Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Leatherback Turtles Extinct in 20 Years





BY: Dr.Y.Bala Murali Krishna

New Delhi,Feb 27(2013) The largest but the critically endangered leatherback marine turtles may be extinct in 20 years if the current trend of their hunting on high seas and unscientific management of nesting sites continue unabated at the animal's last stronghold in the Pacific Ocean.

This is the outcome of a study by an international team led by the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) which recorded a 78 percent decline in the number of nests of the turtle (Dermochelys coriacea).

The team identified four major problems facing leatherback turtles: nesting beach predators, such as pigs and dogs that were introduced to the island and eat the turtle eggs; rising sand temperatures that can kill the eggs or prevent the production of male hatchlings; the danger of being caught by fisheries during migrations; and harvesting of adults and eggs for food by islanders.

The study, published online on Feb 26 in the Ecological Society of America's scientific journal Ecosphere, reveals leatherback nests at Jamursba Medi Beach in Papua Barat, Indonesia -- which accounts for 75 percent of the total leatherback nesting in the western Pacific -- have fallen from a peak of 14,455 in 1984 to a low of 1,532 in 2011. Less than 500 leatherbacks now nest at this site annually.

"If the decline continues, within 20 years it will be difficult if not impossible for the leatherback to avoid extinction. That means the number of turtles would be so low that the species could not make a comeback. " says Prof.Thane Wibbels of UAB's Reproductive Biology wing who had studied marine turtles since 1980.
"The leatherback is one of the most intriguing animals in nature, and we are watching it head towards extinction in front of our eyes," addsd Wibbels.
Other members of the research team include scientists from State University of Papua (UNIPA), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), National Marine Fisheries Service and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Indonesia.
Leatherback turtles can grow to six feet long and weigh as much as 2,000 pounds. They are able to dive to depths of nearly 4,000 feet and can make trans-Pacific migrations from Indonesia to the U.S. Pacific coast and back again.

While it is hard to imagine that a turtle so large and so durable can be on the verge of extinction, Ricardo Tapilatu, the research team's lead scientist and Fulbright Scholar in the UAB Department of Biology, points to the leatherback's trans-Pacific migration, where they face the danger of being caught and killed in fisheries.

"They can migrate more than 7,000 miles and travel through the territory of at least 20 countries, so this is a complex international problem," Tapilatu said. "It is extremely difficult to comprehensively enforce fishing regulations throughout the Pacific."

The team, along with paper co-author Peter Dutton, discovered thousands of nests laid during the boreal winter just a few kilometers away from the known nesting sites, but their excitement was short-lived.

"We were optimistic for this population when year round nesting was discovered in Wermon Beach, but we now have found out that nesting on that beach appears to be declining at a similar rate as Jamursba Medi," said Dutton, head of the NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center's Marine Turtle Genetics Program.

The study has used year-round surveys of leatherback turtle nesting areas since 2005, and it is the most extensive research on the species to date.

Tapilatu, a native of western Papua, Indonesia, has studied leatherback turtles and worked on their conservation since 2004. His efforts have been recognized by NOAA, and he will head the leatherback conservation program in Indonesia once he earns his doctorate from UAB and returns to Papua.

He has worked to educate locals and limit the harvesting of adults and eggs. His primary focus today is protecting the nesting females, eggs and hatchlings. A leatherback lays up to 10 nests each season, more than any other turtle species.

Tapilatu is designing ways to optimize egg survival and hatchling production by limiting their exposure to predators and heat through an extensive beach management program.

"If we relocate the nests from the warmest portion of the beach to our egg hatcheries, and build shades for nests in other warm areas, then we will increase hatching success to 80 percent or more," said Tapilatu.

"The international effort has attempted to develop a science-based nesting beach management plan by evaluating and addressing the factors that affect hatching success such as high sand temperatures, erosion, feral pig predation and relocating nests to maximize hatchling output," said Manjula Tiwari, a researcher at NOAA's Southwest Fisheries Science Center in La Jolla, Calif.

Wibbels, who is also the Ph.D. advisor for Tapilatu, says that optimizing hatchling production is a key component to leatherback survival, especially considering the limited number of hatchlings who survive to adulthood.

"Only one hatchling out of 1,000 makes it to adulthood, so taking out an adult makes a significant difference on the population," Wibbels said. "It is essentially the same as killing 1,000 hatchlings."

The research team believes that beach management will help to decrease the annual decline in the number of leatherback nests, but protection of the leatherbacks in waters throughout the Pacific is a prerequisite for their survival and recovery.

Despite their prediction for leatherback extinction, the scientists are hopeful this species could begin rebounding over the next 20 years if effective management strategies are implemented.//EOM//


Thursday, February 07, 2013

Mobile Phone Detects Mercury Contamination in Water on the Spot.



BY: Dr.Y.Bala Murali Krishna

New Delhi, Feb 7(2013) A camera-fitted mobile phone can now detect in a jiffy contamination of water with mercury, one of the most toxic elements that can poison all animal life including humans, leave alone fish.

Kudos to the team of chemists at the University of Burgos(Spain) which made it possible by devising a fine membrane that changes colour in presence of water contaminated with mercury.

It works like a litmus paper and we could see the result with our naked eye. The concentration of the poison can be quantified when you take the photograph of the membrane with the mobile phone.

Mercury contamination is a problem that is particularly affecting developing countries. It poses a risk to public health since it accumulates in the brain and the kidneys causing long term neurological illnesses. It is emitted from industrial and mining waste, especially small-scale gold mining.

With the new technique, the toxin can be detected in a cheap, quick and in situ way," says José Miguel García, one of the authors of the study, the details of which have been published in the 'Analytical Methods' journal.
The method consists of placing the fine sheet created by the researchers in the water for five minutes. If it turns red, this signals the presence of mercury.

 “Changes can be seen by the naked eye and anyone, even if they have no previous knowledge, can find out whether a water source is contaminated with mercury above determined limits," says  García.

In addition, if we take a photograph of the sheet with a digital camera, like those in mobile phones or tablet computers, we can find out the concentration of the metal.

We only need image treatment software (the team used the open access GIMP programme) to see the colour coordinates. The result is then compared with reference values.

The membrane contains a florescent organic compound called rhodamine, which acts as a mercury sensor. It is insoluble in water but we chemically fix it to a hydrophilic polymer structure in such a way that when put into water it swells and the sensory molecules are forced to remain in the aqueous medium and interact with mercury.

The exact composition of the sheet can be adjusted to the desired parameters. More specifically, the researchers have calibrated the sheet so that it changes colour when limits established by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of the United States are exceeded: 2 ppb (parts per billion) of divalent mercury –Hg(II), one of the most reactive, in water destined for human consumption.

Having also developed a method for other elements like iron or cyanide, the researchers believe that the water drunk in Spain "is of excellent quality due to highly efficient controls." Therefore, the technique could be used there for detecting mercury in certain spills and for studying its presence in fish.

Mercury Poison-A Global Menace:

A recent study by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) demonstrates that a large part of human exposure to this toxic metal is due to consumption of contaminated fish.

Named the Global Mercury Assessment 2013, the report analysed for the first time the mercury released into the rivers and lakes around the whole world.

The small-scale extraction of gold and the combustion of coal for electricity generation seem to be behind the increase in the emissions of developing countries.

As for the sea, in the last century the mercury quantity has doubled in the first hundred meters from the surface of the planet's oceans. Concentrations in deep water have also increased by up to 25%.

To stop the global contamination of this metal, in January more than 140 countries came together in Geneva and approved the start-up of the Minamata Convention, a new international binding regulation bearing the name of the Japanese city where hundreds of people died in the 1950's due to mercury poisoning.//EOM//

Tuesday, February 05, 2013

The Global Goat Gene Pool Seriously Threatened


BY: Dr.Y.Bala Murali Krishna
New Delhi,Feb 6(2013): World's many breeds of goat,which have been a great source of rich pritein,priced wool besides milk for people in the impoverished countries, are facing a serious threat of extinction.
India,China and Mangolia where cashmere goats have been reared for genertions for their wool, are no exception.
The alarm bell was sounded for the first time by researchers of the Asturias(Spain) based Regional Service of Agro-Food Research and Development(SERIDA) in their first monographic study tackling the global impact of this species.
The researchers presented their study “Goat grazing, its interactions with other herbivores and biodiversity conservation issues" in Small Ruminant Research.
The scientists had analysed the situation of the global goat population,taking into account the state of different breeds, the multiple implications of their conservation, the interaction with other animal species (wild and domestic) and the consequences of goat grazing from an environmental point of view.
"The risk of the gene pool of the goat disappearing has increased due to intensive animal husbandry systems that use a very limited number of breeds. Strangely enough, the biggest loss in the genetic resources of indigenous animals has been observed in Europe, although the situation is unknown in many areas," according to Rocío Rosa García, researcher at SERIDA and coauthor of the study.
The bad reputation given to goats stems from one of its main virtues: it has an extraordinary capacity to adapt to the most difficult of environmental conditions in places where other domestic livestock species would not survive.
"It is a reality that the grazing of these animals can cause damaging effects on the environment but ecosystems become overloaded because of inadequate practices of handling," say scientists.
The largest number of goats can be found in the poorest of countries and especially those which have difficult environmental conditions and mountainous, desert and semi-desert regions, according to FAO.
"In poor regions, poor communities are commonplace and often the goat is the only source of animal protein in their diet," explains Rosa García.
The team led by Koldo Osoro Otaduy, manager of the Animal Production Systems Area at SERIDA, undertook a large part of the field work in areas in which the role of the goat is very relevant and have certain similarities with hostile environments in other parts of the world.
"Many national and international projects have been carried out in less-favoured areas, like the Asturian mountains which are home to steep slopes, poor soil, an aging population and a high risk of depopulation and abandonment of traditional activities," the researchers said.
Poor handling of grazing, which does not consider the livestock species and their most fitting habitat, is the main cause of the damaging effects that goats can cause on the environment,the study says.
Uncontrolled growth of the cashmere goat to increase production of its prized wool,had in some cases,ovefloaded the ecosystems. This has not only affected vegetation but also certain indigenous species in India, China and Mongolia.
On the otherhand, the study in some cases noted that the species plays an important role in environmental conservation,as the goats have been used in the fight against fires in areas dominated by bushes and in controlling exotic vegetation plagues that could put ecosystems at risk.
"We wanted to perform a global review, taking into account very different regions of the world, from the Himalayan peaks to tropical areas, and analysing to what extent the goat competes with local fauna in each region and whether it interferes with the survival of the most sensitive species," says Rosa García.//EOM//

Sunday, February 03, 2013

Indian scientists develop ‘snake robots’ for rescue operations | GulfNews.com

Indian scientists develop ‘snake robots’ for rescue operations | GulfNews.com