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A.M. Costa Rica's Second news page |
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José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 6, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 26
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Electronic fare
system planned for buses
By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The transport ministry is seeking public comment on plans to install electronic payment systems on public buses. The Ministerio de Obras Públicas y Transportes says it wants to have a pilot program in operation this year. The period for comments opens Monday and runs until March 9. More information is on the ministry Web page, www.mopt.go.cr, and that of the Consejo de Transporte Público, www.ctp.go.cr. The ministry said that an electronic system would give bus company operators better insight into who is using their vehicles and the system would eliminate the continual robberies of bus drivers. IRS has another form for taxpayers By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The U.S. Internal Revenue Service has come up with another form for overseas U.S. citizens. The form, No. 8965, is used to claim an exemption from the mandatory health insurance coverage under Obama care, the so-called Affordable Care Act. The form is filed with the annual tax return, according to American Citizens Abroad, an expat advocacy group. U.S. citizens who are not physically present in the United States for at least 330 full days within a 12-month period are treated as having minimum essential coverage for that 12-months regardless of whether they enroll in any healthcare coverage, the organization said. In addition, U.S. citizens who are bona fide residents of a foreign country for an entire taxable year are treated as having minimum essential coverage for that year, American Citizens Abroad said. Vice minister of security promoted By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Gustavo Mata Vega, a vice minister, is the new head of the security ministry. He is taking over from Celso Gamboa Sánchez, who is moving into the Ministerio Público as deputy fiscal general. Mata retired from the Judicial Investigating Organization after 30 years. He had risen to the rank of assistant director. The security minster supervises the Fuerza Pública, the ministry's anti-drug police, the airport police, the frontier police and other units. Armed robbers target pedestrians By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
A man in Alajuelita and another in Santa Ana suffered bullet wounds Wednesday night when they were set upon by robbers. In Alajuelita two men on a motorcycle gunned down a pedestrian with the last name of Aubert, said the Judicial Investigating Organization. The victim threw off his backpack and threw away his cell telephone. The robbers took both, investigators said. In Santa Ana, a man with the last name of Vaca was walking with a woman when a car pulled up, a man got out and demanded his belongings, said investigators. The victim protested and was shot, they said. Driving courses seek the uneducated By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The Dirección General de Educación Vial is setting up a driving course for people they call uneducated. The agency defines this as not having finished sixth grade in school. But the agency will not take the word of a would-be driver. The individual has to bring documents from the appropriate regional education office and from the last school attended. Foreigners have to bring similar documents from their home country. The court begins March 2 in San José, Limón, San Carlos, Liberia y Puntarenas, the agency said. Measles becomes a political football By
the A.M. Costa Rica wire
services
The outbreak of measles in the United States — more than 100 cases so far — has just about everyone weighing in, from public health officials to parents to doctors and even the president himself. Health officials are adamant. They say vaccines work and are safe. Top U.S. doctors are urging parents to have their children immunized. Dr. Tom Frieden, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, made similar remarks recently on This Week, an ABC-TV news program. "The more kids who are not vaccinated," he said, "the more they are at risk and the more they are putting their neighbor's kids at risk as well." In Chicago Thursday, five infants at a suburban child care center were diagnosed with measles. All of the cases involve children younger than 1 who are too young for routine measles vaccination. Officials said none of the infants has been hospitalized. All are being cared for at home, they said. Across the country, parents like Colorado mother Barbara Acosta defend their right not to vaccinate their children. "I think every parent has a right to choose what's in the best interest of their children," she said. Some politicians agree. Sen. Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky and a trained ophthalmologist, recently mentioned stories he had heard that link vaccines to mental disorders. "I've heard of many tragic cases of walking, talking, normal children," he said, "who wound up with profound mental disorders after normal vaccine." In Colorado, Ms. Acosta chose not to vaccinate her children and has no intention of vaccinating her grandchildren because of her concerns. She said, "Some kids have such adverse effects. If you go online and you read, there are horrific stories." Yet, studies show vaccines can save lives and that side effects are rare and minor. Dr. Linda Fu, a pediatric infectious disease expert at Children’s National Health System in Washington, said, "The most common side effects to any of the vaccines are pain at the injection site and fever for 24 to 48 hours." Dr. Fu says the minor and temporary side effects of the vaccine outweigh the risk of complications from measles, which can include ear infections, permanent deafness, brain inflammation, permanent brain damage, pneumonia and death. At one time, parents were concerned about preservatives added to vaccines. Dr. Fu says that is no longer a concern. "The vaccines that the children are getting today are very much more pure and are safe and effective," she said. Most doctors practicing today have never seen a case of measles, including Dr. Fu. That's because a vaccine against measles has been available since 1963. The vaccine is 99 percent effective if a child receives two doses. The first vaccine is usually given when a child is 2 years old, and a booster at age 4.
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A.M. Costa Rica Third News Page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 6, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 26 | |
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| 16 more suspects reported being investigated in case of Ruta
1856 |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Prosecutors say there are 16 more suspects in the investigation of irregularities in the construction of Ruta 1856. This is the road built along the Río San Juan at the Nicaraguan border during the Laura Chinchilla administration. The roadway also is called the Carretera Juan Rafael Mora Porras after the president who led the country to take up arms against the U.S. filibusterer William Walker in 1856 and 1857. The revelation Tuesday by prosecutors brings the total of suspects to 42. They include public employees and contractors. The new batch are contractors, said the Poder Judicial. They are accused of double billing for machinery. There might even have been billing for work by machinery that did not exist. The investigation has been going on since November 2012. |
Investigators
have exercised 55 search warrants, accessed 12 bank accounts, accessed
two tax files and conducted 125 interviews, the Poder Judicial said. The public employees are accused of failing to supervise the work that was taking place and colluding with contractors to obtain money that was not earned. The contractors are reported to have done poor work. In some cases shipping containers or tree trunks were used as bridges. Contractors also are accused of exceeding plans to chop down a number of trees for sale. Eventually the Ministerio de Obras Públicas y Transportes took over the work. The project is considered an example of how not to do a public work. The road was a rush job in the face of territorial invasions by Nicaragua. |
| Traffic police make plans for last-minute vacationers By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
Traffic police are enforcing holiday restrictions Saturday and Sunday from 2 to 9 p.m. in anticipation of vacationists trying to get back to the city. Public school starts Monday, and police said they figure that plenty of families will try to squeeze in a run to the mountains or the beach this weekend. The Policía de Tránsito is prohibiting vehicles over six tons from key highways during that time. The highways include the Bernardo Soto, the General Cañas, the Florencio del Castillo and the Braulio Carrillo. The restrictions only include lanes leading to San José. Violations of this regulation will cost a truck driver 51,249.10 colons, about $100. Traffic police as well as the Fuerza Pública will be on duty at some 81 schools Monday for the opening day. This is an annual ritual that usually reduces accidents involving children. |
 A.M. Costa Rica graphic
The first day of school. |
| Overheated extension cord blamed for early morning San Pedro
fire |
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By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
An overheated extension cord is being blamed for a blaze that destroyed a home housing students in San Pedro Thursday morning. The Cuerpo de Bomberos said that the extension cord was |
hooked to a
refrigerator and ignited a couch when it became
overheated. The structure had seven bedrooms and was about 180 square meters. That's about 1,940 square feet. The alarm came in at 5:29 a.m., said fire fighters. |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 6, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 26 | |||||
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| Shade coffee plantations are good for birds, but forests
called better |
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By the University of Utah news staff
The conservation value of growing coffee under trees instead of on open farms is well known, but hasn’t been studied much in Africa. So a University of Utah-led research team studied birds in the Ethiopian home of Arabica coffee and found that shade coffee farms are good for birds but some species do best in forest. “Ethiopian shade coffee may be the most bird friendly coffee in the world, but a primary forest is irreplaceable for bird conservation, especially for birds of the forest understory,” says Evan Buechley, lead author of a new study that will be published online in the journal Biological Conservation. “The best coffee for biodiversity is organic shade coffee in Ethiopia, where the coffee is a native species of the forest,” says ornithologist Çağan Şekercioğlu, the study’s senior author and assistant professor of biology at the University of Utah. “It is grown where it belongs in its native habitat with native tree cover and without chemicals.” “Not all shade coffee is equal,” Şekercioğlu adds. “Because shade coffee is trendy, there are a lot of commercial plantations in the world where they grow shade coffee under exotic trees, not native trees, so they can call it shade coffee. But it’s not as bird friendly as in Ethiopia.” “We hope to see increased marketing of Ethiopia shade coffee so the local farmers get a better deal for their beans by keeping the shade coffee intact rather than converting it to open sun farming” by cutting trees, Şekercioğlu says. The researchers found that all 19 bird species living closer to the ground in the understory of forests also were found in nearby shade coffee farms in Ethiopia. However, understory forest specialists – especially insect-eating birds of the forest understory – were found in much lower numbers in shade coffee. “Ethiopian shade coffee is even better than other shade coffee because all the native forest bird species that we recorded in the forest understory we also recorded in Ethiopia’s traditional shade coffee plantations,” Şekercioğlu says. “But coffee plantations are not better than forest, because forest still had a lot more relative abundance of forest-dependent birds, which were reduced by nearly 80 percent in numbers in shade coffee.” Those forest understory specialists “are among the birds most threatened with extinction globally,” Buechley says. “That they are much more frequent in forests implies forests are really important. Shade coffee isn’t a substitute for forests. But shade coffee provides good habitat for many other species, including migrants from Europe and Asia.” |
 University of Utah photo
Ethiopia produces about 5
percent of the world's coffee.In 2012, Şekercioğlu conducted a global review of scientific literature and found wooded shade plantations for coffee and chocolate have greater diversity of birds than open farmland, but that forests remain the best habitats for tropical birds. He says the new study “gets more specific, and shows that there is shade and there is shade.” Buechley and Şekercioğlu say coffee is the world’s second-most valuable legal international commodity after oil. Ethiopia is the home of Coffea arabica, the world’s most widely produced and valuable coffee, making up two-thirds of the world market. Coffea robusta – native to tropical highlands in central and western sub-Saharan Africa – is the other main bean used for coffee. The word coffee comes from ancient Ethiopia’s Kaffa province. Coffee has been cultivated in the region for more than 1,000 years. The new study was conducted in shade coffee plantations and moist forests at about 6,000 feet elevation in southwest Ethiopia’s Oromia region. The forest canopy contains broadleaf evergreens, including pouteria and olea trees. There are many smaller trees, shrubs, vines, ferns and orchids. In the nearby shade coffee plantations, coffee plants are grown beneath a canopy dominated by silk tree species known as abizzias. |
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A.M. Costa Rica's Fifth
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| Hawaiian officials worry that tsunamis will be huge By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The reality of rising sea levels means many coastal communities and island nations are vulnerable to tsunamis. The U.S. island state of Hawaii is vulnerable to tsunamis and is in the forefront of preparations for a tidal wave. But the devastating 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan led Hawaii officials to re-evaluate their plans. Scientists and emergency managers are now preparing for an extreme tsunami, the kind that comes once in 500 or 1,000 years. The 9.0 magnitude earthquake and resulting tsunami claimed nearly 19,000 lives when it struck the Tohoku region of northeastern Japan four years ago. Scientists say that Hawaii may be just as vulnerable. University of Hawaii researcher Rhett Butler says a mysterious sinkhole on the island of Kauai shows signs that a massive tsunami swept through the islands 500 years ago. “It’s geology. You’re looking for evidence that the ocean came onshore as a sand layer or a bunch of basalt cobbles. You’re looking for that kind of evidence," said Butler. The evidence was uncovered by paleobiologist David Burney, who discovered old coral, shells and ocean sediment in a cave atop a slope 100 meters from the ocean. Civil defense agencies keep the public prepared, frequently testing their tsunami warning system. Scientists say a major tsunami could happen again. They say a theoretical 9.3 magnitude earthquake in the Aleutian Islands in the northern Pacific could create a super tsunami. University of Hawaii researcher Kwok Fai Cheung devised a computer model to simulate the waves from a huge Aleutian earthquake. “I used it as input to my tsunami model and simulated the propagation of the tsunami all the way across the Pacific Ocean from the Aleutian Islands to Hawaii," said Cheung. The results were sobering. The computer model shows that tsunami waves could sweep inland, far beyond current safety zones. The Hawaii Emergency Management Agency works with local governments to draw up disaster plans. Emergency planner Kevin Richards says the old strategy called for evacuation of 85,000 people on the island of Oahu. “If this event took place, we’d have to move 340,000 or 350,000 people to safety, a much more daunting task. And safety is not in the same place anymore. It’s much farther away, it’s farther up the hill, it’s farther inland," said Richards. Some residents could drive to higher ground. But driving is impractical in some parts of the islands, so residents there could walk to safety or take shelter on the fourth floor of a reinforced concrete building. New plans are being devised with an extended evacuation zone for an extreme tsunami. The Japanese tragedy of 2011 is still fresh in the memory of Hawaii residents, and scientist Butler says they take the threat seriously. “It doesn’t mean it’s going to happen in our time. It doesn’t mean it’s going to happen this year or next year. But it’s just the nature of the tectonic forces on our planet. They just keep marching along, and once you relieve all these stresses with these truly great earthquakes, the water responds," he said. Chinese firm using drones to deliver small packages By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Chinese Internet-based retail giant Alibaba has taken the lead in using flying drones for delivery of goods. According to the company’s blog, for three days this week Alibaba will use small, remote-controlled quadcopters to deliver orders of ginger tea to 450 shoppers in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. The packets will be limited to about 340 grams, taken to distances up to one hour of flight time away. Previously, several U.S. and at least one Chinese company have tested drone deliveries, but all of them had limited scope due to lack of regulations for drone operations in both countries. Both Chinese and U.S. retailers are calling on their respective regulating agencies to speed up the approvals of drone flights for delivery of goods. The agency that regulates U.S. air space, the Federal Aviation Administration, recently issued eight more licenses to drone operators while several hundred requests are still waiting for approval. Among other restrictions, commercial drone pilots must have at least a private pilot's license and a medical certificate, while the drone must remain within the pilot's vision during the entire flight. One-atom-thick silicon promises faster computing By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Scientists from University of Texas said this week that they had created what was previously possible only in theory: a one-atom-thick form of silicon, the material essential for production of transistors, the basic elements of all computer chips. The exotic material, called silicene, has all the electrical properties needed for production of much smaller and faster semiconductors. One of the critical properties of today’s computer chips is the distance electrons must travel from one transistor to the next. In transistors that are only one atom thick, the distance and time that signals travel during information processing would obviously be reduced. The new material was notoriously difficult to work with, but the University of Texas scientists said they developed a method to handle the silicene by keeping it between two protective layers. The new method is not ready yet for production, but scientists said it was an important step toward a commercially viable, low-energy, high-speed digital computer chip. Robots in lab are making discoveries of new drugs By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Robots have become partners in the laboratory. At the University of Manchester in England, a robotic scientist named Eve has discovered a compound known to have anti-cancer properties that might also be used to develop drug strategies against malaria and other tropical diseases. Eve follows Adam, a robot scientist the University's Automation Laboratory built in 2009, to do research. Adam and Eve are not human look-alikes. They are boxy and about the size of a car. They have the machine quality of robots you might see in an automotive plant. Team leader Ross King says Adam made a discovery about yeast, a fungus used in biology as a model for human cells. “Adam hypothesized certain functions of genes within yeast and experimentally tested these hypothesizes and confirmed them," he said. "So it both hypothesized and confirmed new scientific knowledge.” That was a first for a robot. Adam's success set the stage for Eve. Eve's science mission is focused on tropical and orphan diseases, which kill millions and infect millions more each year. King says these conditions are largely neglected because, on average, drug development is slow and costly. It can take a decade or more to get new medicines to market, and costs around $1 billion. Manufacturers are unlikely to get that investment back. King says the University of Manchester developed a cheap assay, a test that indicates whether or not a chemical is likely to be a good drug candidate, and then put Eve to work on it. “How it works conventionally is you use robotics as well and you have a large collection of possible drugs," he said. "Against your assay you test every single compound. So you start at the beginning of your library and continue until the end, then stop. So it’s not a very intelligent process. The robotics doesn’t learn anything as it goes along, even if it’s tested a million compounds, it still doesn’t have any expectation of what will happen next when it tests a new compound." That’s where Eve differs. The robot learns as it tests, King explained, so that it can then eliminate the compounds which are unlikely to be good and only test the compounds which has a high probability of being good. That’s how Eve unexpectedly discovered the compound that might fight malaria and other tropical diseases. King hopes to completely automate the process, with robots making assays and synthesizing new chemicals. He points out that while robots have become partners in the lab, humans are still very much in control. “They do the strategic thinking about what’s important to tackle, and organizing the background knowledge and organizing the structure of the process," he said. U.N. rights chief visits D.C. Holocaust Memorial By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The first U.N. human rights chief who is an Arab and a Muslim Thursday also became the first person in that position to visit the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington. As part of his first official visit to the United States, Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein gave a speech about preventing atrocities. He said all people must learn about the Holocaust and ask themselves “why so many ordinary people could kill so easily, feeling no guilt whatsoever.” The Jordanian prince, whose formal title is the U.N. High commissioner for human rights, said the horror of the Holocaust is key to understanding the more recent slaughter by Islamist militants of defenseless people in Iraq, Somalia, Nigeria and elsewhere — and the death by fire of a pilot from his own country. He referred to the militants as takfiri or “infidels,” despite their claims to be acting in the name of Islam, and said they were deceiving their followers with Nazi-like lies and chauvinistic logic. “If we have learned anything from our collective history, it is this: Scrambling only for ourselves, our people, our political or religious ideology, or for our own kind will only scramble it all — eventually, sometimes horrifyingly so — for everyone,” he said. Zeid, who helped set up the International Criminal Court in The Hague in 2002, said the antidote to such logic is human rights education for every child in the world, beginning before the age of 9. “In this way, from Catholic parochial schools to the most secular public institutions, and indeed Islamic madrassahs, children could learn — even in kindergarten — and experience the fundamental human rights values of equality, justice and respect." Zeid’s address filled an auditorium inside the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum past its capacity. Among those in attendance were a few people who survived the Nazi genocide and now work as volunteers at the museum. Margit Meissner was born in Austria in 1922 and escaped with her family by trekking across the Pyrennees. She said Zeid’s speech was right on the money. “What he said is very important,” Ms. Meissner said. “It’s just a question of how can one do it, and how much willingness is there in the world to do it, because everybody throws up his hands and says, 'What a terrible thing,' and then they go about their business.” Somali citizen is jailed for ties with terrorists By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
The U.S. Justice Department said Thursday that a Somali citizen was sentenced to 15 years in federal prison for providing support to the Somali-based Islamic terrorist group al-Shabab. The man, Abdinassir Mohamud Ibrahim, pleaded guilty in July to charges of sending emails to recruit support for the terrorists and sending money to an al-Shabab member. He also admitted lying to U.S. immigration officials by seeking refugee status, claiming he belonged to Somalia's Awer clan and faced persecution at the hands of the Hawiye majority. Ibrahim is actually a Hawiye. Al-Shabab has conducted a deadly terror campaign to turn Somalia into a conservative Islamic state. African Union forces have driven the militants out of a large part of Somalia that had been under its control, but the group is still considered extremely dangerous. Orange jumpsuits aid terrorist, U.S. official says By the A.M. Costa Rica wire services
Proof that the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, inspires and rallies the world’s most savage terrorists has flashed across television screens around the world in recent weeks, a deputy undersecretary of defense said Thursday. “It is no coincidence that recent ISIS videos showing the barbaric burning of a Jordanian pilot and the savage execution of a Japanese hostage each showed the victims clothed in an orange jumpsuit, believed by many to be the symbol of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility,” Undersecretary Brian McKeon told the Senate Armed Services Committee. President Barack Obama has long-advocated closing the Guantanamo facility, which was established to hold terror suspects after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Obama has argued that the prison constitutes a blemish on the United States' reputation that complicates relations with allies and partners and helps terrorist groups recruit new fighters. For independent Sen. Angus King of Maine, at issue are costs and benefits. “Is it more dangerous for the national interest to keep Guantanamo open because of its use as a recruiting tool, or is there a greater risk of the people being released re-engaging?” he asked. King was referring to Pentagon reports that nearly 30 percent of more than 600 detainees released from Guantanamo have either resumed combatant activities or are suspected of having done so. The Obama administration maintains the recidivism rate has declined to less than 10 percent in recent years, something that is of little comfort to a freshman Republican Senator, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, an Iraq War veteran. “In my opinion, the only problem with Guantanamo Bay is there are too many empty beds and cells there," he said. "We should be sending more terrorists there for further interrogation to keep this country safe. As far as I am concerned, every last one of them can rot in hell.” The detention camp’s population has declined from nearly 800 more than a decade ago to just more than 100, of which nearly half are scheduled for release. The administration has said that no further detainees will be sent there, so the question becomes what to do with the last several dozen who remain. U.S. law currently prevents transferring Guantanamo detainees to the United States for trial. Congress should at least consider changing that law, according to Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a Democrat, who notes the cost per detainee at Guantanamo Bay exceeds $3 million a year, compared with less than $100,000 at a U.S. maximum security prison. “Three million dollars per detainee, and $80,000 for the hardened prisoners we have. We have nobody escaping in America,” he said. Far from allowing Guantanamo prisoners on U.S. soil, the Armed Services Committee is considering a bill that would freeze all releases from Guantanamo for two years. At the hearing, administration officials argued strongly against the proposal. The committee’s chairman, Sen. John McCain, a Republican of Arizona, expressed frustration with the administration, noting Obama has had six years to send Congress a comprehensive plan on the future of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility. |
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| A.M. Costa Rica's sixth news page |
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| San José, Costa Rica, Friday, Feb. 6, 2015, Vol. 15, No. 26 | |||||||||
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Moderate jogging
best, new study says
By the American College of Cardiology news
staff
Jogging may be best in small quantities, according to a study published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Researchers looked at 5,048 healthy participants in the Copenhagen City Heart Study and questioned them about their activity. They identified and tracked 1,098 healthy joggers and 413 healthy but sedentary non-joggers for 12 years. The study, which tracked hours of jogging, frequency, and the individual’s perception of pace, found that over the 12-year study strenuous joggers were as likely to die as sedentary non-joggers, while light joggers had the lowest rates of death. Jogging from 1 to 2.4 hours per week was associated with the lowest mortality and the optimal frequency of jogging was no more than three times per week. Overall, significantly lower mortality rates were found in those with a slow or moderate jogging pace, while the fast-paced joggers had almost the same mortality risk as the sedentary non-joggers. Researchers registered 28 deaths among joggers and 128 among sedentary non-joggers. In general, the joggers were younger, had lower blood pressure and body mass index, and had a lower prevalence of smoking and diabetes. “It is important to emphasize that the pace of the slow joggers corresponds to vigorous exercise and strenuous jogging corresponds to very vigorous exercise,” said Peter Schnohr, a researcher from the Copenhagen City Heart Study, Frederiksberg Hospital in Copenhagen, Denmark. “When performed for decades, this activity level could pose health risks, especially to the cardiovascular system.” These findings show similar results to past studies where researchers have found that more than moderate exercise may cause more harm than good. “The U-shaped association between jogging and mortality suggests there may be an upper limit for exercise dosing that is optimal for health benefits,” Schnohr said. “If your goal is to decrease risk of death and improve life expectancy, jogging a few times a week at a moderate pace is a good strategy. Anything more is not just unnecessary, it may be harmful.” By the University of California at Los
Angeles news staff
Since 1970, life expectancy around the world has risen dramatically, with people living more than 10 years longer. That’s the good news. The bad news is that starting when people are in their mid-to-late-20s, the brain begins to wither — its volume and weight begin to decrease. As this occurs, the brain can begin to lose some of its functional abilities. So although people might be living longer, the years they gain often come with increased risks for mental illness and neurodegenerative disease. Fortunately, a new study shows meditation could be one way to minimize those risks. Building on their earlier work that suggested people who meditate have less age-related atrophy in the brain’s white matter, a new study found that meditation appeared to help preserve the brain’s gray matter, the tissue that contains neurons. The scientists looked specifically at the association between age and gray matter. They compared 50 people who had mediated for years and 50 who didn’t. People in both groups showed a loss of gray matter as they aged. But the researchers found among those who meditated, the volume of gray matter did not decline as much as it did among those who didn’t. The article appears in the current online edition of the journal Frontiers in Psychology. |
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| From Page 7: Park rangers getting motorcycles By the A.M. Costa Rica staff
The national bankers association has donated five motorcycles for park rangers. The Asociación Bancaria Costarricense said the donations would be coordinated by Costa Rica por Siempre and Pro Parques, which would place the vehicles in Parque Nacional Santa Rosa, Parque Nacional Volcán Tenorio, Parque Nacional Carara, Parque Nacional Barbilla and the Reserva Biológica Hitoy Cerere. National parks are plagued with illegal hunting and illegal lumbering. The motorcycles will allow more aggressive patrolling in areas that are not open to four-wheel vehicles. |
