15 January 2010
MUSIC: "Our World" theme
This week on Our World: Google challenges China after a major hacking incident ... exploring the link between eyesight and migraine headaches ... and genetically engineering the soybean to add a health supplement
FUCHS: "But I'd much rather have my yogurt and granola bar and salad dressing with omega-3 than having to take a capsule every morning."
He's from Monsanto; others aren't so sure.
Those stories, our Website of the Week, and more...
I'm Art Chimes. Welcome to VOA's science and technology magazine, "Our World."
Citing Hacking Incident, Google Says It Will offer Uncensored Searches on Chinese Website
Four years ago, the giant Internet search company Google entered the Chinese market after agreeing to the Beijing government's requirement that it deliver censored results to searches on Google.cn.
This week, the California-based company reversed course, after announcing that its servers had been hacked and that both corporate information and email accounts of human rights activists had been compromised. Google spokeswoman Jessica Powell said the attacks came from China.
POWELL: "And as a result, and in combination with the environment in China, we've decided to review the feasibility of our business operations there and have decided that in good conscience, we really cannot continue to operate a filtered search engine in China."
Google didn't specifically accuse the Chinese government of the hacking incident, but that was the universal conclusion drawn from the company's vaguely worded statement.
When Google agreed to censorship as a condition to opening its Chinese website in 2006, the company received a lot of criticism. At least one of the critics, Danny O'Brien of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, says this time, Google did the right thing.
O'BRIEN: "They wanted to protect their users' privacy, and they decided that sacrificing their users' ability to access all of the Internet was a price that they weren't willing to pay."
Some commentators have suggested that Google may be acting on principle, while noting that the U.S.-based firm has made little headway against its main Chinese competitor, Baidu. O'Brien says Google is sacrificing a lot to pull out of the huge and expanding Chinese market.
O'BRIEN: "But at the same time, if Google got the reputation as a company that was willing to just lay down for any government's attempts to obtain personal information, that would do severe damage both to their reputation among individual users and their increasing corporate customers."
Even though both Google and Baidu censored their results in China, the two were not equivalent, says Rebecca MacKinnon, former CNN bureau chief in Beijing and now a fellow with the Open Society Institute.
MacKINNON: "Every time I've tested Google.cn with sensitive political terms, I always find that Google.cn provides a greater variety of results and a bit more edgy information than Baidu, which censors much more thoroughly."
MacKinnon says reaction to the Google announcement by Chinese Internet users varies.
MacKINNON: "There are some Chinese Internet users, particularly the more tech-savvy ones, who are actually cheering this move because they're very upset about the increasing censorship over the past year. And they think it's good that an international company like Google would stand up and say we're not going to take this anymore. This is wrong."
On the other hand, MacKinnon says other Chinese users are concerned that Google's retreat from the market will result in China's Internet being more closed and less connected with the outside world.
Meanwhile, Danny O'Brien of the Electronic Frontier Foundation speculates that Google may direct some of its vast reservoir of technical expertise to helping Chinese Internet users circumvent official restrictions.
O'BRIEN: "What we might well see here is a change in strategy by Google's undoubtedly very smart techies. Up until now they've been devoting their work to better filter the Chinese Internet. Now I suspect they'll be spending their time working out how to provide their users with the ability to circumvent the Great Firewall of China."
On Friday, China's official Internet Network Information Center reported that the number of Internet users in the country jumped by about 30 percent last year. With 384 million users, China is the world's largest Internet community.
Consumer Electronic Show features 3-D television, Web-enabled cars
The annual Consumer Electronics Show, the CES, in Las Vegas has wrapped up, and VOA Los Angeles correspondent Mike O'Sullivan was there, and we've got him on the line now.
Q: Mike, what was the coolest thing you saw at the CES?
O'SULLIVAN: "Well, the biggest thing that I saw was 3D or three-dimensional television. All of the big manufacturers — LG, Samsung, Panasonic, Sony — have systems in development, ready to come out at various levels, some fairly simple kind of 3D, something like the old 19th century stereoscopes that you look at. Of course, those didn't move. Others, with computer-linked wireless glasses that actually have a shutter in the eyes, alternating shutter, that's called an active system. And that's actually pretty impressive. I'd say that was probably the most interesting thing there.
Q: Well, something with a smaller screen, perhaps: mobile phones. Google is out with their new mobile phone, Nexus One, challenging Apple's popular iPhone. Does the entry of a search engine company, of all things, into the handset market change things, or is it just one new aspect to a rapidly evolving market?
O'SULLIVAN: "Well, it's hard to say what the result will be. Of course, there are people who worry that Google will become the dominant giant in this high-tech industry. But you know, there are other people who say they more competition from more sources, the better. And it will be interesting to see how Google, as an Internet-based company will do producing and marketing its own hardware — in this case a mobile phone.
Q: Apple is apparently getting ready to introduce a touch-screen tablet computer, so I have to ask if there was anything particularly new or interesting in personal computers, most of which I guess, frankly, have become pretty similar commodity items.
O'SULLIVAN Well, the market is pretty much saturated with personal computers, so companies have to be pretty creative. And one of the directions they're moving in is with the tablet or slate computer. Of course, that's what we're expecting later this month from Apple. HP [Hewlett-Packard] announced one with Microsoft, a joint collaboration. And you know, there are actually quite a few tablets out there. Lenovo, the Chinese company, has got a very interesting small netbook that has a detachable screen that becomes a tablet computer.
Portability is one of the themes, and more range, I think, in terms of size.
Q: Anything new at the CES in the e-reader category?
O'SULLIVAN Well there are a couple of companies, one is a British company called Que, which has an e-reader that people find very impressive — lightweight, fast, easy-to-read, nice handheld size. It's a tough market because Kindle dominates and you have also Barnes and Noble and other companies, Sony. And as I mentioned, Chinese companies. Hanvon makes interesting little e-readers as well, and they're not all that expensive, a few hundred dollars.
But it remains to be seen whether readers are really going to take to the electronic format the way they have traditionally to paper books.
Q: One of the keynote speakers was Ford's CEO, Alan Mulally. And that was interesting to me because you don't think normally of a car company being at the Consumer Electronics Show. So what's happening with consumer electronics and vehicles?
O'SULLIVAN: Well, there are actually quite a few cars on the floor of the show — some with LCD viewers, TV or movie viewers on the back of the headrests. You're getting a lot of connections between companies. Ford, for example, teaming up with Mapquest and AOL to provide real-time directions and also Internet access on a screen on the dashboard, although they say the Internet connection will be somehow minimized while you're driving so the driver won't be distracted playing on the Internet..
Mike O'Sullivan was VOA's man at this year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
Website of the Week Features Writings of Martin Luther King, Jr.
On Monday [18 January], Americans observe the annual holiday honoring the birthday of the late civil rights leader, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., who was assassinated in 1968.
Dr. King's widow, Coretta Scott King, chose Stanford University Professor Clayborne Carson to edit her husband's papers for publication. Those many volumes of speeches, letters, sermons, and other writings are really intended for a scholarly audience, but many of King's writings are now available to a wider audience at our Website of the Week.
CARSON: "Hundreds and even thousands of documents are available on our website, and people throughout the world can get access to information that just 20 years ago was only available to a handful of researchers. So I think that's a major breakthrough and a truly exciting development."
History professor Clayborne Carson is the editor of the King Papers. While the published books will mostly end up in university libraries, Carson says the King papers website is designed for a more general audience, so, for example, young people can learn about Dr. King.
They may study the civil right movement in school, using lessons developed by the King Papers project called the Liberation Curriculum, designed to teach about the values of social justice and non-violence that Dr. King championed in his lifetime.
CARSON: "They can learn about one of the times in history where ordinary people, including many people their own age, changed the course of history."
Martin Luther King is remembered not only as a great civil rights leader but also as an orator of prodigious skill. On KingPapers.org you can read and listen to excerpts of some of Dr. King's great speeches and sermons.
The King Papers project is part of Stanford University's Martin Luther King Institute, and the website also includes the King Online Encyclopedia and a chronology of Dr. King's life.
It's all there at KingPapers.org, or get the link from our site, voanews.com.
MUSIC: Billy Taylor Trio — "I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free"
It's Our World, the weekly science and technology magazine from VOA News. I'm Art Chimes in Washington.
Blind Migraine Sufferers Help Researchers Understand Why Light Makes Headaches Worse
Headaches are a universal phenomenon, but one kind of headache can be particularly crippling — migraines. One thing that sets migraines apart from other types of headaches is that sufferers report exposure to light actually makes the headache worse — and, strangely, that can happen even when patients are blind. Now, research provides some insight on the causes of this light sensitivity. Rose Hoban reports.
HOBAN: Many people might say that light hurts their eyes when they come into a sunny place, until their eyes adjust. But for migraine sufferers, light can be torture. Light makes migraines hurt more intensely. It's a phenomenon called photophobia. The pain is only relieved by retreating to a dark room, sometimes for hours at a time.
Anesthesiology professor Rami Burstein from Harvard Medical School heard complaints about photophobia from countless patients with migraines, except for some blind patients.
BURSTEIN: "And so this group of patients, light does not exacerbate the headaches during the migraine attack."
HOBAN: But not everyone who loses their sight becomes blind in the same way. Some people suffer from diseases that degenerate the retina, the light-collecting part of the eye. Others lose their sight due to infection or age. Burstein says, these blind people are still sensitive to light, because the optic nerve that carries information from the eye to the brain remains intact.
Burstein and his colleagues used this insight to find the nerve pathways in the eyes of animals and study them.
BURSTEIN: "And when the light signals converge on the neurons that are activated during migraine, the light signal increases the electrical activity of the neurons, and by doing so it exacerbates the headache. And that happened within one or two seconds."
HOBAN: Burstein says that in the long run, knowing this could contribute to treatments for migraine.
BURSTEIN: "If we can find the molecules that the visual pathway used to communicate with the migraine pathway in the brain, and find the receptors that they act on, we may be able to develop a drug that will interfere with this communication, and eliminate the sensitivity to light during migraine."
HOBAN: For now, Burstein says he's simply describing the basic biology behind photophobia. But he says these kinds of findings help brain researchers understand more about how migraines occur and eventually, how to treat them.
Burstein's research is published in Nature Neuroscience.
I'm Rose Hoban.
Researchers Say New Genetic map of Malaria Drug Promises Increased Supply
Scientists have completed the first genetic map of a medicinal plant valued as the source of a powerful anti-malaria drug. Researchers say the map should substantially increase stocks and bring down the cost of artemisinin, a drug that's currently in short supply — and high demand — to treat malaria. VOA's Jessica Berman reports.
BERMAN: Artemisinin is cultivated from the ancient Chinese herb, Artemisia annua, to treat malaria. The parasitic disease is spread by mosquitoes and kills an estimated 900,000 people every year, mostly children.
While the parasite responsible for malaria has developed resistance to many drugs, rendering them less effective as a treatment, artemisinin remains a potent weapon. But supplies of the medication are limited because it is cultivated from seeds of a low-yielding wild plant. As a result, artemisinin costs ten times more than other anti-malarials, so it is used sparingly in combination with other drugs to boost their effectiveness.
Now, researchers at the University of York in England are using genetic technology to address the problem. They have drawn a genetic map of the annua plant that has identified traits and markers related to the production of artemisinin.
Ian Graham with York University's Center for Novel Agricultural products helped decipher the artemisinin plant's yield and quality characteristics. He says the new genetic blueprint provides a way to boost the annua plant's artemisin output.
GRAHAM: "What our work is doing is developing new high yielding varieties using this new knowledge. And that will stabilize the supply and prevent these price hikes in the drug which currently exist."
BERMAN: Graham says scientists hope to get seeds of the higher yielding annual varieties delivered soon to farmers, including those in developing countries, to start bolstering the worldwide supply of the anti-malarial drug.
GRAHAM: "So, I think if those processes are effective, we can look forward to reducing malaria. That's what our work is contributing to."
BERMAN: Malaria strikes an estimated 300-500 million people around the world each year.
Will Milhaus of the College of Public Health at the University of South Florida says the possibility of increasing the global supply of artemisin is very exciting.
MILHAUS: "I think it will go a long way towards, as they described, making it into a crop, and making it economically feasible to maintain world supplies."
The research study and commentary by Will Milhaus on the the new genetic map of artemisinin is published in the journal Science.
Jessice Berman, VOA News, Washington.
Scientists May Soybean Genome, Create GM Variety with Omega-3
In other genetic news, an international team of scientists has sequenced the entire genetic map of one of our most important food crops.
The team, led by researchers at Purdue University, found about 46,000 genes in the soybean. But many are duplicates, and one of the lead researchers, Scott Jackson, says that may complicate the process of using the genetic map to develop improved soybean varieties.
Even before this week's announcement of the sequencing, genetic researchers have been tinkering with the ubiquitous soybean.
In fact, a new variety of genetically modified, or GM, soybean nearing commercialization promises to deliver health benefits that could change how people think about agricultural biotechnology. VOA's Steve Baragona has more.
BARAGONA: Today's genetically modified crops are designed to help farmers by making weed and insect control easier. But they're not designed to help consumers, says Jane Rissler, with the Union of Concerned Scientists.
RISSLER: "The farmers and the companies have profited and benefited, and consumers have taken whatever risks there are."
BARAGONA: In the decade or more that GM crops have been on the market, those perceived risks — to the natural environment and to human health — have not materialized. But many consumers remain uncomfortable with anyone tinkering with their food. That's especially true in Europe, where farmers are prohibited from growing most GM crops.
But a new crop could complicate the picture. The giant U.S. seed and biotech company Monsanto is on the verge of introducing genetically modified soybeans that produce substantial amounts of omega-3 fatty acids. Research shows that a diet rich in omega-3s is good for the heart and the brain.
Roy Fuchs heads soybean research at Monsanto. He says conversations with European regulators about the new omega-3-rich soybeans have been encouraging.
FUCHS: "They see this as really the first of a number of products that will have direct consumer benefits and an opportunity to change the conversation from productivity to human health."
BARAGONA: Omega-3-rich GM soybeans could change the conversation because soybean oil is practically ubiquitous in Western processed foods. It's in everything from breads and granola bars to salad dressings. Fuchs says you could get your full daily allotment of one type of omega-3s just by eating three products made with the new soybean oil.
These days, Fuchs takes a capsule of fish oil every day to get his omega-3s.
FUCHS: "But I'd much rather have my yogurt and granola bar and salad dressing with omega-3 than having to take a capsule every morning."
BARAGONA: Providing convenient ways to increase the amount of omega-3s in the American diet could provide some real benefits, according to University of Southern California pharmacology professor Roger Clemens, a spokesman for the American Society for Nutrition.
CLEMENS: "Particularly as our population gets older, this population's at the highest risk of cardiovascular disease, hypertension, diabetes, obesity, and obviously Alzheimer's [disease]. So, those five major hits [diseases] may be impacted by this type of [decision] to provide more omega-3 fatty acids in the American diet."
BARAGONA: While few would argue that a food rich in omega-3 fatty acids would be a healthful addition to any diet, skeptics aren't convinced that Monsanto's genetically modified soybean is the best source for those nutrients.
And Jane Rissler with the Union of Concerned Scientists says questions remain about possible health risks from the GM soybean oil itself.
RISSLER: "This is a rather substantial interference with the oil metabolism processes of soybeans. And this, to us, raises some potential — and I say potential — safety issues that we think need more careful consideration."
BARAGONA: The U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently gave its approval to Monsanto's soybean oil. But Rissler says the FDA's approval process relies too heavily on the company's own safety-testing data.
Monsanto expects their omega-3 soybean oil to hit the market in the next couple years. And then the question will be whether consumers will warm to genetically modified foods made with their health in mind — or whether they'll remain wary of anyone tinkering with the fundamental chemistry of their food.
Steve Baragona, VOA News, Washington.
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