Ecolosophy

Children affected by pharmaceutical source of estrogen

2010-07-30T07:06:00.000-07:00

According to this article in The New York Times, children accidentally exposed to a pharmaceutical source estrogen have exhibited abnormal breast development. Both boys and girls are affected.

Not Quite Ecology

2010-07-16T20:48:00.000-07:00

I ran across this abstract on PubMed. It is from the Nov-Dec 2006 issue of Molecular Pharmacology in which the authors explain how the active ingredient in marijuana, THC, blocks the aggregation of a certain type of peptide implicated in the development of Alzheimer's Disease.

Yet another argument for the legalization of medical marijuana.

OK, let's link this back to ecology, or at least environmental issues, since this blog is, after all, called "Ecolosophy".

Marijuana and it's botanical cousin, hemp, are easy to grow throughout much of North America, but it is illegal to grow them as crops. However, if marijuana and hemp cultivation were legalized, the crops could become important in areas of the United States where tobacco and cotton were once grown. I have heard (but cannot find reliable citations) that hemp is gentler on the soil than many other crops, requiring fewer pesticides and fertilizers. However, since such assertions are unsupported in the literature I searched, I will focus on the one aspect of hemp that is indisputable: its utility as a natural fiber. Hemp was once important in the manufacture of ropes and clothing; there is still a niche market for hemp clothing, but the market could be greatly expanded if widespread cultivation of hemp were legalized.

I realize that with the previous paragraph I transitioned from medical marijuana to hemp, but the fact is that it wouldn't take much marijuana to support the medical industry. Supporting the recreational market for marijuana might be a different matter, but let us assume for the moment that any legalization would preclude recreational smoking. In that case, the cultivation of hemp is the important factor. But, being illegal, it cannot be grown for use as a textile, which is the type of cultivation that would actually use significant amounts of acreage. Following legalization, however, cultivation of hemp could have far-reaching effects.

Legalization of hemp would be beneficial for the environment and for agriculture. It would reduce the mass of synthetic materials dumped in landfills. It would provide an alternative, carbon-neutral, sustainable fiber source for clothing, carpets, landscaping textiles, and industrial fibers. It would also breathe new life into agricultural areas where tobacco and cotton are no longer profitable.

Of course none of these things will happen without a compelling reason to make hemp cultivation legal, which brings us back around to the legalization of medical marijuana. Hemp cultivation is illegal because of the plant's botanical similarity to marijuana even though the hemp plant doesn't produce enough THC to be used as a drug. It is more or less "guilty by association". So, we need an argument in support of marijuana, and the evidence presented in the paper in Molecular Pharmacology is another piece of the puzzle.

Adaptive management of fisheries in the Northeast

2010-07-14T20:02:00.000-07:00

Today NOAA, under the leadership of Dr. Jane Lubchenco, raised the limits on several fisheries in the Northeast. The press release from NOAA is here. This change in policy is important because it allows fishermen to harvest more of certain species that have historically been hurt by overfishing.

Overfishing of natural stocks is a major concern for fisheries managers and fishermen alike. Managers, like the men and women working for NOAA, seek to balance harvesting pressures with the animals' ability to replace itself and maintain a stable population. Fishermen, also try to do this. However, there is disagreement (to say the least) about how much of each species can be removed from the oceans before the stocks begin to decline.

To learn more about which fish species are most at risk of overfishing, visit the Monterey bay Aquarium and read their materials on their seafood watch page. There you will learn which species are most threatened by over-harvesting and which are not. If you choose to eat seafood, this resource is an indispensable tool to making responsible, informed decisions about what to eat.

Buckminster Fuller Award

2010-07-12T18:09:00.000-07:00

So here's an interesting idea: rehabilitate range land and reverse desertification by grazing cattle in small, dense herds on the land that you are concerned about.

This idea is interesting because it pretty much flies in the face of the conventional wisdom about desertification, grazing being thought of as one of the leading causes, not as a fix. The idea is that grazing pressure crops vegetation too close to the ground, causes habitat homogenization by selecting for/against certain plants, and causes the land to dry out because the short-cropped vegetation does not trap as moisture close to the ground. Also the trampling effect is thought to kill vegetation, break the soil and cause it to dry, etc. The result is what we call desertification, or the transformation of prairie into something more akin to a desert.

Enter Allan Savory, winner of the 2010 Buckminster Fuller Award.

The award was given for Savory's work on a grazing method called holistic management in which small, dense herds of cattle are rotated through an area before they cause the kind of damage associated with over grazing. The cattle still break the sod, which aerates the soil according to Savory, but they are not allowed to graze the vegetation.

The really great part about this award is that it was given to someone who questioned the conventional wisdom. Call it being independent, thinking outside the box, innovation, or whatever other label you choose. Any or all of these labels are likely appropriate. It's time to think about problems like desertification a little different than we have been because the problem is only getting worse. Even if the newer or alternative ideas eventually fail, we should be able to learn something when we try to discover why or how the idea didn't work.

Our Stolen Future

2010-07-11T20:11:00.000-07:00

Our Stolen Future by Theo Colborn, Dianne Dumanoski, and John Peterson Myers describes the effects of various endocrine disruptors on vertebrate physiology. An endocrine disruptor, or endocrine mimic, is a chemical that interrupts or alters the function of our hormonal system. These chemicals bear a strong resemblance to those that our body produces on its own (e.g., estrogen or testosterone), so they are able to "confuse" or "shut off" the cellular machinery inside our bodies. Typical effects of endocrine disruptors are reproductive problems, developmental problems, cancer, behavioral/mood problems - basically any process in our body that is regulated by hormones.

The function of hormones in our body is to convey messages from one part of the body to another. This is not a message in the sense of a nerve impulse, but rather a way of controlling processes such as growth or development. These chemicals usually do their work at very low concentrations in our blood, with only a small amount required to stimulate cells with the proper receptors into action. Receptors on the surfaces of our cells are structured in way that allows them to "recognize" a hormone by its shape, or chemical conformation. If an exogenous chemical (a substance originating from a source outside our body) has a shape that is similar to the shape of an endogenous chemical (one produced inside our body), then it can stimulate the receiving cell into action - or, in some cases, "clog" a cell's receptors, thereby preventing it from acting appropriately when endogenous hormones are present in the blood.

The reason this matters (and the reason you should be concerned) is that endocrine disruptors are everywhere! In other words, they are ubiquitous, meaning they can be found throughout our environment. The chemicals get into the environment (including our food, textiles, homes, and recreation areas) via pollution, industrial processes, and the use of pesticides. Once there, they do not break down very quickly (or at all, in some cases), and they slowly poison us, our food resources, our water, and wildlife. The effects of this poisoning are most acute in developing organisms (e.g., children), reproductive individuals (such as expecting mothers), and fetuses. A list of endocrine disruptor chemicals is provided on the web site for Our Stolen Future, and you can read about the their effects, the hormone that they mimic, and find links to the peer-reviewed literature.

Just gettin' started, folks.

2010-07-11T13:05:00.001-07:00

Hang in there; I'll have some content posted soon.