Use of acetaminophen during pregnancy linked to ADHD in children, UCLA researchers say

To all my ADHD peeps, thank Bayer and other big pharma for pushing this stuff on your moms... No scientific study can ever prove anything 100% safe... However, the sensitivity of fetuses to environmental chemical exposures during development is only now just getting more strict attention, and these studies should give us pause as to what we put in our bodies. Especially the effects of low-level, long term chronic chemical/drug exposure, since safety thresholds are usually established for short term exposure at high levels.  Btw many of the tests that establish chemical non-toxicity are based on animal research (by FDA law) and thus can give a false sense of security.  So yeah, let's see which innocuous drug/chemical turns out to be dangerous next...

http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/use-of-acetaminophen-during-pregnancy-250121.aspx

GMO's... scratching the surface

As a former virus genetics researcher I have a lot to say about GMOs, so much in fact, that I haven't been able to motivate myself to write a coherent position paper on the subject out of fear of the level of comprehensiveness it would require (a copout, I know).  

However, I do get incensed when others make sweeping generalizations or claim I am "anti-scientific" for not supporting genetic food technology. I wrote the response below when someone posted a quote from the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), basically stating that GMOs must be safe because they are rigorously tested (false), they are regulated (false) and they are identical to non-GMO food (false).  These points are refuted in this excellent article, which responded to AAAS' well-timed release of their statement to influence the California Prop 37 GMO labeling campaign.

________________________________________________________________

Especially in light of epigenetics, any claim of gmo safety that a parent plant is genetically identical to its offspring is still hard to prove 100%, so any claim of complete safety is tenuous and temporary until new data is exposed. We should wait and see, not rush these "biofood products" to market. Consider the bias inherent in a branch of highly profitable industrial science where researchers must suspend disbelief of the dynamics of living organisms to promote a product, they must feign ultimate control over every aspect of living organisms and ignore awareness of their changing complexity. Science cannot be 100% objective, it is still subject to cultural and societal pressures (i.e. profit motives!!!). To work for any of these GMO giants and admit any nuance or uncertainty is doom to your career, and thus not all the facts are going to be readily published or fully available for scrutiny. Researchers outside this sphere of industry should be allowed to do their own comprehensive testing, but since these are proprietary organisms they are kept secret from the research community even though the consequences of their use are globally distributed. 

My main criticism of all gmo organisms is that they were never designed to evolve in nature, as they only exist to produce a profit, and thus must be patented and must remain "genetically fixed" forever in the face of a dynamically evolving environment. Thus, GMO organisms are essentially removed from the context in which they were successfully adapted and then they are cloned to be identical. When they are reintroduced to nature with zero biodiversity they have a greatly diminished "library" from which to draw new material to adapt in the future (of course the GM scientists will adapt them for us, at great expense). This to me is anti-scientific to deny plants the ability to evolve and woefully ignorant to insist that researchers can control the future of their evolution with complete control. This is impossible unless you believe you can turn crops or even all nature into a 100% isolated closed system, under complete laboratory controlled conditions. And I think such a paradise of predictability and (pretend) control would be the best possible future for biotech and the agriceutical industries to profit from. 

Last, food "safety" aside, the irresponsible rush to get GM foods into the market has completely sidestepped the environmental contamination issue. Sean, I know you care about the environment, thought it is foolish to support a technology that cannot be fully controlled once it is released into the environment. Basic genetics is understood by many nowadays but it is still beyond human perception on scale not even visible with the highest level microscopes, and so even the best genetic researchers make MANY assumptions. Our ability to sequence a genome or to compare genes across many organisms is not equivalent to a 100% level of awareness and certainty as to what those genes are doing and how they interact in multiple levels of global and local feedback loops. The level of certainty (faith) I feel you are projecting onto GM technology is mistaken, though we can assess many many genes simultaneously the technology isn't as precise as it would need to be to claim safety. Once again, in light of epigenetics, the presumed stability and predictability of DNA in living systems is far from well-understood, it's really in its infancy now that we've finally gotten glimpses of the big picture. We're like medieval doctors who cut up cadavers, thinking because we can see the parts we can completely understand the whole, when we've only scratched the surface of living genetic systems.

Go ahead, keep doing research, keep testing new constructs and growing new strains of algae, plants, whatever, but DON'T release them into the world at large just for profit. Keep them research-only, and continue to research them until others can reproduce the findings- this is a huge expectation but given the potential global consequences to humanity and the entire biome, I don't think that's too outrageous a request.

________________________________________________________________

For more info on epigenetics, the unpredictable variability of crop genes, and the mistaken certainty about model organisms being applied to real world examples, this is a good non-partisan example from 1 year ago. Imagine how much we still don't know about basic crop genetics, and yet GMOs are unleashed everywhere already under the FDA label "generally recognized as $afe." 

http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/epimaize.htm

"New research explains how certain traits can pass down from one generation to the next – at least in plants – without following the accepted rules of genetics."

“The gene changes its expression in an epigenetic fashion and it doesn’t follow standard inheritance behaviors. Those two factors alone have pretty profound implications not only for breeding but also for evolution.”

"An investigation of the affected alleles revealed the nearby presence of a transposon, or transposable element: a tiny piece of DNA that has leapt from one area of the genome to another." 


Yes, a self-autonomously copying piece of DNA, poorly understood, yet pervasive in plants and animals and known to unpredictably *change* a plant's genotype and/or phenotype. This doesn't inspire confidence in GMO biofood, there is only an illusion of control.

The latest evidence for the common presence of water in our solar system, which may eventually explain how so much of it collected on Earth. The spacecraft Dawn, led by an investigator here at UCLA, will be the first probe to study the protoplanet Ceres up close and will arrive in 2015. Where there is water, there is life... Interestingly enough, biomolecules have been found along with traces of water inside asteroids, with new theories of magnetism and solar system formation showing that the spread of water may be a typical process given the properties of young stars and the protoplanetary plasma that surrounds them.

Ceres, the largest asteroid in the solar system, lets off steam
Twin jets on asteroid Ceres, which has a surface area roughly the same as India, release 21 tonnes of water vapour every hour

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/jan/22/giant-asteroid-steam-ceres

About time someone stood up to flawed mathematical models of human behavior. Now lets get some real criticism of reigning economic theories of behavior and free choice.  Dan Ariely and Dan Gilbert are excellent starting points for learning about perceptual bias, the basis for our exploitive economic and political conventions. 

The British amateur who debunked the mathematics of happiness

The astonishing story of Nick Brown, the British man who began a part-time psychology course in his 50s – and ended up taking on America's academic establishment

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/jan/19/mathematics-of-happiness-debunked-nick-brown

The worst part is that while we are enjoying our beach weather winter now, the water pinch will be felt later and for years. Climate and water flow are on much longer time scales than politics and human perception. The sooner we align these with reality, the better.  It is January and the flowers are already blooming in Los Angeles, what more evidence of climate change do we need?

NASA Shows Just How Bad The California Drought Is

http://unofficialnetworks.com/nasa-shows-bad-california-drought-127886/

I am currently an outreach educator for the NASA THEMIS/ARTEMIS missions, which study the solar wind and its effects on Earth's magnetic field. My goal is to make my fellow researchers' plasma and magnetic field data into sound, so humanity can actually perceive and better understand the invisible electromagnetic forces that permeate our universe. Magnetism is gaining credibility as a powerful force in shaping the universe, beyond mere gravity.  Magnetic forces are useful not just for hybrid cars and compasses, it is now known to be critical to the formation of ours and other solar systems, and the Earth may have lost its water and atmosphere without the magnetic shield that protects it from the solar wind.  So much to learn...

Dying Stars Write Their Own Swan Songs

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/01/10/261397236/dying-stars-write-their-own-swan-songs

In free market capitalism, corporations are incentivized to cheat because they make more profit even if they get caught and pay a few fines. Worst case, they escape criminal charges by reaching a shady settlement deal, or even filing for bankruptcy. Move your money to a local credit union ASAP...

Now We Know: JPMorgan Chase Is Worse Than Enron

http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/21155-now-we-know-jpmorgan-chase-is-worse-than-enron