There was a time when you had to be rich to be fat. Now you have to be rich to stay thin, says a new study.

Researchers led by Jennifer L. Black at New York University critically reviewed ninety studies published between 1997 through 2007 on neighborhood determinants of obesity through the PubMed and PsychInfo databases.

They found that neighborhoods with decreased economic and social resources have higher rates of obesity. They also found that residents in low-income urban areas are more likely to report greater neighborhood barriers to physical activity, such as limited opportunities for daily walking or physical activity and reduced access to stores that sell healthy foods, especially large supermarkets.

Turning native ecosystems into “farms” for biofuel crops causes major carbon emissions that worsen the global warming that biofuels are meant to mitigate, according to a new study by the University of Minnesota and the Nature Conservancy.

The carbon lost by converting rainforests, peatlands, savannas, or grasslands outweighs the carbon savings from biofuels. Such conversions for corn or sugarcane (ethanol), or palms or soybeans (biodiesel) release 17 to 420 times more carbon than the annual savings from replacing fossil fuels, the researchers said. The carbon, which is stored in the original plants and soil, is released as carbon dioxide, a process that may take decades.

This “carbon debt” must be paid before the biofuels produced on the land can begin to lower greenhouse gas levels and ameliorate global warming.

A study by psychologists at Stanford, Pennsylvania State University and the University of California-Berkeley says that many Americans subconsciously associate blacks with apes.

In addition, the findings show that society is more likely to condone violence against black criminal suspects as a result of its broader inability to accept African Americans as fully human, according to the researchers.

Co-author Jennifer Eberhardt, a Stanford associate professor of psychology, said she was shocked by the results, particularly since they involved subjects born after Jim Crow and the civil rights movement. "This was actually some of the most depressing work I have done," she said. "This shook me up. You have suspicions when you do the work—intuitions—you have a hunch. But it was hard to prepare for how strong [the black-ape association] was—how we were able to pick it up every time."

Anoop Sindhu and colleagues report on a gene that may have played a key role in the evolution of grasses. The gene, Hm1, provides resistance against Cochliobolus carbonum race 1 (CCR1), a fungus that is capable of attacking and killing corn at any stage of its development (images of CCR1 infection). While CCR1 is only known to affect corn, the gene Hm1 and its relatives are present throughout the grass family, but are absent from other lineages.

LONDON, February 7 /PRNewswire/ --

Planalytics Inc., the global leader in Business Weather Intelligence(SM), released its January WeatherCall(SM) report today stating that favourable weather conditions at month's end will benefit retailers after an otherwise slow start due to above normal temperatures. January spawned a drastic difference in temperature between the northern and southern parts of the country. A series of rain bearing systems moved across the UK, resulting in cooler temperatures for Scotland, while England and Wales were experiencing more mild conditions.

MCKINNEY, Texas, February 7 /PRNewswire/ --

Torchmark Corporation (NYSE: TMK) announced today that its Chief Executive Officer, Mark McAndrew, and Chief Financial Officer, Gary Coleman, will present Tuesday, February 12, 2008 at the Merrill Lynch Insurance Investors Conference in New York City. Torchmark's presentation is scheduled to begin at 2:20 p.m. EST.

The presentation will be webcast live at: http://www.torchmarkcorp.com on the Investor Relations page, under "Management Presentations" or http://www.veracast.com/webcasts/ml/insurance08/35112276.cfm

Although scientists have speculated over the negative effects of environmental toxins for years, new data suggest that certain environmental toxins may disrupt the normal growth and hormonal development of girls.

Some of these toxins, such as the mycoestrogen zearalenone (ZEA) produced by the Fusarium fungus species, can be found naturally in the environment, have properties similar to the female reproductive hormone estrogen, and are also structurally similar to anabolic growth agents used in animal breeding.

A new study scheduled for publication in The Journal of Pediatrics suggests that certain mycoestrogens may be directly linked to the early onset of sexual development in young girls.

Using the genetic equivalent of an ancient thermometer, a team of scientists has determined that the Earth endured a massive cooling period between 500 million and 3.5 billion years ago.

Reporting today (Feb. 7) in the journal Nature, researchers from the University of Florida, the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution and the biotechnology company DNA2.0 describe how they reconstructed proteins from ancient bacteria to measure the Earth’s temperature over the ages.

WASHINGTON, February 7 /PRNewswire/ --

- Statement of Matthew L. Myers President, Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids

ADA, Michigan, February 6 /PRNewswire/ --

Amway Corporation (Quixtar in the U.S. and Canada) has discovered an internet scam that uses a bogus Amway charity as a lure. Amway cautions individuals to be on the lookout for e-mails from a group calling itself the "Amway Children Charity Foundation".

Please be advised that this is not an Amway-sanctioned program and the name, program and people indicated in the e-mails are not related to Amway in any way and do not have Amway's authority or support.