Monthly Archives: April 2017

A fossilised ancient creature boasting huge pincers resembling can-openers, a hinged two-piece shell and more than 50 pairs of legs has been discovered, shedding light on the evolutionary past of a huge and diverse group of animals.

Researchers say the creature, thought to have lived about 507 million years ago during the Cambrian period, offers insights into the early body plan of mandibulates a group that encompasses creatures including millipedes, crabs and ants. The group takes its name from the presence of mouth parts known as mandibles, which the animals use to help hold or eat food.

Because it is such a big group, the question is why was it so successful, why did it manage to diversify so much?, said Cedric Aria, co-author of the study from the Nanjing Institute for Geology and Palaeontology, in China. We really lacked an insight into the characters, the traits, that really were fundamental to that diversification.

The sturdy-looking creature, adds Aria, was about 10cm long and would have been found walking on the seafloor, perhaps occasionally swimming, and probably fed on soft-bodied animals that were adept at escaping or hiding.

The prey, says Aria, would have been caught by the animal using its two large pincers. When I first started to study this animal I really thought that they looked like one of those old can openers, he said.

The prey, he adds, would then have been passed to the animals many legs under the body which have spine-like features at their base. The spines might have helped to crush the prey and the remains of that prey would have been brought back to the front where the mandibles would have cut the flesh into small pieces and so that facilitated digestion, he said. The mandibles would have been a revolutionary tool to process food.

Previously discovered fossils of similar creatures with two-part shells had lacked details around the head, including evidence of mandibles. As a result, such fossilised animals had been proposed to be early forms of a category of creatures known as true arthropods. This category includes both mandibulates and other invertebrates that have an exoskeleton and segmented body and appendages, including spiders and the extinct marine creatures called trilobites.

But the new finding, published in the journal Nature, squashes the idea. Rather than occurring at the base of the true arthropod family tree, the new discovery suggests that these creatures with two-part shells actually appeared later in the family tree and are in fact early mandibulates.

It might reflect the body plan of the ancestor of that super mega-group, said Aria of the new find, adding that the presence of legs with a segmented, spiked base in the creature was an important feature. Those segmented bases of the limbs actually explain the diversity of the limbs in mandibulates and they explain the origin of the mandibles themselves, said Aria.

Unearthed in recent years at a site near Marble Canyon in the Canadian Rockies of British Columbia, the newly discovered fossilised creature has been dubbed Tokummia katalepsis a nod to the Tokumm Creek that is surrounded by the Marble Canyon and the Greek word for grasping.

Graham Budd, professor of palaeobiology at Uppsala University in Sweden who was not involved in the study, cautiously welcomed the new discovery. If it is true, [this research shows] that a large number of quite important fossils from the Cambrian are actually all close relatives of the modern day crustaceans and insects, he said. This is very significant because for the first time it allows us to really understand the origins of this really important group of organisms.

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Pincer-wielding 507m-year-old fossil sheds light on evolution of crabs - The Guardian

Its a great time to be in information technology.

While that statement is true, not everyone clearly understands why (or perhaps has the fortitude to make it so). In the face of a massive movement to public cloudby 2020, 92 percent of worlds workloads will be in cloud, with 68 percent in public and 32 percent in privatemany in IT feel their value in the workplace eroding along with their identity.

That feeling doesnt need to be reality. Businesses are changing the way they operate and are transforming to leverage IT more strategically. IT has a real opportunity toleadthis transformation, not let the transformationhappen to them.

IT has led digital transformations before and can do it again. About 10 years ago, the video security surveillance industry underwent a digital transformation wherein video security systems transitioned from coaxial cable networks to IP-based Ethernet, from analog video on tape to digitally encoded video on disk, and from physically separate networks to consolidating into IT-run data centers. IT was the digital leader here, bringing many improvements to the way in which physical security functions. At the end of the day, the physical security guard remained and in combination with their IT partners, delivered on their charter more efficiently than before.

IT has an opportunity to drive digital transformation again, particularly as many businesses are changing the way they operate. Concerned with disrupting or being disrupted, many businesses are pivoting to become software companies.

Yes, software is eating the world. As I arrive to the SolarWinds corporate headquarters each work day, Im reminded of that fact by literal exampleAMD, a leading chip designer, has shrunk its operations to share its campus with SolarWinds, a global software company.

As businesses shift, CIOs are poised to help IT switch from a cost center to asource of differentiated value in terms of how a business might differentiate from other players in their industry.CIOs are positioned to be in a highly strategic, visible and collaborativeposition within the company.

A recent Harvard Business Review studyshows that while nearly half of lines-of-business leader respondents said they would like to learn more about digital trends from theirCIO, closeto two-fifths said their CIO does not seek to educate and empower line-of-business leaders whenit comes to all things digital. Over a third of the organizations polled said IT does not provide usefulknowledge about technologyor understand which digital knowledge is important to specific business functions. Expectations of CIOs are changing, and it behooves IT to rise to the challenge.

The white knuckles of IT needs to relax their grip and embrace internal customers as their lifeline, not shun those running shadow ITbe an accelerator, not an inhibitor. Understand thatconveniencedrives retail consumer purchasing behavior more so than price. Considering those same individuals bring their consumer behaviors (convenience =agility) to the workplace, its no wonder shadow IT is prevalent and always lurking. IT needs to develop holistic strategies in alignment with the business mission. IT organizations that are digital leaders dont just let hybridhappen to them. In fact, digital leaders are three times more likely to have a comprehensive, enterprisewide strategy for hybrid cloud, according to IBM's report "Growing Up Hybrid: Accelerating Digital Transformation."

Hybrid IT strategies may include outsourcing commodity functions. IT can be the providerandthe trusted broker by enabling lines of business with application support, cloud design, not necessarily equipment. A foremost focus on empowerment of the business missionwhether sourcing or providingis how businesses will leverage IT to renovate I&O and innovate.

In some cases, that strategy may involve factions of IT reporting into different lines of businesses (e.g., marketing and finance). Strategies of hybrid IT organizations embracing public and private cloud are evolving from infrastructure-centric thinking to application-centric thinking, recognizing that operations automation is friend, not foe.

Implementing a strategy is not without challenge. Less than a third of the ITorganizations polled in a recent SolarWindsstudy consider that they have adequate resources to manage hybrid IT environments. Fortunately, any business can excel at digital leadership andmanagement regardless of its size or budget. Strategies may consideraggressively retiring legacy technology where the application and business case allow.

Often its not technology impeding implementation of strategy, but people and process. CIOs can mitigate inhibitors from evolving into a hybrid IT organization by helping their people set aside fear, insecurity and politics. CIOs need to help individuals within their organization to understand their changing jobs, migrate to new roles, and be champions of change in their organizations while continuing to ensure security and continuity.

The digital transformation of today is a hybrid evolution of IT. The broad-sweeping influence technology has on how businesses operate continues to accelerate and leaves no industry untouched. Organizations are learning how to become software companies. Established businesses are being turned upside down and inside out, as new players have a software-centric view of the world.

Current market dynamics are fundamentally changing therelationship businesseshave withtheir ITorganization, and IT must evolve because business leaders need IT more than ever. Its an exciting future ahead anda great time to be in information technology!

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The hybrid evolution of IT - Network World

BBC News

'World's oldest fungus' raises evolution questions BBC News Fungus-like life forms have been found in rocks dating back 2.4 billion years. The fossils, drilled from rocks that were once beneath the seafloor, resemble living fungi. Scientists say the discovery could push back the date for the oldest fungi by one ... and more »

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'World's oldest fungus' raises evolution questions - BBC News

AT&T is causing an uproar with its announced plans to launch what it is calling 5G Evolution in more than 20 markets by year-end. The company said 5G Evolution is currently available in Austin, Texas, which is a test location for AT&Ts 5G work and will soon be available in Indianapolis, Indiana, and several more markets including Boston, San Francisco, Chicago, Atlanta, Los Angeles, and Nashville.

But AT&Ts description of 5G Evolution is purposely vague. And the preliminary 5G specification will not be available until year-end. So its pretty clear that 5G Evolution is not a standardized 5G offering.

In the press release, AT&T says 5G Evolution will provide twice the speeds of the companys existing LTE network and will use technologies such as small cells, carrier aggregation, 44 multiple input multiple output (MIMO), and 256 QAM. The service will be coupled with Samsung Galaxy 8 and Galaxy S8 devices, which are not standardized 5G devices.

Those limited details make 5G Evolution sound a lot like Gigabit LTE, which is a service that T-Mobile US demonstrated with Ericsson at Mobile World Congress in early March. In fact, it appears that AT&T may have beat T-Mobile to the punch by marketing Gigabit LTE as 5G Evolution.

At Mobile World Congress, Neville Ray, CTO of T-Mobile US told a small group of reporters that if the company could deliver 1 Gb/s speeds on LTE instead of 5G, the consumer may not know the difference between the two. Theres a lot of chatter about 5G at 1 Gb/s speeds. If you can deliver that on LTE, whats the difference? Whats the difference to the consumer? Ray said. I think in the 5G space there will be a lot of marketing wars.

Interestingly, on AT&Ts earnings call with investors that was held the same day the company announced its 5G Evolution, executives did not mention the offering. In fact, when asked about the companys time frame for deploying 5G, AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said that because of the standards roadmap, the company would not launch 5G until 2018, and it will likely not be available in scale until devices and equipment are ready in 2019 or 2020.

But Stephenson did go into great detail about the companys spectrum holdings and how the spectrum will set the stage for the companys 5G network deployment.

Stephenson said the company has 60 MHz of fallow spectrum in the low and mid-band spectrum that it has accumulated from auctions, acquisitions, and winning a 25-year contract to build and operate the FirstNet nationwide public safety network. Plus, the company has 39 GHz millimeter (mmWave) band spectrum and 24 GHz band spectrum that it acquired from FiberTower that equals a nationwide footprint. And it may have more mmWave spectrum in the 28 GHz and 39 GHz range if it is successful in its acquisition of Straight Path.

Stephenson acknowledged that there is a competitive offer for Straight Path and said the company is deciding whether or not to respond to that bid with a higher offer. It has just five days to make that decision.

Our goal is to put 1-Gig speeds in our customers hands, no matter where they are on our network, Stephenson said, according to a Seeking Alpha transcript of the earnings call.

Sue is VP of Content and Editor-in-Chief at SDxCentral. Prior to SDxCentral, Sue was the Editor-in-Chief of FierceMarkets Telecom Group. Sue has more than 20 years of experience reporting on the telecom industry, including roles as the Executive Editor at Wireless Week and Managing Editor at Convergence magazine. She has also worked as an analyst for Paul Kagan Associates, specializing in wireless and broadband technologies. She can be reached at smarek@sdncentral.com

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AT&T Kicks Off 5G Marketing Wars With '5G Evolution' - SDxCentral

Courtesy of Princeton University Press

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. Evolutions Bite by Peter Ungar, Distinguished Professor of anthropology and director of the Environmental Dynamics program at the University of Arkansas, will be released in May by Princeton University Press.

Advance issues of the book have already received critical acclaim.

The National Science Teachers Associations NSTA Recommends describes the book as about as close to a tour de force as a science book is likely to get.

Evolutions Bite spans the globe, combining scientific breakthroughs with vivid narrative to present a unique perspective on our human journey by comparing todays human teeth to those of our ancestors to teach us how we became human. Ungar also brings together cutting-edge advances in the study of human evolution and climate change as well as new approaches to uncovering dietary clues based on fossil teeth.

Ungar describes how a tooth's "foodprints" distinctive patterns of microscopic wear and tear provide telltale details about what its owner actually ate in the past. These clues, combined with groundbreaking research in paleoclimatology, show how a changing climate altered the food options available to human ancestors. When the diet changed, the species changed, and Ungar traces how that diet and an unpredictable climate determined who among our ancestors was winnowed out and who survived. He also shows why some ancestors transitioned from the role of foragers to farmers. Finally, by sifting through the evidence and the scars left on teeth Ungar makes the important case for what might or might not be the most natural diet for humans.

Pre-release events have nearly sold out, with lines for Ungars autograph lasting an hour.

His related blog post, The True Human Diet, published last week on the Scientific American website, garnered thousands of likes and shares on social media within 24 hours. I seem to have struck a chord, Ungar said.

Ann Gibbons, author of The First Human: The Race to Discover Our Earliest Ancestors, recommends Evolutions Bite for anyone who wants to know where we came from and how we ended up with such messed up teeth and jaws." Rick Potts, director of the Human Origins Program in the Smithsonian Institution, called the book a compelling tale that shows how the union of scientific fields shapes the profound story of food, diet and evolution."

Ungar said that he hopes that, in reading the book, when people smile and look in a mirror, they will be reminded that their teeth are a legacy of our evolution one that connects us all to our distant ancestors and to each other.

Peter S. Ungar is Distinguished Professor of anthropology and director of the Environmental Dynamics Program at the University of Arkansas. He researches the diets of modern primates, early hominins and the mammals coexisting with them. He is author or co-author of more than 130 scientific papers and

author of Teeth: A Very Short Introduction and Mammal Teeth: Origin, Evolution, and Diversity and the editor of Evolution of the Human Diet: The Known, the Unknown, and the Unknowable.

About the University of Arkansas: The University of Arkansas provides an internationally competitive education for undergraduate and graduate students in more than 200 academic programs. The university contributes new knowledge, economic development, basic and applied research, and creative activity while also providing service to academic and professional disciplines. The Carnegie Foundation classifies the University of Arkansas among only 2 percent of universities in America that have the highest level of research activity. U.S. News & World Report ranks the University of Arkansas among its top American public research universities. Founded in 1871, the University of Arkansas comprises 10 colleges and schools and maintains a low student-to-faculty ratio that promotes personal attention and close mentoring.

Editor-selected comments will be published below. No abusive material, personal attacks, profanity, spam or material of a similar nature will be considered for publication.

Originally posted here:

Ungar's New Book, 'Evolution's Bite,' to Be Released in May by Princeton Press - University of Arkansas Newswire

Science Daily

The evolution of dog breeds now mapped Science Daily However, in a new report, researchers have used gene sequences from 161 modern breeds to assemble an evolutionary tree of dogs. The map of dog breeds, which is the largest to date, unearths new evidence that dogs traveled with humans across the ... Genetic map of dogs' evolution could shed new light on causes of cancer and diabetesThe Independent Old Dog, New Dog: Genetic Map Tracks The Evolution Of Man's Best FriendForbes This Genetic Map Shows the Evolution of Dog BreedsI4U News Inverse -The Guardian -Science Magazine all 28 news articles »

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The evolution of dog breeds now mapped - Science Daily

Combining vegetation distribution models and sediment transport models offers a better understanding of how dryland environments change in response to different factors.

Drylands compose more than 40% of Earths surface. Although they are found on every continent and are tremendously diverse, a common feature of drylands is sparse vegetation and expanses of bare ground such as soil or sand. In such a context, the wind plays a significant role in moving loose sediments and shaping the landscape.

Understanding the processes of landscape evolution is important for the management of arid and semiarid areas upon which people depend for their livelihoods. But a long-standing problem in drylands research has been quantifying the transport of sediment by wind in the presence of vegetation and how this influences landscape evolution. For example, wind blowing toward a single tree, a cluster of low shrubs, or an expanse of patchy grass will have different effects in terms of the location and severity of erosion and the location and shape of sediment deposition.

However, predicting exactly what will happen is complex because of the range of factors at play. There are natural variables such as the distribution, type, and size of vegetation; the direction, speed, and consistency of wind; and the frequency, duration, and intensity of rainfall. Human influences are also at play, including growing crops on the land, grazing animals, and setting fire to vegetation, all of which change the availability of sediment and the behavior of wind as it passes over the landscape.

Researchers use awide range of models to simulate what would happen in different conditions, but these models have limitations when scientists try to understandlocalized variations. Mayaud et al. propose a new approach combining two types of models: those that handle vegetation distribution and those that handle sediment transport. The authors describe the technical aspects of their new Vegetation and Sediment Transport model (ViSTA) and the verification tests carried out. These showed that the model could accurately replicate different physical characteristics of dryland environments at various scales and in response to environmental changes such as fire and grazing.

The next step was to carry out an experiment to test the model. For this the authors chose a particular type of dryland environment, a nebkha dune field. Using empirical field data on rainfall and wind, they compared the landscape evolution generated by the model with measurements at a field site on the Skeleton Coast in Namibia. The size and spacing of landforms produced by the model were found to accurately reflect real features, thus suggesting the promising potential of this model.

Drylands are home to more than 2 billion people worldwide who depend on the environment for their food and livelihoods. However, many dryland environments are suffering from degradation and desertification in the face of multiple pressures, including population increase and pressure on water resources, overfarming and soil depletion, and changing precipitation patterns due to climate change.

As we move toward the end of the United Nations Decade for Deserts and the Fight Against Desertification (20102020), this research contributes to a better understanding of dryland landscape processes. The new model is a versatile tool that can be used to simulate a variety of dryland environments and understand the spatial effects of different environmental stresses, whether natural or anthropogenic. (Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface, https://doi.org/10.1002/2016JF004096, 2017)

Jenny Lunn, Contributing Writer

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New Tool for Understanding Landscape Evolution in Drylands - Eos