Family Science Project Yields Surprising Data About a Siberian Lake

May 6, 2008
Family Science Project Yields Surprising Data About a Siberian Lake
By CORNELIA DEAN

In 1945, when Stalin ruled the Soviet Union, Mikhail M. Kozhov began keeping track of what was happening under the surface of Lake Baikal, the ancient Siberian lake that is the deepest and largest body of fresh water on earth.

Every week to 10 days, by boat in summer and over the ice in winter, he crossed the lake to a spot about a mile and a half from Bolshie Koty, a small village in the piney woods on Baikal’s northwest shore. There, Dr. Kozhov, a professor at Irkutsk State University, would record water temperature and clarity and track the plant and animal plankton species as deep as 2,400 feet.

Soon his daughter Olga M. Kozhova began assisting him and, eventually her daughter, Lyubov Izmesteva, joined the project. They kept at it over the years, producing an extraordinary record of the lake and its health.

Now Dr. Izmesteva and scientists in the United States have analyzed the data and concluded, to their surprise, that the water in Lake Baikal is rapidly warming. As a result, its highly unusual food web is reorganizing, as warmer water species of plankton become more prevalent. These shifts at the bottom of the food web could have important implications for all of the creatures that live in the lake, they say.

Although Dr. Kozhov is famous among scientists who study lakes — his 1961 book “Lake Baikal and Its Life” is considered a classic — the new report is “the international debut of the Kozhov family’s legacy of research,” Stephanie E. Hampton of the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis at the University of California, Santa Barbara, said in an e-mail message.

She led the work along with Dr. Izmesteva who, like her mother and grandfather before her, is a professor at the university and a researcher at the biological field station it established in Bolshie Koty in 1918. Their findings are being reported this month in the journal Global Change Biology.

Like others who have seen the data, Dr. Hampton said in an interview that she was in awe of the people who had collected it. “Even in the spring, summer and fall, this is tough,” she said. “In the winter to go out a mile and a half on the ice and break through it to take water samples, in a year-round effort for 60 years, is pretty amazing to me. Every time I think about it I am humbled.”

Marianne V. Moore, an ecologist at Wellesley College and another researcher on the project, said she learned about the data in 2001 when she took students in her class, “Baikal and the Soul of Siberia,” to the lake. Dr. Izmesteva spoke to the group and showed a few slides, which the translator said had been drawn from a 60-year record. “I thought he had made a mistake,” Dr. Moore recalled. “So I basically ignored it.”

When she returned with another class two years later and another scientist mentioned the data, “my jaw dropped to the floor,” she said. “I realized this is just extraordinary.”

She got in touch with Dr. Hamilton, who is an expert in the analysis of complex ecological field data, particularly the use of statistical techniques to discern real trends in the messy ups and downs of nature. The center in Santa Barbara financed the collaboration.

Baikal is a place of unusual biodiversity, with many species found nowhere else. Among them are giant shrimp, bright green sponges that grow in shallow water forests and the Baikal seal, the world’s only exclusively freshwater seal. In 1996, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, or Unesco, designated the lake a World Heritage Site.

Although it is known that warming is more intense at high latitudes, as in the Baikal area, and that water is warming in other major lakes, including Lake Tahoe in Nevada and Lake Tanganyika in central Africa, many scientists had thought that Lake Baikal’s enormous volume and unusual water circulation patterns would buffer the effects of global warming.

Instead, the researchers report, surface waters in Lake Baikal are warming quickly, on average by about 0.4 degrees Fahrenheit every decade. At a depth of about 75 feet, the increase is about 0.2 degrees per decade, they say, enough to jeopardize species “unable to adapt evolutionarily or behaviorally.”

Over the last 137 years, the researchers say, the ice-free season has lengthened by more than two weeks, primarily because ice forms later in the year. The database, including data on chlorophyll that the family started collecting in 1979, suggest that the “growing season” for plankton and algae has lengthened in the lake. Chlorophyll levels have tripled since measurement began, the researchers said.

Ordinarily, the researchers said in their report, this increased plant growth would be accompanied by decreases in water clarity, but that is not what the data show at Lake Baikal. This finding, they said, “highlights the importance of establishing monitoring for ‘early warming’ before a need for monitoring may be perceived visually.”

Now, Dr. Hampton said, she and other researchers are examining how the Kozhov family’s data fit with records of ecological phenomena elsewhere. So far, she said, “the data correlate well.”

“You could not make up something like this.” she added.

Dr. Moore said Dr. Kozhov died in 1968 and his daughter Olga died in 2000. The family persisted in their work through years of political, economic and social turmoil, especially the collapse of the Soviet Union after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 when, Dr. Moore said, “funds for the program just dried up.”

Today, she said, Dr. Izmesteva and her colleagues pay for their work in part with fees they earn by consulting or doing environmental impact assessments.

“They sustain the program any way they can,” Dr. Moore said.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/06/science/earth/06lake.html

Continental Airlines CEO Larry Kellner bet business on being on time, and won

Continental Airlines CEO Larry Kellner bet business on being on time, and won

A ‘View from the Top’ by leader of one of most successful turnarounds in U.S. aviation transportation history

BY APRIL NEILSON

* Printable Version

In an industry known for stiff competition, market volatility and demanding customers, Larry Kellner has a formula guaranteed to smooth out the ride.

Speaking to a packed audience of students and faculty Oct. 11 at the Graduate School of Business, the Continental Airlines Inc. chairman and CEO gave excerpts from his leadership playbook that led to one of the most successful turnarounds in U.S. aviation transportation history.

Credited with taking Continental from bankruptcy to the world's fourth-largest airline, Kellner engaged his audience in a lively tour behind the scenes of the highly competitive and tumultuous airline business—to provide a view of some of the planning processes that earned this company its present day success. His speech was part of the student-run "View from the Top" speaker series, which brings executives to the school to discuss their experiences and leadership styles.

When Kellner became the CFO of Continental in 1995, the carrier was ranked the nation's worst airline in terms of customer complaints, lost baggage and on-time arrivals. "It was a pretty broken company," Kellner said. "And it wasn't just a one-off problem. This was the culture of 'How can we make it cheaper? How can we do it with less?' And we were lousy …, getting tons of complaints. We were losing bags because we were late, and late because we were losing bags."

Confronting $2.3 billion in debt defaults, no cash and a third potential bankruptcy, Kellner came up with a turnaround plan that defied conventional wisdom and some of the standard operating practices of the times. "If you don't spend any money you're not going to make it," he said. The number one priority: Bring flights in on time. "We needed to tell [our employees] that was the most important thing they do, and to put incentives behind it." The decision: For every month the company made it to the top five for on-time arrivals, employees would earn an additional $65.

Within 30 days, Continental moved up to fourth place for on-time arrivals, and within two months, gained the number one slot—a ranking it holds today. "All of a sudden the employees who had been ripping the Continental patches off their uniforms when they went to Wal-Mart after work were in the company store buying Continental hats," Kellner said.

Continental's "Go Forward" plan gave employees more ownership in the firm 's success and more transparency about how the company was run. "If you want to be successful in any business, you need a plan that tells you where you're going. You've got to communicate the plan. … And you've got to treat people with respect and dignity."

Continental's mission was simple—summed up in four key elements:
# An operating plan that "makes reliability a reality";
# A financial plan that "funds the future";
# A people plan that encourages and supports "working together"; and
# A marketing plan delivering a "fly-to-win" strategy.

Kellner said: "You have to understand what it is you want to do. If the plane is there waiting at the gate but the Jetway is not attached, you're not there yet. You can't get the door open."

In a business where every minute counts, it is important, he says, that when you've been on a long flight, in a small seat, you don't sit for 10 minutes waiting for the Jetway to arrive to disembark. "My job is to keep our employees happy and focused on a business plan that works. If they keep you happy … our shareholders will be happy," he said.

Since Kellner joined the carrier, Continental has won more awards for customer satisfaction than any other airline. Having survived two bankruptcies, the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the second Gulf War and spiraling fuel costs, Continental's strategy—under Kellner's leadership—continues to pay off.

Kellner himself is a three-time winner of CFO Magazine's CFO Excellence Award. Says Kellner, "You've got to constantly reinvent the business, reinvent the way you do it, and keep your product fresh. I fly our competitors on a regular basis—I want to see what they are doing, how they are rolling out their service, what we can take from them. I will gladly take anything anyone does that's smarter."

April Neilson is a freelance writer.

Source: http://news-service.stanford.edu/news/2007/october31/kellner-103107.html

Academy of Achievement

An awesome website containing real life stories of the faces of success

Exercise and Heart Rate

Exercise and Heart Rate

Author: Stan Reents, PharmD
Posted: 5/6/2007 10:02:03 AM

Many people know that monitoring their heart rate during exercise helps them determine how hard they are working. And others know that exercising at an intensity that keeps their heart rate in a specific range will result in a "training" effect.

But, recently, new research has revealed other ways you can use your heart rate to determine not only how hard you are exercising, but, also how healthy your cardiovascular system is. This review will discuss 4 different ways you can use your heart rate to monitor your fitness. Your personal trainer may not even know some of these details.

MAXIMUM HEART RATE

Before you can calculate your "target exercise heart rate," you first need to determine your "maximum heart rate".

The traditional formula for calculating maximum heart rate is:

• Max HR = 220 - age

However, several years ago, researchers in the department of kinesiology and applied physiology at the University of Colorado in Boulder noticed that this formula underestimated exercise heart rates in older subjects.

Hirofumi Tanaka, PhD, and his group conducted an exhaustive review of 351 studies involving nearly 19,000 subjects and derived a new formula. They then validated the new formula in 514 healthy subjects.

The formula they propose is:

• Max HR = 208 - (age x 0.7)

In 40-year-old subjects, both formulas yield the same result (ie., 180 beats per minute). However, the Tanaka equation produces slightly lower limits (than the old formula) in subjects younger than 40, and raises the limit slightly in subjects older than 40 years old.

Other formulas exist. What's important is that, for the elderly, and people who are not in shape, maximum heart rate should be determined by calculation since it would be too risky for these people to submit themselves to an all-out exercise test.

Determining Maximum HR From An All-Out Run:

The November 2004 issue of Runner's World magazine offers a method for fit runners to determine their maximum heart rate:

• warmup
• run as hard as you can for 3 minutes
• walk for 2 minutes
• run as hard as you can for another 3 minutes

During the last minute of running, you should be at your maximum heart rate. NOTE: Do not do this unless you are fit, or have been given a clean bill of health by your physician.

But, let's say you're not interested in winning your age group in next month's neighborhood 10-K; you are only exercising for health reasons. In this case, you still need to know your maximum heart rate. This allows you to determine your "training" heart rate, which is explained below.

There's also a medical use for knowing maximum heart rate. Cardiologists have determined that the inability to attain a target heart rate during exercise appears to be an ominous predictor of mortality. Researchers at the Cleveland Clinic found that patients who could not reach at least 85% of their predicted exercise heart rate had a higher risk of death (Lauer MS, et al. 1999).

TRAINING HEART RATE

Now that you know your maximum heart rate, you can determine your training heart rate. Coaches and their athletes know that driving the heart rate up into a specific range is the key to improving performance in aerobic events like cycling, distance running, etc. For example, Ed Eyestone offers the following guidelines in the November 2004 issue of Runner's World magazine:

• 70-80% max HR: aerobic training pace
• 80-90% max HR: lactate threshold pace
• 90-97% max HR: long-interval pace
• 95-100% max HR: short-interval pace

Serious endurance athletes (triathletes, distance runners, etc.) will train mostly at the aerobic training pace. About 10% of their training will be at the lactate threshold pace. Extremely-intense "intervals" make up only a small percentage of the overall training plan.

Training heart rate is also helpful for people who want to exercise for health benefits. Research shows that untrained individuals will begin to improve their aerobic fitness when they exercise regularly at 50% of their maximum heart rate (Pollock ML, et al. 1998).

For example, for a 60-year-old person, the maximum heart rate (using the Tanaka equation) is 166. Fifty percent of that is 83 beats per minute. Thus, exercise does not need to be exhausting to achieve a health benefit.

RECOVERY HEART RATE

"Recovery" heart rate is a determination of how long it takes your heart rate to return to normal after you stop exercising. This concept is mostly for people who are out of shape. People with a slower recovery are at higher risk of sudden death than people who recover more quickly.

Researchers at the Cleveland Clinic exercised patients on a treadmill, then measured their heart rate 1 minute after running stopped and compared it to their peak heart rate. The failure of heart rate to fall rapidly after exercise stopped was associated with increased overall mortality (Cole CR, et al. 1999).

A similar result was seen in a study from France. Cardiologists exercised patients on a stationary bike for 10 minutes, then measured their heart rate 1 minute after cycling stopped and compared it to their peak heart rate. Patients with the poorest recovery had 2.1 times the risk of sudden death compared to patients with the best recovery (Jouven X, et al. 2005).

RESTING HEART RATE

And, finally, the 4th way you can use your heart rate to monitor your exercise program is to simply take your pulse while at rest. Resting heart rate is another indicator of your aerobic fitness.

One of the dramatic things that happens to your heart when you become aerobically fit is that your heart pumps more blood with each beat. This is known as "stroke volume". Since more blood is pumped with each beat, the heart doesn't need to beat as fast, so, resting heart rate is slower.

In one study of female runners, the resting heart rate directly related to how far the women ran per week (Williams PT. 1996):

MILES RUN	RESTING HR
0-10 miles/wk	69
10-20 miles/wk	66
20-30 miles/wk	65
30-40 miles/wk	63
40-86 miles/wk	61

You may have heard of marathon runners who have resting heart rates in the 50's, or, even in the 40's. Generally, this is a sign of a strong heart.

Unfortunately, the opposite is also true. In one study of middle-age men with no evidence of cardiovascular disease, a resting heart rate of 75 beats per minute or higher had 3.5 times the risk of sudden death compared to men with resting heart rates of less than 60 (Jouven X, et al. 2005).

SUMMARY

So, it turns out that something as simple as keeping track of your heart rate can tell you a lot about your health and fitness. Here's how to do it:

•Resting Heart Rate: Take your pulse as soon as you wake up in the morning, preferably, without an alarm clock, and definitely before that first cup of coffee. Take it while you are still lying in bed; don't sit up. If you don't want to do a 60-second count, then do a 6-second count and simply add a zero.

•Maximum Heart Rate: This was discussed above. To repeat, do NOT do the running test unless you have a clean bill of health from your physician. Instead, use the formula by Tanaka et al. listed above.

•Training Heart Rate: If you simply want to exercise for health benefits, you only need to exercise at about 50-60% of your maximum heart rate. However, if you want to improve your times in a 10-K race for example, then you need to push your HR into the 70-90% range periodically. Since it is very difficult to take your pulse when you are exercising this hard, use a heart rate monitor.

Source: http://www.athleteinme.com/ArticleView.aspx?id=275

Open Chain Versus Closed Chain Exercises

Open Chain Versus Closed Chain Exercise

In addition to different types of muscle contraction, you can use two basic types of movement to elicit those contractions. Each has pros and cons, and you may need to analyze an activity to decide if you want to include it in your program. The names of these types of movement, open chain and closed chain, come from the science of biomechanics. They refer to whether or not the extremity is fixed at the distal end during an exercise, meaning whether the hand or foot stays in contact with either a stable surface or a piece of equipment that moves in a predetermined way. An open chain activity is one in which the extremity can move in any direction, because it is not attached at the end. For example, if you raise one of your feet off the ground, you can move that leg in any direction or sequence of movements. A closed chain activity, on the other hand, fixes the distal end of the extremity either to the ground or to a device that has a predetermined motion. When you keep your feet on the ground while you bend or straighten one joint, the other joints move in a predictable, set manner.

Open chain exercises do a good job of targeting one set of muscles for strengthening, but they increase the forces transmitted to the involved joint. Closed chain activities transmit less force to the joint (although they too can be stressful) and often are more functional movements. Another benefit is that when you perform closed chain exercises, you often strengthen several muscle groups.

Because of the increased stress on joints, keep open chain activities to a minimum. Exercises such as biceps curls are simple and usually do not cause too many problems. On the other hand, knee extension exercises that use an open chain motion produce a lot of stress to the knee and will probably increase your pain. If you opt for an open chain activity, keep the resistance lower around an arthritic joint. For example, you might do a knee extension in an open chain manner using rubber tubing, but keep away from knee extension machines. If you want to use a machine, the leg press is a better option; it is a closed chain activity and you can usually modify your position to further decrease the stress to your knees.

Source: http://www.healthline.com/hlbook/art-open-chain-versus-closed-chain-exercise

Exercise and Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF)

What is the role of exercise in promoting BDNF production?

The capacity of physical activity to maintain and compensate for deterioration of nerve cell function is becoming increasingly recognized. Numerous animal studies have reported that voluntary exercise leads to an upregulation of BDNF. Upregulation simply means that more BDNF is produced. In one rat study, several days of voluntary wheel-running increased levels of BDNF in the hippocampus. This finding is surprising considering that the hippocampus is a structure normally associated with higher cognitive functions such as emotion and memory rather than motor activity. The changes in BDNF levels were found in nerve cells within days in both male and female rats and were sustained even several weeks after exercise.

In particular, running activity increased levels of BDNF in the lumbar spinal cord, cerebellum, and cortex, but not in the striatum. Since the main site of neurodegeneration in people with HD is the striatum, exercise alone will likely not be able to prevent many of the symptoms of the disease. However, exercise can help preserve cognitive function and promote the general health of the brain, as well as the health of the body overall. Although exercise may not be able to promote neurogenesis (the growth of nerve cells) in the striatum, it can promote neurogenesis in other areas of the brain and body and these changes may be enough to delay the onset and progression of various HD symptoms.

There is debate over what intensity of exercise is best to promote brain health. Although previous reports showed that only rigorous exercise, like treadmill running, stimulated BDNF expression, researchers have more recently found that even a light exercise routine may be sufficient. The downside of high intensity is that sometimes this kind of exercise can be a stressful experience that increases the release of stress hormones, thereby canceling the BDNF-promoting effects of exercise. Also, many individuals are simply unable to perform rigorous exercise. These new reports are very encouraging because they indicate that everyone can enjoy the benefits of exercise by simply engaging in light activities such as walking or doing yard work.

Source: http://hopes.stanford.edu/treatmts/bdnf/b3.html

Taking Isles back from alien plants

Photo by: Jan Tenbruggencate
Source: Honolulu Advertiser, August 10th, 2006
Author: JAN TENBRUGGENCATE

http://tinyurl.com/m22w9

LIHU'E, Kaua'i — Conservation organizations statewide are fighting to slow an invasion of alien plants that are spreading from home and commercial landscapes into the Hawaiian native forest.
A notable invader, the Australian tree fern, is favored for its fast growth, dense canopy and tolerance of a range of growing conditions. But its tiny spores readily spread on the winds and are supplanting native species in forests around the state.

Although many of the state's nurseries have agreed to halt sales, it's still available at a number of major retailers.

"You can still find it in lots of the larger stores. It's about the dollar," said Joylynn Paman, spokeswoman for the Maui Invasive Species Committee, who said landscapers on her island are working on a program to stop using the worst invasive plants.If some outlets continue to sell the invasive species, it reduces the effectiveness of the entire program, said Jacqueline Kozak, of the Kaua'i Invasive Species Committee.

"It's unfair to the smaller nurseries that are taking an economic hit and ecologically ineffective," Kozak said. "It needs to be an across-the-board commitment."Some stores are still learning about the issue. Among the big-box stores still selling some invasive species are Wal-Mart and Home Depot. But both, in response to calls from The Advertiser, said they had been unaware of the issue and are reviewing their plant sales programs."Being good stewards of the environment is very important to Wal-Mart and our associates. Because of that we are reviewing the plants we currently offer our customers in Hawai'i and will provide an update to the communities we serve in the near future," said Wal-Mart spokeswoman Karen Burk.

Home Depot spokeswoman Kathryn Gallagher said the issue is new to the company, but "we're going to work with the appropriate agencies, and we'll tailor our business to meet the needs of the location."YOU CAN SEE EFFECTS

The impact of the aggressive alien species is clear in Hawai'i's forests, said Kaua'i craft maker Linda Hunt, of Wailua Homesteads.

"When we go up into the forest to pick maile and mokihana, there's a lot of invasive plants. People go up to pull them out and herbicide them, but there's not enough volunteers to make a dent," Hunt said.The Kaua'i Landscaping Industry Council in June joined the O'ahu Nursery Growers Association in signing on to a program of the Missouri Botanical Garden and The Nature Conservancy — a code of conduct to help prevent the spread of invasive species. In the code, growers agree to work with experts to identify potentially invasive plants, develop alternatives to the use of those plants, phase out the sale of the invasive species, and encourage their customers not to use them.

Richard Beach, operator of Alexander's Nursery on Kaua'i, is not a member of industry groups, but completely supports the goal."We've destroyed all our own Australian tree ferns, and we're now destroying them in our clients' places," Beach said. "It is one of the most scurrilous invasive species. When you see a road cut left bare, they appear. I've found them coming up in clients' yards."

His argument to customers who mention using invasive plants in landscaping is simple."There is a serious movement to preserve what we can of Hawai'i's forests. The tradeoff is that you help play a part in preserving the 'Hawaiianness' of Hawai'i."

The Kaua'i Landscaping Industry Council has agreed to stop the sale of a dozen plants: Australian tree fern, rubbervine, smokebush, butterfly bush, pampas grass, hiptage, fountain grass, glorybush, fiddlewood, kahili ginger, common St. John's wort and Indian rhododendron. Earlier, O'ahu nurseries agreed to stop selling 10 species, many of them the same as the Kaua'i ones.PROBLEMS EVERYWHERE

Different weedy species are bigger problems in specific environments. The Nature Conservancy conducted aerial surveys of the Kaua'i forests, and "I've never seen a weed species that can spread as far and multiply and grow as fast as an Australian tree fern here on Kaua'i," said the conservancy's Trae Menard in a prepared statement.

Kaua'i Nursery owner Lelan Nishek, president of the Kaua'i council and vice president of the Landscaping Industry Council for Hawai'i, said he destroyed $8,000 worth of Australian tree ferns and has launched an extensive program to propagate the native hapu'u tree fern instead."I even cut down the Australian tree ferns in my own yard" after seeing how invasive they were in the natural environment, he said.

Christy Martin, director of the Coordinating Group on Alien Pest Species, said pampas grass is a particular problem on Maui, after it became a popular landscaping plant in Kula.

"We're finding it in Haleakala Crater — even in the back of the crater where nobody goes," she said.In southeast Moloka'i, the rubbervine is spreading. Fountaingrass forms clumps across much of the Big Island's lava fields, Martin said.

Miconia and ivy gourd continue to be severe pest problems in many parts of the state, but they're not listed among the nursery problem plants because almost all nurseries now understand their risk and won't market them, she said.WORKING ON EDUCATION

Landscape professionals can learn about the invasive potential of new plants they're considering with a program called the Weed Risk Assessment. For many known plants in Hawai'i, the assessments have already been done.

"If you bring things in from other parts of the world, please get them screened before you plant them and sell them," Martin said she tells people who import new plants.

Her group and the invasive species committees in the four counties are working to expand industry and public knowledge about the threats of invasive plants.

"If there are people working hard in the upper forests to stop invasive species, it is important for the community to see that the nurseries aren't selling the very same species down below," Kozak said. "It shows that we are all working together."

Crafter Hunt said that many people insist on showy non-Hawaiian foliage because they don't recognize the value of native plants.

"There's so many invasive plants, and people keep bringing them in. They don't see the natural beauty of our plants, our ferns," Hunt said.

Other Resources:

Codes of Conduct to control invasives:
www.centerforplantconservation.org

Hawai'i Weed Risk Assessment:
www.botany.hawaii.edu

Hawai'i Ecosystems at Risk:
www.hear.org

Landscape Industry Council of Hawai'i:
www.lichawaii.com/invasive_species.htm

Jumping the Fence Line
www.ctahr.hawaii.edu/rnre/Invasive_Agricultural_Plants.asp

The Whys of Mating: 237 Reasons and Counting

Photo by: Polly Becker
Source: New York Times, July 31, 2007
Author: JOHN TIERNEY

http://tinyurl.com/yqnclj

Scholars in antiquity began counting the ways that humans have sex, but they weren’t so diligent in cataloging the reasons humans wanted to get into all those positions. Darwin and his successors offered a few explanations of mating strategies — to find better genes, to gain status and resources — but they neglected to produce a Kama Sutra of sexual motivations.

Perhaps you didn’t lament this omission. Perhaps you thought that the motivations for sex were pretty obvious. Or maybe you never really wanted to know what was going on inside other people’s minds, in which case you should stop reading immediately.

For now, thanks to psychologists at the University of Texas at Austin, we can at last count the whys. After asking nearly 2,000 people why they’d had sex, the researchers have assembled and categorized a total of 237 reasons — everything from “I wanted to feel closer to God” to “I was drunk.” They even found a few people who claimed to have been motivated by the desire to have a child.

The researchers, Cindy M. Meston and David M. Buss, believe their list, published in the August issue of Archives of Sexual Behavior, is the most thorough taxonomy of sexual motivation ever compiled. This seems entirely plausible.

Who knew, for instance, that a headache had any erotic significance except as an excuse for saying no? But some respondents of both sexes explained that they’d had sex “to get rid of a headache.” It’s No. 173 on the list.

Others said they did it to “help me fall asleep,” “make my partner feel powerful,” “burn calories,” “return a favor,” “keep warm,” “hurt an enemy” or “change the topic of conversation.” The lamest may have been, “It seemed like good exercise,” although there is also this: “Someone dared me.”

Dr. Buss has studied mating strategies around the world — he’s the oft-cited author of “The Evolution of Desire” and other books — but even he did not expect to find such varied and Machiavellian reasons for sex. “I was truly astonished,” he said, “by this richness of sexual psychology.”

The researchers collected the data by first asking more than 400 people to list their reasons for having sex, and then asking more than 1,500 others to rate how important each reason was to them. Although it was a fairly homogenous sample of students at the University of Texas, nearly every one of the 237 reasons was rated by at least some people as their most important motive for having sex.

The best news is that both men and women ranked the same reason most often: “I was attracted to the person.”

The rest of the top 10 for each gender were also almost all the same, including “I wanted to express my love for the person,” “I was sexually aroused and wanted the release” and “It’s fun.”

No matter what the reason, men were more likely to cite it than women, with a couple of notable exceptions. Women were more likely to say they had sex because, “I wanted to express my love for the person” and “I realized I was in love.” This jibes with conventional wisdom about women emphasizing the emotional aspects of sex, although it might also reflect the female respondents’ reluctance to admit to less lofty motives.

The results contradicted another stereotype about women: their supposed tendency to use sex to gain status or resources.

“Our findings suggest that men do these things more than women,” Dr. Buss said, alluding to the respondents who said they’d had sex to get things, like a promotion, a raise or a favor. Men were much more likely than women to say they’d had sex to “boost my social status” or because the partner was famous or “usually ‘out of my league.’ ”

Dr. Buss said, “Although I knew that having sex has consequences for reputation, it surprised me that people, notably men, would be motivated to have sex solely for social status and reputation enhancement.”

But then, men were also more likely than women to say they’d had sex because “I was slumming.” Or simply because “the opportunity presented itself,” or “the person demanded that I have sex.”

If nothing else, the results seem to be a robust confirmation of the hypothesis in the old joke: How can a woman get a man to take off his clothes? Ask him.

To make sense of the 237 reasons, Dr. Buss and Dr. Meston created a taxonomy with four general categories:

¶Physical: “The person had beautiful eyes” or “a desirable body,” or “was good kisser” or “too physically attractive to resist.” Or “I wanted to achieve an orgasm.”

¶Goal Attainment: “I wanted to even the score with a cheating partner” or “break up a rival’s relationship” or “make money” or “be popular.” Or “because of a bet.”

¶Emotional: “I wanted to communicate at a deeper level” or “lift my partner’s spirits” or “say ‘Thank you.’ ” Or just because “the person was intelligent.”

¶Insecurity: “I felt like it was my duty” or “I wanted to boost my self-esteem” or “It was the only way my partner would spend time with me.”

Having sex out of a sense of duty, Dr. Buss said, showed up in a separate study as being especially frequent among older women. But both sexes seem to practice a strategy that he calls mate-guarding, as illustrated in one of the reasons given by survey respondents: “I was afraid my partner would have an affair if I didn’t.”

That fear seems especially reasonable after you finish reading Dr. Buss’s paper and realize just how many reasons there are for infidelity. Some critics might complain that the list has some repetitions — it includes “I was curious about sex” as well as “I wanted to see what all the fuss was about” — but I’m more concerned about the reasons yet to be enumerated.

For instance, nowhere among the 237 reasons will you find the one attributed to the actress Joan Crawford: “I need sex for a clear complexion.” (The closest is “I thought it would make me feel healthy.”)Nor will you find anything about gathering rosebuds while ye may (the 17th-century exhortation to young virgins from Robert Herrick). Nor the similar hurry-before-we-die rationale (“The grave’s a fine and private place/ But none I think do there embrace”) from Andrew Marvell in “To His Coy Mistress.”

From even a cursory survey of literature or the modern mass market in sex fantasies, it seems clear that this new taxonomy may not be any more complete than the original periodic table of the elements.

When I mentioned Ms. Crawford’s complexion and the poets’ rationales to Dr. Buss, he promised to consider them and all other candidates for Reason 238.

You can nominate your own reasons at TierneyLab. You can also submit nominations for a brand new taxonomy: reasons for just saying “No way!” Somehow, though, I don’t think this list will be as long.

The Spread of Obesity in a Large Social Network over 32 Years

Photo by: Lars Klove for The New York Times
Source: New England Journal of Medicine Vol. 357:370-379 July 2007
Author: Nicholas A. Christakis, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H., and James H. Fowler, Ph.D.

Original Publication:
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/full/357/4/370

Consumer Article:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/07/25/healthscience/fat.php

Background The prevalence of obesity has increased substantially over the past 30 years. We performed a quantitative analysis of the nature and extent of the person-to-person spread of obesity as a possible factor contributing to the obesity epidemic.

Methods We evaluated a densely interconnected social network of 12,067 people assessed repeatedly from 1971 to 2003 as part of the Framingham Heart Study. The body-mass index was available for all subjects. We used longitudinal statistical models to examine whether weight gain in one person was associated with weight gain in his or her friends, siblings, spouse, and neighbors.

Results Discernible clusters of obese persons (body-mass index [the weight in kilograms divided by the square of the height in meters], ≥30) were present in the network at all time points, and the clusters extended to three degrees of separation. These clusters did not appear to be solely attributable to the selective formation of social ties among obese persons. A person's chances of becoming obese increased by 57% (95% confidence interval [CI], 6 to 123) if he or she had a friend who became obese in a given interval. Among pairs of adult siblings, if one sibling became obese, the chance that the other would become obese increased by 40% (95% CI, 21 to 60). If one spouse became obese, the likelihood that the other spouse would become obese increased by 37% (95% CI, 7 to 73). These effects were not seen among neighbors in the immediate geographic location. Persons of the same sex had relatively greater influence on each other than those of the opposite sex. The spread of smoking cessation did not account for the spread of obesity in the network.

Conclusions Network phenomena appear to be relevant to the biologic and behavioral trait of obesity, and obesity appears to spread through social ties. These findings have implications for clinical and public health interventions.

Mâconnais: A reasonably priced wine of quality

Photo by: Lars Klove for The New York Times
Source: International Herald Tribune, July 25, 2007
Author: Eric Asimov

http://tinyurl.com/27vj4r

NEW YORK: Price-conscious consumers are understandably a little shy of the 2005 Burgundy vintage. Praise has been nearly unanimous, and prices have shot skyward.

While most attention has been on the reds, the whites are great, too. Still, not everybody will cheerfully drop $50 on a village-level Meursault, much less $150 for a good Corton-Charlemagne.

As ever, the Mâconnais region rides to the rescue. For decades, the Mâconnais, south of the Côte d'Or but part of Burgundy, has overflowed with inexpensive whites. The best were tangy, refreshing and satisfying. The problem was that few achieved even this modest level.

But for the last decade or two, Mâconnais wines have been improving significantly. Dynamic young producers who couldn't afford more desirable vineyard sites in Burgundy flocked to the Mâconnais, where they saw untapped potential at a reasonable price. Instead of viewing grapes as a cash crop to be transformed into wine at the local cooperative, they approach grape growing as seriously as the best Burgundian vignerons.

Even some of the most renowned Burgundy producers, like Comtes Lafon of Meursault and Anne-Claude Leflaive of Domaine Leflaive, unable to expand in the Côte d'Or, bought land in the Mâconnais. They recognized that the region was full of distinctive terroirs with much to offer.

Change has been slow, but progress has been steady. So the panel decided to taste 25 bottles of 2005 Mâconnais to see how the wines fared in this excellent year and whether the Mâconnais was still a bargain hunter's paradise. For the tasting, Florence Fabricant and I were joined by Byron Bates, general manager of Bette in Chelsea; and the wine writer Natalie MacLean, proprietor of the Web site Nat Decants.

Like almost all white Burgundies, Mâconnais wines are made from chardonnay grapes. Yet their contrast with California chardonnays is extraordinary, and they serve as a delicious introduction to what makes white Burgundies distinct.

Unlike chardonnays made almost anywhere else, in which ripe fruit flavors dominate, the best white Burgundies exude minerality and a vibrant texture, with underlying fruit and floral aromas. These differences can make people more attuned to the big fruit flavors wonder whether something is missing in the more subtle Burgundies. It can require a recalibration of the pleasure center.

We found a lot to like about these wines, both in the glass and in their relatively light demand on the wallet. Because of the size of the Mâconnais, we restricted our tasting to the Mâcon appellations, excluding others that are parts of the larger Mâconnais, like Pouilly-Fuissé and Saint-Veran. Given the quality of the Mâcon wines, it would be fair to say that the Pouilly-Fuissés and Saint-Verans would be even better, though they generally cost more, too.

The Mâconnais can be confusing in a different way than the Côte d'Or. There the village and vineyard names suggest a hierarchy. The Mâconnais is more chaotic. Though wines labeled simply Mâcon are thought to be insipid, two plain Mâcons made our top 10. If the grapes come from any of 40 or so villages, the wine can be called Mâcon-Villages; if the grapes all come from one of those villages, the name of that village can be appended to Mâcon, as in Mâcon Igé. But the sort of taxonomic arrangement of Côte d'Or villages and vineyards has not yet taken place in Mâconnais.

I tended to be more impressed than my colleagues. They liked them, but only to a point. MacLean liked their lemon zestiness and what she called their sunny happiness. Bates was impressed by the minerality and the purity of several of the wines, but on the whole said they were to drink, not to ponder.

While these are not on the level of the Côte de Beaune, I think the ratio of quality to price counts. Is there a better $10 chardonnay than our No. 1, the Mâcon Igé Château London from Domaine Fichet? This lively, exotic wine was floral and succulent.

Our No. 2, a Mâcon-Villages from Trenel, was more of a classic white Burgundy, with good minerality and a nutlike flavor of barrel aging.

The Bret Brothers, Jean-Guillaume and Jean-Philippe, of Domaine de la Soufrandière, make excellent wines, primarily from Pouilly-Vinzelles. Their négociant operation offers some fine Mâcon wines, including our No. 3, Mâcon-Villages Cuvée Terroir du Mâconnais.

The least expensive wines we tasted were $9, and two made the top 10. The first, the Mâcon-Lugny Les Charmes from Cave de Lugny, is tangy with an almost yeasty freshness; it was what the best Mâconnais wines were like before producers got more ambitious. It's still delicious. The Labouré-Roi Mâcon-Villages St. Armand was unusual for its pronounced pear and apple flavors.

It is fashionable to extol smaller estates over larger operations, and we certainly had praise for the little guys. The Mâcon-Charnay Franclieu from Jean Manciat had delicious mineral and citrus flavors, while the Mâcon from Domaine Sainte-Barbe had anise and mineral flavors along with an attractive smoky quality. But some big negociants are reliable. The Mâcon-Villages from Joseph Drouhin was pure and delicious with great texture.

We only scratched the surface of the Mâconnais. Clearly, Mâconnais is a region in transition. The best wines show greater distinction and personality, and this is apparent in many of the 2005s. Yet they are still good values. Luckily, this has not changed.