter Hoff has invented a simple plastic device called the Groasis Waterboxx. He says he got the idea from nature.

PIETER HOFF: "If you look at nature, and I give an example in your own country, if you look to the Rocky Mountains of the Sierra Nevada, you find trees all over the mountains. So trees are actually able to grow on rocks. They have very strong roots."
Mr. Hoff says the trick is that nature does not dig a hole like we humans do to plant seeds. Nature plants the seeds through birds or animals on top of the soil. Their waste then acts as a cover. It prevents the humidity in the soil from evaporating.

Trio shares Nobel Prize for Chemistry

Scientists Imitate Life, Melding Carbon Atoms for Uses From Cutting-Edge Drugs to Electronics

more in Health »

By GAUTAM NAIK

United Press International

Nobel winner Ei-ichi Negishi.

The Nobel Prize for Chemistry was awarded to a trio of scientists who came up with an elegant way to mesh together stubborn carbon atoms, an approach vital for the development of novel medicines, materials and electronics.

Trying Move & Stop

I want to make a picture move & stop if I point to it & move and so on