Monday, 9 September 2013
Sunday, 8 September 2013
Biting Boobies
Joke: An old man is walking down the street when he sees a beautiful brunette walk by with a truly gigantic set of knockers. He turns around and catches up to the woman and says to her: "I'll give you $100 to let me bite your boobs" "Get away from me you perv!" she shouts back and continues walking. The old man catches up to her again and says: "I'll give you $1,000 to bite your boobs" "I said no!" she replies and walks away. The old man catches up to her again and says: "I'll give you $10,000 to bite your boobs. The lady thinks about it for a bit and decides that $10,000 dollars is a lot of money so she might as well do it. So she flips up her shirt and removes her bra. The old man begins touching and feeling and squishing the boobs in his hands. After a while the lady says: "Well are you gonna bite them?" The old man replies: "Nah, too expensive."
Saturday, 7 September 2013
What the body did to repair itself during Sleeping hours
Sleep 'boosts brain cell numbers'
Myelin ensheaths nerves to protect them and speed up their signallingScientists believe they have discovered a new reason why we need to sleep - it replenishes a type of brain cell.
Sleep ramps up the production of cells that go on to make an insulating material known as myelin which protects our brain's circuitry.
The findings, so far in mice, could lead to insights about sleep's role in brain repair and growth as well as the disease MS, says the Wisconsin team.
The work is in the Journal of Neuroscience.
Dr Chiara Cirelli and colleagues from the University of Wisconsin found that the production rate of the myelin making cells, immature oligodendrocytes, doubled as mice slept.
The increase was most marked during the type of sleep that is associated with dreaming - REM or rapid eye movement sleep - and was driven by genes.
In contrast, the genes involved in cell death and stress responses were turned on when the mice were forced to stay awake.
Precisely why we need to sleep has baffled scientists for centuries. It's obvious that we need to sleep to feel rested and for our mind to function well - but the biological processes that go on as we slumber have only started to be uncovered relatively recently.
Growth and repairDr Cirelli said: "For a long time, sleep researchers focused on how the activity of nerve cells differs when animals are awake versus when they are asleep.
"Now it is clear that the way other supporting cells in the nervous system operate also changes significantly depending on whether the animal is asleep or awake."
The researchers say their findings suggest that sleep loss might aggravate some symptoms of multiple sclerosis (MS), a disease that damages myelin.
Scientists are only just unravelling the precise mysteries of why we sleepIn MS, the body's immune system attacks and destroys the myelin coating of nerves in the brain and spinal cord.
Future studies could look at whether or not sleep affects the symptoms of MS, says Dr Cirelli.
Her team is also interested in testing whether lack of sleep, especially during adolescence, may have long-term consequences for the brain.
Sleep appears necessary for our nervous systems to work properly, says the US National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS).
Deep sleep coincides with the release of growth hormone in children and young adults. Many of the body's cells also show increased production and reduced breakdown of proteins during deep sleep.
Since proteins are the building blocks needed for cell growth and for repair of damage from factors like stress and ultraviolet rays, deep sleep may truly be "beauty sleep", says NINDS.
Wednesday, 4 September 2013
Confirmed: Fracking practices to blame for Ohio earthquakes
Wastewater from the controversial practice of fracking appears to be linked to all the earthquakes in a town in Ohio that had no known past quakes, research now reveals.
This map shows the intensity of shaking in the area of a magnitude-3.9 earthquake that struck near Youngstown, Ohio, on Dec. 31, 2011. Research has linked this earthquake to the underground injection of wastewater from fracking.
The practice of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, involves injecting water, sand and other materials under high pressures into a well to fracture rock. This opens up fissures that help oil and natural gas flow out more freely. This process generates wastewater that is often pumped underground as well, in order to get rid of it.
A furious debate has erupted over the safety of the practice. Advocates claim fracking is a safe, economical source of clean energy, while critics argue that it can taint drinking water supplies, among other problems.
One of the most profitable areas for fracking lies over the geological formation known as the Marcellus Shale, which reaches deep underground from Ohio and West Virginia northeast into Pennsylvania and southern New York. The Marcellus Shale is rich in natural gas; geologists estimate it may contain up to 489 trillion cubic feet (13.8 trillion cubic meters) of natural gas, more than 440 times the amount New York State uses annually. Many of the rural communities living over the formation face economic challenges and want to attract money from the energy industry.
Youngstown quakesBefore January 2011, Youngstown, Ohio, which is located on the Marcellus Shale, had never experienced an earthquake, at least not since researchers began observations in 1776. However, in December 2010, the Northstar 1 injection well came online to pump wastewater from fracking projects in Pennsylvania into storage deep underground. In the year that followed, seismometers in and around Youngstown recorded 109 earthquakes, the strongest registering a magnitude-3.9 earthquake on Dec. 31, 2011. The well was shut down after the quake.
Scientists have known for decades that fracking and wastewater injection can trigger earthquakes. For instance, it appears linked with Oklahoma's strongest recorded quake in 2011, as well as a rash of more than 180 minor tremors in Texas between Oct. 30, 2008, and May 31, 2009.
The new investigation of the Youngstown earthquakes, detailed in the July issue of the journal Geophysical Research Letters, reveals that their onset, end and even temporary dips in activity were apparently all tied to activity at the Northstar 1 well.
For instance, the first earthquake recorded in Youngstown occurred 13 days after pumping began, and the tremors ceased shortly after the Ohio Department of Natural Resources shut down the well in December 2011. In addition, dips in earthquake activity lined up with Memorial Day, the Fourth of July, Labor Day, Thanksgiving and other times when injection at the well was temporarily stopped.
"Earthquakes were triggered by fluid injection shortly after the injection initiated — less than two weeks," researcher Won-Young Kim, a seismologist at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y., told LiveScience. "Previously, we knew (of) unusual earthquakes around Youngstown, Ohio, only on March 17, around 80 days after injection began. If we had better seismographic station coverage, or if we were more careful, we could have caught those early events."
Ancient faultThe earthquakes were apparently centered in an ancient fault near the Northstar 1 well, and Kim suggested pressure from wastewater injection caused this fault to rupture. The quakes crept from east to west down the length of the fault — away from the well — throughout the year, a sign that they were caused by a traveling front of pressure generated by the injected fluid.
The researchers did note that of the 177 wastewater disposal wells of this size active in Ohio during 2011, only the Northstar 1 well was linked with this kind of seismic activity, suggesting this ability to cause earthquakes was rare. Kim personally felt injecting wastewater deep underground "is a fairly good method of massive fluid waste disposal."
Kim stressed these earthquakes are not directly related to fracking of rock for natural gas. "They are due to injection of waste fluid from fracking," he noted.
In the future, "we need to find better ways to image hidden subsurface faults and fractures, which is costly at the moment," Kim said. "If there are hidden subsurface faults near the injection wells, then sooner or later they can trigger earthquakes."
In the future, operators of such wells may look for earthquakes for about six months after the beginning of operations, Kim said.
"However, there are cases when triggered earthquakes occurred nearly 10 years after the injection," he noted.
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