Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire On December 18, a National Research Council panel told the Environmental Protection Agency that sufficient data exist to begin assessing the potential health risks posed by phthalates, among the most ubiquitous pollutants on the planet. http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN.NET At the same time, the NRC panel strongly recommended that the agency adopt a “paradigm shift” in the way it assesses the chemicals’ toxicity to humans.
Instead of evaluating each phthalate compound individually, EPA should begin assessing risks from likely combos of these and related chemicals — even if each chemical works differently, according to the panel’s new report.
Phthalates are a widely used family of plasticizers and solvents. Owing to the chemicals’ presence in plastics, cosmetics, personal care products and even medicines, residues of these chemicals show up in everyone throughout the developed world. http://LOUIS-J-SHEEHAN.NET
For more than a decade, studies in rodents have been demonstrating that exposures to phthalates early in life can perturb — in some cases derail — development of an animal’s reproductive organs (SN: 9/2/00, p. 152). Males are most sensitive, largely because these chemicals act as anti-androgens. That is, the chemicals lower concentrations of testosterone, the primary male sex hormone. Especially concerning: In females, phthalates can cross the placenta and pollute the womb.
The NRC panel advocated that EPA assess cumulative risks from all phthalates and other anti-androgenic compounds together — even if the way each pollutant depresses testosterone action or availability results from differing modes of action.
Whether these pollutants pose serious risks to people remains an open question, acknowledged several authors of the NRC report, who took part in a teleconference for the report’s release.
EPA didn’t ask NRC to assess phthalates’ toxicity to humans, notes Deborah Cory-Slechta of the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry in New York. Instead, EPA asked her panel to evaluate whether sufficient data exist to conduct a human risk assessment. And if so, how should the risks be evaluated: on the basis of single compounds considered separately, as a group evaluated together, or as a group assessed along with additional anti-androgenic agents.
Cory-Slechta says her panel found that there are plenty of data for EPA “to go ahead and do it [a human risk assessment].” But the panel also recommended that when EPA does such an assessment, it should take a sharply different tack from its normal approach. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
To Shanna Swan, a phthalate researcher at the University of Rochester, the recommended change in how to calculate the risk of these chemicals “is a big deal. Cumulative risk assessment is the way it must be done,” she says, “given the dose additivity of these chemicals and the multiplicity of our exposures.”
Most people regularly encounter many phthalates, and as a class these compounds tend to have similar impacts. So, even if each of five phthalates had no apparent effects at a particular dose when delivered individually, coincident exposure to the mix might easily prove to compound the toxicity, the new report explained.
Indeed, published data show that “phthalates can work together at quite low doses,” noted NRC panel member Andreas Kortenkamp of the University of London School of Pharmacy in England. “So if combination effects were not taken into consideration at this level, we would underestimate possible risks.” In fact, he said, his committee’s new paradigm for considering phthalate toxicity cumulatively must inevitably result in findings of higher risks than would have been calculated by assessing each chemical in isolation.
In the new report, NRC concluded that a lifelong testosterone shortfall triggered by phthalate exposures can cause “the variety of effects observed” in animals — including infertility, reduced sperm production, undescended testes, penile birth defects and other reproductive-tract malformations — “if it occurs at times that are critical for male reproductive development.” The most sensitive exposure period: time in the womb.
Indeed, concentrations of phthalates measured in amniotic fluid in the human womb can be “in the range of levels in rat amniotic fluid that gives rise to adverse effects in the offspring,” Kortenkamp said.
However, links to human effects have been quite limited, observes panel member Paul Foster of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in Research Triangle Park, N.C. One exception: a study of infant boys linking phthalate exposure in the womb to a feminization of the anogenital distance — the span separating the gonads and anus (SN: 6/4/05, p. 355).
In rodents, this distance is demonstrably longer in males. In fact, researchers depend on this sex-linked distance to visually determine the gender of young rodents.
Follow-up studies are needed with more subjects to test the validity of those preliminary data, Foster says. That said, this phthalates toxicologist points out that the general processes by which these chemicals interfere with sexual differentiation “are common to all mammals. And so, having seen them in rats, one would not expect them not to occur in humans — providing, of course, the exposure was high enough.”
* Print
* |
* Comment
Found in: Body & Brain, Environment and Science & Society
Share & Save
* slashdot slashdot
* digg digg
* facebook facebook
* yahoo yahoo
* del.icio.us del.icio.us
* reddit reddit
* google google
* technorati technorati
Comments 2
* I neglected to mention that the cumulative neuro-toxic effects of pesticides, and other related chemicals, are also probably behind the rise in various learning deficits and spectrum disorders in children. If this continues, the planet will truly be unfit for rational intelligent life, if this hasn't already happened.
James Boettcher James Boettcher
Dec. 20, 2008 at 2:24am
* Endocrine disruptors (ED) are chemicals that interfere with the normal function of the endocrine system. Some of these chemicals have structural similarities to hormones and can bind to receptor cells where a hormone would normally bind.
As might be expected, the effect on the target cell is different with the ED attached. Sometimes the target cell “turns on” and performs its regular function, but there is no “off” to its activity and there is too much chemical or change that results. Sometimes, the target cell can not “turn on” because of the ED and the result is that there will be too little of a chemical or change when required.
Chemicals that act like hormones in the system but interrupt normal activity are called “hormone mimics”. A class of hormone mimics that act like the reproductive hormones (which include estrogen) are called “environmental estrogens” (EE).
The number of pollutants that are classified as EDs or EEs is large and growing.
Suspected EDs are found in pesticides (agriculture, home, pet (flea collars, etc.), detergents, birth control pills, plastics (PVCs), PCBs, dioxins (including Agent Orange), oil refining, auto and truck exhaust, cigarette smoke, coal burning power plant emissions. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire The list is quite long and the effects of very small levels of EDs, in the parts per trillion range, are unknown, but their effects are cumulative.
In her 1996 book 'Our Stolen Future', Dr. Theo Colborn brought world-wide attention to scientific discoveries about endocrine disruption and the fact that common contaminants can interfere with the natural signals controlling development of the fetus.
The original work was done in the 80's. More than 20 years later and the EPA is still stone-walling this information.
Note that in 2007, an attempt to honor Rachael Carson for her work on pesticides was blocked by Republicans in Congress and their friends in the Chemical Lobby.
The politicization of the EPA, and indeed the total lack of Science within the current administration is an obvious fact. Let's hope the new President, and a Science friendly cabinet, will put an end to this nonsense for good.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Friday, April 10, 2009
prostate 9.pro.001001 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
t’s the medical equivalent of a buy one, get one free offer — for men at least. Take cholesterol-lowering drugs for your heart, and slow the growth of prostate tumors, too. Lower cholesterol levels limit the growth of blood vessels inside prostate tumors, scientists report.
In a new study, researchers implanted mice with human prostate cancer tumors and fed the mice either a high-cholesterol or a no-cholesterol diet. Half the mice on each diet received the cholesterol-lowering drug Zetia. http://LOUIS2J2SHEEHAN.US
Two weeks after implantation, the prostate tumors were largest in mice on the high-cholesterol diet without Zetia and smallest in mice on the no-cholesterol diet with the drug, Keith Solomon of Children’s Hospital Boston at Harvard Medical School and colleagues report in the March issue of The American Journal of Pathology. And as expected, when cholesterol levels were measured, the mice on high-cholesterol diets not receiving the drug had the highest levels, while those on no-cholesterol diets with the drug had the lowest.
Scientists found that as well as being smaller, tumors from the Zetia-treated mice also had dramatically fewer blood vessels. “It was a complete surprise,” Solomon says. “I just noticed that some of the tumors seemed bloodier than others. It was a basic bench-top observation.”
Limited blood vessel development starves the tumor of the blood and oxygen it needs to thrive, slowing the progression of prostate cancer, the researchers suggest.
Prostate cancer has been linked to cholesterol before. A 2006 study reported that people who took statins, another cholesterol-lowering drug, were less likely to have advanced prostate cancer that spread to other organs, says epidemiologist Elizabeth Platz of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, a coauthor of the statin study. But the new work is the first study that “tries to determine the mechanism” of the link between cholesterol and prostate cancer, Platz says. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Slowing the growth of prostate tumors would improve quality of life for men with prostate cancer, Solomon says. Many prostate cancers are relatively slow-growing anyway, but limiting tumor growth even more with a low-cholesterol diet and Zetia could lower the risk of impotence and incontinence, which often come with prostate surgery. But first work is needed to determine that Zetia has the same effect on prostate tumors in people as it did in the mice in the study, the researchers say. http://LOUIS2J2SHEEHAN.US
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire Lowering cholesterol could impact blood vessel development in other types of tumors in a similar way, the researchers speculate. But the prostate produces more cholesterol than most other organs — and seems to accumulate it too. “It could be that prostate tumors have a different interaction with cholesterol than other types of tumors,” Platz notes. “The prostate seems to be particularly susceptible to choleste
In a new study, researchers implanted mice with human prostate cancer tumors and fed the mice either a high-cholesterol or a no-cholesterol diet. Half the mice on each diet received the cholesterol-lowering drug Zetia. http://LOUIS2J2SHEEHAN.US
Two weeks after implantation, the prostate tumors were largest in mice on the high-cholesterol diet without Zetia and smallest in mice on the no-cholesterol diet with the drug, Keith Solomon of Children’s Hospital Boston at Harvard Medical School and colleagues report in the March issue of The American Journal of Pathology. And as expected, when cholesterol levels were measured, the mice on high-cholesterol diets not receiving the drug had the highest levels, while those on no-cholesterol diets with the drug had the lowest.
Scientists found that as well as being smaller, tumors from the Zetia-treated mice also had dramatically fewer blood vessels. “It was a complete surprise,” Solomon says. “I just noticed that some of the tumors seemed bloodier than others. It was a basic bench-top observation.”
Limited blood vessel development starves the tumor of the blood and oxygen it needs to thrive, slowing the progression of prostate cancer, the researchers suggest.
Prostate cancer has been linked to cholesterol before. A 2006 study reported that people who took statins, another cholesterol-lowering drug, were less likely to have advanced prostate cancer that spread to other organs, says epidemiologist Elizabeth Platz of Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, a coauthor of the statin study. But the new work is the first study that “tries to determine the mechanism” of the link between cholesterol and prostate cancer, Platz says. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Slowing the growth of prostate tumors would improve quality of life for men with prostate cancer, Solomon says. Many prostate cancers are relatively slow-growing anyway, but limiting tumor growth even more with a low-cholesterol diet and Zetia could lower the risk of impotence and incontinence, which often come with prostate surgery. But first work is needed to determine that Zetia has the same effect on prostate tumors in people as it did in the mice in the study, the researchers say. http://LOUIS2J2SHEEHAN.US
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire Lowering cholesterol could impact blood vessel development in other types of tumors in a similar way, the researchers speculate. But the prostate produces more cholesterol than most other organs — and seems to accumulate it too. “It could be that prostate tumors have a different interaction with cholesterol than other types of tumors,” Platz notes. “The prostate seems to be particularly susceptible to choleste
Saturday, January 10, 2009
moth 2.mot.2 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire. A gray moth with orange highlights called Bertholdia trigona “goes berserk,” making lots of noise above the range of human hearing when a hunting bat approaches, says William Conner of Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C. Bats rely on their natural sonar to locate flying moths in the dark, but in a lab setup, the bats rarely managed to nab a loud moth.
When researchers disabled the moth’s noisemaking organs, though, bats caught the moths in midair with ease, Conner reported at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology. http://Louis-J-Sheehan.biz
Conner says the work is “the first example of any prey item that jams biological sonar.”
Conference attendee David Yager of the University of Maryland in College Park says Conner’s experimental paradigm is “very strong, and I do think he has documented jamming by a species of moth.”
Insect-hunting bats and their moth prey have become a classic in the study of evolutionary arms races, Conner says. “This is warfare … The first counter-adaptation is that the insects developed ears.”
Biologists have debated the possibility that moths could also evolve sounds that sabotage bat sonar. “It’s a sexy idea,” Conner said. “There was some tantalizing neurophysiological work.” But to collect behavioral evidence to demonstrate jamming, he said, takes the right moth. http://Louis-J-Sheehan.biz
Tiger moths, a group of some 11,000 species, have been intriguing candidates because they present a puzzle in battlefield behavior. As other moth species silently flee when they hear the sonar pings of an incoming bat, tiger moths generally click back. As Conner puts it, “Why would you do that to a bigger, more dangerous predator that’s going to eat you?”
Jamming isn’t the only possible explanation for moth noises, he said. An explosive clicking sound coming back out of the night might startle a bat just a split-second long enough for the moth to get away. Or the moth clicks might work like an acoustic version of the brilliant colors on poison dart frogs, a handy code that helps predators learn and remember that these tidbits are not good to eat.
But three out of four bats in the tests readily ate the moths when the researchers silenced the moth’s sound, so Conner ruled out the possibility that the noise in this species functions mainly as a Mr. Yuk warning.
“Bill's lab has clearly shown that different species use clicking differently. There's no single answer to its function,” Yager says. “One of the future challenges will be to discover what ecological and behavioral forces drive one species toward jamming and another toward startle.”
In terms of sound, most tiger moths in North America “crackle a little bit but it’s not very impressive,” Conner says. In contrast B. trigona gives a steady, broad-band sound that “fills up all bandwidth, all the time.”
He first realized these moths made so much noise when he encountered them in the Amazon in 1992, and the possibility that the noise was a sonar jam had been in the back of his mind since, he says. Last summer, one of Conner’s students, Aaron Cochran, collected the moths in Arizona, the northern tip of their range, so that the researchers could test them with live, big brown bats.
Conner’s research group studies the war between bats and moths by tethering a moth in a large cage and seeing if one of the lab’s resident big brown bats can catch it. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
When researchers disabled the moth’s noisemaking organs, though, bats caught the moths in midair with ease, Conner reported at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology. http://Louis-J-Sheehan.biz
Conner says the work is “the first example of any prey item that jams biological sonar.”
Conference attendee David Yager of the University of Maryland in College Park says Conner’s experimental paradigm is “very strong, and I do think he has documented jamming by a species of moth.”
Insect-hunting bats and their moth prey have become a classic in the study of evolutionary arms races, Conner says. “This is warfare … The first counter-adaptation is that the insects developed ears.”
Biologists have debated the possibility that moths could also evolve sounds that sabotage bat sonar. “It’s a sexy idea,” Conner said. “There was some tantalizing neurophysiological work.” But to collect behavioral evidence to demonstrate jamming, he said, takes the right moth. http://Louis-J-Sheehan.biz
Tiger moths, a group of some 11,000 species, have been intriguing candidates because they present a puzzle in battlefield behavior. As other moth species silently flee when they hear the sonar pings of an incoming bat, tiger moths generally click back. As Conner puts it, “Why would you do that to a bigger, more dangerous predator that’s going to eat you?”
Jamming isn’t the only possible explanation for moth noises, he said. An explosive clicking sound coming back out of the night might startle a bat just a split-second long enough for the moth to get away. Or the moth clicks might work like an acoustic version of the brilliant colors on poison dart frogs, a handy code that helps predators learn and remember that these tidbits are not good to eat.
But three out of four bats in the tests readily ate the moths when the researchers silenced the moth’s sound, so Conner ruled out the possibility that the noise in this species functions mainly as a Mr. Yuk warning.
“Bill's lab has clearly shown that different species use clicking differently. There's no single answer to its function,” Yager says. “One of the future challenges will be to discover what ecological and behavioral forces drive one species toward jamming and another toward startle.”
In terms of sound, most tiger moths in North America “crackle a little bit but it’s not very impressive,” Conner says. In contrast B. trigona gives a steady, broad-band sound that “fills up all bandwidth, all the time.”
He first realized these moths made so much noise when he encountered them in the Amazon in 1992, and the possibility that the noise was a sonar jam had been in the back of his mind since, he says. Last summer, one of Conner’s students, Aaron Cochran, collected the moths in Arizona, the northern tip of their range, so that the researchers could test them with live, big brown bats.
Conner’s research group studies the war between bats and moths by tethering a moth in a large cage and seeing if one of the lab’s resident big brown bats can catch it. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
Monday, January 5, 2009
viagra 7.via.0003004 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire. The Afghan chieftain looked older than his 60-odd years, and his bearded face bore the creases of a man burdened with duties as tribal patriarch and husband to four younger women. His visitor, a CIA officer, saw an opportunity, and reached into his bag for a small gift. http://louis-j-sheehan-esquire.sampa.com/louis-j-sheehan-esquire/blog
Four blue pills. Viagra. http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
"Take one of these. You'll love it," the officer said. Compliments of Uncle Sam.
The enticement worked. The officer, who described the encounter, returned four days later to an enthusiastic reception. The grinning chief offered up a bonanza of information about Taliban movements and supply routes -- followed by a request for more pills.
For U.S. intelligence officials, this is how some crucial battles in Afghanistan are fought and won. While the CIA has a long history of buying information with cash, the growing Taliban insurgency has prompted the use of novel incentives and creative bargaining to gain support in some of the country's roughest neighborhoods, according to officials directly involved in such operations.
In their efforts to win over notoriously fickle warlords and chieftains, the officials say, the agency's operatives have used a variety of personal services. These include pocketknives and tools, medicine or surgeries for ailing family members, toys and school equipment, tooth extractions, travel visas, and, occasionally, pharmaceutical enhancements for aging patriarchs with slumping libidos, the officials said.
"Whatever it takes to make friends and influence people -- whether it's building a school or handing out Viagra," said one longtime agency operative and veteran of several Afghanistan tours. Like other field officers interviewed for this article, he spoke on the condition of anonymity when describing tactics and operations that are largely classified.
Officials say these inducements are necessary in Afghanistan, a country where warlords and tribal leaders expect to be paid for their cooperation, and where, for some, switching sides can be as easy as changing tunics. If the Americans don't offer incentives, there are others who will, including Taliban commanders, drug dealers and even Iranian agents in the region.
The usual bribes of choice -- cash and weapons -- aren't always the best options, Afghanistan veterans say. Guns too often fall into the wrong hands, they say, and showy gifts such as money, jewelry and cars tend to draw unwanted attention.
"If you give an asset $1,000, he'll go out and buy the shiniest junk he can find, and it will be apparent that he has suddenly come into a lot of money from someone," said Jamie Smith, a veteran of CIA covert operations in Afghanistan and now chief executive of SCG International, a private security and intelligence company. "Even if he doesn't get killed, he becomes ineffective as an informant because everyone knows where he got it."
The key, Smith said, is to find a way to meet the informant's personal needs in a way that keeps him firmly on your side but leaves little or no visible trace.
"You're trying to bridge a gap between people living in the 18th century and people coming in from the 21st century," Smith said, "so you look for those common things in the form of material aid that motivate people everywhere."
Among the world's intelligence agencies, there's a long tradition of using sex as a motivator. Robert Baer, a retired CIA officer and author of several books on intelligence, noted that the Soviet spy service was notorious for using attractive women as bait when seeking to turn foreign diplomats into informants.
"The KGB has always used 'honey traps,' and it works," Baer said. For American officers, a more common practice was to offer medical care for potential informants and their loved ones, he said. "I remember one guy we offered an option on a heart bypass," Baer said.
For some U.S. operatives in Afghanistan, Western drugs such as Viagra were just part of a long list of enticements available for use in special cases. Two veteran officers familiar with such practices said Viagra was offered rarely, and only to older tribal officials for whom the drug would hold special appeal. While such sexual performance drugs are generally unavailable in the remote areas where the agency's teams operated, they have been sold in some Kabul street markets since at least 2003 and were known by reputation elsewhere.
"You didn't hand it out to younger guys, but it could be a silver bullet to make connections to the older ones," said one retired operative familiar with the drug's use in Afghanistan. Afghan tribal leaders often had four wives -- the maximum number allowed by the Koran -- and aging village patriarchs were easily sold on the utility of a pill that could "put them back in an authoritative position," the official said. http://louis-j-sheehan-esquire.sampa.com/louis-j-sheehan-esquire/blog
Both officials who described the use of Viagra declined to discuss details such as dates and locations, citing both safety and classification concerns.
The CIA declined to comment on methods used in clandestine operations. One senior U.S. intelligence official familiar with the agency's work in Afghanistan said the clandestine teams were trained to be "resourceful and agile" and to use tactics "consistent with the laws of our country."
"They learn the landscape, get to know the players, and adjust to the operating environment, no matter where it is," the official said. "They think out of the box, take risks, and do what's necessary to get the job done."
Not everyone in Afghanistan's hinterlands had heard of the drug, leading to some awkward encounters when Americans delicately attempted to explain its effects, taking care not to offend their hosts' religious sensitivities.
Such was the case with the 60-year-old chieftain who received the four pills from a U.S. operative. According to the retired operative who was there, the man was a clan leader in southern Afghanistan who had been wary of Americans -- neither supportive nor actively opposed. The man had extensive knowledge of the region and his village controlled key passages through the area. U.S. forces needed his cooperation and worked hard to win it, the retired operative said.
After a long conversation through an interpreter, the retired operator began to probe for ways to win the man's loyalty. A discussion of the man's family and many wives provided inspiration. Once it was established that the man was in good health, the pills were offered and accepted.
Four days later, when the Americans returned, the gift had worked its magic, the operative recalled.
"He came up to us beaming," the official said. "He said, 'You are a great man.' "
"And after that we could do whatever we wanted in his area." Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
Four blue pills. Viagra. http://www.bebo.com/LouisS205
"Take one of these. You'll love it," the officer said. Compliments of Uncle Sam.
The enticement worked. The officer, who described the encounter, returned four days later to an enthusiastic reception. The grinning chief offered up a bonanza of information about Taliban movements and supply routes -- followed by a request for more pills.
For U.S. intelligence officials, this is how some crucial battles in Afghanistan are fought and won. While the CIA has a long history of buying information with cash, the growing Taliban insurgency has prompted the use of novel incentives and creative bargaining to gain support in some of the country's roughest neighborhoods, according to officials directly involved in such operations.
In their efforts to win over notoriously fickle warlords and chieftains, the officials say, the agency's operatives have used a variety of personal services. These include pocketknives and tools, medicine or surgeries for ailing family members, toys and school equipment, tooth extractions, travel visas, and, occasionally, pharmaceutical enhancements for aging patriarchs with slumping libidos, the officials said.
"Whatever it takes to make friends and influence people -- whether it's building a school or handing out Viagra," said one longtime agency operative and veteran of several Afghanistan tours. Like other field officers interviewed for this article, he spoke on the condition of anonymity when describing tactics and operations that are largely classified.
Officials say these inducements are necessary in Afghanistan, a country where warlords and tribal leaders expect to be paid for their cooperation, and where, for some, switching sides can be as easy as changing tunics. If the Americans don't offer incentives, there are others who will, including Taliban commanders, drug dealers and even Iranian agents in the region.
The usual bribes of choice -- cash and weapons -- aren't always the best options, Afghanistan veterans say. Guns too often fall into the wrong hands, they say, and showy gifts such as money, jewelry and cars tend to draw unwanted attention.
"If you give an asset $1,000, he'll go out and buy the shiniest junk he can find, and it will be apparent that he has suddenly come into a lot of money from someone," said Jamie Smith, a veteran of CIA covert operations in Afghanistan and now chief executive of SCG International, a private security and intelligence company. "Even if he doesn't get killed, he becomes ineffective as an informant because everyone knows where he got it."
The key, Smith said, is to find a way to meet the informant's personal needs in a way that keeps him firmly on your side but leaves little or no visible trace.
"You're trying to bridge a gap between people living in the 18th century and people coming in from the 21st century," Smith said, "so you look for those common things in the form of material aid that motivate people everywhere."
Among the world's intelligence agencies, there's a long tradition of using sex as a motivator. Robert Baer, a retired CIA officer and author of several books on intelligence, noted that the Soviet spy service was notorious for using attractive women as bait when seeking to turn foreign diplomats into informants.
"The KGB has always used 'honey traps,' and it works," Baer said. For American officers, a more common practice was to offer medical care for potential informants and their loved ones, he said. "I remember one guy we offered an option on a heart bypass," Baer said.
For some U.S. operatives in Afghanistan, Western drugs such as Viagra were just part of a long list of enticements available for use in special cases. Two veteran officers familiar with such practices said Viagra was offered rarely, and only to older tribal officials for whom the drug would hold special appeal. While such sexual performance drugs are generally unavailable in the remote areas where the agency's teams operated, they have been sold in some Kabul street markets since at least 2003 and were known by reputation elsewhere.
"You didn't hand it out to younger guys, but it could be a silver bullet to make connections to the older ones," said one retired operative familiar with the drug's use in Afghanistan. Afghan tribal leaders often had four wives -- the maximum number allowed by the Koran -- and aging village patriarchs were easily sold on the utility of a pill that could "put them back in an authoritative position," the official said. http://louis-j-sheehan-esquire.sampa.com/louis-j-sheehan-esquire/blog
Both officials who described the use of Viagra declined to discuss details such as dates and locations, citing both safety and classification concerns.
The CIA declined to comment on methods used in clandestine operations. One senior U.S. intelligence official familiar with the agency's work in Afghanistan said the clandestine teams were trained to be "resourceful and agile" and to use tactics "consistent with the laws of our country."
"They learn the landscape, get to know the players, and adjust to the operating environment, no matter where it is," the official said. "They think out of the box, take risks, and do what's necessary to get the job done."
Not everyone in Afghanistan's hinterlands had heard of the drug, leading to some awkward encounters when Americans delicately attempted to explain its effects, taking care not to offend their hosts' religious sensitivities.
Such was the case with the 60-year-old chieftain who received the four pills from a U.S. operative. According to the retired operative who was there, the man was a clan leader in southern Afghanistan who had been wary of Americans -- neither supportive nor actively opposed. The man had extensive knowledge of the region and his village controlled key passages through the area. U.S. forces needed his cooperation and worked hard to win it, the retired operative said.
After a long conversation through an interpreter, the retired operator began to probe for ways to win the man's loyalty. A discussion of the man's family and many wives provided inspiration. Once it was established that the man was in good health, the pills were offered and accepted.
Four days later, when the Americans returned, the gift had worked its magic, the operative recalled.
"He came up to us beaming," the official said. "He said, 'You are a great man.' "
"And after that we could do whatever we wanted in his area." Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire.
Thursday, December 25, 2008
bigger 5.big.002003 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Progressively larger brains evolved in primates of all stripes, not just humans. We can thank a common capacity for solving a broad range of problems, from coordinating social alliances to inventing tools, according to a new study.http://louisjsheehan.blogstream.com
This conclusion challenges a popular theory that big, smart brains arose primarily because they afforded advantages when it came to negotiating complex social situations during human evolution.
"The ability to learn from others, invent new behaviors, and use tools may have [also] played pivotal roles in primate-brain evolution," say Simon M. Reader of McGill University in Montreal and Kevin N. Laland of the University of Cambridge in England. In an upcoming report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the two zoologists chronicle links between an array of intelligent behaviors and enhanced brain size in primates.http://louisjsheehan.blogstream.com
Reader and Laland examined approximately 1,000 scientific studies of behavior in 116 of the world's 203 known primate species. They identified 553 instances of animals discovering new solutions to survival-related problems, 445 observations of individuals learning skills and acquiring information from others, and 607 episodes of tool use.
The researchers then consulted previously obtained data on brain size relative to body size in different primates. In particular, they focused on the volume of the structures that make up what scientists call the executive brain, a frontal region thought to be crucial for complex thinking.
Species that have the proportionately largest executive brains are the ones that most often innovate, learn from others, and use tools, Reader and Laland contend. These three facets of intelligence vary together as primate brains enlarge, they say. There's no evidence in any species of an evolutionary trade-off between these traits, such as an increase in innovation accompanying a decline in social learning.
A related report by neuroscientist Barbara L. Finlay of Cornell University and her colleagues concluded that different brain regions in mammals enlarged all together during mammalian evolution, not in piecemeal fashion related to specific functions. Whole-brain evolution was driven by changes in the timing of early brain development in individuals, says Finlay. In all species, late-generated structures�including the executive brain�have grown the largest, Finlay's team asserted in the April 2001 Behavioral and Brain Sciences.http://louisjsheehan.blogstream.com
Reader and Laland provide "important new evidence" that wide-ranging thinking skills shared by many primate species encouraged the evolution of large brains, comment psychologist Robert M. Seyfarth and biologist Dorothy L. Cheney, both of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, in a comment published with the new report.
They suggest that intellectual accomplishments unique to people, such as language use, may have played a smaller role in the evolution of our sizable brains than has often been thought.http://louisjsheehan.blogstream.com
This conclusion challenges a popular theory that big, smart brains arose primarily because they afforded advantages when it came to negotiating complex social situations during human evolution.
"The ability to learn from others, invent new behaviors, and use tools may have [also] played pivotal roles in primate-brain evolution," say Simon M. Reader of McGill University in Montreal and Kevin N. Laland of the University of Cambridge in England. In an upcoming report in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the two zoologists chronicle links between an array of intelligent behaviors and enhanced brain size in primates.http://louisjsheehan.blogstream.com
Reader and Laland examined approximately 1,000 scientific studies of behavior in 116 of the world's 203 known primate species. They identified 553 instances of animals discovering new solutions to survival-related problems, 445 observations of individuals learning skills and acquiring information from others, and 607 episodes of tool use.
The researchers then consulted previously obtained data on brain size relative to body size in different primates. In particular, they focused on the volume of the structures that make up what scientists call the executive brain, a frontal region thought to be crucial for complex thinking.
Species that have the proportionately largest executive brains are the ones that most often innovate, learn from others, and use tools, Reader and Laland contend. These three facets of intelligence vary together as primate brains enlarge, they say. There's no evidence in any species of an evolutionary trade-off between these traits, such as an increase in innovation accompanying a decline in social learning.
A related report by neuroscientist Barbara L. Finlay of Cornell University and her colleagues concluded that different brain regions in mammals enlarged all together during mammalian evolution, not in piecemeal fashion related to specific functions. Whole-brain evolution was driven by changes in the timing of early brain development in individuals, says Finlay. In all species, late-generated structures�including the executive brain�have grown the largest, Finlay's team asserted in the April 2001 Behavioral and Brain Sciences.http://louisjsheehan.blogstream.com
Reader and Laland provide "important new evidence" that wide-ranging thinking skills shared by many primate species encouraged the evolution of large brains, comment psychologist Robert M. Seyfarth and biologist Dorothy L. Cheney, both of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, in a comment published with the new report.
They suggest that intellectual accomplishments unique to people, such as language use, may have played a smaller role in the evolution of our sizable brains than has often been thought.http://louisjsheehan.blogstream.com
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
dead zone 6.dea.10010 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire . For years scientists have known that nitrogen and phosphorus, which commonly enter freshwater lakes in chemical fertilizers, play a role in eutrophication—the process by which algal blooms, turbidity, and oxygen deficiencies turn a lake into a dead zone, largely devoid of animal life. A recent paper, published in August in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, presents a more nuanced picture. http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com In a 37-year experiment with a lake in northern Ontario, scientists demonstrated that controlling phosphorus in particular is the key to reversing eutrophication.
The researchers polluted the lake with nitrogen and phosphorus over the years, gradually decreasing the amount of added nitrogen but keeping the input level of phosphorus constant. For the last 16 years they added only phosphorus. http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com Algae continued to flourish in proportion to the amount of phosphorus dumped into the water, even without nitrogen.
The experiment revealed the dynamics of eutrophication. Cyanobacteria, the blue-green algae responsible for the most common algal blooms, are nitrogen fixing—meaning that they get nitrogen from the air. So eliminating nitrogen from the water by controlling nitrogen-based fertilizer doesn’t solve the problem. “Nitrogen is important in determining which species grow,” says Robert Hecky, a coauthor of the paper and a professor of lake ecology at the University of Minnesota at Duluth. “If we just control nitrogen, we’ll merely shift the balance in favor of the species that can fix nitrogen, giving the same algal biomass.” To bring dead zones back to life, phosphorus must be controlled. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
The researchers polluted the lake with nitrogen and phosphorus over the years, gradually decreasing the amount of added nitrogen but keeping the input level of phosphorus constant. For the last 16 years they added only phosphorus. http://louis3j3sheehan3esquire.wordpress.com Algae continued to flourish in proportion to the amount of phosphorus dumped into the water, even without nitrogen.
The experiment revealed the dynamics of eutrophication. Cyanobacteria, the blue-green algae responsible for the most common algal blooms, are nitrogen fixing—meaning that they get nitrogen from the air. So eliminating nitrogen from the water by controlling nitrogen-based fertilizer doesn’t solve the problem. “Nitrogen is important in determining which species grow,” says Robert Hecky, a coauthor of the paper and a professor of lake ecology at the University of Minnesota at Duluth. “If we just control nitrogen, we’ll merely shift the balance in favor of the species that can fix nitrogen, giving the same algal biomass.” To bring dead zones back to life, phosphorus must be controlled. Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
Wednesday, December 3, 2008
tree 7.tre.000100 Louis J. Sheehan, Esquire
In Libby, Mont., mining of asbestos-contaminated vermiculite—a natural insulating material—sickened or killed many workers and townspeople in recent decades. Now, a study finds that even 16 years after the vermiculite mine closed, area trees hold substantial amounts of asbestos, rendering them hazardous to a separate group of workers.
Logging is a major employer for people around Libby. With asbestos a potential contaminant in dust, Tony J. Ward of the University of Montana in Missoula and his colleagues wondered whether asbestos from the mining operations might have settled on local trees. http://myface.com/Louis_J_Sheehan
Ward, an atmospheric chemist, notes that his team found between 40 million and 530 million asbestos fibers per gram of bark on trees within 4 miles of the mine—"concentrations that are pretty staggering." Even 15 miles from the mine, but near a railway siding where trains took on vermiculite, tree bark holds up to 19 million fibers per gram, his team reports in the Aug. 15 issue of Science of the Total Environment. http://members.greenpeace.org/blog/purposeforporpoise
Not only loggers but also locals who cut and burn wood for home heating face a risk from the fibers, Ward worries. He and his colleagues say that the findings also suggest that people who live far away from Libby but along former transportation routes for the vermiculite might face a health threat.
Logging is a major employer for people around Libby. With asbestos a potential contaminant in dust, Tony J. Ward of the University of Montana in Missoula and his colleagues wondered whether asbestos from the mining operations might have settled on local trees. http://myface.com/Louis_J_Sheehan
Ward, an atmospheric chemist, notes that his team found between 40 million and 530 million asbestos fibers per gram of bark on trees within 4 miles of the mine—"concentrations that are pretty staggering." Even 15 miles from the mine, but near a railway siding where trains took on vermiculite, tree bark holds up to 19 million fibers per gram, his team reports in the Aug. 15 issue of Science of the Total Environment. http://members.greenpeace.org/blog/purposeforporpoise
Not only loggers but also locals who cut and burn wood for home heating face a risk from the fibers, Ward worries. He and his colleagues say that the findings also suggest that people who live far away from Libby but along former transportation routes for the vermiculite might face a health threat.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
