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The Revolution was a technological success.

The Revolution was a technological success.

"Before the 1960s, the population of India was multiplying like rats in a barn," said Jagjit Singh Hara, "but we didn't have the grain to feed them. After the Green Revolution, we doubled our yield and now we have proved that India can feed the world".

But the process has limits and they may have been reached. Population, on the other hand, has continued to rise in poor parts of the world.

The graph, compiled for the BBC by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, shows that while yield per hectare has increased, the amount of land used for the major staple grains has remained fairly constant; this is because the amount of good farmland is finite.

Many young, white women frequently tan indoors

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - More than one in every four young, white U.S. women uses an indoor tanning facility at least once a year, according to a new study. Researchers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta found that between 25 and 30 percent of young, white women reported using an indoor tanning facility in the last year."Among this population indoor tanning is widespread and because of the association between indoor tanning and cancer, reducing indoor tanning is important," Gery Guy Jr., the study's lead author, told Reuters Health.Previous research, Guy and his colleagues write in JAMA Internal Medicine, has found that tanning before age 35 increases the risk of melanoma, the deadliest type of skin cancer, by up to 75 percent.Tanning before the age of 25 up to doubles the risk.Melanoma is most common among whites, who have a lifetime risk of about one case in every 50 people, according to the American Cancer Society.For the new study, the researchers analyzed information from a 2011 survey of high school students and a 2010 survey of adults between the ages of 18 and 34."There haven't been many previous estimates just looking at the non-Hispanic, white population. For the adults, there's really no data to compare it to," Guy said.Overall, he and his colleagues found that just over 29 percent of white high school girls said they had used an indoor tanning facility in the past 12 months and about 17 percent said they had tanned indoors at least 10 times in the past year.Among white women between the ages of 18 and 34, about 25 percent said they had used an indoor tanning facility during the past year and about 15 percent reported frequent usage."These findings showing such high rates of indoor tanning in the population reinforce the importance of education efforts in young adults to reduce the risk of skin cancer," Guy said."We should be at the forefront of educating parents and consumers of tanning beds about the risks associated with ultraviolet radiation," Dr. Brundha Balaraman, of the Division of Dermatology at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, told Reuters Health in an email. Currently, 33 states limit the use of tanning beds for minors under the age of 18, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. That includes California and Vermont, which ban the use of the devices for minors.Balaraman, who has studied indoor tanning use but was not involved with the new research, said in addition to laws and education, regulation of tanning devices may be effective."Tanning devices should be elevated to a Class II or III category for medical devices, which would at least require regulatory oversight of manufacturers," she wrote, adding that tanning beds are currently Class I medical devices, the same category that covers Band-Aids and tongue depressors.Guy and his colleagues write that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has proposed reclassifying tanning devices as moderate-risk devices."I think it's important that multi-level, comprehensive approaches are taken, such as the FDA's proposed changes, counseling that's been effective and changing social norms," Guy said.SOURCE: bit.ly/MbBLb9 JAMA Internal Medicine, online August 19, 2013.

This article is taken from Reuters.com

Novartis muscle wasting drug gets 'breakthrough' status

ZURICH (Reuters) - Novartis said on Tuesday U.S. regulators have granted breakthrough therapy status for its investigational compound bimagrumab for the potential treatment of patients with sporadic inclusion body myositis (sIBM). The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) created the "breakthrough therapy" designation earlier this year for medicines deemed likely to demonstrate "substantial improvement" over existing drugs.sIBM is a rare yet potentially life-threatening muscle-wasting condition. Patients suffering from the disease can gradually lose the ability to walk. There are currently no approved treatments, according to Novartis.Bimagrumab was developed by Novartis in collaboration with Morphosys. The drug works by stimulating muscle growth by blocking from inhibitory molecules.(This corrects day of the week to Tuesday from Thursday)(Reporting by Caroline Copley)

This article is taken from Reuters.com

Wrecked Fukushima storage tank leaking highly radioactive water

TOKYO (Reuters) - Contaminated water with dangerously high levels of radiation is leaking from a storage tank at Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, the most serious setback to the cleanup of the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl. The storage tank breach of about 300 metric tons of water is separate from contaminated water leaks reported in recent weeks, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co said on Tuesday.The latest leak is so contaminated that a person standing half a meter (1 ft 8 inches) away would, within an hour, receive a radiation dose five times the average annual global limit for nuclear workers.After 10 hours, a worker in that proximity to the leak would develop radiation sickness with symptoms including nausea and a drop in white blood cells."That is a huge amount of radiation. The situation is getting worse," said Michiaki Furukawa, who is professor emeritus at Nagoya University and a nuclear chemist.The embattled utility Tokyo Electric has struggled to keep the Fukushima site under control since an earthquake and tsunami caused three reactor meltdowns in March 2011.Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority has classified the latest leak as a level 1 incident, the second lowest on an international scale for radiological releases, a spokesman told Reuters on Tuesday.It is the first time Japan has issued a so-called INES rating for Fukushima since the meltdowns. Following the quake and tsunami, Fukushima was assigned the highest rating of 7, when it was hit by explosions after a loss of power and cooling.A Tokyo Electric official said workers who were monitoring storage tanks appeared to have failed to detect the leak of water, which pooled up around the tank."We failed to discover the leak at an early stage and we need to review not only the tanks but also our monitoring system," he said.Tokyo Electric, also known as Tepco, said it did not believe water from the latest leak had reached the Pacific Ocean, about 500 meters (550 yards) away. Nonetheless, continued leaks have alarmed Japan's neighbors South Korea and China.CRITICISMTepco has been criticized for its failure to prepare for the disaster and been accused of covering up the extent of the problems at the plant.In recent months, the plant has been beset with power outages and other problems that have led outside experts to question whether Tepco is qualified to handle the clean up, which is unprecedented due to the amount of radioactive material on the site and its coastal location.The government said this month it will step up its involvement in the cleanup, following Tepco's admission, after months of denial, that leaked contaminated water had previously reached the ocean.Fukushima Governor Yuhei Sato told an emergency meeting of prefectural officials on Tuesday it was a "national emergency", and that the local government would monitor the situation more strictly and seek additional steps as needed.Massive amounts of radioactive fluids are accumulating at the plant as Tepco floods reactor cores via an improvised system to keep melted uranium fuel rods cool and stable.The water in the cooling system then flows into basements and trenches that have been leaking since the disaster.Highly contaminated excess water is pumped out and stored in steel tanks on elevated ground away from the reactors. About 400 metric tons of radioactive water a day has been stored at Fukushima.In order to keep up with the pace of the flow, Tepco has mostly relied on tanks bolted together with plastic sealing around the joints. Those tanks are less robust - but quicker to assemble - than the welded tanks it has started installing.The latest leak came from the more fragile tank, which Tepco plans to carry on using, although it is looking at ways to improve their strength, said Tepco official Masayuki Ono.A puddle that formed near the leaking tank is emitting a radiation dose of 100 millisieverts an hour about 50 cm above the water surface, Ono told reporters at a news briefingTepco has also struggled with worker safety. This month, 12 workers decommissioning the plant were found to have been contaminated by radiation. The utility has not yet identified what caused those incidents, which only came to its notice when alarms sounded as the workers prepared to leave the job site.A South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman said Seoul had asked Japanese officials to explain what they were doing to stop contaminated water reaching the ocean and fishing grounds."They also need to make the information available to the public, all over the world, given this is the first case in history where contaminated water from a nuclear plant is flowing into the ocean at this magnitude," he said.(Reporting by Yuka Obayashi, Yoko Kubota; Additional reporting by Linda Sieg, Kiyoshi Takenaka; Writing by Aaron Sheldrick; Editing by Alison Williams)

This article is taken from Reuters.com

Wrecked Fukushima storage tank leaking highly radioactive water

TOKYO (Reuters) - Contaminated water with dangerously high levels of radiation is leaking from a storage tank at Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, the most serious setback to the cleanup of the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl. The storage tank breach of about 300 metric tons of water is separate from contaminated water leaks reported in recent weeks, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co said on Tuesday.The latest leak is so contaminated that a person standing half a meter (1 ft 8 inches) away would, within an hour, receive a radiation dose five times the average annual global limit for nuclear workers.After 10 hours, a worker in that proximity to the leak would develop radiation sickness with symptoms including nausea and a drop in white blood cells."That is a huge amount of radiation. The situation is getting worse," said Michiaki Furukawa, who is professor emeritus at Nagoya University and a nuclear chemist.The embattled utility Tokyo Electric has struggled to keep the Fukushima site under control since an earthquake and tsunami caused three reactor meltdowns in March 2011.Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority has classified the latest leak as a level 1 incident, the second lowest on an international scale for radiological releases, a spokesman told Reuters on Tuesday.It is the first time Japan has issued a so-called INES rating for Fukushima since the meltdowns. Following the quake and tsunami, Fukushima was assigned the highest rating of 7, when it was hit by explosions after a loss of power and cooling.A Tokyo Electric official said workers who were monitoring storage tanks appeared to have failed to detect the leak of water, which pooled up around the tank."We failed to discover the leak at an early stage and we need to review not only the tanks but also our monitoring system," he said.Tokyo Electric, also known as Tepco, said it did not believe water from the latest leak had reached the Pacific Ocean, about 500 meters (550 yards) away. Nonetheless, continued leaks have alarmed Japan's neighbors South Korea and China.CRITICISMTepco has been criticized for its failure to prepare for the disaster and been accused of covering up the extent of the problems at the plant.In recent months, the plant has been beset with power outages and other problems that have led outside experts to question whether Tepco is qualified to handle the clean up, which is unprecedented due to the amount of radioactive material on the site and its coastal location.The government said this month it will step up its involvement in the cleanup, following Tepco's admission, after months of denial, that leaked contaminated water had previously reached the ocean.Fukushima Governor Yuhei Sato told an emergency meeting of prefectural officials on Tuesday it was a "national emergency", and that the local government would monitor the situation more strictly and seek additional steps as needed.Massive amounts of radioactive fluids are accumulating at the plant as Tepco floods reactor cores via an improvised system to keep melted uranium fuel rods cool and stable.The water in the cooling system then flows into basements and trenches that have been leaking since the disaster.Highly contaminated excess water is pumped out and stored in steel tanks on elevated ground away from the reactors. About 400 metric tons of radioactive water a day has been stored at Fukushima.In order to keep up with the pace of the flow, Tepco has mostly relied on tanks bolted together with plastic sealing around the joints. Those tanks are less robust - but quicker to assemble - than the welded tanks it has started installing.The latest leak came from the more fragile tank, which Tepco plans to carry on using, although it is looking at ways to improve their strength, said Tepco official Masayuki Ono.A puddle that formed near the leaking tank is emitting a radiation dose of 100 millisieverts an hour about 50 cm above the water surface, Ono told reporters at a news briefingTepco has also struggled with worker safety. This month, 12 workers decommissioning the plant were found to have been contaminated by radiation. The utility has not yet identified what caused those incidents, which only came to its notice when alarms sounded as the workers prepared to leave the job site.A South Korean Foreign Ministry spokesman said Seoul had asked Japanese officials to explain what they were doing to stop contaminated water reaching the ocean and fishing grounds."They also need to make the information available to the public, all over the world, given this is the first case in history where contaminated water from a nuclear plant is flowing into the ocean at this magnitude," he said.(Reporting by Yuka Obayashi, Yoko Kubota; Additional reporting by Linda Sieg, Kiyoshi Takenaka; Writing by Aaron Sheldrick; Editing by Alison Williams)

This article is taken from Reuters.com