Science and Technology Update
August 2009

Endeavour lands safely
Canadian astronaut Julie Payette and the other six crew members of the space shuttle Endeavour have returned safely to Earth, the end of a successful construction mission at the International Space Station. On a clear Florida morning, Endeavour touched down on the runway at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., at 10:48 a.m. ET, concluding the 16-day mission. [CBC]

Canadians make stem-cell breakthrough
In a 'great advance' to research, scientists at Toronto's Mount Sinai Hospital have discovered a new technique that safely turns skin cells into stem cells, removing risks and complications involved in using the technology. [G&M]

University of Toronto team finds 1st tree-climbing animal
He was a pretty puny thing, this Suminia getmanovi. But today's monkeys would probably worship the branches he walked on. Some 51 centimetres from the end of his nose to the tip of his tail, he was a timid and furtive creature. But the early mammal precursor was groundbreaking in the most literal way some 260 million years ago, when he looked up from the late Paleozoic earth and ... climbed a tree. [The Star]

Tech giants to be rated on human rights
A group of prominent Canadian researchers has launched an initiative to examine how closely companies like Google, Microsoft and Yahoo follow their own principles regarding freedom of expression and privacy. Citizen Lab, which runs out of the University of Toronto's Munk Centre for International Studies, has gained prominence this year after it uncovered an alleged internet spy network based mostly in China in March and last month aided Iranians in accessing blocked content on the web. Now the group will turn its attention to the private sector, examining how closely technology companies follow their own agreed-upon principles for conduct. [CBC]

When viruses book a flight
If a deadly infectious disease - the Ebola virus, or maybe something new and more sinister - were to break out in a remote region of the world, a team of Toronto doctors could predict how and where it would spread around the globe. The first-of-its-kind system quickly analyzes commercial air traffic patterns to determine where emerging infectious diseases might travel and to pinpoint potential hotbeds of infection. [The Star]

World's most precise microscope headed for the University of Victoria
Exclusively for the University of Victoria, Hitachi High-Technologies is building a $20-million scanning transmission electron holography microscope, a one-of-a-kind instrument that will be the most precise microscope in the world. Capable of viewing the subatomic universe, the instrument will allow scientists to see quasiparticles and materials well beyond the ability of the human eye. The microscope, to be built in Japan, will be installed at the University of Victoria in late 2010, and is expected to be operational by early 2011. [uVic]

The future of stem cell research - A Canadian perspective
The recent announcement by American President Barack Obama to lift the ban on federal funding of stem-cell research and pump an additional $15 billion into genetic research has generated many headlines. InnovationCanada.ca sat down with Bartha Maria Knoppers, the new director of the Centre of Genomics and Policy at McGill University and Génome Québec Innovation Centre to discuss what this could mean for stem-cell and genetics research in Canada. [Innovation Canada] Français

Ottawa takes on social media giant for violating Canada's law
Canada is striking at the heart of social media's revenue model, ordering global giant Facebook to limit the personal information it gives to companies that make add-on programs for the site or face potential court action. Privacy Commissioner Jennifer Stoddart ruled that Facebook had failed to adequately respond to four "well-founded" allegations about its practices that contravene federal privacy law. [G&M]

DNA 'barcodes' identify plants
Plant species could soon be identified from tiny crumbs of leaves or seeds using databases of standard DNA "barcodes" - a tool that until now was only available for animals. If the DNA segments endorsed by an international group of 52 scientists do become standard, they could lead to handy tools for non-scientists such as border agents and people who sell traditional medicines. Researchers from the University of Toronto, the University of British Columbia and the University of Guelph are involved in this project. [CBC]

Research team trumpets sustainable backyard fishery
First came the home-based vegetable gardens. Next, a few agrarian-minded people began toying with backyard chicken coops. And now, if an innovative project at Vancouver Island University in Nanaimo, B.C., gains enough steam, the next frontier in backyard farming might actually be fish. A research team led by technician Anne McCarthy has become a pioneer in the field of aquaponics - the combination of aquaculture and hydroponics - to create self-contained sustainable ecosystems capable of food production. [CBC]

Should humans dictate nature in the name of conservation?
On naked patches of land in Western Canada and the United States, scientists are planting trees that don't belong there. It's a bold government-funded experiment to move trees threatened by global warming into places where they may thrive amid a changing climate. The bold experiment has scientists planting trees in areas they don't belong in a pre-emptive strike on climate change. [G&M]

Canada and the U.S. join forces to provide access to health research
The National Research Council's Canada Institute for Scientific and Technical Information, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), and the US National Library of Medicine have announced a three-way partnership to establish PubMed Central Canada (PMC Canada). PMC Canada will be a national digital repository of peer-reviewed health and life sciences literature, including research resulting from CIHR funding. This searchable Web-based repository will be permanent, stable and freely accessible. This initiative will provide researchers free access to a vast digital archive of published health research at their desktop and connect them to an emerging international network of digital archives anchored in the United States. [NRC] Français