Eco-warriors have long reported the damage that pesticides have caused the environment. Just earlier this year, US biologists reported that pesticides could be threatening the survival of Salmon in the Pacific. But for many of us in the UK, we carry on eating food grown with the help of pesticides and ignore the claims of the green brigade.

However, researchers from a London University have found that it might not just be the environment that is being harmed by pesticides. These chemicals could be responsible for some human deaths too – suicides in fact, brought on by exposure to a certain type of pesticides.

Okay, so the pesticides at the centre of the study (organophosphate agricultural pesticides) are banned in Western nations, but these chemicals are sadly still used in lower income countries such as China and the findings are certainly worrying. Results have shown that these pesticides can be absorbed even through low-grade exposure by the skin and lungs.

Scientists from King’s College London have found the first evidence through an epidemiological study suggesting a link between pesticide exposure and suicidal thoughts. Their work, which was recently published by the World Health Organisation, found that in China people who were exposed to higher level of certain pesticides were more likely to experience suicidal thoughts.

Preparing to use pesticides on crops. Image courtesy of of Roy Bateman, Wikipedia Commons. Used here under Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 3.0 License

Over 9000 residents in Zhejiang province were sampled in the study carried out by KCL in conjunction with the Tongde Hospital of Zhejiang Province. Participants were asked both about the storage of pesticides at their homes and whether they had ever considered suicide within the 2 years before their interview. To detect the presence of any mental disorders the Chinese version of the 12-item General Health Questionnaire was administered and trained psychiatric nurses carried out the interviews.

Alarmingly the researchers found that those people who stored pesticides at home, and therefore suffered more exposure, were more likely to report contemplating suicide. Easy access to the pesticides was associated with thoughts on suicide and the geographical regions with the highest prevalence of pesticides (the rural areas) also had the highest levels of suicidal thoughts in their populations.

Although this study made no attempt to quantify the actual pesticide exposure, the findings are certainly interesting with regard to health policies. Pesticides are frequently used during suicide attempts; in fact, pesticide ingestion was involved in 62% of China suicides between 1996 and 2000. But now it seems they might also be subconsciously linked with suicidal thoughts.

Dr Robert Stewart, from KCL’s Institute of Psychiatry, believes these findings are a cause for concern: “Our research findings that suggest that higher exposure to these chemicals might actually increase the risk of suicidal thoughts provides further support for calls for tighter international restrictions on agricultural pesticide availability and use.”

With these organophosphates so readily available in countries like China more work is needed to firstly understand the causal mechanisms which lead to increased suicidal thoughts and also how best to intervene in this situation to ensure public health is safeguarded. Hopefully, this work and further research may help convince even people in the UK that chemical pesticides are more harmful than first thought and should be eliminated from food production.

Earlier this week the British Beekeepers’ Association reported that nearly a fifth of the UK’s honey bees died last winter. They found that 19.2% of the honey bee population was lost nationally in the 2008/2009 winter period with the highest losses reported in the north of England at 32.1%. These results are alarming given that a 7-10% death rate is usually considered acceptable.

With bees contributing £200 million annually to the agricultural industry such losses could drastically affect the survival of Britain’s plants and crops – bees are involved in the production of a third of the food we eat.

But there is some good news. The BBKA has seen a 25% increase in membership and a host of celebrities are keeping bees, including Scarlett Johansson and Ronnie Corbett.

However, aspiring apiarists are not confined to just rural locations. Bee keeping is becoming an urban hobby too. An introductory bee-keeping course in London saw 1,000 applications for just 60 places and there’s a host of London bee-keeping organisations available for people to join.

London honey is also rumoured to taste better than that produced in rural England. In country locations the honey is often entirely from oil seed rape which is found in abundance in rural areas. However, in London there is often a larger selection of flowers and trees, such as lime trees, sweet chestnut, horse chestnut and sycamore. London plants are also far less likely to have been sprayed with pesticides and other chemicals further improving the taste of London honey. In fact in 2003, London honey was awarded first prize in the open international category at the National Honey Show.

So how can bees be kept in London? Many apiarists rely on roof-terraces (such as these photographs from East London) as well as small gardens and a new plastic bee hive, known as the beehaus, has recently been developed by Omlet, the firm which developed the urban chicken coop. Surprisingly, little space is needed to keep bees since the insects are capable of finding pollen within a 3mile radius and are able to reach a height of around 5 metres above the ground.

If you’re interested in getting involved in bee-keeping in London your first point of call should be The London Beekeepers Association who can provide the necessary information and courses to start your low-maintenance rural hobby.

Today it was announced in PLoS Biology that researchers at Imperial College, London have discovered the mechanism by which our body’s frontline defence system is able to distinguish between good and evil.

Researchers from the university’s Department of Life Sciences and the National Heart and Lung Institute at Imperial studied the ‘Natural Killer’ (NK) immune cells in the human body identifying how they know which cells are diseased and must be destroyed and which are normal cells. They believe that this work could help scientists develop new ways of boosting the body’s natural defences.

NK cells are a fundamental part of our body’s immune system – in fact over 1,000 NK cells are found in every drop of our blood. By latching onto harmful cells they can protect our bodies against tumours, viruses and bacteria.

However, up until now it was not understood how NK cells would know to leave our own normal cells unharmed.

Professor Dan Davis, the principal investigator of the study, and his colleagues used high speed microscopy imahing techniques to observe first-hand how the NK cells decide which cells and good and which are evil.

They found that NK cells have two types of receptors on their surface that are capable of interacting with proteins on the surface of the captured cell. One set of these receptors are ‘activators’ (capable of turning the killing mechanism on), whilst the others are ‘inhibitors’ (which prevent the captured cell being killed).

A series of sill images showing Nk cells at work, coutresy of Imperial College, London. This series of images show the time course of an NK cell killing a diseased cell. The top row of panel shows the cells in black and white and below are the same cells with the NK cell marked with a red dye and the target cell marked green. The NK cell attaches to the target and spreads over it before delivering a lethal dose of toxins. The death of the target cell can be seen in the last image as the surface of the cell is seen to bubble. The whole process takes about 15 minutes.

If an NK cell finds a harmful cell, such as a cancerous one, more of its activator receptor cells interact and the killing signal dominates, causing the NK cell to maintain contact with the harmful cell and eventually kill it. Conversely, if a normal cell is captured, the inhibitor receptors dominate the the NK cell knows to quickly move off in search of other cells.

“Our research has shown that information gleaned from its surface receptors tells the Natural Killer cell whether to stop patrolling and commence killing, or to move off quickly, and harmlessly, in search of another target,” said Professor Davis.

This work is a significant step forward in our understanding of how our body’s natural defence system works.

“The bigger the better” is how Graeme Jones, chemical ecologist, describes the molecular models that he takes such pleasure in creating.

Well known for “Sex Drugs and Rock and Roll” (a hit at the 2006 Cheltenham Science Festival) and smashing world records for making giant models of DNA, Graeme has now gained another achievement. He is the first chemist to put on a scientific exhibit on behalf of the Royal Society of Chemistry since they moved into their headquarters, Burlington House, in 1857.

Right now on the courtyard of Burlington House in front of the Royal Academy of Arts in Piccadilly, is a new piece of sci-art. Asked by the RSC to fit in with their 2009/2010 theme of Food, he has created ‘Carbon Rapture’ a group of three large scientific exhibits open for viewing until 27th August.

Graeme admits in a statement on his website that producing a large exhibit with the theme Food was not easy. “This was a tall order trying to come up with something that would be visually exciting and interesting to the general public. There were also a number of technical obstacles to overcome, the main one being the precious granite slabs, you can’t anchor anything down!!”

In the end Graeme decided to focus on carbon, the chemical present in all foods and he has now developed three exhibits:

1. The Diamond model – previously made for the Science Museum but this time featuring transparent carbons and translucent bonds which in his words “[give] it a more diamondy feel”

2. The Buckyball – which Graeme admits ironically “had a mega effect on the carbon footprint of the exhibition as I had to make a mad dash to Cumbria to sort out a problem”

3. Graphite

Graeme is a passionate scientific communicator who has, in his own words, spent the last few years “trying to re-establish science at the heart of culture”. With concerns that the “loss of scientific cultural identity…has increased the publics mistrust in science and scientists” he’s hoping that Carbon Rapture will allow the public to appreciate the hard work of scientists. I’m sure everyone will agree that this is a worthwhile cause – so make sure you visit Carbon Rapture before it closes on 27th August.

EDITED: Just edited the photos included in this post as Graeme very kindly took some more images for me today which show off his work much more clearly.

Scientists frequently encounter voids within science – empty spaces in their knowledge. Usually they attempt to fill these gaps in their understanding, but now one scientist is trying to cross a 2.5 metre void…all in the name of entertainment.

Tomorrow evening sees the launch of a brand new science-entertainment programme on BBC One: ‘Bang Goes the Theory’. Exploring the world’s most exciting scientific breakthroughs, it aims to inspire the public through the use of scientific experiments. Travelling around the world the team of four presenters are planning to test ideas from a range of fields including geology and neuropsychology.

The BGTT team, (L-R): Dallas, Liz, Yan and Jem

In keeping with its title, the show aims to start with a bang. Tuesday evening sees a high-tech ‘science stunt’ aired live on tv between The One Show (1900hrs) and EastEnders (1930hrs) on BBC One. Nicknamed ‘The Big Contraption’ the stunt will see Dr Yan Wong, one of the presenters, propelled across a 2.5 metre void. After online voting by the public Dr Wong will cross the void using magnetism, a Van de Graaf generator, fireworks propelled through water and, if the BBGT’s official blog is anything to go by, a giant bunny. This feature of public voting will carry on throughout the series and the producers have announced that there will also be many interactive resources and free events (organised in conjunction with the Open University who are also co-producers), including a London roadshow in the not too distant future – although exact details for this are currently under tight wraps.

Part of ‘The Big Contraption’ which will be unveiled live on Tuesday evening. More preview photos of BGTT can be viewed on Nature Networks’ Flickr account here.

However, the BBC team involved in this latest science programme are keen to stress that their new project is distinct from the pop-sci show Brainiac, the successful brainchild of Sky television.

The BBC team told me that “it is true that BGTT will incorporate experiments and visual demonstrations into programming, but they will be secondary to the exploration of topics and theories. The programme will not put fun ahead of good science (although we’re sure that some of the show moments will turn out to be quite amusing).”

They also added that “the production team will apply their extensive expert knowledge (ranging from those passionate about science to PhDs) by explaining science subjects to a broad audience that is interested in gaining a better understanding of the world around them. BGTT is also about participation and interaction and will be backed by the website offering further information on scientific theories raised by the programme.”

The programme certainly looks to be a step in the right direction towards improved public engagement, whilst also a welcome opportunity to return science to the prime BBC channel.

Make sure you tune in tomorrow evening for The Big Contraption live on BBC One and then again from 29th July for the 10-show series. Also keep reading this blog for details as soon as they emerge on the subsequent London roadshow.

Mention greenery in central London and you’re probably envisaging Hyde Park or Hampstead Heath. But now scientists at Imperial College have created a futuristic £1 million rooftop ‘greenhouse’ on the top of a five-storey building on their South Kensington Campus.

The new GroDome, as it’s affectionately known, will allow scientists to grow large quantities of plants for a wide range of experiments. The greenhouse may hold the key to the future developments of biofuels or sequencing the tomato genome.

Unripe Cherry Tomatoes. Image Courtesy of Wikipedia.

With over 200 square metres of temperature and light controlled growing space for a variety of plant species, the GroDome is the only rooftop facility of its kind in London.

Since it’s opening in April earlier this year, three projects have already taken root in the GroDome:

1. Research into extracting sugars for biofuels from the cell walls of willow trees.

2. Understanding tomato stress resistance and sequencing the tomato genome. The long term aim being to produce crops that are better able to survive in today’s changing environment.

3. Studying how aphids, a serious pest, interact with plants, in the hope to breed resistance mechanisms into plants.

The GroDome is only part of a development project at Imperial’s South Kensington Campus. In order to help support and develop plant science research, a number of laboratories have also been refurbished and specialist controlled environment plant growth rooms installed.

Today sees the start of the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition 2009 in London, which sees over 20 diverse exhibits on display until Saturday 4th July. The event offers the chance for non-specialists to observe first-hand some of the creative ideas of the 21st Century and engage with their creators.

The Royal Society’s event is truly trying to engage science and the public – offering the two cultures (as first referred to be C.P. Snow), the opportunity to communicate to, and with, each other. The exhibition is all about the public contecting with scientists – asking them about the work and offering their opinions. There is a diverse collection of interactive exhibits – from understanding why fluorescent fish can help humans, to how a chewing robot can help develop the future of dental technology. There is also a selection of art, history of science exhibits, lunchtime talks, an interactive presentation and, on Saturday, a family workshop.

My own Imperial College London have four very different displays at the Summer Science Exhibition. One of them focuses on how what happens in the womb can have a life-long effect. A group of researchers from the Institute of Reproductive and Developmental Biology at Imperial College have constructed an exhibit featuring a game for visitors to play that shows how a mother’s stress can increase the heart rate of her unborn baby. The researchers behind this exhibit hope that it will raise families’ awareness of the effect on stress on every single member of their household, including those currently unborn. They believe that by reducing stress during pregnancy, thousands of children could be prevented from developing emotional and behavioural problems, such as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.

A human foetus. Image Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Their exhibit also features a real placenta, encased safely in plastic, which visitors will be allowed to touch. The significance of this display is that when pregnant women become stressed, the placenta becomes less protective and the mother’s stress hormone cortisol can have unwanted effects on the foetus.

One of the other Imperial College exhibits is sure to catch the attention of visitors, with a James Bond-esque title: “Quantum of Sol”. Imperial Scientists from the Department of Physics in conjunction with the Grantham Institute of Climate Change have created a new generation of ‘nano-structured’ millimetre-sized solar cells that could convert the sun’s energy to electricity more efficiently than current technology.

The solar cells, which are custom-built on a scale 1000 times smaller than the size of a human hair, capture more solar energy than existing silicon solar panels. With different layers of materials, they are able to individually target different colours of sunlight, leading to greater efficiency. The lead researcher, Dr Ned Ekins-Daukes, believes that within a decade his technology will be capable of achieving 50% efficiency – a vast improvement on the current solar panels which can only manage between 12 and 20 percent.

Visitors interested in this exhibit, will be able to temporarily become solar power engineers during their visit. Experimenting with mirrors and lenses, they can focus a beam of light onto a miniature solar cell, in a scaled-down representation of desert solar power technology, known as a ‘concentrator power system’ to learn how much electrical power can be generated from the sun.

With a whole host of other exhibits touching on the fields of biotechnology, space exploration and environmental studies amongst other topics, the Royal Society Summer Science Event 2009 is sure to inspire both working scientists and the general public alike.

For information on visiting the Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition 2009, see the Royal Society’s website.

If you’re looking to sell or rent out your home soon, then researchers at UCL’s Bartlett School of Graduate Studies could help you.

As part of an EPSRC funded project, a group of researchers are studying the levels of overheating in the capital this summer. They will be researching the urban heat island phenomenon, which is where a densely-populated area such as a city, is significantly warmer than the surrounding area. The UCL scientists are trying to examine the impact of climate change and the heat island effect on indoor thermal comfort.

This thermal image shows part of Atlanta, Georgia. Blue shows cool temperatures, red warm, and hot areas appear white. Daytime air temperatures were only about 26.7°C (80°F), but some surface temperatures reached 47.8°Celsius (118°F). Courtesy of Wikipedia

They will be devloping a computer model for London that predicts local temperatures and environmental conditions using data loggers (the size of credit cards) which measure temperature and humidity at regular intervals. The data loggers are battery powered and do not require any care during the monitoring period from June to September.

The team are currently looking for willing Londoners who are happy to allow these data loggers to be left in their properties. In return you will receive a free Energy Performance Certificate (EPC) which usually costs £60 and is required by law before selling or renting out your home.

The researchers will need to visit your property and carry out an energy survery, which takes around 30-40 minutes to complete. You will then receive a free EPC produced by an accredited energy assessor, along with a report suggesting how to make your home more energy efficient.

In September, the team will visit your home and collect the data loggers before asking you to complete a short questionnaire.

If anyone is interested in getting involved in the scheme, please contact Anna Mavrogianni on 0207 679 1973 at UCL by Wednesday 17 June.

“You know nothing about the Earth” Wallace Broecker was told as a first year grad student, before he was whisked away for an all-expenses-paid three week trip to study some lakes. Little did his then supervisor realise that ‘Wally’, as he prefers to be known, would change the world of climate science forever. In 1975, Wally coined the phrase ‘global warming’.

On Friday 12th June, Wally will receive an honorary degree from Cambridge University and the following Monday will be celebrating 57 years of scientific research. With over 470 publications to his name and a host of books, it was a great pleasure for me to listen to Wally give the second Grantham Institute for Climate Change Annual Lecture of 2009 at Imperial College earlier this evening.

Professor Wallace Broecker giving his lecture at Imperial College

His talk was both enlightening and alarming – he believes that for many of us at the talk, the effects of global warming would be visible in our lifetimes. Furthermore, contrary to popular belief, it would be changes in rainfall pattern that would bring the most harm, rather than increases in temperature.

Wally has studied the changing rainfall throughout history by analysing lakes and their sediments and believes that the past can tell us a great deal about what is to come. However, with climate scientists currently unable to produce accurate models to describe the past, he is concerned. Feedback mechanisms make him fear that realistic models to predict the future are still a long way off.

One of the stunning landscapes that Wally has been investigating

What is clear, however, is that the changes in rainfall will far outweigh any changes we see in temperature. As global warming continues, he explained that the Northern Hemisphere would heat up more quickly than the Southern Hemisphere, because of the great abundance of landmass that has a lower specific heat capacity. This will cause a significant northward shift in the thermal equator, defined as the belt encircling the Earth where the highest mean annual temperatures are for each longitude.

Despite this, Wally doesn’t believe that convincing the richer nations to cut back on their carbon emissions is the way forward – he believes that this will only eclipse the larger problem of the developing countries that will continue to expand and industrialise. Instead, he has high hopes in what his colleague and friend is working on.

Professor Klaus Lackner is a geophysicist with a big idea – he believes he might just have the solution to storing carbon dioxide after 5 years of hard work. Lackner has developed a plastic, which upon exposure to air, can absorb carbon dioxide.

Wally explains that the ligands present in the plastic pick up the carbon dioxide preferentially over water vapour molecules. The plastic can then be placed inside an evacuated chamber, where they release the carbon dioxide. Although still heavily in the development phase, Lackner’s hope is that each unit of this plastic will be capable of removing one tonne of carbon dioxide from the air each day.

This idea might seem far-fetched, but with Professor Broecker and Prince Charles amongst Lackner’s fans, this piece of plastic might be one of the future solutions to prevent further global warming.

Giant rabbits are shortly set to take-over the capital. But these 5ft high creatures with flashing ears, are not some genetically engineered monster-bunny, but instead the work of fashion designer Paul Smith as he tries to tackle London’s litter louts.

The bunny-bins whose ears light up when rubbish is put in them, are one of several ideas on display at the London’s Design Museum, and a couple of the bins have already been tested in Covent Garden and Holland Park.

Bins in London (similar to this one seen in Bristol) could soon be replaced by grey rabbit bins with flashing ears. Image courtesy of Wikipedia

Paul Smith isn’t the first celebrity to jump on the cleaning bandwagon – in 2007 Bill Bryson became the new president of the Campaign to Protect Rural England – the same year in which a survey revealed that a shocking 50% of people admit to dropping litter. Back in April this year, campaigners dropped bags of litter in Trafalgar Square to highlight the plight of the capital.

London can seem pretty grotty at times – in fact the equivalent of 100,000 dustbin bags of rubbish are discarded on London streets ever day. The city produces 3.4million tonnes of rubbish a year – enough waste to fill Canary Wharf tower every eight days or to fill an Olympic-sized swimming pool every hour. Although the recession might be making us more cautious about leftovers, the problem of rubbish is getting worse as we purchase more packaged items and disposable goods. With predictions that by 2016 there will be 700,000 more people living in London the problem with both littering and disposal of rubbish is something that needs considering.

Recongnised universally as the symbol for throwing rubbish in the bins provided. Image courtesy of Wikipedia

At present, most of London’s rubbish is either burnt or buried in landfill sites, with as much as 70% exported out to the Home Counties or beyond due to a lack of required space within the city. However, the rate at which Londoners are recycling is slowly improving, although at present it falls well below the theoretical maximum. It’s estimated that as much as 60% of what we throw away can be recycled, but at present London’s only recycle just over 25% (still a dramatic increase from the 8% in 2000). However, in Harringey, north London the local council are pleased with their 20% recycling rate although they told ‘The Independent’ that as many as 50% of their residents don’t recycle.

A tiny fraction of everything London produces goes to the Grosvenor Waste Management’s plant at Crayford, south-east London, where they attempt to sort through the truck loads of mixed up recycling that arrives. Using conveyor belts, magnets, air jets and photo-recognition equipment they separate the aluminium, tin, paper and plastic products, whilst employees check the final conveyor belts by hand. However, the sudden surge in recycling has itself led to problems – the UK is currently struggling to reprocess much of the waste. So instead 4 million tons of UK industrial, commercial and household waste gets exported overseas to India, China and south-east Asia. Ships that arrive at UK ports with Far Eastern imports return filled with the UK’s waste, which places like China are desperate for.

So are flashing bins the answer? Well, it actually seems that Paul Smith’s bunny idea isn’t the first new style bin to hit London. In 2008, it was announced that new superbins would be hitting the financial district of London this year. They claim to not only recycle, but also to report the latest news and information as well as being bombproof thanks to their ‘blast intelligent technology’. With the 2012 Olympics looming, when London will be on display to the world, the city is getting desperate. So we’ll just have to hope that the endearing animal-bins will encourage more people to ‘dunk their junk’.