Day: November 15, 2020

Giant, aging cables that support one of the world’s largest single-dish radio telescopes are slowly unraveling in this U.S. territory, pushing an observatory renowned for its key role in astronomical discoveries to the brink of collapse.The Arecibo Observatory, which is tethered above a sinkhole in Puerto Rico’s lush mountain region, boasts a 1,000-foot-wide (305-meter-wide) dish featured in the Jodie Foster film “Contact” and the James Bond movie “GoldenEye.” The dish and a dome suspended above it have been used to track asteroids headed to Earth, conduct research that led to a Nobel Prize and helped scientists trying to determine if a planet is habitable.”As someone who depends on Arecibo for my science, I’m frightened. It’s a very worrisome situation right now. There’s a possibility of cascading, catastrophic failure,” said astronomer Scott Ransom with the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves, a collaboration of scientists in the United States and Canada.Last week, one of the telescope’s main steel cables that was capable of sustaining 1,200 pounds (544 kilograms) snapped under only 624 pounds (283 kilograms). That failure further mangled the reflector dish after an auxiliary cable broke in August, tearing a 100-foot (30-meter) hole and damaging the dome above it.  Officials said they were surprised because they had evaluated the structure in August and believed it could handle the shift in weight based on previous inspections.  It’s a blow for the telescope that more than 250 scientists around the world were using. The facility is also one of Puerto Rico’s main tourist attractions, drawing some 90,000 visitors a year. Research has been suspended since August, including a project aiding scientists in their search for nearby galaxies.The telescope was built in the 1960s and financed by the Defense Department amid a push to develop anti-ballistic missile defenses. It has endured more than a half-century of disasters, including hurricanes and earthquakes. Repairs from Hurricane Maria, which devastated Puerto Rico in 2017, were still under way when the first cable snapped.  Some new cables are scheduled to arrive next month, but officials said funding for repairs has not been worked out with federal agencies. Scientists warn that time is running out. Only a handful of cables now support the 900-ton platform.”Each of the structure’s remaining cables is now supporting more weight than before, increasing the likelihood of another cable failure, which would likely result in the collapse of the entire structure,” the University of Central Florida, which manages the facility, said in a statement Friday.University officials say crews have noticed wire breaks on two of the remaining main cables. They warn that employees and contractors are at risk despite relying heavily on drones and remote cameras to assess the damage.  The observatory estimates the damage at more than $12 million and is seeking money from the National Science Foundation, an independent federal agency that owns the observatory.  Foundation spokesman Rob Margetta said engineering and cost estimates have not been completed and that funding the repairs would likely involve Congress and discussions with stakeholders. He said the agency is reviewing “all recommendations for action at Arecibo.””NSF is ultimately responsible for decisions regarding the structure’s safety,” he said in an email. “Our top priority is the safety of anyone at the site.”Representatives of the university and the observatory said the telescope’s director, Francisco Córdova, was not available for comment. In a Facebook post, the observatory said maintenance was up to date and the most recent external structural evaluation occurred after Hurricane Maria.The most recent damage was likely the result of the cable degrading over time and carrying extra weight after the auxiliary cable snapped, the university said. In August, the socket holding that cable failed, possibly the result of manufacturing error, the observatory said.The problems have interrupted the work of researchers like Edgard Rivera-Valentín, a Universities Space Research Association scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Texas. He had planned to study Mars in September during its close approach to Earth.”This is the closest Mars was going to be while also being observable from Arecibo until 2067,” he said. “I won’t be around the next time we can get this level of radar data.”The observatory in Puerto Rico is considered crucial for the study of pulsars, which are the remains of stars that can be used to detect gravitational waves, a phenomenon Albert Einstein predicted in his theory of general relativity. The telescope also is used to search for neutral hydrogen, which can reveal how certain cosmic structures are formed.”It’s more than 50 years old, but it remains a very important instrument,” said Alex Wolszczan, a Polish-born astronomer and professor at Pennsylvania State University.He helped discover the first extrasolar and pulsar planets and credited the observatory for having a culture that allowed him to test what he described as wild ideas that sometimes worked.  “Losing it would be a really huge blow to what I think is a very important science,” Wolszczan said.An astronomer at the observatory in the 1980s and early 1990s, Wolszczan still uses the telescope for certain work because it offers an unmatched combination of high frequency range and sensitivity that he said allows for a “huge array” of science projects. Among them: observing molecules of life, detecting radio emission of stars and conducting pulsar work.The telescope also was a training ground for graduate students and widely loved for its educational opportunities, said Carmen Pantoja, an astronomer and professor at the University of Puerto Rico, the island’s largest public university.She relied on it for her doctoral thesis and recalled staring at it in wonder when she was a young girl.”I was struck by how big and mysterious it was,” she said. “The future of the telescope depends greatly on what position the National Science Foundation takes…I hope they can find a way and that there’s goodwill to save it.”
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Space X is preparing to send a rocket carrying four astronauts to the International Space Station Sunday evening.“All systems are go for tonight’s launch at 7:27 p.m. EST of Crew Dragon’s first operational mission with four astronauts on board,” SpaceX, the rocket company of high-tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, wrote on Twitter Sunday. SpaceX also said, “Teams are keeping an eye on weather conditions for liftoff, which are currently 50% favorable.”All systems are go for tonight’s launch at 7:27 p.m. EST of Crew Dragon’s first operational mission with four astronauts on board. Teams are keeping an eye on weather conditions for liftoff, which are currently 50% favorable → https://t.co/bJFjLCzWdKpic.twitter.com/GTpvVAiLkK— SpaceX (@SpaceX) November 15, 2020Separately, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence tweeted that he was looking forward to attending the viewing of the launch with the second lady, Karen Pence. A White House statement said the Pences would travel to Florida Sunday and return to Washington in the evening.Looking forward to attending the viewing of @NASA’s @SpaceX Crew-1 Mission Launch tomorrow with @SecondLady! https://t.co/vDjOAHrOoJ— Mike Pence (@Mike_Pence) November 15, 2020The mission will be the first time NASA is launching a privately-owned rocket into space.The journey to the orbiting outpost is expected to take 27 hours. It was initially scheduled to begin on Saturday, but was delayed due to wind gusts, according to NASA officials.In August, two U.S. astronauts returned to Earth, splashing safely into the Gulf of Mexico after a mission to the International Space Station aboard the commercially developed SpaceX spacecraft Crew Dragon.  The two men had lifted off from Florida in May, the first NASA astronaut launch from U.S. soil since 2011 and the first time a commercially developed spacecraft had carried humans into orbit.
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In an unassuming house in rolling hills east of the Hungarian capital, a small family firm is helping oil the wheels of the world’s big pharmaceutical companies on the path to a coronavirus vaccine. Biologist Noemi Lukacs, 71, retired to Szirak, her birth village, to establish English & Scientific Consulting (SciCons) and manufacture a genetic sensor so sensitive that a few grams can supply the entire global industry for a year. “We produce monoclonal antibodies,” Lukacs told Reuters in the single-story house where she was born, now partly converted into a world-class laboratory. The white powder ships worldwide from here, micrograms at a time. “These antibodies recognize double-stranded RNA [dsRNA],” she explained. DsRNA is a byproduct of viruses replicating, so its presence signals the presence of a live virus, long useful in virus-related research. More importantly, dsRNA is also a byproduct of the process used by U.S. giant Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech to create their experimental COVID-19 vaccine which is more than 90% effective according to initial trial results last week.And because dsRNA can be harmful to human cells, it must be filtered out from any vaccine to be used in humans. Several filtering methods exist, but the most widely used way to do quality control is to expose the vaccine to Lukacs’ antibodies. Not only will the antibodies show if there is any dsRNA in the vaccine, they will also tell researchers how much of it is present. Only once completely freed from dsRNA can the vaccine be administered. The result: a line of big pharma representatives outside her door. Hungarian biologists Alexandra Torok and Noemi Lukacs check the purity of an antibody, a genetic sensor of sorts, in Szirak, Hungary, Nov. 13, 2020.The small company is growing rapidly, yet its revenue was only 124 million forints (just over $400,000) last year, with profits at 52 million forints. That feeds five employees and even leaves some for local charity projects in Szirak. To Lukacs, that is just fine. The success of the RNA field, long frowned upon, is vindication enough. Dog in the race The former university professor followed the race to the vaccine closely and rooted especially for the contestants who look set to come first: those using modified RNA to train cells of the human body to recognize and kill the coronavirus. The RNA was her dog in the race. The modified RNA, or mRNA, methodology is a whole new group of drugs, with the COVID vaccine the first product likely to get regulatory approval and go into mass production. But more applications are expected, which has Lukacs overjoyed. “Once you get into the RNA field, it is an extremely exciting area,” she said, recalling decades of struggles when the rest of the scientific community did not share her excitement. Or most of the rest, that is. Another Hungarian woman, Katalin Kariko, working across the Atlantic, patented the method that enables the use of RNA and promises to free the world not only of the coronavirus but scores of other diseases. In the process, Kariko — now the Vice President of Germany’s BioNTech, which was first alongside U.S. giant Pfizer to break through with a vaccine earlier this month  — became an early SciCons customer. The COVID breakthrough and other RNA uses may necessitate more use of Lukacs’s antibodies as well, but they do not anticipate much of a boon. “We would be happy to sell more of it,” said Johanna Symmons, her daughter and the small company’s chief executive. “We probably will too. But it’s not like we’ll get silly rich.” Being part of the solution reaps its own rewards. “We have cooperated with most vaccine manufacturers, and certainly almost all of the ones using the mRNA method,” she said with a hint of pride. “We have been a small screw in this large machine.”    
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This year’s U.N. World Diabetes Day on Nov. 14 was observed in Cameroon with medical staff all over the central African state encouraging those with the disease to return to hospitals for treatment.Health workers say patients scared of COVID-19 stopped going to hospitals for control of their glucose levels. Although the disease is spreading rapidly due to Cameroonians’ sedentary lifestyles, experts say, health workers complain that 80% of patients do not know they have diabetes.A medical doctor told scores of people at the General Hospital in Cameroon’s capital, Yaoundé, to go to the nearest hospital if they get tired and thirsty regularly, drink water and urinate frequently. She said while at any hospital, such people should immediately ask for their blood sugar levels to be measured.Diabetes educator Agnes Koki said the campaign is part of World Diabetes Day activities. She said medical staff members want to encourage people to find out whether they have diabetes.”There were so many people out there without the knowledge of diabetes,” she said. “We educate them on what diabetes is all about, how to feed and so many other things. We do free consultation, free screening.”Sixty-year-old carpenter Hilary Lingalia said he was diagnosed with diabetes after his wife forced him to go to the hospital. He said the African traditional healers he counted on for treatment from nerve pain, a diabetes-related condition, instead told him that he had been bewitched.”It was a strange sickness to me because my father did not have diabetes nor my mother,” he said. “In 2014, I had this complication on my leg until it was amputated. To face the reality, I accepted it.”3 million casesCameroon’s National Diabetes and Hypertension Program reports that the prevalence of diabetes has increased from fewer than 1 million cases in 2010 to more than 3 million in 2020. The report says 80% of people living with diabetes are currently undiagnosed. Cameroon also blames sedentary lifestyles for the increase in the disease.Solange Essunge leads an association of diabetic patients in Yaoundé. She says many people fear being screened for diabetes because they believe the disease kills slowly and cannot be treated.She said the Association of Diabetic Patients she heads wants the government to immediately provide free treatment to everyone whose sugar level is very high. She said the government and donor agencies should show more commitment to the well-being of patients by making treatment available in all hospitals and supplying all patients with blood glucose meters so they will always be able to measure their blood sugar levels.Essunge said that since Cameroon reported the first cases of the coronavirus in March, many diabetic patients have avoided going to the hospital for fear of contamination. She said a majority of the more than 500 people who have died of COVID-19 in Cameroon were diabetic patients.Vincent de Paul Djientcheu, director of the General Hospital in Yaoundé and official of Cameroon’s health ministry, said people should guard against diabetes by watching their diets and getting regular physical exercise.He said Cameroonians should work harder toward preventing diabetes because the rapid spread of the disease has severe consequences for patients, their families and the community. He said diabetes drains family resources and makes people poorer. He urged patients to return to hospitals for routine checks and said patients should make sure they always respect COVID-19 prevention measures, such as wearing face masks, regularly washing their hands, and keeping 2 meters apart.Djientcheu said people should stop considering diabetes a death sentence because they can live with the disease if they control their diet and take regular treatment.The United Nations instituted World Diabetes Day in 2007 in recognition of the urgent need to improve human health, provide access to treatment and health care education.The U.N. says globally, 422 million adults were living with diabetes in 2014, compared to 108 million in 1980, and that diabetes prevalence has risen faster in low- and middle-income countries than in high-income countries.
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There are nearly 54 million coronavirus cases around the world, the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported early Sunday.The U.S., India, and Brazil continue to top the list as the places with the most infections. The U.S. has almost 11 million cases, while India and Brazil have 8.8 million and 5.8 million, respectively.On Sunday, India reported 41,100 new infections in the previous 24-hour period.An uptick in cases in the U.S. has prompted the Navajo Nation to impose a three-week lockdown, beginning Monday.“The Navajo Nation is experiencing an alarming rise in positive COVID-19 cases and uncontrolled spread in 34 communities across the Navajo Nation,” the reservation’s Department of Health said in a public health order announcing the lockdown. “These cluster cases are a direct result of family gatherings and off-Reservation travel.”The Navajo health department reported Saturday that there are 13,249 COVID-19 infections on the massive reservation where almost 600 people have died from the virus.Former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown says the world may be on the brink of a child mortality crisis as developing countries struggle in the battle against the coronavirus and struggle to pay their Western and Chinese creditors.Brown’s comments in The Observer, a British publication, come as the G-20 nations prepare to meet in a few days in Saudi Arabia. The nations may consider a temporary debt freeze for eligible countries as they fight the coronavirus.In Europe, the continent is facing another surge of the coronavirus and several countries have imposed tighter COVID-19 restrictions. Poland on Saturday reported a new daily record of about 550 coronavirus-related deaths, bringing the country’s total to more than 10,000.Lebanon began a two-week lockdown Saturday to contain the spread of the virus, which has increased sharply in recent weeks and killed dozens over the past few days. A nighttime curfew has been expanded from sunset to sunrise, and driving has been prohibited on Sundays.
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A year ago, if you saw someone wearing a mask, you might assume they were sick or maybe even a little weird or paranoid. Today, thanks to the pandemic, wearing a mask to prevent the spread of COVID-19 is the new normal for many Americans.Thirty-four states and the District of Columbia require people to FILE – Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams, left, bumps elbows at Sergio’s Restaurant in Doral, Florida, July 23, 2020.Not all Americans have adopted mask-wearing, especially not those who view masks through a political lens. But pandemics have changed public habits in the past. Wearing a face covering is much more common in East Asia since the outbreak of FILE – Barbers Johnny ‘Geo’ Sanchez, left, and Alberto Sagentin, rear, cut hair in the Little Havana neighborhood of Miami, May 21, 2020.“I can see how, in the future, especially during the cold and flu seasons, people are going to step away from it saying, ‘Hey, listen, let’s just wave, let’s bow to each other, let’s do a namaste. Let’s do something different,” he says. “So yeah, I think there’s going to be a cultural shift with the handshake.”Overall, Americans might be less touchy-feely, according to Dr. Aaron Glatt, spokesperson for the FILE – A shopper wears a mask and gloves to protect against coronavirus as he shops at a grocery store in Mount Prospect, Illinois, May 13, 2020.“When you go through something like a pandemic, regardless of how you feel politically, it is a fairly scary and unpredictable event. And I do feel like certain habits that we’ve picked up, like hygiene habits, are likely to stick on some level of moving forward,” says Mathema of Columbia University.“Some of these habits that we’ve learned, like washing our hands, including mask-wearing, for that matter, disinfecting surfaces, some of these habits will likely sort of continue on,” he says.And that could be one of the pandemic’s silver linings.“I think there’s a heightened sense of awareness of how certain illnesses can be spread,” says Glatt of IDSA. “People won’t accept … uncleanliness or poor hygiene, and they may wipe things down where in the past they would have not thought to do so. They may be a little bit more careful washing their hands.”Industries might also change. More businesses have gone paperless and contactless during the pandemic; there are fewer receipts to sign, restaurants have dropped paper menus, and airlines have new cleaning and air filtration standards.“I see that being the more important component, where the service side of the world is basically going to say, ‘We learned that cleanliness is important, that disinfection is important, and we’ll continue doing that in the workplace,’” says Lushniak of the University of Maryland. “It’s those types of practices that I think people will be looking for and, in fact, specific industries may be advertising, saying, ‘Hey, we do it this way, why don’t you come into our place versus some other place?’”FILE – Hand sanitizer sits on a cart as Des Moines Public Schools custodian Tracy Harris cleans a chair at Brubaker Elementary School, July 8, 2020, in Des Moines, Iowa.Another long-term impact of the pandemic could be more people staying at home when they are sick.“What we’ve learned about here is the beauty of, not in everybody’s circumstance, but the world of telework has really opened up new opportunities for us to say, ‘Listen, you know, right now I’m not feeling well.’ It used to be that that was always a sign of weakness,” Lushniak says.In a post-pandemic world, staying home might be more likely to be viewed as a courtesy to fellow commuters and coworkers, and an effort to stop the spread of disease.
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We’re closing in on a year with a viral pandemic that has affected more than 47 million people and has claimed the lives of more than 1 million, according to the World Health Organization. As VOA’s Carol Pearson reports, people are now suffering from what’s being called “pandemic fatigue.” 
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