In these times of uncertainty, many people are feeling threatened from losing their jobs, bills they can’t pay, lost of health insurance and the list goes on.

What researchers at Rice University wants to know is whether the smell of fear facilitates humans’ other stronger senses.

When threatened, many animals release chemicals as a warning signal to members of their own species, who in turn react to the signals and take action. Research by Rice University psychologist Denise Chen suggests a similar phenomenon occurs in humans.

Chen and graduate student Wen Zhou collected “fearful sweat” samples from male volunteers. The volunteers kept gauze pads in their armpits while they were shown films that dealt with topics known to inspire fear.

Later, female volunteers were exposed to chemicals from the “fearful sweat” when they were fitted with a piece of gauze under their nostrils.  They then viewed images of faces that morphed from happy to ambiguous to fearful. They were asked to indicate whether the face was happy or fearful by pressing buttons on a computer.

Exposure to the smell of fear biased women toward interpreting facial expressions as more fearful, but only when the expressions were ambiguous.  It had no effect when the facial emotions were more discernable.

Cellulosic biofuels offer similar, if not lower, costs and very large reductions in greenhouse gas emissions compared to petroleum-derived fuels. That’s one of the key take-home messages from a series of expert papers on “The Role of Biomass in America’s Energy Future (RBAEF)” in a special issue of Biofuels, Bioproducts and Biorefining.

Professor Lee Lynd, from Dartmouth College’s Thayer School of Engineering is co-author of five of the eight papers in the special issue.

“We conclude that mature biomass refining is highly competitive with the fuels currently available, based on all the factors considered” says Professor Lynd. “The most promising class of processes we analysed combined the biological fermentation of carbohydrates to fuels with advanced technologies that thermochemically convert process residues to electrical power and, or, additional liquid fuels. One of our important findings, which contradicts conventional wisdom, is that similar greenhouse gas emission reductions on a per ton biomass basis are anticipated for the production of liquid fuels and electricity via mature technology.”

The researchers also found that the mature cellulosic biofuel technologies analysed:

• Have the potential to realize efficiencies on par with petroleum-based fuels.
• Require modest volumes of process water.
• Achieve production costs consistent with gasoline when oil prices are at about $30 a barrel.

According to AccuWeather.com, the worst of the flooding across Queensland may have past, but its impact will be far reaching.

AccuWeather.com reports that flood waters have started to recede across much of Queensland from its height earlier this month. At the height of the flooding, flood waters covered an area equal to the size of South Australia, according to Australian officials.

The massive flooding has threatened crops, livestock and some water supplies across much of the state, AccuWeather.com reports.

Australia is a major global exporter of beef and sugar with the majority of these commodities produced in Queensland.

Australia’s Agriculture Minister, Tony Burke, estimates up to 150,000 cattle were killed in the floods and up to 20% of the sugarcane crop was lost in some areas.

According to AccuWeather.com, these losses will likely lead to lower exports and could eventually be felt by consumers later this year. However, an accurate accounting of the damage will take some time.

Australia is a major beef exporter to Asian markets. Also, JBS Swift is Australia’s largest beef packer.

There’s a lot of things for President Obama to fix that has gone to pot over the last eight years, including the safety of the food Americans eat. It’s not enough that our health care system is falling apart as more and more people can’t afford to get sick and go to the doctor,  that they probably have to go to the doctor any way because they are getting sick from the food they eat.

Fewer than one in four consumers now believe the U.S. food supply is safer than it was a year ago, according to new data from the University of Minnesota’s Food Industry Center.

The center said that after January’s national salmonella outbreak, just 22.5 percent of consumers in the study said they were confident the food supply is safer than a year ago, the lowest reading since the study began in May 2008. Eight people died and more than 500 have become ill in the most recent outbreak, which may have originated in a Georgia peanut plant and spread through peanut-butter products sold nationwide.

The drop in confidence mirrors a similar drop last June, when a salmonella outbreak later traced to jalapeno peppers sickened nearly 1,500 people. The study involves continuously tracking consumer confidence in food supply safety via a weekly online survey of about 175 consumers from across the nation. The consumers are selected each week by a national market research company.

The ongoing study is conducted jointly with the Louisiana State University AgCenter and is funded by the National Center for Food Protection and Defense.