Martes, Mayo 29, 2012

Radioactive bluefin tuna crossed the Pacific to US

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Across the vast Pacific, the mighty bluefin tuna carried radioactive contamination that leaked from Japan's crippled nuclear plant to the shores of the United States 6,000 miles away — the first time a huge migrating fish has been shown to carry radioactivity such a distance.
"We were frankly kind of startled," said Nicholas Fisher, one of the researchers reporting the findings online Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The levels of radioactive cesium were 10 times higher than the amount measured in tuna off the California coast in previous years. But even so, that's still far below safe-to-eat limits set by the U.S. and Japanese governments.
Previously, smaller fish and plankton were found with elevated levels of radiation in Japanese waters after a magnitude-9 earthquake in March 2011 triggered a tsunami that badly damaged the Fukushima Dai-ichi reactors.
But scientists did not expect the nuclear fallout to linger in huge fish that sail the world because such fish can metabolize and shed radioactive substances.
One of the largest and speediest fish, Pacific bluefin tuna can grow to 10 feet and weigh more than 1,000 pounds. They spawn off the Japan coast and swim east at breakneck speed to school in waters off California and the tip of Baja California, Mexico.
Five months after the Fukushima disaster, Fisher of Stony Brook University in New York and a team decided to test Pacific bluefin that were caught off the coast of San Diego. To their surprise, tissue samples from all 15 tuna captured contained levels of two radioactive substances — ceisum-134 and cesium-137 — that were higher than in previous catches.
To rule out the possibility that the radiation was carried by ocean currents or deposited in the sea through the atmosphere, the team also analyzed yellowfin tuna, found in the eastern Pacific, and bluefin that migrated to Southern California before the nuclear crisis. They found no trace of cesium-134 and only background levels of cesium-137 left over from nuclear weapons testing in the 1960s.
The results "are unequivocal. Fukushima was the source," said Ken Buesseler of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, who had no role in the research.
Bluefin tuna absorbed radioactive cesium from swimming in contaminated waters and feeding on contaminated prey such as krill and squid, the scientists said. As the predators made the journey east, they shed some of the radiation through metabolism and as they grew larger. Even so, they weren't able to completely flush out all the contamination from their system.
"That's a big ocean. To swim across it and still retain these radionuclides is pretty amazing," Fisher said.
Pacific bluefin tuna are prized in Japan where a thin slice of the tender red meat prepared as sushi can fetch $24 per piece at top Tokyo restaurants. Japanese consume 80 percent of the world's Pacific and Atlantic bluefin tuna.
The real test of how radioactivity affects tuna populations comes this summer when researchers planned to repeat the study with a larger number of samples. Bluefin tuna that journeyed last year were exposed to radiation for about a month. The upcoming travelers have been swimming in radioactive waters for a longer period. How this will affect concentrations of contamination remains to be seen.
Now that scientists know that bluefin tuna can transport radiation, they also want to track the movements of other migratory species including sea turtles, sharks and seabirds.

Opera would cost Facebook over $1 billion: analysts

OSLO (Reuters) - Opera Software would cost Facebook over $1 billion as competition from Google and others could push up the price tag, analysts said on Tuesday, as takeover talk pushed the shares up as much as 26 percent on Tuesday.
Oslo-listed Opera, coveted for its advanced mobile phone software technology, would be a perfect fit for Facebook but the firm's business is also vital for some of the industry's biggest players so any bid is likely to attract others to the table.
"Opera would be sensible for Facebook on several levels," Arctic Securities said.
"It would enhance the now limited mobile experience of Facebook, improve Facebook's mobile monetization problem, help Facebook retain online game developers leaving the social network over the lack of a mobile platform and further improve Facebook's ability to target ads."
Opera makes various web browsers that work across an array of platforms including mobile phones, tablets, PCs, and TVs.
The software is available on most phones, including the iPhone and the BlackBerry, and works on various operating systems, including Android, giving Opera the reach Facebook is seeking.
The browser can compress data by as much as 90 percent, saving consumers on data charges, and has the technology to better display ads, a key factor for Facebook which has struggled to convert its rapidly increasing traffic from mobile platforms to revenue.
Opera, which has about 200 million Mobile and Mini subscribers, has also built a significant market share in key emerging markets, such as India, Brazil and Asia, where Facebook has been generally weak.
$1 BILLION PLUS?
It would be such a perfect fit for Facebook, analysts said it would have to pay a hefty premium.
DNB, Norway's top bank, said the price would have to be double Friday's closing level, or 68.6 crowns, valuing the firm at $1.35 billion, while Danske Bank and ABG Sundal Collier both predicted a price between 50 and 60 crowns a share, or between $1 billion and $1.2 billion.
At 1139 GMT, the stock traded up 17.2 percent at 40.2 crowns a share, valuing the firm at around $800 million.
Opera officials have repeatedly declined to comment.
However, Chief Executive Lars Boilesen last October said he would "love to" further cooperate with Facebook.
"We are already Facebook's platform of distribution in emerging markets like Africa and India. A big part of the Opera Mini traffic is from Facebook. So we are already their channel in these markets," he said in October.
"We would love to cooperate with Facebook, but the same goes for Google and everyone else. There are no limits here, because we are the leading mobile client in these markets," he added.
OBSTACLES
Still, several obstacles remain.
Opera founder and top shareholder Jon S. Von Tetzchner said the firm should focus on organic growth.
"I want Opera to focus on growth and delivering good results; there are big opportunities for Opera," Tetzchner, who holds 10.9 percent of Opera told Reuters. "We have been promised 500 million users by 2013 and I think that's a good goal and the firm should keep going for it."
"I personally think that an ARPU (average revenue per user) goal of $1 is even modest," he said. "I am not pushing for a takeover."
Tetzchner said he was not aware of a bid and had not decided how he would react to one but added it would be "undemocratic" for him to try to block it if others supported it.
Another obstacle could be Google, which has extensive relationships with Opera.
"A takeover by Facebook will likely send cold water down Google's spine," Arctic Securities said.
Google is Opera's default search partner for Opera Mini and Opera Mobile worldwide outside Russia/CIS, making the firm a key relationship for Google.

Pastor who gave anti-gay sermon draws hundreds of protesters in North Carolina

The North Carolina pastor who gave a disturbing, anti-gay sermon—in which he suggested rounding up all "queers and homosexuals" and quarantining them inside an electric fence—drew hundreds of protesters on Sunday.
Between 1,500 and 2,000 "peaceful" protesters demonstrated outside the Catawba County Justice Center, 12 miles from the Maiden, N.C., church where Rev. Charles Worley delivered his homophobic rant on Mother's Day.
"I figured a way to get rid of all the lesbians and queers," Worley told churchgoers on May 13. "Build a great big large fence—50 or 100 miles long—put all the lesbians in there. Fly over and drop some food. Do the same thing with the queers and the homosexuals and have that fence electrified so they can't get out. And you know what, in a few years, they'll die out. Do you know why? They can't reproduce!"
"It makes me pukin' sick to think about," Worley added. "Can you imagine kissing some man?"
Lt. Daryl McCarty of the Catawba County Sheriff's office told CNN that vandals tried to set fire to Worley's Providence Road Baptist Church on Friday "in retaliation about his remarks against homosexuals and lesbians from the pulpit." Police are investigating the incident.
According to the sheriff's office, two protesters on Sunday were cited for noise violations, but no arrests were made.