Dromaeosaurus

The Dromaeosaurus name actually means "Running Lizard". Many Fossil remains have been found in Alberta, Canada, and Montana, USA but there has never been a full body and head found together. There have been remains such as a head, limb, teeth, ribs, and other various body parts scattered along the dinosaur fossil hotspots of the two regions.

It was first discovered by a man named Barnum Brown in 1914 along the Red Deer River. Later on many fossil teeth have been found of the Dromaeosaurus. Scientists could only guess that this dinosaur may have had an attitude to attack other dinosaurs that were much bigger. The Dromaeosaurus was actually the size of a dog from the main finding by Mr. Barnum.

The Dromaeosaurus was from the Theropoda group. It was thought to be a heavily feathered dinosaur. Dromaeosaurus actually had a lot in common was the Tyrannosaurus, though. It had a very strong build with powerful legs. Not only that but it also had a very thick skull and powerful jaws. Even with the fact that there have not been many fossil findings of this dinosaur it actually is named after its own group "Dromaeosauridae". Those in the same group had much in common and where considered very bird like.

Fruit fly biorhythms differ indoors and out

The first big study of daily rhythms in fruit flies outdoors doesn’t match some of the basic results from decades of lab tests.

Fruit flies flittering in lab containers have revealed much about how light can set the master molecular clock that ticks out a daily beat in living organisms. Yet watching daily rhythms in fruit flies caged outdoors reveals regular surges in activity not seen in the lab, says geneticist Rodolfo Costa of the University of Padova in Italy. And certain patterns of activity seen in the lab don’t show up in the real world, he and his colleagues report online April 4 in Nature.

A major difference, he says, is that the typical increase in fruit fly motion as day dawns doesn’t seem to need a built-in clock in the real world. Flies with genetic mutations that disable their biological clocks don’t join in the usual laboratory bustle of activity before lights-on. Yet outdoors they perk up and get moving just like clock-normal flies. “This was something really unexpected,” Costa says. 

“We are not saying that everything that has been done until now is useless,” he adds. But some of the assumptions based on laboratory experiments, he says, should be expanded to account for behavior in nature.

“The new study very nicely illustrates the risks of extrapolating from laboratory studies to natural conditions,” says neuroscientist and chronobiologist F. Rob Jackson of Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston.

Decades of laboratory work suggest that many organisms — molds, cyanobacteria, mice, plants, people and so on — share genetic mechanisms that create a master 24-hour rhythm influencing cell processes. 

Understanding what drives this rhythm and what derails it holds promise for treating sleep disorders, managing the stress of shift work and optimizing medical treatments — as well as understanding how the rhythms of life evolved on a periodic planet.

In indoor lab studies, when lights flip on in the morning and flip off at night, fruit flies are active around dawn and dusk. Genetically normal flies start fidgeting and moving about several hours before lights-on and then settle down during the day for a siesta. They get moving again as lights-off nears. Adding dim simulated moonlight shifts some of their activity to the night.

To translate laboratory work to outdoor experiments, Costa and his colleagues set both natural and mutant flies in clear containers in Padova, with automatic equipment to monitor their activity. For comparison, collaborator Charalambos Kyriacou of the University of Leicester in England set up a parallel fly outfit in his children’s old outdoor playhouse.

Outdoor environments expose flies to a much more complicated mix of cues. Light appears and dims gradually. Intensity and color change. Temperature rises and falls.

Unlike in the lab experiments, the scientists saw the outdoor flies go through an afternoon burst of activity. Instead of being a dawn/dusk animal, “fruit flies are diurnal,” Costa says. Also he saw no moonlight effect. And in some cases, temperature apparently trumped light as a cue.

A difference between indoor and outdoor flies is not that surprising, says geneticist Paul Hardin, who directs the Center for Biological Clocks Research at Texas A&M University in College Station. What those differences turned out to be though, did strike him as unexpected. “This will be a notable paper moving forward,” he says. .

f7bdc530e02545589d2e6361f9d88fdb

Chocolate may protect the brain and heart

Eating high levels of chocolate could reduce the risk of coronary heart disease and stroke, according to a review of previous research.

Data from 114,009 patients suggested risk was cut by about a third, according to a study published on the BMJ website.
But the researchers warned that excessive consumption would result in other illnesses.
The British Heart Foundation said there were better ways to protect the heart.
The analysis, conducted by scientists at the University of Cambridge, compared the risk to the brain and heart in groups of people who reported eating low levels of chocolate, fewer than two bars per week, with those eating high levels - more than two bars per week.
Chocolate shield
It showed that the "highest levels of chocolate consumption were associated with a 37% reduction in cardiovascular disease and a 29% reduction in stroke compared with the lowest levels".

One of the researchers, Dr Oscar Franco, said chocolate was known to decrease blood pressure.

He told the BBC the findings were "promising", but needed further research to confirm any protective effect.
The study also warns that chocolate can lead to weight gain and Type 2 diabetes. It suggested that chocolate could one day be used to protect from heart problems and stroke - if the sugar and fat content of chocolate bars was reduced.
Dr Franco added: "The advice if you don't eat chocolate is not to start eating chocolate."
For those who did eat chocolate, he recommended that they should "avoid binge-eating" and eat "small amounts [of chocolate] on a regular basis".
Victoria Taylor, senior heart health dietician at the British Heart Foundation, said: "Evidence does suggest chocolate might have some heart health benefits but we need to find out why that might be.
"We can't start advising people to eat lots of chocolate based on this research.
"It didn't explore what it is about chocolate that could help and if one particular type of chocolate is better than another.
"If you want to reduce your heart disease risk, there are much better places to start than at the bottom of a box of chocolates."