Bat saliva may give life to victims of cerebral strokes. At present, there is no specific cure for people who are not treated within three hours of stroke onset. But, Cleveland Clinic’s Cerebrovascular Center in US is studying an agent found in vampire bats’ saliva, which may help people to break this time-barrier.
Females at risk again! This time from air pollution. Researchers at Pennsylvania State University say that air pollution affects females more than males. They studied two groups of mice with pneumonia. One group was exposed to ozone, an air pollutant at ground level, and the other breathed filtered air.
Penguins on treadmill will save the planet! 50 penguins living on the Crozet Islands in the southern Indian Ocean have been fitted with special heart-rate monitors in an experiment to assess global warming by scientists from Birmingham University.
Sumatran striped rabbit, one of the world’s most rare species of the animal, was recently spotted in Indonesia for just the third time in 35 years. It is known to exist only in the forests of Sumatra, and is probably the only representative of its genus.
The first animal to switch from water to land probably looked like a Salamander. To know how it did so, a team of scientists led by Auke Jan Ijspeert, Ecole Polytechnique Federale, Switzerland, built a robot with a primitive electric nervous system that mimics that change in motion.
Siachen is the biggest glacier after the North and South poles. The 76 sq km glacier has been the stage for several wars between India and Pakistan. The aftermath is heaps of human waste, plastic sheets, ammunition boxes,
parachutes and food packets. The world’s highest battlefield has turned into the ‘most polluted glacier’!
Hoodia gordonii kills hunger and thirst! It’s not a medicine, but a plant that grows wild in the Kalahari Desert in southern Africa. Priced almost like a narcotic, it is the latest craze of the dieting industry. But this hot demand, along with rampant smuggling, is threatening the rare plant — already listed as an endangered species.
It’s time to say bye to Baiji, one of the world’s oldest dolphin species. This rare white dolphin dating back about 20 million years may soon be extinct. An expedition
searching for them ended without a single sighting.
The famous flamingos of Lake Nakuru in Africa are dying and flying off as their home is shrinking rapidly. The lake was home to nearly 1 million flamingos just six years ago, and now there are around 30,000 left. The bird symbolises Africa to many people as much as lions and rhinos.
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