Roman Baths algae could fuel cars

11 July 2011 Last updated at 08:33 GMT The researchers are looking for algae with a high oil content Algae growing in Bath's Roman Baths could be used to make fuel for cars, according to new research.

The Roman Baths are at the centre of a university study aimed at producing renewable biofuels from algae.

Studies have been carried out into creating biodiesel from algae for 20 years, but limitations currently prevent it being used on a large scale.

Researchers hope to produce one of the seven algae in the baths in commercially viable quantities.

Biodiesel can be produced by extracting the oil from the algae cell.

PhD student Holly Smith-Baedorf, who is working on the project at the University of Bath, said: "Algae are usually happiest growing at temperatures around 25C and that can limit the places in which it can be cultivated on a large scale.

"Areas where these ideal conditions are available also usually make good arable areas and are therefore needed for food production.

"In an ideal world we would like to grow algae in desert areas where there are huge expanses of land that don't have other uses, but the temperatures in these zones are too high for algae to flourish."

Intensive process

The research team, which also includes the university's department of chemistry and scientists at the University of the West of England, is growing each of the algae from the Roman Baths over a range of temperatures and comparing them to "control" algae known for being good for producing biodiesel at normal temperatures.

Professor Rod Scott said: "The results of this study will help us identify whether there is a particular algae species among the seven identified in the Roman Baths that is well adapted to growing at higher temperatures and also suitable for producing sufficient amounts of biodiesel to make wide-scale production viable."

Another restraint on producing large quantities of algae is that its cell walls are difficult to break, making extraction of the oil inside an energy intensive process.

Some algae cells are also easier to filter than others, reducing the energy and economic cost of "harvesting" the algae from cultures.

The research team are therefore also looking for a species of algae with a weaker cell wall and high oil content.

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Storms could spoil shuttle launch

5 July 2011 Last updated at 17:07 GMT By Jonathan Amos BBC science correspondent, Florida It will be the 33rd and final launch of Atlantis The countdown to Friday's final launch of a space shuttle has begun at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC).

But the famous clock in front of the spaceport's press centre may struggle to get all the way down to zero.

Forecasters say showers and even storms will be over Florida's Space Coast by the week's end.

When it does fly, the Atlantis orbiter will be hauling more than 3.5 tonnes (8,000lb) of supplies to the International Space Station (ISS).

"I wish I had a better briefing for you," Nasa's shuttle weather officer Kathy Winters told reporters.

"Right now we are going with a 60% chance of KSC weather prohibiting launch due to the potential for showers and isolated thunderstorms in the area."

Huge crowds are expected on the Space Coast to watch the 1126 local time (1526 GMT) lift-off.

The forecast is going to make for some tough decisions on their part. Do they endure the jammed roads and long queues on Friday to get into the best viewing positions, only for the launch to be postponed? Or do they stay away, hoping for a 24-hour delay and much better weather prospects?

Saturday's forecast is better (40% chance of no-go weather conditions); Sunday's even more so (30%)

Winters said early morning conditions on Friday might be fine, but those showers and storms were likely to pop up just around launch time.

The crew arrived at Kennedy on Monday

Nasa will continue with its preparations in any case.

The start of the countdown triggers engineers to start working through a pre-planned list of final checks on the shuttle and its associated ground systems.

Nasa Test Director Jeremy Graeber said the team would get on with the job efficiently and would not be distracted by all the emotion swirling around them.

"The team gets into the mode of 'this is launch countdown'. And that's really the focus that everybody has, and the rest of the emotion that comes with the end of the space shuttle programme, I think will kind of roll in when launch is completed and we get past that."

If all goes according to plan, the order to start loading nearly two million litres of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen into the shuttle's external tank will go out at around 0200 local time on Friday morning. The crew will then suit up and make the drive down to the launch pad, leaving their quarters just after 0730.

Just four individuals will be flying on the mission. Commander Chris Ferguson, Pilot Doug Hurley, and Mission Specialists Sandy Magnus and Rex Walheim have a busy 12 days in space ahead of them.

Their orbiter has been crammed full of stores, including a year's worth of food for the ISS.

It should give Nasa some room to play with if the new commercial re-supply freighters that are due to replace the shuttle encounter problems with their development.

Friday's ascent will be the 135th and last shuttle launch. It will be the 33rd lift-off for Atlantis.

On its return from orbit, the vehicle will be prepared for public display at the nearby Kennedy Space Center visitor complex.

The other two reusable spaceplanes in Nasa's fleet have already made their swansongs. Discovery completed its last mission on 9 March; Endeavour came home to retirement on 1 June.

It will be some years before the agency can use American systems again to launch astronauts. Private US companies are developing a range of vehicles but they are not expected to enter service until at least the middle of the decade.

Nasa itself intends to divert resources from the shuttle programme into designing a deep-space capsule that could visit the Moon, asteroids or even Mars.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk

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Frog-skin drug could treat cancer

7 June 2011 Last updated at 05:52 GMT A protein from the waxy monkey frog can inhibit the growth of blood vessels Scientists at Queen's University Belfast have won an award for work on frog and toad skins which could lead to treatments for over 70 major diseases.

The researchers received the commendation at the Medical Futures Innovation Awards in London on Monday.

The research, led by Professor Chris Shaw at Queen's School of Pharmacy, has identified two proteins which can regulate how blood vessels grow.

The team are the only entry from NI to win at this year's awards.

They discovered that a protein from the waxy monkey frog can inhibit the growth of blood vessels and could be used to kill cancer tumours.

Professor Shaw said that most cancer tumours can only grow to a certain size before they need blood vessels to grow into the tumour to supply it with vital oxygen and nutrients.

"Stopping the blood vessels from growing will make the tumour less likely to spread and may eventually kill it," he said.

"This has the potential to transform cancer from a terminal illness into a chronic condition."

The team have also discovered that the giant firebellied toad produces a protein which can stimulate blood vessel growth and could help patients recover from injuries and operations much more quickly.

Serendipity

"This has the potential to treat an array of diseases and conditions that require blood vessels to repair quickly, such as wound healing, organ transplants, diabetic ulcers, and damage caused by strokes or heart conditions," Professor Shaw said.

According to the professor, scientists and drugs companies around the world, despite an investment of around $4-5bn, have yet to develop a drug that can effectively target, control and regulate the growth of blood vessels.

"The aim of our work at Queen's is to unlock the potential of the natural world - in this case the secretions found on frog and toad skins - to alleviate human suffering. We are absolutely convinced that the natural world holds the solutions to many of our problems, we just need to pose the right questions to find them.

"It would be a great shame to have something in nature that is potentially the wonder drug to treat cancer and not aim to do everything in our power to make it work."

Commenting on the work of Professor Shaw and his colleagues, Professor Brian Walker and Dr Tianbao Chen, the judging panel said they wanted to encourage the researchers to take their work to "the next level".

"Many of the great discoveries have been through serendipity and Professor Shaw's idea is indeed very innovative and exciting in an area of much unmet need," the panel said

"It is important to realise that the innovation is at an early stage and much work needs to be done to turn this in to a clinical therapy."

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Murky exoplanet 'could host life'

17 May 2011 Last updated at 10:22 GMT The Gliese star hosts four confirmed planets and may host as many as six A red dwarf star 20 light-years away is again providing hints that it hosts the first definitively habitable planet outside our Solar System.

The planet Gliese 581d is at the colder outer edge of the "Goldilocks zone" in which liquid water can be sustained.

Now a study in Astrophysical Journal Letters suggests its atmosphere may keep things warm enough for water.

The solar system also hosts another contender for habitability, unconfirmed planet Gliese 581g announced in 2010.

However, the existence of that planet has since been called into question.

Gliese 581d is less controversial; it was discovered along with the planet Gliese 581c in 2007, occupying the outer and inner edges of the Goldilocks zone, respectively.

Gliese 581c was soon determined to be too close to its host star to sustain water, with a surface temperature exceeding 1,000C.

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With future generations of telescopes, we'll be able to search for life on Gliese 581d directly”

End Quote Robin Wordsworth Institut Pierre Simon Laplace Conversely, the outlying planet 581d - with a mass about six times that of the Earth and twice its size - was initially taken to be too cold to have liquid water.

Now, French researchers have run computer simulations of the planet's atmosphere, arguing that it is likely to contain high concentrations of carbon dioxide.

They contend that conditions could be suitable for oceans of liquid water as well as clouds and rainfall.

However, Gliese 581d's denser air and dim red light from its host star would make for a murky environment that would be toxic to humans.

Robin Wordsworth, a member of the team from the Institut Pierre Simon Laplace in Paris, said that the findings were further evidence that the sheer variety of planets and environments far outpaced that which we see in our own Solar System.

Dr Wordsworth said that the simulations are tantamount to a first definitive claim for a habitable exoplanet.

"This discovery is important because it's the first time climate modellers have proved that the planet is potentially habitable, and all observers agree that the exoplanet exists," he told news agency PA.

"The Gliese system is particularly exciting to us as it's very close to Earth, relatively speaking. So with future generations of telescopes, we'll be able to search for life on Gliese 581d directly."

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Quakes 'could rupture glacial lakes'

16 May 2011 Last updated at 01:27 GMT By Navin Singh Khadka Environment reporter, BBC News Many lakes are said to be growing because of melting glaciers Glacial lakes in the Himalayas could pose a major hazard to population centres if they are ruptured by earthquakes, scientists say.

The true risk to settlements and infrastructure downstream in the Hindu-Kush-Himalayas region is difficult to assess.

But the Himalayan region is dotted with glacial lakes and is in a seismically active zone.

Experts say that, on the basis of past records, a large quake in the region is overdue.

Many glacial lakes are said to be growing - some of them alarmingly - because of melting glaciers.

Some are at risk of rupturing, which would flood areas downstream.

There have been at least 35 glacial lake outburst events in Nepal, Pakistan, Bhutan and China during the last century, according to the United Nations Environment Programme (Unep).

Location, location, location

But the increased risk from the quake-induced rupture of glacial lakes has been rarely discussed.

"Such a disaster is very much possible, more so, when we are expecting a big earthquake in the region now," says Sushil Kumar, a geophysicist with the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology in India.

"If the acceleration is very high in the epicentre of the earthquake, everything will be in the air as things will not be stable. So, naturally the liquids like waters in glacial lakes will burst out."

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When the last earthquakes hit the region, there were barely any glacial lakes in the Himalaya region”

End Quote Sushil Kumar Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology A number of these lakes are located near seismic faults.

"Given the location of the lakes, if the epicentre of the earthquake happens to be nearby them, they will certainly explode," says Pradeep Mool, a glaciologist with the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) that works on mountain issues in the region.

A recent report produced by his organisation together with the World Bank and the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery has also said, that such a hazard "is a possibility that should be considered, although prediction [of earthquakes] is beyond current competence."

Officials with Nepal's National Seismological Centre (NSC) say at least half a dozen minor tremors are recorded in the Himalayas every day.

"And when the tremor is [Magnitude] five or above... we record many aftershocks as well," says Dilliram Tiwari of the NSC.

"We know that these activities are happening in the Himalayas but we cannot confirm if they are happening nearby any glacial lakes."

That is because hardly any seismic meters are installed nearby glacial lakes.

Avalanche trigger

The danger is not just from the ones that are filling up.

Landslides and avalanches can make even smaller lakes dangerous, especially during earthquakes, experts say.

For instance, the outburst of the Dig Tsho glacial lake near Mount Everest in eastern Nepal in 1985 was triggered by a large ice and rock avalanche.

The splash into the relatively small lake led to an outburst. The floodwaters swamped a hydroelectric plant and other infrastructure downstream.

Nepal's is one of the most monitored glacial lakes. The Tsho Rolpa is risky not just because of its growing size and weak moraine, but also because it has two hanging glaciers high above it.

"In case of earthquakes, glaciers such as these can make the glacial lakes like Tsho Rolpa even more dangerous because of the possibility of splash and surge," says Mool.

Although not created by glacial melting, a lake that formed after a landslide blocked the Hunza river in Pakistan last year was caused by an earthquake, scientists there say.

What has happened in these lower parts of the Hindu Kush Himalayas could also occur in higher areas with glacial lakes.

Major quake

"The main reason why we have not yet witnessed the outburst of glacial lakes because of earthquakes is because the region has not been hit by big ones in recent decades," says Mr Kumar of the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology.

"And when the last earthquakes hit the region, there were barely any glacial lakes in the Himalaya region."

Glaciologists say the round of glacial melting leading to the formation of most new glacial lakes in the Himalayas began in the 1950s.

The last big earthquake to hit the region was in 1934.

A recent report on Nepal's glaciers said their average area had increased by 33%.

"A great number of people are potentially in danger should the lakes classified as dangerous in the Hindu Kush Himalayas drain," says another report by the UNEP.

"In most cases, there would be little or no warning, with insufficient time for complete evacuation."

But studies have so far focused only on retreating glaciers and expanding glacial lakes.

"They have not been monitored in relation to seismicity," says Professor Asif Khan, a geologist with the Peshawar University in Pakistan.

"It is indeed quite worrying given the scale of the impending risk."

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