Republicans in Washington, D.C., aren’t giving up trying to ram through the Keystone XL pipeline. On Monday, less than two weeks after President Obama rejected the controversial Canada-to-Texas project, Republicans in the Senate introduced a bill that would let Congress make it a reality. They’re also scrambling to attach Keystone XL to other pieces of legislation floating around the Capitol.

We’re not surprised: Big Oil and its congressional cronies were angered by Obama’s rejection of Keystone XL. We can’t let up on the counterpressure. If it’s built, Keystone XL would, as climatologist Dr. James Hansen says, be “game over” for climate change. It would also be a disaster for Canada’s boreal forests (where the tar sands the pipeline would carry are extracted) and put hundreds of waterways and some 20 imperiled plants and animals, from the whooping crane to the piping plover, at risk of a spill — which government scientists say would be inevitable.

The Center for Biological Diversity has been at the forefront of the fight against Keystone XL, and we’ll keep you up to date on how to stop this dangerous project.

Check out our press release, read our Oregonian op-ed on the issue and learn more about our Keystone XL campaign.

Interrupted development. Even small concentrations — 1.5 parts per million — of a biocide used in cosmetics interrupted neurological development in tadpole brains. (Credit: Aizenman lab/Brown University)

ScienceDaily (Jan. 10, 2012) — A new study finds that low concentrations of the chemical methylisothiazolinone has subtle but measurable negative effects on the neural development of tadpoles. The chemical is found in some cosmetics, although the study does not provide any evidence that cosmetics are unsafe for humans.

Scientists, health officials, and manufacturers already know that a chemical preservative found in some products, including cosmetics, is harmful to people and animals in high concentrations, but a new Brown University study in tadpoles reports that it can also interrupt neurological development even in very low concentrations.

In the cosmetics industry, the biocide methylisothiazolinone or MIT, is considered safe at concentrations of less than 100 parts per million. Lab studies, however, have found that lower concentrations affected the growth of animal neurons. Picking up from there, the Brown researchers performed a series of experiments to investigate how 10 days of exposure at concentrations as low as 1.5 ppm would affect whole, living tadpoles as they develop. Their results appear in advance online in the journal Neuroscience.

“The lower concentrations we studied didn’t kill the animals or cause any big deformities or affect the behavior you’d see just by looking at them,” said Carlos Aizenman, associate professor of neuroscience and the study’s senior author. “But then we decided to do a series of functional tests and we found that exposure to this compound during a period of development that’s critical for the fine wiring of the nervous system disrupted this period of fine tuning.”

Aizenman emphasized that there is no evidence in the study that any products with MIT, such as shampoos or cosmetics, are harmful to consumers.

Neurotoxic effects

When Aizenman and lead author Ariana Spawn explored the consequences of exposing tadpoles to two nonlethal concentrations, 1.5 ppm and 7.6 ppm, they found some deficits both in behavior and in basic brain development.

In one experiment they shined moving patterns of light into one side of the tadpole tanks from below. As they expected, the unexposed tadpoles avoided the light patterns, swimming to the other side. Tadpoles that had been exposed to either concentration of MIT, however, were significantly less likely to avoid the signals.

In another experiment, Aizenman and Spawn, who was an undergraduate at the time and has since graduated, exposed the tadpoles to another chemical known to induce seizures. The tadpoles who were not exposed to MIT and those exposed to the lower concentration each had the same ability to hold off seizures, but the ones who had been exposed to the 7.6 ppm concentration succumbed to the seizures significantly more readily.

In these experiments, seizure susceptibility had nothing to do with epilepsy, Aizenman said, but was instead a measure of more general neural development.

After observing the two significant behavioral effects in the tadpoles, Aizenman and Spawn then sought the underlying physiological difference between exposed and unexposed tadpoles that might cause them. They performed an electrophysiological analysis of each tadpole’s optic tectum, a part of the brain responsible for processing visual information. They found evidence that the chemical seems to have stunted the process by which tadpoles prune and refine neural connections, a key developmental step.

“The neural circuits act like the neural circuits of a much more immature tadpole,” Aizenman said. “This is consistent with the previous findings in cell cultures.”

Aizenman said consumers should know about the study’s results and pay attention to the ingredients in the products they use, but should not become worried based on the basic science study.

Aizenman said one area where further studies may be warranted is in cases of repeated exposure in industrial or occupational settings, but the study’s broader message may be that chemical manufacturers and independent labs should test more for neurodevelopmental effects of even low concentrations of products. In the specific case of MIT in tadpoles, he noted, “It’s resulting in a non-obvious but real deficit in neural function.”

Brown University and the Whitehall Foundation funded the research.

Celebrating the Return of the Salmon!   A Progress Report and …Community Social

Sunday, February 26^th 3-6pm

at the Salmon Creek Falls Environmental Center (Salmon Creek School)

Please join Gold Ridge RCD, Occidental Arts and Ecology Center, Prunuske Chatham Inc., and the Salmon Creek Watershed Council, as we host an informational me! eting and community gathering to report on the status of Coho Salmon recovery in the Salmon Creek Watershed. In addition, experts will share information on how landowners can improve salmon habitat.

Brittany Heck, Executive Director

Gold Ridge RCD

P.O. Box 1064

Occidental, CA 95465

(707) 874-2907

brittany@goldridgercd.org

www.goldridgercd.org

This Tuesday, January 31, at 9 am, please come to support a County “freeze” on any new vineyard and orchard development in Sonoma County until June 1st of this year.  At that time, VESCO (Vineyard Erosion and Sediment Control Ordinance) will be updated to incorporate tree removal protection language.

This will be held in the Supervisors’ Chambers, 575 Administrative Drive, Room 100A, Santa Rosa.

Thank you.

36th Annual Sonoma County Environmental Awards Dinner

Building Healthy, Just &

Sustainable Communities

IN THE FACE OF CLIMATE CHANGE

Paloma Pavel, PhD, President of Earth House Center

and Executive Director of Breakthrough Communities

 Saturday, March 3, 2012

Sebastopol Veterans’ Auditorium, 5:30 – 9:00pm

282 South High Street, Sebastopol

 MC: Leticia Romero, Vice-President, North Bay Organizing Project and

Community Organizer, Committee for Immigrant Rights Sonoma County

                                                 2012 Environmental Awards

Nominations open until 2/6 midnight: www.envirocentersoco.org/awards

Silent Auction and Raffle

Gourmet Dinner: A La Heart Catering

Tickets: $40, after 2/20: $50

Students with ID: $25, after 2/20: $30

Non-Profit Group Discount: 5 tickets for the price of 4, $160 until 2/20

Tickets: www.envirocentersoco.org

or send a check payable to SCCC to: PO Box 4346, Santa Rosa, CA 95402