The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current, February 13, 2003, Image 6

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    Page 6A •Thursday, February 13,2003
Sci|Tech
The Battalion
Infant brain damage recoverable
Study shows dramatic IQ increases for ‘preemies’
Standardized measure of intelligence
From a study of very low-birth-weight infants 60Q-1250g
- Normal childrens median scores increase 4.5 points
from 36-96 months
• VLBW infants median scores increase 10-11 points
from 36-96 months
12.5%
9% ■■Scores increased 10 or more points
Scores increased 5-9 points
AgB/_ j ■■Scores increased 0-4 points
! Scores decreased
33%
Actual score change from age 36 months to 96 months
Travis Swenson • THE BATTALION
By Lindsey Tanner
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
CHICAGO — Neurological damage in
very small premature babies may decrease
over time, according to research that tracked
children through age 8 and found substantial
mental gains.
Many youngsters once considered retard
ed ended up scoring in the nearly normal
range on tests of verbal function and IQ, the
study found.
Children who received early intervention
such as speech therapy, those from two-par
ent families, and those whose mothers had
high levels of education were found to expe
rience the greatest improvement in mental
function.
The findings are surprising because previ
ous research has found negative long-term
results for very small preemies, and conven
tional thinking says that IQ doesn’t change
— at least in people bom at a normal weight.
“We were thrilled by the findings and sur
prised because previous reports suggested
that there’s an adverse outcome for very low
birth-weight babies,” said lead researcher Dr.
Laura Ment, a Yale University pediatric
neurologist.
“We found children progressively getting
better between 3 and 8 years of age,”
Ment said.
The study involved 296 children bom at
28 weeks and weighing just over 2 pounds on
average. Results
appear in
Wednesday’s Journal
of the American
Medical Association.
Children born
extremely prema
turely are at risk for a
variety of neurologi
cal problems, rang
ing from cerebral
palsy, mental retarda
tion and vision trou
ble to more subtle
learning and behav
ior difficulties.
Ment said the
study results echo
recent research in
animals showing that
the developing brain
can repair itself.
A JAMA editorial
suggests that broader tests of mental function
would have had poorer results and notes that
IQ improvements were still in the average to
low-average range.
“Despite the noted improvements in
scores, such low average functioning can
place a child at significant academic disad
vantage,” said editorial author Glen Aylward,
a developmental specialist at Southern
Illinois University’s medical school.
The youngsters were given a test of verbal
abilities and three different IQ tests starting at
Source: Journal of the American Medical Association
age 3 and continuing through childhood.
The average IQ scores increased from 90
to 95.
The average score on the verbal test
increased from 88 points at age 3 to 99 points
at age 8. Data from normal birth-weight chil
dren suggest average verbal scores improve
by about 4.5 points over time, the
authors said.
A score of 100 would be average on both
the IQ and verbal tests for a normal child.
NEWS IN BRIEF
17 people Indicted
for satellite TV theft
LOS ANGELES (AP) - A federal
grand jury has indicted 17 people
who authorities say hacked into
satellite television transmissions,
causing millions of dollars in loss
es to DirecTV and Dish Network,
the U.S. Attorney's office said.
Six of the defendants were
charged with violating the anti
encryption provisions of the
Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
The other charges involved con
spiracy or manufacturing a device
for the purpose of stealing satel
lite signals. All three counts carry
a maximum prison sentence of
five years. The indictments were
returned last month and
unsealed Tuesday.
Defect blamed for
loss of NASA probe
SPACE CENTER, Houston (AP)
— An unmanned spacecraft that
broke up last summer as it
embarked on a mission to study
comets was probably doomed
by a defect in its design, NASA's
chief engineer said Wednesday.
Contour had been orbiting the
Earth for a month when it fired
its rocket motor for 50 seconds
Aug. 15 to send it on a trajec
tory to collect data from at least
two comets. The spacecraft was
never heard from again.
Days later, telescope images
showed pieces moving away
from Earth along the same path
and at roughly the same velocity
Contour was expected to travel.
Transcript records
Columbia’s end
By Paul Recer
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
SPACE CENTER, Houston
— NASA has released tran
scripts from some of
Columbia’s final radio trans
missions, chronicling the
efforts of Mission Control
engineers as they became
painfully aware that the shuttle
had broken apart.
In the conversations,
released Tuesday, Mission
Control reports a litany of
problems that seem to worsen
by the minute as the shuttle
breaks into pieces.
The first bad news came
when Jeff Kling, the mainte
nance, mechanical arm and
crew systems officer, reported a
sudden and unexplained loss of
data from spacecraft sensors.
“I just lost four separate
temperature transducers on the
left side of the vehicle, the
hydraulic return temperatures,”
Kling said.
Flight director Leroy Cain
quickly asked if there was any
thing common to the sensors
and got bad news in reply.
Kling said there was no com
monality, suggesting there was
a general failure instead of a
single system.
Moments later, Cain asks
Mike Sarafin, the guidance and
navigation officer, if everything
appears normal with the shuttle
flight control.
Sarafin assures him, “I
don’t see anything out of the
ordinary.”
There is a short indistinct
call from the spacecraft and.
almost at the same time, Kling
says the landing gear tires have
lost pressure.
Capsule communicator
Charlie Hobaugh then address
es the spacecraft: “And
Columbia, Houston, we see
your tire pressure messages
and we did not copy your last.
Columbia commander Rid
Husband’s response - “Roger,
buh ... “ - is abruptly cut off. It
is 7:59 a.m. CST.
Communication with
Columbia was never regained.
“MILA, the Kennedy
spacecraft communication cen
ter is not reporting any RF
(radio frequency) at this time,"
says Bill Foster, a ground con
troller.
“OK,” says Cain, who then
asks hopefully when a radar
signal was expected.
“One minute ago, flight,”
comes the response from
Richard Jones, flight dynamics
officer.
“We do not have any valid
data at this time,” said Jones.
He said there was a “blip” but
it was bad data.
Then a long pause, a silence
of despair. Then Cain says the
final words, the phrase that
marked the lack of hope:
“Lock the doors.”
This meant nobody could
leave Mission Control or even
make phone calls. For the next
several hours, the engineers
have to ignore the certain loss
of the crew and store the data in
their computers, finish reports
and then write personal
accounts of what they said.
The wedding was
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a different story.
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EveryStudent.com
Paid for by Campus Crusade for Christ at Texas A&M University
cru.tamu.edu
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