Oldest Mother Dies

A SPANISH woman who became the oldest woman in the world to give birth in 2006 when she had twin boys at the age of 67 using in vitro fertilisation has died.

Carmen Bousada, who was single, died at the weekend at the age of 69 from a cancer which was diagnosed just one year after she gave birth to Cristian and Pau, daily Diario de Cadiz reported, citing her brother Ricardo Bousada.

He refused to disclose where she died or give details regarding who will now look after the twins, who are now two-and-a-half years old.

Bousada gave birth to the boys on December 26, 2006 at Barcelona hospital after undergoing hormone treatment and being artificially inseminated using donor eggs and sperm at a Los Angeles fertility clinic, sparking a worldwide debate, which her death is likely to revive.

She later admitted to having lied to doctors at the clinic about her age, saying she was just 55, in order to get around the institution's age limit for single women.

Spanish law does not set an age limit for fertility treatments but the majority of clinics turn away women who are over 50.

link: Carmen Bousada dies of cancer aged 69 leaving twin boys | The Australian

Soot-toos: Oldest Known Tattoos Studied

For those inclined to put ink to flesh, modern tattoo parlours offer dizzying arrays of dyes – mercury-containing reds, manganese purples, even pigments that glow in the dark. Getting inked wasn't always quite so complicated, however. A new analysis concludes that the world's oldest tattoos were etched in soot. Belonging to Ötzi the 5300 year old Tyrolean iceman, the simple tattoos may have served a medicinal purpose, not a decorative one, says Maria Anna Pabst, a researcher at the Medical University of Graz, Austria, who trained optical and electron microscopes on biopsies of Otzi's preserved flesh.

link: World's oldest tattoos were made of soot - science-in-society - 15 July 2009 - New Scientist

Do Current Models Underestimate Global Warming?

New research published in the journal Nature Geoscience shows that during Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, a period about 55 million years ago when the planet warmed rapidly, only about 40% of that warming can be attributed to rises in CO2 in the atmosphere.

In short, "theoretical models cannot explain what we observe in the geological record," report co-author Gerald Dickens says. (Science Codex)

So, what else is going on and what does it mean for current climate models?

What we know from sediment cores about the period is that atmospheric carbon levels and global surface temperatures rose rapidly, between 5-9°C in 10,000 years—a blink of an eye in geological terms—accompanied by carbon dioxide increasing about 70%.

However studying these samples reveals that CO2 was only responsible for part of the increase and that another mechanism had to be at work as well. "Some feedback loop or other processes that aren't accounted for" in the climate models must be responsible, according to Dickens.

"If this additional warming...was caused as a response to CO2 warming, then there's a chance that future warming could be more intense than people anticipate," report co-author Richard Zeebe said. (Reuters)

link: CO2 Increases Responsible for Only 40% of Ancient Warming - Could the World Get Even Hotter Than Models Predict? : TreeHugger

Canadian Plan: Divert Water to USA

Quebec could raise up to C$9.5 billion ($8.5 billion) a year by reversing the flow of three northern rivers to generate power and export water to the United States, according to a report released on Wednesday.

The Montreal Economic Institute said Quebec could divert floodwaters from the three rivers in the spring, pumping the excess water higher, and then letting it flow south through the Ottawa River to the St. Lawrence.

The rivers currently flow into James Bay in northern Canada and then into Hudson Bay, a 316,000 sq mi (818,000 sq km) expanse of water that's bigger than Chile.

The report said that diverting the floodwater from north to south would boost levels on the St Lawrence River and let U.S. and Canadian authorities increase their use of fresh water from the Great Lakes without any risk to St Lawrence itself, a major international seaway.

"The revenue generated by exporting freshwater would be the result of complex negotiations between state, provincial and federal governments," said the report, compiled by former hydro-electric power engineer Pierre Gingras.

link: Quebec report seeks to divert water, generate power | Science | Reuters

"Genre" Genius: Jack Vance

Carlo Rotella writes:

Jack Vance, described by his peers as “a major genius” and “the greatest living writer of science fiction and fantasy,” has been hidden in plain sight for as long as he has been publishing — six decades and counting. Yes, he has won Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy awards and has been named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, and he received an Edgar from the Mystery Writers of America, but such honors only help to camouflage him as just another accomplished genre writer. So do the covers of his books, which feature the usual spacecraft, monsters and euphonious place names: Lyonesse, Alastor, Durdane. If you had never read Vance and were browsing a bookstore’s shelf, you might have no particular reason to choose one of his books instead of one next to it by A. E. van Vogt, say, or John Varley. And if you chose one of these alternatives, you would go on your way to the usual thrills with no idea that you had just missed out on encountering one of American literature’s most distinctive and undervalued voices.

That’s how Vance’s fans see it, anyway. Among them are authors who have gained the big paydays and the fame that Vance never enjoyed. Dan Simmons, the best-selling writer of horror and fantasy, described discovering Vance as “a revelation for me, like coming to Proust or Henry James. Suddenly you’re in the deep end of the pool. He gives you glimpses of entire worlds with just perfectly turned language. If he’d been born south of the border, he’d be up for a Nobel Prize.” Michael Chabon, whose distinguished literary reputation allows him to employ popular formulas without being labeled a genre writer, told me: “Jack Vance is the most painful case of all the writers I love who I feel don’t get the credit they deserve. If ‘The Last Castle’ or ‘The Dragon Masters’ had the name Italo Calvino on it, or just a foreign name, it would be received as a profound meditation, but because he’s Jack Vance and published in Amazing Whatever, there’s this insurmountable barrier.”

link: The Genre Artist - NYTimes.com

Russian Rights Activist Dead

A prominent Russian human rights activist kidnapped in Chechnya on Wednesday has been found dead in woodland in Ingushetia, the Ingush interior ministry said.

"The body had two wounds to the head, it was clear she had been murdered in the morning," Madina Khadziyeva, a spokeswoman at the ministry, told Reuters. She did not specify the nature of the injuries.

The body of Natalia Estemirova, abducted this morning in her native Chechnya, was found in the neighboring republic of Ingushetia near the city of Nazran, she added.

link: CORRECTED: Kidnapped Russian rights activist is dead: ministry | International | Reuters