Five worthless species in need of saving

s a species worth saving if it offers no benefit to humans? The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has drawn up a list of 100 threatened animals, plants and fungi that it says have unique values which make them worth saving. Take a look and decide for yourself. Hannah Krakauer

Tonkin snub-nosed monkey

There are only an estimated 250 Tonkin snub-nosed monkeys (Rhinopithecus avunculus) left hiding out in their native north-eastern Vietnam.

They spend most of their time in tropical evergreen forests, where they eat soft leaves, fruits and seeds.

Despite their sceptical facial expressions, they are not shy – and that increases their chances of being shot by human hunters.

(Image: Le Khac Quyet/University of Colorado, Boulder)

 

Bullock's false toad

This Chilean frog (Telmatobufo bullocki) is so rare that a 10-year search turned up only one adult in its final year.

The tadpoles eat algae off rocks in rivers, and the adults tend to stick to the same fast-flowing streams. Clear-cutting and other environmental damage fill the water with silt, making it difficult for the tadpoles to feed.

(Image: Andres Charrier)

 

Underground orchid

Only a dedicated digger will have a chance to see this beautiful orchid (Rhizanthella gardneri), which spends its entire life underground. That includes the bloom, which consists of around 150 tiny flowers.

Land clearing for agriculture in Western Australia, combined with climate change, has knocked the number of individuals down to below 100.

(Image: Kingsley Dixon)

 

Kaiser's spotted newt

This vibrant newt has even more names than it does colours, though it is most commonly called Kaiser's spotted newt (Neurergus kaiseri). The adults are tiny, reaching only 10 to 14 centimetres in length.

Extensive firewood collection and damming have put their habitat at risk, but their biggest threat is actually the pet trade. Many adults are legally exported out of their native Iran, and others have been found on sale in markets in the capital, Tehran.

(Image: R. D. Bartlett)

 

Araripe manakin

The Araripe manakin (Antilophia bokermanni) was described only in 1988. Since then it has been found in three tiny regions on the north-eastern slope of the Chapada do Araripe in Brazil.

It prefers humid spots in the forest, sticking close to rivers and streams. Fewer than 800 individuals exist, and they are often found in mated pairs.

Forest clearing for farming of maize, bananas, beans and tomatoes, along with cattle raising and home construction, are the biggest threats to the species.

(Image: Ciro Albano)

 

Cannabis anti-convulsant shakes up epilepsy treatment

The versatile cannabis plant may have a new use: it could be used to control epileptic seizures with fewer side effects than currently prescribed anti-convulsants.

Ben Whalley at the University of Reading, UK, and colleagues worked with GW Pharmaceuticals in Wiltshire, UK, to investigate the anti-convulsant properties of cannabidivarin (CBDV), a little-studied chemical found in cannabis and some other plants.

There is "big, historical, anecdotal evidence" that cannabinoids can be used to control human seizures, says Whalley, but the "side-effect baggage" means there have been relatively few studies of its pharmaceutical effect on this condition.

The team investigated the effectiveness of CBDV – one of around 100 non-psychoactive cannabinoids found in cannabis – as an anti-convulsant. They induced seizures in live rats and mice that had been given the drug. These animals experienced less severe seizures and lower mortality compared with animals given a placebo. The drug also had fewer side effects and was better tolerated than three of the most widely prescribed anticonvulsants.

Epileptic seizures affect about one per cent of the population. Left uncontrolled, they can lead to depression, cognitive decline and death. If you control the seizures, says Whalley, "the chances of death drop away completely". The decision about whether to test the drug in humans will be made next year.

"This is a very positive result," says Ley Sander, an epilepsy specialist at University College London, UK, who was not involved in the study. "We need new drugs," he says. "For 20-30 per cent of people with epilepsy, nothing seems to work."

But he urges caution. "The animals in the study are made epileptic," he says, which is not how epilepsy is acquired in humans. He adds that what you see in animal models doesn't always translate directly into humans.

"Most compounds showing promise in preclinical studies never reach market," warns Mark Richardson of the Epilepsy Research Group at King's College London. "But I agree that these results justify progressing further down the drug development pipeline."

5 Ways Technology Helps Us to Consume Less

Technology has improved our lives in many ways and not just through making thing faster and more convenient. We are better connected and better informed. Technology lets us travel the globe and get close to wildlife without leaving our desk, our cell phones can help us to make better shopping decisions and software helps us to be more energy efficient. It also has served to dematerialize our lives. Here are five of the major ways that technology helps us to consume less and lighten our environmental footprints.

1. Digitization

Probably the biggest technological advance that has helped us to consume less is the digitization of so much of our lives. Think of all the things that we now overwhelmingly use digital versions of instead of physical items: music, books, movies, phone books, photos, letters, maps, encyclopedias and on and on. While the physical versions of these things still exist, overwhelmingly we now favor the instant digital version.
When we replace these things with digital versions, we consume less actual stuff. That translates to fewer resources used to make things and less energy used to manufacture and transport them. When we use our computer or smartphone to consume music, we prevent the use of resources to make physical CDs, their jewel cases and liner notes; when we read an e-book, we prevent the need for pulp for the paper and the energy used to print and ship them.
When your entire music library is contained within an iPod or smartphone, or an unlimited amount of knowledge is just a Google search away, your footprint is so much lower than if you had consumed the same amount of music in physical form or bought the equivalent amount of books.

2. Consolidation

Another major way that technology is helping us to consume less is through the consolidation of things within one gadget. This has been especially noteworthy in the past few years with the rise of smartphones and tablets. These technologies let us carry just one device that serves several purposes, as opposed to many. Smartphones serve as phones, music players, personal planners, GPS devices, cameras, watches and alarm clocks and more. Tablets do all that plus they have the ability serve as e-readers, dvd players, gaming consoles and pretty much any type of media device.
For some, tablets are even replacing home computers.
These devices can act as several gadgets in one, and replace the need for many individual things. In fact, the more you can use the features of your smartphone or tablet for instead of buying additional gadgets, the lower your environmental footprint is. We've talked before about how smartphones can help us to be better consumers, but the phones themselves help us to consume less in the first place by filling so many needs at once.

3. Resell/Reuse

Buying second-hand and reselling your things when you're done with them is one of the best ways to reduce your environmental footprint. The practice helps to curb the consumption of resources and energy for making new things when used items continue to be marketed and used.
It's always been possible to walk into your local thrift or second-hand shop and find used items, but technology has opened up a global marketplace for selling and buying used goods. Ebay and Craigslist connect buyers and sellers in a way that had never been possible before. Whatever you're in the market for, there is an easy way to go online and find a used version, from sofas to clothes to iPads.

Electronics-recycling sites help to extend the life of our gadgets by buying, refurbishing and reselling them. Sites like NextWorth, Gazelle and TechForward all give us easy ways to conserve resources and energy by keeping working devices out of the landfill and reducing demand for new gadgets off the assembly line, usually with just a click of a few buttons.

4. Community Sharing

Something else that technology has really allowed to expand to a much greater scale is community sharing. It's one thing to get to know your neighbors and occasionally share items with them and its another to share things on a city-wide, national or even global scale.
Services like ZipCar, where people can set up online appointments to borrow cars in their city by the hour or by the day, lets many users share a small number of cars, instead of each person owning one. Netflix lets people consume DVDs that way and Borrow Lenses lets photographers and filmmakers rent camera, video and audio equipment for their projects instead having to buy it.
Ride sharing service RideJoy has an app that instantly connects drivers and those who need a ride based on city or route they're traveling. City-wide bike sharing programs use let anyone access community bikes from kiosks located around the city. All you need is a credit card.
These types of community sharing services are able to have a far reach thanks to technology and, especially in urban environments, they open up the possibility of only sharing major things like cars and bikes instead of owning, cutting down on not just individual consumption, but community consumption as well.

5. Customization

Most recently technology has really helped us to customize the things that we make and buy, leading to consumption that is less wasteful. Here at TreeHugger, we're huge fans of 3D printing, an innovation that defines customization. 3D printing allows you to design and make exactly what type of object you need or at the exact time you need it, using only the exact amount of materials required and without the need to ship it anywhere.
The possibilities are also endless. 3D printing can be used to make replacement parts for repairing things instead of buying all new items. Also, making things one at a time in the spot where they will be consumed means no wasteful packaging or excess products made on an assembly line that may never be bought. Right now, 3D printers are still more of a specialist product, but I can't imagine that it won't be too long before they are accessible to everyone.
Another service that I would also include here is Kickstarter. The crowd-funding site that lets people support the launch of products and innovations of their choosing has been allowing us to customize what ideas we want brought to the marketplace. The site allows us to put our money behind things that are truly needed in this world and are sure to be used, unlike the random, endless rows of plastic things found at big box stores that may never really have any usefulness or any buyers and represent heaps of wasted resources and energy.

Technology Has Helped to Dematerialize Our Lives, but It's Still Up to Us

Technology has in many ways allowed us to consume less from physical stuff to energy and resources, but all of those advances won't matter if our behavior is still one of over consumption. Smartphones and tablets may consolidate our devices and gadgets, but if we update our phones and tablets each year or every time a new model is released, we're voiding a lot of that benefit.
Community sharing services are out there, but to make an impact we have to use them more instead of more often choosing individual ownership.
All in all, it's still up to us to use these technologies to their potential and be thoughtful about what we buy, what we use and to do our best to get by with less.

Science And Technology: How Nigeria Remains At Odds

Science and technology has made the world look more like something out of a fairy tale, but how many of those who now toy with all kinds of technological devices really do realize the wizardry of science and technology? As a young man growing up, I used to hear stories of witches and wizards, their magical  powers and how they flew at night and used diabolical means to inflict harm on whoever they choose.  Indeed some Nigerian communities still routinely torture and even kill those accused of being witches or wizards.
But the ignorant beliefs and tales of witchcraft in primitive societies such as Nigeria pales in comparison to the real practical wizardry of science and technology. Many of us regularly employ the services of aeroplanes to fly to different destinations without ever pausing to ponder the wizardry of having such a large and heavy device flying effortlessly at unbelievable speeds for hours on end, with hundreds of passengers. Try throwing up your mobile phone or shoe as light as they are and see how fast it will fall and hit the ground.
If a mobile phone or shoe can  hit the ground that fast, imagine the miracle in having an object as large and as heavy as an aeroplane laden with so many passengers, luggage’s and cargo hurtling  through the sky like a giant  bird and you will begin to better appreciate the wizardry of science and technology. Jump into the sea and you will sink before you can blink your eyes, but a large ship, loaded with container cargoes weighing hundreds of tons will sail the sea without sinking for weeks and months.
Science and technology has gone as far as probing other planets in search of human life. Imagine the space vessel or rocket that travels through space, breaking through the earth’s crust on its way to other planets. Imagine the breathless speed at which the rocket travels and the unending wizardry of science and technology becomes ever more evident. The revolution in the wizardry of science and technology has continued at a dizzying pace that it is becomingly increasingly difficult to catch up for many. Among the recent technologies is the GSM mobile phone technology that has made mobile phones practically available to all and sundry.
Another recent entry is the “email,” an electronic mail system that is delivered immediately to your electronic mailbox. This invention has kept friends and family in constant communication and almost eliminated the use of good old conventional letters. For academics and general research, the “Google” search engine, an electronic library has virtually put all possible information at the fingertips of every individual.  From history to medicine, bomb making to love making, there is practically no information you cannot find on the Google library. Other electronic search engines such as Yahoo, MSN have since joined the bandwagon, further enriching the cyber world.
For drivers, life has been made much easier by “Satellite navigators,” an electronic device that locates addresses. With a Satellite navigation system, it is possible to trace routes and addresses that would ordinarily have been frustrating and time consuming to locate. For long lost friends and potential new friends, “Facebook” has become the new craze where old friends hook-up and new friends are made.  Together with similar sites such as Twitter and Netlog, these highly interactive sites where photo albums, events and other activities are shared have virtually created a whole new world on the web.
Movie and music lovers, news and sports enthusiasts alike have come to cherish “YouTube,” an online video machine that amasses a limitless array of videos on practically every issue under the sun, keeping individuals glued to their screens for hours on end.  The wizardry in these technologies goes far beyond the tales of the mythical exploits of witches and wizards I was told as a child.  At the speed with which new technologies continue to be churned out, it numbs the mind to imagine what new innovation we are going to be toying with by this time next year.
Yet, even as we await new technologies and as nations across the world continue to make technological progress in leaps and bounds that has brought the many solutions  and pleasures we now enjoy and even take for granted,  Nigeria remains at odds with modernity. Still at the crossroads of civilization, it beggars belief that in spite of the solutions technology has provided, Nigeria has ironically edged Nigeria further into darkness, incapable of generating electricity. There are no roads, no pipe borne water, no functional hospitals to name but a few.
Any surprises?  The criminal leaders that hibernate in Aso rock are more interested in robbing and wrecking the nation to be bothered about any investments in science and technology. As a consequence, Nigeria has remained stuck in the 19^th century while other nations are racing across the 21^st and into the 22^nd century.