Glad We Weren't Around Then......

British scientists have announced that a quarry in Germany has yielded the fossil of an amazing prehistoric creature called Jaekelopterus Rhenaniae. It is not a dinosaur, however, but possibly the largest bug to ever walk the face of the earth--eight feet long.

This ancient sea scorpion is the ancestor of today's scorpions and possibly all spiders, mites and ticks. Paleontologists speculate that this giant scorpion was capable of growing to enormous size because it did not have any natural enemies, but it was eventually wiped out by the evolution of larger fish. The giant scorpion was also a cannibal, fighting and eating others of its species. The fossil found in Germany was of a kind of scorpion that lived exclusively in that country about 400 million years ago. It is believed that the quarry where the fossil was found was once either an estuary or a swamp.

Although paleontologists have known for quite some time as a result of fossil discoveries that giant millipedes, cockroaches, dragonflies and scorpions once inhabited the earth, they never anticipated that some of them reached the size supported by the find in Germany.

Stem Cells from Skin Cells

Two research teams (one working at Kyoto University, the other at the University of Wisconsin-Madison) have made public their landmark achievement of producing stem cells from human skin cells. The new laboratory technique is being viewed as the answer to the scientific/religious/ethical debates that have surrounded obtaining stem cells from human embryos.

Just this past summer, both teams of researchers discovered how to develop stem cells in mice, but surprised even themselves with the human cell breakthrough. The new technique reprograms skin cells, giving them the ability of embryonic stem cells to morph into many kinds of tissue. The hope is that this new development will put medical research onto the fast track, enabling patients to be treated with genetically matched healthy tissue to replace damaged cells.

Perhaps the best news of all is that, unlike the embryonic cloning method for obtaining stem cells, the new process is relatively simple and can be begun in other laboratories immediately.

A 21st Century Noah's Ark

Oslo, Norway is the site of the Global Seed Vault, a 400-foot tunnel dug into a remote Arctic mountainside of the Svalbard Archipelago. Over the next two months, refrigeration units will begin to lower the temperature of the vault from 23 degrees to zero degrees, where its precious contents can be stored safely for up to 1,000 years.

The remote site was chosen for its relative safety from threats, its climate, and its permafrost. If the power goes out, the permafrost will maintain the temperature needed to preserve the vault's contents. It is here that up to 4.5 million of the world's agricultural seeds will be kept safe from global warming, plant epidemics, natural disasters, or war. Each country of the world has been invited to deposit seed samples, each containing 500 seeds and wrapped in foil.

Although many countries have begun their own seed banks, some (such as the Philippines, Iran and Iraq) have already been compromised by extreme weather conditions or war. The Svalbard vault is intended to be the final backup so that food production can be restarted in the event of a regional or global catastrophe.

Although Norway will own the vault, each country will retain ownership of the materials it deposits there. The Global Seed Vault will officially open on February 26th.

Nigersaurus Taqueti a/k/a DinoCow

University of Chicago paleontologist, Paul Sereno, unveiled the life-size model of a very strange dinosaur this week. Nigersaurus taqueti was discovered by Sereno in 1997 and excavated in Niger approximately three years ago, where parts of five skeletons were found, including one that was eighty percent complete. Nigersaurus is an elephant-sized dinosaur, but the bones of its skull are almost translucent and protect a brain the size of a walnut.

The amazing revelation of Nigersaurus is that its discovery offers a new view of the behavior of long-necked, plant-eating dinosaurs, what they looked like, and how they behaved. Until now, it was believed that this type of dinosaur behaved like a giraffe, holding its head high overhead and eating vegetation from the tops of trees. When it roamed the earth 110 million years ago, Nigersaurus spent its life with its head hanging down, using its wide mouth to "graze" on ferns and other vegetation.

Paleontoligists now believe that long-necked plant-eaters behaved more like cows than giraffes. This theory is supported by some of the dinosaur's features which are extreme versions of features seen in other grazing animals. Nigersaurus' mouth is wider than its skull, and all its teeth are incisors lined up to form an efficient clipping mechanism, ideal for cutting grass.

Photographs of the life-size model and skeleton of Nigersaurus taqueti are accessible at http://news.nationalgeographic.com/.

Art Conveys Effects of Global Warming

Much of the information we learn today about global warming is funneled to us by scientists as a result of the studies they perform and the predictions they make based upon those studies. A group of forty artists from twenty-five countries, however, has utilized their talent to produce an exhibit intended to educate the world about the effect melting ice caps will have on living species. The result is entitled "Melting Ice: A Hot Topic", and it is scheduled to arrive in this country in April.

An American artist, Chris Jordan, has made an interesting contribution to the exhibit. Jordan is fascinated by consumerism and chose to replicate Ansel Adam's famous photograph of Mount McKinley in Alaska's Denali National Park. Jordan, however, digitally replicated Adam's photograph, incorporating 24,000 logos of General Motors' Denali SUV. Why 24,000 logos? That number represents how many Denali SUVs were sold during a six-week period in 2004. In a clever twist, Jordan chose to correctly spell "Denali" in half the of the 24,000 digital tiles, and to misspell it as "Denial" in the other half, thereby making his own statement about the consumption of fossil fuels by SUVs and their impact on the environment.

The hope of the exhibit's organizers is that if the public observes the effects of global warming through the artistic forum, it will appeal to the emotions that only art can provoke and bring about change.

The exhibit began its tour in Oslo, Norway and is currently in Brussels. It will travel to Monaco next, after which it will come to Chicago in April, where it will remain until June 5, 2008--Earth Day.

A Museum Exhibit All About Pets

Professor Katherine Grier's research into human-animal relationships evolved into an entire museum exhibit entitled "Pets in America". The exhibit chronicles Americans' love for their pets from the 18th century to the present and will be touring the country for the next several years.

Although primarily about America, the exhibit also traces the origin of pet-keeping back to its roots in the Far East; the exhibit contains many examples of ornate cages used to house crickets. From the earliest times here in America, the focus on pets has been mainly on cats and dogs because they served as both companions and workers. Songbirds, especially canaries, became popular in the early 20th century as a means of entertainment--they provided background music long before gramophones, radios or ipods. The exhibit explores all manner of pets, however, and makes use of some interesting artifacts.

The exhibit also examines how there has been an explosion in pet products and services in response to the ever-increasing popularity of pets in America. It also illustrates how Hollywood jumped on the pet bandwagon by producing animal heroes like Lassie and Rin Tin Tin. A section of the exhibit is devoted to the evolution of veterinary medicine, as well. Much of early pet care, as with early human medical care, consisted of quackery and nonsense.

A virtual tour of the exhibit is available at www.petsinamerica.org. Take the virtual tour with your pet, because they are not allowed in museums.....

Dentists Should NOT Be Dancing

A dental patient from Syracuse, New York has brought a lawsuit against her dentist for injuries she allegedly sustained when a drill bit that snapped and lodged near her eye. The woman is seeking $600,000 for her medical expenses, as well as pain and suffering.

The incident dates back to October 2004 when the thirty-one-year-old woman sought treatment at an emergency dental clinic for pain in a left molar. The dentist administered Novocain and began drilling the tooth in preparation for its extraction. According to the lawsuit, as the dentist drilled, he was "performing rhythmical steps and movements to the song 'Car Wash,'" playing on a radio in the office. The patient then heard the snap of the drill bit. The dentist attempted to pull the bit out by using a metal hook, but only succeeded in pushing it into the patient's sinus and bone socket of the left eye, according to the lawsuit.

After initially telling his patient that she would probably sneeze the drill bit out, he later advised her to go to a hospital emergency room. Hospital personnel advised her that had she sneezed, she likely would have lost the sight in her left eye. The patient underwent emergency surgery and spent three days in the hospital, but she claims that she is suing the dentist simply because he broke his promise to pay her medical bills.