Gen Next

Wishing all our Readers a Very Happy & Prosperous New Year!!! Happy Reading!!!

Fool's Paradise

Egyptian Humor

Monday Sockers

Chicken Soup For The Soul

Goan Philosophy

Student Braves Controversy, Refuses to Recite Pledge

"Liberty and justice for all?"

Will Phillips doesn't believe that describes America for its gay and lesbian citizens. He's a 10-year-old at West Fork Elementary School in Arkansas, about three hours east of Oklahoma City. Given his beliefs, he refused to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, specifically because that one phrase, "liberty and justice for all," he says, does not truly apply to all.

That did not go over well with the substitute teacher in his fifth-grade classroom.

The Arkansas Times reports that he started refusing to say the pledge Mon., Oct. 5. By Thursday, the substitute was steamed. She told Will she knew his mother and grandmother and they would want him to recite the pledge.

Will told the Times the substitute got more and more upset. She raised her voice. By this point, Will told the newspaper, he started losing his cool too, adding: "After a few minutes, I said, 'With all due respect ma'am, go jump off a bridge.'"
That got him sent to the principal's office. The principal made him look up information about the flag and what it represents. Meanwhile, there was the inevitable call to his mother.

At first, mom Laura Phillips told the Times, the principal talked about Will telling a substitute to jump off a bridge. When pressed, the principal admitted the whole incident was sparked by the boy exercising his constitutional right not to recite the Pledge of Allegiance.

Phillips suggested an apology was in order -- from the teacher. When the principal said that wasn't necessary, Will's mother started venting to friends via Twitter. Those friends, in turn, told the news media. And what would have been a minor classroom incident has people throughout Arkansas and beyond choosing sides.

As for Will, he continues to exercise his right to remain silent. It can be rough at times, he and his family admit. He has his share of supporters, however, his critics are louder and nastier -- especially because he took his stand to defend gay rights.

"In the lunchroom and in the hallway, they've been making comments and doing pranks, calling me gay," he told the Times. "It's always the same people, walking up and calling me a gaywad."

Nonetheless, Will told the paper, he is sticking to his convictions. A reporter for the paper asked Will -- with all this talk about patriotism and the pledge -- what he thinks it means to be an American.

"Freedom of speech," he responded. "The freedom to disagree. That's what I think pretty much being an American represents."

His mother is proud.

"He's probably more aware of the meaning of the pledge that a lot of adults," Phillips told the Times.

Punjabi Jingle Bells

Merry Christmas

Elevator Humor

The Great Indian Tea Story

Alcohol hinders having a baby through IVF, couples warned

Couples who share a bottle of wine a week reduce their chances of having a baby through IVF by more than a quarter, according to a study by American fertility specialists.

Research into alcohol consumption among couples being treated at a fertility clinic found fewer successful pregnancies when the women drank several glasses of wine a week, or the man had a daily beer.

Doctors at Harvard medical school, in Boston, asked 2,574 couples about their drinking habits shortly before they embarked on a course of IVF treatment.

A little over half of the women (56%) and a third of the men had less than one alcoholic drink a week, while 4% of women and 5% of men consumed at least one drink every day.

Dr Brooke Rossi, who led the study, said men and women who each drank six units of alcohol a week each or more "significantly reduced their likelihood of pregnancy".

At these levels of consumption, women were 18% less likely to have a successful IVF baby, while men reduced their chances of fatherhood by 14%.

The effects were particularly strong for women who drank white wine and men who preferred drinking beer, Rossi told the American Society of Reproductive Medicine annual meeting in Atlanta, Georgia last month.

"In general, women are told they should stop drinking when they are trying to achieve pregnancy," Rossi said. The men and women who took part in the study had average ages of 37 and 34 respectively. They were all from the Boston area and completed questionnaires about their drinking habits between 1994 and 2003.

Tony Rutherford, chairman of the British Fertility Society, said guidelines from the society and the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) advise women to stop drinking completely throughout their pregnancy. "The link between alcohol and conception is an area where the evidence is not clear-cut. It may well be that couples who are already subfertile are more affected by alcohol that those who are perfectly fertile," he said

"If you are going to have IVF, my recommendation would be that it makes sense to avoid alcohol all together, from three months beforehand."

A previous study, published in the British Medical Journal by Tina Jensen at the National University hospital in Copenhagen, Denmark, found that women were less likely to conceive if they drank moderately.

But other studies have found that alcohol had little effect on the time it took women to conceive.

Rutherford added: "This is further evidence to suggest that alcohol does have an impact and that those women who try for a baby should think about their lifestyle choices.

"Eggs and sperm take at least three months to develop so women have got to stop smoking, reduce alcohol consumption or, if you are overweight, correct that weight, that far ahead if you want to maximise your chances of conception."

Little Mohamed

Little Mohamed entered his classroom in France.
- What is your name? asked the teacher.
- Muhammad.... answered the kid.
- Here we are in France, there is no Mohamed. From now on your name will be
Jean-Francois, replied the teacher.
In the evening, Mohamed returned home.


- How was your day, Mohamed? asked his mother.
- My name is not Mohamed, I am in France and my name is Jean-François.
- Ah, are you ashamed of your name, are you trying to disown your parents,
your heritage, your religion? Shame on you .. and she beat him.
Then she called the father and he too beat him savagely.


The next day Mohamed returned to school. When the teacher saw him with all
the bruises she asked:
- What happened my little Jean-François..
- Well Miss, just two hours after becoming French I was attacked by two
Arabs!

Celine Dion determined to try IVF again

Celine Dion is "determined" to continue with in-vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment after learning she is not pregnant after all.The Canadian superstar, 41, confirmed she was expecting her second child with husband Rene Angelil in August (09) amid reports she was carrying an embryo that had been frozen in liquid nitrogen for the past eight years.

The couple had embryos frozen for in-vitro fertilization while trying to conceive her first child, Rene-Charles, now eight.Dion had embryos implanted in her womb in August (09) and again in October (09), but both attempts proved to be unsuccessful.

Reports Dion was no longer pregnant broke on Wednesday (11Nov09), but the sad news has not put the My Heart Will Go On singer off trying for another baby. Angelil, 67, tells Canadian newspaper Journal de Montreal, "Dr. Zev Rosenwaks believed that the procedure/pregnancy took, but that wasn't the case. We found out some days later. We were shocked...

"We are living the reality of the majority of couples who have to use (IVF). The process can be long and arduous. But today, we are full of confidence. Celine is more determined than ever... You know Celine. She doesn't let go."Angelil admits his famous wife has been through so much in her bid to fall pregnant again, but the couple is not deterred and will travel to New York again to undergo further IVF treatment.

He adds, "I admire all the women who go through such a tough process. Since April, she has undergone numerous examinations, multiple hormone injections and blood tests. Celine and I didn't get discouraged... we put our faith in life and in the stars."

Pakistan Today

Doctors embrace social networking

In the waiting room, the patient's family members circled a Blackberry. About every 15 minutes, Dr. Carlos Wolf of Miami Plastic Surgery gave them a few keystrokes of information about how the patient was doing.

``M is asleep,'' one of Wolf's nurses typed at 9:13 a.m. on June 3. ``We will start surgery soon.''

Less than an hour later, the nose job was complete.

``Beautiful,'' the nurse typed. ``She's going to love it.''

Twitter, Facebook and YouTube aren't just for entertainment anymore. Wolf and doctors around South Florida and the rest of the country are using the social networking tools to bring patients' families and the general public into operating rooms, sometimes sharing step-by-step medical procedures. They favor the real-time updates and videos as a way to reduce the fear factor of surgeries and educate people about the realities of certain procedures, especially new ones.

Earlier this year, surgeons at a Detroit hospital used Twitter to report the blow-by-blow steps of an operation to remove a kidney tumor. In any given month at JFK Medical Center in Atlantis, Dr. Beth-Ann Lesnikoski likes to use Twitter as an educational tool during surgeries to treat breast cancer. Last month, anyone with Internet access could watch live as Dr. Harlan Selesnick repaired a knee ligament at Doctors Hospital in Coral Gables, courtesy of the Baptist Health South Florida website, which posts webcasts of surgeries on a regular basis.

Some physicians, such as Dr. Camil Sader, a South Florida surgeon, have gone so far as to create their own iPhone apps.

BEDSIDE MANNERS

Wolf says he masks patients' identities by using just one of their initials, and the posts are vague enough that strangers may have trouble figuring out what kind of operation is being performed.

``At this point, it's really to make those patients, family and friends feel comfortable,'' says Wolf, who has been practicing for more than 20 years. ``We don't have a two-way conversation. The most important thing is for me to concentrate on what I'm doing.''

And if something were to go wrong in surgery? Wolf says he or a nurse would step out to speak with the family -- just like in the past.

``People think of social media as being cold,'' says a South Florida mother whose teenage daughter lay on the table when Wolf performed his first surgical tweeting session. ``Although I couldn't see it, I felt like I was close to my daughter. It's modern-day bedside manner.''

But not everyone is comfortable with physicians posting updates from the operating room -- especially when tweets and webcasts are available for public consumption.

``If it doesn't serve the patient, using it is unacceptable,'' says Dr. Erika Schwartz, an internist and medical director of the South Florida-based health insurance agency Cinergy Health. ``Sometimes, we all get carried away with the novelty of something.''

Still, Schwartz has a Facebook page and encourages patients to communicate with her via e-mail. She says she has cut some of her patients' healthcare costs by answering questions electronically instead of requiring office visits.

``The Internet is a great opportunity to create a better connection between doctors and patients,'' Schwartz says. ``I'm a big fan of social networking. It reaches people. There's a lot of information that can be shared. But it's got to be done with respect to the doctor-patient relationship.''

When a patient sent her a medical question using Facebook, Schwartz says, she made a point not to answer it there.

At JFK Medical Center in Palm Beach County, Lesnikoski's inaugural tweets were designed to contrast the effect of breast cancer on a woman in her 40s and a woman in her 90s; she was operating on one of each that July day. The only information she revealed about the patients was their age.

Before the surgery, Lesnikoski prepared a series of facts about breast cancer that could be tweeted to her 70-plus followers, along with basic information about the surgery, from her account, drbethjfk.

Lesnikoski, who has a background as a medical educator, says every surgery is a highly prescribed process, so there are traditional stopping points that can be used to tweet without interrupting the operating team's concentration. She says the hospital is now looking into tweeting during surgery as a way to keep families informed about a patient's progress.

``Surgeries can last from 45 minutes to 2 ½ hours,'' Lesnikoski says. ``These families will get updates every 20 minutes. The patients we've done our focus groups with have loved this concept.''

BRIEF IS BETTER

Dr. Donna Bilu Martin of South Beach Dermatology has been sharing skin facts and product information this year with her Twitter account followers. It's a compressed version of information she might send out in an e-mail -- but tweets don't clog up someone's inbox or get stuck in a spam filter.

``We can do this without being annoying,'' says the dermatologist, who tweets under the user name drbilumartin.

``The risk of melanoma -- the most deadly form of skin cancer -- increased by 75 percent in people who started using sunbeds regularly before age 30,'' she tweeted last month.

In another post, she shared information about a drug recently approved to hide wrinkles.

While Twitter identities are the latest tool in some doctors' medical bags, Dr. Camil Sader now considers his iPhone a medical necessity.

Sader, who specializes in laparoscopic surgery in Broward and Palm Beach counties, sometimes visits 180 patients at four hospitals in a single week. Tracking which patients he saw, their prognosis and other details about their care had become a paperwork nightmare.

When Sader couldn't find a simple and secure database program, he created one. It's an iPhone app called ``Dr. Rounds'' and it debuted in July. The information now stored in it can be formatted into an e-mail and be sent to his office manager for billing. Or it can be sent to other physicians watching over Sader's patients.

``It makes all the difference. At the end of the week, I press a few buttons and I get a report of what I did rather than shuffle through seven to 12 pieces of paper to see `How many times did I see Mr. Smith?'' '' Sader says.

BY NIRVI SHAH

9h: The Luxury Capsule Hotel

If you go to Tokyo, you may want to check into 9h—Nainawasu in Japanese—a luxury capsule hotel that is 9 stories tall, storing 125 capsules that use Panasonic's environmental and lighting control system.
According to Panasonic, their system controls lighting to guarantee "good sleeping." I don't know about you but, to me, "good sleeping" means a large bed, a good duvet, and someone special to spoon with all night. Still, if you want to get close to the experience of hibernation in a deep space vessel, this is the place to go!

Digital Tattoo Interface Turns Your Skin Into A Display

There are implants which are purely aesthetic, and then there's the Digital Tattoo Interface concept. It's a blood-powered electronic interface which is embedded under skin to mimic a tattoo, display videos, or act as a phone or computer.

As great as it seems, this concept is seriously creepy because it powers itself by converting the glucose and oxygen found in blood into electricity. Though somehow getting your blood sucked by a gadget is worth it for the endless potential applications. I'd probably just end up using it to tweet, but what would you do first with your implant?

That's a Bad Cough, Let's Examine Your Genome

In 2003, we mapped the human genome, the 20,000-ish genes we all share. It cost $3 billion. Today, you can literally spit in a cup, place the saliva in the mail and get a peek at your own.

Services like 23andMe (proponents of the above-mentioned "spit parties") and Navigenics both examine specific snippets of your genome for known severe genetic conditions like diabetes, bipolar disorder and certain types of cancers (as well as goofier stuff like freckling and "food preference").

Meanwhile, a boutique genome mapping company named Knome maps not just snippets of DNA but your entire genome, using a blood sample. When it's ready, they sit you down with a doctor to explain their findings.

This thoroughness comes at a cost, of course. Knome's service will run you the price of a Porsche, while their competitors bill up to only a thousand dollars, often less. And while we can technically map the entire genome, we certainly can't understand everything we see.

Ari Kiirikki, a VP at Knome we met at TEDMED, decodes the future of genomics in this brief Q&A:

Where's genomics now?

The first human genome, completed in 2003, took 13 years and nearly $3 billion to decode. Today, we can sequence and interpret an entire human genome in a matter of weeks for less than $70,000 (our current price is $68,000). New software and other analytical tools have put decades of accumulated scientific research at our fingertips, enabling us to analyze an individual's DNA in order to identify risk for thousands of diseases and other inherited traits and conditions.

What will we be doing in 5 years?

Within 5 years, the cost of sequencing an entire human genome is expected to plummet below $1,000, which will dramatically increase the demand for genetic sequence interpretation. The resulting increase in raw data will enable scientists to make new and important discoveries linking our DNA to health and disease, thereby further increasing the clinical utility of DNA analysis. This will enable us to finally deliver on the promise of personalized medicine by allowing scientists to begin the development medicines and individualized "cocktails" of therapeutics tailored to individual genetic profiles.

In 10?

Ten years from now, sequencing a human genome will cost less than $100. Within the decade, scientists are likely to have unraveled precisely how DNA interacts with our environment to impact our risk for developing disease. Expect DNA sequencing to become a regular part of your annual check-up along with the introduction of new therapeutics that can be prescribed to help delay or completely avoid getting specific diseases that you may be predisposed to.

And now we're stretching it, what about 20?

Every medicine you take will be tailored specifically to your genome. Every newborn child will be sequenced at birth, enabling future generations to use their DNA to guide the management of their health over their entire lifetime. Perhaps most amazingly, your DNA will be fully integrated into your everyday life. Genetics will move beyond the clinic, into a broad range of consumer products—snacks, vitamins, mouthwash, skin creams, dating services, etc., all optimized for your unique genetic profile.
-Mark Wilson

I can't speak for everyone here, but I could certainly go for a stick of gum that, instead of being labeled "grape" or "spearmint," simply stated, "You'll enjoy DNA-certified flavor, fatty."

[Image: Human chromosomes "painted" by flourescent dyes to detect abnormal exchange of genetic material frequently present in cancer. Chromosome paints also serve as valuable resources for other clinical and research applications.

Human Genome Program, U.S. Department of Energy, Human Genome Program Report, 1997.]

Women who 'let go' may have better luck with IVF

Women who cope with the stress of infertility treatment by relinquishing control are nearly twice as likely to get pregnant as those who don't adopt this strategy, research from Israel shows.

The findings, say the researchers, suggest that techniques like meditation, which is focused on teaching people to "let go," could help improve women's chances of getting pregnant.

There is increasing evidence that stress and emotional distress can influence in-vitro fertilization (IVF) success, Dr. Nathalie Rapoport-Hubschman of the Rabin Medical Center in Petah Tikva and her colleagues note in the journal Fertility and Sterility. But evidence on the effects of other psychological factors has been inconclusive, they add.

Rapoport-Hubschman and her team theorized that coping mechanisms, rather than traits like anxiety or hostility, might play a role in IVF success. While problem-focused coping is an effective way to deal with situations that are under a person's control, so-called "emotion-focused coping," which can involve humor, denial, relaxation, and letting go, might be a less stressful way to handle infertility treatment, they suggest.

The researchers looked at 88 women undergoing IVF, 21 of whom got pregnant. The only factors that independently influenced IVF success, the researchers found, were a woman's age and whether she had high "letting go" coping levels at the beginning of the study.

IVF treatment is "highly uncontrollable," Rapoport-Hubschman and her colleagues note in their report. "When control is not possible, focusing on and regulating one's associated emotions may be more effective."

Women who don't use this approach may spend more time worrying and thinking about whether or not they will get pregnant, the researchers note; this can affect multiple systems in the body.

"The next logical step would be to test whether meditation, aimed at helping women relinquish control and improve letting go, could have positive effects on reproductive outcomes in women undergoing infertility and IVF treatments," the researchers conclude.

SOURCE: Fertility and Sterility, October 2009.

Intending mothers fight for maternity leave following surrogacy

Following new UK government guidelines on surrogacy published last month aimed at improving the rights of surrogacy patients, Ministers are now facing a new legal challenge calling for further changes in the law.

Specialist fertility law firm, Gamble and Ghevaert, have written to Ministers demanding that the current rules, which prevent women who use surrogates from receiving maternity benefits, be changed. At present, only women who themselves go through a successful pregnancy are entitled to paid maternity leave and employment protection - even in cases where they are not the genetic parent. Thus, surrogate mothers are entitled to all maternity benefits. However, no such rights are available for parents who use a surrogate or adopt, leading campaigners to describe the current position as discriminatory.

Natalie Gamble, partner at Gamble and Ghevaert, explained the situation thus: 'The lack of right to maternity leave is tied up with the fact the surrogate mother is regarded as the mother…In any other circumstances you would get maternity leave. Women aren't going to need a whole year. What would make sense is a system where you have some sort of sharing arrangement [for maternity leave]'. She continued, 'We also need to take account of our modern human rights and anti-discrimination laws which do not allow unfair treatment of minority groups, however small they are'. At present, approximately 40 babies are born through surrogacy in Britain each year, mainly due to medical reasons which prevent some women from giving birth themselves.

Surrogacy in Britain is laden with problems. Surrogates in Britain may not receive payment for the service they render, apart from expenses. Furthermore, surrogacy agreements are not legally binding, meaning the surrogate mother has the right to keep the baby she gives birth to, even if the child is not genetically related to her, and she has been paid all expenses. These restrictions have led to couples going overseas to carry through a surrogacy arrangement. However this can also present difficulties; the worst case scenario is that a much-wanted baby is recognised in neither Britain, nor the country of it's birth.

Sharmy Beaumont, aged 33, is one of the few UK women who has become a parent with the help of a surrogate. Beaumont was born with a rare condition which meant her womb could not cope with carrying a child. After learning of this in her twenties, Beaumont contacted Surrogacy UK and was put in touch with her surrogate, Liz Stringer. After a successful surrogate pregnancy and the birth of her baby daughter, Isabelle, Beaumont was forced to take unpaid leave in order to care for her.

She says, 'My work have been understanding and have allowed me some leave to look after Isabelle…However, the fact that parents through surrogacy are not entitled to any maternity benefits to spend time with their babies is unfair and the Government has not recognised this'.

'I love being a mum,' Beaumont concludes, 'but the system is unfair'.

IVF Witness uses RFID to identify the sperm and eggs, and reduces the risk of lab errors in infertility treatment

A new software technology is helping to reduce the risk of laboratory errors in infertility treatment, by electronically identifying the sperm, eggs, resulting embryos and other materials used in in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment cycles. Using non-invasive Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), IVF Witness(TM) can track a patient's sperm, eggs and embryos during the course of treatment. If the wrong material is introduced in the lab environment, IVF Witness alerts the staff, via visual and audible signals, to help prevent mislabeling of any materials.

While laboratory errors are rare, by creating an automated system to minimize the chance for mix up, IVF Witness safeguards the infertility treatment process and gives patients peace of mind.

The IVF Witness is being used in infertility clinics worldwide, including leading clinics in the UK and United States. Since launching this new technology last year, over 20,000 infertility treatment cycles have employed IVF Witness to ensure the safety and security of patients' genetic material.

IVF Witness uses RFID tags, each containing a microchip that acts as a unique digital fingerprint, safely identifying samples at the outset and tracking them through the fertilization process. Each patient is given an RFID identity card, with a unique identification, that are used with all sample materials for that patient, including Petri dishes and test tubes used in a patient's treatment cycle. The entire system is electronically managed.

"Our aim was to develop a system that automatically tracks a patient's eggs, sperm and resulting embryos during an infertility treatment cycle, to reduce the risk of mislabeling or error," said Bill Brown, President of Research Instruments. "Infertility treatment is a very precise and personal process and IVF Witness helps to maintain the integrity and security of this process for both healthcare providers and patients."

"IVF is difficult enough for patients without the added worry of possible mix ups," said Kevin M. Johnson, MD, Medical Director, Overlake Reproductive Health in Seattle, WA. "We want to offer our patients complete peace of mind and that is why we have invested in the IVF Witness system for both of our laboratories."

International Organizations Call for More Safeguards

The American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) recently pledged to work with patient groups, policy makers and other stakeholders to develop systems to reduce the risk of errors. In the United Kingdom, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), the UK's regulatory body, is supporting the use of electronic witnessing in all IVF clinics. Currently, HFEA requires all IVF clinics to at least 'double witness' the IVF process, with two staff members manually double-checking the labeling and handling of all samples.

According to John Robinson, MD, Scientific Director of Hull IVF Unit in the UK, "IVF Witness, unlike the double witness process, does not require two members of staff to operate. It allows embryologists to work safely and effectively, without frequent interruptions to witness with other colleagues. In effect, it is providing a continual and very robust safety check, independent and additional to the many checks embryologists have to carry out."

"Several infertility practices in the US, and most major IVF clinics in the UK have already installed the IVF Witness, and are pleased with the additional reassurance it brings," added Brown. "Interest has also been considerable in countries such as China, Japan and the Middle East, where IVF Witness has recently been launched."

Fruity Bats of Lavasa

Why don't bats live alone?

They prefer to hang out with their friends!

A bat that was clinging to space shuttle Discovery’s external fuel tank during the countdown to launch the STS-119 mission remained with the spacecraft as it cleared the tower, analysts at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center concluded.Based on images and video, a wildlife expert who provides support to the center said the small creature was a free tail bat that likely had a broken left wing and some problem with its right shoulder or wrist. The animal likely perished quickly during Discovery’s climb into orbit. Because the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge coexists inside Kennedy Space Center, the launch pads have a number of measures available, including warning sirens, to deter birds and other creatures from getting too close. The launch team also uses radar to watch for birds before a shuttle liftoff.Nevertheless, the bat stayed in place and it was seen changing positions from time to time. Launch controllers spotted the bat after it had clawed onto the foam of the external tank as Discovery stood at Launch Pad 39A. The temperature never dropped below 60 degrees at that part of the tank, and infrared cameras showed that the bat was 70 degrees through launch.The final inspection team that surveys the outside of the shuttle and tank for signs of ice buildup observed the small bat, hoping it would wake up and fly away before the shuttle engines ignited. It was not the first bat to land on a shuttle during a countdown. Previously, one of the winged creatures landed on the tank during the countdown to launch shuttle Columbia on its STS-90 mission in 1998.Bats sure are intriguing creatures.

There has never been a TV series where the animal hero was a bat. Why not? Because people generally hate bats.For many Westerners, bats conjure up eerie visions of vampires and witches. The Chinese see these flying rodents as symbols of good luck. Fortunately, there are people working on behalf of bats - people who study bats; who respect bats; who love bats; who have, on occasion, TASTED bats.No, seriously, although bats look like evil creepy demonettes from hell that want to swoop down and bite us and give us rabies, the truth is that they are generally harmless flying mammals just like us who form colonies, care for their young, go to the mall, etc. Statistically, the average bat is far less likely to be rabid than Abu Azmi. Besides catching insects, bats play a critical role in pollinating certain plants, such as the agave, without which there would be NO TEQUILA.Even vampire bats have their human side. Researcher Ted Fleming told me that sometimes a female vampire bat will return from a successful bloodsucking trip and share her good fortune by "regurgitating to her roost mates."

Many bat species are endangered because of humans, some of whom view bats as actual food. A researcher once told me that in parts of Southeast Asia, bat soup and fried bat are considered tasty treats. In Guam, people have eaten pretty much all the bats. There's a bat shortage! You could become a bat rancher and get rich! Although you would need skilled bat wranglers. He also told me that the Gubu people of Papua, New Guinea (I am not making the Gubu people up), have a big feast wherein they boil up a mess of bats, cook them over coals and then eat them whole, after which they pick little bat teeth out of their mouths. He said that, as a researcher, he actually took a tiny bite of this dish.Incredibly, he did not say that it tasted like chicken!

So we see that bats have really received a "raw deal" from us humans. I think that from now on, we should all remember that bats are our friends, and we should make every effort to be nice to them while remaining at a safe distance! Also, if we go to a restaurant in Southeast Asia, we should make darned sure we know what we are ordering.

The Bats we see around Lavasa are the Megabats.They are also referred to as fruit bats, old world fruit bats, or flying foxes. The megabat, contrary to its name, is not always large: the smallest species is 6 centimeters (2.4 inches) long and thus smaller than some microbats. The largest reach 40 cm (16 inches) in length and attain a wingspan of 150 cm (5 feet), weighing in at nearly 1 kg (2.2 pounds). Most fruit bats have large eyes, allowing them to orient visually in the twilight of dusk and inside caves and forests.Fruit bats are frugivorous or nectarivorous, i.e., they eat fruits or lick nectar from flowers. Often the fruits are crushed and only the juices consumed. The teeth are adapted to bite through hard fruit skins. Large fruit bats must land in order to eat fruit, while the smaller species are able to hover with flapping wings in front of a flower or fruit.Frugivorous bats aid the distribution of plants (and therefore, forests) by carrying the fruits with them and spitting the seeds or eliminating them elsewhere. Nectarivores actually pollinate visited plants. They bear long tongues that are inserted deep into the flower; pollen thereby passed to the bat is then transported to the next blossom visited, pollinating it.Because of their large size and somewhat "spectral" appearance, fruit bats are sometimes used in horror movies to represent vampires or to otherwise lend an aura of spookiness. In reality, as noted above, the bats of this group are purely herbivorous. Some works of fiction are more in line with this fact, portraying fruit bats as sympathetic or even featuring them as characters. For example, in the book series Silverwing by Kenneth Oppel, a fruit bat named Java is one of the main characters in the final book of the series. In Stellaluna, a popular children's book by Janell Cannon, the story revolves around the plight of a young fruit bat who is separated from her mother. In The Winjin Pom, a 1991 puppetry-based tv-series by Richard Carpenter and Steve Bendelack, Frazer is an anthropomorphic fruit bat with a laid-back attitude and a taste for fresh fruits.

Female short-nosed fruit bats have been observed performing fellatio on their partners during copulation. Mating pairs spent more time copulating if the female did so.The video seen here is sexually explicit and was edited and soundtracked by the researchers.
Coming back to Lake Dasve, you see a lot of fruit-bats suspended from the trees at the Western end of the lake (see photos!). The best sightings of these fruitbats are towards sunset when they are in their element. They are handsome creatures with a very stylish flight path. If you take the Pontoon boat ride at closing time (5pm), you can have a personalized sighting of our very own Lavasa Fruity Bats! I have spent hours on hours photographing these fascinating mammals. In fact, legend has it that they have a photographic memory! A Weizmann Institute researcher from Israel however, is using bats to help reveal the secrets of human memory.

The Rehovot institute's Interface magazine wrote recently about bat researcher Dr. Nachum Ulanovsky, a neurobiologist who studies the most common Israeli bat species - the fruit bat. He says they are an excellent animal model for human memory not only because of their impressive spatial memory but also due to their highly developed senses and unique behaviors. Bats are being outfitted with sophisticated telemetry equipment transmitting data about the activity of single neurons or networks. These are used as the bats crawl or fly around in Ulanovsky's lab. A US company working with the Rehovot researcher developed the world's first global positioning and telemetry system that weighs only nine grams; as the average fruit bat can carry nine grams of equipment and still fly with ease, it is the perfect bat species for his experiments. To avoid disrupting the bats' natural behavior, Ulanovsky has arranged for the building of a large cave-like room with rough-hewn rocks in the ceiling.

His work, which is partially conducted in collaboration with the Hebrew University, promises to reveal new information not only on human memory but also on hippocampal diseases such as epilepsy and Alzheimer's.

We are opening an outlet at New Years which will serve only desserts - and guess what it is christened - Fruity Bat!

Older IVF Mums can bank on a Girl

A study of 13,000 Australian and New Zealand IVF mums found age had a profound effect on a baby's gender.

More than 10,000 babies are born through fertility treatment in Australia each year.

Most IVF mums are over 30, but researchers stopped short of saying the gender imbalance was causing a man shortage.

University of the NSW expert Prof Michael Chapman said in the normal population, 51 per cent of births were boys and 49 per cent girls.

The study of IVF mums showed women over 30 were 5 per cent more likely to have girls, while those under 30 were 5 per cent more likely to have boys.

And the probability of having a girl increased further with age. Women over 40 were up to 10 per cent more likely to have daughters than those under 30.

"So it's a substantial change ... and it will be having an impact on the gender ratio in Australia," Prof Chapman told a Fertility Society of Australia meeting in Perth yesterday.

He said it was the largest study of its kind, and provided clear evidence of an increased ratio of girls from older women after assisted conception.

Prof Chapman said the gender shift was not dramatic enough to create a serious shortage of men in the community, but it indicated IVF could change genetics.

"IVF certainly has some impact on the expression of the Y chromosome, and more importantly whether it has an impact in other ways on the genetics of a child," he said.

The reason for the link between maternal age and the sex ratio of babies was not yet clear, he said.

Royal blood disorder identified

Scientists have discovered that the so-called 'Royal disease' that afflicted Queen Victoria's descendants was a very rare form of haemophilia. By analysing the degraded DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) taken from the bones of what are believed to be the last children of Russian Tsar, Nicholas II, scientists at the University of Massachusetts, US, discovered a mutation occurring in F9 on the X chromosome responsible for the production of Factor IX, a clotting agent. A malfunction in this production is the cause of haemophilia B.

Termed 'Christmas disease,' after Stephen Christmas who suffered from the disease in the 50s, haemophilia B affects one in 20,000-34,000 males, according to The Times newspaper. The disorder is passed through the maternal line but it only manifests itself in males, as they only have one X chromosome. It would be very rare for a female to be more than a carrier of the mutation as both X chromosomes would need to be affected.

Dr Evgeny Rogaev, who led the study published in the journal Science, commented, 'We have resolved a medical mystery from the past.' Although it was known that Queen Victoria's descendants suffered from a blood-clotting disorder, it was not known exactly what the condition was. In the publication the authors explain that: 'We identified the likely disease-causing mutation by applying genomic methodologies (multiplex target amplification and massively parallel sequencing) to historical specimens from the Romanov branch of the royal family.' The 'Royal disease' is now extinct, say the authors, but it was passed across the Royal families throughout Europe including Spain and Russia. It is believed the disorder originated spontaneously from Queen Victoria, whose son, Leopold, died after bleeding from a fall. The Times explained that whereas nowadays patients with haemophilia B are given synthetic clotting agents, back in 1905 Tsarina Alexandra turned to the infamous 'psychic' Rasputin.

Tsar Nicholas II and his family were murdered during the Russian Revolution in 1918. It was since believed that two of his children may have escaped, Alexei and Anastasia, but their bones were discovered in the Ural mountains in 2007. Subsequent testing confirmed the identity of the remains and that they too had been murdered.

Fatal heart condition passed on by sperm donor

The American Medical Association has returned the issue of sperm donor screening to the public eye after publishing an article detailing the transmission of a rare and deadly heart defect to nine offspring of a registered sperm donor. The Los Angeles man (42), who is the genetic father of twenty-four children, was given a full medical check, along with tests for infectious diseases and provided a full medical history when he originally donated in the early 1990s but his genetic condition was not diagnosed until one of the children, aged 2, died suddenly from a previous undiagnosed heart problem.

The condition, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, leads to a thickening of the tissues in the heart, reducing the ability to pump blood. The problem affects around one in 500 people but, according to Dr Heidi Reim of Harvard Medical School and co-author of the article, many more are likely to carry the genetic defect without apparent symptoms.

The San Francisco sperm bank that passed the sperm on has now begun testing all donors with an electrocardiogram to ensure that transmission does not occur again. The article suggested that all clinics should consider implementing such a test as part of the battery of tests each donor engages in. While testing of donors is covered only by voluntary guidelines intended to rule out transmission of infectious and heritable diseases the degree to which genetic conditions are tested for varies widely and is often for rarer, higher profile conditions than hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.

If diagnosed, the condition is treatable through medication, surgery and the implantation of a defibrillator to restart the heart if it stops. Such surgery has now been performed on one of the afflicted children who was already symptomatic and the others are in receipt of regular observation to monitor their condition's development.

Best yet - The Golden Years???

Top 10 Tiger Woods Jokes

One:

Apparently, the only person who can beat Tiger Woods with a golf club is his wife



Two:

What's the difference between a car and a golf ball? Tiger can drive a ball 400 yards



Three:

Tiger Woods was injured in a car accident as he pulled out of his driveway early Friday morning. It was Woods' shortest drive since an errant tee shot at the US Open.



Four:

What was Tiger Woods doing out at 2.30 in the morning? He'd gone clubbing



Five:

Tiger Woods crashed into a fire hydrant and a tree. He couldn’t decide between a wood and an iron



Six:

Perhaps Tiger should be using a driver?



Seven:

This is the first time Tiger’s ever failed to drive 300 yards



Eight:

Apparently, Tiger admitted this crash was the closest shave he’s ever had. So Gillette has dropped his contract.



Nine:

Tiger Woods wasn't seriously injured in the crash. He's still below par though



Ten:

Tiger Woods is so rich that he owns lots of expensive cars. Now he has a hole in one.