World’s hottest chile pepper discovered

The following is copied directly from EurekAlert.org:

10-26-2007
Contact: Michael W. Neff
American Society for Horticultural Science

LAS CRUCES, New Mexico — Researchers at New Mexico State University recently discovered the world’s hottest chile pepper. Bhut Jolokia, a variety of chile pepper originating in Assam, India, has earned Guiness World Records’ recognition as the world’s hottest chile pepper by blasting past the previous champion Red Savina. In replicated tests of Scoville heat units (SHUs), Bhut Jolokia reached one million SHUs, almost double the SHUs of Red Savina, which measured a mere 577,000.

Dr. Paul Bosland, Director of the Chile Pepper Institute at New Mexico State University’s Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences collected seeds of Bhut Jolokia while visiting India in 2001. Bosland grew Bhut Jolokia plants under insect-proof cages for three years to produce enough seed to complete the required field tests. “The name Bhut Jolokia translates as ‘ghost chile,’” Bosland said, “I think it’s because the chile is so hot, you give up the ghost when you eat it!” Bosland added that the intense heat concentration of Bhut Jolokia could have significant impact on the food industry as an economical seasoning in packaged foods.

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The complete study and abstract are available on the ASHS HortScience electronic journal web site: http://hortsci.ashspublications.org/cgi/content/abstract/42/2/222

Founded in 1903, the American Society for Horticultural Science (ASHS) is the largest organization dedicated to advancing all facets of horticultural research, education, and application. Society website – ashs.org

FOUR new KINGDOMS of Life Discovered in Colorado

Thursday, 22 May 2003
Excerpt from original article
by Danny Kingsley
ABC Science Online

Four complete new kingdoms of life have been discovered by American researchers in the high alpine environment of Colorado, rewriting the textbooks on microbes.

The new microbe kingdoms were found in barren, boulder-filled tundra slopes west of Boulder, Colorado, delegates of the a meeting of the American Society for Microbiology in Washington DC heard this week.

Dr Allen Meyer, a medical practioner working with Professor Steven Schmidt in the environmental, population and organismic biology department of the University of Colorado in Boulder, made the discovery as part of the U.S. National Science Foundation’s ‘Microbial Observatories’ program.

“It is very interesting and kind of surprising to discover four kingdoms in the same locality,” Dr Don Colgan, an evolutionary biologist at the Australian Museum in Sydney, commented to ABC Science Online.

Until relatively recently, ‘kingdom’ was the highest level of classification in the scientific taxonomic system that places all forms of life into hierarchical categories. Kingdoms are made up of divisions (or phyla), which themselves break down again into classes, then orders, families, genus and finally, species.

Scientists in the 18th century originally classified the kingdoms of life into two basic groups: plants and animals. In 1977, Dr Carl Woese turned biology on its head when he discovered the ‘third kingdom of life’: archaea micro-organisms that live near volcanic vents on the seafloor without oxygen and in conditions thought to be reminiscent of Earth’s earliest environment. He has since proposed that these three kingdoms be placed in a higher classification, called domains.

Two advances in science have helped uncover even more new kingdoms of life, Colgan said: the increase in the analytical power of computers and the discovery of the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) process, which has allowed scientists to look at DNA sequences in intricate detail. A debt must also be paid to adventurers who go to extreme places and collect samples, he added.

Scientists now believe there are many more kingdoms, including fungi and a number of types of single-celled organisms. The number of kingdoms was estimated to be about 30 before the University of Colorado discovery. [more…]

Much MUCH more information is included in the Original Article at the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) website, News in Science.com.

Found: 37,000! New Extremophile Marine Microbes

Excerpt from
original article
by Julie Steenhuysen
CHICAGO (Reuters) –

Using new DNA sequencing techniques, the researchers have identified as many as 37,000 different kinds of bacteria huddled near two hydrothermal vents on an underwater volcano off the Oregon coast.

“Many of these bacteria had never been reported before,” said Julie Huber of the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, whose study appears in the journal Science.

[…]

Her research is part of an international effort to create a census of marine microbes, which make up as much as 90 percent of the total ocean biomass by weight.

Read the full, detailed article at Reuters.com.

Looks Like a Duck, and Walks Like a Duck…

Then it MUST be 2 newly discovered DINOSAURS!

First:
–Excerpt from original
article by: Scott Norris
for National Geographic News
October 3, 2007

“A massive fossil skull found in southern Utah represents a new species of duck-billed dinosaur, researchers say.

The unusually well-preserved skull shows the duckbill was a muscular vegetarian, with hundreds of teeth and bulging jaws.

“It could have eaten whatever [vegetation] was in its way,” said lead researcher Terry Gates, a paleontologist at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.

[…]

Gates and colleague Scott Sampson studied the skull, and concluded that it is a new species of hadrosaur, or duck-billed dinosaur.

The species was given the scientific name Gryposaurus monumentensis in honor of the national monument where the skull was unearthed.”

Read full article at National Geographic.

News in Science article here.

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Second:
Excerpt from article at
LiveScience.com

” A strange, long-necked waddling dinosaur with massive arms and probably enormous claws has been discovered.

It walked only on its hind legs like the carnivorous dinosaurs from which it evolved, but Suzhousaurus megatherioides, meaning “giant sloth-like reptile from Suzhou,” was an herbivore, says researcher Daqing Li of the Third Geology and Mineral Resources Exploration Academy of Gansu Province in northwestern China, where the fossil specimen was found.

The creature belongs to a group of dinosaurs called therizinosaurs, characterized by long necks capped by small heads, massive arms and claws, and flaring ribs and hips that made their bodies very wide. […]”

Read the entire (very detailed) article at LiveScience.com.

New Tribe Spotted in Peruvian Amazon!

October 4, 2007 From BBC News

A previously unknown indigenous group living in isolation has been found deep in Peru’s Amazon jungle, a team of ecologists has said. The ecologists spotted the 21 Indians near the Brazilian border as they flew overhead looking for illegal loggers.

The group was photographed and filmed from the air on the banks of the Las Piedras River in Peru’s south-eastern Amazon region.

A government official who was on the flight said there were three palm huts on the river bank.

“We’ve found five other sites with this kind of shelter along the same river,” Ricardo Hon told Associated Press news agency.

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Get more info from the original article at BBC News.–While you’re there, make a point to check out the links to other articles about Peruvian Indians in the news. The links can be found at the top of the right-hand column.

Find an INCREDIBLE resource for information on Native Amazonian tribes (including maps, photos*, videos, illustrations of different ceremonies- like the ‘Poison Frog Ceremony’- and MUCH more!) at Amazon-Indians.org, Matses.info, and Amazonz.info.

*please be aware that there is ‘National Geographic’ style nudity in the photos at these sites. These are native Natives.

Photo credit: Amazon-Indians.org, with many thanks! The Indians pictured are of the Matis tribe, of theYavarí Valley in Brazil. They bear many cultural and linguistic similarities to other tribes in Peru. You can find out more about that at the site.