An Adventure in Sound - AudioBooks, ReadAlongs and Online Stories.

We're glad to report that a bathtub-sized marine sponge rediscovered after a century of extinction.


Not found alive for over a century the evocatively named Neptune's cup sponge (Cliona patera) has been rediscovered off the shores of Singapore. Researchers with the environmental consulting DHI Group found the species during a routine dive. Although the specimen they found was small, the goblet-shaped sponge can reach nearly 5 feet (1.5 meters) high and the same in diameter.

"When we came across the sponge, we knew immediately that this was something very different," marine biologist Karenne Tun from DHI said in a press release.

First described in 1822, full-grown Neptune cups were used as bathtubs for children. Overharvesting for the magnificent organism, however, led to its near extinction. The sponge was last sighted in 1908 in Indonesian waters and believed to be extinct since then. However, dead Neptune's cups were found in dredge samples from northern Australia in the 1990s, providing hope that the species was still around.

"Basically, little is known about the Neptune's Cup, as it was never found alive," adds Tun. "Now we have the opportunity to study the biology and ecology of this impressive sponge and learn about its life cycle. [...] We've already had the first surprise: The Neptune's cup was thought to be a very slow growing species. However, between our last visits in April and August, respectively, it had grown several centimeters."

Evolving over 150 million years ago, sponges anchor themselves to the marine floor, feeding on plankton and other small marine animals as water passes through their filtering bodies.

This story originally appeared in mongabay.com

Noticed a report in the Daily Mail about how an antibiotic found in sharks could be used as drug to treat human viruses and revolutionise medicine.

Anyone who's listened  to Rockford's Rock Opera audio book and apps will know that 'Creatures Secrets' are fundamental to our story; how losing creatures to extinction is ridding the world of potentially world changing discoveries. Perhaps now, at last, we'll begin to see sharks not a killers, but life savers?

More about sharks' secrets.

The compound, found in the liver of sharks, could be used as a new type of drug to treat a broad spectrum of diseases from dengue and yellow fever to hepatitis B, C and D.  
The antibiotic, squalamine, is already known to be safe for use in humans as an antiviral agent.  

Breakthrough: A compound found in sharks could protect humans from a range of diseases
Dr Michael Zasloff, from Georgetown University who led the study, said: 'To realise that squalamine potentially has broad antiviral properties is immensely exciting, especially since we already know so much from ongoing studies about its behaviour in people.'
 
They found that in both lab and animal experiments squalamine produced antiviral activity against the human pathogens found in the diseases such as some forms of hepatitis which cannot currently be treated. 

Along with offering medical advances this discovery may solve the mystery of how sharks with primitive immune systems can so effectively fight viruses that plague all living creatures. 
Dr Zasloff said: 'I believe squalamine is one of a family of related compounds that protects sharks and some other "primitive" ocean vertebrates, such as the sea lamprey, from viruses.
'Squalamine appears to protect against viruses that attack the liver and blood tissues, and other similar compounds that we know exist in the shark likely protect against respiratory viral infections, and so on.
'We may be able to harness the shark's novel immune system to turn all of these antiviral compounds into agents that protect humans against a wide variety of viruses.
'That would be revolutionary. While many antibacterial agents exist, doctors have few antiviral drugs to help their patients, and few of those are broadly active.'
Dr Zasloff discovered squalamine in 1993 and it has already been used in clinical trials to treat cancer and several eye disorders. 
'I was interested in sharks because of their seemingly primitive but effective immune system. No one could explain why the shark was so hardy,' he said.

Water interesting discovery: The study may solve the mystery of how sharks with primitive immune systems can so effectively fight viruses that plague all living creatures
When he started to 'play' with the compound he found that it inhibited the growth of rapidly growing blood vessels, such as those found in tumour growth and certain retinal diseases. 
Since 1995 it has been synthesised in the laboratory rather than taking any natural shark tissue. 
Dr Zasloff remained interested in how the natural cholesterol type molecule, which has a net positive electrical charge, acted as an immune agent in sharks.
When it enters cells, and it can only access certain cells including those in blood vessels, capillaries and the liver, squalamine 'kicks off' positively-charged proteins that are bound to the negatively charged surface of the cells inner membrane.
Some of these displaced proteins are used by viruses to replicate and without the protein a virus's life cycle is disrupted, the microbe is rendered inert and the cell containing it is destroyed. 
This means that squalamine seems to be designed to fight certain viral infections, Dr Zasloff claimed. 
He said: 'To me, the key to squalamine is that once in the body it times its action to match the life cycle of most viruses.
'Most viruses take hours to complete their life cycle, the same time period that squalamine renders tissues and organs viral resistant after administration. 
'In addition, it acts fast to stop viral replication, clearing the body of these predators within hours.
'Furthermore, because squalamine acts by making the host's tissues less receptive for infection, rather than by targeting a specific viral protein, the emergence of viral resistance would not be anticipated.'
In tissue culture studies squalamine was shown to inhibit the infection of human blood vessel cells by the dengue virus and human liver cells infected with hepatitis B and D, which can cause liver failure and cancer.
In animal studies, scientists from across the USA discovered that squalamine controlled infections of yellow fever, Eastern equine encephalitis virus, and murine cytomegalovirus, and in some cases cured the animals.
The study was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences Early Edition online.


Original Story: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2039323/An-antibiotic-liver-sharks-revolutionise-human-medicine.html#ixzz1YVV2cXMa

This story, reported by the BBC and many others, highlights a recent report regarding the Earth's species and, highly relevantly to Rockford's Rock Opera - the ecological musical audio book - it states that many species may become extinct before we even discover them. Poor us....

Here's the story.

The natural world contains about 8.7 million species, according to a new estimate described by scientists as the most accurate ever.

But the vast majority have not been identified - and cataloguing them all could take more than 1,000 years.

The number comes from studying relationships between the branches and leaves of the "family tree of life".

The team warns in the journal PLoS Biology that many species will become extinct before they can be studied.

Although the number of species on the planet might seem an obvious figure to know, a way to calculate it with confidence has been elusive.

In a commentary also carried in PLoS Biology, former Royal Society president Lord (Robert) May observes: "It is a remarkable testament to humanity's narcissism that we know the number of books in the US Library of Congress on 1 February 2011 was 22,194,656, but cannot tell you - to within an order of magnitude - how many distinct species of plants and animals we share our world with."

Now, it appears, we can.

"We've been thinking about this for several years now - we've had a look at a number of different approaches, and didn't have any success," one of the research team, Derek Tittensor, told BBC News.

"So this was basically our last chance, the last thing we tried, and it seems to work."

Dr Tittensor, who is based at the UN Environment Programme's World Conservation Monitoring Centre (Unep-WCMC) and Microsoft Research in Cambridge, UK, worked on the project alongside peers from Dalhousie University in Canada and the University of Hawaii.

The vast majority of the 8.7 million are animals, with progressively smaller numbers of fungi, plants, protozoa (a group of single-celled organisms) and chromists (algae and other micro-organisms).

The figure excludes bacteria and some other types of micro-organism.

Linnaean steps
About 1.2 million species have been formally described, the vast majority from the land rather than the oceans.

Continue reading the main story
The natural world in numbers

Animals: 7.77 million (12% described)
Fungi: 0.61 million (7% described)
Plants: 0.30 million (70% described)
Protozoa: 0.04 million (22% described)
Chromists: 0.03 million (50% described)
The trick this team used was to look at the relationship between species and the broader groupings to which they belong.

In 1758, Swedish biologist Carl Linnaeus developed a comprehensive system of taxonomy, as the field is known, which is still - with modifications - in use today.

Groups of closely related species belong to the same genus, which in turn are clustered into families, then orders, then classes, then phyla, and finally into kingdoms (such as the animal kingdom).

The higher up this hierarchical tree of life you look, the rarer new discoveries become - hardly surprising, as a discovery of a new species will be much more common than the discovery of a totally new phylum or class.

The researchers quantified the relationship between the discovery of new species and the discovery of new higher groups such as phyla and orders, and then used it to predict how many species there are likely to be.

"We discovered that, using numbers from the higher taxonomic groups, we can predict the number of species," said Dalhousie researcher Sina Adl.

"The approach accurately predicted the number of species in several well-studied groups such as mammals, fishes and birds, providing confidence in the method."

And the number came out as 8.7 million - plus or minus about a million.

Muddied waters
If this is correct, then only 14% of the world's species have yet been identified - and only 9% of those in the oceans.


The rate of species discovery has remained about even ever since Haeckel compiled his Kunstformen der Natur (Art Forms of Nature) a century ago
"The rest are primarily going to be smaller organisms, and a large proportion of them will be dwelling in places that are hard to reach or hard to sample, like the deep oceans," said Dr Tittensor.

"When we think of species we tend to think of mammals or birds, which are pretty well known.

"But when you go to a tropical rainforest, it's easy to find new insects, and when you go to the deep sea and pull up a trawl, 90% of what you get can be undiscovered species."

At current rates of discovery, completing the catalogue would take over 1,000 years - but new techniques such as DNA bar-coding could speed things up.

The scientists say they do not expect their calculations to mark the end of this line of inquiry, and are looking to peers to refine methods and conclusions.

One who has already looked through the paper is Professor Jonathan Baillie, director of conservation programmes at the Zoological Society of London (ZSL).

"I think it's definitely a creative and innovative approach, but like every other method there are potential biases and I think it's probably a conservative figure," he told BBC News.

"But it's such a high figure that it wouldn't really matter if it's out by one or two million either way.

"It is really picking up this point that we know very little about the species with which we share the planet; and we are converting the Earth's natural landscapes so quickly, with total ignorance of our impact on the life in them."

If you haven't joined us already, please 'like' Rockford's Rock Opera on Facebook. We've just hit 500 fans. Thanks everyone and please do stop by and say hello.

Here!! :-)  

Here's a lovely Review of Rockford's Rock Opera from Inside the Wendy House - a lovely blog for children and parents:

This is what they said :-)

Music is a fundamental part of life Inside the Wendy House.  From my own teenaged songstress, to my guitar playing husband to my all singing, all dancing little ones, not a moment goes by where our love of music does not figure in some way.

So when I was offered the chance to review Rockford's Rock Opera I was only too happy to be able to introduce something new into my home for my music loving family to enjoy.  I'm so glad I did.



Created by Sweetapple and written by comedian Steve Punt, it is an adventure like no other.  An amazing story where sound effects, narration, fantastic characters and wonderful songs combine to create a unique adventure in sound.  The central character is Rockford the dog.

The story tells us about the far, away Sea of Tranquility where the Island of Infinity lies.  Here is home to the last one of every extinct animal species, the world's lost creatures.  And they have a secret for the world!



The Rockford's Rock Opera is a triple CD pack.  The complete story of Rockford's Rock Opera is told in three parts.  Each enhanced CD features an animated video bringing the story to life and comes with a 24 page illustrated booklet featuring the song lyrics.  



The Rockford's Rock Opera is like an audio book which tells a beautiful story with great songs.  It is quite dark in parts but is ultimately about hope.  At two and a half hours long it is perfect for a long car journey (which is how we first listened to it!)  It is an entertaining tale with memorable tunes, fantastical creatures and great music.  "The Cocklebur Ick" song has become a family favourite with its catchy chorus!

The most powerful thing about this Rock Opera is the message contained within the songs.  The idea that we can learn so much from the world and its vast array of inhabitants, many of which have been around for millions of years. It reminds us of the tragedy of extinction.  It teaches us to respect our world, to listen, to look, to learn.  The power to save the planet is here...we just have to find it!  In these times when children are so clued up on the environment, this comes as a real breath of fresh air and food for thought about the future of our planet (albeit in a fictional, fantastical way!)

For more details, sample music and to buy a copy, check out their website.  For just £15.99 you could own this stunning piece of musical storytelling!

A big THANK YOU for such a lovely review! For more like this please subscribe to Inside the Wendy House

Spotted this sorry and thought I should share it with fans of Rockford's Rock Opera!

Certain dinosaurs may soon go extinct from the record books because they are duplicates of animals already on the books.

John Horner, a paleontologist at Montana State University in the USA, and others suspect that at least 50 dinosaurs on the record books now have been incorrectly identified.

Paleontologist Michael J. Benton at the University of Bristol in the UK said that up to 51.7% of all dinosaur species are mis-categorised.

H This means that more than half the species of dinosaurs ever named were in error!

Horner added that at present, "new" dinosaurs are discovered and named at a rate of one every two weeks. Thousands of dinosaurs are now on record, with many of them probably being duplicates of animals already on the books.

Horner, who has two dinosaurs named after him, is proposing that paleontologists follow a rigorous set of procedures known as the Unified Frame of Reference (UFR) when attempting to identify fossils.

The UFR will take into account microscopic analysis of the fossils, which uses technologies not available in the past.

It will also require detailed analysis of where the remains were found, how they appeared when first observed pre-excavation, how they compare to existing species, and more.

"The proposals by Horner are very important as a reminder of a problem paleontologists are aware of, but we still don't know if it will provide a 100% watertight solution that means we will never make mistakes about dinosaur species ever again," said Benton.

The study was reported in Science journal.

Part 3 of Rockford's Rock Opera - the award winning ecological audio book for all ages - has now been released as a iPhone / iPod Touch / iPad App!

And Android versions will be ready soon!

So there are now THREE Rockford's Rock Opera Apple Apps available:

Part One (over an hour of pictures, music, story and animation) is FREE!!!

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/id345554761?mt=8

Part Two (40 minutes with lots more) £2.99 / $4.99

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/id396897529?mt=8

Part Three (The best yet!) £2.99 / $4.99

http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/id429178855?mt=8

And Part Four is on its way soon.

We do hope you enjoy them! Perfect for the holidays!!


It's great to hear from you so, please join us on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/rockfordsrockopera

That's it for the moment.

As you may know, at Rockford's Rock Opera, we're supporters of the work of the World Wildlife fund. And one of the WWF's biggest annual events is Earth Hour - a chance to switch off for an hour.

Now, as the globe prepares to switch off for Earth Hour, cities across the world are leading the drive to take Earth Hour 2011 beyond the hour by committing to lasting environmental actions including:

• Sydney, Australia where actions include switching to LED lights in parks and streets
• Medellin, Colombia where long term water protection and tree planting initiatives form part of a commitment that goes "beyond 60 minutes"
• Shenyang, China where 38,000 hectares of land will be reforested
• And a race among Sweden's cities to be named the Earth Hour capital.

Earth Hour is well worth supporting and knowing more about. For more information visit earthhour.org

Rockford's Rock Opera, the award winning ecological musical App for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad, has hit the Top 10 of the App Book Charts.

 

At time of writing, Rockford's Rock Opera (Part 2) - £2.99 from the Apple App Store - is No 9 in the App Book Charts, beating other classic children's brands such as Mickey Mouse and The Three Little Pigs! And Rockford's Rock Opera (Part 1), which is free, is now at No 20 in the free charts.

 

Importantly, these chart positions have been achieved with no promotion on behalf of Rockford's creators. Word of mouth among children and parents has been the key.

 

With two further Parts now nearing completion, these are exciting times for Rockford's Rock Opera which recently passed another milestone, 1,000,000 story downloads from the www.RockfordsRockOpera.com website.

 

With a mixture of great music, clear narration, songs, animation and illustrations, together with information about the facts behind the story, Rockford's Rock Opera is the perfect app for all ages.

About Rockford's Rock Opera

Writing in The Times newspaper, children's audiobook reviewer, Christina Hardyment said:

"Rockford's Rock Opera is an amazing mix of story, songs and sound effects. It has a freshness that makes you smile as you listen and could become a cult favourite as beloved as Wallace and Gromit.

Created by Sweetapple and featuring and scripted by respected BBC writer and performer, Steve Punt, this is also a story is a story with an original ecological message - a unique 'take' on the threat of extinction and the effect man is having upon life on earth. The Rockford's Rock Opera website is full of fascinating information about the story and the facts behind the fiction.

 

To discover Rockford's Rock Opera, take a look at our website or search Rockford's Rock Opera in the Apple App store

Rockford's Rock Opera is the perfect Christmas audio book for all ages. Children and adults alike. Not only its there a Christmas, wintery feel to the story, complete with snow and magical happenings, it's an ecological tale of hope for all ages.

Here's the Guardian's Christmas audiobook review:

"For years I've distributed Christmas presents of Peter and the Wolf to small children starting flute/clarinet/piano lessons. This year I'm breaking new ground with this thoroughly modern musical for kids about a boy called Moog and a dog called Rockford...

Ingenious story, foot-tapping music and three booklets containing not just the lyrics so you can all sing along, but lots of quirky pictures of strange animals, sci-fi scenery, Battersea power station and other stuff that children think about while practising arpeggios."
Sue Arnold (The Guardian)

Of course, Rockford's Rock Opera isn't just for children learning music. Another who loves a good Christmas audio story and great music at Christmas will enjoy the adventure.

As The Times Best Kids Audiobooks for Christmas review said:

"Rockford's Rock Opera is an amazing mix of story, songs and sound effects. It has a freshness that makes you smile as you listen and could become a cult favourite as beloved as Wallace and Gromit."
Christina Hardyment (The Times)

But, as the Observer Review of the Best Audiobooks pointed out, the great thing about Rockford's Rock Opera is that you can sample an hour of the story free for Christmas. It's a free Christmas story online for everyone to enjoy this festive season.

Happy Christmas and welcome to Rockford's Rock Opera the best free children's audio book for Xmas!