This press release contains:
· Summaries of newsworthy papers:
Bioethics: When does life belong to the living?
Environment: How Much is Left?
Perspective: Snake Oil in the Supermarket
Medicine: Why Can’t We Live Forever?
And finally… Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish
PDFs of all the papers mentioned on this release can be found in the relevant journal’s section of http://press.nature.com. Press contacts for the Nature journals are listed at the end of this release.
Warning: This document, and the Nature journal papers to which it refers, may contain information that is price sensitive (as legally defined, for example, in the UK Criminal Justice Act 1993 Part V) with respect to publicly quoted companies. Anyone dealing in securities using information contained in this document, or in advance copies of a Nature journal’s content, may be guilty of insider trading under the US Securities Exchange Act of 1934.
PLEASE CITE SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN AND OUR WEBSITE www.scientificamerican.com AS THE SOURCE OF THE FOLLOWING ITEMS. IF PUBLISHING ONLINE, PLEASE CARRY A HYPERLINK TO www.scientificamerican.com
The full articles highlighted below are available on the Nature Press Site: http://press.nature.com/press and are also now live at www.scientificamerican.com
Endings are part of life. This year our special single topic issue of Scientific American explores the idea of THE END. Some are inevitable—such as our own, others more apocalyptic—such as the end of our natural resources or the end of time. Part of the reason we are all so fascinated with the idea of THE END is that each end usually implies a NEW BEGINNING.
[] Bioethics: When does life belong to the living?
With medical technologies that can restart the heart and health care costs that are skyrocketing, what guidelines should we adopt in defining death? In this month’s issue of Scientific American, Robin Marantz Henig traces some of the historic steps and present day conversations on death and organ donation. The article delves into the bioethics and science of death as it applies to one end-of-life and life-saving issue: organ transplantation.
Of the 100,000 people awaiting an organ transplant in the U.S., 7,000 will die waiting. But the problem isn’t only a shortage of organs, but also receiving “fresh” organs: “The sooner an organ can be removed,” Henig writes, “the less time it spends without oxygen and the greater the chance of a successful transplantation.” But there is no clear rule that doctors and surgeons can use to determine when death has occurred. This lands them in a gray area marked by ill-defined medical conventions, hospital ethics committees and lawyers. In recent years, physicians have found themselves in the courtroom or academic conferences defending how soon after death—or as some have claimed, before death—organs were harvested. Does it matter if you wait a full 120 seconds after a final heartbeat to confirm death, or is it excusable to wait only 75 seconds if it means saving someone’s life?
Henig investigates the complicated line between life, death and saving lives.
Author contact:
Robin Marantz Henig (Contributing writer, New York City, NY, USA)
E-mail: [email protected]
[] Environment: How Much is Left?
Your new flat-panel television needs a metal called indium but at current production levels, the known reserves of indium will run out in 18 years. In just 15 years, many countries around the world will find the supplies of water dwindling to below levels considered minimum for functioning societies. Michel Moyer and Carina Storrs take a look at how much of our natural resources are left, and when they will be gone, in this month’s issue of Scientific American.
Glaciers melting and fossil fuel sources drying up are commonly discussed, though they are only harbingers of other ends. With global warming and melting glaciers much of the agriculture around the world will see a shift, affecting some countries and regions more than others. “By 2050,” write Moyer and Storrs, “counteracting the ill effects of climate change on nutrition will cost more than $7 billion a year.” And while coal was once thought to be the “inexhaustible” fuel source, some scientists believe that by 2072 we will have extracted 90% of available coal. How about the lithium we need to run our electronic devices? Or the biodiversity around the world? What could be the end date for the Alps glaciers? The editors find some final answers.
Author contact:
Michael Moyer (Scientific American, New York City, NY, USA)
Tel: +1 212 451 2448
E-mail: [email protected]
[] Perspective: Snake Oil in the Supermarket
Health claims for food need to be held "to the same scientific standards as those for drugs," say the editors in this month’s Scientific American. The growing industry of "functional foods"—synthetically modified to provide supposed health benefits—generated $31 billion in the U.S. in 2008 and profits from health claims with little or no scientific backing. Manufacturers should be made to convince the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of these alleged benefits before releasing products for sale.
In March the FDA issued 17 warning letters to food and beverage manufacturers with regard to false or misleading nutritional claims on their products. However, they are just “playing catch-up” because the agency does not currently review packaging messages on food products before they are shipped to our supermarkets. The editors suggest a system more reflective of the European system: asking for scientific evidence of any packaging claims. “This simple act of asking for evidence,” the editors note, “is sometimes enough to reveal the shoddiness of a claim.”
Author contact:
Editors at Scientific American are available to comment on this topic; please contact the Press Office
E-mail: [email protected]
[] Medicine: Why Can’t We Live Forever?
There is no real cap for how long humans can or should live, so why do we die and for how long can we put it off? Thomas Kirkwood investigates in this month’s Scientific American.
From an evolutionary standpoint, aging and dying is the ultimate trade-off. Our body limits the energy used to repair the wear and tear in our cells over the years, to prioritize reproduction. But as Kirkwood notes, science and medicine are attempting to reverse some of this cellular damage in the body to extend life span. However, understanding the science of aging and then slowing it down—or stopping it—is not an easy task as aging affects the body in different ways and at different rates. “Solutions will not come easily,” Kirkwood notes, “despite the claims made by the merchants of immortality who claim that caloric restriction or dietary supplements, such as resveratrol, may allow us to live longer.”
Author contact:
Tom Kirkwood (Newcastle University, U.K.)
Tel: +44 191 248 1100
Email: [email protected]
[] And finally… Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish
The world would be better off without many of our creations. An article in this month’s Scientific American takes a look at the benefits of doing away with daylight saving time, Teflon skillets, gene patents and landfills, among other things.
Daylight saving was originally intended to reduce energy use, but has been linked to increased traffic accidents, depression and may even contribute to increased risk of heart attacks—perhaps due to disruption of circadian rhythms. Factories that create Teflon kitchen equipment are polluting lakes and wildlife with a chemical by-product that doesn’t break down in the environment. The chemical has found its way into 95% of Americans and may increase the risk of developing cancer. Bisphenol A is found in many plastic food containers and could be very harmful to us. It may not all be bad news though, as major companies have begun to phase it out.
Two-thirds of the 250 million tons of trash that Americans generate each year ends up in landfills, where the waste is converted into toxic materials and greenhouse gases. This issue has been recognized and several companies and cities are attempting to be "zero waste." San Francisco has introduced a "pay as you throw" scheme to help combat waste. Gene patents which “suppress independent research and innovation,” and walled-off software platforms are also mentioned as creations we would be happy to bid good riddance to.
The feature reviews some of the smallest and largest human creations that are past their expiration date.
Author contact:
Editors at Scientific American are available to comment on this topic; please contact the Press Office
E-mail: [email protected]
PRESS CONTACTS…
From North America and Canada
Neda Afsarmanesh, Nature New York
Tel: +1 212 726 9231
E-mail: [email protected]
From the UK/Europe/other countries not listed above
Ruth Francis, Nature London
Tel: +44 20 7843 4562
E-mail [email protected]
From Japan, Korea, China, Singapore and Taiwan
Mika Nakano, Nature Tokyo
Tel: +81 3 3267 8751
E-mail: [email protected]
About Nature Publishing Group (NPG):
Nature Publishing Group (NPG) is a publisher of high impact scientific and medical information in print and online. NPG publishes journals, online databases and services across the life, physical, chemical and applied sciences and clinical medicine.
Focusing on the needs of scientists, Nature (founded in 1869) is the leading weekly, international scientific journal. In addition, for this audience, NPG publishes a range of Nature research journals and Nature Reviews journals, plus a range of prestigious academic journals including society-owned publications. Online, nature.com provides over 5 million visitors per month with access to NPG publications and online databases and services, including Nature News and NatureJobs plus access to Nature Network and Nature Education’s Scitable.com.
Scientific American is at the heart of NPG’s newly-formed consumer media division, meeting the needs of the general public. Founded in 1845, Scientific American is the oldest continuously published magazine in the US and the leading authoritative publication for science in the general media. Together with scientificamerican.com and 15 local language editions around the world it reaches over 3 million consumers and scientists. Other titles include Scientific American Mind and Spektrum der Wissenschaft in Germany.
Throughout all its businesses NPG is dedicated to serving the scientific and medical communities and the wider scientifically interested general public. Part of Macmillan Publishers Limited, NPG is a global company with principal offices in London, New York and Tokyo, and offices in cities worldwide including Boston, Buenos Aires, Delhi, Hong Kong, Madrid, Barcelona, Munich, Heidelberg, Basingstoke, Melbourne, Paris, San Francisco, Seoul and Washington DC. For more information, please go to www.nature.com.
