Monthly Archives: January 2015

Yesterday I was struck by a Forbes headline, 97% Of Climate Scientists Agree Is 100%Wrong. The post questions the way Australian science popularizer John Cook arrived at this often-quoted number to illustrate the scientific consensus that human activity is contributing to global warming.

I agree with one statement in the post, which is the premise that in science, logic and explanation trump scientific opinion. I would have said logic and evidence, but thats close enough. And yet, the piece focuses primarily on the derivation of the 97% statistic, rather than on the logic and explanation behind the concern over human-generated global warming and the widespread fear among scientists that global warming will indeed prove dangerous and costly. I decided to expand on this post by giving some climate scientists a chance weigh in.

1: The oceans are getting warmer.

Measurements of global air temperatures show a long-term rise over recent decades, but the rise isnt steady. Like the stock market, it jumps up and down on shorter time scales. There was a spike in 1998, for example. If you measure global warming from that year onward, you get a distorted picture the overall trend, said Penn State climatologist Richard Alley. The trend over decades is what we should focus on.

Whats even more worrisome, he explained, is that air temperatures only give part of the picture. The real concern with the buildup of greenhouse gases is that were getting more energy from the sun than were sending back into space, he said. That energy, he said, is not only warming the atmosphere, its also melting ice and warming the oceans.

The oceans have warmed by about .3 degrees F since 1969, according to NASA. How much greenhouse gas-related heating goes into the ocean depends on currents known as El Nino and La Nina, he said. Those currents affect the surface temperatures of the oceans, with warmer water coming to the surface during the El Nino phase. In 1998, El Nino switched to La Nina. That shift caused cooler water to come to the surface and allowed the oceans to absorb heat like a big sponge.

During the years since, the measured air temperature rise has flattened. Some people have used that trend to argue that global warming has stopped. It hasnt. The currents have tended to oscillate, said Alley, so eventually the oceans will switch back to the El Nino pattern, after which that warmer water will come back to the surface and force more heat to go into the atmosphere.

2: Theres experimental evidence showing that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere acts to direct heat back toward Earth heat that would otherwise have been lost to space. Thats the greenhouse effect. And theres ample data showing that weve changed the composition of the atmosphere enough to alter the global climate.

In fact, human activity has nearly doubled our atmospheres load of carbon dioxide since the Industrial Revolution started. The basics behind this are the laws of physics, said Ben Horton a professor of marine and coastal sciences at Rutgers University.

The reason we accept that fossil fuel burning is increasing CO2 and warming the planet comes down to basic physics and chemistry thats more than 100 years old, said Penn State University climatologist Michael Mann. The fact that were measuring the effects is validation of the prediction.

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Four Reasons To Worry About Global Warming: Beyond Scientific Consensus

IMAGE:This is Dr. Armen Goenjian. view more

Credit: UCLA

Why do some people develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) while others who suffered the same ordeal do not? A new UCLA discovery may shed light on the answer.

UCLA scientists have linked two gene variants to the debilitating mental disorder, suggesting that heredity influences a person's risk of developing PTSD. Published in the February 2015 edition of the Journal of Affective Disorders, the findings could provide a biological basis for diagnosing and treating PTSD more effectively in the future.

"Many people suffer with post-traumatic stress disorder after surviving a life-threatening ordeal like war, rape or a natural disaster," explained lead author Dr. Armen Goenjian, a researcher at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA. "But not everyone who experiences trauma suffers from PTSD. We investigated whether PTSD has genetic underpinnings that make some people more vulnerable to the syndrome than others."

In 1988, Goenjian, an Armenian American, raced to Spitak, Armenia, after a 6.8 magnitude earthquake devastated the country. The temblor leveled entire towns and cities, killing more than 25,000 Armenians, two-thirds of them children.

With support from the Armenian Relief Society, Goenjian and his colleagues helped establish a pair of psychiatric clinics that treated earthquake survivors for 21 years. A dozen multigenerational families in northern Armenia agreed to allow their blood samples to be sent to UCLA, where Goenjian and his colleagues combed the DNA of 200 individuals for genetic clues to psychiatric vulnerability.

In 2012, his team discovered that PTSD was more common in survivors who carried two gene variants associated with depression. In the current study, Goenjian and first author Julia Bailey, an adjunct assistant professor of epidemiology at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, focused on two genes called COMT and TPH-2 that play important roles in brain function.

COMT is an enzyme that degrades dopamine, a neurotransmitter that controls the brain's reward and pleasure centers, and helps regulate mood, thinking, attention and behavior. Too much or too little dopamine can influence various neurological and psychological disorders.

TPH-2 controls the production of serotonin, a brain hormone that regulates mood, sleep and alertness -- all of which are disrupted in PTSD. Antidepressants called SSRIs, or selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors, which were designed to treat depression, target serotonin. More physicians are prescribing SSRIs to treat disorders beyond depression, including PTSD.

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UCLA study IDs two genes that boost risk for post-traumatic stress disorder

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Newswise Why do some people develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) while others who suffered the same ordeal do not? A new UCLA discovery may shed light on the answer.

UCLA scientists have linked two gene variants to the debilitating mental disorder, suggesting that heredity influences a persons risk of developing PTSD. Published in the February 2015 edition of the Journal of Affective Disorders, the findings could provide a biological basis for diagnosing and treating PTSD more effectively in the future.

Many people suffer with post-traumatic stress disorder after surviving a life-threatening ordeal like war, rape or a natural disaster, explained lead author Dr. Armen Goenjian, a researcher at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA. But not everyone who experiences trauma suffers from PTSD. We investigated whether PTSD has genetic underpinnings that make some people more vulnerable to the syndrome than others.

In 1988, Goenjian, an Armenian American, raced to Spitak, Armenia, after a 6.8 magnitude earthquake devastated the country. The temblor leveled entire towns and cities, killing more than 25,000 Armenians, two-thirds of them children.

With support from the Armenian Relief Society, Goenjian and his colleagues helped establish a pair of psychiatric clinics that treated earthquake survivors for 21 years. A dozen multigenerational families in northern Armenia agreed to allow their blood samples to be sent to UCLA, where Goenjian and his colleagues combed the DNA of 200 individuals for genetic clues to psychiatric vulnerability.

In 2012, his team discovered that PTSD was more common in survivors who carried two gene variants associated with depression. In the current study, Goenjian and first author Julia Bailey, an adjunct assistant professor of epidemiology at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, focused on two genes called COMT and TPH-2 that play important roles in brain function.

COMT is an enzyme that degrades dopamine, a neurotransmitter that controls the brains reward and pleasure centers, and helps regulate mood, thinking, attention and behavior. Too much or too little dopamine can influence various neurological and psychological disorders.

TPH-2 controls the production of serotonin, a brain hormone that regulates mood, sleep and alertness all of which are disrupted in PTSD. Antidepressants called SSRIs, or selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors, which were designed to treat depression, target serotonin. More physicians are prescribing SSRIs to treat disorders beyond depression, including PTSD.

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Study IDs Two Genes That Boost Risk for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com Your Universe Online

While severe trauma can cause post-traumatic stress disorder, not everyone who experiences such events develop PTSD, and now UCLA scientists believe they know why.

Dr. Armen Goenjian, a researcher at the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA, and his colleagues report in the February edition of the Journal of Affective Disorders that they have linked to gene variants to the trauma-related anxiety disorder.

The findings, they explained, could provide a biological basis for diagnosing and treating PTSD more effectively in the future. It could also lead to faster diagnoses for patients, they added.

Many people suffer with post-traumatic stress disorder after surviving a life-threatening ordeal like war, rape or a natural disaster, Dr. Goenjian explained. But not everyone who experiences trauma suffers from PTSD. We investigated whether PTSD has genetic underpinnings that make some people more vulnerable to the syndrome than others.

Dr. Goenjian, an Armenian American, travelled to that country after a 6.8 magnitude earthquake leveled towns and cities and killed over 25,000 people in 1988. He and his colleagues, with the assistance of the Armenian Relief Society, established a pair of psychiatric clinics that provided treatment to survivors of the earthquake for more than two decades.

Twelve multigenerational families in northern Armenia gave permission to have their blood samples sent to UCLA, where Dr. Goenjian and his colleagues analyzed the DNA of 200 men and women in search of genetic clues to psychiatric vulnerability.

In April 2012, research by his team revealed that that PTSD was more common in survivors who carried two gene variants associated with depression. Now, along with UCLA Fielding School of Public Health adjunct assistant professor of epidemiology Julia Bailey, Dr. Goenjian focused on two genes (COMT and TPH-2) known to play key roles in the function of the brain.

COMT, the researchers explain, is an enzyme that degrades the neurotransmitter dopamine, which controls the reward and pleasure center of the brain and helps regulate mood. Too much or too little dopamine can influence various neurological and psychological disorders, they said.

TPH-2, on the other hand, controls the production of the brain hormone serotonin, which regulates mood, sleep and alertness. All three are affected by PTSD, and a type of antidepressant known as selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRIs) target the hormone to treat depression. An increasing number of doctors are prescribing them to treat PTSD, the study authors noted.

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Two genes linked to predisposition for PTSD