Zebrafish made to grow pre-hands instead of fins

PERHAPS the little fish embryo shown here is dancing a jig because it has just discovered that it has legs instead of fins. Fossils show that limbs evolved from fins, but a new study shows how it may have happened, live in the lab.

Fernando Casares of the Spanish National Research Council and his colleagues injected zebrafish with the hoxd13 gene from a mouse. The protein that the gene codes for controls the development of autopods, a precursor to hands, feet and paws.

Zebrafish naturally carry hoxd13 but produce less of the protein than tetrapods - all four-limbed vertebrates and birds - do. Casares and his colleagues hoped that by injecting extra copies of the gene into the zebrafish embryos, some of their cells would make more of the protein.

One full day later, all of those fish whose cells had taken up the gene began to develop autopods instead of fins. They carried on growing for four days but then died (Cell, DOI: 10.1016/j.devcel.2012.10.015).

"Of course, we haven't been able to grow hands," says Casares. He speculates that hundreds of millions of years ago, the ancestors of tetrapods began expressing more hoxd13 for some reason and that this could have allowed them to evolve autopods.

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Testing time for China's migrant millions

BEIJING: Dozens of frustrated parents crowded into a Beijing office, surrounding an education official and brandishing copies of the constitution to demand their children be allowed to take an exam.

Mothers and fathers around the world fight to send their children to the best schools they can, in the hopes of drastically improving their futures.

But China's migrant families are victims of a decade-old residency system that denies urban incomers equal access to advantages from jobs and healthcare to the right to buy a home or car -- and education.

Chinese university admission is based on a single test, the "gaokao".

Cities such as Beijing that host China's best universities -- and large incomer populations -- only allow those with official residency permits, or "hukou", to take their exam and benefit from preferential quotas for places.

Around a third of the capital's 20 million population are migrants, but many of their families become split by rules requiring their children to go to their "home" provinces -- even if they have never lived there -- sometimes for years, to study for and take the test, which varies by location.

Even then, because of the quota system they will have to score higher to win places at top schools.

"Either you let the country share in your education resources or you accept the reality that outsiders are stuck in your education gutter," said Du Guowang, a 12-year Beijing resident from Inner Mongolia.

He and dozens of parents packed Beijing's education bureau each week hoping -- in vain -- it would let their children take next year's exam. But registration closed last week.

"This will directly affect their studies and their future prospects so of course it's unfair," said Xu Zhiyong, a prominent legal activist who has assisted the parents.

Over the past three decades more than 230 million people -- four times the entire population of Britain -- have moved to China's cities in a phenomenal mass migration.

The hukou system restrictions date back to 1958, when the government sought, among its many controls, to designate where people should farm in rural areas, and work or live for those in towns.

It has loosened the rules in recent decades to encourage urbanisation, and acknowledges the need to better accommodate newcomers -- especially as resentment mounts over China's widening rural-urban inequality.

At a key gathering of the ruling Communist Party last month, President Hu Jintao urged officials to "accelerate" hukou reform and work to "ensure that all permanent urban residents have access to basic urban public services".

But bigger cities are less willing to share residency or benefits, fearing doing so would burden their already strained resources and spur a new influx.

Some point to congested roads and overcrowded hospitals to argue that cities cannot handle larger loads.

But critics say the system is discriminatory.

Full reform would need years, but should begin sooner to defuse resentment, said Wang Zhenyu, deputy director of a public policy research centre at China University of Political Science and Law.

"From the basics like education and healthcare to social security to employment to buying a home or car, hukou-based discrimination covers every aspect," he said, "Your hukou will affect you your entire life."

Despite years of lobbying national and city education officials, the migrant parents in Beijing have received noncommittal answers -- along with occasional warnings. Their website, where they posted their demands, stopped working recently.

"Whatever we ask, it's always: 'We are studying the matter and are not ready to respond'," Du said of the official who usually receives them, "We have memorised his words."

The national education ministry has urged local governments to address the issue, and less-competitive areas have agreed to accept outside test-takers, but the capital, with its highly prized schools, has yet to act.

A Beijing education bureau official told AFP to wait for any policy announcements, adding that the office was open to parents once a week for a few hours to let them present their case.

But a mother, who wanted to be identified only by her online name "Hu Yang", said her daughter's teacher sent her a message a few weeks ago to stop making trouble.

She said she told her daughter: "I'm not making trouble for you to be able to go to school. It's for all children fighting for the right for equal education," she said.

"When they grow up they will contribute to society and to the country."

- AFP/fl

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Suspected security hole found in many Samsung devices

Samsung's Galaxy Note 2.

(Credit:
Josh Miller/CNET)

A suspected security hole affecting a handful of Samsung smartphones could give apps access to user data and leave the handset vulnerable to malicious apps and bricking, according to a developer.

The vulnerability, which was discovered and detailed by an XDA member with the handle "alephzain," lies in Exynos 4, the ARM-based system-on-chip typically found in Samsung smartphones and
tablets. Alephzain developed an exploit he said bypasses the system permissions, allowing any app to extract data from the device's RAM or inject malicious code into the kernel.

Alephzain said that he stumbled upon the vulnerability while trying to find a new way to root his Galaxy S3, but that the exploit affects the Galaxy S2,
Galaxy Note, and Meizu MX as well. However, the
Nexus 10 is unaffected as it uses the Exynos 5 chip.

"The good news is we can easily obtain root on these devices and the bad is there is no control over it," alephzain writes.

CNET has contacted Samsung for comment for comment and will update this report when we learn more.

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Space Pictures This Week: Frosty Mars, Mini Nile, More

Photograph by Mike Theiss, National Geographic

The aurora borealis, also known as the northern lights, illuminates the Arctic sky in a recent picture by National Geographic photographer Mike Theiss.

A storm chaser by trade, Theiss is in the Arctic Circle on an expedition to photograph auroras, which result from collisions between charged particles released from the sun's atmosphere and gaseous particles in Earth's atmosphere.

After one particularly amazing show, he wrote on YouTube, "The lights were dancing, rolling, and twisting, and at times looked like they were close enough to touch!" (Watch his time-lapse video of the northern lights.)

Published December 14, 2012

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Obama: Nation Faces 'Hard Questions' After Shooting

President Barack Obama said at an interfaith prayer service in this mourning community this evening that the country is "left with some hard questions" if it is to curb a rising trend in gun violence, such as the shooting spree Friday at Newtown's Sandy Hook Elementary School.

After consoling victims' families in classrooms at Newtown High School, the president said he would do everything in his power to "engage" a dialogue with Americans, including law enforcement and mental health professionals, because "we can't tolerate this anymore. These tragedies must end. And to end them we must change."

Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images

President Obama: 'Newtown You Are Not Alone' Watch Video

Sandy Hook Elementary Shooting: Remembering the Victims Watch Video

The president was not specific about what he thought would be necessary and did not even use the word "gun" in his remarks, but his speech was widely perceived as prelude to a call for more regulations and restrictions on the availability of firearms.

The grieving small town hosted the memorial service this evening as the the nation pieces together the circumstances that led to a gunman taking 26 lives Friday at the community's Sandy Hook Elementary School, most first graders.

"Someone once described the joy and anxiety of parenthood as the equivalent of having your heart outside your body all of the time, walking around," he said, speaking of the joys and fears of raising children.

"So it comes as a shock at a certain point when you realize no matter how much you love these kids you can't do it by yourself," he continued. "That this job of protecting kids and teaching them well is something we can only do together, with the help of friends and neighbors, with the help of a community, and the help of a nation."

CLICK HERE for Full Coverage of the Tragedy at Sandy Hook

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Zebrafish made to grow pre-hands instead of fins

PERHAPS the little fish embryo shown here is dancing a jig because it has just discovered that it has legs instead of fins. Fossils show that limbs evolved from fins, but a new study shows how it may have happened, live in the lab.

Fernando Casares of the Spanish National Research Council and his colleagues injected zebrafish with the hoxd13 gene from a mouse. The protein that the gene codes for controls the development of autopods, a precursor to hands, feet and paws.

Zebrafish naturally carry hoxd13 but produce less of the protein than tetrapods - all four-limbed vertebrates and birds - do. Casares and his colleagues hoped that by injecting extra copies of the gene into the zebrafish embryos, some of their cells would make more of the protein.

One full day later, all of those fish whose cells had taken up the gene began to develop autopods instead of fins. They carried on growing for four days but then died (Cell, DOI: 10.1016/j.devcel.2012.10.015).

"Of course, we haven't been able to grow hands," says Casares. He speculates that hundreds of millions of years ago, the ancestors of tetrapods began expressing more hoxd13 for some reason and that this could have allowed them to evolve autopods.

If you would like to reuse any content from New Scientist, either in print or online, please contact the syndication department first for permission. New Scientist does not own rights to photos, but there are a variety of licensing options available for use of articles and graphics we own the copyright to.

All comments should respect the New Scientist House Rules. If you think a particular comment breaks these rules then please use the "Report" link in that comment to report it to us.

If you are having a technical problem posting a comment, please contact technical support.

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Britain looks to Chinese tourists for Christmas cheer

LONDON - With their shelves spilling over with festive goodies, London's department stores are working hard to attract Christmas shoppers -- but Chinese visitors are the particular target of a charm offensive.

Hotels, retailers and the government are stepping up efforts to woo big-spending Chinese visitors in a bid to bounce back from Britain's longest recession in half a century.

Congee and dumplings are on the breakfast menu at enterprising hotels, major London stores have installed Chinese bank card terminals, and Mandarin-speaking staff are on hand to help out with the Christmas shopping.

Britain is courting Chinese travellers not only because they are a rapidly growing market -- they made an estimated 70 million overseas trips in 2011, up 20 percent in just a year -- but because they are serious shoppers.

"My goodness, they spend," said Patricia Yates, director of strategy for the VisitBritain tourism authority.

"The average Chinese visitor spends about three times as much -- 1,600 pounds (US$2,600, 2,000 euros) -- as the average visitor to Britain," she told AFP.

"So they're very welcome by the retail industry at the moment, who have seen domestic demand soften."

Purveyors of luxury goods in particular have welcomed affluent Chinese visitors with open arms.

The renowned Harrods department store, in London's exclusive Knightsbridge district, now has 70 Mandarin-speaking staff and more than 100 China Union Pay terminals allowing direct payment from Chinese bank accounts.

A Harrods spokeswoman said jewellery and watches, fashion and fine wines were top of the shopping list for many Chinese customers.

"They seek out the very latest, limited edition and exclusive products," she told AFP.

Beneath the twinkling Christmas lights on London's central shopping artery Oxford Street, too, Chinese shoppers were on the lookout for designer items.

"We think London is the capital of fashion," said Harry Gao, a fashion student from the eastern Chinese city of Wenzhou, who was wrapped up against the drizzle in a fur coat and gold trainers.

"Lots of famous designers are from the UK. It's lots of fun."

A record 149,000 Chinese visitors came to Britain last year, bringing some 240 million pounds to the struggling economy.

But Britain's share of the coveted Chinese market is poor compared to several competitors in mainland Europe including France, which welcomed nearly a million tourists from China last year.

"We know that our European rivals do much better than us," Yates admitted. "We really want to break the Chinese market."

The complex British visa system is frequently blamed for the shortfall.

While Chinese tourists can visit 26 European countries on a single "Schengen" visa, a trip to Britain requires a separate visa involving lengthy forms in English as well as additional costs.

Interior minister Theresa May confirmed Wednesday that the government is looking at expanding online applications and making some visa forms available in Mandarin, as well as introducing an express service for premium travellers.

Meanwhile, the government is throwing 8 million pounds at luring an additional 233,000 Chinese visitors a year by 2020, and VisitBritain sent its biggest-ever delegation to Shanghai last month to drum up business.

Over a Chinese breakfast of congee (rice porridge), steamed buns and warm soya milk at London's Landmark Hotel, marketing manager Yan-Ping Mew said he has had "very good feedback" since the meal became available to guests earlier this year.

The hotel also recommends smartphone apps to help Chinese guests navigate London and allocates them room numbers traditionally seen as lucky, such as those on the third or eighth floor.

"The Chinese tend to be slightly more superstitious," Mew explained.

He added that while many Chinese guests come to London to shop, they also want to see the sights and, in some cases, visit prospective universities for their children.

Yates also insisted that Britain had more to offer than shopping.

"There's the history and tradition of our royal family with palaces that you can go and see, great museums that have world-class treasures," she told AFP, adding that the London Olympics had been "an amazing showcase".

- AFP/ir

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Google will alter search to end FTC antitrust inquiry, says report

The Federal Trade Commission may bring its two-year antitrust investigation of Google to a close by allowing the company to make voluntary changes to its search business, according to a report.

The search giant is said to be readying an announcement about changes to its use of "snippets," bits of text culled from sites such as Yelp and TripAdvisor and displayed in search results, Politico reports, citing unnamed sources. Yelp and others had charged Google with using their content without permission.

Google will also makes tweaks that will allow for easier porting of search-ad campaigns from Google to rival search services, Politico's sources said.

Politico suggested on Tuesday that the FTC may leave the search-related case to the European Commission, which has mounted an investigation of its own. Reuters reported on Tuesday that some Google competitors, sensing a possible defeat, are taking the case to the Justice Department.

Google and the FTC also look to be close to a settlement in a case involving so-called frand -- or standard essential -- patents owned by Google.

Politico said the FTC declined to comment on today's report about the search tweaks, and it said Google would provide only the following statement: "We continue to work cooperatively with the Federal Trade Commission and are happy to answer any questions they may have."

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Space Pictures This Week: Frosty Mars, Mini Nile, More

Photograph by Mike Theiss, National Geographic

The aurora borealis, also known as the northern lights, illuminates the Arctic sky in a recent picture by National Geographic photographer Mike Theiss.

A storm chaser by trade, Theiss is in the Arctic Circle on an expedition to photograph auroras, which result from collisions between charged particles released from the sun's atmosphere and gaseous particles in Earth's atmosphere.

After one particularly amazing show, he wrote on YouTube, "The lights were dancing, rolling, and twisting, and at times looked like they were close enough to touch!" (Watch his time-lapse video of the northern lights.)

Published December 14, 2012

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Conn. Victim's Father Remembers 'Loving' Daughter

(Image credit: Emilie Parker Fund/Facebook)

Emilie Parker, the little girl with the blond hair and bright blue eyes, would have been one of the first to comfort her classmates at Sandy Hook Elementary School, had a gunman’s bullets not claimed her life, her father said.

“My daughter Emilie would be one of the first ones to be standing and giving support to all the victims because that’s the kind of kid she is,” her father, Robbie Parker said as he fought back tears, telling the world about his “bright, creative and loving” daughter who was one of the 20 young victims in the Newtown, Conn., shooting.

“She always had something kind to say about anybody,” her father said.  ”We find comfort reflecting on the incredible person Emilie was and how many lives she was able to touch.”

Emilie, 6, was helping teach her younger sisters to read and make things, and she was the little girls would go to for comfort, he said.

“They looked up to her,” Parker said.

READ: Complete List of Sandy Hook Victims

Parker moved his wife and three daughters to Newtown eight months ago after accepting a job as  a physician’s assistant at Danbury Hospital. He said Emilie, his oldest daughter, seemed to have adjusted well to her new school, and he was very happy with the school, too.

“I love the people at the school. I love Emilie’s teacher and the classmates we were able to get to know,” he said.

      (Image Credit: Alex von Kleydorff/AP Photo)

The family dealt with another tragic loss in October when Emilie lost her grandfather in an accident.

“[This] has been a topic that has been discussed in our family in the past couple of  months,” Parker said. “[My daughters ages 3 and 4] seem to get the idea that there’s somebody who they will miss very much.”

Emilie, a budding artist who carried her markers and pencils everywhere, paid tribute to her grandfather by slipping a special card she had drawn into his casket, Parker said.  It was something she frequently did to lift the spirits of others.

“I can’t count the number of times Emilie would find someone feeling sad or frustrated and would make people a card,” Parker said. “She was an exceptional artist.”

The girl who was remembered as “always willing to try new things, other than food” was learning Portuguese from her father, who speaks the language.

(Image Credit: Emilie Parker Fund/Facebook)

On Friday morning, Emilie woke up before her father left for his job and exchanged a few sentences with him in the language.

“She told me good morning and asked how I was doing,” Parker said. “She said she loved me, I gave her a kiss and I was out the door.”

Parker found out about the shooting while on lockdown in Danbury Hospital and found a television for the latest news.

“I didn’t think it was that big of deal at first,” he said. “With the first reports coming in, it didn’t sound like it was going to be as tragic as it was. That’s kind of what it was like for us.”

CLICK HERE for full coverage of the Sandy Hook shooting.

Parker said he knows that God can’t take away free will and would have been unable to stop the Sandy Hook shooting. While gunman Adam Lanza used his free agency to take innocent lives, Parker said he plans to use his in a positive way.

“I’m not mad because I have my  [free] agency to use this event to do whatever I can to make sure my family and my wife and my daughters are taken care [of],” he said. “And if there’s anything I can do to help to anyone at any time at anywhere, I’m free to do that.”

(Image credit: Emilie Parker Fund/Facebook)

Friday night, hours after he learned of his daughter’s death, Parker said he spoke at his church.

“I don’t know how to get through something like this. My wife and I don’t understand how to process all of this,” he said today. “We find strength in our religion and in our faith and in our family. ”

“It’s a horrific tragedy and I want everyone to know our hearts and prayers go out to them. This includes the family of the shooter. I can’t imagine how hard this experience must be for you and I want you to know our family … love and support goes out to you as well.”

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