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A new study has found that male humpback whales favor the largest females.

Female humpback whales are usually larger than males to begin with, measuring up to around 50 feet long and weighing approximately 79,000 pounds.

“While obesity is understandably a serious problem in humans, it is interesting to find that in some of the largest animals ever to exist, bigger is indeed better. Thus size does matter!” lead author Adam Pack, an assistant professor of psychology and biology at the University of Hawaii at Hilo, told Discovery News.

Pack, who is also the co-founder and vice president of The Dolphin Institute, and his research team made the determination after studying courting humpback whales for five consecutive years in the waters of the Auau, Kalohi and Pailolo channels off West Maui.

In winter and spring months, the whales assemble on shallow banks and along coastal areas for breeding and calving.

Since females produce a single calf every two to three years on average, and not all females migrate to breeding grounds, males usually far outnumber females at the sites.

Interested males serve as “escorts” for their female of choice, swimming in close proximity to her and, if present, her calf.

The males all gravitated to the largest females, sometimes engaging in dangerous fights to win and maintain the coveted escort position.

“The principal escort’s defensive behaviors include visual displays, such as lunging through the water with ventral throat grooves expanded, making the whale look visually larger, to screens of bubbles expelled from the blowhole or mouth, to chases and physical strikes, sometimes drawing blood from a rival,” Pack explained.

The researchers next measured each whale using both a hand-held sonar device and mathematical calculations based on angle of view and distance.

The scientists even donned snorkeler gear and swam around, and underneath, the courting whales.

Fitness appears to be behind the whales’ fondness for fat and long bodies, since the researchers also discovered that the largest females also produced the biggest calves.

Since whales depend upon stored body fat to support their metabolic requirements, particularly during the winter, the extra heft is necessary for their survival, promoting greater reproductive success and aiding females in the nursing of their offspring.

A new study has shown that “smart growth”, combined with the use of hybrid vehicle technology, could reduce cities’ carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions significantly by 2050.

According to Brian Stone, associate professor of City and Regional Planning, the research shows that expected levels of CO2 emissions from cars and trucks in 2050 could be reduced back to 2000 levels if the full vehicle fleet was converted to hybrid electric vehicles, such as the Toyota Prius or the soon-to-be released Chevy Volt.

This research also found that a doubling of population density in large U.S. cities by 2050 would have a greater impact on CO2 reductions than full hybridization of the vehicle fleet.

Stone’s study looked at 11 major metropolitan regions of the Midwestern U.S. over a 50-year period and took into account three different scenarios: the use of hybrid vehicles and two different urban growth scenarios through which population density was increased over time, a central component of smart growth planning.

“In this study, we looked at two general approaches on how to deal with the challenge of climate change,” said Stone.

“One approach is to improve vehicle technology and become more efficient. We can use less gas and reduce tailpipe emissions of CO2. The second approach is to change behavior by changing the way we design cities. We can travel less and take more walking and transit trips,” he added.

Stone said that it would be possible for virtually all cars on the roads by 2050 to be hybrid electric vehicles, assuming the costs of these vehicles become more competitive with conventional engine technologies.

Today’s hybrid electric vehicles can achieve 40 miles to the gallon and higher.

However, even the full hybridization of the national vehicle fleet by 2050 would not meet the CO2 targets identified though the Kyoto Protocol, an international climate change agreement which the United States has signed but not yet ratified.

To meet these global targets, CO2 emissions from all sectors on the U.S. would need to return to 1990 levels or lower.

According to Stone’s work, meeting this goal in the transportation sector would require a combination of technological improvements and higher density land use patterns in cities.

“If we can help cities to grow in more compact ways, what we call smart growth, it will help reduce emissions even further by allowing people to travel less often, travel shorter distances when they do travel and take advantage of public transit,” said Stone.

Indian Space Research Organisation Chairman G Madhavan Nair today said that European space consortium Arianespace would market home-grown rocket PSLV in Europe and maintained that ISRO does not see the latter as a long-term competitor.

“ISRO does not want to be a competitor of Arianespace. ISRO is looking for cooperation and collaboration with the European space community to evolve next generation of GSLV-Mk III,” he said.

“Similarly (in addition to marketing PSLV), some payloads which do not rightly suit their launcher (rocket), they (Arianespace) will deflect to us,” Nair, also Secretary in the Department of Space, said on the sidelines of an international seminar here.

Chairman and CEO of Arianespace, Jean-Yves Le Gall, who was also present, added “Cooperation (with ISRO) will centre around (marketing in Europe of) PSLV (ISRO’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle)”.

Since 1981, Arianespace has launched 13 of ISRO’s satellites. It is slated to launch INSAT-4G towards the end of this year.

Beyond that, barring one or two launches for which ISRO may have to go to Arianespace, Indian space agency is expected to have all launches from Indian soil. Its first flight of GSLV-Mk III, which can carry four tonne class satellite, is expected next year and this rocket is slated to be operational after the first two flights.

Ever wondered why you’ve that recurring dream about being chased or ending up back in the classroom at school? Well, a researcher has come forward to solve the mystery.

Finnish researcher Antti Revonsuo reckons it is your link to when wild animals chased our cavemen ancestors and without them we could be wiped out.

According to Revonsuo, people have inherited the dreams - based on a primitive need to survive - because they train their brains to cope with tricky situations today, reports the Sun.

He says: “It’s pretty certain that our ancestors did dream because dreaming seems to be biologically programmed into our brain, and the brain that our ancestors had was pretty much identical to ours.

“We know that our ancestors lived in an environment which was full of all sorts of fatal dangers.

“The nature of bad dreams and nightmares is that they contain threatening events and force us to go through those simulated threatening events.

“So, in the waking world, when we encounter similar or different kinds of threatening events then we are more prepared to survive when we have been training for them in our dreams.

“Although we may dread our nightmares, they help us deal with the day ahead. So as a species we should be thankful for these fearsome visions.

“They are a good thing. Without nightmares and bad dreams, there is a good chance humanity wouldn’t be here.”