ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano, Russian commander Fyodor Yurchikhin and NASA astronaut Karen Nyberg returned to Earth today, landing in the Kazakhstan steppe.

Their return flight, landing at 02:49 GMT (03:49 CET), was in the same Soyuz TMA-09M spacecraft that flew them to the International Space Station on 29 May.

Luca and Karen will now travel to Houston, Texas, where they will undergo medical checks before meeting media on 13 November at 13:30 GMT (14:30 CET).

Luca spent five months on the International Space Station for his Volare mission under a bilateral agreement with the Italian space agency and NASA. He conducted more than 30 scientific experiments, performed two extravehicular activities (EVAs) and operational tasks as well as maintaining the orbital outpost.

Luca’s science roster included installing and running experiments on emulsions that will help industry to create foods and pharmaceuticals with longer shelf‑lives.

The Italian astronaut used ESA’s space furnace to heat metal to 1400°C for studying microstructures during alloy casting. This research can only be conducted in microgravity and is paving the way for ultra-light and stable space‑age metals.

Another experiment had Luca collect data of his own skin to help develop a model of how our tissues age. Luca also recorded his sleep to help understand how the human body regulates sleep patterns.

These experiments and more are benefitting people on Earth and preparing humans for further exploration of our Solar System. Previous experiments have drastically improved the industrial process for creating complex titanium alloys, resulting in cheaper and faster manufacturing of high-quality materials.

In addition to his scientific workload, Luca carried out operational tasks such as monitoring the docking of ESA’s fourth Automated Transfer Vehicle,Albert Einstein. Luca oversaw the unloading of more than 1400 items from the cargo spaceship.

Karen and Luca worked as a team to grapple and berth the second commercial spacecraft to visit the International Space Station, Cygnus.

His eventful mission included two spacewalks to install external experiments and prepare the Station for a new Russian module that will be launched next year.

Luca’s second spacewalk was cut short after a malfunction in the spacesuit caused water to accumulate inside his helmet, forcing him and NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy to return to the airlock as quickly as possible. Luca, a test pilot from the Italian air force, remained calm and returned to the airlock safely despite intermittent communications and without being able to see out of his helmet.

This was the first mission for Luca and the first for ESA’s new astronauts from the class of 2009. The next to fly to the Station will be Alexander Gerst, set for launch on 28 May 2014 from Kazakhstan.

The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. It is an intergovernmental organisation, created in 1975, with the mission to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space delivers benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.

ESA has 20 Member States: Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, of whom 18 are Member States of the EU.

ESA has Cooperation Agreements with eight other Member States of the EU. Canada takes part in some ESA programmes under a Cooperation Agreement.

ESA is also working with the EU on implementing the Galileo and Copernicus programmes.

By coordinating the financial and intellectual resources of its members, ESA can undertake programmes and activities far beyond the scope of any single European country.

ESA develops the launchers, spacecraft and ground facilities needed to keep Europe at the forefront of global space activities.

Today, it launches satellites for Earth observation, navigation, telecommunications and astronomy, sends probes to the far reaches of the Solar System and cooperates in the human exploration of space.

http://www.esa.int/For_Media/Press_Releases/ESA_astronaut_Luca_Parmitano_lands_safely_back_on_Earth

Partners agree approach for developing vaccines capable of reducing malaria cases by 75% and to enable malaria elimination.

Dr Jean-Marie Okwo Bele, Director of WHO’s Department of Immunization, Vaccines and Biologicals

The world should aim to have vaccines which reduce malaria cases by 75%, and are capable of eliminating malaria, licensed by 2030, according to the updated 2013 "Malaria Vaccine Technology Roadmap", launched today. This new target comes in addition to the original 2006 Roadmap’s goal of having a licensed vaccine against Plasmodium falciparum malaria, the most deadly form of the disease, for children under 5 years of age in sub-Saharan Africa by 2015.

“Safe, effective, affordable vaccines could play a critical role in defeating malaria,” said Dr Robert D. Newman, Director of WHO’s Global Malaria Programme. ”Despite all the recent progress countries have made, and despite important innovations in diagnostics, drugs and vector control, the global burden of malaria remains unacceptably high.”
Current situation

The most recent figures by the WHO indicate that malaria causes an estimated 660 000 deaths each year from 219 million cases of illness. Scale-up of WHO recommended malaria control measures has been associated with a 26% reduction in the global malaria death rate over the last decade. Effective malaria vaccines could be an important complement to existing measures, if they can be successfully developed.

Final results from Phase III trials of the most advanced vaccine candidate, RTS,S/AS01, will be available by 2015. Depending on the final trial results, and depending on the outcome of the regulatory review by the European Medicines Agency, a WHO recommendation for use and subsequent prequalification of this first vaccine could occur in late 2015.
The Malaria Vaccine Technology Roadmap

The new roadmap, launched today at the annual conference of the American Society of Tropical Medicine & Hygiene in Washington DC and also announced in a letter published in "The Lancet", aims to identify where additional funding and activities will be particularly key in developing second generation malaria vaccines both for protection against malaria disease and for malaria elimination. These include next-generation vaccines that target both Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax species of malaria.

“The new vaccines should show at least 75% efficacy against clinical malaria, be suitable for use in in all malaria-endemic areas, and be licensed by 2030,” says Dr Jean-Marie Okwo Bele, Director of WHO’s Department of Immunization, Vaccines and Biologicals. “The roadmap also sets a target for malaria vaccines that reduce transmission of the parasite.”

The 2013 "Malaria Vaccine Technology Roadmap" cites several reasons for the update, among them changing malaria epidemiology associated with the successful scale-up of malaria control measures in the last decade; a renewed focus on malaria elimination and eradication in addition to the ongoing need to sustain malaria control activities; and new technological innovations since 2006 including promising early work on so-called transmission-blocking malaria vaccines.

WHO lists 27 malaria vaccine candidates currently in clinical trials, with most in early stages of testing; RTS,S/AS01 is the only one currently in late-stage development.

The Roadmap’s vision centres on developing safe and effective vaccines against Plasmodium falciparum and Plasmodium vivax that prevent disease and death and prevent transmission to enable malaria eradication, and is built around two strategic goals:

Development of malaria vaccines with protective efficacy of at least 75% against clinical malaria suitable for administration to appropriate at-risk groups in malaria-endemic areas.
Development of malaria vaccines that reduce transmission of the parasite and thereby substantially reduce the incidence of human malaria infection. This will enable elimination in multiple settings. Vaccines to reduce transmission should be suitable for administration in mass campaigns.

The "Malaria Vaccine Technology Roadmap" is the result of a consultative process led by WHO, which brought together the global community of malaria vaccine researchers and product developers, and is supported by an informally-organized group of malaria vaccine funders. The Malaria Vaccine Funders Group comprises the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the European & Developing Countries Clinical Trials Partnership, the European Vaccine Initiative, the European Commission, the PATH Malaria Vaccine Initiative, the US Agency for International Development, the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the Wellcome Trust, and WHO.

http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/notes/2013/malaria-vaccines-20131114/en/index.html

Misunderstandings of Human Evolution

224 pages | 8 line drawings | 6 x 9 | © 2013

The idea of a missing link between humanity and our animal ancestors predates evolution and popular science and actually has religious roots in the deist concept of the Great Chain of Being. Yet, the metaphor has lodged itself in the contemporary imagination, and new fossil discoveries are often hailed in headlines as revealing the elusive transitional step, the moment when we stopped being “animal” and started being “human.” In The Accidental Species, Henry Gee, longtime paleontology editor at Nature, takes aim at this misleading notion, arguing that it reflects a profound misunderstanding of how evolution works and, when applied to the evolution of our own species, supports mistaken ideas about our own place in the universe.

Gee presents a robust and stark challenge to our tendency to see ourselves as the acme of creation. Far from being a quirk of religious fundamentalism, human exceptionalism, Gee argues, is an error that also infects scientific thought. Touring the many features of human beings that have recurrently been used to distinguish us from the rest of the animal world, Gee shows that our evolutionary outcome is one possibility among many, one that owes more to chance than to an organized progression to supremacy. He starts with bipedality, which he shows could have arisen entirely by accident, as a by-product of sexual selection, moves on to technology, large brain size, intelligence, language, and, finally, sentience. He reveals each of these attributes to be alive and well throughout the animal world—they are not, indeed, unique to our species.

The Accidental Species combines Gee’s firsthand experience on the editorial side of many incredible paleontological findings with healthy skepticism and humor to create a book that aims to overturn popular thinking on human evolution—the key is not what’s missing, but how we’re linked.

http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/A/bo12789718.html

Feathered Dinosaurs for Korean Museum
by Dennis Wilson

This project was commissioned for an exhibit that explores the evolution of flight among dinosaurs.  All models are life size, scientifically accurate to the latest research and are feathered in our usual manor of applying each feather one at a time. 

http://www.behance.net/gallery/Feathered-Dinosaurs-for-Korean-Museum/11774005#!

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please read this interesting article by Nico Danan on blog.marinexplore

Fabien Cousteau: 31 Days Underwater and the Life of an Aquanaut

Fabien Cousteau is the grandson of late undersea pioneer and explorer Jacques-Yves Cousteau. Following in the footsteps of his grandfather and the Conshelf underwater habitat, Fabien shares his thoughts and motivation behind Mission 31, his undersea expedition to start in November this year.

31 days at 63 feet under the sea, what will you accomplish that your grandfather could not with Conshelf?

Conshelf was a series of three different habitats. The one that most people know about was Conshelf II, where the dive team lived at 10 meters (33 feet) for 30 days, and dove to even deeper depth on a daily basis, 75 feet or more. The difference here with my grandfather’s habitat is that we are based at twice the depth, 65 feet. We will be diving daily from 65 feet down to 150 and even 200 feet......

http://blog.marinexplore.com/fabien-cousteau-31-days-underwater/#!

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please read this interesting article by Wes Judd on Australian Geographic

New mosquito repellent makes you "invisible"

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A new vapour developed in the USA renders humans virtually undetectable to mozzies.

SCIENTISTS HAVE CREATED WHAT might be the most effective insect repellent ever.

While the majority of existing repellents create an odour that is unpleasant for mosquitos, using a yellow oil known as DEET, this new blend of chemicals renders the insect senseless.

“These chemicals make you invisible,” says Dr Ulrich Bernier, a research chemist at the United States Department of Agriculture research service, and creator of the new formula......

http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/journal/new-mosquito-repellent-is-ultra-effective.htm#!

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please read this interesting article on http://www.amphibians.org/aboutus/

Why save amphibians?

In the closing of her Nobel acceptance speech, the late Wangari Maathai told a story: “I reflect on my childhood experience when I would visit a stream next to our home to fetch water for my mother. I would drink water straight from the stream. Playing among the arrowroot leaves I tried in vain to pick up the strands of frogs’ eggs, believing they were beads. But every time I put my little fingers under them they would break. Later, I saw thousands of tadpoles: black, energetic and wriggling through the clear water against the background of the brown earth. This is the world I inherited from my parents.

Today, over 50 years later, the stream has dried up, women walk long distances for water, which is not always clean, and children will never know what they have lost. The challenge is to restore the home of the tadpoles and give back to our children a world of beauty and wonder.”

Frogs, salamanders and caecilians are woven through our cultural fabric the world over. They provide children with beauty and wonder and play an integral role in the functioning of ecosystems. Because of their sensitivity to change, amphibians are believed to be bellwethers of ecosystem health.

But the world over, amphibians are in trouble, as entire species are being driven to extinction by threats that include loss of habitat, disease, contamination and climate change. The latest figures from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species™ show that there are nearly as many threatened species of amphibians as birds and mammals combined, and that the proportion of threatened species is higher for amphibians (30.2%) than for either birds (12.5%) or mammals (20.6%).

The ASA is committed to converging a diverse network of global partners with one goal: to protect amphibians and their habitats. We have a blueprint for action in the form of an Amphibian Conservation Action Plan (ACAP) and a track record of conservation successes on which to build. The preservation of core amphibian habitat will be coupled with strategies to mitigate the other threats.

Together we can ensure that frogs, salamanders and caecilians thrive in healthy ecosystems around the world for future generations.

http://www.amphibians.org/

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please read this interesting article by Erin Allday on sfgate

U.S. malaria cases climb as global rates drop

Even as rates of malaria are falling in many of the world's hot spots for tropical diseases, the number of cases in the United States is climbing as global travel becomes cheaper and easier, health officials say.

Rates of malaria - a parasitic illness that is spread by mosquitoes - have dropped 25 to 50 percent in parts of Asia and Africa where the disease is endemic. But in 2011, the U.S. reported 1,925 cases, the most in more than 40 years, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report released last week. California had the second-highest number of cases, 149, behind only New York.

All but a handful of those diagnosed in the U.S. that year became infected in another country. The report suggests that Americans are not taking proper precautions when they travel to places where malaria is prevalent.....

http://www.sfgate.com/health/article/U-S-malaria-cases-climb-as-global-rates-drop-4969319.php#!

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please read this interesting article by Marc Bekoff on psychologytoday

Disabled Whale Missing Two Fins Cared for by Family

A heartwarming story that shows wild animals display compassion and empathy

Here's a story that'll make your day. There's not much to write that's not covered by this short essay called "Disabled killer whale with missing fins survives with the help of family who hunt for its food" so I hope you enjoy what you read and see......

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/animal-emotions/201311/disabled-whale-missing-two-fins-cared-family

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please read thisinteresting article by Marc Bekoff on psychologytoday

Frankenstein's Cat: Biotechnology, Strange Creatures, and Us

What does genetically engineering animals—glowing fish, frozen zoos—mean?
Published on November 12, 2013 by Marc Bekoff, Ph.D. in Animal Emotions

I finally got around to reading a book with the catchy title, Frankenstein's Cat: Cuddling Up to Biotech's Brave New Beasts, by journalist Emily Anthes, and I'm sorry I let it sit on my cluttered desk for as long as I did. Highly-acclaimed, packed with a lot of information, very well-referenced, and an easy read, this book made me think hard and deep about our relationships with other animals (the focus of the field of anthrozoology) and just what is okay and what is not.

Some of the examples about which Ms. Anthes writes include cloning endangered and other species, creating frozen zoos, using prosthetics to help injured animals, supplementing their natural senses, and engineering mutant animals and glowing cats...

http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/animal-emotions/201311/frankensteins-cat-biotechnology-strange-creatures-and-us#!