HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: jbh@anat.UMSMED.EDU (James B. Hutchins)
Subject: Re: Rats and Rabies
Summary: Apparently not, but why not? 
Organization: Dept. of Anatomy, Univ. Mississippi Medical Center
Date: Sun, 30 Aug 1992 00:59:33 GMT


In article <1992Aug28.203734.37137@watson.ibm.com> clarke@watson.ibm.com (Ed Clarke) writes:
>I'm kind of curious as to whether or not RATS can get rabies?  There have
>been two cases of rabid racoons attacking dogs in New York City within the
>past few days.  Since both racoons and rats enjoy eating garbage, I think
>that there is probably a lot of contact between the two species.
>
>What a thought!  Packs of wild rabid rats running through the streets of
>New York ... shades of "Ben".
>

According to my Merck Vet Manual, all warm-blooded animals are susceptible
to rabies, but it is only common in bats, dogs, foxes, skunks and raccoons.

It's not clear to me exactly why rats should not transmit rabies, except
that they may routinely be killed once bitten and do not live to develop
the disease and transmit the virus.  It is notable that all the animals on
the above list are carnivores, except bats, and we are apparently talking
vampire bats and not the frugivorous or insectivorous kind :-)

However, I'm not an expert (well, yes I am, but not on *this* subject ;-)
and welcome any comments/corrections from those who are.

Jim
-- 
Jim Hutchins                    []     E-Mail: jbh@anat.umsmed.edu
Dept of Anatomy                 []
Univ Mississippi Med Ctr        []
Xref: sparky sci.bio:3026 rec.pets:2899 rec.gardens:6251
From: dplatt@ntg.com (Dave Platt)
Newsgroups: sci.bio,rec.pets,rec.gardens
Subject: Re: bacteria as pets
Date: 26 Aug 92 18:29:35 GMT
Organization: New Technologies Group, Inc.  Palo Alto CA

>I remember walking along the beach in Cape Cod one year (about 6 years
>ago) and looking back to see my footsteps glowing green behind me.  I
>thought it was the coolest thing!  A friend of mine brought some of
>the sand back to school with her ( we got extra credit in geology for
>bringing back soil samples from vacations) but could never get it to
>glow again, I guess we killed it.  Now theres a pet I'd like to have!
>Glowing sand!  Anyone know what it was?

Probably Noctiluca (I almost certainly mis-spelled that!) or a similar
thingie.  They're small sea-living creatures which emit a flash of light
when disturbed.  When their populations in seawater are high (usually in
summer) they are abundant enough to leave glowing wakes behind boats,
whales, dolphins, and humans swimming at night.

It's an amazing sight to go down to the beach on a moonless night, and
see the waves glowing blue as they break upon the shore.



-- 
Dave Platt                                                VOICE: (415) 813-8917
              Domain: dplatt@ntg.com      UUCP: ...netcomsv!ntg!dplatt
 USNAIL: New Technologies Group Inc. 2468 Embarcardero Way, Palo Alto CA 94303
Newsgroups: sci.bio
From: gordo@uhunix.uhcc.Hawaii.Edu (Gordon C. Smith)
Subject: Re: Migratory habits of Mediterranean eels
Organization: University of Hawaii
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 01:09:58 GMT

In article <978@tdat.teradata.COM> swf@tdat.teradata.com (Stanley Friesen) writes:
>In article <1992Aug31.123639.12993@cco.caltech.edu> kate@cithe501.cithep.caltech.edu (Kate Scholberg) writes:
>|Recently an Italian collaborator of mine claimed that the eels caught 
>|in the Mediterranean near Italy have actually migrated from the
>|Gulf of Mexico.  Does anyone know if this is true?  Can anyone
>|provide me with, or direct me to, any further information on
>|eels, especially those of the Mediterranean?
>
>I am not sure about the Mediterranean eels, but I do know that eels are
>amoung the champion migrators in the sea, and that some do migrate from
>the U.S. coastal area to somewhere in Europe.
>

Anguillid eels from the northern hemisphere, both North America and 
Europe, live as adults in rivers and streams. They migrate great distances
to the Sargasso Sea region (off of Bermuda ) to spawn in deep water. The
larvae spend some time at sea drifting with the currents and then make the
return journey to metamorphose and move back into freshwater.

This is catadromy, when an aquatic organism makes a regular transition
from freshwater (adult) to the sea (spawn & larval stage). Anadromy is the 
converse, when it's the adult in the sea and they go to freshwater to spawn. 
Salmon and some trout are anadromous. Here in Hawaii much of our native 
freshwater macrofauna is _amphidromous_, the adults live and breed in the 
streams and it's just the larvae that enter the sea and spend some time 
drifting as plankton before metamorphosing and reentering freshwater. (There 
are a number of gobies, atyid shrimp and neritid snails that do this 
throughout the south Pacific.) Taken together all these life histories are
termed diadromous.

Try finding:
   Diadromy : (sorry I forget the subtitle)
   Robert McDowell
   Timber Press,
   Portland OR

There are a lot of articles on catadromous eels and their long migration
I can't think of the references right now. Oh yeah, to answer your original
question, I don't think that Mediterranean eels actually enter the Gulf
of Mexico.

Gordon Smith


Xref: sparky sci.bio:3013 rec.pets:2887 rec.gardens:6215
From: joanm@moe.coe.uga.edu (Joan Maxfield UCNS)
Newsgroups: sci.bio,rec.pets,rec.gardens
Subject: Re: bacteria as pets
Date: 25 Aug 92 17:37:16 GMT
	<1992Aug24.193002.6225@iscsvax.uni.edu>
	<adwright.714750689@vincent1.iastate.edu>
Organization: College of Education, University of Georgia

I remember walking along the beach in Cape Cod one year (about 6 years
ago) and looking back to see my footsteps glowing green behind me.  I
thought it was the coolest thing!  A friend of mine brought some of
the sand back to school with her ( we got extra credit in geology for
bringing back soil samples from vacations) but could never get it to
glow again, I guess we killed it.  Now theres a pet I'd like to have!
Glowing sand!  Anyone know what it was?

Joan  (someday remind me to relate the glowing roast story that my
professor told me)
Xref: sparky sci.bio:3044 sci.skeptic:15355 soc.men:15655 soc.women:15939
From: pw@panix.com (Paul Wallich)
Newsgroups: sci.bio,sci.skeptic,soc.men,soc.women
Subject: Re: Biological Sex Differences? ("Women only" excusable ?)
Date: 28 Aug 92 23:39:31 GMT
Organization: Trivializers R Us

In article <92241.144153RIPBC@CUNYVM.BITNET> <RIPBC@CUNYVM.BITNET> writes:
>-From: csh@newt.phys.unsw.edu.au (Chris Heath)
>-Subject: Re: Biological Sex Differences? ("Women only" excusable ?)
>-
>-It appears from what is said here that women are more "intelligent" than men
>-in some aspects and men are more "intelligent" than women in others, and
>-I suppose, approximately equal in most.....Is this what is being implied or am
>-I misinterpreting?

>Exactly.  It seems like a matter of Common Sense, but people seem to have a
>shortage of this commodity.  for example, the chiarperson of a Computer
>Science Dept is asked by the administration to `explain' why only 37% of the
>CS majors are women.  However, Doreeen Kimura states explicitly that high
>mathematical ability (which is involved in many parts of CS) occurs 13
>times as often among boys as among girls.  The implication is clear that the
>chairperson HAS nothing to `explain'.  Oddly enough, departments that have
>90% girls are not asked for a corresponding explanation.

A) High mathematical ability is not involved in many parts of CS, although
logic and basic math may be.

B) Kimura states nothing of the sort. She simply notes that young men
outnumber young women in the top percentiles of certain standardized
tests.

C) It used to be well known that musical performing ability was a
field in which men vastly outnumbered women among the top ranks; then
orchestras introduced the blind audition, in which judges listen
from behind a screen, and the statistics changed significantly. My
point is that statistics tell you relatively little about the ground
truth, and that if people complain of discrimination (as they do in CS,
for example) their complaints should probably be taken seriously.

paul

we now return you to you regular endless thread
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Sex reversed males and females
From: ssbethal@wsuhub.uc.twsu.edu
Date: 2 Sep 92 11:06:41 CST
Organization: Wichita State University, Wichita, Ks

Hi,
I want to have information on Sex Reversed Males(genotype XX) and Sex Reversed
Females (genotype XY). Will these individuals have the capability to have
fertile gametes? I understand the phenomenon of this abnormality, which is due 
to the deletion of TDS factor or improper crossing over between X and Y
chromosomes giving rise to the sex reversed females and sex reversed males
respectively. I'll appreciate if any one could furnish further info. in this
matter. Thanks alot in advance.
Bye
Shanthi

Newsgroups: sci.bio
From: andrick@sun.rhrk.uni-kl.de (Ulf Andrick [Biologie])
Subject: RE: Sexual Selection:  breasts and penises
Reply-To: andrick@sun.rhrk.uni-kl.de (Ulf Andrick [Biologie])
Organization: University of Kaiserslautern (Germany)
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 11:02:41 GMT

 
In article <2SEP92.15524801@cc4.crl.aecl.ca>, roihar@cc4.crl.aecl.ca writes:
> Ulf R. Andrick writes:
> 
> "Breasts, so has been argued, replace the buttocks in frontal copulation.
> Their curvature might affect the same male recognition mechanism which 
> reacts to buttocks. They also emphasise the nibbles, which don't happen to 
> be there to serve as sexual signals again. This is only of use in upright 
> walk; thus the lack of breasts in other primates."
> 
> Note the use of the word nibbles in the third sentence. A freudian slip
> if ever there was one!
> 

I'm grateful that someone pointed to it. Probably, I'd never have
become aware that it might be a slip, and even more, a Freudian one.
I would have missed quite a bit of amusement without that hint.


I fail to see whether my lapsus linguae could give rise to some
embarassment. If this be the case, then, please, take into consideration 
that English is a foreign language to me, though I try what I can
to conceal that. The meaning of certain words or phrases may be not so 
vivid to me as in my native language, so that I feel less restraint to 
use them and to discuss the matter at all.



Ulf R. Andrick                                  andrick@rhrk.uni-kl.de
Tierphysiologie
FB Biologie
Universitaet
D-W 6750 Kaiserslautern

Newsgroups: sci.bio
From: roihar@cc4.crl.aecl.ca
Subject: RE: Sexual Selection:  breasts and penises
Organization: AECL RESEARCH
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 1992 19:52:48 GMT

Ulf R. Andrick writes:

"Breasts, so has been argued, replace the buttocks in frontal copulation.
Their curvature might affect the same male recognition mechanism which 
reacts to buttocks. They also emphasise the nibbles, which don't happen to 
be there to serve as sexual signals again. This is only of use in upright 
walk; thus the lack of breasts in other primates."

Note the use of the word nibbles in the third sentence. A freudian slip
if ever there was one!




Newsgroups: sci.bio
From: woods hole (hemant chikarmane (hemant@mbl.edu))
Subject: Re: bacteria as pets
Organization: marine biological lab
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 92 15:23:32 GMT

In article <adwright.714928418@vincent1.iastate.edu>, adwright@iastate.edu () writes:
> 
> Larry:
> 
> Would the American Type Cultures Collection have glowing microbes?
> 
> What should we ask for if they do?
> 
> 
> I am using microbiological assays as a means of screening maize for vitamin and
> if amino acid values. I am using the standard DIFCO procedures and they are ok but if i can get glowing bacteria and make my own auxotroph from this perhaps
> i could use the light generated as a index of growth. Say, exposure on a film?
> Maybe even "eyeballing" the cultures in a dark room. I dont care about exact 
> values, just want the high ones. What glowing microbes would be easiest to
> culture? Many thanks.
> Allen
> 

The ATCC certainly has "glowing microbes".  Here are some common ones:

Vibrio fischeri
Vibrio harveyi

Xenorhabdus sp.

If you are doing assays for specific vitamins or amino acids, you would need
the appropriate auxotrophic mutants.  I am not sure that auxotrophs are
available.  Best place to check is the Woody Hastings lab at Harvard 
University, Cambridge MA.  I am quite sure that the first two bugs in the 
list will grow happily in Luria-Broth or nutrient broth, though they
are marine bacteria.

Good luck.

Hemant Chikarmane
Marine Biological Laboratory
Woods Hole MA 02543

hemant@mbl.edu						(508) 548-3705
From: bwilliam@oyster.smcm.edu (Bill Williams)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Space Poop
Date: 4 Sep 92 17:40:38 GMT
Organization: St. Mary's College of Maryland
X-UserAgent: Nuntius v1.1.1d9
X-XXMessage-ID: <A6CD1808100201D2@williams.smcm.edu>
X-XXDate: Fri, 4 Sep 92 18:41:28 GMT

In article <183h82INNkhf@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> Mike E. Romano,
bj368@cleveland.Freenet.Edu writes:
>Some scientist also predict that sufficient debris in this belt will
begin
>to reduce solar radiation and alter world climate.

Uh.... a little arithmetic would be useful here.  How many lens caps
would it take to reduce the total insolation by, let's say, 0.0001%? 
Let's assume for simplicity that a "lens cap" is 1 square meter in area
(thereby subsuming the vast majority of "space poop") and that all this
stuff orbits at an altitude of zero (at the surface -- a worst-case
scenario for obscuring the sun).  The earth's average radius is 6371 km,
so the surface area is roughly 1.3E14 square meters.  0.0001% of this is
1.3E8, and so it would take 130 million one-square-meter pieces of poop
to obscure the sun by even this tiny amount (well below the short-term
noise level of the sun's current output).

Maybe we should worry about future space probes getting clobbered by
floating lens caps, but I think photosynthesis is secure, at least for
the next few million space shots.
___________________________________
William E. Williams, bwilliam@oyster.smcm.edu
Divison of Natural Sciences and Mathematics
St. Mary's College of Maryland
St. Mary's City, MD 20686
Newsgroups: sci.bio
From: ljones@utkvx1.utk.edu (Jones, Leslie Lamont)
Subject: RE: SEXUAL SELECTION
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    
Organization: University of Tennessee Computing Center
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 1992 15:51:00 GMT

that there are two major forms: male contest and female choice.
Ulf Andrick alluded to both in an earlier posting (quite aware of the
difference I'm sure, considering the quality of his other posts.)
     Most of the posts have dealt with female choice, but there
is male contest.

Leslie Lamont Jones
ljones@utkvx.utk.edu
From: ljones@utkvx4.utk.edu (Jones, Leslie Lamont)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: re: sexual selection
Date: 28 Aug 92 17:53:00 GMT
Organization: University of Tennessee Computing Center
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41


     I recall reading in _Natural History_a few years back about 
"kung-fu kerosene drinker theory." The author, who practiced kung-fu,
knew a black belt who drank a cup of kerosene once a month to prove his 
abilities. The author argued that a male who could survive with an obvious
handicap, such as a peacock's plumage, must have extraordinarily
fit genes to compensate. So these extraordinarily fit genes are what are being
selected for.
     I think the advantage of sexually-selected characters are better 
described by the "sexy son" theory. In this model, females are attracted
to certain males because they are hardwired to find the males attractive.
Instances of hardwiring have been discovered, as in the case of sword-
tailed fish which S.J. Gould discussed in his column a few years ago.
     The advantage for the female is that she will bear some sons 
who will be sexy, reproduce, and spread her genes, including those genes which
find those particular male characters sexy. It then becomes a case of runaway
selection, with females producing sexy sons and daughters who find the sons
sexy (thought there is no implied incest; the lines can propogate separately 
with distant cousins mating.)

Leslie Lamont Jones
ljones@utkvx.utk.edu 
Xref: sparky sci.bio:3038 sci.skeptic:15310 soc.men:15618 soc.women:15907
Newsgroups: sci.bio,sci.skeptic,soc.men,soc.women
Subject: Re: Biological Sex Differences? ("Women only" excusable ?)
From: <RIPBC@CUNYVM.BITNET>
Date: Friday, 28 Aug 1992 14:41:52 EDT
 92233.141512RIPBC@CUNYVM.BITNET><1992Aug24.003020.11881@usage.csd.unsw.OZ.AU>
Organization: City University of New York/ University Computer Center

-From: csh@newt.phys.unsw.edu.au (Chris Heath)
-Subject: Re: Biological Sex Differences? ("Women only" excusable ?)
-
-It appears from what is said here that women are more "intelligent" than men
-in some aspects and men are more "intelligent" than women in others, and
-I suppose, approximately equal in most.....Is this what is being implied or am
-I misinterpreting?
-
---
-
-SMEE

Exactly.  It seems like a matter of Common Sense, but people seem to have a
shortage of this commodity.  for example, the chiarperson of a Computer
Science Dept is asked by the administration to `explain' why only 37% of the
CS majors are women.  However, Doreeen Kimura states explicitly that high
mathematical ability (which is involved in many parts of CS) occurs 13
times as often among boys as among girls.  The implication is clear that the
chairperson HAS nothing to `explain'.  Oddly enough, departments that have
90% girls are not asked for a corresponding explanation.

Of course we also have the other variety of silliness where some people assert
that girls can't do X where X may be Math or mountain climbing.  These
people conveniently forget that differences are statistical and not absolute
and that even if only one girl in 100 can do X, she is entitled to our
support and encouragement.

Rohit Parikh
Newsgroups: sci.bio,sci.med,sci.bio.technology,sci.med.physics
From: polar@top.cis.syr.edu (Polar Humenn)
Subject: Good Skeleton Picture
Keywords: Skeleton, Bones
Organization: Syracuse University, CIS Dept.
Date: Wed, 2 Sep 92 10:14:47 EDT

Hi,
I am looking for a good picture (in GIF format??) of a frontal and a
side view of the _entire_ human skeleton, good for learning purposes.
It could be line drawing, or even in X/ray style.  I'll take all types.

Please don't post, send to me directly. I normally don't read these
newsgroups.  Please, No flames for using up bandwidth for this stupid
request.  I am trying to post to the "relevant" news groups.
Thanks in advance,
-Polar
		polar@top.cis.syr.edu
From: klier@iscsvax.uni.edu
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: Rats and Rabies
Date: 1 Sep 92 21:46:04 -0500
Organization: University of Northern Iowa

jbh@anat.UMSMED.EDU (James B. Hutchins) writes:
> 
> According to my Merck Vet Manual, all warm-blooded animals are susceptible
> to rabies, but it is only common in bats, dogs, foxes, skunks and raccoons.
> 
> It's not clear to me exactly why rats should not transmit rabies, except
> that they may routinely be killed once bitten and do not live to develop
> the disease and transmit the virus.  It is notable that all the animals on
> the above list are carnivores, except bats, and we are apparently talking
> vampire bats and not the frugivorous or insectivorous kind :-)

I'm no expert either, but all mammals can get rabies to the best of 
my knowledge.  Once infected, the animals can exhibit two different
behaviors as the disease hits the central nervous system.  "Furious"
rabies is the form that we associate with "Mad Dogs" -- the animal
may bite for no reason, and there's a high likelihood of transmission.
The "silent" form of rabies tends to cause the animal to be more withdrawn
from contact, and it may just den up and die.  Vets around here (Story
Co., Iowa, is usually #1 nationally in occurrence of rabies*) think that
there is more incidence of rabies in wild animal populations than gets 
reported, simply because most animals exhibit the silent form.  BTW,
some species are especially prone to the furious form, others to the
silent form.

*perhaps not coincidentally, Story Co. has a very high proportion of
veterinarians, with the National Animal Disease Lab, the Vet Med Research
Institure, and the ISU Vet school all in Ames.  Could be that rabies just
gets recognized more often in Story Co.?


Kay Klier  Biology Dept  UNI
Xref: sparky sci.bio:3073 sci.skeptic:15771 soc.men:15844 soc.women:16066
From: twain@milton.u.washington.edu (Barbara Hlavin)
Newsgroups: sci.bio,sci.skeptic,soc.men,soc.women
Subject: Re: Biological Sex Differences? ("Women only" excusable ?)
Keywords: left-handed and proud of it
Date: 2 Sep 92 20:18:38 GMT
Article-I.D.: u.1992Sep2.201838.14188
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle

>bevans@carina.unm.edu (Mathemagician) writes:
>
>>Since when is left-handedness "not good"?  Yes, I know you said
>>"generally," but left-handedness tops your list.


We lefties spend our lives adjusting to a largely right-handed world. 
(Some of these adaptations are ingenious, and my private theory is 
that we learn to think in creative ways, and tend to be more independent 
in our judgments, because we have to provide our own solutions to 
handedness problems.) 

The latest whine is that people who are left-handed tend to die five 
to seven years earlier than right-handers.  I haven't read the study 
so I do not vouch for the conclusions, nor am I able to tell you to 
what the researchers attributed this tendency -- are we clumsier, 
does our maladroitness which is a result of being forced to use 
tools that were designed to serve the needs of right-handers and there- 
fore work poorly if at all for us, cause us to have more accidents? 

Just speculating, but perhaps this is what the original poster had 
in mind when he listed left-handedness as "not good."  

Or perhaps it causes him pain to watch us write.  :-)  

--Barbara