Eideard

OK, boys. Turn ‘em loose!

Trillions of bacteria with a taste for turkey fat and cooking oil are being unleashed in sewers to eat the annual onslaught of Christmas dinner grease that risks blocking pipes.

Yorkshire Water said it was deploying the “biological weapon” of bacillus bacteria – commonly found in the human gut – in its sewer network in an attempt to prevent blockages, which typically increase by 25pc over the festive season.

The company began pouring vats of water mixed with the bacteria down sewers at known trouble spots last week and is rolling out the treatment at 180 sites in Yorkshire.

Sewer blockages cost the water industry tens of millions of pounds a year, with many due to hot fat, oil and grease being poured down the drains and then solidifying. The fat also binds with non-biodegradable rubbish flushed down toilets, causing blockages which can make sewage flood back up into homes.

The fatty build-ups are usually cleared out manually with high-pressure water jets. With the likely increase in fat over Christmas, the company was turning to “new and innovative methods”.

Patrick Killgallon, pollution manager at Yorkshire Water said the utility was confident that the ” ‘good’ bacteria, literally feasting on solidified fat” would be cost-effective and could potentially end all such blockages.

“Because these bacteria constantly multiply in the right environment, we can leave them to get on with their job in our sewers, seven days a week, 24 hours a day, without the need for regular dosing,” he said.

Next up? Little nano-boats filled with bacteria volunteers to navigate your own body’s plumbing.

Kiss, kiss!

Ostriches have bloodless erections, according to researchers.

The large birds were previously thought to have blood-based erection mechanisms similar to humans. But scientists from Yale University have now confirmed that the birds actually enlarge their penises with lymph fluid. All other birds with a penis achieve erections in this way, leading scientists to believe the mechanism evolved in their ancient ancestors…

The majority of birds reproduce with a ‘cloacal kiss’ – touching together their cloaca for long enough for sperm to transfer from the males to the females. The cloaca is a single opening through which urine and faeces are excreted but certain species, including ducks, geese, swans and flamingos also possess a penis. In birds, this reproductive organ is unusual as it is enlarged by lymph: the fluid found in bodily tissues.

But the ratite family, from large ostriches to small kiwis, were thought to be the exception to this rule. “Earlier reports form the late 19th Century had suggested that the ostrich had a blood vascular erection mechanism, while no data existed for the emu or rhea,” said Dr Patricia Brennan who co-authored the study.

“Since all other birds with penises have lymphatic erection mechanisms, I always thought that it was strange that the ostrich would be blood vascular.”

To solve the puzzle, Dr Brennan and her team closely examined the penis of a male ostrich and three male emus and found some key differences. “The penis of the ostrich is fundamentally very different from emu and rhea because it is made out of a dense collagen matrix, but the lymphatic machinery is all there,” she told BBC Nature.

“Ostriches do have blood vessels near the surface of the penis, that makes it look pink, but the inside of the penis fills up with lymph, not blood…The reason why the change between blood vascular and lymphatic took place remains a mystery,” said Dr Brennan.

At first look, this might have had special meaning for male humans, a sex group which seems to be consumed with questions about erections. Poisonally, I’d suggest research be devoted to the study of raccoon and bear penises. They are perpetually stiffened by a bone running the length of the interior. A little weightlifting might help out with the rest of the process.

Internal government documents show that Canada’s scientific and environmental bureaucracy does not share the Conservative government’s view that oil sands projects in Alberta have relatively little negative impact on the environment.

Postmedia News, a publisher that owns several major Canadian newspapers including The National Post in Toronto, obtained the previously confidential material through Canada’s access-to-information laws.

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I almost forgot to post this, this year. Best Jingle Bells ever.

And as ever – thanks to Om Malik for pointing it out to the rest of the West.

The tax authorities say Italy loses an estimated $150 billion a year in undeclared revenues, while the national statistics authority places the underground economy to be about 17.5 percent of gross domestic product — the third highest in Western Europe after Malta and Greece but before Spain. Other experts place the percentage much higher.

To tackle the issue, Prime Minister Mario Monti’s new $40 billion austerity package, which received final approval on Thursday in the Senate, includes tougher measures that will allow tax officials to peer into Italians’ bank accounts to check declared income against bank deposits — not to mention yacht, car and home ownership — under a new cross-referencing initiative…

…Italy is introducing the cross-referencing initiative, dubbed the “income-o-meter,” to be put in place in the coming months. “If you declare $26,000 a year, you can’t buy a piece of real estate valued at $1.3 million,” said Attilio Befera, the director of the Agenzia delle Entrate, Italy’s internal revenue service. Discrepancies like that will now prompt an audit, Mr. Befera said.

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In America “storm-chasers” are the intrepid types who pursue tornadoes, and sometimes hurricanes. But the Arctic Circle has its aurora chasers – people who speed around in search of the best views of the aurora borealis, or Northern Lights.

“Last week we saw one that had everything – spiralling, curtains, ribbons, greens and reds, and the whole sky lit up. We were amazed at what was unfolding before us,” says Andy Keen.

Five years ago he left his job running a charity in the UK to move to Ivalo, a remote village in northern Lapland, Finland, latitude 68 degrees – two degrees above the Arctic Circle. “I saw a TV documentary about the Northern Lights. So I went there to have a look. Now I’m absolutely addicted,” he says.

Mr Keen’s company, Aurorahunters, now takes seven tourists a week on hunting trips in the Arctic wilderness to search for the Northern Lights…There are similar companies operating elsewhere in Finland and in neighbouring Norway where the official tourism website describes the aurora as “a tricky lady”. It adds: “You never know when she bothers to turn up. This diva keeps you waiting…”

When a location has been selected, Mr Keen and his group jump into minibuses and head into the wilderness, sometimes taking to sledges pulled by huskies to reach the most remote areas. They often see moose and bear tracks and have ventured as far north as the Arctic Ocean.

All to get the best vantage point to see the aurora borealis, named after the Roman goddess of dawn (Aurora) and the Greek name for the north wind (Boreas)…

RTFA. Details about the causes, predictions. Suggestions about chasing and photographing the elusive beauty of the aurora. All useful.

Daylife/AP Photo used by permission
Sad to see – the late Avery Cornett of Lebanon, MO

The manufacturer of the widely used baby formula Enfamil said Sunday that its testing shows the product is free of the bacteria blamed for the death of a Missouri infant.

Mead Johnson Nutrition said two tests of samples of its Enfamil Premium Newborn formula found no sign of the bacteria, known as Cronobacter sakazakii. The samples tested were taken from the same lot as the formula given to the baby boy who died…

The Missouri case prompted retail giant Walmart to pull all cans of the same size and lot number from its shelves last week. Another newborn baby was sickened in Illinois, but is recovering from the infection, according to the state health department.

“These new results reaffirm the testing conducted before the batch was made available to retailers and consumers,” the company said in a written statement on the results. “Based on both sets of tests, Mead Johnson can say with confidence that Enfamil Premium Newborn formula, like every infant formula the company produces, is safe.”

State authorities and the federal Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control have been testing similar samples for the bacteria, which the CDC says sickens four to six people a year…

The company said its findings match those of health agencies that have conducted their own tests. Early indications led authorities to suspect a link to powdered infant formula, but state and federal tests found no Cronobacter, the CDC’s Dr. Robert Tauxe said Friday.

“We really don’t have evidence that the two infections are related to each other,” Tauxe told CNN. “Those two cases that occurred this past month may just be a coincidence.

The next circle of testing – which will press the scientists at the CDC much further – will have to involve the range of products also aimed at newborns and often consumed in conjunction with Enfamil Newborn. A thinner more tenuous connection; but, one which must be examined.

Click on photo to enlarge

Employees work on an A350 Airbus plane at the company’s facility near Saint-Nazaire, western France. The company is to hire 4,000 staff in 2012, about half of them in France.

The growth at Airbus is matched pretty much one-for-one at Boeing. As the global economy shuffles forward from the joys brought to us by an unregulated Wall Street, an underfunded SEC, a total disregard for oversight, honesty and integrity for a decade or more – some aspects continue to grow slowly and steadily – especially in capital goods.

In spite of 19th Century ideologues who prefer to return us to Bush-league standards.

A new work by British artist Banksy, in the form of a billboard, adorns a wall near the Canary Wharf financial district in London, December 22, 2011 – Reuters Editors’ Choice.

Reuters Editors’ Choice is a site I visit almost daily. The view of the world formed by photographers, journalists – my kind of artists.

Click on photo to enlarge

Spotted this little dude just as we set off for our first walk of the morning. Cold and crisp temperatures, daunting to folks who aren’t fur-bearing.