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Busy 2010 hurricane season is forecast

FORT COLLINS, Colo., Dec. 10 (UPI) -- U.S. meteorologists say they expect an above-average number of Atlantic basin hurricanes to develop during next year's hurricane season.

Meteorologists Philip Klotzbach and William Gray -- in the 27th annual early extended-range hurricane forecast issued by Colorado State University's Tropical Meteorology Project -- predict 11-16 named storms will develop, 6-8 of them hurricanes and 3-5 of the hurricanes to become major hurricanes with winds of 111 mph or greater.

The team said its December early season forecast calls for a range of storms since the report is based on Atlantic basin conditions that can change substantially by the June 1 start of the hurricane season. Klotzbach and Gray said they will issue specific numerical predictions in their next forecast April 7.

"We foresee a somewhat above-average Atlantic basin hurricane season," Gray said. "We anticipate the current El Nino event to dissipate by the 2010 hurricane season and warm sea surface temperatures are likely to continue being present in the tropical and North Atlantic during 2010 -- conditions that contribute to an above-average season."

Klotzbach's and Gray's forecast includes:

-- A 64 percent chance of at least one major hurricane making landfall on the U.S. coastline during 2010. The long-term average probability is 52 percent.

-- A 40 percent probability of a major hurricane making landfall along the U.S. East Coast, including the Florida Peninsula, and along the Gulf Coast from the Florida Panhandle west to Brownsville, Texas. The long-term average for both areas is about 30 percent.

-- A 53 percent chance of a major hurricane making landfall in the Caribbean. The average probability in that area during the last century is 42 percent.

The 2010 hurricane season runs from June 1 through Nov. 30.

U.S. healthcare most expensive, not best

PARIS, Dec. 10 (UPI) -- The United States spends more on healthcare -- $7,290 per capita in 2007 -- than any other country, an international ranking found.

The fifth edition of Health at a Glance provides the latest comparable data on different aspects of the performance of health systems in Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries.

The more than $7,000 spent by the United States on healthcare -- 16 percent of gross domestic product -- is almost two-and-a-half times greater than the OECD average of $2,984, or an average of 8.9 percent adjusted for purchasing power parity. France follows the United States in healthcare spending at 11 percent of GDP, Switzerland at 10.8 percent and Germany 10.4 percent.

Japan has higher survival rates for people with cancer than most countries. The United States and Canada have good cancer care, screening more people than most other countries, the report said. However, the United States suffers from worse primary care and preventable hospital admissions for asthma and diabetes are twice what they are, on average, in the OECD, the report said.

Angel Gurria, secretary-general of the OCED in Paris, said the Netherlands, Italy, Switzerland and Germany provide good primary care, but no one OECD country provides high quality care in all areas.

"There are opportunities for all countries to improve the performance of their healthcare care system, and making such improvements does not necessarily require higher spending," Gurria said.

First transgenic prairie vole developed

ATLANTA, Dec. 10 (UPI) -- U.S. researchers say they've generated the first transgenic prairie vole by injecting a single-cell vole embryo with a gene from a jellyfish.

Yerkes National Primate Researcher Center scientists at Emory University, led by Zoe Donaldson, said they chose the prairie vole, a monogamous rodent, so they could later identify brain mechanisms underlying monogamous pair bonds.

"Domesticated lab rats and mice dominate biomedical research, but wild rodent species with more complex social behaviors are better suited for investigating the biology of the social brain," said Donaldson.

The researchers said they injected a virus containing a jellyfish gene that directs the production of a green fluorescent protein into single-cell prairie vole embryos. The prairie vole that grew from the embryo had the green fluorescent protein throughout its body, and the jellyfish gene was subsequently passed on to multiple generations of vole offspring.

The Yerkes researchers say gaining competence in such genetic manipulation will help identify brain mechanisms for social bonding and other complex behaviors. Ultimately, they say their work might help scientists development treatments for psychiatric disorders characterized by impairments in social behavior.

The research appears in the journal Biology of Reproduction.

New Parkinson's disease diagnostic offered

HERSHEY, Pa., Dec. 10 (UPI) -- U.S. medical researchers say they've determined asymmetrical arm swings while walking might be an early sign of Parkinson's disease.

Scientists at Penn State Hershey College of Medicine and the University of North Carolina said Parkinson's disease is an age-related disorder involving loss of certain types of brain cells and marked by impaired movement and slow speech.

"The disease is currently diagnosed by tremors at rest and stiffness in the body and limbs," said Penn State Associate Professor Xuemei Huang. "But by the time we diagnose the disease, about 50- to 80 percent of the critical cells called dopamine neurons are already dead."

Huang and her colleagues say they've confirmed the hypothesis that people with Parkinson's display an asymmetrical arm swing. In other words, one arm swings much less than the other as a person walks.

"We believe this is the first demonstration that asymmetrical arm swings may be a very early sign of the disease," said Huang, who noted that while slightly irregular arm swing occurs in people without Parkinson's, the asymmetry is significantly larger in those suffering from the disease.

The research that included University of North Carolina Assistant Professor Michael Lewek and researchers Roxanne Poole, Julia Johnson and Omar Halawa appears in the journal Gait and Posture.