CBP Detroit Donates Seized Fossils to University of Michigan

Detroit – U.S. Customs and Border Protection in the Port of Detroit announced the donation of hundreds of seized pre-historic fossils to the University of Michigan.

Some of the seized fossils donated by U.S. Customs and Border Protection to the University of Michigan.

A CBP officer working at a primary lane of the Ambassador Bridge on March 28, 2011, encountered two Canadian citizens who claimed they were attending a fossil trade show in Illinois. The two travelers had several boxes containing over 1,100 fossils.

Secondary inspection revealed that the fossils were actually for sale and the individuals did not properly declare their goods. The fossils were seized after a lengthy forfeiture process, which afforded the individuals the opportunity to pay associated penalties, however the violators did not respond to CBP efforts to assist them in reclaiming their property.

“This interception is an excellent example of CBP’s commitment at our ports of entry to the surrounding community,” said Roderick Blanchard, Detroit port director. “CBP not only stopped the illegal entry, but was able to contribute to the University of Michigan. This seizure highlights the diversity of the CBP mission.”

This donated fossils will be used for research and/or teaching by the University of Michigan Paleontology Department, which maintains a repository for fossil specimens.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) is the unified border agency within the Department of Homeland Security charged with the management, control, and protection of our Nation's borders at and between the official ports of entry. CBP is charged with keeping terrorists and terrorist weapons out of the country while enforcing hundreds of U.S. laws.

Road to the New Energy Economy - Electric Cars

The future of green transportation holds many questions. Will electric vehicles become more accessible? Will they be more affordable for the general public? Can they really help solve the energy crisis? In this March 23, 2011, Capitol Hill briefing, Jeff Stein of the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and Genevieve Cullen, Vice-President of Electric Drive at the Transportation Association, tackle these important issues.

Credit: National Science Foundation

NASA Selects Low Cost, High Science Earth Venture Space System

J.D. Harrington

Headquarters, Washington                              

202-358-5241

j.d.harrington@nasa.gov

 

WASHINGTON -- NASA has selected an ocean wind study proposal led by the University of Michigan from among 19 submitted to the agency's Announcement of Opportunity for small spaceflight investigations of the Earth system. The proposed mission will make accurate measurements of ocean surface winds throughout the life cycle of tropical storms and hurricanes, which could help lead to better weather forecasting.

The competitively-selected proposal, the Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System (CYGNSS), is led by Principal Investigator Dr. Chris Ruf of the University of Michigan, and includes partnerships with the Southwest Research Institute of Texas, Surrey Satellite Technology of Colorado and NASA Ames Research Center.

It is the second award, and first award for space-based investigations, in the Earth Venture-class series of rapidly developed, cost-constrained projects for NASA's Earth Science Division. The award will be funded during the next five years for $151.7 million. The cost includes initial development, launch, deployment and data analysis.

The mission will use a constellation of small satellites that will be carried to orbit on a single launch vehicle. The CYGNSS data will enable scientists, for the first time, to probe key air-sea interaction processes that take place near the inner core of the storms, which are rapidly changing and play large roles in the genesis and intensification of hurricanes. The CYGNSS measurements also may provide information to the hurricane forecast community.

Once in orbit, CYGNSS's eight micro-satellite observatories will receive both direct and reflected signals from Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites. The direct signals pinpoint CYGNSS observatory positions, while the reflected signals respond to ocean surface roughness, from which wind speed is retrieved.

"The CYGNSS mission is both a scientific and a programmatic advance for NASA’s Earth science and applications program," said John Grunsfeld, NASA's Science Mission Directorate associate administrator in Washington. "CYGNSS will provide vital science data on tropical cyclones, and the CYGNSS team will advance our ability to obtain high-quality Earth science data through smaller, more affordable space systems."

The Earth Venture missions are part of NASA's Earth System Science Pathfinder program. The small, targeted science investigations complement NASA's larger research missions. In 2007, the National Research Council recommended NASA undertake these types of regularly solicited, quick-turnaround projects. The previous Earth Venture award was for five airborne investigations all of which are progressing well with initial data being collected. The first Announcement of Opportunity in the Earth Venture-Instruments series was issued earlier this year, and proposals are now under review.

The Earth Venture program is expected to continue with awards at regular intervals for investigations using cutting edge instrumentation carried on airborne platforms, on small space missions, or as secondary instruments or hosted payloads on larger platforms. NASA's Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va., manages the Earth System Science Pathfinder program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. The missions in this program provide an innovative approach to address Earth science research with periodic windows of opportunity to accommodate new scientific priorities.

For more information about the Earth System Science Pathfinder program, visit http://go.nasa.gov/MKvgJO.

For information about NASA and agency programs, visit http://www.nasa.gov/.

- end -

Young Adults Responded Well to Swine Flu

About one in five young adults in their late 30's received a flu shot during the 2009-2010 swine flu epidemic, a University of Michigan (U-M) study released today says.

But about 65 percent were at least moderately concerned about the flu, and nearly 60 percent said they were following the issue very or moderately closely.

Using survey data collected from approximately 3,000 young adults during the 2009-2010 H1N1 influenza epidemic, this second of three parts in a U-M Generation X Report explores the first serious infectious disease Americans ages 36-39 ever experienced. It describes how the group kept abreast of the issue and what actions they eventually took to protect themselves and their families.

The data is part of the Longitudinal Study of American Youth conducted by the Institute for Social Research at University of Michigan and directed by Jon D. Miller, author of the report. The study, funded by the National Science Foundation since 1986, now includes responses from approximately 4,000 Gen Xers--those born between 1961 and 1981.

"These results suggest that young adults in Generation X did reasonably well in their first encounter with a major epidemic," says Miller. "Those with minor children at home were at the greatest risk, and they responded accordingly with higher levels of awareness and concern."

According to Miller, understanding GenX reactions to this recent threat may help public health officials manage future epidemics more effectively.

"This nationally-representative study helps us understand young adults' knowledge of viral infections and the ways they sought information on the H1N1 epidemic," says Gavin Fulmer, associate program director in NSF's Division of Research on Learning. "The findings can inform public health officials about the relationships among health knowledge, accessible sources of health information and preventive behaviors. This may help us address future epidemics or other potential health emergencies."

The results also show that even though a majority of Generation X young adults felt that they were "well informed" or "very well informed" about the issue, overall they scored only moderately well on an Index of Influenza Knowledge, a series of five items designed to test the level of knowledge about viral infections generally and about the swine flu epidemic specifically.

Among the other findings:

•Young adults with minor children at home were most likely to follow the news about influenza closely and were most concerned about the swine flu epidemic.

•Young adults were most likely to report getting information about the epidemic from friends, co-workers and family members.  In the month before the survey, they reported having about nine such conversations, compared to getting news about the flu less than three times via print or broadcast media and about five times from searching the internet.

•The most trusted sources of information about the influenza epidemic were physicians, followed by the National Institutes of Health, pharmacists at local drug stores and nurses from county health departments.  The least trusted sources were YouTube videos, drug company commercials and Wikipedia articles.

"In the decades ahead, the young adults in Generation X will encounter numerous other crises--some biomedical, some environmental, and others yet to be imagined," says Miller. "They will have to acquire, organize and make sense of emerging scientific and technical information, and the experience of coping with the swine flu epidemic suggests how they will meet that challenge."

A third Generation X Report on the topic of food and cooking will be issued in April 2012. Subsequent reports will cover climate, space exploration, citizenship and voting.

-NSF-

Seeing the Forest Under the Trees

Scientists recently discovered nitrogen that falls from the atmosphere in acid rain can influence large tracts of sugar maples in North America.

The atmospheric nitrogen in acid rain can affect forest ecosystems by acidifying soils and causing nutrient imbalances.

Sugar maples in northeastern North America are especially vulnerable. Vast maple areas have been affected by this acidification process, which depletes soil calcium in already calcium-poor soils such as those of the Eastern United States.

In the calcium-rich soils of the upper Great Lakes, however, acid rain also wreaks havoc, ecologists have found.  It slows leaf decomposition, leading to a pile-up of leaves and hindering new young maples from sprouting up.

The researchers published their results on-line in the current issue of the Journal of Applied Ecology.

"The process has the potential to affect sugar maple-dominated forests throughout the Great Lakes region," says Donald Zak, an ecologist at the University of Michigan, "especially as nitrogen deposition continues in the future."

He and colleagues Sierra Patterson of the University of Michigan, Andrew Burton of Michigan Technological University and Alan Talhelm and Kurt Pregitzer of the University of Idaho conducted seventeen years of nitrogen deposition experiments at rates that will likely happen by the end of this century.

"The effects have slowed the natural processes of decomposition, such as the decay of dead leaves, causing the leaves to build up and the forest floor to thicken," says Zak.

The leaf-littered ground has become a barrier to the small seeds of sugar maples, hence numbers of young sugar maples--the forest's next generation--are dropping.

"There were significantly fewer seedlings in the nitrogen treatment area," says Patterson, the paper's lead author.

"Increasing the amount of fallen leaves on the forest floor caused a significant reduction in successful sugar maple seedlings," she says. "On the other hand, decreasing the thickened forest floor increased seedling survival."

"The surprising results reported in this study are an example of the value of long-term research," says Saran Twombly, program director in the National Science Foundation (NSF)'s Division of Environmental Biology, which funded the work.

"Uncovering an unexpected link between nitrogen deposition and sugar maple seedling success depended on the ability to simulate increased nitrogen deposition year after year," Twombly says.

"The manipulations used to reveal the details of this link could not have worked in other than a long-term study."

Scientists need to re-think the myriad ways in which acid rain may affect forests, Zak believes, especially those made up largely of sugar maples. 

"We need to learn to see the forest," he says, "that's under the trees."

Cheryl Dybas, NSF (703) 292-7734 cdybas@nsf.gov

NASA Spacecraft Reveals New Details Of Planet Mercury

If you’re into science and astronomy, discover these popular NASA books written by military veteran astronauts.

Dwayne Brown

Headquarters, Washington     

 

Paulette Campbell

Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Md.

 

Science Journal Has Embargoed Details Until 2 p.m. EDT on Sept. 29

WASHINGTON -- NASA will host a media teleconference at 2 p.m. EDT on Thursday, Sept. 29, to discuss new data and images from the first spacecraft to orbit Mercury.

NASA's MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft conducted fifteen laps through the inner solar system for more than six years before achieving the historic orbit insertion on March 18.

Briefing participants are:

-     Ed Graykzeck, MESSENGER program manager, NASA Headquarters, Washington

-     James Head, III, professor of geological sciences, Brown University

-     David Blewett, MESSENGER participating scientist and staff scientist, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), Laurel, Md.

-     Patrick Peplowski, staff scientist, APL

-     Thomas Zurbuchen, professor of space science and aerospace engineering, University of Michigan

To participate in the teleconference, reporters must contact Dwayne Brown at dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov or 202-358-1726, by noon on Sept. 29 for dial-in instructions.

Audio of the teleconference will be streamed live at http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio.

Related images and supporting briefing information will be available at http://www.nasa.gov/messenger.

- end -

NASA Spacecraft's Data Reveal Magma Ocean Under Jupiter Moon

Dwayne C. Brown

Headquarters, Washington

 

Jia-Rui Cook

Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

WASHINGTON -- New data analysis from NASA's Galileo spacecraft reveals a subsurface ocean of molten or partially molten magma beneath the surface of Jupiter's volcanic moon Io.

The finding heralds the first direct confirmation of this kind of magma layer at Io and explains why the moon is the most volcanic object known in the solar system. The research was conducted by scientists at the University of California, Los Angeles, the University of California, Santa Cruz, and the University of Michigan. The study is published this week in the journal Science.

"Scientists are excited we finally understand where Io's magma is coming from and have an explanation for some of the mysterious signatures we saw in some of the Galileo's magnetic field data," said Krishan Khurana, lead author of the study and former co-investigator on Galileo's magnetometer team at UCLA. "It turns out Io was continually giving off a 'sounding signal' in Jupiter's rotating magnetic field that matched what would be expected from molten or partially molten rocks deep beneath the surface."

Io produces about 100 times more lava each year than all the volcanoes on Earth. While Earth's volcanoes occur in localized hotspots like the "Ring of Fire" around the Pacific Ocean, Io's volcanoes are distributed all over its surface. A global magma ocean about 20 to 30 miles (30 to 50 kilometers) beneath Io's crust helps explain the moon's activity.

"It has been suggested that both the Earth and its moon may have had similar magma oceans billions of years ago at the time of their formation, but they have long since cooled," said Torrence Johnson, a former Galileo project scientist based at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif. He was not directly involved in the study. "Io's volcanism informs us how volcanoes work and provides a window in time to styles of volcanic activity that may have occurred on the Earth and moon during their earliest history."

NASA's Voyager spacecraft discovered Io's volcanoes in 1979, making that moon the only body in the solar system other than Earth known to have active magma volcanoes. The energy for the volcanic activity comes from the squeezing and stretching of the moon by Jupiter's gravity as Io orbits the largest planet in the solar system.

Galileo was launched in 1989 and began orbiting Jupiter in 1995. Unexplained signatures appeared in magnetic field data from Galileo flybys of Io in October 1999 and February 2000. After a successful mission, the spacecraft intentionally was sent into Jupiter's atmosphere in 2003.

"During the final phase of the Galileo mission, models of the interaction between Io and Jupiter's immense magnetic field, which bathes the moon in charged particles, were not yet sophisticated enough for us to understand what was going on in Io's interior," said Xianzhe Jia, a co-author of the study at the University of Michigan.

Recent work in mineral physics showed that a group of rocks known as "ultramafic" rocks become capable of carrying substantial electrical current when melted. Ultramafic rocks are igneous in origin, or form through the cooling of magma. On Earth, they are believed to originate from the mantle. The finding led Khurana and colleagues to test the hypothesis that the strange signature was produced by current flowing in a molten or partially molten layer of this kind of rock.

Tests showed that the signatures detected by Galileo were consistent with a rock such as lherzolite, an igneous rock rich in silicates of magnesium and iron found in Spitzbergen, Sweden. The magma ocean layer on Io appears to be more than 30 miles (50 kilometers) thick, making up at least 10 percent of the moon's mantle by volume. The blistering temperature of the magma ocean probably exceeds 2,200 degrees Fahrenheit (1,200 degrees Celsius).

The Galileo mission was managed by JPL for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. For more information about the Galileo mission and its discoveries, visit http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/galileo and http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/galileo-legacy.

- end -

Justice Department Convenes First Meeting of New Science Advisory Board

WASHINGTON – The Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs’ (OJP) newly created Science Advisory Board convened its first meeting today in Washington, D.C.   Created last year, the board is charged with providing OJP with guidance and recommendations for research, statistics and grant programs, ensuring the programs and activities are scientifically sound and pertinent to policymakers and practitioners.

Today’s meeting provided the board’s newly appointed members with information about OJP’s mission and goals, and how their participation will enhance the overall impact and performance of OJP’s activities in criminal and juvenile justice.   In Fiscal Year 2010, OJP awarded nearly 5,000 grants totaling $2.6 billion to the criminal and juvenile justice field.   This funding will be used for research and evaluation programs designed to encourage innovative approaches to prevent and control crime, to assist victims, and to increase the capacity of state, local and tribal law enforcement agencies.

“The Science Advisory Board will play a critical role in institutionalizing the protection of science at the Department of Justice,” said Laurie O. Robinson, OJP’s Assistant Attorney General.   “The board’s members will provide valuable input and guidance to ensure adherence to the highest levels of scientific rigor, while serving as a bridge between research and practice in the criminal justice fields.”

In November 2010, Attorney General Eric Holder announced the 18 board’s members – experts and scholars in criminology, statistics, sociology and practitioners in the criminal and juvenile justice fields.   The members are:

Chair: Alfred Blumstein, Ph.D., The H. John Heinz III College, Carnegie Mellon University.    Dr. Blumstein is a previous winner of the Stockholm Prize in Criminology and serves as the J. Erik Jonsson Professor of Urban Systems and Operations Research at Carnegie Mellon Heinz College.

William J. Bratton, Chairman, Altegrity Risk International.   Mr. Bratton most recently served as chief of the Los Angeles Police Department.

Andrea J. Cabral, Sheriff, Suffolk County, Mass.   Sheriff Cabral was elected as the 30th Sheriff of Suffolk County and she is the first female in the commonwealth’s history to hold the position.

Frank Cullen, Ph.D., Distinguished Research Professor of Criminal Justice, University of Cincinnati.    Dr. Cullen is the past editor of Justice Quarterly and Journal of Crime and Justice and was president of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences.

Tony Fabelo, Ph.D., Director of Research, Council of State Governments Justice Center.    Dr. Fabelo was a member of the National Research Council panel of the National Academy of Sciences that issued two national reports in 2000 and 2001 on juvenile crime and juvenile justice.

James M. Lepkowski, Ph.D., Chair, Program in Survey Methodology, University of Michigan.    Dr. Lepkowski is Senior Research Scientist at the Survey Research Center and Associate Professor of Bio-statistics at the University of Michigan.

Alan I. Leshner, Ph.D., Chief Executive Officer, American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).    Dr. Leshner has been the chief executive officer of the AAAS and Executive Publisher of the journal, Science, since December 2001.

Mark Lipsey, Ph.D., Director, Peabody Research Institute, Vanderbilt University.

Dr. Lipsey is the director of the Peabody Research Institute and his research and teaching interests include public policy, program evaluation and social intervention with an emphasis on programs for children and youth.

Colin Loftin, Ph.D., School of Criminal Justice, University at Albany, State University of New York.    Dr. Loftin is co-director of the Violence Research Group, a research collaboration with colleagues at the University at Albany and the University of Maryland that conducts research on the causes and consequences of interpersonal violence.

The Honorable Theodore A. McKee, Chief Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.   Prior to his appointment to the bench, Judge McKee served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney where he prosecuted cases of public corruption, police brutality and civil rights violations.

Tracey L. Meares, J.D., Deputy Dean and Walton Hale Hamilton Professor of Law, Yale University.   Professor Meares’ research and teaching interests center on criminal procedure and criminal law policy, with a particular emphasis on empirical investigation of these subjects.

Edward P. Mulvey, Ph.D., Director, Law & Psychiatry Research, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.   Dr. Mulvey is a fellow of both the American Psychological Association and the American Psychological Society.

Joan Petersilia, Ph.D., Faculty Co-director, Stanford Criminal Justice Center

Dr. Petersilia is the author of 11 books about crime and public policy and has conducted research about parole reform, prisoner reintegration, and sentencing policy.

Joycelyn Pollock, Ph.D., Department of Criminal Justice, Texas State University.    Dr. Pollock began her career in criminal justice as a probation and parole officer in the state of Washington.   Her primary research areas include prisons, women in the system (as professionals, offenders and victims) and legal topics.

Richard Rosenfeld, Ph.D., Professor, Criminology and Criminal Justice, University of Missouri.   Dr. Rosenfeld is the Curators Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.   He recently served as the President of the American Society of Criminology.   Dr. Rosenfeld is the co-author with Steven Messner of Crime and the American Dream, now in its fourth edition.   

Elizabeth A. Stasny, Ph.D., Professor of Statistics and Vice Chair of Graduate Studies in Statistics and Bio-Statistics, Ohio State University .   Dr. Stasny has served on the editor boards of the Journal of the American Statistical Association and Survey Methodology.    She is a recognized expert in dealing with missing data and other response errors in surveys.

Robert J. Sampson, Ph.D., Professor of Social Sciences, Department of Sociology, Harvard University .   Dr. Sampson is the 2011 co-recipient of the Stockholm Prize in Criminology.   He and Dr. John H. Laub, Director of the National Institute of Justice, are joint winners for their work on understanding how and why criminals stop committing crime.  Dr. Sampson currently is on a one-year research sabbatical from Harvard University to the Russell Sage Foundation.    His research interests center on crime and violence, the life course, neighborhood effects and the sociology of the modern city.

David Weisburd, Ph.D., Professor of Law and Criminal Justice, Hebrew University and George Mason University.    Dr. Weisburd is the 2010 winner of the Stockholm Prize in Criminology and one of the early proponents of place-based experimental research in criminology.