Chemical in plastic tied to preemie problems

A chemical used in many plastic products and already under scrutiny for potential health risks is suspected of raising the risk of liver problems in premature babies, according to a new study.
The small study in a German hospital suggests a chemical known as a phthalate, used in some intravenous feeding bags and tubing, may raise preemies' chances for liver damage.
Rigorous research on phthalates' effects in humans is lacking, and at least one expert found the German study unconvincing. There is no solid proof implicating the phthalate studied, DEHP.



However, the researchers said their results show that hospitals treating newborns or preemies should turn to IV feeding equipment that doesn't contain DEHP. Some hospitals in the U.S. already have switched.
Premature babies' livers are immature so they are already at risk for liver complications. They also are often fed intravenously, a practice already known to increase liver problems. The new study, published Monday in the journal Pediatrics, says one possible reason is DEHP. Animal studies suggest the phthalate chemical may cause various health risks including liver abnormalities and reproductive system damage.
Also found in toys, vinyl flooringPhthalates (pronounced thowl-ates) are found in many products besides medical supplies — toys, vinyl flooring and cosmetics. They're used to stabilize fragrances and make plastics flexible. Some countries and California have restricted their use.
They are different from bisphenol-A, or BPA, a plastic-hardening chemical that also has raised health concerns and is found in food containers and other products. It's no longer used in many baby bottles.
In a 2002 phthalates advisory, the Food and Drug Administration recommended alternatives for patients most at risk from the chemical leeching out of plastic medical equipment, including sick infant boys because of possible damage to developing reproductive organs.
Liver issues with half preemies exposed to DEHPThe German study involved 30 mostly premature infants treated in a Mannheim intensive care unit before the hospital switched to feeding equipment without the chemical, and 46 infants treated there afterward.
Serious liver problems involving reduced flow of bile, a digestive fluid produced by the liver, developed in 50 percent of the infants fed with the tubes containing DEHP versus just 13 percent of the other infants.
The researchers took into account other factors that might contribute to liver problems, and the two groups were mostly similar. However, the chemical group was intravenously fed for an average of 26 days, four more days than the other infants.
That is a limitation that could have skewed the results. But that alone "wouldn't have accounted for the magnitude of the difference" between the groups, said Deborah Cory-Slechta, an environmental medicine professor at the University of Rochester medical school.
"This is a pretty strong damnation of" phthalates, she said. "It needs to be replicated. But I still think this makes a very strong case for getting rid of these compounds" in infant intensive care units, she said.
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Edmund Crouch, a scientist who served with the Rochester professor on a National Research Council committee on phthalates risks, was skeptical and said the study doesn't rule out other factors that might have caused liver problems.
Steve Risotto of the American Chemistry Council, which represents chemical makers, also disputed the results and said the study "doesn't show any direct cause and effect."
But Beth Lyman, a pediatric nutrition nurse at Children's Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, called the results intriguing. Her hospital switched to phthalate-free feeding systems more than a decade ago. Lyman said she'd noticed fewer liver problems in IV-fed infants since then, and that the study makes her wonder if the switch might have contributed.

Study: Tropical rain band is shifting north

We're talking about the most prominent rainfall feature on the planet, one that many people depend on as the source of their freshwater because there is no groundwater to speak of where they live," said Julian Sachs, associate professor of oceanography at the University of Washington and lead author of the paper. "In addition many other people who live in the tropics but farther afield from the Pacific could be affected because this band of rain shapes atmospheric circulation patterns throughout the world."

While water is increasingly becoming a hot commodity around the globe, there is no global water shortage. Human demand for water has tripled in the past 50 years, by some estimates. Yet Earth has essentially as much water now as ever — about 360 quintillion gallons.

Rather, human populations put ever more pressure on local and regional water resources, which in some cases — such as the American Southwest — are dwindling with climate change. The water still exists, it just gets dumped elsewhere.

The band of tropical rainfall is created at what scientists call the intertropical convergence zone. There, just north of the equator, trade winds from the northern and southern hemispheres collide where heat pours into the atmosphere from the tropical sun. Rain clouds up to 30,000 feet thick dump as much as 13 feet of rain a year in some places.

The amount of rain in the zone actually increased between 1979 and 2005, this video shows.

The band is thought to have hugged the equator 350 years ago, during the planet's Little Ice Age (roughly 1400 to 1850).

From dry to downpours
The authors analyzed natural records of rainfall (including microbes and chemical ratios) left in annual layers of lake and lagoon sediments from four Pacific islands at or near the equator.

Washington Island, about 5 degrees north of the equator, is now at the southern edge of the intertropical convergence zone and receives nearly 10 feet of rain a year. But during the Little Ice Age it was arid. A similar arid past was found for Palau, which lies about 7 degrees north of the equator and in the heart of the modern convergence zone.

In contrast, the researchers present evidence that the Galapagos Islands, today an arid place on the equator in the Eastern Pacific, had a wet climate during the Little Ice Age.

"If the intertropical convergence zone was 550 kilometers, or 5 degrees, south of its present position as recently as 1630, it must have migrated north at an average rate of 1.4 kilometers — just less than a mile — a year," Sachs said in a statement. "Were that rate to continue, the intertropical convergence zone will be 126 kilometers — or more than 75 miles — north of its current position by the latter part of this century."

The work was funded by the National Science Foundation, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Gary Comer Science and Education Foundation.Earth's most prominent rain band, near the equator, has been moving north at an average rate of almost a mile a year for three centuries, likely because of a warming world, scientists say.

The band supplies fresh water to almost a billion people and affects climate elsewhere.

If the migration continues, some Pacific islands near the equator that today enjoy abundantrainfall may be starved of freshwater by midcentury or sooner, researchers report in the July issue of the journal Nature Geoscience.

White House creates climate analysis job

A scientist from the University of Rhode Island who headed research expeditions in the Arctic and the Indian Ocean will soon join the White House in a new position that targets the worldwide issue of climate change.

Kate Moran, associate dean of URI's Graduate School of Oceanography, begins work Monday as a senior policy analyst for President Barack Obama's Office of Science & Technology Policy. In her new role, Moran will provide advice on issues relating to oceans, the Arctic and global warming.

"Climate affects all aspects of our life, our food, our energy, our politics," Moran said in a telephone interview this week as she hurried to pack for her move to Washington. "It affects defense, security, and so it's crosscutting."

Trained as an engineer, Moran was the co-chair of an Arctic expedition in 2004 that sent scientists to the ice-clogged waters above the Lomonosov Ridge, about 155 miles from the North Pole. The expedition drilled first-of-their-kind core samples from the floor of the Arctic Ocean.

The samples showed that temperatures in the Arctic reached an average 74 degrees during a period of global warming about 55 million years ago, a surprise to scientists who previously believed the polar regions would have remained cooler.

Moran also helped lead the first research team to investigate the sea floor at the site of the 2004 earthquake that triggered a deadly tsunami in the Indian Ocean that killed 230,000 people in a dozen countries. The research team debunked the theory that underwater landslides strengthened the tsunami, showing that existing models used to predict and study tsunamis must be revised.

Closer to home, Moran has become known in the public debate over global warming. She testified last year before a U.S. Senate panel that climate change and its human causes are "unequivocal." She supports a proposal to build a massive wind farm miles off Rhode Island's coast, meant to provide 15 percent of the state's electricity needs and reduce the state's reliance on fossil-fuel power plants.

"I think scientists should be more active in speaking about their own science," she said.

Moran made similar statements about global warming last year during a public presentation on climate change held at URI's campus, eliciting hostile questions from audience members who did not believe global warming or doubted that humans contribute to it, said Peter August, a URI professor of natural resource science.

She didn't flinch during the exchanges, showing skills that August thinks could be helpful in Washington.

"She can hold her ground, she can speak with objective authority," August said. "She doesn't get upset, and she doesn't make people look stupid.

Warm Caribbean, Gulf seas threaten corals

Warm ocean temperatures predicted to persist through October in the Caribbean and the central Gulf of Mexico could mean the loss of huge swaths of corals across those regions, U.S. scientists warned Wednesday.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Coral Reef Watch network said the conditions may lead to coral disease outbreaks and bleaching, when the stressed organisms expel the colorful algae living in their tissues, leaving a whitish color.

Coral bleaching that lasts more than a week can kill the organisms, since they rely on the algae for sustenance, leading to the loss of reef habitat for numerous marine species.

Sea surface temperatures in parts of the Caribbean are already at levels typically not seen until late summer months when the water is hottest, said C. Mark Eakin, coordinator of NOAA's Coral Reef Watch.

Bleaching can occur when sea temperatures rise just a few degrees above the average of the warmest summer months in these areas where coral reefs live. The general average for the hottest summer months in the Caribbean is about 84 degrees Fahrenheit, Eakin said.

Slide show Corals in crisis View images taken by researcher John Bruno and others of coral reefs stressed by disease, warming seas and other factors.

He noted that sea temperatures in some parts of this region already are at the higher threshold, around 86 degrees, and that some bleaching has already begun. Those temperatures are expected to hold through October.

Scientists fear the bleaching could exceed what was seen in 2005 in the Caribbean, the worst coral bleaching event in the region's recorded history. In parts of the eastern Caribbean four years ago, up to 90 percent of corals suffered bleaching, with more than half dying.

"Just like any climate forecast, local conditions and weather events can influence actual temperatures. However, we are quite concerned that high temperatures may threaten the health of coral reefs in the Caribbean this year," Eakin said.

NOAA also warned of potential high sea temperatures stressing corals near the central Pacific islands of Kiribati, and between the Northern Mariana Islands and Japan.

Scientists hope the early warnings of potential coral stress will lead governments to take protective steps, including establishing temporary restrictions on users of coral reefs in the areas, such as divers, boaters and anglers

Corals around the world are being stressed by rising sea temperatures, causing bleaching events that expose the organisms to disease and death. Carbon dioxide released by burning fossil fuels is absorbed by the oceans, making the waters more acidic and corrosive on corals. Land-based pollution, such as sewage, beach erosion, coastal development and overfishing also are to blame, experts say.

About 25 percent of all marine species need coral reefs to live and grow, while 40 percent of fish caught commercially and consumed worldwide use reefs to breed.

Where to store 17,000 tons of mercury?

The U.S. government is trying to find a location to store the country's excess mercury deposits, with seven states being considered. But the government is quickly finding out that very few people want the stuff.

The United States still exports surplus elemental mercury, the purest form, often to developing countries with less restrictive environmental regulations. Then-U.S. Sen. Barack Obama sponsored a bill last year to bar mercury exports beginning in 2013, and President George W. Bush signed it.

The bill also requires the Department of Energy to identify a safe, long-term storage site for up to 17,000 tons of mercury, which is so dense that it would fill less than half of an Olympic-size swimming pool. That includes stockpiles held by the federal government, as well as commercial supplies.

Officials are considering sites in seven states:

• Grand Junction, Colo.: Department of Energy's Grand Junction Disposal Site;
• Richland, Wash.: Department of Energy's Hanford Site;
• Idaho Falls, Idaho: Department of Energy's Idaho National Laboratory;
• Kansas City, Mo.: Department of Energy's Kansas City Plant;
• Aiken, S.C.: Department of Energy's Savannah River Site;
• Hawthorne, Nev.: Hawthorne Army Depot;
• Andrews, Texas: Waste Control Specialists.

Residents are swiftly voicing opposition because mercury is such a toxic substance.

Sometimes called "quicksilver," mercury is a dense, metallic element that occurs naturally in the environment and has been used in gold mining, manufacturing chlorine and caustic soda, batteries, thermometers and other uses. Its use has been in decline in this country since it was linked to health issues, including pulmonary and neural disorders.

Colo., Idaho governors oppose
In Colorado, the Energy Department is considering a site near Grand Junction where uranium tailings are stored. Residents fear mercury could contaminate tributaries that flow into the Colorado River, a water source for millions of people in the West.

Colorado Gov. Bill Ritter came out against the plan Thursday, saying he will convey his opposition about the proposal to the Department of Energy.

Idaho Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter told a radio station that mercury storage there is "not gonna happen" and expressed dismay that he hadn't been notified Idaho National Laboratory was even being considered.

Officials in South Carolina say waste at the Savannah River site from the production of atomic weapons during World War II and the Cold War should be dealt with before more is added.

Nevada officials expressed "grave concerns" about storing the waste at the Hawthorne Army Depot, a 150,000-acre depot in a small, struggling desert town 130 miles south of Reno.

The Bannister Federal Complex near Kansas City is also being considered, but the Kansas City Council unanimously approved a resolution this month protesting the plan.

Best option in Texas?
Officials in Texas, the only site where a private, commercial landfill expressed interest in storing the waste, have taken no position on the proposal. Waste Control Specialists, based in Dallas, already stores PCBs and radioactive waste at its landfill near Andrews in West Texas.

The company has permits to receive mercury at the site, as long as they don't exceed their capacity, said Andrea Morrow, spokeswoman for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality.

The federal government wants to work cooperatively with states to find a safe site, said Frank Marcinowski, the Energy Department's deputy assistant secretary for regulatory compliance.

A draft environmental impact statement is expected to be released for public comment in the fall.

"We are ordered to come up with a site," Marcinowski said. "We see this as an opportunity to help reduce the export and transportation of mercury."