Chile’s Calbuco had a very busy day after its unexpected eruption on April 22. The initial eruption produced a ~15 kilometers plume that towered over the region and dumped upwards of 40 centimeters of ash and larger volcanic debris on some areas. The first explosion ended with lava flows that made it down from the summit crater but it is likely that any dome that formed in the crater was destroyed by a second explosive eruption that may have reached over 15 kilometers in the early morning hours of April 23. Around 4,000 people have been evacuated from town near Calbuco.
Be sure to watch this exceptional video (UPDATE: here is a non-Facebook link to the video) that shows, in realtime, the start of the eruption at Calbuco. At 18:05:54 PM local time (1:37 into the video), a small plume starts to grow from the summit crater. By about one minute into the eruption, the plume has consumed much of the summit, with what look like small pyroclastic flows around the crater. Pay attention at ~3:04 into the video to see an excellent view of the vertical thrust portion of the column lofting the initial cloud of ash skyward. By the end of the video, the plume is pulsing with each explosion, with some of the material being thrust upward and some billowing sideways and flowing down the slopes of the volcano.
Considering the size and surprise of the first explosion, it is remarkable that no one is thought to have been killed or hurt by the eruption (although a hiker is still missing). The biggest issue facing the area around the volcano will be ash removal and potential remobilization of the volcanic debris by winds, in lahars (mudflows) or floods. Ash fall has been reported as far north as Pucón to the north and well into Argentina to the east. Remember, ash might look light but its really much denser than snow, averaging ~1,600 kilograms per cubic meter of dry ash (much heavy when wet). This means that any flat roofs would have upwards of 600 kilograms of ash per square meter if they are being buried by 40 centimeters of ash — a recipe for collapse. On top of that, many surface water sources might be contaminated by heavy ash fall.
The plume was well documented by satellites as well. NASA’s Terra satellite captured a gorgeous image of the tan ash plume spreading across southern South America. In that same image (above), you can see some of the ash fall on the area around the volcano as well. The Suomi NPP infrared imager captured the plume (see below) and “gravity waves” in the atmosphere caused by the concussive blast of the eruption. You should definitely check out this great infrared loop from the GOES-13 satellite that captures both of the plumes from the explosions on the night of April 22. The GOME-2 satellite has also imaged the sulfur dioxide plume from the eruption spreading eastward from the volcano. Even the International Space Station got into the act, catching some of the ash plume.
It’s far too early to tell what, if any, climate impact the eruption might have, but if you’re curious, check out this post on the Carbon Brief. Right now, the SERNAGEOMIN webcam for Calbuco looks calm, but with an eruption like this, new explosion could occur without much notice as magma continues to move under the volcano.
IN AN INTERNATIONAL first, researchers in China have reported doing experiments that involve editing the genome of a human embryo. Ever since scientists developed the ability to cut and splice DNA, they have worried over the safety and ethical implications of applying those techniques to the human genome. Now, though the reported work was preliminary and not completely successful, researchers will have to contend with a challenging set of questions about this newly-opened genetic frontier.
In the research, published a week ago in the journal Protein and Cell, the scientists used a powerful new DNA-editing method called CRISPR/Cas9 to replace the genes that cause a potentially deadly blood disorder. If the edit had been successful, the new genes would have manifested in every new cell as the embryo developed. (The embryos used in the study would never have reached term, because they had been fertilized with two sperm each.) Because only a small number of the 86 cells in the trial survived and carried on the material, the experiment was abandoned. The study’s lead author, Junjiu Huang of Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, told Nature News, “If you want to do it in normal embryos, you need to be close to 100%. That’s why we stopped, we still think it’s too immature.”
The technique Huang and his co-investigators used, CRISPR/Cas9, allows researchers to snip out and insert specific segments of genetic code. Discovered in 2012, the technique is the subject of a lot of excitement and trepidation in the cell sciences (and its inventors are already being suggested as candidates for a Nobel Prize). Relative to other gene editing techniques, CRISPR/Cas9 is easy to use, and it seems to work in just about every living organism. That means it could, among other possibilities, hold the key to personalized medical therapies, new drugs, and (as the Chinese scientists attempted) human genetic modification.
But—and this is a big but—using the technique without proper guidance could result in unforeseen consequences. The Chinese researchers, for example, found mutations in many of the embryos in genes other than the ones they’d targeted with CRISPR/Cas9. They assumed this was due to errors in the method, but also mentioned that the mutations could have been because the eggs were double-fertilized.
Within the past few months, several groups of scientists around the world have called for a moratorium on just this type of research—calling for no more human embryo modification. They’re worried about all the science-fiction problems you’d imagine: The technology has the potential to erase genetic diseases, but it could also be used to make designer humans. And this kind of genome editing is on what’s called the “germ line,” which is to say, the edits get passed along to subsequent generations.
WIRED spoke to many of the people who called for moratoriums in two of world’s top scientific journals, to see what they thought about this Chinese research, and what it means for prioritizing the national discussion on the ethics of germline editing.
These quotes have been edited and condensed for clarity.
Edward Lanphier, co-author of Nature moratorium on embryonic DNA editing—Sangamo Biosciences; Alliance of Regenerative Medicine
This paper completely validates the technical and scientific concerns that we raised in the Nature article, especially in terms of the “off target” gene modifications, and the inefficiencies in modifying the target gene. I think this exacerbates or highlights the need for the kind of broad-based discussion that we called for, and for a renewed sense of urgency.
Also, there is an important distinction between modifications to the germ line—which is passing things on from generation to generation—and somatic cell modification, which is already being used to treat disease, and we’re having great successes there.
George Q. Daley, co-author of Science moratorium; stem cell biologist—Boston Children’s Hospital
We need to start having this conversation now, immediately if not sooner. Because I think this paper indicates that researchers are actively pursuing the area of embryonic DNA editing.
There are two issues: One is trying to understand at a deeper scientific level whether such an approach can be made safely. The second would be the broader and deeper ethical considerations of editing our heredity. I feel very significant concerns about using a new technology to do something as bold as changing someone’s germ line—not just for that individual, but all of the offspring.
This article really reported the remarkable inefficiency and highlighted a lot of challenges in getting this procedure to work in a human embryo. It’s a cautionary tale, and it should make any practitioner take pause before moving forward.
R. Alta Charo, co-author of Science moratorium; professor of medical history and bioethics—University of Wisconsin-Madison
The number of unintended effects is precisely why this technique is not appropriate for use in clinical applications. Regulatory agencies look for a reasonable balance between possible benefit and risks. I was among the authors on the paper in Science calling for a temporary moratorium on clinical efforts to use CRISPR for germ line gene editing of nuclear DNA. The call for a moratorium while public discussion and safety research proceeds is especially pertinent, therefore, in places where regulation is weak or absent.
G. Steven Martin, co-author of Science moratorium; cell and molecular biologist—University of California, Berkeley
It was precisely this sort of possibility that just reinforces our conclusion that there should be some temporary moratorium on this sort of research until we figure out what’s safe and what’s ethical. It’s clear from the results they describe that there are lots of problems with the application of the technology.
If we have an open and vigorous discussion in the US, then the Chinese authorities and Chinese Academy of Science will take notice and try to make sure that research is conducted more responsibly in China. That’s really all we can do. We hope to conduct those debates in a very public way, and the sooner we can conduct them the better.
Jennifer Doudna, co-author of Science moratorium; cell biologist; co-discoverer of CRISPR/Cas9—University of California, Berkeley
Although it has attracted a lot of attention, the study simply underscores the point that the technology is not ready for clinical application in the human germline. And that application of the technology needs to be on hold pending a broader societal discussion of the scientific and ethical issues surrounding such use.
Hank Greely, co-author of Science moratorium—Stanford Law School
I don’t think there’s anything wrong with their research. The fact that they used triponuclear zygotes, and their work could not in any respect ever become a baby, is an important ethical safeguard. As far as we can tell, they met legal requirements in China. What they did would be illegal in some US states, and they certainly couldn’t apply for federal funding. But I don’t think they have anything to be ashamed of.
I thought it was useful research, but if anything this makes it more real, and makes it look like it may happen more. And even just beyond the fact of how poorly it worked, it did work in a human embryo. This makes it even more urgent to have a societal conversation about how far to go. My own view of the Science paper is that it didn’t call for a moratorium on all research, it called for a moratorium on making babies this way.
Mike Botchan, co-author of Science moratorium; cell biologist—University of California, Berkeley
I think this is an important point: This is not something that scientists can have an opinion on that’s any better than yours. These are ethical, political, economic issues. It behooves scientists to be transparent about what’s possible and what isn’t, and get ahead of any potential hysteria that might come from misinformation of what we can and can’t with genome editing do on a technical level. We can have opinions, but our opinions are part of the process.
ACCORDING TO A New York judge, two chimpanzees now have a right that until Monday was reserved for humans. The chimps, used in research at Stony Brook University, may never actually be released, but the court’s move represents a historic change in thinking about animal rights.
Here’s what happened: In December 2013, the Nonhuman Rights Project filed lawsuits in the New York Supreme Court on behalf of four privately owned chimpanzees, considered property in the eyes of the law. The lawsuits sought to have the chimps moved to Save the Chimps, a Florida sanctuary and, more importantly, asked that they be declared legal persons, not with full human rights but with a basic one: not to be owned and caged.
Since then, courts have heard the cases several times. Preliminary arguments have focused on whether a court could issue writs of habeas corpus calling upon the chimpanzees’ owners to justify their captivity. If they can’t justify it, the prisoners have to be released—a process set in motion Monday by Justice Barbara Jaffe. She issued the writs on behalf of Hercules and Leo, the Stony Brook chimps. It’s the first time habeas corpus, historically used to free slaves and people wrongly imprisoned, has ever been extended to a species other than Homo sapiens.
“It’s a breakthrough. The judge is implicitly saying that chimps are—or at least could be—persons,” says Steven Wise, an attorney and founder of the Nonhuman Rights Project.
Things haven’t gone as well for the chimps in the two other cases. In the case of Kiko, a chimp owned by a couple in Niagara Falls, appeals court judges in January told the Nonhuman Rights Project that habeas corpus didn’t apply because the Save the Chimps sanctuary is merely another kind of captivity. In the case of Tommy, a 26-year-old chimp kept in a warehouse in Gloversville, the appeals court concluded in December that rights are given only to individuals capable of fulfilling social obligations and responsibilities.
The decisions hint at the deep unease with which many people—not least judges reluctant to rock the legal boat—view the idea of legal rights for a nonhuman. Legal scholar Richard Cupp has argued that expanding personhood to include chimpanzees would cheapen human personhood. Others have worried that, if given to a chimpanzee, rights might be inconveniently extended to other animals, such as chickens or lab mice.
Chimps, though, may deserve a special status. In affidavits in the Nonhuman Rights Project lawsuits, nine primatologists argued that chimpanzees are thoughtful, independent beings to whom freedom is likely as meaningful as it is to us. “Wow. Wow. Wow. This is incredible,” said Mary Lee Jensvold, a primatologist and former director of the Chimpanzee and Human Communication Institute, upon learning of Hercules and Leo’s habeas corpus. Jensvold filed one of the affidavits. “I didn’t think this would happen so soon. It takes so long for attitudes to change. It’s a great piece of news, just to know that a judge wants to hear the case.”
Hercules and Leo’s case was originally dismissed on a technicality, but the Nonhuman Rights Project refiled it last month. Now that the writ of habeas corpus has been issued, Stony Brook University—represented by the attorney general of New York—must appear in court May 6 and justify Hercules and Leo’s captivity. If the Nonhuman Rights Project wins, Hercules and Leo will go to Save the Chimps, and the door will open to further legal challenges to the captivity of chimpanzees—and perhaps other animals—in New York and other states with similar laws.
“It’s a big step forward,” said Jonathan Lovvorn, senior litigator at the Humane Society of the United States. “Getting your day in court is always a victory.” Lovvorn cautioned that the habeas corpus may simply have been a procedural formality: perhaps Justice Jaffe granted them without truly believing that chimps can have rights. Yet it could also be argued, said Lovvorn, that simply issuing the writs—regardless of whatever decision ultimately is made—implicitly recognizes chimp personhood, since under New York law habeas corpus can only be given to a person. Even if the judge decides against Hercules and Leo, the precedent is set that a chimp is person enough to deserve a hearing.
At Stony Brook University, Hercules and Leo are used in studies of chimpanzee movement designed to investigate the evolution of human bipedalism. Little else is publicly known about their lives. Though presently kept at the university, they are reportedly owned by the New Iberia Research Center, a primate facility that has faced allegations of mistreating chimpanzees and illegally breeding them. While strict welfare guidelines regulate the treatment of federally-owned chimps, privately-owned chimps—such as those represented by the Nonhuman Rights Project—are governed by the whims of their owners. Chimp advocates say this patchwork of regulations underscores the need for legal rights.
While a victory would not give Hercules and Leo total freedom, life at Save the Chimps would be an improvement, says Jensvold. Chimps at the sanctuary live outdoors, in family groups—in keeping with chimpanzees’ social nature, say supporters of their transfer. But the people at the Nonhuman Rights Project see this victory in more philosophical terms. “They would no longer be confined against their will,” says Wise. “We’d be respecting their autonomy, their freedom, and allowing them to live their lives as chimpanzees who are as free as they can possibly be in North America.”
THE SECOND TRAILER for Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens looks exciting. In case you haven’t seen it, you can watch it here. So, how about an analysis? Can I estimate the speed of the Rey’s speeder as it moves across the desert? Let’s try.
The first thing I need is a scale. This is pretty tough. Really, the only thing I can use to set the size of the motion in each frame is the size of the speeder itself. In my previous analysis of the speeder (from the first trailer), I estimated the size of the large part of the speeder to be about 2.8 meters long. From this, I will use a rough value of 4.0 meters for the entire length of the speeder.
After that, it’s just a simple process of shifting the coordinate axis origin to accommodate the panning camera (I used calibration point pairs in Tracker Video Analysis).
Here is a plot of the position of the speeder as a function of time.
You can see some problems with this data. The apparent speed at the beginning and end of the motion look to be different than in the middle. This could be explained by a couple of reasons. First, I think there might be a problem with Tracker’s axis over large changes in frame. It seems like the axis deviates from the horizon towards the end of the video. I’m not sure if this is a problem with my adjustment for the panning of the video or with the software. Second, the changes in motion could be due to changes in scale. Here, let me draw a sketch showing both the motion of the speeder and the camera.
In the middle of the speeder’s motion, the speeder would be slightly closer to the camera giving it a larger apparent size and a larger apparent speed. Ok, so that could be the problem.
As an estimate, let me just determine a value for the speed based on my initial estimate of the scale and the slope of the position graph near the middle (where it looks more constant). This gives a speeder speed of 74.7 m/s (167 mph). Of course, this is just an estimate. If I approximate the speeder size as 4.0 +/- 1.0 meter, this would give a speed of 74.7 +/- 18.7 m/s (167 +/- 41.8 mph) – which is still pretty fast. Here is a quick review of uncertainty calculations if you are interested.
Based on the scale of 4.0 meters, I can also get an estimate of how far the speeder moved during this time. It’s about 858 meters. That’s pretty far. So, how close would the camera have to be to the speeder in order to get a slight distortion in apparent speed as shown? I’ll leave that up to you to estimate as a homework question. Here is the data from the video in a Google spreadsheet (you might need that to complete the homework).
Looking at Camera Shake
Just for fun, let’s look at one more thing. While correcting for the panning motion of the camera, I also noticed that the camera appears to jump up and down a little bit as though it were manually being moved. I suspect that this whole scene was done with CGI and not a real camera, but I could be wrong.
How do you measure the camera motion? This is pretty easy to do using Tracker Video Analysis. Without setting the scale or the axis, I can just track the motion of some background object (in this case I picked part of the crashed x-wing fighter). It really helps to use Tracker’s autotracker feature.
Here is the horizontal motion of the camera (the distance units are just “pixels”).
There’s not too much to see here. The camera just pans and any “shaking” in the horizontal direction is difficult to see within the panning motion. However, you might be able to get a better look at the motion. First, here is the data from the video. What if you get a baseline motion using the average panning speed. Then you could plot the horizontal deviations from this average. Honestly, I’m not sure what you will find. It’s possible that there is no horizontal shake. Ok, now for the vertical motion. Normally, I would plot the trajectory of background (x vs. y) but in this case I am going to plot vertical position versus time.
But what does this tell us? I’m not sure – but it’s homework for you.
Create a plot of the vertical jump as a function of time. Does this show anything cool?
Are the jump sizes random or do they create some pattern?
Create a Fourier Transform of the data to get an estimate of the frequency of camera shakes. How does this compare to a hand held camera? Just for comparison, here is a video that uses “fake camera shake”.
If you found any horizontal deviations, how does the horizontal shake compare to the vertical shake?
In the end, you want to answer the question: Is this a CGI (Computer Generated Imagery) or a partially real video? If there is evidence of fake shake, that would point toward CGI.
WHO CAN HATE a Roomba? Astronomers, that’s who.
The robotic vacuums we all know and love ensure we don’t have to clean our own homes ourselves to get them spotless. (God forbid.) Now, the Roomba’s maker, iRobot, wants to do for lawn care what it did for vacuuming. According to filings with the FCC spotted by IEEE Spectrum, iRobot is designing a robotic mower—news that should elate lazy people the world over.
But one group is really, really unhappy about this boon to the slothful: Astronomers. Some of them are so upset, in fact, that their objections might put the kibosh on the whole thing. How could this be? In a scenario that sounds straight out of the Golden Age of sci-fi, it all comes down to robots versus telescopes, and how they all communicate.
The saga started in February, when iRobot filed a waiver request with the FCC seeking approval to use a portion of the radio spectrum to help guide its robomower. The problem with grass-cutting bots, according to iRobot’s filing, is the only way to get them to work is to dig a trench along the perimeter of a lawn and install a wire that creates the electronic fence needed to ensure the automatons don’t wander beyond the property line.
As a less arduous solution, iRobot proposes using stakes, driven into the ground, to act as beacons. The beacons will talk to the lawnbot, helping it map the area and stay within the designated boundaries. A typical user with a typical lawn (a quarter to a third of an acre) might need between four and nine beacons.
But the system requires special permission from the FCC due to its restrictions on fixed outdoor infrastructure. In a nutshell, the FCC doesn’t want people creating ad hoc networks of transmitters, which could interfere with existing authorized services like cellular and GPS systems. In its filings, iRobot says it should be exempt because it doesn’t set out to establish a broad communications network—its lawnbot networks would be tightly contained.
Astronomers say that’s not good enough. The frequency band proposed for the lawnbot (6240-6740 MHz) is the very same one several enormous radio telescopes operate on. Astronomers want the FCC to protect their share of the radio spectrum so their telescopes continue observing methanol, which abounds in regions where celestial bodies are forming.
“The Observatory’s telescopes … do a kind of celestial cartography that measures distances to star-forming regions with high precision, charting the course of galactic evolution,” representatives of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory wrote in public comments to the FCC objecting to iRobot’s application to the agency.
Stay Off Our Lawn
The solution iRobot proposes is to add a note in its user manual: “Consumer use only; use must be limited to residential areas.” This, the company argues, should ensure the lawnbots won’t be doing their thing near observatories. But Harvey Liszt, spectrum manager with the NRAO, says a written warning likely won’t work. “What’s to stop the guy who spends thousands of dollars on this product from using it in residential areas near our telescopes?” he asks.
Liszt says lawyers representing iRobot got in touch with the NRAO in January to explain the tech specs before requesting the FCC waiver. Liszt responded to the message saying that the distances within which the ‘bots would operate would be quite large, and he was not confident that iRobot could police each of its users. “We didn’t talk anymore, then I saw the filing,” Liszt says. “I replied, and I was fairly surprised by how hard they pushed back.”
The communication breaks down between the NRAO and iRobot when the two entities do their calculations for the range the lawnbot beacons affect. Liszt and the NRAO claim a 55-mile exclusion zone is necessary to protect radio telescopes from harmful interference, while iRobot says 12 miles is sufficient. In a later response, iRobot added that NRAO observatories usually are surrounded by desert or forests, not environments where residential lawn equipment is used—a claim the NRAO called “silly.” In its latest filing with the FCC, Liszt included pictures of some sites with telescopes he believes could be exposed to lawnbot beacon interference.
“NRAO is not trying to stop this, NRAO just wants people to respect where its telescopes are,” says Liszt.
The folks at iRobot declined to be interviewed for this story, saying the company’s policy is not to discuss specifics around unannounced products or technologies.
“It’s a very strange process,” says Liszt of the back-and-forth playing out via the FCC’s public comments. “But the topic really grabs the public’s interest—it’s telescopes against robots. I think there may well be larger issues here that the FCC will base their decision on.”
WHEN CIVIL WAR erupted in Syria, Ahmed Amri immediately thought about seeds.
Specifically, 141,000 packets of them sitting in cold storage 19 miles south of Aleppo. They included ancient varieties of wheat and durum dating back nearly to the dawn of agriculture in the Fertile Crescent, and one of the world’s largest collections of lentil, barley, and faba bean varieties—crops that feed millions of people worldwide every day. If these seeds were decimated, humanity could lose precious genetic resources developed over hundreds, or in some cases thousands, of years. And suddenly, with the outbreak of violence, their destruction seemed imminent.
Amri is the director of genetic resources at the International Center for Agricultural Research in Dry Areas (ICARDA), one of 11 international genebanks charged with conserving the world’s most vital crops and their wild relatives. Each center has a speciality—you’ll find the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines, for example, while the International Potato Center is based in Peru—and this one focuses on preserving and protecting crops from arid regions, mostly in developing countries. The Center’s crown jewel is its genebank, where its samples are identified and stored for future use, either by the center’s scientific staff or plant breeders around the world.
Despite the high-tech sheen of the word genebank, the concept draws on basic agricultural principles people have used to improve their crops since the beginning of farming. Let’s say you’ve got two plants, one that grows well without much water, and another that produces a particularly large amount of the stuff you want to eat. Breed the two together and you’ve got a high yield, drought-tolerant version of your crop.
That’s the idea, anyway. In the long run, this conventional breeding process is wildly effective. It’s not only created every variety of the crops we grow and eat, but in many cases it’s created the crops themselves. Maize, for example, was created by ancient Mesoamericans by painstakingly breeding more and more appetizing teosinte, a stubby grass with tiny, tough kernels that has so little in common with modern maize that archaeologists dismissed it as a possible wild ancestor until genetic tests revealed the surprising truth. The problem in the short run is that conventional breeding can be s…l…o…w. Teosinte was domesticated in central Mexico between 6,000 and 10,000 years ago, but farmers only managed to create a variety that tasted good a mere millennium ago.
Genebanks aim to preserve crop varieties that already have been created, as well as speed up the process of making new ones. Between the 11 international crop genebanks, more than 700,000 varieties of the world’s 17 most important crops are preserved. Why so many? You never know when an old crop—or more likely, the genes it contains—might come in handy. A type of maize that no one plants anymore could be the one that contains exactly the genes the crop needs to become, say, more drought tolerant. Preserving those seeds preserves those genes.
The banks routinely make their collections available to farmers and breeders the world over so those genes can be bred into modern varieties as needed. And they also have their own scientific teams working to identify the primary traits of the seeds they’ve collected and create new varieties of crops that may come in handy. For example, genes from fast-growing varieties of maize are helping breeders create corn crops that can cope with a shorter rainy season in Mexico, an effect of climate change.
Destroy a seedbank, though, and those helpful genes can be wiped out before anyone can discover them, much less put them to use. That’s why Amri was so worried about the fate of the seeds at his agricultural research center. Although crop varieties and their wild relatives are at risk of disappearing every day as farmers switch to monocultures or abandon fields all together, no international genebank had ever faced so immediate a risk from war.
At the beginning of Syria’s civil war, the fighting was concentrated in the south, far from the Center’s headquarters in the north. But Amri knew it wouldn’t take guns or bombs to destroy the genebank. All it would take was a power outrage that knocked out the facility’s air conditioning. The seeds, preserved in cold rooms for decades, would warm quickly and become unusable. The bank had backup generators, but how long would they last? What if it became impossible to buy fuel? What if the generators were stolen, or commandeered by soldiers?
Luckily, the Center had been preparing for its own destruction since day one. It already had sent emergency backups of about 87 percent of its collection to genebanks in other countries. Even under the best political conditions, “you worry about fire, you worry about earthquakes,” the Center’s director general Mahmoud Solh says in this video interview. Creating emergency backups is standard practice for international genebanks, from Mexico to Nigeria.
But that left 13 percent of the Syrian collection—more than 20,000 samples—that hadn’t been backed up. As soon as the fighting started in the spring of 2011, the genebank’s staff switched gears from collecting and distributing seed samples to devising a rescue plan. People there became very familiar with northern Syria’s back roads as they drove the seeds out of the country.
Importing seeds and other agricultural materials can be difficult—just think of that half-eaten apple you had to throw away during your last trip through customs. The Center’s employees milked every connection they had to get the job done. When they evacuated half of the vulnerable samples to Turkey, the Turkish agricultural minister drove to the border to escort the seeds into his country, Solh remembers. (The other half went to Lebanon, with much less fuss.) Today, “99.9 percent of the holdings are all outside Syria,” Amri says.
A year and half after the war began, the fighting drew close enough to Aleppo that the Center’s international staff was advised to leave Syria. That left about 50 Syrian staff members responsible for completing the second round of the evacuation: shipping as many samples as possible to the Svalbard Seed Vault in Norway. That’s the “backup to the backup,” the genebank designed to outlast all other genebanks from its location in the Arctic Circle and come to the rescue in case of worldwide, catastrophic crop destruction, explains Salazar, whose organization oversees the Svalbard collection.
Even as the area around the genebank fell under the control of two competing armed groups and the remaining staff reckoned with several kidnappings, they managed to backup 80 percent of the center’s collection in Svalbard. The last shipment farrived at Svalbard in March 2014—nearly two years after Amri and much of the rest of the international staff had relocated to Rabat, Morocco. Last month, the Center won the Gregor Mendel Innovation Prize—coveted among plant breeders—for its rescue and preservation of the genebank. And amazingly, the Aleppo site continues to be operational. The Syrian staff has managed to keep the electricity on and the genebank intact through four years of war.
Now comes the hard part: planting the seeds the team sent away and regenerating those crops far from home. Usually, genebanks store about a pound of each kind of seed they collect, but the “safety duplicated” samples stored at other genebanks are only about half an ounce, says Thomas Payne, the head of the genebank at the International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center outside of Mexico City, which stores many of ICARDA’s emergency backups.
Half an ounce isn’t enough to share with farmers, one of a genebank’s central missions. “What is the value of having all that material secured but not accessible?” Payne says. The Center has granted Payne and his team permission to open their duplicated wheat samples and start planting them at the Mexican center, both to help bulk up the collection and make sure the samples are still viable. After all, “just because something’s in the refrigerator, it doesn’t mean it’s alive,” Salazar points out.
“What happened in Syria was a good eye-opener” for international genebanks, Solh says. Despite the emergency backups, the Center was too centralized in Syria. Now, it’s running major initiatives in Morocco, India, and Ethiopia. Those centers will continue to operate as part of the new, decentralized center, even if international staff can eventually return to Aleppo, Solh says. Genebanks are not isolated treasure troves and shouldn’t be treated as such. Their power comes from the connections between them, and the worldwide network of genetic resources those connections create.
APPLE’S NEWEST MACBOOK is a beautiful, polarizing machine. As soon as it was revealed last month, you immediately knew whether you’d buy one. You were either totally enamored with its sleek design and tiny case, or you LOLed at its mid-level specs, weird one-port connectivity solution, and $1,300 price tag.
If you’re looking elsewhere for a slim, fancy wedge of a laptop, you’ll find many choices. Ever since the arrival in 2008 of so-called Ultrabooks, exemplified by the first MacBook Air, we’ve been living in a golden age of laptops. These uber-portable PCs offer solid performance in impossibly slender frames weighing less than 3 pounds. Depending on the machine, prices are low, too—a consumer-friendly side effect of the struggling PC business.
Of course, there are plenty of reasons you may want a new MacBook beyond its fetching design: You want OS X, it has a tack-sharp screen, and its keyboard and trackpad are unique. But there are more capable and affordable ultraportables out there.
Here’s the bird’s eye view. We’ve compared the core components, weight, price, and connectivity options of the best choices within the lean-and-light crowd. And for the hell of it, we added the heavy but high octane 14-inch Razer Blade, as well as the base versions of the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro With Retina Display.
We’ve also rounded up all the specs into this chart. We used the base configurations for each laptop in the list. For things like touchscreen options and different screen resolution, we made a note when those options were available in a higher-priced configuration.
Apple MacBook ($1,300)
You’re paying for the design, the screen resolution, the effortless portability, and the ability to use Mac OS X. Compared to the rest of the pack, it also has above-average battery life and double the base-configuration storage. The 1.1 GHz Core M processor is decent, but you can get much more for the price (or less). And of course, the single USB-C port is a major consideration.
Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon ($1,088)
This ThinkPad is a bit thicker and 0.84 pounds heavier than the MacBook, but it’s a nicely priced competitor that brings more horsepower, screen real estate, and a great keyboard. Also, Lenovo still believes in multiple ports! The base configuration has a 2.7GHz Intel Core i5 CPU and 4GB RAM, and there’s a pair of USB 3.0 ports, HDMI-out, and a Mini DisplayPort. All this for 200 bucks less than the MacBook. The 1080p screen is lower-res (157ppi vs. 226ppi), but you can move up to higher-resolution and touchscreen configurations.
ASUS Zenbook UX305 ($700)
Your tradeoffs here include a lower-end Core M processor (0.8GHz vs. 1.1GHz), a lower-resolution 1080p display, and a heavier load by just 0.62 lbs. Otherwise, this 13.3-inch Zenbook is a solid competitive bargain. It matches the MacBook’s 8GB RAM and 256GB storage in its $700 version, and it comes equipped with three USB 3.0 ports, MicroHDMI out, and an SD card reader. Touchscreen and higher-resolution configurations are also available.
Dell XPS 13 ($800)
Here’s another bargain if you’re looking for power. If you can deal with lower resolution (165ppi vs 226ppi), storage (128GB), and RAM (4GB), the XPS 13 has a 2.1GHz Core i3 CPU and a nice array of ports: Two USB 3.0 plugs, a Mini DisplayPort, and an SD card reader. It’s only 2.6 pounds. If you need a touchscreen or a higher-resolution panel, the price climbs.
Microsoft Surface Pro 3 ($800 + $130 for TypeCover)
Finally, something lighter and thinner than the MacBook, and with similar screen resolution. At 1.76 lbs. and 0.36 inches thick, the Surface Pro 3 is feathery, and it has a touchscreen, a USB 3.0 port, MicroSD, Mini DisplayPort, and a 1.5GHz Intel Core i3 processor. But the base configuration comes with just 64GB storage, and don’t forget the TypeCover keyboard. As polarizing as the MacBook’s keyboard is, it beats typing on a $130 accessory.
Samsung Ativ Book 9 ($1,200)
If you think a 1.1GHz Core M processor is underpowered, you’ll want to steer away from the 0.8GHz Core M-based Ativ Book 9. Samsung’s base slim-and-light laptop also comes with less storage (128GB) and RAM (4GB), too. Otherwise, they’re practically twins: 12-inch screens with similar resolutions (247ppi vs. 226 ppi) and weights within 0.07 pounds of one another. Samsung wins in terms of ports, with a pair of USB 3.0s, MicroSD, and MicroHDMI.
Google Chromebook Pixel ($1,000)
The major caveat with the Pixel is that it’s a Chromebook—it only runs web apps. If you use your browser for everything, it may be worth a look. It certainly has muscle, with a 2.2GHz Core i5 CPU, 8GB RAM, a gorgeous 239ppi touchscreen display that’s just under 13 inches. It not only rocks a pair of USB-C ports, but also a pair of USB 3.0 ports and an SD card reader. Battery life is great. But at 3.3 pounds it’s more than a pound heavier than the MacBook, and you only get 32GB storage for the hefty price. Picture Unavailable on this blog
Lenovo LaVie Z ($1,300 in May)
The hottest MacBook competitor isn’t even out yet. Somehow, the 13.3-inch Lenovo LaVie Z weighs a scant 1.72 pounds, and it’ll have an Intel Core i5 processor under the hood. It’ll also have two USB 3.0 ports, an HDMI port, and an SD card reader built into it. The base price matches that of the MacBook, as does the screen resolution (221 ppi versus 226 ppi). Tradeoffs include less RAM (4GB) and storage (128GB), and battery life is still a mystery.
Razer Blade ($2,000)
This isn’t really a MacBook competitor; it’s more of a control subject. This is what a powerhouse 14-inch portable costs—for its lower-end configuration, at least. Two grand gets you a 2.6GHz Core i7, 8GB RAM, 256GB storage, three USB 3.0 ports, and HDMI-out. Still, caveats exist! Battery life isn’t great—expect half as much as a MacBook—and it weighs in at 4.1 pounds. A higher-resolution, touchscreen equipped version is available for $2,200.
MacBook Air 11-Inch ($900)
If you’re looking for an ultraportable Mac, the 11-inch Air still deserves your attention. It may not be available in gold or space gray, and you’re giving up quite a bit in screen resolution—142 ppi for the Air, 226 ppi for the MacBook. But there’s plenty to like. Its 1.6GHz Core i5 CPU is better equipped for Photoshop, and it has a pair of USB 3.0 ports in addition to a Thunderbolt 2 jack. You can step up to the $1,000 13-incher for better battery life (12 hours verus 9 hours) with a bit more weight (2.96 pounds versus 2.28 pounds).
MacBook Pro With Retina Display ($1,300)
Here it is, the ultimate Apple-to-Apple comparison. For the same price as the new MacBook, the base-config Pro has roughly the same resolution, a bigger screen, a 2.7GHz Intel Core i5 processor, 8GB RAM, and all the ports you need: Two USB 3.0, HDMI, a pair of Thunderbolt 2s, and an SD card slot. But bro, do you even lift? At 3.48 pounds, it’s almost twice as heavy as the MacBook—and with half as much storage (128GB).
