No More Chimps At Research Labs?

Chimpanzees should hardly ever be used for medical research, a panel of influential medical experts said.

Most US research on chimpanzees is unnecessary and should be strictly limited in the future, an independent panel of medical experts said Thursday, stopping short of urging an outright ban.

While Europe ended research on great apes in 1999, the United States has continued to allow medical studies on chimps in areas ranging from HIV/AIDS vaccines, hepatitis C, malaria, respiratory viruses, brain and behavior.

making up just 53 of the 94,000 active projects sponsored by the National Institutes of Health in 2011, or 0.056 percent of all federally funded US research.

An NIH proposal to reintroduce several dozen retired chimpanzees into research colonies last year caused mounting public outcry and led to the review of chimp research by independent medical experts at the Institute of Medicine.

"The committee concludes that while the chimpanzee has been a valuable animal model in the past, most current biomedical research use of chimpanzees is not necessary," said the IOM in its report.

The NIH should therefore limit the use of chimps to biomedical research in which there is no other model available, that could not be performed ethically on humans, and would hinder progress against life-threatening conditions if halted.

Chimps are still necessary in the development of vaccines against hepatitis C, for short-term continued study of monoclonal antibody research against bacteria and viruses, and for comparative genome studies and behavioral research, the IOM said.

When chimpanzees are used for these ends, the studies should "provide otherwise unattainable insight into comparative genomics, normal and abnormal behavior, mental health, emotion, or cognition," the report said.

In addition, all experiments must be performed "in a manner that minimizes pain and distress, and is minimally invasive."

US research on chimps is mainly conducted at four facilities: the Southwest National Primate Research Center, the New Iberia Research Center at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, the Michale E. Keeling Center for Comparative Medicine and Research of the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, and the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Emory University.

As of May, there were 937 chimpanzees available for research in the United States. The US government supports 436 of them, and the rest are owned and used for research by private industry.

The IOM noted that since the NIH called for a moratorium on breeding chimps for research back in 1995, the US federally funded research population will "largely cease to exist" by 2037.
European Union facilities have not conducted any research on chimps since 1999, and a formal ban on using great apes in research -- including chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans -- was issued last year.

U.S. military drone crashes in Seychelles

By Jason Ukman

One of the Air Force’s premier drones crashed Tuesday morning in the Seychelles, the Indian Ocean archipelago that serves as a base for anti-piracy operations, as well as U.S. surveillance missions over Somalia.

The crash of the MQ-9 Reaper comes roughly two weeks after a U.S. drone went down in Iran.

The Seychelles, where U.S. officials have worked closely with local officials to establish the drone base, is hardly enemy territory, and the drone that crashed Tuesday was operated by the Air Force, not the CIA, which operated the stealth RQ-170 that crashed in Iran.

Still, Tuesday’s crash once again illustrates the fallibility of unmanned aerial vehicles.

The Air Force acknowledged the crash at the Seychelles airport, and a spokesman for the service said the crash happened as the drone was landing. No one was injured.

The Air Force said the cause of the crash — the first ever of a Reaper in the Seychelles — was under investigation. A statement from the civil aviation authority in the Seychelles attributed it to engine failure, saying that, after landing, the drone failed to stop before skidding into an outcropping of rocks at the end of the runway.

“It has been confirmed that this drone was unarmed and its failure was due to mechanical reasons,” the statement said. The Air Force confirmed that the MQ-9 was unarmed.

Photos of the Reaper show that it sustained heavy damage, with the nose of the drone carved off and one wing partially missing.

Gervais Henrie, editor of the local Le Seychellois Hebdo, who witnessed a crew lifting the remains of the drone with a crane after the crash, said it had burst into flames. Much of the Reaper appeared charred.

“Totally destroyed,” Henrie said in a phone interview.

The U.S. military is believed to have only a handful of Reapers in the Seychelles, based in a hangar located about a quarter-mile from the main passenger terminal at the airport.

The island nation of 85,000 people has hosted the drones since September 2009. U.S. and Seychellois officials have said the primary mission of the Reapers was to track pirates in regional waters, but they have also been used to conduct surveillance missions over Somalia.

The base in the Seychelles is part of a constellation of drone bases that the U.S. government has expanded in the region to monitor or attack al-Qaeda affiliates.

Hernie said Seychellois often see the Reapers flying overhead, and that they have come to accept them as a a routine part of living in the islands.

Microsoft Co-Founder To Build Giant Plane To Launch People, Cargo Into Space

SEATTLE (AP) — Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and aerospace pioneer Burt Rutan are building the world’s biggest plane to help launch cargo and astronauts into space, in the latest of several ventures fueled by technology tycoons clamoring to write America’s next chapter in spaceflight.

Their plans, unveiled Tuesday, call for a twin-fuselage aircraft with wings longer than a football field to carry a rocket high into the atmosphere and drop it, avoiding the need for a launch pad and the expense of additional rocket fuel.

Allen, who teamed up with Rutan in 2004 to send the first privately financed, manned spacecraft into space, said his new project would “keep America at the forefront of space exploration” and give a new generation of children something to dream about.

“We have plenty and many challenges ahead of us,” he said at a news conference.

Allen and Rutan join a field crowded with Silicon Valley veterans who grew up on “Star Trek” and now want to fill a void created with the retirement of NASA’s space shuttle. Several companies are competing to develop spacecraft to deliver cargo and astronauts to the International Space Station.

Allen bemoaned the fact that government-sponsored spaceflight is waning.

“When I was growing up, America’s space program was the symbol of aspiration,” he said. “For me, the fascination with space never ended. I never stopped dreaming what might be possible.”

Allen and Rutan last collaborated on the experimental SpaceShipOne, which was launched in the air from a special aircraft. It became the first privately financed, manned spacecraft to dash into space in 2004 and later won the $10 million Ansari X Prize for accomplishing the feat twice in two weeks.

Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic licensed the technology and is developing SpaceShipTwo to carry tourists to space.

The new plane will have a wingspan of 380 feet — the world’s largest. The plane will carry under its belly a space capsule with its own booster rocket; it will blast into orbit after the plane climbs high into the atmosphere.

This method saves money by not using rocket fuel to get off the ground. Another older rocket company, Orbital Sciences Corp., uses this method for unmanned rockets to launch satellites.

The rockets will eventually carry people, but the first tests, scheduled for 2016, will be unmanned. It should be another five years before people can fly on the system that Allen and Rutan are calling Stratolaunch.

The company, to be based in Huntsville, Ala., bills its method of getting to space as “any orbit, any time.” Rutan will build the carrier aircraft, which will use six 747 engines.

The spaceship and booster will be provided by another Internet tycoon, Elon Musk of PayPal, who has built a successful commercial rocket.

Allen left Microsoft in 1983. Since his time at the software giant he has pursued many varied interests. He’s the owner of the Seattle Seahawks football team as well as the Portland Trailblazers of the NBA.

Donald Trump says he may run as independent if Republican nominee unacceptable

By Mark Egan / Reuters 
NEW YORK – Real estate mogul and reality TV star Donald Trump on Friday said he was unsure if he would still host a Republican presidential debate, which now has only two participants.

Trump also issued a statement saying he still might run for the White House as an independent if he does not approve of the eventual Republican nominee.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who has surged to the front of the Republican field in recent weeks, and former Senator Rick Santorum are now the only candidates planning to participate in Trump’s Dec. 27 forum in Iowa.

Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, former Utah Governor Jon Huntsman, Texas Governor Rick Perry and U.S. Representatives Ron Paul and Michele Bachmann have said they will not attend the debate, throwing the event into question.

Several of the Republican candidates have met with Trump in hopes of winning his support but many party members worry the showboating Trump, star of NBC’s “The Apprentice” program where he is known for his catch phrase “You’re fired,” could make the debate all about him.

Trump, who is promoting his latest book, said some Republican candidates want assurances from him that he will not mount an independent run once his reality TV shows completes its season at the end of May. But, he said, “I must leave all of my options open.”

Earlier on Fox Business Network’s “Imus in the Morning”- show, Trump was asked if the event will go ahead and replied, “I don’t know. I have to look into it.”

Earlier this year Trump flirted with a run for the Republican 2012 presidential nomination and was derided for pushing a discredited charge that Democratic U.S. President Barack Obama might not have been born in the United States.

Although the resulting publicity yielded significant support for Trump in some polls, he never mounted an actual campaign and critics suggested it was all self promotion.

Trump eventually decided not to pursue the Republican nomination but recently has said he still might run as an independent.

“It is very important to me that the right Republican candidate be chosen to defeat the failed and very destructive Obama administration,” he said in statement Friday. “But if that Republican, in my opinion, is not the right candidate, I am unwilling to give up my right to run as an independent candidate.”

The debate will be sponsored by the Newsmax website and broadcast on the Ion cable television network. It comes at a time when Americans are busy with holidays but less than a week before the key Jan. 3 caucus in Iowa and the first primary in New Hampshire on Jan. 10.

A campaign spokesman for Paul said that Trump moderating a debate would result in “an unwanted circus-like atmosphere.”

Republican strategists in Washington worried that by participating in the debate, candidates would appear foolish or out-of-touch with voters.

Ari Fleischer, former press secretary for Republican President George W. Bush, said on Twitter that Trump moderating a debate was absurd. Veteran Republican strategist Karl Rove urged the Republican National Committee to call on Trump to cancel the event.

Scientists Narrow Search For 'God Particle'

Thomas Moore, science correspondent

Scientists at the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland claim to have narrowed the search for the "Higgs Boson", knowns as the elusive "God particle".

Two independent teams of researches working at the Cern physics research centre in Switzerland say the particle is more likely to be found in lower mass or energy ranges.

:: Q&A on the Higgs Boson

Fabiola Gianotti, an Italian physicist who heads the team running what's called the ATLAS experiment, said "the hottest region" is in lower energy ranges of the collider.
She said there are indications of the Higgs' existence and that with enough data it could be unambiguously discovered or ruled out next year.
Several mass or energy ranges within the atom smasher are now excluded to a "95% confidence level," she told other physicists at Cern.

Guido Tonelli, lead physicist for the team running what is called the CMS experiment, outlined similar findings, saying that the particle is most likely found "in the low mass region" of the collider.
The Higgs particle, or boson, is a key missing piece in the most widely accepted theory of physics - called the Standard Model - which describes how particles and forces interact.

"I am feeling quite a level of excitement," said Oliver Buchmueller, one of the senior scientists seeking the particle following the latest developments.

For more than a year, scientists at Cern have been firing particles in opposite directions around a 27km long ring-shaped tunnel 100 metres below ground.

When the particles have accelerated to almost the speed of light, they are encouraged to collide. Sensitive detectors are then used to examine the debris for new particles.

There is still a possibility that the findings are down to chance disturbances, rather than a real observation. Further tests are planned.

"We are moving very close to a conclusion in the first few months of next year," said Dr Buchmueller.

The £6bn experiment is an attempt to replicate the conditions shortly after the universe was created 13.7 billion years ago in the Big Bang.

The Standard Model of physics predicts that sub-atomic particles should have no mass.

But, according to the theory proposed by some scientists, an invisible Higgs force field and an associated boson were created soon after the Big Bang.

These create a drag on other particles, giving them mass.

If the Cern experiments confirm the Higgs boson exists, it would fix the biggest hole in the Standard Model - and give credence to what has been a largely mathematical model of how the universe works.

But, if they showed it does not exist, it would shake the foundations of modern physics and force a massive rethink on the forces that glue the universe together.