Principia Discordia

Principia Discordia => Techmology and Scientism => Topic started by: Kai on July 30, 2008, 10:04:06 PM

Title: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 30, 2008, 10:04:06 PM
July 30, 2008

The Nature of Glass Remains Anything but Clear

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

It is well known that panes of stained glass in old European churches are thicker at the bottom because glass is a slow-moving liquid that flows downward over centuries.

Well known, but wrong. Medieval stained glass makers were simply unable to make perfectly flat panes, and the windows were just as unevenly thick when new.

The tale contains a grain of truth about glass resembling a liquid, however. The arrangement of atoms and molecules in glass is indistinguishable from that of a liquid. But how can a liquid be as strikingly hard as glass?

http://snipurl.com/37ch9

AIDS Deaths Down 10 Percent in 2007

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The number of AIDS deaths worldwide dropped 10 percent in 2007 because of increasing access to treatment, as did the number of new infections in children, the United Nations reported today.

Condom use and prevention efforts increased in many countries and adolescent sex declined in some of the most heavily affected regions, the report says.

... Despite these gains, however, the overall number of new infections during the year remained constant at about 2.7 million, fueled by increases in countries including China, Indonesia, Kenya, Mozambique, Russia and Vietnam.

http://snipurl.com/37cjj

Canadian Arctic Sheds Ice Chunk

from BBC News Online

A large chunk of an Arctic ice shelf has broken free of the northern Canadian coast, scientists say.

Nearly 20 sq km (eight sq miles) of ice from the Ward Hunt shelf has split away from Ellesmere Island, according to satellite pictures. It is thought to be the biggest piece of ice shed in the region since 60 sq km of the nearby Ayles ice shelf broke away in 2005.

Scientists say further splitting could occur during the Arctic summer melt. The polar north is once again experiencing a rapid ice retreat this year, although many scientists doubt the record minimum extent of 4.13 million sq km (1.59 million sq miles) of sea-ice seen in 2007 will be beaten.

http://snipurl.com/37nlt 

When Play Becomes Work

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

It happens all the time: Two guys in a garage come up with a cool new technology—and dream of making it big. A thousand people take time off work to campaign for a visionary politician because they feel they are doing something to change the world. A million kids hit baseballs—and wonder what it would take to become a pro.

Then the brainiacs, volunteers and Little Leaguers grow up. What they did for fun becomes ... work. Paychecks and bonuses become the reasons to do things. Pink slips and demotions become the reasons not to do other things.

Psychologists have long been interested in what happens when people's internal drives are replaced by external motivations. A host of experiments have shown that when threats and rewards enter the picture, they tend to destroy the inner drives.

http://snipurl.com/37cmj

Experimental Alzheimer's Drug Shows Early Promise

from USA Today

CHICAGO (Associated Press)—For the first time, an experimental drug shows promise for halting the progression of Alzheimer's disease by taking a new approach: breaking up the protein tangles that clog victims' brains.

The encouraging results from the drug called Rember, reported Tuesday at a medical conference in Chicago, electrified a field battered by recent setbacks. The drug was developed by Singapore-based TauRx Therapeutics.

Even if bigger, more rigorous studies show it works, Rember is still several years away from being available, and experts warned against overexuberance. But they were excited.

http://snipurl.com/37cp6

Ancient Ocean Cooling Sparked a Biodiversity Boom

from National Geographic News

More than 400 million years ago, Earth's dramatically warmer sea temperatures plummeted to almost present-day levels, opening the door for a boom in biodiversity, new research shows.

The cooler seas—which occurred during the Ordovician period—created a more hospitable environment for a range of species, researchers say.

The find might also foreshadow a biodiversity crisis if the planet continues to warm due to climate change.

http://snipurl.com/37cub

Bees Help Police Close in on Serial Killers

from New Scientist

You might not think it, but bumblebees and serial killers have something in common: neither like to divulge their address and both tend to stay close to home. Now a study of the habits of one could be used to track down the other.

Geographical profiling (GP) is a technique used by the police to find serial offenders. The search is narrowed down using two common traits: most attacks happen fairly close to the perpetrator's home, but beyond a "buffer zone" that prevents the attacker being recognised or noticed by neighbours.

By mapping out the locations of crime scenes, police aim to identify the buffer zone and prioritise their search in this area.

http://snipurl.com/37cxr

Bracing the Satellite Infrastructure for a Solar Superstorm

from Scientific American

As night was falling across the Americas on Sunday, August 28, 1859, the phantom shapes of the auroras could already be seen overhead. From Maine to the tip of Florida, vivid curtains of light took the skies.

Startled Cubans saw the auroras directly overhead; ships' logs near the equator described crimson lights reaching halfway to the zenith. Many people thought their cities had caught fire. Scientific instruments around the world, patiently recording minute changes in Earth's magnetism, suddenly shot off scale, and spurious electric currents surged into the world's telegraph systems.

... The impact of the 1859 [solar] storm was muted only by the infancy of our technological civilization at that time. Were it to happen today, it could severely damage satellites, disable radio communications and cause continent-wide electrical blackouts that would require weeks or longer to recover from.

http://snipurl.com/37d17

Statins 'May Cut Dementia Risk'

from BBC News Online

Scientists have found further evidence that taking commonly used cholesterol-lowering statins may protect against dementia and memory loss.

The study, published in Neurology, found that statins—normally taken to reduce heart disease risk—may cut the risk of dementia by half.

The five-year project examined 1,674 Mexican Americans aged 60 and over at heightened risk of dementia. The Alzheimer's Research Trust said the research is "encouraging."

http://snipurl.com/37crl

The Web's Best 'Happy Birthday' Cards for NASA

from the Christian Science Monitor

NASA turned 50 yesterday. On July 29, 1958, President Dwight Eisenhower signed his name to the National Aeronautics and Space Act, creating the agency that brought man to the moon, satellites to distant planets, and landers to Mars.

No NASA milestone would be complete without tons of multimedia coverage.

So, to help ring in this golden jubilee, the Monitor has brought together some of the best multimedia NASA-birthday coverage from across the web.

http://snipurl.com/37d
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 31, 2008, 03:04:41 PM
Just a note on this thread:

I get an email with this sent from my graduate adviser weekly. Some of the news is fail, but most of it is fairly interesting. I don't know if you all care, but I'm putting it out there anyway.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cramulus on July 31, 2008, 03:35:21 PM
Very interesting reading! Thanks Kai!

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on July 31, 2008, 04:31:33 PM
QuoteWhen Play Becomes Work

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

It happens all the time: Two guys in a garage come up with a cool new technology—and dream of making it big. A thousand people take time off work to campaign for a visionary politician because they feel they are doing something to change the world. A million kids hit baseballs—and wonder what it would take to become a pro.

Then the brainiacs, volunteers and Little Leaguers grow up. What they did for fun becomes ... work. Paychecks and bonuses become the reasons to do things. Pink slips and demotions become the reasons not to do other things.

Psychologists have long been interested in what happens when people's internal drives are replaced by external motivations. A host of experiments have shown that when threats and rewards enter the picture, they tend to destroy the inner drives.

http://snipurl.com/37cmj

This is the one that interests me the most... and how it seems to run counter to the IDEAL of "I want a job where I'm doing something I like."

Is all action-for-pay doomed to become "work" even if we enjoyed the action before we got paid for it?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Daruko on July 31, 2008, 04:43:16 PM
Good thread.  Interesting articles.   I'll add to it, if you don't mind.

3D Printing for the Masses
http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/21152/?a=f (http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/21152/?a=f)
Shapeways, a new online service, aims to bring customized manufacturing to the masses by allowing consumers to submit digital designs of products that are then printed, using 3-D printers, and shipped back, at prices typically between $50 and $150.

While some 3-D printing services already exist, they are geared to professionals familiar with rendering designs in software suitable for 3-D printers. Shapeways makes this process far easier. Its proprietary software checks customers' designs to ensure that they are printable, and it tweaks them if necessary.


Gene surveys identify schizophrenia triggers
http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080730/full/news.2008.994.html (http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080730/full/news.2008.994.html)
Researchers in two large-scale multinational studies have found that rare genetic changes are associated with an increased risk of schizophrenia.

The International Schizophrenia Consortium studied the genomes of 3,391 patients with schizophrenia, looking for a specific type of genetic error called a "copy number variation (CNV)," in which a section of the genome has been deleted or duplicated. In the other study, the SCENE consortium cataloged all the CNVs between 15,000 parents and their children and looked for matches with the CNVs of over 4,600 schizophrenia patients.

Both studies found genetic deletions in chromosomes 1, 15 and 22. These deletions are associated with a greatly increased risk of schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia affects around 1 in every 100 people at some point during their lives. Genetic factors are thought to account for more than 70% of cases.


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on July 31, 2008, 04:50:58 PM
QuoteWhen Play Becomes Work

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

It happens all the time: Two guys in a garage come up with a cool new technology—and dream of making it big. A thousand people take time off work to campaign for a visionary politician because they feel they are doing something to change the world. A million kids hit baseballs—and wonder what it would take to become a pro.

Then the brainiacs, volunteers and Little Leaguers grow up. What they did for fun becomes ... work. Paychecks and bonuses become the reasons to do things. Pink slips and demotions become the reasons not to do other things.

Psychologists have long been interested in what happens when people's internal drives are replaced by external motivations. A host of experiments have shown that when threats and rewards enter the picture, they tend to destroy the inner drives.

http://snipurl.com/37cmj

This is the one that interests me the most... and how it seems to run counter to the IDEAL of "I want a job where I'm doing something I like."

Is all action-for-pay doomed to become "work" even if we enjoyed the action before we got paid for it?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 31, 2008, 05:54:37 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 30, 2008, 10:04:06 PM
When Play Becomes Work

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

It happens all the time: Two guys in a garage come up with a cool new technology—and dream of making it big. A thousand people take time off work to campaign for a visionary politician because they feel they are doing something to change the world. A million kids hit baseballs—and wonder what it would take to become a pro.

Then the brainiacs, volunteers and Little Leaguers grow up. What they did for fun becomes ... work. Paychecks and bonuses become the reasons to do things. Pink slips and demotions become the reasons not to do other things.

Psychologists have long been interested in what happens when people's internal drives are replaced by external motivations. A host of experiments have shown that when threats and rewards enter the picture, they tend to destroy the inner drives.

http://snipurl.com/37cmj

This is especially interesting to me because it may help explain why so many full-time lampers I know find their creativity and production stifled by doing custom work.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on July 31, 2008, 09:12:09 PM
Quote from: Daruko on July 31, 2008, 04:43:16 PM
Good thread.  Interesting articles.   I'll add to it, if you don't mind.

3D Printing for the Masses
http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/21152/?a=f (http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/21152/?a=f)
Shapeways, a new online service, aims to bring customized manufacturing to the masses by allowing consumers to submit digital designs of products that are then printed, using 3-D printers, and shipped back, at prices typically between $50 and $150.

While some 3-D printing services already exist, they are geared to professionals familiar with rendering designs in software suitable for 3-D printers. Shapeways makes this process far easier. Its proprietary software checks customers' designs to ensure that they are printable, and it tweaks them if necessary.


Gene surveys identify schizophrenia triggers
http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080730/full/news.2008.994.html (http://www.nature.com/news/2008/080730/full/news.2008.994.html)
Researchers in two large-scale multinational studies have found that rare genetic changes are associated with an increased risk of schizophrenia.

The International Schizophrenia Consortium studied the genomes of 3,391 patients with schizophrenia, looking for a specific type of genetic error called a "copy number variation (CNV)," in which a section of the genome has been deleted or duplicated. In the other study, the SCENE consortium cataloged all the CNVs between 15,000 parents and their children and looked for matches with the CNVs of over 4,600 schizophrenia patients.

Both studies found genetic deletions in chromosomes 1, 15 and 22. These deletions are associated with a greatly increased risk of schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia affects around 1 in every 100 people at some point during their lives. Genetic factors are thought to account for more than 70% of cases.



What, he's good for something!  No fucking way!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 01, 2008, 02:09:16 AM
Guess it was (semi) daily and not weekly. so, postings whenever I get them.

July 31, 2008
As Olympics Near, Beijing Still Can't Beat Pollution

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

BEIJING -- Despite removing 1.5 million cars from the roads, shutting down hundreds of factories and construction sites and bringing much of the city's economic life to a standstill, Beijing remains stubbornly shrouded in a persistent, gray haze on the eve of the Summer Olympics.

The poor air quality just 11 days before the opening ceremonies has left Chinese government officials scrambling for explanations that include statistical anomalies and the 90-plus-degree heat.

The state-run China Daily reported Monday that the Chinese government may be forced to implement an "emergency plan" if air quality hasn't improved 48 hours before the Games begin Aug. 8. One possible measure would expand the recently implemented system that allows cars on the road only on odd or even days, depending on license plate numbers, to a ban of up to 90 percent of private traffic.

http://snipurl.com/37ot1

Eclipses in Ancient China Spurred Science, Beheadings?

from National Geographic News

The Olympics aren't the only epic event occurring in China next month. A total solar eclipse, the first since 2006, will turn day to night on Friday, the first of August.

The eclipse will also be visible in parts of northern Canada, Greenland (Denmark), Siberia (Russia), and Mongolia. Many Chinese will celebrate the celestial event with parties and viewing festivities—but it wasn't always so.

The Chinese have a long, sophisticated history of charting the skies and have recorded eclipses for thousands of years. The events were once considered ill omens and, if the ancient records are to be believed, dramatic eclipses may have caused more than one unfortunate astrologer to lose his head.

http://snipurl.com/37tm1

Thin Films: Ready for Their Close-Up?

from Nature News

From the 1950s onwards, big chunks of crystalline silicon have dominated the world of solar cells. But the dominance of these traditional cells—which make up 90 percent of today's 10-gigawatt-a-year installation market—is now being challenged by 'thin-film' solar cells that are micrometres or mere nanometres thick, and frequently made of materials other than silicon.

Some argue that such a change in technology is the only way that solar-cell technology can hope to maintain the 50 percent annual growth it has enjoyed during the past five years.

... Most thin-film cells sold today still use silicon, but in its amorphous, rather than crystalline, form. This makes the cells thin and cheap but costs them half or more of their efficiency compared with traditional designs. The hope, and to some extent the hype, is focused on new technologies.

http://snipurl.com/37tom

Nature's Chronic Boozers

from Science News

Out boozing for several hours every night—that would be drinking like a tree shrew. Except the tree shrews can scurry a straight line afterward.

The pentailed tree shrews (Ptilocercus lowii) of Malaysia average more than two hours each night sipping palm nectar that has naturally fermented, report Frank Wiens of the University of Bayreuth in Germany and his colleagues in the July 29 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"This is the first recorded case of chronic alcohol consumption by a wild mammal," Wiens says. ... But tree shrews may not have the same metabolism as humans when it comes to detoxifying alcohol.

http://snipurl.com/37tr1

After the Tragedy: Vent? Not Necessarily

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

"The more [Virginia Tech students] can talk about what they've lived through, the more that they can be encouraged to emote ... that gives them some security and insulation against burying those feelings and then having them surprise them later in life."

In the aftermath of the April 16, 2007, fatal shootings of 32 students and faculty at Virginia Tech, [Keith] Ablow was simply voicing post-Freudian conventional wisdom: When something horrible happens, vent.

... But hold on a minute. That has simply not been proved true for all people in all circumstances, [Mark] Seery says. His most recent research, in the June issue of Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, shows that after a large-scale traumatic event, such as the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, quickly talking about one's emotions isn't necessarily for the best.

http://snipurl.com/37ouv

Termite Bellies and Biofuels

from Smithsonian Magazine

Falk Warnecke peered down through a mounted magnifying glass and poked gently at a small pile of bugs. ... With a pair of fine-tipped forceps, he grabbed one of the insects at the base of its thorax and lifted it off the block. It was brown, and hardly bigger than an eyelash. With a second forceps, he pinched the end of its abdomen. He tugged gently, and pulled it in two. A shiny, reddish string slid smoothly out of the exoskeleton.

... The gut has bulbous chambers that are swollen with vast quantities of microbes that the termites employ to break down cellulose from the wood or grass the insects consume. When he's not calling termites "cute little animals," he refers to them as "walking bioreactors," and considers their juicy interiors a kind of liquid gold.

For now, he's interested only in the biggest bulb on the string, what's known as the third proctodeal segment, or, in the vernacular of microbial ecology, the "hindgut paunch." This microliter-sized compartment ... is home to a distinct community of microbes that some people think may help solve the energy crisis.

http://snipurl.com/37tt5

Scientists Confirm Liquid Lake, Beach on Saturn's Moon Titan

from Scientific American

Just in time for a summer holiday, scientists have discovered the solar system's newest beach destination. Too bad there's no way to get there—at least not easily. Researchers report in Nature today that they identified a dark liquid lake, surrounded by a lighter shoreline and a "beach," on the surface of Saturn's moon Titan.

The foot-shaped lake is the first verified extraterrestrial body of liquid, and is likely filled with hydrocarbons, simple compounds also common on Earth.

"This is the first definitive evidence for both liquid and liquid hydrocarbons on Titan," says lead study author Robert Brown, a professor of planetary science at the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory (LPL) in Tucson.

http://snipurl.com/37tw2

Gene Mutations Reveal Schizophrenia's Complexity

from New Scientist

The three largest genetic schizophrenia studies to date have uncovered several ways in which changes to the genome may increase the risk of developing the mental disorder.

The studies bring to light several common variations that increase the risk slightly, and rarer ones that raise it significantly, researchers say.

While previous studies have suggested several genes with roles in schizophrenia, small sample sizes gave these findings limited statistical significance. Most recently, differences in copy number variations (CNVs) ... were identified between healthy and schizophrenic people. But the study was too small to implicate specific CNVs in causing the disease.

http://snipurl.com/37txk

Ancient Greek 'Computer' Displayed Olympics Calendar

from the Guardian (UK)

An ancient Greek "computer" used to calculate the movements of the sun, moon and planets has been linked to Archimedes after scientists deciphered previously hidden inscriptions on the device.

X-ray images of the bronze mechanism, which was recovered from a shipwreck more than a century ago, also revealed a sporting calendar that displays the cycle of the prestigious "crown" games, including the Olympics, which were held every four years.

Corroded remains of the device were found in 1901 by spongedivers, who happened upon the shipwreck of a Roman merchant vessel while sheltering from a storm near the tiny Greek island of Antikythera. The ship, which was laden with treasures from the Greek world including bronze statues, pottery and glassware, is believed to have met its fate in the notoriously dangerous stretch of water en route to Italy.

http://snipurl.com/37u1a

Not Quite Rocketeer, but Jet Pack's a Start

from the Seattle Times

OSHKOSH, Wis. — This isn't how a jet pack is supposed to look, is it?

Hollywood has envisioned jet packs as upside-down fire extinguishers strapped to people's backs. But Glenn Martin's invention is more unwieldy: a 250-pound piano-size contraption that people settle into rather than strap on.

As thousands watched Tuesday, the New Zealand inventor's 16-year-old son donned a helmet, fastened himself to a prototype Martin jet pack and revved the engine, which sounded like a motorcycle. Harrison Martin eased about 3 feet off the ground, the engine roaring with a whine so loud that some kids covered their ears.

http://snipurl.com/37u47
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: singer on August 01, 2008, 02:56:48 AM
Quote from: LMNO on July 31, 2008, 04:50:58 PM

This is the one that interests me the most... and how it seems to run counter to the IDEAL of "I want a job where I'm doing something I like."

Is all action-for-pay doomed to become "work" even if we enjoyed the action before we got paid for it?


Probably in sombunal cases generally,  but certainly in mosbunal cases where the standards for approval are raised as soon as money changes hands.

All those little girls who like to play with hair and little boys who like to mess with engines get tons of praise and encouragement as long as they are giving haircuts and cleaning carburetors for free, but as soon as their friends have to pay for the service, they become critical and demanding, and that sucks all the fun out of it because that was the pay off... the praise.... the rush of being validated by others.

Given enough adjustment time sombunal make the transition to a monetary pay off.  It probably isn't as inherently gratifying as all the validating praise, but at least they're making money doing what they USED to do for the love of it.

As opposed to doing something they outright loathe to make money.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 01, 2008, 07:05:24 AM
You know, not as a criticism of you specifically, but just in general, "Some" already does not mean "all", and neither does "Most". I have always thought those were the lamest attempts at new vocabulary.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on August 01, 2008, 10:18:13 AM
Quote from: Nigel on August 01, 2008, 07:05:24 AM
You know, not as a criticism of you specifically, but just in general, "Some" already does not mean "all", and neither does "Most". I have always thought those were the lamest attempts at new vocabulary.

Yes. If people are too stupid to realize that, they should not be on the internet, or go outside without adult supervision.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: singer on August 01, 2008, 11:33:31 AM
Quote from: Cain on August 01, 2008, 10:18:13 AM


Yes. If people are too stupid to realize that, they should not be on the internet, or go outside without adult supervision.

...and yet... there they are.... all the time, looking for their little nitpicky points to score so they can start a 'lamewar' in order to feel somehow superior.  Hence the pre-emptive linguistic "I already SAID "not all" so that maybe a conversational concept could be furthered without the need for everyone to stop and wet their pance at the incredible unique special specialness of whoever is gonna jump in first and say "I'm not most people".

Meh.  I blame it on the text message generation.

(edit=typo)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on August 01, 2008, 01:07:24 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 11:33:31 AMMeh.  I blame it on the text message generation.

what?

- triplezero,
text message generation
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: singer on August 01, 2008, 01:33:35 PM
Quote from: triple zero on August 01, 2008, 01:07:24 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 11:33:31 AMMeh.  I blame it on the text message generation.

what?

- triplezero,
text message generation

If you were a real thumbtyper that would have been "wht".... or just "?"  (ok.. maybe "???")
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on August 01, 2008, 01:33:40 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 11:33:31 AM
Quote from: Cain on August 01, 2008, 10:18:13 AM


Yes. If people are too stupid to realize that, they should not be on the internet, or go outside without adult supervision.

...and yet... there they are.... all the time, looking for their little nitpicky points to score so they can start a 'lamewar' in order to feel somehow superior.  Hence the pre-emptive linguistic "I already SAID "not all" so that maybe a conversational concept could be furthered without the need for everyone to stop and wet their pance at the incredible unique special specialness of whoever is gonna jump in first and say "I'm not most people".

Meh.  I blame it on the text message generation.

(edit=typo)

They'll do it anyway.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 01, 2008, 02:03:53 PM
Quote from: Nigel on August 01, 2008, 07:05:24 AM
You know, not as a criticism of you specifically, but just in general, "Some" already does not mean "all", and neither does "Most". I have always thought those were the lamest attempts at new vocabulary.


The redundancy, I feel, is there to underscore the fact that the following will be conditional.  Many people (but not all of them, lol) glaze over standard conditional phrases and jump to the assumption that a blanket statement is being made.  Sombunal and Mosbunal are, to me, good ways of clarifying.

But don't use it if you don't want to.  I don't care.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 01, 2008, 02:21:40 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/01/world/asia/01algae.html

Story about the huge algal bloom in China. I can't find the species name but it seems to be one of the more prolific marine greens (Division: Chlorophyta). If it was a bluegreen (Division: Cyanophyta), the other group that tends to have these massive filamentous blooms, the toxins coming off this bloom would have been highly destructive, kinda like dinoflagellates can do (Division: Dinophyta). The only recorded people ever killed by algae were two kids done in by bluegreen toxins.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on August 01, 2008, 02:55:21 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 01:33:35 PM
Quote from: triple zero on August 01, 2008, 01:07:24 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 11:33:31 AMMeh.  I blame it on the text message generation.

what?

- triplezero,
text message generation

If you were a real thumbtyper that would have been "wht".... or just "?"  (ok.. maybe "???")

stop playing dumb. there is no significant character limit on forum posts. you're generalizing retardedness and laziness over an entire generation.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Daruko on August 01, 2008, 03:13:20 PM
Quote from: triple zero on August 01, 2008, 02:55:21 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 01:33:35 PM
Quote from: triple zero on August 01, 2008, 01:07:24 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 11:33:31 AMMeh.  I blame it on the text message generation.

what?

- triplezero,
text message generation

If you were a real thumbtyper that would have been "wht".... or just "?"  (ok.. maybe "???")

stop playing dumb. there is no significant character limit on forum posts. you're generalizing retardedness and laziness over an entire generation.

:kingmeh:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: singer on August 01, 2008, 03:46:26 PM
Quote from: triple zero on August 01, 2008, 02:55:21 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 01:33:35 PM
Quote from: triple zero on August 01, 2008, 01:07:24 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 11:33:31 AMMeh.  I blame it on the text message generation.

what?

- triplezero,
text message generation

If you were a real thumbtyper that would have been "wht".... or just "?"  (ok.. maybe "???")

stop playing dumb. there is no significant character limit on forum posts. you're generalizing retardedness and laziness over an entire generation.

I don't think I am.  What I am saying is that the habit of reducing full sentences to acronymic representation is a function of a habit promulgated through the use of certain technologies, and you will find this habit adopted most readily by the grouping of individuals employing said technologies.

I'm pretty sure there are ample examples of laziness and retardation throughout a broad cross section of all generations.

(edited for clarity)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 01, 2008, 05:18:01 PM
Quote from: Cain on August 01, 2008, 10:18:13 AM
Quote from: Nigel on August 01, 2008, 07:05:24 AM
You know, not as a criticism of you specifically, but just in general, "Some" already does not mean "all", and neither does "Most". I have always thought those were the lamest attempts at new vocabulary.

Yes. If people are too stupid to realize that, they should not be on the internet, or go outside without adult supervision.

Yeah, I just feel like it just encourages lazy reading and degenerating reading comprehension levels when the writer uses made-up words as replacements for already-existing words that mean the same thing, just because many people are too lazy to learn to read carefully and thoroughly.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 01, 2008, 05:19:25 PM
Quote from: LMNO on August 01, 2008, 02:03:53 PM
Quote from: Nigel on August 01, 2008, 07:05:24 AM
You know, not as a criticism of you specifically, but just in general, "Some" already does not mean "all", and neither does "Most". I have always thought those were the lamest attempts at new vocabulary.


The redundancy, I feel, is there to underscore the fact that the following will be conditional.  Many people (but not all of them, lol) glaze over standard conditional phrases and jump to the assumption that a blanket statement is being made.  Sombunal and Mosbunal are, to me, good ways of clarifying.

But don't use it if you don't want to.  I don't care.

It's just been a peeve that's been stewing for a while, since I first encountered the terms in November. I just finally had to let it out. I'm done now.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 01, 2008, 06:38:00 PM
Quote from: Nigel on August 01, 2008, 05:18:01 PM
Quote from: Cain on August 01, 2008, 10:18:13 AM
Quote from: Nigel on August 01, 2008, 07:05:24 AM
You know, not as a criticism of you specifically, but just in general, "Some" already does not mean "all", and neither does "Most". I have always thought those were the lamest attempts at new vocabulary.

Yes. If people are too stupid to realize that, they should not be on the internet, or go outside without adult supervision.

Yeah, I just feel like it just encourages lazy reading and degenerating reading comprehension levels when the writer uses made-up words as replacements for already-existing words that mean the same thing, just because many people are too lazy to learn to read carefully and thoroughly.

But the thing is, usually those words are used because people are too lazy to learn to read carefully and thoroughly.  Using an unusual word pokes the reader into acknowledging the specific meaning of the sentence.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 01, 2008, 06:48:12 PM
Quote from: LMNO on August 01, 2008, 06:38:00 PM
Quote from: Nigel on August 01, 2008, 05:18:01 PM
Quote from: Cain on August 01, 2008, 10:18:13 AM
Quote from: Nigel on August 01, 2008, 07:05:24 AM
You know, not as a criticism of you specifically, but just in general, "Some" already does not mean "all", and neither does "Most". I have always thought those were the lamest attempts at new vocabulary.

Yes. If people are too stupid to realize that, they should not be on the internet, or go outside without adult supervision.

Yeah, I just feel like it just encourages lazy reading and degenerating reading comprehension levels when the writer uses made-up words as replacements for already-existing words that mean the same thing, just because many people are too lazy to learn to read carefully and thoroughly.

But the thing is, usually those words are used because people are too lazy to learn to read carefully and thoroughly.  Using an unusual word pokes the reader into acknowledging the specific meaning of the sentence.

...creating an endless self-perpetuating cycle of laziness and words designed to stimulate the lazy...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 01, 2008, 06:48:38 PM
August 1, 2008
Test of Mars Soil Sample Confirms Presence of Ice

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Heated to 32 degrees Fahrenheit, a sample of soil being analyzed by NASA's Phoenix Mars lander let out a puff of vapor, providing final confirmation that the lander is sitting over a large chunk of ice.

"We've now finally touched it and tasted it," William V. Boynton, a professor at the Lunar and Planetary Laboratory at the University of Arizona and the lead scientist for the instrument that detected the water, said at a news conference on Thursday. "And I'd like to say, from my standpoint, it tastes very fine."

The main goal of the lander is to analyze ice in the northern arctic plains. Since it arrived on the planet on May 25, scientists have visually seen what they were almost certain was ice: a flat, shiny patch beneath the lander and tiny white chunks in a trench dug by the lander's robotic arm.

http://snipurl.com/38uhg

Alarm Raised on Security Flaw in Internet's Basic Structure

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

Since a secret emergency meeting of computer security experts at Microsoft's headquarters in March, Dan Kaminsky has been urging companies around the world to fix a potentially dangerous flaw in the basic plumbing of the Internet.

While Internet service providers are racing to fix the problem, which makes it possible for criminals to divert computer users to fake Web sites where personal and financial information can be stolen, Kaminsky worries that they have not moved quickly enough.

By his estimate, roughly 41 percent of the Internet is still vulnerable. Now Kaminsky, a technical consultant who first discovered the problem, has been ramping up the pressure on companies and organizations to make the necessary software changes before criminal hackers take advantage of the flaw. Next week, he will take another step by publicly laying out the details of the flaw at a security conference in Las Vegas.

http://snipurl.com/37u6i

Ancient T. Rex Tissue, or Just Old Slime?

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Soft, organic material discovered inside a Tyrannosaurus rex fossil that scientists believed was 70-million-year-old dinosaur tissue may have been nothing more than ordinary slime, scientists said in a study published Wednesday.

Researchers reported in the online journal PLoS ONE that bacterial colonies infiltrating tiny cavities in the bones long after the dinosaurs died may have naturally molded into shapes resembling the tissues they replaced. Carbon dating performed on one sample showed that the tissue-like material was modern, circa 1960.

After further examination with light and electron microscopy, researchers concluded that the substances were most likely remnants of biofilms, or layers of bacterial cells and the sticky molecules they secrete. The finding sparked a strong response from the researchers who originally said they had found ancient dinosaur tissue.

http://snipurl.com/38fzx

Drug Gives Couch Potato Mice Benefits of a Workout

from the San Francisco Examiner

NEW YORK (Associated Press) - Here's a couch potato's dream: What if a drug could help you gain some of the benefits of exercise without working up a sweat? Scientists reported Thursday that there is such a drug - if you happen to be a mouse.

Sedentary mice that took the drug for four weeks burned more calories and had less fat than untreated mice. And when tested on a treadmill, they could run about 44 percent farther and 23 percent longer than untreated mice.

Just how well those results might translate to people is an open question. But someday, researchers say, such a drug might help treat obesity, diabetes and people with medical conditions that keep them from exercising.

http://snipurl.com/38g1e

Geological Mapping Gets Joined Up

from BBC News Online

The world's geologists have dug out their maps and are sticking them together produce the first truly global resource of the world's rocks.

The OneGeology project pools existing data about what lies under our feet and has made it available on the web. Led by the British Geological Survey (BGS), the project involved geologists from 80 nations.

Between 60 percent and 70 percent of the Earth's surface is now available down to the scale of 1:1,000,000. "That's 1cm for every 10km of the Earth's surface," explained Ian Jackson from the BGS and leader of the OneGeology Project. "With that resolution, people can focus in on a small part of their city."

http://snipurl.com/38g5w

FDA Finds Salmonella Strain on Mexican Pepper Farm

from USA Today

The Food and Drug Administration came closer Wednesday to cracking the mystery of a massive salmonella outbreak with a finding of contaminated serrano peppers and irrigation water on a farm in Mexico.

The FDA said consumers should avoid fresh serrano peppers from Mexico and products containing them. It also reiterated its earlier warning that consumers avoid fresh jalapeno peppers from Mexico.

The new findings lend weight to the FDA's theory that several foods may be causing the outbreak, which has sickened more than 1,300 people nationwide since April. They also are the case's first positive samples of the rare salmonella saintpaul strain found in Mexico, a major chile pepper supplier to the USA.

http://snipurl.com/38g4j

Stem Cell Advance Turns Skin Cells into Nerve Cells

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Researchers are one step closer to reprogramming skin cells into tailor-made, healthy replacements for diseased cells.

Applying the technique first developed by James Thomson of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University, scientists at Harvard and Columbia universities reported online Thursday in the journal Science that they had turned skin cells from two elderly patients with the neurodegenerative disorder amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) into motor neurons, the nerve cells that become damaged in ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease.

This is the first time that scientists have coaxed embryonic-like cells from adult patients suffering from a genetic-based disease, then induced the cells to form the specific cell types that would be needed to study and treat the disease.

http://snipurl.com/38ujo

Big Bang Ripples Formed Universe's First Stars

from National Geographic News

Ripples in the early universe following the big bang 13.7 billion years ago caused gases to coalesce into the luminous seeds of the first stars, a new computer simulation reveals.

Such stellar embryos, or protostars, were the universe's first astronomical objects and its first sources of light.

Previous telescope observations have shown that very distant—and thus very old—cosmic objects contain heavy elements such as carbon and iron, which are formed only by the nuclear reactions inside full-grown stars. This suggests that massive stars must have existed even earlier in the universe's history than telescopes can see. Until now, the earliest stages of primordial star formation had not been modeled in detail.

http://snipurl.com/38ghn

Wake-Up Call for Sleep Apnea

from Science News

A common breathing disorder that disrupts sleep also, over time, increases the risk of death, a study in the August Sleep suggests. But people who use a nighttime breathing apparatus face less risk, the research shows.

Obstructive sleep apnea is a disorder marked by gaps in breathing during sleep that rob the blood of oxygen until a person gasps for air. People with apnea stop breathing many times in an hour, which can jar them out of restful sleep and wreak havoc with blood pressure, heart rate and internal stress responses.

In the United States, about one in six people may have sleep apnea, with one-fourth of those cases severe, Terry Young, an epidemiologist at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, estimates.

http://snipurl.com/38ull

Anthrax Scientist Commits Suicide as FBI Closes In

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- A top U.S. biodefense researcher apparently committed suicide just as the Justice Department was about to file criminal charges against him in the anthrax mailings that traumatized the nation in the weeks following the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, according to a published report.

The scientist, Bruce E. Ivins, 62, who worked for the past 18 years at the government's biodefense labs at Fort Detrick, Md., had been told about the impending prosecution, the Los Angeles Times reported for Friday editions. The laboratory has been at the center of the FBI's investigation of the anthrax attacks, which killed five people.

Ivins died Tuesday at Frederick Memorial Hospital in Maryland. The Times, quoting an unidentified colleague, said the scientist had taken a massive dose of a prescription Tylenol mixed with codeine. Tom Ivins, a brother of the scientist, told The Associated Press that another of his brothers, Charles, told him Bruce had committed suicide.

http://snipurl.com/38une


Also, whatever to the current discussion.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on August 01, 2008, 08:47:35 PM
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jul/31/energyefficiency.energy

Scientists have found an inexpensive way to produce hydrogen from water, a discovery that could lead to a plentiful source of environmentally friendly fuel to power homes and cars.

The technique, which mimics the way photosynthesis works in plants, also provides a highly efficient way to store energy, potentially paving the way to making solar power more economically viable.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on August 02, 2008, 01:15:29 PM
for those wondering about the security vuln in "the internet's basic structure":

http://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2008/07/the_dns_vulnera.html

gives a bit more detailed and interesting writeup about the event.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 02, 2008, 05:39:33 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on August 01, 2008, 08:47:35 PM
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jul/31/energyefficiency.energy

Scientists have found an inexpensive way to produce hydrogen from water, a discovery that could lead to a plentiful source of environmentally friendly fuel to power homes and cars.

The technique, which mimics the way photosynthesis works in plants, also provides a highly efficient way to store energy, potentially paving the way to making solar power more economically viable.

Thats actually really cool. Biologically inspired technology is the way of the future.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: rong on August 02, 2008, 07:48:57 PM
Quote from: singer on August 01, 2008, 03:46:26 PM
I don't think I am.  What I am saying is that the habit of reducing full sentences to acronymic representation is a function of a habit promulgated through the use of certain technologies, and you will find this habit adopted most readily by the grouping of individuals employing said technologies.

I'm pretty sure there are ample examples of laziness and retardation throughout a broad cross section of all generations.

(edited for clarity)

man, when i first discovered horseradish mustard, i put it on EVERYTHING.  after a while, i got tired of it. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Requia ☣ on August 02, 2008, 11:07:11 PM
My favorite part about the big internet vuln is that its apparently been known since before I was born, people just now got around to caring  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on August 03, 2008, 07:50:20 PM
Quote from: Requiem on August 02, 2008, 11:07:11 PMMy favorite part about the big internet vuln is that its apparently been known since before I was born, people just now got around to caring  :lulz:

no it's been around since the early days of the internet (which may have been before you were born), but it hasn't been discovered until about 6 months ago.

personally i'm more surprised by the fact that nobody ever noticed that Debian Linux never generated more than 32,768 distinct SSH keys for all these years (should have been into the several zillion billion trillions, but they made a bug. making everything very vulnerable. heh. it's fixed now.)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 04, 2008, 04:10:03 PM
August 4, 2008
Anthrax Case Renews Questions on Bioterror Effort

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON—Until the anthrax attacks of 2001, Bruce E. Ivins was one of just a few dozen American bioterrorism researchers working with the most lethal biological pathogens, almost all at high-security military laboratories.

Today, there are hundreds of such researchers in scores of laboratories at universities and other institutions around the United States, preparing for the next bioattack.

But the revelation that F.B.I. investigators believe that the anthrax attacks were carried out by Dr. Ivins, an Army biodefense scientist who committed suicide last week after he learned that he was about to be indicted for murder, has already re-ignited a debate: Has the unprecedented boom in biodefense research made the country less secure by multiplying the places and people with access to dangerous germs?

http://snipurl.com/3aimh

Instant-Messagers Really Are About Six Degrees from Kevin Bacon

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Turns out, it is a small world.  The "small world theory," embodied in the old saw that there are just "six degrees of separation" between any two strangers on Earth, has been largely corroborated by a massive study of electronic communication.

With records of 30 billion electronic conversations among 180 million people from around the world, researchers have concluded that any two people on average are distanced by just 6.6 degrees of separation, meaning that they could be linked by a string of seven or fewer acquaintances.

The database covered all of the Microsoft Messenger instant-messaging network in June 2006, or roughly half the world's instant-messaging traffic at that time, researchers said.

http://snipurl.com/3aju6

Sweet Peas Make a Second Skin

from the Guardian (UK)

Might sweet peas and a polymer help reduce disfiguring skin contractions after a skin graft? Sheila MacNeil, professor of tissue engineering at the University of Sheffield, thinks so. Thanks to a compound called beta-aminopropionitrile found in sweet peas, plastic surgeons may soon replace uncomfortable pressure garments with a drug-containing polymer gel.

MacNeil is also behind the development of an artificial skin scaffold. Now, she and her colleagues have turned to an ages-old problem with skin grafts that shrink, become lumpy and, for children with burns, give real problems as they grow.

She's combining polymer chemistry with tissue engineering—a technical challenge in itself—along with a desire to do something clinically useful.

http://snipurl.com/38g89

Stinging Tentacles Offer Hint of Oceans' Decline

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

BARCELONA, Spain—Blue patrol boats crisscross the swimming areas of beaches here with their huge nets skimming the water's surface. The yellow flags that urge caution and the red flags that prohibit swimming because of risky currents are sometimes topped now with blue ones warning of a new danger: swarms of jellyfish.

In a period of hours during a day a couple of weeks ago, 300 people on Barcelona's bustling beaches were treated for stings, and 11 were taken to hospitals.

From Spain to New York, to Australia, Japan and Hawaii, jellyfish are becoming more numerous and more widespread, and they are showing up in places where they have rarely been seen before, scientists say. ...
But while jellyfish invasions are a nuisance to tourists and a hardship to fishermen, for scientists they are a source of more profound alarm, a signal of the declining health of the world's oceans.

http://snipurl.com/3aimo

Inventors Flock to File Patents in U.S.

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

GENEVA (Associated Press)—The United States is again the favored destination to patent inventions after 43 years in which Japan and the now-defunct Soviet Union held the lead, a U.N. report said Thursday.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office received nearly a quarter of the 1.76 million patents filed worldwide in 2006—the latest years for which figures are available—according to the World Intellectual Property Organization, or WIPO.

The Soviet Union briefly overtook the U.S. in 1964 at a time when technology was seen as the key to winning the space race—not to mention more mundane battles back on Earth. By 1970 Japan eclipsed both the superpowers, holding onto its lead until 2005.

http://snipurl.com/38gec

Genetically Modified Olympians?

from the Economist

For as long as people have vied for sporting glory, they have also sought shortcuts to the champion's rostrum. Often, those shortcuts have relied on the assistance of doctors. After all, most doping involves little more than applying existing therapies to healthy bodies.

These days, however, the competition is so intense that existing therapies are not enough. Now, athletes in search of the physiological enhancement they need to take them a stride ahead of their opponents are scanning medicine's future, as well as its present. In particular, they are interested in a field known as gene therapy.

Gene therapy works by inserting extra copies of particular genes into the body. These extra copies, known as "transgenes," may cover for a broken gene or regulate gene activity. Though gene therapy has yet to yield a reliable medical treatment, more than 1,300 clinical trials are now under way. As that number suggests, the field is reckoned to be full of promise.

http://snipurl.com/38ggc

Rescued Dog Blazes a Surgical Trail

from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

Three years ago, Cassidy Posovsky was a three-legged German shepherd mix hobbling homeless around the Bronx. Thursday morning, he was a medical pioneer getting fitted with a cutting-edge prosthetic that could one day help thousands of veterans and others who lose limbs in trauma.

If all goes well, Cassidy's artificial leg will fuse into his bone, and he should be on all fours in months—paving the way for veterinary orthopedic surgeons at N.C. State University to start working with doctors for human implantation.

With more than 1.3 million veterans seeking prosthetics from the Department of Veterans Affairs each year, and more service members in Iraq and Afghanistan wounded every day, the need for improved limb-replacement technology is becoming more acute. Futuristic technologies such as computerized legs, microprocessor knees and bionic nerve systems have become top priorities of VA research.

http://snipurl.com/38x2c

Light Goes Out on Pioneer Machine

from BBC News Online

The pioneering Synchrotron Radiation Source (SRS) based at the Daresbury Laboratory in Warrington, UK, will be switched off on Monday.

The machine, which probed the structure of materials down to the molecular and atomic level, developed the technology now used in some 60 centres worldwide. Its X-ray science has been behind new drugs and electronics, and was used in Nobel-winning research on cell energy.

UK synchrotron studies have now moved to the Diamond centre in Oxfordshire. Daresbury's future is envisioned as an innovation super-centre, where scientific ideas can better make the leap to business.

http://snipurl.com/3aira

AIDS Survey Signals 'Downturn in Treatment'

from USA Today

Half of AIDS patients worldwide appear to be stopping their medication or failing to begin treatment because of side effects from therapy, researchers will report today.

The survey of nearly 3,000 patients from 18 countries in Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas represents a sweeping effort to track patient attitudes about their social concerns and treatment, with side effects ranging from disfiguring fatty deposits to drug toxicity to clogged arteries.

... A separate study, released over the weekend, shows that thousands more people are getting HIV each year than experts realized. "The epidemic is—and has been—worse than was previously known," says Kevin Fenton, of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The government's tally of the year-by-year impact of the AIDS epidemic offers the first clear picture of HIV in the USA. It appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

http://snipurl.com/3aivg

World's Smallest Snake Discovered, Study Says

from National Geographic News

The world's smallest snake—and perhaps the smallest possible snake—has been discovered on the Caribbean island of Barbados, a new study says.

At about ten centimeters long (less than four inches), the diminutive reptile might easily be mistaken for an earthworm, and could comfortably curl up on a U.S. quarter, researchers say.

A second new species, only slightly larger, was found on the neighboring island of St. Lucia. Genetic tests and studies of the snakes' physical features identified the animals as new species, said biologist Blair Hedges of Penn State university, who led the study team.

http://snipurl.com/3aize 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 04, 2008, 04:16:52 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 04, 2008, 04:10:03 PM

Stinging Tentacles Offer Hint of Oceans' Decline

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

BARCELONA, Spain—Blue patrol boats crisscross the swimming areas of beaches here with their huge nets skimming the water's surface. The yellow flags that urge caution and the red flags that prohibit swimming because of risky currents are sometimes topped now with blue ones warning of a new danger: swarms of jellyfish.

In a period of hours during a day a couple of weeks ago, 300 people on Barcelona's bustling beaches were treated for stings, and 11 were taken to hospitals.

From Spain to New York, to Australia, Japan and Hawaii, jellyfish are becoming more numerous and more widespread, and they are showing up in places where they have rarely been seen before, scientists say. ...
But while jellyfish invasions are a nuisance to tourists and a hardship to fishermen, for scientists they are a source of more profound alarm, a signal of the declining health of the world's oceans.

http://snipurl.com/3aimo


For some reason, the thought of swarms of jellyfish is awesome to me.  Yes, I know it sucks to be stung by one... I've been a victim.

So I dunno why, but... yeah.  I'd love to watch this happen.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Daruko on August 04, 2008, 05:08:20 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 04, 2008, 04:10:03 PM
Instant-Messagers Really Are About Six Degrees from Kevin Bacon

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Turns out, it is a small world.  The "small world theory," embodied in the old saw that there are just "six degrees of separation" between any two strangers on Earth, has been largely corroborated by a massive study of electronic communication.

With records of 30 billion electronic conversations among 180 million people from around the world, researchers have concluded that any two people on average are distanced by just 6.6 degrees of separation, meaning that they could be linked by a string of seven or fewer acquaintances.

The database covered all of the Microsoft Messenger instant-messaging network in June 2006, or roughly half the world's instant-messaging traffic at that time, researchers said.

http://snipurl.com/3aju6
RELATED:

In the "largest social network constructed and analyzed to date," Microsoft and Carnegie Mellon University researchers investigated (http://research.microsoft.com/~horvitz/Messenger_graph_www.htm) Maximise Your Easy Hyper Links - Video Tutorials Plus Free Link Cloaker  on a planetary scale the oft-cited report that people are separated by "six degrees of separation."

Based on 30 billion Microsoft Messenger instant-message conversations among 240 million people, the study found that the average path length among Messenger users was 6.6.

"Researchers have concluded that any two people on average are distanced by just 6.6 degrees of separation, meaning that they could be linked by a string of seven or fewer acquaintances," a Washington Post article (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/01/AR2008080103718.html) stated.

However, one publication, eFluxMedia, suggested the study was "heavily misinterpreted (http://www.efluxmedia.com/news_Microsoft_Instant_Messaging_Study_Heavily_Misinterpreted_21440.html)" by the media.

"MSN Messenger users are not a random group of people. Their use of the Redmond company's instant messaging tool is already a selection which raises chances they can connect to each other in fewer hops. Furthermore, instant messaging itself is not a measure of real life connections. Also, somebody can have many contacts in their instant messenger client, without actually knowing them. Microsoft researchers considered acquaintances people who sent each other at least one message. But with the mass messages going around, that's hardly an accurate way of determining connections between people."

In a related story, questioning the validity of inferences from potentially skewed or incomplete data, last week, Microsoft posted videos of a test involving about 140 randomly chosen computer users who had low opinions of Vista viewing a demo of a "new operating system" called "Mojave" (actually Vista), finding they liked it.

Nevertheless, the New York Time stated (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/04/technology/04vista.html?ref=technology), "many bloggers had problems with how the Mojave Experiment was conducted. The main complaint was: is 10 minutes of watching an expert demonstrate Vista a valid basis on which to assess it?"




SOURCE: Berkeley Lab news release (http://www.lbl.gov/publicinfo/newscenter/pr/2008/ALS-fast-holograms.html)
An international group of scientists has produced two of the brightest, sharpest x-ray holograms of microscopic objects ever made, thousands of times more efficiently than previous x-ray-holographic methods.
(http://www.lbl.gov/publicinfo/newscenter/pr/assets/img/X-Ray-holography/hologram-schematic-sm.jpg)
The two experiments demonstrate that massively parallel holographic x-ray images with nanometer-scale resolution can be made of objects measured in microns, in times as brief as femtoseconds, using a pinhole array.

By knowing the precise layout of a pinhole array, including the different sizes of the different pinholes, a computer can recover a bright, high-resolution image numerically.

The researchers believe the holograms could be pushed to only a few nanometers, or, using computer refinement, even better.




SOURCE: Wired Science (http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/08/rumors-abound-a.html)
Rumors are flying this weekend that Mars Phoenix has made a major discovery relating to the potential for life on Mars.
(http://www.aviationweek.com/media/images/space_images/NASA/Phoenix/Phoenixsepttrenchiunivariz-nasa-jpl.jpg)
The White House has been alerted by NASA (http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story.jsp?id=news/WH08018.xml&headline=White%20House%20Briefed%20On%20Potential%20For%20Mars%20Life&channel=space) about plans to make an announcement soon on major new Phoenix lander discoveries concerning the "potential for life" on Mars, scientists told Aviation Week & Space Technology.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 05, 2008, 04:40:23 PM
http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2008/08/glow_in_the_dark_mollusk_used.php

Glowing gastropods allow detection of human sickness before onset of symptoms.

How cool is that?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Daruko on August 05, 2008, 04:58:14 PM
Screensaver reveals new test for synaesthesia

Caltech scientist Melissa Saenz has found that with certain visual stimuli, from moving dots to flashes of light, people described simple abstract sounds such as tapping, thumping, whirring or whooshing.

I tried it, and it didn't work on me.  I'd be curious to hear it work on someone here.
Synesthesia test (http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1250579695/bclid1252300654/bctid1709855746)

Original Article (http://www.newscientist.com/channel/being-human/dn14459-screensaver-reveals-new-test-for-synaesthesia.html?feedId=online-news_rss20)



Invention: Exoskeleton for grannies

Yoshiyuki Sankai at the University of Tsukuba has developed an exoskeleton for a single arm that can improve the strength and utility of aging limbs.
(http://technology.newscientist.com/data/images/ns/cms/dn14457/dn14457-1_250.jpg)
The device consists of a tabard worn over the shoulders with a motorized exoskeleton for one arm attached. The exoskeleton senses the angle, torque and nerve impulses in the arm and then assists the user to move his or her shoulder and elbow joints accordingly.

Original Article (http://technology.newscientist.com/channel/tech/dn14457-invention-exoskeleton-for-grannies.html?feedId=online-news_rss20)



A first in integrated nanowire sensor circuitry

Scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California at Berkeley have created the world's first all-integrated sensor circuit based on nanowire arrays, combining light sensors and electronics made of different crystalline materials.

Their method can be used to reproduce numerous such devices with high uniformity.

Original Article (http://www.physorg.com/news137088634.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 07, 2008, 11:42:33 PM
August 5, 2008
Medication Increasingly Replaces Psychotherapy, Study Finds

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Wider use of antidepressants and other prescription medications has reduced the role of psychotherapy, once the defining characteristic of psychiatric care, according to an analysis published today.

The percentage of patients who received psychotherapy fell to 28.9 percent in 2004-05 from 44.4 percent in 1996-97, the report in Archives of General Psychiatry said.

Researchers attributed the shift to insurance reimbursement policies that favor short medication visits compared with longer psychotherapy sessions, and to the introduction of a new generation of psychotropic medications with fewer side effects.

http://snipurl.com/3b3xi

Male Dominance Is No Guarantee of Genetic Success

from New Scientist

Genghis Khan spread his seed so liberally that nearly a tenth of men now living in the former Mongolian empire trace their ancestry back to the 13th-century warrior. However, a new analysis suggests that most socially dominant males contribute no more to the genetic pool than do their supposed inferiors.

"An individual really doesn't have the opportunity to set up things so their genetic information pervades the gene pool a long time in the future," says mathematician Joseph Watkins, of the University of Arizona in Tucson. "It could happen because life is chaotic."

Theories on how genes flow through populations of organisms generally support this idea, which has been dubbed neutrality. But some anthropologists argue that cultural dominance can seal a man's legacy. For instance, a rich and powerful father can ensure the status of his sons and grandsons.

http://snipurl.com/3b4l5

To Heal the Wounded

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The pictures show shredded limbs, burned faces, profusely bleeding wounds. The subjects are mostly American G.I.'s, but they include Iraqis and Afghans, some of them young children.

They appear in a new book, "War Surgery in Afghanistan and Iraq: A Series of Cases, 2003-2007," quietly issued by the United States Army—the first guidebook of new techniques for American battlefield surgeons to be published while the wars it analyzes are still being fought.

Its 83 case descriptions from 53 battlefield doctors are clinical and bone dry, but the gruesome photographs illustrate the grim nature of today's wars, in which more are hurt by explosions than by bullets, and body armor leaves many alive but maimed. And the cases detail important advances in treating blast amputations, massive bleeding, bomb concussions and other front-line trauma.

http://snipurl.com/3b3wj

Soil Tests on Mars Spawn a Mystery

from the Arizona Daily Star

If you plant asparagus in Martian soil, will it grow? That's the question perplexing scientists with the UA-led Phoenix Mars Mission, who are trying to comprehend contradictory results from a series of soil tests that show the red planet's surface to be both friendly and unfriendly to life.

The seeming paradox was announced just days after mission scientists confirmed the presence of water in Mars' northern arctic region, a key finding as officials try to determine whether the red planet could support life.

Chemistry test results announced on Monday show that soil recently collected for the lander's wet chemistry lab contained perchlorate, an oxidizing agent that's the primary ingredient for jet fuel. The presence of perchlorate in the soil would be hazardous to plant life and undermine a preliminary hypothesis supported by test results from the same chemistry lab.

http://snipurl.com/3b44b

U.S. Panel Questions Prostate Screening

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The blood test that millions of men undergo each year to check for prostate cancer leads to so much unnecessary anxiety, surgery and complications that doctors should stop testing elderly men, and it remains unclear whether the screening is worthwhile for younger men, a federal task force concluded yesterday.

In the first update of its recommendations for prostate cancer screening in five years, the panel that sets government policy on preventive medicine said that the evidence that the test reduces the cancer's death toll is too uncertain to endorse routine use for men at any age, and that the potential harm clearly outweighs any benefits for men age 75 and older.

"The benefit of screening at this time is uncertain, and if there is a benefit, it's likely to be small," said Ned Calonge, who chairs the 16-member U.S. Preventive Services Task Force. It published the new guidelines today in the Annals of Internal Medicine. "And on the other side, the risks are large and dramatic."

http://snipurl.com/3b3tw

A Dance of Environment and Economics in the Everglades

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla.—When Florida officials announced a plan last month to save the Everglades by buying United States Sugar and its 187,000 acres, they knew that the success of their plan could be defined by Alfonso Fanjul and his brother J. Pepe Fanjul.

The Fanjuls' family-run sugar company, Florida Crystals, owns what the state wants: about 35,000 acres needed to recreate the River of Grass's historic water flow from Lake Okeechobee south to the Everglades.

State officials have said they hope to trade some of United States Sugar's assets for the Fanjuls' property, and in their first interview since the deal was announced, the Fanjuls said they were "on board"—but with a few caveats.

http://snipurl.com/38fy9

Primates 'Face Extinction Crisis'

from BBC News Online

A global review of the world's primates says 48 percent of species face extinction, an outlook described as "depressing" by conservationists. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species says the main threat is habitat loss, primarily through the burning and clearing of tropical forests.

More than 70 percent of primates in Asia are now listed as Endangered, it adds. The findings form part of the most detailed survey of the Earth's mammals, which will be published in October.

Other threats include hunting of primates for food and the illegal wildlife trade, explained Russell Mittermeier, chairman of global conservation group IUCN's Primate Specialist Group and president of Conservation International.

http://snipurl.com/3b461

Superbugs

from the New Yorker

In August, 2000, Dr. Roger Wetherbee, an infectious-disease expert at New York University's Tisch Hospital, received a disturbing call from the hospital's microbiology laboratory.

At the time, Wetherbee was in charge of handling outbreaks of dangerous microbes in the hospital, and the laboratory had isolated a bacterium called Klebsiella pneumoniae from a patient in an intensive-care unit.

"It was literally resistant to every meaningful antibiotic that we had," Wetherbee recalled recently. The microbe was sensitive only to a drug called colistin, which had been developed decades earlier and largely abandoned as a systemic treatment, because it can severely damage the kidneys. "So we had this report, and I looked at it and said to myself, 'My God, this is an organism that basically we can't treat.'"

http://snipurl.com/3aj0d

Ancient Moss, Insects Found in Antarctica

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—Mosses once grew and insects crawled in what are now barren valleys in Antarctica, according to scientists who have recovered remains of life from that frozen continent.

Fourteen million years ago the now lifeless valleys were tundra, similar to parts of Alaska, Canada and Siberia—cold but able to support life, researchers report.

Geoscientist Adam Lewis of North Dakota State University was studying the ice cover of the continent when he and co-workers came across the remains of moss on a valley floor. "We knew we shouldn't expect to see something like that," Lewis said in a telephone interview.

http://snipurl.com/3b4hp

Study: Kids Meals Pack It On

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

It's 7 p.m. and your tots are cranky and hungry. Where can you go for a fast kids meal that won't make you feel like a bad parent?

Not many restaurant chains, according to a report from the Center for Science in the Public Interest that was released Monday. The CSPI study found a whopping 93 percent of all kids meals offered by 13 top chains contain too many calories. In fact, several meals hover around the 1,000-calorie mark, far above the roughly 430-calorie-a-meal recommendation from the Institute of Medicine for sedentary children 4 to 8 years old.

With so many restaurants called out for heavy use of soft drinks and fried foods on so many of their children's meals, it can be tough to guide your child's dining choices. But at least one dietitian points out that there are smart ways to eat at chain restaurants.

http://snipurl.com/3b4co
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 08, 2008, 02:14:21 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 07, 2008, 11:42:33 PM
August 5, 2008
Medication Increasingly Replaces Psychotherapy, Study Finds

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Wider use of antidepressants and other prescription medications has reduced the role of psychotherapy, once the defining characteristic of psychiatric care, according to an analysis published today.

The percentage of patients who received psychotherapy fell to 28.9 percent in 2004-05 from 44.4 percent in 1996-97, the report in Archives of General Psychiatry said.

Researchers attributed the shift to insurance reimbursement policies that favor short medication visits compared with longer psychotherapy sessions, and to the introduction of a new generation of psychotropic medications with fewer side effects.

http://snipurl.com/3b3xi

I'm no Scientologist, but this kind of freaks me out.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 08, 2008, 03:16:34 PM
Its faster, geared towards instant gratification, and means that people don't have to work through their problems and see reality.

In other words, sign of the times.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Daruko on August 08, 2008, 03:56:49 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 08, 2008, 03:16:34 PM
Its faster, geared towards instant gratification, and means that people don't have to work through their problems and see reality.

In other words, sign of the times.

Scanner Darkly anyone?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 08, 2008, 06:23:37 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 07, 2008, 11:42:33 PM

It's 7 p.m. and your tots are cranky and hungry. Where can you go for a fast kids meal that won't make you feel like a bad parent?

Not many restaurant chains, according to a report from the Center for Science in the Public Interest that was released Monday. The CSPI study found a whopping 93 percent of all kids meals offered by 13 top chains contain too many calories. In fact, several meals hover around the 1,000-calorie mark, far above the roughly 430-calorie-a-meal recommendation from the Institute of Medicine for sedentary children 4 to 8 years old.

With so many restaurants called out for heavy use of soft drinks and fried foods on so many of their children's meals, it can be tough to guide your child's dining choices. But at least one dietitian points out that there are smart ways to eat at chain restaurants.

http://snipurl.com/3b4co

Why the hell can't parents either plan their day so they're home at dinnertime, or plan ahead and carry snacks? What the fuck is wrong with them? It's just not that hard to do. Also there are these things called "Grocery stores" that sell "food". I guess some parents are just tooooo busy socializing at the Mall to remember to make arrangements to feed their fucking children something that won't kill them.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 08, 2008, 06:25:02 PM
Quote from: Nigel on August 08, 2008, 06:23:37 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 07, 2008, 11:42:33 PM

It's 7 p.m. and your tots are cranky and hungry. Where can you go for a fast kids meal that won't make you feel like a bad parent?

Not many restaurant chains, according to a report from the Center for Science in the Public Interest that was released Monday. The CSPI study found a whopping 93 percent of all kids meals offered by 13 top chains contain too many calories. In fact, several meals hover around the 1,000-calorie mark, far above the roughly 430-calorie-a-meal recommendation from the Institute of Medicine for sedentary children 4 to 8 years old.

With so many restaurants called out for heavy use of soft drinks and fried foods on so many of their children's meals, it can be tough to guide your child's dining choices. But at least one dietitian points out that there are smart ways to eat at chain restaurants.

http://snipurl.com/3b4co

Why the hell can't parents either plan their day so they're home at dinnertime, or plan ahead and carry snacks? What the fuck is wrong with them? It's just not that hard to do. Also there are these things called "Grocery stores" that sell "food". I guess some parents are just tooooo busy working two jobs each, so they can pay their home heating bills and stay off welfare to remember to make arrangements to feed their fucking children something that won't kill them.

Here we go again...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on August 08, 2008, 06:25:38 PM
Compromise:  Subway
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 08, 2008, 09:30:18 PM
Quote from: LMNO on August 08, 2008, 06:25:02 PM
Quote from: Nigel on August 08, 2008, 06:23:37 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 07, 2008, 11:42:33 PM

It's 7 p.m. and your tots are cranky and hungry. Where can you go for a fast kids meal that won't make you feel like a bad parent?

Not many restaurant chains, according to a report from the Center for Science in the Public Interest that was released Monday. The CSPI study found a whopping 93 percent of all kids meals offered by 13 top chains contain too many calories. In fact, several meals hover around the 1,000-calorie mark, far above the roughly 430-calorie-a-meal recommendation from the Institute of Medicine for sedentary children 4 to 8 years old.

With so many restaurants called out for heavy use of soft drinks and fried foods on so many of their children's meals, it can be tough to guide your child's dining choices. But at least one dietitian points out that there are smart ways to eat at chain restaurants.

http://snipurl.com/3b4co

Why the hell can't parents either plan their day so they're home at dinnertime, or plan ahead and carry snacks? What the fuck is wrong with them? It's just not that hard to do. Also there are these things called "Grocery stores" that sell "food". I guess some parents are just tooooo busy working two jobs each, so they can pay their home heating bills and stay off welfare to remember to make arrangements to feed their fucking children something that won't kill them.

Here we go again...

I figured someone would bring in the "They're soooo poor and working soooo hard that they can't afford to have beans and rice prepared at home, they can only afford to spend ten times as much on fast food!" argument. Bullfuckingshit. I grew up POOR, fucking starvation-poor, so poor that at 12 I had stretch marks all over my undersized runt body from growing on an inadequate diet, eating OTHER PEOPLE's restaurant leftovers poor. And then I learned to work, buy my own food, and cook, because nobody was doing it for me, and things got a lot better.

I've also been a single mom working such long hours that I was getting up at 5:30, trekking to the next town over (two buses and a light-rail, 45 minutes EACH WAY) to drop off my six-month-old and my two-year-old at my ex's mom's house because I couldn't afford daycare, then working until 7, back out to Beaverton to pick them up, home by 9, feed the kids, go to bed. EVERY DAY. I'm not some mollycoddled suburbanite housewife; the last couple of years have been the most plushly prosperous I've been in my life, and I'm grateful for that, but I know EXACTLY what it's like to be a low-income single working parent, and you don't fucking go to MacDonald's because you can't afford it. You pack a bag of Cheerios and crackers and some baby carrots everywhere you go. Fast food is for poor planners, and then they bitch about how it's not all nutritionally balanced and shit. Well, FUCKING MAKE FOOD AT HOME, you worthless sack of shit, and quit bitching because at least you can afford to blow $30 on take-out.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 09, 2008, 02:57:26 AM
August 8, 2008
Skin Cells Produce Library of Diseased Stem Cells

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Reuters)—U.S. stem cell experts have produced a library of the powerful cells using ordinary skin and bone marrow cells from patients, and said Thursday they would share them freely with other researchers.

They used a new method to re-program ordinary cells so they look and act like embryonic stem cells—the master cells of the body with the ability to produce any type of tissue or blood cell.

The new cells come from patients with 10 incurable genetic diseases and conditions, including Parkinson's, the paralyzing disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS, juvenile diabetes and Down's Syndrome. Writing in the journal Cell, the team at Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital in Boston said the point is not yet to treat anyone, but to get as many researchers as possible experimenting with these cells in lab dishes to better understand the diseases.

http://snipurl.com/3cics

US Nuclear Submarine Leaked Radiation Over 2 Years

from the Seattle Times

TOKYO (Associated Press)—An American nuclear-powered submarine leaked radiation for more than two years, releasing the bulk of the material in its home port of Guam and at Pearl Harbor, Japanese and U.S. officials said Thursday.

On Aug. 1, the U.S. Navy notified Japan that the USS Houston had leaked water containing small amounts of radiation during three calls to the southern Japanese ports of Sasebo and Okinawa in March and April this year but caused no threat to people or the environment.

The U.S. Navy released a detailed chronology of the leaks over the past two years, showing that the cumulative radioactivity released was less than 9.3 micro curies—with 8 micro curies released in Guam alone. ... Navy Commander Jeff Davis said the Houston is still in Hawaii being repaired and the reactor is turned off.

http://snipurl.com/3ci75

Bullets Tagged with Pollen Could Help Solve Gun Crimes

from the Guardian (UK)

Pollen could be used to identify the perpetrators of gun crimes, thanks to developments in nanotechnology. The microscopic grains can be coated onto bullets during manufacture and are sticky enough to hold on even after the gun has been fired. Each 'nanotag' is made up of pollen and a unique chemical signature that can be used to identify the batch of ammunition.

The pollen grains—from one of two species of lily—are around 30 micrometres in diameter and are invisible to the naked eye. Thousands can be attached to each cartridge.

"The tags primarily consist of naturally occurring pollen, a substance that evolution has provided with extraordinary adhesive properties," said Prof Paul Sermon from the University of Surrey, who led the research.

http://snipurl.com/3ci4p

Cern Lab Set for Beam Milestone

from BBC News Online

A vast physics experiment—the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)—reaches a key milestone this weekend ahead of an official start-up on 10 September.

Engineers had previously brought a beam of protons—tiny, sub-atomic particles—to the "doorstep" of the LHC. On 9 August, protons will be piped through LHC magnets for the first time.

The most powerful physics experiment ever built, the LHC will re-create the conditions present in the Universe just after the Big Bang. For the two-day "synchronisation test," engineers will thread a low intensity beam through the injection system and one of the LHC's eight sectors.

http://snipurl.com/3ci32

For Nanotech Drug Delivery, Size Doesn't Matter—Shape Does

from Scientific American

As nanotechnology to ferry drugs to their destinations is tested in both the laboratory and in clinical trials, scientists have made a surprising discovery about the kinds of nanoparticles that might be most effective for eventually transporting a number of different cancer-fighting therapies throughout the body.

The conventional wisdom is that the smaller, the better. But that may not be true, according to a team of scientists led by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (U.N.C.) chemistry professor Joseph DeSimone.

DeSimone and his colleagues have shown that the shape of these microscopic drug carriers is much more important than size and can even mean the difference between whether a drug penetrates target cells effectively or ends up as a target itself, only to be destroyed by the immune system.

http://snipurl.com/3chv6

Solar Systems Like Ours May Be Rare

from New Scientist

Our solar system is a Goldilocks among planetary systems. Conditions have to be just right for a disc of dust and gas to coalesce into such a set of neatly ordered planets, a new computer model suggests.

Similar planetary systems are likely to be a minority in the galaxy, says model developer Edward Thommes of the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada. Even so, if only 1 percent of the Milky Way's hundreds of billions of stars have a terrestrial planet with a stable orbit in the habitable zone, the Earth could have plenty of company.

Astronomers long thought planets orbited where they formed, with small terrestrial planets close to the star, gas giants near the middle, and smaller ice giants such as Neptune towards the edge of a 'protoplanetary' disc of gas and dust before it dissipated.

http://snipurl.com/3choy

Duck-Billed Dinosaurs "Outgrew" Their Predators

from National Geographic News

Talk about being a big baby. The duck-billed dinosaur Hypacrosaurus grew three to five times faster than the fearsome predators that hunted it, reaching its full size by age ten, according to a new study.

Unlike other plant-eating dinosaurs, duckbills such as Hypacrosaurus didn't have piercing horns, dagger-like teeth, or hulking body armor. So the ability to grow bigger faster provided the animals with a size advantage that likely served them well in their early years.

For example, baby duckbills were probably about the same size as Tyrannosaurus rex hatchlings, said study co-author Drew Lee of Ohio University's College of Osteopathic Medicine. But by five years old the duckbill would be the size of a grown cow, while the T. rex would be only as big as a large dog.

http://snipurl.com/3chkd

Making T Cells Tougher Against HIV

from Science News

I pity the fool who messes with these T cells. A method to deliver molecular "scissors" into T cells in mice makes the cells downright hostile to HIV. Not only do the cells reject the virus' advances, but copies of the virus already inside the cells get snipped up.

The technique is the first to deliver these HIV-fighting scissors—called small interfering RNAs, or siRNAs—into T cells in living animals, Premlata Shankar of Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center in El Paso and her colleagues report in the Aug. 22 Cell. Shankar performed the research while at Harvard Medical School in Boston.

"I think they've shown very nicely that you can ... target T cells and knock down the virus," comments John Rossi, an AIDS researcher at the Beckman Research Institute at City of Hope in Duarte, Calif. "It's a nice proof of principle that I think could be developed into a viable therapy."

http://snipurl.com/3chy5

Fingerprints Yield More Telltale Clues

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—Scientists have found ways to tease even more clues out of fingerprints' telltale marks—one in a string of developments that gives modern forensics even better ways to solve mysteries like the anthrax attacks or JonBenet Ramsey's murder.

For example, if a person handled cocaine, explosives or other materials, there could be enough left in a fingerprint to identify them, says chemist R. Graham Cooks of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind.

Progress in forensics comes from a combination of new techniques, like those involved in the anthrax investigation, and existing techniques, like those used in the Ramsey case, said Max M. Houck, director of West Virginia University's Forensic Science Initiative.

http://snipurl.com/3ciab

Anthrax Case Raises Doubt On Security

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Revelations about anthrax scientist Bruce E. Ivins's mental instability have exposed what congressional leaders and security experts call startling gaps in how the federal government safeguards its most dangerous biological materials, even as the number of bioscience laboratories has grown rapidly since the 2001 terror attacks.

An estimated 14,000 scientists and technicians at about 400 institutions have clearances to access viruses and bacteria such as the Bacillus anthracis used in the anthrax attacks, but security procedures vary by facility, and oversight of the labs is spread across multiple government agencies.

Screening for the researchers handling some of the world's deadliest germs is not as strict as that for national security jobs in the FBI and CIA, federal officials said.

http://snipurl.com/3cvsk
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 11, 2008, 05:34:31 PM
August 11, 2008
DNA Is Just Anthrax Clue, Not Clincher

from the Philadelphia Inquirer

DNA evidence alone wasn't a smoking gun in the case against Bruce Ivins as the perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax attacks, say microbiologists and other experts who have read details of the investigation released last week.

Genetic sleuthing was useful in narrowing the list of suspects, they say, but it wasn't conclusive since DNA from bacteria doesn't often carry a unique genetic fingerprint the way human DNA does.

At first, prosecutors seemed to suggest that forensic DNA had solved the case. ... But at least eight other anthrax samples gathered from researchers in the investigation carried the same genetic signature as Ivins' batch at Fort Detrick, Md., court documents say.

http://snipurl.com/3e3f4

Iron Age Warrior with Roman Links Found in U.K.

from National Geographic News

The grave of an ancient British warrior with tantalizing Roman connections has been unearthed in southern England, archaeologists say.

The 2,000-year-old skeleton of the tribal king or nobleman was found buried with military trappings, including a bronze helmet and an ornate shield both of a style previously unknown in Britain, experts say.

The Iron Age man, who died in his 30s, was discovered in June at the site of a new housing development in North Bersted on England's southeastern coast. "What we've found is of national and international importance," said dig team member Mark Taylor, senior archaeologist at West Sussex County Council.

http://snipurl.com/3e3it

An Asteroid Cop Gets Ready to Patrol

from the Christian Science Monitor

Toronto—A satellite the size of a suitcase may soon protect our planet from a catastrophic collision with an asteroid. Dubbed NEOSSat—for Near Earth Object Surveillance Satellite—the Canadian craft will be the world's first space telescope designed to hunt asteroids that threaten to slam into Earth.

Several ground-based telescopes already scan the sky for potential dangers, but they only hunt at night and poor weather obscures their view. By circling pole to pole in a sun-synchronous orbit about 500 miles above Earth, NEOSSat can operate nonstop, twirling hundreds of times a day as it photographs sections of space, says Alan Hildebrand, a planetary scientist at the University of Calgary in Alberta.

NEOSSat's six-inch wide telescope has a sunshade that lets it search close to the sun, where potentially hazardous asteroids are concentrated.

http://snipurl.com/3e3cm

A Tall, Cool Drink of ... Sewage?

from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

... When you flush in Santa Ana [Calif.], the waste makes its way to the sewage-treatment plant nearby in Fountain Valley, then sluices not to the ocean but to a plant that superfilters the liquid until it is cleaner than rainwater.

The "new" water is then pumped 13 miles north and discharged into a small lake, where it percolates into the earth. Local utilities pump water from this aquifer and deliver it to the sinks and showers of 2.3 million customers.

It is now drinking water. If you like the idea, you call it indirect potable reuse. If the idea revolts you, you call it toilet to tap. Opened in January, the Orange County Groundwater Replenishment System is the largest of its type in the world.

http://snipurl.com/3e2uk

Barbadians Slam Discovery, Naming of Tiny Snake

from the San Francisco Examiner

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Associated Press)—A small snake has sparked a big debate in Barbados. Residents of the wealthy Caribbean nation have been heating up blogs and clogging radio airwaves to vent their anger at a U.S. scientist, who earlier this week announced his "discovery" of the world's smallest snake and named it "Leptotyphlops carlae," after his wife Carla.

"If he needs to blow his own trumpet ... well, fine," said 43-year-old Barbadian Charles Atkins. "But my mother, who was a simple housewife, she showed me the snake when I was a child."

One writer to the Barbados Free Press blog took an even tougher tone, questioning how someone could "discover" a snake long known to locals, who called it the thread snake.

http://snipurl.com/3do0z

Perseid Meteor Shower To Peak August 11 and 12

from National Geographic News

Unlike short-lived solar eclipses or unpredictable auroras, meteor showers regularly offer skywatchers a dazzling show. Soon the curtain will rise on one of the best of these showers: the Perseids, so called because the meteors appear to originate in the constellation Perseus.

Slated to peak sometime during the night and early morning of August 11 to 12, the shower offers one of the year's best chances to see a shooting star.

Under perfect conditions, observers can expect to see about 90 to 100 meteors an hour, said Wayne Hally, a self-professed "meteor geek" who writes a newsletter for the North American Meteor Network.

http://snipurl.com/3d29l

Invisibility Cloak 'Step Closer'

from BBC News Online

Scientists in the US say they are a step closer to developing materials that could render people invisible.

Researchers at the University of California in Berkeley have developed a material that can bend light around 3D objects making them "disappear."

The materials do not occur naturally but have been created on a nano scale, measured in billionths of a metre. The team says the principles could one day be scaled up to make invisibility cloaks large enough to hide people.

http://snipurl.com/3emkm

Cassini to Search for Source of Saturn Moon's Plumes

from New Scientist

On Monday, the Cassini spacecraft will return to Saturn's icy moon Enceladus, passing within 50 kilometres of its south pole. NASA team members hope the flyby will provide evidence for subsurface liquid water containing the building blocks of life.

Previous encounters revealed huge plumes of ice and water vapour venting from blue-green fault lines, or "tiger stripes", that criss-cross the south pole. The source of these jets, which feed Saturn's rings, is hotly contested.

Gathering data about these features has been slow because only a few instruments can be used fully during each flyby. Early budget cuts to the mission in 1992 limited the ability of its detectors to move independently, so some are often on the wrong side of the spacecraft to be useful.

http://snipurl.com/3e3ly

The Recipe for You

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

In episode 17 of the TV series "Star Trek: The Next Generation" (Stardate 41463.9), a silica-based life form called a "microbrain" disparagingly describes humans as "ugly bags of water."

Which is true—at least the part about us being bags of water. Every school kid learns that humans are mostly water, albeit in varying amounts. The average adult is about 60 percent water. Newborns are 78 percent; obese people can be less than 50 percent water, since lean muscle tissue contains much more water (75 percent) than fat (14 percent).

But as basic as water is to the human condition, other things are even more elemental, such as the hydrogen and oxygen that combine to make water. Roughly 99 percent of your body's mass is composed of just six elements: oxygen (65 percent); carbon (18 percent); hydrogen (10 percent); nitrogen (3 percent); calcium (1.5 percent); and phosphorus (1 percent).

http://snipurl.com/3e3qn

Snake's Impact on Guam Appears to Extend to Flora

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

One of the most infamous examples of what can happen when a nonnative species is introduced into a new environment involves the brown tree snake—a voracious, semi-venomous species that in less than 50 years all but destroyed bird life on the northern Pacific island of Guam.

Introduced inadvertently from the South Pacific just after World War II, apparently on a cargo ship, the snake has killed off 10 bird species on the island and is in the process of wiping out the remaining two.

The virtual extermination of Guam's birds has been bemoaned for decades, but new research suggests that the damage to the ecology of the narrow, 30-mile-long island did not stop there. The hundreds of thousands of snakes, researchers say, are now changing the way Guam's forest grows ...

http://snipurl.com/3emnt 

A note about the Thread Snake. My advisor says that this is indication we shouldn't use the word "discover" when what we really mean is formally name and describe, because species may be well known to locals but new to science.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cramulus on August 11, 2008, 06:43:52 PM
great reading! thanks kai!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 11, 2008, 06:54:24 PM
Quote from: Professor Cramulus on August 11, 2008, 06:43:52 PM
great reading! thanks kai!

You're welcome. I'm glad someones reading this thread with all the drama going on. :)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 12, 2008, 09:06:12 PM
This is one of the best threads here.  Thanks Kai

Now, if only I had to initiative to post articles here too.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on August 12, 2008, 09:16:03 PM
Kai,

if you havent already, I suggest downloading somethin like Snarfer, and adding as many science site and blog feeds as possible to it.  I often don't comment in here, thouh I do read it when I have the time, but I have just Reuters Science and Science Daily on my feed and I have tons of stories every day to read in addition to these, should I wish.

Its a great method of keeping track of frequently updated sites, and you could likely find many more science articles as well.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 12, 2008, 11:02:22 PM
I'll look into it. I use google reader right now but only have a couple of science blogs on there. I've been trying to find good ways to keep track of science news that isn't ridiculously dumbed down for years. Maybe this would work.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 12, 2008, 11:19:29 PM
August 12, 2008
2,500-Year-Old Greek Ship Raised off Sicilian Coast

from National Geographic News

An ancient Greek ship recently raised off the coast of southern Sicily, Italy, is the biggest and best maintained vessel of its kind ever found, archaeologists say.

At a length of nearly 70 feet and a width of 21 feet, the 2,500-year-old craft is the largest recovered ship built in a manner first depicted in Homer's Iliad, which is believed to date back several centuries earlier.

The ship's outer shell was built first, and the inner framework was added later. The wooden planks of the hull were sewn together with ropes, with pitch and resin used as sealant to keep out water. Carlo Beltrame, professor of marine archaeology at the Università Ca' Foscari in Venice, said the boat, found near the town of Gela, is among the most important finds in the Mediterranean Sea.

http://snipurl.com/3fabq

Overweight, but Still Healthy

from the Seattle Times

CHICAGO (Associated Press)—You can look great in a swimsuit and still be a heart attack waiting to happen. And you can also be overweight and otherwise healthy.

A new study suggests a surprising number of overweight people—about half—have normal blood pressure and cholesterol levels, while an equally startling number of trim people suffer from some of the ills associated with obesity.

The first national estimate of its kind bolsters the argument that you can be hefty but still healthy, or at least healthier than has been believed. The results also show stereotypes about body size can be misleading, and that even "less voluptuous" people can have risk factors commonly associated with obesity, said study author MaryFran Sowers, a University of Michigan obesity researcher.

http://snipurl.com/3fa98

The Humpback Whale Is Back

from the Times (London)

Forty years ago conservationists feared that humpback whales were being hunted to extinction. Now numbers have returned to such a level that they have been taken off the danger list.

The latest count stands at 40,000 mature individuals, meaning that, for now at least, the humpback is safe from the threat of extinction.

Several other whales, such as the blue whale, the biggest animal on earth, and the sei and southern right whales, are also growing in number after similar scares.

The populations of several smaller species of whales and other cetaceans are still falling, however, and it is feared that some may be close to disappearing, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

http://snipurl.com/3fa6s

Lower Vitamin D, Higher Risk of Death

from USA Today

Low levels of vitamin D may raise a person's risk of premature death, a study by Johns Hopkins researchers shows.

The research follows other recent studies showing low levels of vitamin D are linked to certain cancers, diabetes, and bone and immune system problems, but this is the first research to connect vitamin D deficiency to a higher risk of death, says study author Erin Michos, assistant professor of cardiology at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore.

The study appears in this week's Archives of Internal Medicine. Michos and her colleagues analyzed data from a large government observational survey of more than 13,000 people who represented a realistic, diverse swath of U.S. adults ages 20 and up. Participants' vitamin D levels were collected by blood test from 1988 through 1994.

http://snipurl.com/3fa3j

No Room at the Beach

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

CHATHAM—After the fog lifts, a cloud of short-billed dowitchers, red knots, American oystercatchers and all types of plovers tear and careen off an inlet. They crest on the breeze, settling near the shore.

... This pristine spot where South Beach meets South Monomoy Island is a critical stopover for many shorebird species on their way from the Arctic to their wintering grounds in Central or South America, or even New Zealand. But such relatively untouched coastal land is getting rarer—and so are the oystercatchers, sandpipers, and plovers that depend on it for their feeding grounds.

The populations of nearly all of North America's 55 shorebird species are declining ... in large part because of disturbance to their beachfront habitats. Every flap of their wings to evade beach walkers, all-terrain vehicles, or dogs depletes more of the energy they need for long flights, leading to lower reproductive success and even death, specialists said.

http://snipurl.com/3fa1h

Handle With Care

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Last year, a private company proposed "fertilizing" parts of the ocean with iron, in hopes of encouraging carbon-absorbing blooms of plankton. Meanwhile, researchers elsewhere are talking about injecting chemicals into the atmosphere, launching sun-reflecting mirrors into stationary orbit above the earth or taking other steps to reset the thermostat of a warming planet.

This technology might be useful, even life-saving. But it would inevitably produce environmental effects impossible to predict and impossible to undo. So a growing number of experts say it is time for broad discussion of how and by whom it should be used, or if it should be tried at all.

Similar questions are being raised about nanotechnology, robotics and other powerful emerging technologies. There are even those who suggest humanity should collectively decide to turn away from some new technologies as inherently dangerous.

http://snipurl.com/3f9yz

Researchers Work to Turn Car's Exhaust into Power

from the San Francisco Examiner

WARREN, Mich. (Associated Press)—The stinky, steaming air that escapes from a car's tailpipe could help us use less gas.

Researchers are competing to meet a challenge from the U.S. Department of Energy: Improve fuel economy 10 percent by converting wasted exhaust heat into energy that can help power the vehicle.

General Motors Corp. is close to reaching the goal, as is a BMW AG supplier working with Ohio State University. Their research into thermoelectrics—the science of using temperature differences to create electricity—couldn't come at a better time as high gas prices accelerate efforts to make vehicles as efficient as possible.

http://snipurl.com/3eugi

Gardasil Vaccine Doubts Grow

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Sandra Levy wants to do everything she can to safeguard the health of her 11-year-old daughter—and that, of course, includes cancer prevention. She has had her child inoculated with one shot of Gardasil, the human papilloma virus vaccine that may prevent cervical cancer. But now, she says, she has serious reservations about going ahead with the next two injections of the course.

"It's very confusing, and we really don't know if it's 100% safe," says Levy, of Long Beach. "I'm not against vaccines, but I don't want to do anything that would harm my daughter."

Though most medical organizations strongly advocate using the HPV vaccine, some doctors and parents, like Levy, are asking whether the vaccine's benefits really outweigh its costs. They say they aren't convinced that the expensive shots offer any more protection than preventive measures already available—principally, regular screening via the Pap smear test.

http://snipurl.com/3eqzi

Dachshunds Gene 'Blindness Clue'

from BBC News Online

A genetic mutation in dachshunds could help uncover the roots of some inherited forms of blindness in humans, say scientists.

Cone-rod dystrophies are caused by progressive cell loss in the retina. Dachshunds are particularly prone to similar conditions, and US and Norwegian researchers spotted an altered gene which may play a role.

Writing in the journal Genome Research, they said research on the similar gene in humans might lead to new therapies. Cone-rod dystrophies are relatively rare, and can lead at first to "day-blindness", in which vision in bright light is affected, then to full loss of vision. It can start as early as childhood.

http://snipurl.com/3d2br

The Sprinter's Brain

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

If American sprinters Tyson Gay and Walter Dix reprise their race in the U.S. Olympic trials at the Olympic finals in Beijing, you will see the athletes crouch low over the starting blocks. Gay's right foot will be in the rear position on the blocks; Dix prefers to have his left foot in the rear position.

It might be a little awkward, but someone ought to tap Dix on the shoulder and tell him to consider switching the position of his legs. And not just Dix—every sprinter in the Olympics ought to think about starting with his or her right foot in the rear position.

That's the surprising conclusion of an unusual new piece of research that ties sprinters' speed off the starting blocks with the structure of the human brain.

http://snipurl.com/3eui7
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 13, 2008, 02:58:31 PM
Quote from: Cain on August 12, 2008, 09:16:03 PM
Kai,

if you havent already, I suggest downloading somethin like Snarfer, and adding as many science site and blog feeds as possible to it.  I often don't comment in here, thouh I do read it when I have the time, but I have just Reuters Science and Science Daily on my feed and I have tons of stories every day to read in addition to these, should I wish.

Its a great method of keeping track of frequently updated sites, and you could likely find many more science articles as well.
Science daily doesn't get technical enough for my tastes.  Although, I do like that they actually cite the relevant paper at the end of their article.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on August 14, 2008, 08:12:16 AM
QuoteGardasil Vaccine Doubts Grow

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Sandra Levy wants to do everything she can to safeguard the health of her 11-year-old daughter—and that, of course, includes cancer prevention. She has had her child inoculated with one shot of Gardasil, the human papilloma virus vaccine that may prevent cervical cancer. But now, she says, she has serious reservations about going ahead with the next two injections of the course.

"It's very confusing, and we really don't know if it's 100% safe," says Levy, of Long Beach. "I'm not against vaccines, but I don't want to do anything that would harm my daughter."

Though most medical organizations strongly advocate using the HPV vaccine, some doctors and parents, like Levy, are asking whether the vaccine's benefits really outweigh its costs. They say they aren't convinced that the expensive shots offer any more protection than preventive measures already available—principally, regular screening via the Pap smear test.

http://snipurl.com/3eqzi
There has been a big anti-vaccination blitz against Gardasil this week, including slipping a paper into Medscape (http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2008/08/woo_and_antivaccinationism_in_mainstream.php).  I wonder who's behind all of it.

Also:  Fuck the Denialists in their pointy little heads.   :argh!:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on August 14, 2008, 02:20:39 PM
Quote from: LMNO on July 31, 2008, 04:31:33 PM
QuoteWhen Play Becomes Work

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

It happens all the time: Two guys in a garage come up with a cool new technology—and dream of making it big. A thousand people take time off work to campaign for a visionary politician because they feel they are doing something to change the world. A million kids hit baseballs—and wonder what it would take to become a pro.

Then the brainiacs, volunteers and Little Leaguers grow up. What they did for fun becomes ... work. Paychecks and bonuses become the reasons to do things. Pink slips and demotions become the reasons not to do other things.

Psychologists have long been interested in what happens when people's internal drives are replaced by external motivations. A host of experiments have shown that when threats and rewards enter the picture, they tend to destroy the inner drives.

http://snipurl.com/37cmj

This is the one that interests me the most... and how it seems to run counter to the IDEAL of "I want a job where I'm doing something I like."

Is all action-for-pay doomed to become "work" even if we enjoyed the action before we got paid for it?

All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind.
    Aristotle

it seems you are in good company
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 14, 2008, 04:01:36 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on August 14, 2008, 08:12:16 AM
QuoteGardasil Vaccine Doubts Grow

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Sandra Levy wants to do everything she can to safeguard the health of her 11-year-old daughter—and that, of course, includes cancer prevention. She has had her child inoculated with one shot of Gardasil, the human papilloma virus vaccine that may prevent cervical cancer. But now, she says, she has serious reservations about going ahead with the next two injections of the course.

"It's very confusing, and we really don't know if it's 100% safe," says Levy, of Long Beach. "I'm not against vaccines, but I don't want to do anything that would harm my daughter."

Though most medical organizations strongly advocate using the HPV vaccine, some doctors and parents, like Levy, are asking whether the vaccine's benefits really outweigh its costs. They say they aren't convinced that the expensive shots offer any more protection than preventive measures already available—principally, regular screening via the Pap smear test.

http://snipurl.com/3eqzi
There has been a big anti-vaccination blitz against Gardasil this week, including slipping a paper into Medscape (http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2008/08/woo_and_antivaccinationism_in_mainstream.php).  I wonder who's behind all of it.

Also:  Fuck the Denialists in their pointy little heads.   :argh!:
But, if you vaccine the little girls, they'll have the secks!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on August 14, 2008, 04:11:16 PM
have you seen the TV add? the disclaimer is longer than the commercial the list of side effects, possible harm it may cause is huge.  it also  says "it may not work " :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 14, 2008, 07:48:32 PM
August 14, 2008
Probe Gets Close Up to Enceladus

from BBC News Online

The Cassini spacecraft has returned some remarkable new close-up images of the Saturnian moon Enceladus.

They were captured during a flyby on 11 August, with the probe passing above the icy terrain at a distance of just 50km at closest approach. The pictures show previously unseen detail in the so-called tiger stripes that mark the south pole of Enceladus.

These cracks run across a "hot-spot" region that is hurling plumes of ice particles into space. Scientists are intrigued by what might be driving this activity; and some have suggested the mechanisms involved could be sufficient to maintain a mass of liquid water below the moon's surface.

http://snipurl.com/3frdn

How Are Swimmers Smashing So Many Olympic Records?

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

BEIJING—Anyone tuning in to watch swimming for the first time in several years can't help but be a little suspicious this week.

It's one thing to watch Michael Phelps smash world records left and right, but should every world record in swimming be falling like this? Through the first three days of the 2008 Olympics, there have been 10 world records broken in nine events.

... Is it the new Speedo suits? The deeper pool? Does the sport have a drug problem that no one is talking about? All of the above? People within the worldwide swimming community have different answers. But for the most part, athletes and coaches believe it's just the accelerated progression of the sport.

http://snipurl.com/3fpw6

Before the Gunfire, Cyberattacks

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Weeks before bombs started falling on Georgia, a security researcher in suburban Massachusetts was watching an attack against the country in cyberspace. Jose Nazario of Arbor Networks in Lexington noticed a stream of data directed at Georgian government sites containing the message: "win+love+in+Rusia."

Other Internet experts in the United States said the attacks against Georgia's Internet infrastructure began as early as July 20, with coordinated barrages of millions of requests—known as distributed denial of service, or D.D.O.S., attacks—that overloaded and effectively shut down Georgian servers.

... As it turns out, the July attack may have been a dress rehearsal for an all-out cyberwar once the shooting started between Georgia and Russia. According to Internet technical experts, it was the first time a known cyberattack had coincided with a shooting war.

http://snipurl.com/3fq2u

Neanderthals Didn't Mate With Modern Humans, Study Says

from National Geographic News

Neanderthals and anatomically modern humans likely did not interbreed, according to a new DNA study. The research further suggests that small population numbers helped do in our closest relatives.

Researchers sequenced the complete mitochondrial genome—genetic information passed down from mothers—of a 38,000-year-old Neanderthal thighbone found in a cave in Croatia.

The new sequence contains 16,565 DNA bases, or "letters," representing 13 genes, making it the longest stretch of Neanderthal DNA ever examined. Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is easier to isolate from ancient bones than conventional or "nuclear" DNA—which is contained in cell nuclei—because there are many mitochondria per cell.

http://snipurl.com/3frcw

How Many Arms Does an Octopus Have?

from the Times (London)

A giant Pacific octopus called Mavis has helped researchers to prove that the one thing everyone knows about the creatures is wrong.

The name octopus is derived from the Ancient Greek for eight feet. Mavis, who lives in a tank at Weymouth Sea Life Centre, actually has six arms and two legs. Researchers who were studying octopuses' behaviour were taken aback to discover that some of the most basic assumptions about them were wrong.

Until now it had been believed that the tentacles were deployed in two equal sets, one set of four for propulsion and the other for manipulation. The research, conducted at 20 centres across Europe, was originally intended to establish whether octopuses favoured one side over the other, as people do, or were multidextrous.

http://snipurl.com/3frkm

Firm Evidence that Earth's Core Is Solid

from Science News

Faint yet distinct ground motions recorded by a large network of seismic instruments in Japan in early 2006 are the strongest, most direct evidence that Earth's inner core is solid.

On February 22, 2006, a magnitude-7 quake rocked Mozambique. The temblor was an unusually large one for southern Africa, but it also was quick for its size: Motions at the epicenter lasted only eight seconds or so, says George Helffrich, a geophysicist at the University of Bristol in England.

While much of the quake's energy spread along the planet's surface, some of it radiated downward, traveled through Earth's core and then returned to the surface in Japan, where more than 700 seismometers picked up the vibes. ... [The] size, shape and timing of some of the vibrations picked up by the Japanese instruments suggest that the waves traveled through the planet's inner core as shear waves, which can travel only through a solid material, says Helffrich.

http://snipurl.com/3frmo

How the Brain Monitors Errors and Learns from Goofs

from Scientific American

... Of course, people make mistakes, both large and small, every day, and monitoring and fixing slipups is a regular part of life. Although people understandably would like to avoid serious errors, most goofs have a good side: they give the brain information about how to improve or fine-tune behavior. In fact, learning from mistakes is likely essential to the survival of our species.

In recent years researchers have identified a region of the brain called the medial frontal cortex that plays a central role in detecting mistakes and responding to them. These frontal neurons become active whenever people or monkeys change their behavior after the kind of negative feedback or diminished reward that results from errors.

Much of our ability to learn from flubs, the latest studies show, stems from the actions of the neurotransmitter dopamine. In fact, genetic variations that affect dopamine signaling may help explain differences between people in the extent to which they learn from past goofs.

http://snipurl.com/3frp8

Physicists Spooked by Faster-Than-Light Information Transfer

from Nature News

Two photons can be connected in a way that seems to defy the very nature of space and time, yet still obeys the laws of quantum mechanics.

Physicists at the University of Geneva achieved the weird result by creating a pair of 'entangled' photons, separating them, then sending them down a fibre optic cable to the Swiss villages of Satigny and Jussy, some 18 kilometres apart.

The researchers found that when each photon reached its destination, it could instantly sense its twin's behaviour without any direct communication. The finding does not violate the laws of quantum mechanics, the theory that physicists use to describe the behaviour of very small systems. Rather, it shows just how quantum mechanics can defy everyday expectation ...

http://snipurl.com/3frs0

Galileo, Reconsidered

from Smithsonian Magazine

... Galileo helped paved the way for classic mechanics and made huge technological and observational leaps in astronomy. Most famously, he championed the Copernican model of the universe, which put the sun at its center and the earth in orbit. The Catholic Church deemed Galileo's 1632 book "Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems" heresy, banned it, forced Galileo to recant his heliocentric views and condemned him to house arrest. He died in his Florence home in 1642.

Historians of science have long debated the exact nature of and motivations for Galileo's trial. War, politics and strange bedfellows obscure science's premier martyrdom story. Many of the documents historians use to try and untangle the mystery are mired in their own prejudices or were written long after the fact, or both.

Now the very first written biography of Galileo has been rediscovered. It offers a rare glimpse into what people thought about the trial only 20 years after Galileo's death and even suggests a tantalizing new explanation for why he was put on trial in the first place.

http://snipurl.com/3frue

U.S. Fuel Tanks May Be Fouling Water

from the Baltimore Sun

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—The government owns hundreds of underground fuel tanks—many designed for emergencies during the Cold War—that need to be inspected for leaks of hazardous substances that could be making local water undrinkable.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has known since at least the 1990s that tanks under its supervision around the country could be leaking fuel into soil and groundwater, according to interviews and research.

The agency knows of at least 150 underground tanks that need to be inspected for leaks, according to spokeswoman Debbie Wing. FEMA is also trying to determine by September whether an additional 124 tanks are underground or above ground and whether they are leaking. ... There has been no documentation of reported leaks or harm to communities from the FEMA tanks, Wing said, although former agency officials and congressional testimony suggest that the tanks have long been seen as a problem.

http://snipurl.com/3frye

good set of articles today
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 17, 2008, 12:27:46 AM
August 15, 2008
Screen Wars: Stealing TV's 'Eyeball' Share

from the Christian Science Monitor

Is this the summer that the Internet finally kills television as we once knew it?

Most industry observers are stopping short of that prediction, citing some significant hurdles still in the way. But the growing number of new deals and new devices being announced suggests that a profound change in the way people watch video—and what video they watch—is under way.

The line between "television" and video via the Internet already has blurred and may disappear in coming years. At least one industry analyst has declared "TV is dead" and welcomes Americans to a new age of video everywhere. Increasingly, Americans are watching video when they want to, and on the screen that suits them at the time.

http://snipurl.com/3g1v4

Infant Transplant Procedure Ignites Debate

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Surgeons in Denver are publishing their first account of a procedure in which they remove the hearts of severely brain-damaged newborns less than two minutes after the babies are disconnected from life support, and their hearts stop beating, so the organs can be transplanted into infants who would otherwise die.

A detailed description of the transplants in [yesterday's] issue of the New England Journal of Medicine has ignited an intense debate about whether the first-of-their-kind procedures are pushing an already controversial organ-retrieval strategy beyond acceptable legal, moral and ethical bounds.

The doctors who performed the operations as part of a federally funded research project defended the practice, and some advocates for organ donation praised the operations as offering the first clear evidence that the procedures could provide desperately needed hearts for terminally ill babies.

http://snipurl.com/3g1ok

The Old Motor Roars Back

from the Economist

Small cars sometimes struggle to climb steep hills. But a converted Chevrolet Lacetti has something special to help it along. Instead of having to keep changing down and revving harder to ascend a winding Alpine-type test track, the engine can cruise almost to the summit in top gear.

This is because the car benefits from one of the developments that in these more economical and greener times promises to give the petrol engine a new lease of life. Old technologies have a habit of fighting back when new ones come along. This is not surprising because they often have an enormous amount of design, engineering and production knowledge invested in them—especially so in the case of car engines.

So new hybrid systems, fuel cells and electric motors will be chasing a moving target. The internal combustion engine will be getting better too. The Lacetti is just one example. It gets its extra oomph from a supercharger forcing more air into the combustion chambers of its engine. This is an old idea that used to speed up 1920s racing cars ...

http://snipurl.com/3g20k

Giant Prehistoric "Kangaroos" Killed Off by Humans

from National Geographic News

Humans, not climate change, were responsible for the extinction of giant "kangaroos" and other massive marsupials in Tasmania more than 40,000 years ago, according to new research.

Hunting on the Australian island exterminated several prehistoric animals, including the kangaroo-like beasts, marsupial "hippopotamuses," and leopard-like cats, a team of scientists announced.

The giant kangaroo-like Protemnon anak, a long-necked leaf browser, survived on Tasmania until at least 41,000 years ago—much later than previously believed and up to 2,000 years after the first human settlers are believed to have arrived—according to new radiocarbon and luminescence dating of fossils, some of which were accidentally found by cavers.

http://snipurl.com/3g1az

Hope for Arthritis Vaccine 'Cure'

from BBC News Online

A single injection of modified cells could halt the advance of rheumatoid arthritis, say UK scientists. The Newcastle University team is about to start small-scale safety trials of the jab, which will hopefully stop the immune system attacking the joints.

The Arthritis Research Campaign, which is funding the project, said if successful, the treatment would be "revolutionary." It could be fully tested and available within five years.

Rheumatoid arthritis is one of a family of "autoimmune" diseases, in which the body's defence systems launch attacks on its own tissues. In the case of rheumatoid arthritis, this means painful inflammation and progressive damage to the joints, eased only slightly by courses of painkillers and immune dampening drugs.

http://snipurl.com/3g1rr

To Protect Whales, Navy Will Limit Use of Low-Frequency Sonar

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The U.S. Navy will restrict the use of low-frequency active sonar during training to prevent possible harm to whales and other creatures, under an agreement reached with environmental groups Tuesday.

The accord, approved by a federal court in San Francisco, would restrict the use of a type of sonar in areas in the Pacific Ocean that are known to be whale breeding grounds and key habitat, such as the Humpback Whale National Marine Sanctuary off Hawaii.

The Navy and environmentalists have been jousting in court for several years over the risk to whales and other marine life posed by underwater noise from sonar exercises. A separate lawsuit, not involved in Tuesday's announcement, involves mid-frequency sonar. That case is pending at the U.S. Supreme Court.

http://snipurl.com/3g1i1

Breast Cancer: Risk of Relapse Low After Surviving 5 Years

from USA Today

Women who survive five years after being diagnosed with breast cancer have a good chance of remaining cancer-free, a new study shows. In the most detailed study of its kind, the report shows that 89% of such patients remain disease-free 10 years after diagnosis, and 81% are cancer-free after 15 years.

Authors of the study, published online Tuesday in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, say their findings may reassure breast cancer survivors, many of whom assume their odds are much bleaker.

"Patients often ask me, 'Now that I've survived my breast cancer, what is my future risk of a recurrence?' " says author Abenaa Brewster, an assistant professor at Houston's M.D. Anderson Cancer Center. "This is an answer we've had a hard time giving. They remain really terrified about their risk."

http://snipurl.com/3g1q6

Venomous Lionfish Prowls Fragile Caribbean Waters

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Associated Press)—A maroon-striped marauder with venomous spikes is rapidly multiplying in the Caribbean's warm waters, swallowing native species, stinging divers and generally wreaking havoc on an ecologically delicate region.

The red lionfish, a tropical native of the Indian and Pacific oceans that probably escaped from a Florida fish tank, is showing up everywhere—from the coasts of Cuba and Hispaniola to Little Cayman's pristine Bloody Bay Wall, one of the region's prime destinations for divers.

Wherever it appears, the adaptable predator corners fish and crustaceans up to half its size with its billowy fins and sucks them down in one violent gulp. Research teams observed one lionfish eating 20 small fish in less than 30 minutes.

http://snipurl.com/3g1vz

Drugs Treat Heart Pain Nearly as Well as Stents, Study Says

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Common heart drugs worked nearly as well in treating chest pain in patients with stable heart disease as a more invasive and expensive procedure known as stenting, according to a study, suggesting that many of the hundreds of thousands of such procedures done each year may be unnecessary as a first-line treatment.

Those who got stents and drug therapy had only a small additional benefit in pain relief and that disappeared within two to three years, compared with those who got drug therapy alone.

The finding, which was published Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine, is the latest piece of research to question the need for the large numbers of elective angioplasties to open blocked coronary arteries. It's estimated that several hundred thousand of the elective procedures are performed each year in the United States.

http://snipurl.com/3g1xm

Rapid Growth Found in Oxygen-Starved Ocean 'Dead Zones'

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Many coastal areas of the world's oceans are being starved of oxygen at an alarming rate, with vast stretches along the seafloor depleted of it to the point that they can barely sustain marine life, researchers are reporting.

The main culprit, scientists say, is nitrogen-rich nutrients from crop fertilizers that spill into coastal waters by way of rivers and streams.

A study to be published Friday in the journal Science says the number of these marine "dead zones" around the world has doubled about every 10 years since the 1960s. About 400 coastal areas now have periodically or perpetually oxygen-starved bottom waters, many of them growing in size and intensity. Combined, the zones are larger than Oregon.

http://snipurl.com/3gbvl
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on August 17, 2008, 07:14:28 AM
Quote from: Kai
Hope for Arthritis Vaccine 'Cure'

from BBC News Online

A single injection of modified cells could halt the advance of rheumatoid arthritis, say UK scientists. The Newcastle University team is about to start small-scale safety trials of the jab, which will hopefully stop the immune system attacking the joints.

The Arthritis Research Campaign, which is funding the project, said if successful, the treatment would be "revolutionary." It could be fully tested and available within five years.

Rheumatoid arthritis is one of a family of "autoimmune" diseases, in which the body's defence systems launch attacks on its own tissues. In the case of rheumatoid arthritis, this means painful inflammation and progressive damage to the joints, eased only slightly by courses of painkillers and immune dampening drugs.

http://snipurl.com/3g1rr

Holy shit!  That may be the best news I've heard all day.  It's amazing how medicine seems to be moving by leaps and bounds in the last 10 years or so.  If this keeps up I'll end up living until I'm 135 at which point I'll kill myself out of boredom.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 17, 2008, 03:26:58 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on August 17, 2008, 07:14:28 AM
Quote from: Kai
Hope for Arthritis Vaccine 'Cure'

from BBC News Online

A single injection of modified cells could halt the advance of rheumatoid arthritis, say UK scientists. The Newcastle University team is about to start small-scale safety trials of the jab, which will hopefully stop the immune system attacking the joints.

The Arthritis Research Campaign, which is funding the project, said if successful, the treatment would be "revolutionary." It could be fully tested and available within five years.

Rheumatoid arthritis is one of a family of "autoimmune" diseases, in which the body's defence systems launch attacks on its own tissues. In the case of rheumatoid arthritis, this means painful inflammation and progressive damage to the joints, eased only slightly by courses of painkillers and immune dampening drugs.

http://snipurl.com/3g1rr

Holy shit!  That may be the best news I've heard all day.  It's amazing how medicine seems to be moving by leaps and bounds in the last 10 years or so.  If this keeps up I'll end up living until I'm 135 at which point I'll kill myself out of boredom.
Just wait until gene therapy becomes mainstream.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: nurbldoff on August 17, 2008, 04:26:32 PM
I like this thread. It probably already contains more information than the whole rest of the board.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 18, 2008, 07:25:45 PM
August 18, 2008
Windmills Split Town and Families

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

LOWVILLE, N.Y. (Associated Press)—"Listen," John Yancey says, leaning against his truck in a field outside his home.

The rhythmic whoosh, whoosh, whoosh of wind turbines echoes through the air. Sleek and white, their long propeller blades rotate in formation, like some otherworldly dance of spindly-armed aliens swaying across the land.

Yancey stares at them, his face contorted in anger and pain. He knows the futuristic towers are pumping clean electricity into the grid, knows they have been largely embraced by his community. But Yancey hates them. He hates the sight and he hates the sound.

http://snipurl.com/3hdek

Dr. Doom

from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

On Sept. 7, 2006, Nouriel Roubini, an economics professor at New York University, stood before an audience of economists at the International Monetary Fund and announced that a crisis was brewing.

In the coming months and years, he warned, the United States was likely to face a once-in-a-lifetime housing bust, an oil shock, sharply declining consumer confidence and, ultimately, a deep recession.

He laid out a bleak sequence of events: homeowners defaulting on mortgages, trillions of dollars of mortgage-backed securities unraveling worldwide and the global financial system shuddering to a halt. These developments, he went on, could cripple or destroy hedge funds, investment banks and other major financial institutions like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The audience seemed skeptical, even dismissive.

http://snipurl.com/3hdel

The Newest Generation of Drugs: Who Can Afford Them?

from the Seattle Times

Sally Garcia, a 53-year-old lawyer disabled by multiple sclerosis, was torn. A new-generation medication, Copaxone, was really working for her. After two decades of being in and out of hospitals, Garcia was taking steps to work again.

Her wallet, though, was in severe distress. Under her Medicare prescription plan, Garcia's share of the expensive drug was $330 per month. All together, medications were taking a third of her disability payments—her only income—and she couldn't swing it.

Copaxone, Enbrel, Remicade: For some patients, such new-generation drugs, often called "biologicals" or "bioengineered" when they are created by genetically modified living cells, have performed magic. In some cases, they work when other drugs have failed, or for diseases that previously had no drug treatments at all. But they cost a lot—often $2,000 to $3,000 per month.

http://snipurl.com/3hdeo

Progress Against Toxins in Toys Takes Small Steps

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

When a nationwide ban on hormone-disrupting chemicals in soft plastic toys and cosmetics takes effect early next year, it will mark an important turning point in efforts to remove toxic compounds from consumer products.

The ban on a group of chemicals known as phthalates is part of a major overhaul of the nation's consumer safety system brokered last month by Congress. It reflects growing concerns among parents and public health advocates that children are absorbing a vast array of harmful substances, sometimes merely by sucking on a rubber duck, drinking from a plastic bottle or playing on treated carpet.

Indeed, new health concerns seem to be raised every month or so about some oddly named chemical that has been used for decades in toys, cosmetics and consumer products.

http://snipurl.com/3hdeq

Pluto Is Part of Hot Debate

from the Baltimore Sun

It was billed as a debate over the 2006 decision by the International Astronomical Union that kicked Pluto out of the family of planets, leaving just eight.

But in the end, after a jocular and noisy tussle before scientists and educators gathered at the Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory, both debaters agreed that the IAU's definition only muddied the waters, and that more time is needed for science to sort out the increasingly complex range of objects circling our sun and other stars.

"Get the notion of counting things out of your system," said Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of New York's Hayden Planetarium. "The more we learn about anything, the more we have to tune the vocabulary we use to describe it."  The two debaters also expressed delight that a scientific debate has captured so much public attention.

http://snipurl.com/3hdew

F.B.I. Will Present Scientific Evidence in Anthrax Case to Counter Doubts

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON—Growing doubts from scientists about the strength of the government's case against the late Bruce E. Ivins, the military researcher named as the anthrax killer, are forcing the Justice Department to begin disclosing more fully the scientific evidence it used to implicate him.

In the face of the questions, Federal Bureau of Investigation officials have decided to make their first detailed public presentation [this] week on the forensic science used to trace the anthrax used in the 2001 attacks to a flask kept in a refrigerator in Dr. Ivins's laboratory at Fort Detrick, in Maryland. Many scientists are awaiting those details because so far, they say, the F.B.I. has failed to make a conclusive case.

"That is going to be critically important, because right now there is really no data to make a scientific judgment one way or the other," Brad Smith, a molecular biologist at the Center for Biosecurity at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. "The information that has been put out, there is really very little scientific information in there."

http://snipurl.com/3hdf0

Controversial Chemical Bisphenol A Is Safe, FDA Says

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

A draft document released Friday by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration declares that a chemical commonly found in baby bottles and aluminum can linings is safe.

The document comes on the heels of several conflicting reports by national and international agencies released this year on the safety of the chemical, bisphenol A.

It was immediately embraced by industry scientists, who commended the federal agency's "thorough analysis," and condemned by environmental groups that questioned the timing of the report's release and its reliance on industry funded studies.

http://snipurl.com/3hdfb

Summit Targets World Water Issues

from BBC News Online

While global attention has recently focused on energy and food, a global summit this week in Stockholm, Sweden, will tackle the key issue of water.

The World Water Week meeting starts on Sunday and will hear renewed calls to solve growing challenges of sanitation, climate change and drinkable supplies.

Sanitation in particular is one of the most important global issues. The organisers say lack of adequate sanitation is a scandal that costs the lives of 1.4m children every year.  Investing in this area, say scientists, is the most cost effective health intervention the world could make.

http://snipurl.com/3hdfh

Archaeologists Get a Glimpse of Life in a Sahara Eden

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The tiny skeletal hand jutted from the sand as if beckoning the living to the long dead.

For thousands of years, it had lain unheeded in the most desolate section of the Sahara, surrounded by the bones of hippos, giraffes and other creatures typically found in the jungle.

A chance discovery by a team of American scientists has led to the unearthing of a Stone Age cemetery that is providing the first glimpses of what life was like during the still-mysterious period when monsoons brought rain to the desert and created the "green Sahara."

http://snipurl.com/3gd5t

The 2003 Northeast Blackout—Five Years Later

from Scientific American

On August 14, 2003, shortly after 2 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, a high-voltage power line in northern Ohio brushed against some overgrown trees and shut down—a fault, as it's known in the power industry. The line had softened under the heat of the high current coursing through it. Normally, the problem would have tripped an alarm in the control room of FirstEnergy Corporation, an Ohio-based utility company, but the alarm system failed.

Over the next hour and a half, as system operators tried to understand what was happening, three other lines sagged into trees and switched off, forcing other power lines to shoulder an extra burden. Overtaxed, they cut out by 4:05 P.M., tripping a cascade of failures throughout southeastern Canada and eight northeastern states.

All told, 50 million people lost power for up to two days in the biggest blackout in North American history. The event contributed to at least 11 deaths and cost an estimated $6 billion. So, five years later, are we still at risk for a massive blackout?

http://snipurl.com/3g21o
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 18, 2008, 08:28:33 PM
I hope medicine does advance to the point where we can enjoy extended health for an extra 50 years or so; I have a lot of stuff I'd like to do and at this rate I'll never get it all in by the time I'm 90.

Also if they could figure a non-invasive way to remove tumors that would rule.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 18, 2008, 08:45:07 PM
Quote from: Nigel on August 18, 2008, 08:28:33 PM
I hope medicine does advance to the point where we can enjoy extended health for an extra 50 years or so; I have a lot of stuff I'd like to do and at this rate I'll never get it all in by the time I'm 90.

Also if they could figure a non-invasive way to remove tumors that would rule.
It's being worked on. (http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=antibody-drug-unleashes-tumor-killer-t-cells)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 18, 2008, 09:08:53 PM
That's totally cool!

Doesn't say whether it works on benign tumors but I am guessing no.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 18, 2008, 09:21:17 PM
Quote from: Nigel on August 18, 2008, 09:08:53 PM
That's totally cool!

Doesn't say whether it works on benign tumors but I am guessing no.
I'd guess no too, especially as it looks like it just works for lymphoma.  But, that doesn't mean the knowledge gained can't help with other tumors.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 18, 2008, 09:31:44 PM
I hope so 'cause that would be SWEET.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 19, 2008, 03:20:49 PM
August 19, 2008
F.B.I. Details Anthrax Case, but Doubts Remain

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON—Federal Bureau of Investigation officials on Monday laid out their most detailed scientific case to date against Bruce E. Ivins, the military scientist accused of being the anthrax killer, but they acknowledged that the many mysteries of the case meant an air of uncertainty would always surround it.

"I don't think we're ever going to put the suspicions to bed," said Vahid Majidi, head of the F.B.I.'s weapons of mass destruction division. "There's always going to be a spore on a grassy knoll."

At a two-hour briefing for reporters, Dr. Majidi was joined by seven other leading scientists from inside and outside the bureau. They discussed in intricate detail the halting scientific path that led them from two main samples of anthrax used in the 2001 attacks, to four genetic mutations unique to the samples, to 100 scientists in the United States who had access to that particular strain, and ultimately to Dr. Ivins.

http://snipurl.com/3hozp

Spanish Fear Day When Tap Will Run Dry

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

BARCELONA, Spain—Water woes spiraled to such depths this year that the top regional environment minister here—a confirmed agnostic—confessed to climbing the stony shrine of the Virgin of Montserrat for a bit of solace.

Winter rains refused to fall, shriveling reserves to severe drought levels and prompting a water shipment from France. ... A monthlong downpour rescued Spain a couple of months later, ending the drought and adding yet another twist to Spain's unease over its water resource: The unrelenting rain marooned a section of a long-awaited world's fair in Zaragoza that, as luck would have it, touted water conservation.

Expo2008 rebounded to draw thousands of tourists for high-minded talk on sustainable development, but anxieties over water and market pressures now bedevil Spain's most development-hungry regions.

http://snipurl.com/3hi7j

Technology's Toll on Privacy and Security

from Scientific American

Computers, databases and networks have connected us like never before, but at what cost?

Scientific American presents a series of reports. Protesters, terrorists and warmongers have found the Internet to be a useful tool to achieve their goals. Our jittery state since 9/11, coupled with the Internet revolution, is shifting the boundaries between public interest and "the right to be let alone."

A little digging on social networks, blogs and Internet search engines lets you put together information about people like pieces of a puzzle. It's not a pretty picture for security or privacy. And with less than three months before the presidential election, the hotly contested state, Ohio, along with others, continue to have problems with E-voting technology.

http://snipurl.com/3hi41

FDA Approves 1st Drug for Huntington's Disease

from Newsday

Federal drug regulators Friday approved a medication to treat a major symptom of Huntington's disease, marking the first time since the disorder was first described in a Long Island family 136 years ago that any kind of treatment has been available in the United States.

In Huntington's, a rare, devastating condition, brain cells degenerate because of a genetic miscue easily passed from one generation to the next. The disorder results in jerky, involuntary movements known as chorea.

The drug tetrabenazine controls the chorea, which affects about 90 percent of people with the disease. It was approved under the Food and Drug Administration's orphan products program, which is aimed at developing treatments for conditions affecting fewer than 200,000 people. Huntington's disease affects 30,000 people nationwide.

http://snipurl.com/3hhxr

The Winners' Body Language—It's Biological

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Throwing their heads back, thrusting their arms in the air, puffing out their chests, and flashing big grins, Olympic athletes from across the world follow the same triumphant choreography each night.

They aren't just gold medal-clad copycats; a study released last week says that such displays of pride seem to have biological underpinnings, shared with chest-beating mountain gorillas and strutting monkeys.

For insight into pride and shame, scientists studied the aftermath of judo matches from the 2004 Olympic and Paralympic Games, comparing the behavior of winning and losing judo players. They found that victory looked the same across cultures, and even among athletes who were born blind, and could never have learned the behavior from watching their peers celebrate victory.

http://snipurl.com/3hhww

Bacteria Played a Role in 1918 Pandemic Flu Deaths, Scientists Say

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Most deaths in the 1918 influenza pandemic were due not to the virus alone but to common bacterial infections that took advantage of victims' weakened immune systems, according to two new studies that could change the nation's strategy against the next pandemic.

"We have to realize that it isn't just antivirals that we need," said Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and coauthor of one study. "We need to make sure that we're prepared to treat people with antibiotics," said Fauci, whose study will be released online this month by the Journal of Infectious Diseases.

In both studies, scientists analyzed a trove of historical documents from around the world, examining firsthand accounts, medical records and autopsy reports.

http://snipurl.com/3hhtr

'Big Pig Dig' Was Treasure Trove of Fossils

from the San Francisco Chronicle

(Associated Press)—The fossil field formally known as the Pig Wallow Site at Badlands National Park will close for good at the end of this summer, 15 years after student paleontologists started unearthing prehistoric remains.

"The main research of the site is to better understand how fossils are preserved and how bones accumulate in a particular setting. And the site is very unique here at the Badlands. We've never found a site like it in the White River Badlands," said Rachel Benton, park paleontologist.

Excavation started in June 1993 after two visitors found a large backbone sticking out of the ground near the Conata Picnic Area in what researchers think was a watering hole that trapped animals in mud.

http://snipurl.com/3hhup

Mummified Remains from 1948 Plane Crash Identified

from the San Francisco Examiner

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Associated Press)—Nine years of sleuthing, advanced DNA science and cutting-edge forensic techniques have finally put a name to a mummified hand and arm found in an Alaska glacier.

The remains belong to Francis Joseph Van Zandt, a 36-year-old merchant marine from Roanoke, Va., who was on a plane rumored to contain a cargo of gold when it smashed into the side of a mountain 60 years ago. Thirty people died in the crash.

"This is the oldest identification of fingerprints by post-mortem remains," said latent fingerprint expert Mike Grimm Sr., during a teleconference Friday, during which the two pilots who found the remains, genetic scientists and genealogists talked about the discovery.

http://snipurl.com/3hhvo

More than 50 Percent of College Students Felt Suicidal

from USA Today

BOSTON—A comprehensive study of suicidal thinking among college students found more than half of the 26,000 surveyed had suicidal thoughts at some point during their lifetime.

The web-based survey conducted in spring 2006 used separate samples of undergraduate and graduate students from 70 colleges and universities across the country.

Of the 15,010 undergraduates, average age 22: 55 percent had ever thought of suicide; 18 percent seriously considered it; and 8 percent made an attempt. Among 11,441 graduate students, average age 30: Exactly half had such thoughts; 15 percent seriously considered it and 6 percent made an attempt.

http://snipurl.com/3hhyu

Mexican Peppers Posed Health Risks Long Before Salmonella Outbreak

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

FRESNO, Calif. (Associated Press)—Federal inspectors at U.S. border crossings repeatedly turned back filthy, disease-ridden shipments of peppers from Mexico in the months before a salmonella outbreak that sickened 1,400 people was finally traced to Mexican chilies.

Yet no larger action was taken. Food and Drug Administration officials insisted as recently as last week that they were surprised by the outbreak because Mexican peppers had not been spotted as a problem before.

But an Associated Press analysis of FDA records found that peppers and chilies were consistently the top Mexican crop rejected by border inspectors for the last year. Since January alone, 88 shipments of fresh and dried chilies were turned away. Ten percent were contaminated with salmonella. In the last year, 8 percent of the 158 intercepted shipments of fresh and dried chilies had salmonella.

http://snipurl.com/3hp1w
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 20, 2008, 07:26:02 PM
August 20, 2008
Statins: From Fungus to Pharma

from American Scientist

In 1966, Akira Endo, a young Japanese biochemist, started an adventure that would ultimately save thousands, if not millions, of lives.

Only 33 years old at the time, Endo was a research scientist at Sankyo—a pharmaceutical company, later known as Daiichi Sankyo, in Tokyo—where he was looking for enzymes in fungal extracts for improving the quality of certain foodstuffs. But his research was soon to enter a new realm.

As he would write years later: "In the mid-1960s, fascinated by several excellent reviews on cholesterol biosynthesis by Konrad Bloch of Harvard University, who received the Nobel Prize in 1964, I became interested in the biochemistry of cholesterol and other lipids." Endo's curiosity triggered research that eventually spawned one of today's most widely used families of drugs.

http://snipurl.com/3hpjt

China's Olympic Pollution Efforts Paid Off, Expert Says

from National Geographic News

Beijing's air for the opening track-and-field events at the 2008 Summer Olympic Games is "better than expected," said U.S. Olympic distance runner Amy Yoder Begley.

"When I came to China to race in 2002," Yoder Begly said in an e-mail earlier this week, "the air caused my lungs and nasal passages to burn." She also described the sensation as "swallowing glass."

Although air pollution in China's capital city is almost always worse than anywhere in the United States, Chinese efforts to clean up the air before the Games have paid off. The country shut down all nearby factories and ordered half the cars off the road, creating tangible improvements, scientists say.

http://snipurl.com/3hi1n

Methadone Rises as a Painkiller With Big Risks

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Suffering from excruciating spinal deterioration, Robby Garvin, 24, of South Carolina, tried many painkillers before his doctor prescribed methadone in June 2006, just before Mr. Garvin and his friend Joey Sutton set off for a weekend at an amusement park.

On Saturday night Mr. Garvin called his mother to say, "Mama, this is the first time I have been pain free, this medicine just might really help me." The next day, though, he felt bad. As directed, he took two more tablets and then he lay down for a nap. It was after 2 p.m. that Joey said he heard a strange sound that must have been Robby's last breath.

Methadone, once used mainly in addiction treatment centers to replace heroin, is today being given out by family doctors, osteopaths and nurse practitioners for throbbing backs, joint injuries and a host of other severe pains.

http://snipurl.com/3hhtd

Cybercrime: 'A Lot of People Just Don't Take the Basic Precautions'

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

At the end of the Black Hat hacker convention in Las Vegas this month, James Finch, head of the FBI's Cyber Division, sat down for an interview about crime and the Internet. About 4,000 people gathered at the annual convention to hear about research on the latest network and computer or electronic-device security vulnerabilities.

The FBI's Cyber Division is responsible for investigating high-tech crimes, including computer and network intrusions and child pornography cases. Each of the FBI's 56 field offices has a cyber squad, which pulls from a pool of 500 to 600 agents specializing in the area.

According to an FBI spokesman, there are currently about 50 FBI-led cybercrime task forces across the country working cases with state and local authorities and with investigators from other law enforcement agencies. The Washington Post presents excerpts from aninterview with James Finch.

http://snipurl.com/3htsm

Researchers Produce Blood in Lab from Stem Cells

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Scientists said [yesterday] that they have devised a way to grow large quantities of blood in the lab using human embryonic stem cells, potentially making blood drives a relic of the past.

But experts cautioned that although it represented a significant technical advance, the new approach required several key improvements before it could be considered a realistic alternative to donor blood.

The research team outlined a four-step process for turning embryonic stem cells into red blood cells capable of carrying as much oxygen as normal blood. The procedure was published online in the journal Blood. The ability to make blood in the lab would guarantee that hospitals and blood banks have access to an ample supply of all types of blood, including the rare AB-negative and O-negative, the universal donor.

http://snipurl.com/3htqv

Bird Flu Hopes from 1918 Victims

from BBC News Online

Survivors of the devastating 1918 influenza pandemic are still protected from the virus, according to researchers in the US.

American scientists found that people who lived through the outbreak can still produce antibodies that kill the deadly strain of the H1N1 flu. The study, published in the journal Nature, could help develop emergency treatments for future outbreaks.

The Spanish flu outbreak of 1918 killed an estimated 50 million people. Some experts say it was the most devastating epidemic in history, affecting even healthy adults.

http://snipurl.com/3htup

Bloating Galaxies Confound Astronomers

from New Scientist

Astronomers continue to puzzle over the recent discovery of a strange population of dense, compact galaxies that existed in the early universe but are nowhere to be seen today.

They suspect the galaxies somehow puffed up into the bloated behemoths we see around us, but new research shortens the timescale during which this mysterious swelling could have happened.

In April, astronomers reported finding extremely compact galaxies as far back as 10 billion years ago, or 3.7 billion years after the big bang. The galaxies contained the same number of stars as modern, blob-shaped galaxies known as ellipticals—but were two to three times smaller on average. Now, observations have turned up compact galaxies roughly a billion years later, when the universe was almost 5 billion years old.

http://snipurl.com/3htvz

Songbirds Show Signs of Recognizing Their Own Bodies in Mirrors

from Science News

Magpies sing a self-reflective tune to themselves that until now has gone unheard. When placed in front of a mirror, these songbirds realize that they're looking at themselves, raising the possibility that they have independently evolved the brain power to support a basic form of self-recognition, a new study suggests.

Magpies are the first non-mammal to demonstrate a rudimentary affinity for self-recognition, psychologist Helmut Prior of Goethe University in Frankfurt on Main, Germany and his colleagues report in the Aug. 19 PLoS Biology.

Members of the corvid family, which includes crows and ravens, magpies join apes, bottlenose dolphins and elephants as the only animals other than humans that have been observed to understand that a mirror image belongs to their own body.

http://snipurl.com/3htwy

A Monster Discovery? It Was Just a Costume

from ABC News

In the end, it seems Bigfoot was nothing more than a frozen Halloween costume. Last Friday, two men, Matthew Whitton and Rick Dyer, announced they had found the remains of the elusive legend, Sasquatch, better known as Bigfoot.

The two men had teamed up with self-proclaimed Bigfoot hunter Tom Biscardi, creating a media bonanza replete with claims that they had a real half-human, half-ape body in their possession.

Biscardi, who himself has a history of dubious Bigfoot sightings, claims the story started to unravel over the weekend. And he apparently tried to shift responsibility to Whitton and Dyer claiming the pair "deceived him." But several Bigfoot academics say all three men appear to have been perpetrating a hoax.

http://snipurl.com/3i0r1

Researchers Say Numbers Aren't Needed to Count

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—Answer this without counting: Are there more X's here XXXXXX, or here XXXXX? That's a problem facing people whose languages don't include words for more than one or two. Yet researchers say children who speak those languages are still able to compare quantities.

"We argue that humans possess an innate system for enumeration that doesn't rely on words," says Brian Butterworth of the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London.

In an attempt to prove it, Butterworth compared the numerical skills of children from two indigenous Australian groups whose languages don't contain many number words with similar children who speak English. All the groups performed equally well, his research team reports in Tuesday's edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipurl.com/3i0sr
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Golden Applesauce on August 21, 2008, 03:33:33 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 19, 2008, 03:20:49 PM
Technology's Toll on Privacy and Security

from Scientific American

Computers, databases and networks have connected us like never before, but at what cost?

Scientific American presents a series of reports. Protesters, terrorists and warmongers have found the Internet to be a useful tool to achieve their goals. Our jittery state since 9/11, coupled with the Internet revolution, is shifting the boundaries between public interest and "the right to be let alone."

A little digging on social networks, blogs and Internet search engines lets you put together information about people like pieces of a puzzle. It's not a pretty picture for security or privacy. And with less than three months before the presidential election, the hotly contested state, Ohio, along with others, continue to have problems with E-voting technology.

http://snipurl.com/3hi41

This is a big one.  Some retarded faculty member at my college decided it would be a good idea to post a searchable directory with students name, phone numbers, email addresses, and physical addresses online.  At the moment some faculty members have photos as well; I'm hoping they aren't going to apply that to students as well.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 21, 2008, 04:13:32 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on August 21, 2008, 03:33:33 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 19, 2008, 03:20:49 PM
Technology's Toll on Privacy and Security

from Scientific American

Computers, databases and networks have connected us like never before, but at what cost?

Scientific American presents a series of reports. Protesters, terrorists and warmongers have found the Internet to be a useful tool to achieve their goals. Our jittery state since 9/11, coupled with the Internet revolution, is shifting the boundaries between public interest and "the right to be let alone."

A little digging on social networks, blogs and Internet search engines lets you put together information about people like pieces of a puzzle. It's not a pretty picture for security or privacy. And with less than three months before the presidential election, the hotly contested state, Ohio, along with others, continue to have problems with E-voting technology.

http://snipurl.com/3hi41

This is a big one.  Some retarded faculty member at my college decided it would be a good idea to post a searchable directory with students name, phone numbers, email addresses, and physical addresses online.  At the moment some faculty members have photos as well; I'm hoping they aren't going to apply that to students as well.

We have that here, but you actually have to be a student or staff/faculty to access it, requiring a logon.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Requia ☣ on August 21, 2008, 05:01:17 AM
Quote from: Golden Applesauce on August 21, 2008, 03:33:33 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 19, 2008, 03:20:49 PM
Technology's Toll on Privacy and Security

from Scientific American

Computers, databases and networks have connected us like never before, but at what cost?

Scientific American presents a series of reports. Protesters, terrorists and warmongers have found the Internet to be a useful tool to achieve their goals. Our jittery state since 9/11, coupled with the Internet revolution, is shifting the boundaries between public interest and "the right to be let alone."

A little digging on social networks, blogs and Internet search engines lets you put together information about people like pieces of a puzzle. It's not a pretty picture for security or privacy. And with less than three months before the presidential election, the hotly contested state, Ohio, along with others, continue to have problems with E-voting technology.

http://snipurl.com/3hi41

This is a big one.  Some retarded faculty member at my college decided it would be a good idea to post a searchable directory with students name, phone numbers, email addresses, and physical addresses online.  At the moment some faculty members have photos as well; I'm hoping they aren't going to apply that to students as well.

I used one of those for nefarious purposes a while back.  They are a seriously bad idea.  But then, so are online phone books.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 21, 2008, 02:43:26 PM
Yeah, you could easily find out who I am, where I live, what classes I take, and a thousand other little but revealing things about my identity with only a little digging, assuming you knew where to look.

Thats a risk I'm willing to take.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on August 21, 2008, 03:36:41 PM
Quotehttp://snipurl.com/3hdeq

Pluto Is Part of Hot Debate

from the Baltimore Sun

It was billed as a debate over the 2006 decision by the International Astronomical Union that kicked Pluto out of the family of planets, leaving just eight.

But in the end, after a jocular and noisy tussle before scientists and educators gathered at the Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory, both debaters agreed that the IAU's definition only muddied the waters, and that more time is needed for science to sort out the increasingly complex range of objects circling our sun and other stars.

"Get the notion of counting things out of your system," said Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of New York's Hayden Planetarium. "The more we learn about anything, the more we have to tune the vocabulary we use to describe it."  The two debaters also expressed delight that a scientific debate has captured so much public attention.

"Yeah, that's right bitches! Bow down to my scientifical prowess!"
                                                        /
(http://tinyfrog.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/neiltyson2.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 21, 2008, 03:54:36 PM
The problem is that there are many many objects circling the sun, from the Jovian planets being the largest, to the inner terrestrial planets, to the smaller Kuiper belt objects and other "dwarf planets" like Eris, to even smaller asteroids, comets, and then the countless meteors.

Theres no simple system to separate these out, but the easiest way, I think, would be by size, location and composition. There's also the issue of hydrostatic equilibrium, that is, the amount of mass needed to cause a planet or planetoid to have a spherical shape. Even some asteroids, such as Ceres, may qualify in that category.

If we really looked hard at this too, we could reclassify the moon as a planet, dwarf planet anyway, and the earth moon as a binary planet system. Both rotate around a center of gravity that is near the earths crust, and not at the center of the earth.

Interesting. Its all interesting.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on August 21, 2008, 04:12:41 PM
It is interesting.  As our technology has advanced, allowing us to gather in more visual and scientific information about our Solar System, we discover more and more that we have to redefine our models.  It was easy with just the handheld telescopes of yesteryear, when you could just make out the planets. 

Kind of a nice BIP corrolary really.  The more information you allow to come into focus, the more you realize you didn't know as much as you thought you did before. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 21, 2008, 04:35:18 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on August 21, 2008, 04:12:41 PM
It is interesting.  As our technology has advanced, allowing us to gather in more visual and scientific information about our Solar System, we discover more and more that we have to redefine our models.  It was easy with just the handheld telescopes of yesteryear, when you could just make out the planets. 

Kind of a nice BIP corrolary really.  The more information you allow to come into focus, the more you realize you didn't know as much as you thought you did before. 

And that ties into a nice law of fives corrolary: the more you focus on this information, the more examples and discoveries become apparent to you.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 04:51:23 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on August 21, 2008, 04:12:41 PM
It is interesting.  As our technology has advanced, allowing us to gather in more visual and scientific information about our Solar System, we discover more and more that we have to redefine our models.  It was easy with just the handheld telescopes of yesteryear, when you could just make out the planets. 

Kind of a nice BIP corrolary really.  The more information you allow to come into focus, the more you realize you didn't know as much as you thought you did before. 

And I think it is that corrolary that many of the New Atheists seem to miss... those ones that think Dawkins and Darwin solved all of life's mysteries....

At Pennsic I had a conversation with a couple hardcore Atheists... both seemed to think that we'd already discovered pretty much everything we needed to understand Life, The Universe and Everything. One, a younger kid just preparing for college, actually said  that he was getting into astrophysics because it was the only area of science left with mysteries. Biology and the other fields, in his mind, had already been figured out.

*headdesk*


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on August 21, 2008, 04:54:52 PM
Quote from: Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 04:51:23 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on August 21, 2008, 04:12:41 PM
It is interesting.  As our technology has advanced, allowing us to gather in more visual and scientific information about our Solar System, we discover more and more that we have to redefine our models.  It was easy with just the handheld telescopes of yesteryear, when you could just make out the planets. 

Kind of a nice BIP corrolary really.  The more information you allow to come into focus, the more you realize you didn't know as much as you thought you did before. 

And I think it is that corrolary that many of the New Atheists seem to miss... those ones that think Dawkins and Darwin solved all of life's mysteries....

At Pennsic I had a conversation with a couple hardcore Atheists... both seemed to think that we'd already discovered pretty much everything we needed to understand Life, The Universe and Everything. One, a younger kid just preparing for college, actually said  that he was getting into astrophysics because it was the only area of science left with mysteries. Biology and the other fields, in his mind, had already been figured out.

*headdesk*

Gah!  It's because he's got this nutty idea in his head that because Space is inifinite (maybe?), that means there are limitless possibilities.  A very macrocosm perspective.  Shit, we still haven't fully explained how the very thing we think with works.  Hopefully he'll figure it out sooner, rather then later. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 04:59:56 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on August 21, 2008, 04:54:52 PM
Quote from: Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 04:51:23 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on August 21, 2008, 04:12:41 PM
It is interesting.  As our technology has advanced, allowing us to gather in more visual and scientific information about our Solar System, we discover more and more that we have to redefine our models.  It was easy with just the handheld telescopes of yesteryear, when you could just make out the planets. 

Kind of a nice BIP corrolary really.  The more information you allow to come into focus, the more you realize you didn't know as much as you thought you did before. 

And I think it is that corrolary that many of the New Atheists seem to miss... those ones that think Dawkins and Darwin solved all of life's mysteries....

At Pennsic I had a conversation with a couple hardcore Atheists... both seemed to think that we'd already discovered pretty much everything we needed to understand Life, The Universe and Everything. One, a younger kid just preparing for college, actually said  that he was getting into astrophysics because it was the only area of science left with mysteries. Biology and the other fields, in his mind, had already been figured out.

*headdesk*

Gah!  It's because he's got this nutty idea in his head that because Space is inifinite (maybe?), that means there are limitless possibilities.  A very macrocosm perspective.  Shit, we still haven't fully explained how the very thing we think with works.  Hopefully he'll figure it out sooner, rather then later. 

Oh no, he was pretty sure we'd discovered everything, including the edge of the Universe... but we just hadn't explained everything like what's inside a black hole. After some discussion he admitted that maybe neurology also had some mysteries left, but nothing else. He was a great kid, but if his view reflects what they're teaching in school, the next generation is gonna be pretty bored. ;-)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 21, 2008, 06:33:18 PM
I wonder where these kids get this idea that everything has been discovered and understood? Maybe their science focuses too much on the things that the scientific communities understand and very little on the massive amount of things that we still lack information of.

Yesterday I was attending a lecture by a rather renowned entomologist. He just recently finished a count of all the known described names of species that were still valid, species of insects I mean. The count came just over 1 million. However, he said, the number of insect species still undescribed is likely 20-50 times what we know now. Even in my own field of study, Trichopterology, we have just over 11,000 described species but the estimate is somewhere around 5 times that.

And thats just species unknowns. That doesn't quantify all the lack of information we have about physiology or ecology, or evolutionary biology, or genetic, etc.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 21, 2008, 06:40:21 PM
Haven't most humans almost always thought that their generation reached the end of knowledge?

It seems almost an inborn trait.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on August 21, 2008, 06:53:21 PM
Again I think an issue of perspective.  It seems humans have a hard time zooming out to see the larger picture.  Of course with some religion is a confounding variable.  (Like those who think the universe has only existed for a few thousand years)  When you map out the history of the world on a timeline and see how much of a blip humanity is, and then see how much of a blip the average lifespan is, it seems kind of like a no-brainer that we've only scratched the surface.

But when looking at it from a perspective on the ground, within the lifespan, not seeing beyond one's own mortality, yeah, I can see why many would fall into that trap of perceived limitations. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 06:58:53 PM
GODDESSDAMNIT, WHEN WILL HUMANS LEARN TO SAY

"I Don't Know?"

(and if you respond with "I don't know..." I will unleash a storm of chaoacorns on your head...)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on August 21, 2008, 07:13:29 PM
Je ne sais pas.


Ha!  Owned by a Frenchmen!   :D
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 21, 2008, 08:08:10 PM
Quote from: Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 04:51:23 PMOne, a younger kid just preparing for college, actually said  that he was getting into astrophysics because it was the only area of science left with mysteries. Biology and the other fields, in his mind, had already been figured out.

*headdesk*



Wait, what?  I'm going into biotechnology and there is plenty of unknown.  Hell, there is this neat little thing called recombinant DNA (genetic engineering) that is just begging for work to be done, not to mention stem cells.  There are also oodles of genetic disorders that may be treatable or even curable.  The human genome project may be done, but not epigenetics.  Plus, many non-human species haven't had their genome analyzed.  There is the huge possibility of finding new medicine based on human genes.  Oh, and cancer research, can't forget about cancer.  There is plenty of work to do.

This isn't to say there hasn't been a lot of work done, there has been.  It's also been very impressive.  But, with every answered question, we have a new question.  Not that there is anything wrong with astrophysics, but it's not like the other fields have everything figured out.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 09:36:19 PM
Quote from: Vene on August 21, 2008, 08:08:10 PM
Quote from: Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 04:51:23 PMOne, a younger kid just preparing for college, actually said  that he was getting into astrophysics because it was the only area of science left with mysteries. Biology and the other fields, in his mind, had already been figured out.

*headdesk*



Wait, what?  I'm going into biotechnology and there is plenty of unknown.  Hell, there is this neat little thing called recombinant DNA (genetic engineering) that is just begging for work to be done, not to mention stem cells.  There are also oodles of genetic disorders that may be treatable or even curable.  The human genome project may be done, but not epigenetics.  Plus, many non-human species haven't had their genome analyzed.  There is the huge possibility of finding new medicine based on human genes.  Oh, and cancer research, can't forget about cancer.  There is plenty of work to do.

This isn't to say there hasn't been a lot of work done, there has been.  It's also been very impressive.  But, with every answered question, we have a new question.  Not that there is anything wrong with astrophysics, but it's not like the other fields have everything figured out.


Precisely... I think I stunned him when I told him that if we had discovered 'everything' there was to know on any subject... then it was just because we were too egotistical, lazy or ignorant to ask the next question.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 09:38:07 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on August 21, 2008, 07:13:29 PM
Je ne sais pas.


Ha!  Owned by a Frenchmen!   :D

bâtard
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 21, 2008, 10:11:37 PM
Quote from: LMNO on August 21, 2008, 06:40:21 PM
Haven't most humans almost always thought that their generation reached the end of knowledge?

It seems almost an inborn trait.

I think it has to do something with both the human complacency when they are in comfort (or comfortable fear) of their environment, and technological plateau which makes them believe that everything to be learned has been.

When people feel uncomfortable with their surroundings, when they want change, and when new technology is challenging the status quo, I think you see less and less of this. Education plays a role because, at least in biology, you have a tendency to be bombarded with the great achievements of the past as the basis for current knowlege and the process tends to be very slow at incorporating new knowlege, which seems to be old, been done, has been by the time its taught.

Also: PEOPLE ARE VERY AFRAID OF MAKING MISTAKES.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on August 21, 2008, 11:06:12 PM
Quote from: Ratatosk on August 21, 2008, 04:51:23 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on August 21, 2008, 04:12:41 PM
It is interesting.  As our technology has advanced, allowing us to gather in more visual and scientific information about our Solar System, we discover more and more that we have to redefine our models.  It was easy with just the handheld telescopes of yesteryear, when you could just make out the planets. 

Kind of a nice BIP corrolary really.  The more information you allow to come into focus, the more you realize you didn't know as much as you thought you did before. 

And I think it is that corrolary that many of the New Atheists seem to miss... those ones that think Dawkins and Darwin solved all of life's mysteries....

At Pennsic I had a conversation with a couple hardcore Atheists... both seemed to think that we'd already discovered pretty much everything we needed to understand Life, The Universe and Everything. One, a younger kid just preparing for college, actually said  that he was getting into astrophysics because it was the only area of science left with mysteries. Biology and the other fields, in his mind, had already been figured out.

*headdesk*



Teenagers know absolutely everything there is to know about the universe.  Just ask them. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 22, 2008, 03:31:19 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 21, 2008, 10:11:37 PM
Also: PEOPLE ARE VERY AFRAID OF MAKING MISTAKES.
This.  What is so terrifying about a complete and total fuck up?  That's the best way to learn.  I love being proven wrong.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 22, 2008, 04:07:49 AM
Quote from: Vene on August 22, 2008, 03:31:19 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 21, 2008, 10:11:37 PM
Also: PEOPLE ARE VERY AFRAID OF MAKING MISTAKES.
This.  What is so terrifying about a complete and total fuck up?  That's the best way to learn.  I love being proven wrong.

Its less about the mistake itself and more about not wanting to be embarrassed or humiliated.

Fact: many people fear public speaking first above even death. Why? Because they fear public embarrassment or humiliation more than anything.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 22, 2008, 04:11:50 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 22, 2008, 04:07:49 AM
Quote from: Vene on August 22, 2008, 03:31:19 AM
Quote from: Kai on August 21, 2008, 10:11:37 PM
Also: PEOPLE ARE VERY AFRAID OF MAKING MISTAKES.
This.  What is so terrifying about a complete and total fuck up?  That's the best way to learn.  I love being proven wrong.

Its less about the mistake itself and more about not wanting to be embarrassed or humiliated.

Fact: many people fear public speaking first above even death. Why? Because they fear public embarrassment or humiliation more than anything.
I don't understand, what is this "embarrassed" you speak of.  I take great pride in acting like a damn fool every day.

And the public speaking thing makes me lol.  I don't care that I've heard it before, it's still so damn funny.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 22, 2008, 10:51:04 AM
Its the honest truth. People are deathly afraid of being embarrassed in public. Some cultures took it so far as to kill themselves to leave the pain of being "dishonoured" or loosing face (i.e. the Japanese). As social creatures we subconsciously worry what our peers think of us and where we stand in relation to other people hierarchically because our standing, at least classically, determined the resources that were available for us. That isn't as boldly true anymore, but it still resonates within some aspects of society.

I know I feel it. I don't feel its the worst thing ever but I still have difficulty getting up and speaking to a group of my peers.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 22, 2008, 02:10:26 PM
Yeah, in one of my performance classes, the professor actually forced us to really dig down and say what's the worst thing to happen if we get on stage and mess up in front of an audience.

For most of the class, it boiled down to "people won't like me/find me attractive," or "I won't feel superior to them."

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on August 22, 2008, 02:27:55 PM
I don't get nervous like I used to when it comes to presenting information and public speaking.  It helps that in Maine, once you've gone to a couple of events in any given field, you've pretty much met everybody in that field and so you get to know people pretty quick.  So it helps when you have people in the audience that you know and who know you are sharp and know what you are talking about.

Otherwise, it's kind of that fear of not presenting to your audience a sense that you are educated and knowledgeable about what you are speaking about.  You know you know it, because it's right there in your head, but your audience can't see that.  So I think that's a big fear too, being able to project your personal knowledge "appropriately". 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 22, 2008, 04:21:05 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 22, 2008, 10:51:04 AM
Its the honest truth. People are deathly afraid of being embarrassed in public. Some cultures took it so far as to kill themselves to leave the pain of being "dishonoured" or loosing face (i.e. the Japanese). As social creatures we subconsciously worry what our peers think of us and where we stand in relation to other people hierarchically because our standing, at least classically, determined the resources that were available for us. That isn't as boldly true anymore, but it still resonates within some aspects of society.

I know I feel it. I don't feel its the worst thing ever but I still have difficulty getting up and speaking to a group of my peers.
Yeah, I do realize that.  I'm just a freak and tend not to give a damn.

Quote from: LMNO on August 22, 2008, 02:10:26 PMFor most of the class, it boiled down to "people won't like me/find me attractive," or "I won't feel superior to them."
You don't have to feel you're superior, you have to be superior.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 22, 2008, 04:25:16 PM
Ok, we get it, you don't have stagefright.


Sheesh.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on August 22, 2008, 07:02:42 PM
New research has discovered that humans can taste calcium, and it isn't a good taste.  This may explain why so many people have calcium deficiencies.
link (http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=osteoporosis-calcium-taste-chalk)

Scientists have found a neurological cause for weight gain as we age.  It looks as if the cells the suppress appetite degenerate over time and the foods that cause the most damage are carbohydrates.
link (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080821110113.htm)

A new catalyst has been found to be effective for the generation of hydrogen from biofuels.  It's 0.1% the cost of traditional catalysts.
link (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080820163111.htm)

An organism that is able to use arsenic instead of water for photosynthesis has been discovered.
link (http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=using-a-poison-to-turn-sunlight-into-food)

Climate change has been shown to be responsible for an abnormally low amount of rain in the southwest United States.
(http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=fewer-april-showers-for-southwest)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 26, 2008, 12:24:10 AM
August 25, 2008
A Teacher on the Front Line as Faith and Science Clash

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ORANGE PARK, Fla.—David Campbell switched on the overhead projector and wrote "Evolution" in the rectangle of light on the screen.

He scanned the faces of the sophomores in his Biology I class. Many of them, he knew from years of teaching high school in this Jacksonville suburb, had been raised to take the biblical creation story as fact.

His gaze rested for a moment on Bryce Haas, a football player who attended the 6 a.m. prayer meetings of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes in the school gymnasium. "If I do this wrong," Mr. Campbell remembers thinking on that humid spring morning, "I'll lose him."

http://snipurl.com/3jjn4

Undecided Voter? There May Be No Such Thing

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Can't decide between Barack Obama and John McCain? Chances are your brain already has.

Using a simple word association test to look inside voters' heads, Canadian and Italian researchers found that many voters who thought they were undecided had unconsciously made up their minds.

Their decisions arise less from careful deliberation of the facts than from deep-seated attitudes that they have little awareness of, the study found. Inside their brains, undecideds are often partisans, although "they do not know it yet," said Bertram Gawronski, a University of Western Ontario psychologist and senior author of the study.

http://snipurl.com/3itbb

"Water Mafias" Put Stranglehold on Public Water Supply

from National Geographic News

Worldwide corruption driven by mafia-like organizations throughout water industries is forcing the poor to pay more for basic drinking water and sanitation services, according to a new report.

If bribery, organized crime, embezzlement, and other illegal activities continue, consumers and taxpayers will pay the equivalent of U.S. $20 billion over the next decade, says the report, released [last] week at the World Water Week conference in Stockholm, Sweden.

The water sector is one of most corrupt after health and education, added Håkan Tropp, chair of the Water Integrity Network (WIN), an advocacy group and report co-author. That's because the poor often don't have a voice in strategic water policy decisions ...

http://snipurl.com/3isrb

How RFID Tags Could Be Used to Track Unsuspecting People

from Scientific American

If you live in a state bordering Canada or Mexico, you may soon be given an opportunity to carry a very high tech item: a remotely readable driver's license.

Designed to identify U.S. citizens as they approach the nation's borders, the cards are being promoted by the Department of Homeland Security as a way to save time and simplify border crossings.

But if you care about your safety and privacy as much as convenience, you might want to think twice before signing up.

http://snipurl.com/3issy

Gravity Is Not the Main Obstacle for America's Space Business

from the Economist

In the spring of 2006 Robert Bigelow needed to take a stand on a trip to Russia to keep a satellite off the floor. ... It was, says the entrepreneur and head of Bigelow Aerospace in Nevada, "indistinguishable from a common coffee table."

Nonetheless, the American authorities told Mr Bigelow that this coffee table was part of a satellite assembly and so counted as a munition. During the trip it would have to be guarded by two security officers at all times.

Exporting technology has always presented a dilemma for America. ... If export rules are too lax, foreign powers will be able to put American technology in their systems, or copy it. But if the rules are too tight, then it will stifle the industries that depend upon sales to create the next generation of technology.

http://snipurl.com/3isvs

At Conference on the Risks to Earth, Few Are Optimistic

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ERICE, Sicily—This ancient hilltop town ... is hosting a very modern gathering: a conference on global risks like cyberterrorism, climate change, nuclear weapons and the world's lagging energy supply.

More than 120 scientists, engineers, analysts and economists from 30 countries were hunkered down here for the 40th annual conference on "planetary emergencies."

The term was coined by Dr. Antonino Zichichi, a native son and a theoretical physicist who has made Erice a hub for experts to discuss persistent, and potentially catastrophic, global challenges. The participants were not particularly optimistic.

http://snipurl.com/3jjn6

Global Warming Sign? Huge Petermann Glacier in Arctic Is Cracking

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

In northern Greenland, a part of the Arctic that had seemed immune from global warming, new satellite images show a growing giant crack and an 11-square-mile chunk of ice hemorrhaging off a major glacier, scientists said Thursday.

That has led the university professor who spotted the wounds in the massive Petermann glacier to predict disintegration of a major portion of the Northern Hemisphere's largest floating glacier within the year.

... The question that now faces scientists is: Are the fractures part of normal glacier stress or are they the beginning of the effects of global warming?

http://snipurl.com/3jjn8

Sky Survey Yields New Cosmic Haul

from BBC News Online

Astronomers looking through the data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, the world's largest survey of galaxies, have found a new haul of objects closer to home—including one with a potentially exotic origin.

By searching through a survey region known as Stripe 82, a team led by Dr Andrew Becker of the University of Washington, has discovered almost 50 new asteroid-sized bodies in the outer regions of our Solar System.

As part of a search for supernovae—exploding stars in distant galaxies—the robotic Sloan telescope in New Mexico revisited this area of the southern sky every three days. By comparing images taken on different nights, the Washington team was able to detect the asteroids as they moved across the sky.

http://snipurl.com/3jjnc

Virus-Infecting Virus Fuels Definition of Life Debate

from National Geographic News

The discovery of a massive virus that suffers from another virus has reignited debate over whether the microscopic agents of infection should be considered living things rather than bags of genes.

Earlier this month scientists reported a new strain of giant virus called mamavirus, which was first detected in amoebas from a water-cooling tower in Paris.

In a recent study, electron microscopy revealed a much smaller virus attached to the mamavirus, which the study authors say made the host virus grow abnormally and damaged its ability to replicate. The tiny satellite virus, dubbed Sputnik, is the first described virophage—so named because its behavior resembles that of bacteria-targeting viruses known as bacteriophages.

http://snipurl.com/3jjni

Seeing in Four Dimensions

from Science News

Three dimensions can be so limiting. Mathematicians, freed in their imaginations from physical constraints, can conjure up descriptions of objects in many more dimensions than that.

... There is the minor difficulty that our nervous systems are only equipped to conjure images in three dimensions. But that doesn't stop Étienne Ghys of the École Normale Supérieure in Lyon, France, from visualizing the four-dimensional dynamical systems he studies: "I live in dimension four," he says.

And you can too. Ghys has now created a series of videos teaching others to visualize four dimensions the way he does.

http://snipurl.com/3jjnm
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 30, 2008, 02:38:24 PM
August 29, 2008

Ancient Urban Network Mapped in Amazon Forests
from National Geographic News

Dozens of densely packed, pre-Columbian towns, villages, and hamlets arranged in an organized pattern have been mapped in the Brazilian Amazon, anthropologists announced [yesterday].

The finding suggests that vast swathes of "pristine" rain forest may actually have been sophisticated urban landscapes prior to the arrival of European colonists.

"It is very different from what we might expect using certain classic models of urbanism," noted study co-author Michael Heckenberger, an anthropologist at the University of Florida in Gainesville. Nevertheless, he said, the repeated patterns within and among settlements across the landscape suggest a highly ordered and planned society on par with any medieval European town.

http://snipurl.com/3kyq8


U.S. Salmonella Outbreak Linked to Jalapenos Appears Over
from USA Today

The largest outbreak of food-borne illness in the past decade may finally be over. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday that the salmonella outbreak tied to tomatoes, jalapeno and serrano chilies appears to have ended. The Food and Drug Administration has also lifted its advice to consumers to avoid eating raw jalapenos and serrano peppers grown or packed in Mexico.

A total of 1,442 people were infected with the rare bacterial strain known as salmonella saintpaul. At least 286 were hospitalized. The CDC says the infection, which can cause diarrhea and dehydration, may have contributed to at least two deaths.

The first documented case began on April 16, and the last occurred on Aug. 11. Most fell ill in May or June. The only states with no documented cases were Alaska, Delaware, Hawaii, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wyoming.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqd


Beetle Drive
from the Economist

One of the lies regularly promulgated by creationist ideologues is that you cannot see evolution in action right now. For microorganisms this is obviously untrue. The evolution of new viral diseases, such as AIDS, is one example.

The evolution of antibiotic-resistant bacteria is another. But bacteria and viruses breed fast, so natural selection has time, within the span of a human life, to make a difference. For species with longer generations, examples are less numerous. But they do exist.

A new one has just been published, appropriately, in Evolution. It concerns dung beetles. Harald Parzer and Armin Moczek, of Indiana University, have been studying a species called Onthophagus taurus. Or, rather, it was a species 50 years ago, but it is now heading rapidly towards becoming at least four of them.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqg


Gene Linked to Eye Disease
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LA JOLLA—An international team led by a UCSD eye researcher has found the first genetic link to dry age-related macular degeneration, the most common form of progressive blindness.

A study by the team describes a genetic variant in about 66 percent of the population that appears to protect people from certain kinds of viral damage, a leading suspect in the development of the eye disease. People who lack this variant are not protected and thus more vulnerable to dry macular degeneration.

The discovery was spearheaded by Dr. Kang Zhang of the Shiley Eye Center at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine in La Jolla. About 900,000 people in the United States have been diagnosed with dry macular degeneration, and up to 10 million are at risk.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqo


Fly's Brain 'Senses Swat Threat'
from BBC News Online

Researchers in the US say that they have solved the mystery of why flies are so hard to swat. They think the fly's ability to dodge being hit is due to its fast acting brain and an ability to plan ahead.

High speed, high resolution video recordings revealed the insects quickly work out where a threat is coming from and prepare an escape route.

The research suggests that the best way of swatting a fly is to creep up slowly and aim ahead of its location. The study has been published in the journal Current Biology.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqs


A-Beta on the Brain
from Science News

Amyloid-beta is a thinking brain's protein. A new study involving people with severe brain injuries shows that as neuronal activity increases, levels of amyloid-beta in the brain also go up.

A-beta, as the protein is sometimes called, is best known for causing plaques in the brains of people with Alzheimer's disease. It is a normal component of the brain, but scientists don't know what it does.

Traumatic brain injuries increase the risk for Alzheimer's disease. So to find out if brain injuries cause a spike in amyloid-beta levels that could lead to plaque formation, a team of researchers from Milan, Italy, and Washington University in St. Louis sampled fluid from the brains of 18 comatose patients.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqx


Purdue, Citing Research Misconduct, Punishes Scientist
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

An appeals committee at Purdue University has upheld findings of misconduct on the part of a professor who claims to have created energy-generating fusion in a tabletop experiment, the university announced on Wednesday.

With the findings, William R. Woodson, the university's provost, has imposed punishment on the professor, Rusi P. Taleyarkhan. Dr. Taleyarkhan remains on the Purdue faculty, but his distinction as a "named professor" has been removed, along with an annual allotment of $25,000 that accompanied it.

In addition, he is prohibited from serving as a thesis adviser to graduate students for at least the next three years. John Lewis, a lawyer for him, said Dr. Taleyarkhan was considering his options, among them challenging the sanctions in court.

http://snipurl.com/3kyr3


University's Plans for Milton Friedman Institute Spark Outcry
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

CHICAGO, Aug. 27—Plans by the University of Chicago to establish a research institute named after legendary free-market economist Milton Friedman have caused an uproar at the school on the city's South Side.

More than 100 tenured faculty members have signed letters and a petition opposing the institute, which would be paid for by private donations and would conduct research in economics, medicine, public policy and law. Critics say that they are concerned the institute will be a partisan, elitist organization and that it shouldn't be under the auspices of a university.

"There are a lot of aspects that look like a right-wing think tank. I'm very worried about that possibility," said Bruce Lincoln, a professor of the history of religions who helped draft the letters and petition. "People are concerned about the blurring of the line between Friedman's technical work in economics and his fairly well-known persona as a political advocate of a very pure, free-market conservative or neoliberal position, where the market is the solution to everything."

http://snipurl.com/3kyq5


Photographs of Dead Sea Scrolls to Go Online
from the Guardian (UK)

Scientists and scholars in Jerusalem have begun a programme to take the first high-resolution digital photographs of the Dead Sea Scrolls so that they can be shown on the internet.

The Israel Antiquities Authority ends a pilot project this week which prepares the way for a much larger operation to photograph the 15,000-20,000 fragments that make up the 900 scrolls. The scrolls, first photographed in the 1950s after their discovery by shepherds in caves near the Dead Sea, have been kept in monitored conditions in a vault. Only four specially trained curators are allowed to handle them.

In a project that could take five years and cost millions of dollars, the fragments will be photographed first by a 39-megapixel digital camera then by another digital camera in infra-red light. Finally, some will be photographed using a sophisticated multi-spectral imaging camera.

http://snipurl.com/3kyr4


Portable GPS Units Establish Defendants' Whereabouts
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

(Associated Press)—Like millions of motorists, Eric Hanson used a GPS unit in his Chevrolet TrailBlazer to find his way around. He probably didn't expect that prosecutors would eventually use it too—to help convict him of killing four family members.

Prosecutors in suburban Chicago analyzed data from the Garmin GPS device to pinpoint where Hanson had been on the morning after his parents were fatally shot and his sister and brother-in-law bludgeoned to death in 2005. He was convicted of the killings earlier this year and sentenced to death.

Hanson's trial was among recent criminal cases around the country in which authorities used GPS navigation devices to help establish a defendant's whereabouts. Experts say such evidence will almost certainly become more common in court as GPS systems become more affordable and show up in more vehicles.

http://snipurl.com/3kyr7



Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Requia ☣ on August 31, 2008, 12:37:17 AM
Undecided Voter? There May Be No Such Thing

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Can't decide between Barack Obama and John McCain? Chances are your brain already has.

Using a simple word association test to look inside voters' heads, Canadian and Italian researchers found that many voters who thought they were undecided had unconsciously made up their minds.

Their decisions arise less from careful deliberation of the facts than from deep-seated attitudes that they have little awareness of, the study found. Inside their brains, undecideds are often partisans, although "they do not know it yet," said Bertram Gawronski, a University of Western Ontario psychologist and senior author of the study.

http://snipurl.com/3itbb
[/quote]

Heuristic modules do not imply counciousness follows suit  :argh!:

The only thing these tests determine is decision making capability when you strip the agent of the ability to think about what they are doing.  Useful for talking about latent tendancies and studying societal imprints, not useful for predicting premeditated behavior.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on September 02, 2008, 07:15:12 AM
Quote
Gene Linked to Eye Disease
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LA JOLLA—An international team led by a UCSD eye researcher has found the first genetic link to dry age-related macular degeneration, the most common form of progressive blindness.

A study by the team describes a genetic variant in about 66 percent of the population that appears to protect people from certain kinds of viral damage, a leading suspect in the development of the eye disease. People who lack this variant are not protected and thus more vulnerable to dry macular degeneration.

The discovery was spearheaded by Dr. Kang Zhang of the Shiley Eye Center at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine in La Jolla. About 900,000 people in the United States have been diagnosed with dry macular degeneration, and up to 10 million are at risk.

http://snipurl.com/3kyqo

Well, looks like I'm fucked.  Three generations of my family have had surgery for macular degeneration and I will more than likely be next.  :sad:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 06, 2008, 03:43:37 PM
September 5, 2008

For the Brain, Remembering Is Like Reliving
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Scientists have for the first time recorded individual brain cells in the act of summoning a spontaneous memory, revealing not only where a remembered experience is registered but also, in part, how the brain is able to recreate it.

The recordings, taken from the brains of epilepsy patients being prepared for surgery, demonstrate that these spontaneous memories reside in some of the same neurons that fired most furiously when the recalled event had been experienced. Researchers had long theorized as much but until now had only indirect evidence.

Experts said the study had all but closed the case: For the brain, remembering is a lot like doing (at least in the short term, as the research says nothing about more distant memories).

http://snipurl.com/3nagx


Mammoths Moved 'Out of America'
from BBC News Online

Scientists have discovered that the last Siberian woolly mammoths may have originated in North America. Their research in the journal Current Biology represents the largest study of ancient woolly mammoth DNA.

The scientists also question the direct role of climate change in the eventual demise of these large beasts.

They believe that woolly mammoths survived through the period when the ice sheets were at their maximum, while other Ice Age mammals "crashed out." The iconic Ice Age woolly mammoth—Mammuthus primigenius—roamed through mainland Eurasia and North America until about 10,000 years ago.

http://snipurl.com/3mzcv


Study Finds No Autism Link in Vaccine
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

A common vaccine given to children to protect them against measles, mumps and rubella is not linked to autism, a study published [Wednesday] concludes. The findings contradict earlier research that had fueled fears of a possible link between childhood vaccinations and a steep increase in autism diagnoses.

In February 1998, the Lancet journal published a study by British researcher Andrew Wakefield of 12 children with autism and other behavioral problems that suggested the onset of their behavioral abnormalities was linked to receiving the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine.

The new study comes as the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington is in the midst of evaluating evidence on whether children's vaccines are implicated in causing autism.

http://snipurl.com/3mz48


Milky Way's Black Hole Seen in New Detail
from Science News

New radio wave observations are giving astronomers their closest look yet at the supermassive black hole believed to be lurking at the center of our galaxy.

Reporting in the Sept. 4 Nature, a team has, for the first time, resolved features as small as the black hole's event horizon—the gravitationally warped region from which nothing, not even light, can escape.

"We have now entered a new era, one in which we can directly image structure at the event horizon of a black hole," asserts Christopher Reynolds of the University of Maryland in College Park in a commentary accompanying the Nature report.

http://snipurl.com/3mzul


BPA Linked to Primate Health Issues
from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON—Researchers at the Yale School of Medicine have linked a chemical found in everyday plastics to problems with brain function and mood disorders in monkeys, the first time the chemical has been connected to health problems in primates.

The study is the latest in an accumulation of research that has raises concerns about bisphenol A, or BPA, a compound that gives a shatterproof quality to polycarbonate plastic and has been found to leach from plastic into food and water.

The Yale study results come as federal toxicologists Wednesday reaffirmed an earlier draft-report finding that there is "some concern" bisphenol A can cause developmental problems in the brain and hormonal systems of infants and children.

http://snipurl.com/3mzft


Doctors: New Way to Spot Breast Cancer Shows Promise
from USA Today

A radioactive tracer that "lights up" cancer hiding inside dense breasts showed promise in its first big test against mammograms, revealing more tumors and giving fewer false alarms, doctors reported Wednesday.

The experimental method—molecular breast imaging, or MBI—would not replace mammograms for women at average risk of the disease.

But it might become an additional tool for higher-risk women with a lot of dense tissue that makes tumors hard to spot on mammograms, and it could be done at less cost than an MRI, or magnetic resonance imaging.

http://snipurl.com/3mz9s


Cracking Anthrax
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Attacked by Bacillus anthracis in its most virulent form, the human body is no match. White blood cells dispatched to kill the pathogen wind up transporting anthrax spores back to key organs, where the bacteria burst forth in multitudes, flooding the bloodstream with death-dealing toxins.

By the time many victims realize they're infected, they're already doomed. Anthrax is an old nemesis.

... Robert Koch, a pioneer in microbiology, finally isolated the bacterium in 1877, helping launch a scientific effort to understand and overcome the microbe. That effort continues around the world, including inside labs at San Diego State University and the University of California San Diego. A driving motivation is fear, of course.

http://snipurl.com/3mzpn


How the Large Hadron Collider Might Change the Web
from Scientific American

When the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) begins smashing protons together this fall inside its 17-mile-circumference underground particle racetrack near Geneva, Switzerland, it will usher in a new era not only of physics but also of computing.

Before the year is out, the LHC is projected to begin pumping out a tsunami of raw data equivalent to one DVD (five gigabytes) every five seconds. Its annual output of 15 petabytes (15 million gigabytes) will soon dwarf that of any other scientific experiment in history.

The challenge is making that data accessible to a scientist anywhere in the world at the execution of a few commands on her laptop. The solution is a global computer network called the LHC Computing Grid, and with any luck, it may be giving us a glimpse of the Internet of the future.

http://snipurl.com/3mzwa


A Changing Climate of Opinion?
from the Economist

There is a branch of science fiction that looks at the Earth's neighbours, Mars and Venus, and asks how they might be made habitable. The answer is planetary engineering. ... So, fiddle with the atmospheres of these neighbours and you open new frontiers for human settlement and far-fetched story lines.

It is an intriguing idea. It may even come to pass, though probably not in the lifetime of anyone now reading such stories. But what is more worrying—and more real—is the idea that such planetary engineering may be needed to make the Earth itself habitable by humanity, and that it may be needed in the near future.

Reality has a way of trumping art, and human-induced climate change is very real indeed. So real that some people are asking whether science fiction should now be converted into science fact.

http://snipurl.com/3mzzm 


Scientists Map Gene Changes Linked to Cancer
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—Scientists have mapped the cascade of genetic changes that turn normal cells in the brain and pancreas into two of the most lethal cancers. The result points to a new approach for fighting tumors and maybe even catching them sooner.

Genes blamed for one person's brain tumor were different from the culprits for the next patient, making the puzzle of cancer genetics even more complicated. But Friday's research also found that clusters of seemingly disparate genes all work along the same pathways.

So instead of today's hunt for drugs that target a single gene, the idea is to target entire pathways that most patients share. Think of delivering the mail to a single box at the end of the cul-de-sac instead of at every doorstep. The three studies, published in the journals Science and Nature, mark a milestone in cancer genetics.

http://snipurl.com/3nakt 

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on September 06, 2008, 07:53:27 PM
Quote from: Kai on September 06, 2008, 03:43:37 PM

Study Finds No Autism Link in Vaccine
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

A common vaccine given to children to protect them against measles, mumps and rubella is not linked to autism, a study published [Wednesday] concludes. The findings contradict earlier research that had fueled fears of a possible link between childhood vaccinations and a steep increase in autism diagnoses.

In February 1998, the Lancet journal published a study by British researcher Andrew Wakefield of 12 children with autism and other behavioral problems that suggested the onset of their behavioral abnormalities was linked to receiving the MMR (measles, mumps, rubella) vaccine.

The new study comes as the U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington is in the midst of evaluating evidence on whether children's vaccines are implicated in causing autism.

http://snipurl.com/3mz48

Well, duh!  Anyone who still thinks that it's the vaccines that cause autism deserves to have their child get measles, mumps, and rubella all at the same time.

QuoteHow the Large Hadron Collider Might Change the Web
from Scientific American

When the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) begins smashing protons together this fall inside its 17-mile-circumference underground particle racetrack near Geneva, Switzerland, it will usher in a new era not only of physics but also of computing.

Before the year is out, the LHC is projected to begin pumping out a tsunami of raw data equivalent to one DVD (five gigabytes) every five seconds. Its annual output of 15 petabytes (15 million gigabytes) will soon dwarf that of any other scientific experiment in history.

The challenge is making that data accessible to a scientist anywhere in the world at the execution of a few commands on her laptop. The solution is a global computer network called the LHC Computing Grid, and with any luck, it may be giving us a glimpse of the Internet of the future.

http://snipurl.com/3mzwa

And people said that the LHC would be a worthless boondoggle. (THAT WILL END ALL LIFE IN THIS QUANDRANT OF SPACE!!!111! ZOMG!!!)


QuoteScientists Map Gene Changes Linked to Cancer
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—Scientists have mapped the cascade of genetic changes that turn normal cells in the brain and pancreas into two of the most lethal cancers. The result points to a new approach for fighting tumors and maybe even catching them sooner.

Genes blamed for one person's brain tumor were different from the culprits for the next patient, making the puzzle of cancer genetics even more complicated. But Friday's research also found that clusters of seemingly disparate genes all work along the same pathways.

So instead of today's hunt for drugs that target a single gene, the idea is to target entire pathways that most patients share. Think of delivering the mail to a single box at the end of the cul-de-sac instead of at every doorstep. The three studies, published in the journals Science and Nature, mark a milestone in cancer genetics.

http://snipurl.com/3nakt 


Sweet!  It's awesome to know that a real cure for cancer could happen in our lifetimes.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 10, 2008, 04:56:33 PM
September 10, 2008

'Big Bang' Experiment Starts Well
from BBC News Online

Scientists have hailed a successful switch-on for an enormous experiment which will recreate the conditions a few moments after the Big Bang.

They have fired a beam of particles called protons around the 27km-long tunnel which houses the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). The £5bn machine on the Swiss-French border is designed to smash particles together with cataclysmic force. Scientists hope it will shed light on fundamental questions in physics.

The beam completed its first circuit of the underground tunnel at just before 0930 BST. "There it is," project leader Lyn Evans said when the beam completed its lap. There were cheers in the control room when engineers heard of the successful test. He added later: "We had a very good start-up."

http://snipurl.com/3owds


Down Canyons and Up Cliffs, Pursuing Southwest's Ancient Art
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In his mid-60s, Ekkehart Malotki, a retired linguistics professor, willingly dangled from a rope tied to a car that was backed to the edge of a cliff. A half-dozen times, he descended with his rope, photographed the cliff face and climbed back up.

He was documenting a rock art panel a quarter-mile long in northern Arizona. These adventures are commonplace for Dr. Malotki, a German-born American who is now 69.

Dr. Malotki fell in love with America's desert Southwest as a 20-something graduate student of languages at the University of California, San Diego. There, he debunked the longstanding notion that the Hopi tribe of northern Arizona did not talk about time. He believes time is a fundamental, universal concept that is likely to appear in the words of any human culture, and with respect to the Hopi, he was right.

http://snipurl.com/3ooti


The Sun Will Eventually Engulf Earth—Maybe
from Scientific American

The future looks bright—maybe too bright. The sun is slowly expanding and brightening, and over the next few billion years it will eventually desiccate Earth, leaving it hot, brown and uninhabitable.

About 7.6 billion years from now, the sun will reach its maximum size as a red giant: its surface will extend beyond Earth's orbit today by 20 percent and will shine 3,000 times brighter. In its final stage, the sun will collapse into a white dwarf.

Although scientists agree on the sun's future, they disagree about what will happen to Earth. Since 1924, when British mathematician James Jeans first considered Earth's fate during the sun's red giant phase, a bevy of scientists have reached oscillating conclusions. In some scenarios, our planet escapes vaporization; in the latest analyses, however, it does not.

http://snipurl.com/3omat


Neanderthals Grew Fast, but Sexual Maturity Came Late
from National Geographic News

Live fast, die young—this is how our closest relatives the Neanderthals were traditionally thought to progress through life. But a new study of Neanderthal skeletons suggests the species grew quickly but reached sexual maturity later than so-called modern humans—and quite possibly survived to a ripe old age.

The study also suggests that Neanderthals had a harder time of child bearing and possibly child raising. As a result, modern humans may have simply outbred their heavy-browed rivals. By studying the skulls of Neanderthal babies, researchers were able to estimate how quickly the infants' brains grew.

They found that between birth and adulthood, a Neanderthal brain expanded faster than that of a modern human. The biggest growth spurt occurred in the first couple of years of life.

http://snipurl.com/3om7c


Friendly Invaders
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

New Zealand is home to 2,065 native plants found nowhere else on Earth. They range from magnificent towering kauri trees to tiny flowers that form tightly packed mounds called vegetable sheep.

When Europeans began arriving in New Zealand, they brought with them alien plants—crops, garden plants and stowaway weeds. Today, 22,000 non-native plants grow in New Zealand. Most of them can survive only with the loving care of gardeners and farmers. But 2,069 have become naturalized: they have spread out across the islands on their own. There are more naturalized invasive plant species in New Zealand than native species.

It sounds like the makings of an ecological disaster ... But in a paper published in August in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Dov Sax, an ecologist at Brown University, and Steven D. Gaines, a marine biologist at the University of California, Santa Barbara, point out that the invasion has not led to a mass extinction of native plants. The number of documented extinctions of native New Zealand plant species is a grand total of three.

http://snipurl.com/3om1z


'Water Bears' Are First Animal to Survive Space Vacuum
from New Scientist

Tiny invertebrates called 'water bears' can survive in the vacuum of space, a European Space Agency experiment has shown. They are the first animals known to be able to survive the harsh combination of low pressure and intense radiation found in space.

Water bears, also known as tardigrades, are known for their virtual indestructibility on Earth. The creatures can survive intense pressures, huge doses of radiation, and years of being dried out.

To further test their hardiness, Ingemar Jönsson of Sweden's Kristianstad University and colleagues launched two species of dried-up tardigrades from Kazakhstan in September 2007 aboard ESA's FOTON-M3 mission, which carried a variety of experimental payloads.

http://snipurl.com/3omdx


Some Teens So Heavy They Face Liver Damage, Transplants
from USA Today

TRENTON, N.J. (Associated Press)—In a new and disturbing twist on the obesity epidemic, some overweight teenagers have severe liver damage caused by too much body fat, and a handful have needed liver transplants. Many more may need a new liver by their 30s or 40s, say experts warning that pediatricians need to be more vigilant.

The condition, which can lead to cirrhosis and liver failure or liver cancer, is being seen in kids in the United States, Europe, Australia and even some developing countries, according to a surge of recent medical studies and doctors interviewed by The Associated Press.

The American Liver Foundation and other experts estimate 2% to 5% of American children over age 5, nearly all of them obese or overweight, have the condition, called nonalcoholic fatty liver disease.

http://snipurl.com/3ooa8


Potent Promise: Essential Stemness
from Science News

Stem cells' powers of self-renewal, immortality and potential for medicine inspire those who study them. But progress toward understanding them has been slow—it took 20 years just to figure out how to grow embryonic stem cells in the laboratory.

More recently, though, molecular techniques have enabled swift movement on two fronts. Researchers are starting to see how stem cells can replenish their numbers while giving rise to specialized cells.

Others are learning how to turn adult skin cells into cells more like their embryonic ancestors. These advances offer hope that scientists will soon harness the capabilities of stem cells, at last fulfilling the cells' promise.

http://snipurl.com/3oooe


Blood-Sugar Control Benefits May Last
from the Seattle Times

Diabetics who tightly control their blood sugar—even if only for the first decade after they are diagnosed—have lower risks of heart attack, death and other complications 10 or more years later, a large follow-up study has found.

The discovery of this "legacy effect" may put new emphasis on rigorous treatment when people first learn they have type 2 diabetes, the most common form and the type linked to obesity.

Doctors warn that people should not let their blood sugar spin out of control—that could have serious health consequences. "What you don't want is for people to think that they had a period of good glucose control and then they allow their blood glucose to go high—that would be disadvantageous," said Dr. Stephen Davis, head of Vanderbilt University's diabetes and endocrinology division, who had no role in the study.

http://snipurl.com/3owfm 


Lost Bacteria Collection Raises Concerns about Biobanks
from Nature News

A US congressional investigation into the destruction of more than 10,000 bacterial samples from an infectious disease laboratory has led to a call for uniform guidelines governing federally funded biobanks.

At a subcommittee hearing of the House Committee on Science and Technology on Tuesday 9 September, representatives expressed their dismay at the destruction of specimens maintained by researchers then at the Veterans Affairs (VA) Medical Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

After the Special Pathogens Laboratory there was closed in 2006, administrators decided to destroy the samples without warning, even as researchers prepared to transfer the collection to the nearby University of Pittsburgh. Loss of the specimens prompted an outcry from the microbiology community and nearly 250 researchers signed a petition calling for an independent inquiry into the matter.

http://snipurl.com/3owiy

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 11, 2008, 04:13:16 PM
September 11, 2008

Condors in a Coal Mine
from Smithsonian Magazine

It was early winter, the end of deer-hunting season in Central California, and condor biologist Joe Burnett of the Ventana Wildlife Society was steeling himself for a task he had come to dread. Burnett and a team of four Condor Recovery Program members were at a remote site in the mountains east of Big Sur, where they were trapping condors and testing them for lead poisoning.

Three team members were restraining an adult female known as Condor 208. Their arms encircled her body, and one person clamped the bird's powerful jaws shut. Burnett grabbed a syringe. "OK, here we go," he said. The team members tightened their hold, and Burnett plunged the needle into the bird's leg. The condor flinched.

Burnett transferred a drop of blood to a glass slide and inserted it into a portable instrument that tests blood for lead. It takes the instrument three minutes to give a reading; Burnett calls the waiting time "180 seconds from hell." ... The machine beeped and displayed the test result: High. The bird's blood-lead level was elevated beyond the instrument's range. Condor 208 was in mortal danger.

http://snipurl.com/3oyc4 


Particle Accelerator Speeds Into an Age of "New Physics"
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

MEYRIN, Switzerland—It is the biggest machine ever built. Everyone says it looks like a movie set for a corny James Bond villain. They are correct. The machine is attended by brainiacs wearing hard hats and running around on catwalks. They are looking for the answer to the question: Where does everything in the universe come from? Price tag: $8 billion plus.

The world's largest particle accelerator is buried deep in the earth beneath herds of placid dairy cows grazing on the Swiss-French border. The thing has been under construction for years, like the pyramids. Its centerpiece is a circular 17-mile tunnel that contains a pipe swaddled in supermagnets refrigerated to crazy-low temperatures, colder than deep space.

The idea is to set two beams of protons traveling in opposite directions around the tunnel, redlining at the speed of light, generating wicked energy that will mimic the cataclysmic conditions at the beginning of time, then smashing into each other in a furious re-creation of the Big Bang—this time recorded by giant digital cameras.

http://snipurl.com/3oykp


Potent Promise: Back to the Womb
from Science News

Reverting adult cells to an embryonic state without creating embryos is a tricky business

The diagnosis is not good; the patient will need surgery. So the doctor plucks a hair from the patient's head and tells her to come back in a few weeks. When the patient returns, the surgeon patches up the faulty organ by implanting healthy cells generated in the lab from the patient's hair follicle. After a few months, the new cells have integrated into the organ and the woman's symptoms recede. A year later, she's healthy and living a normal life.

This is the scenario that stem cell researchers hope will be commonplace 10 or 15 years from now. A patient's own cells—perhaps taken from hair follicles, blood or skin—would be transformed into cells of the heart, brain or other organs. Doctors would then transplant these converted cells into the afflicted organ to treat the illness, whether it's multiple sclerosis, Parkinson's disease, heart failure or diabetes.

http://snipurl.com/3owzq


Creationism Vs. Evolution
from Scientific American

The controversy over evolution rages on. Win all your debates against creationists with the science in our special report.

A recent movie, Expelled, claims that intelligent design is good science that is being censored by adherents to evolution, which is nothing but Darwinian dogma. Creationists cast themselves as proponents of "academic freedom." Opponents of evolution want to make a place for creationism by tearing down real science, but their arguments don't hold up.

Two prominent defenders of science exchange their views on how scientists ought to approach religion and its followers. Plus an interactive map of the U.S. highlights this year's battlegrounds in the fight to teach evolution.

http://snipurl.com/3oy8o


Steven Wiley Recounts "My Favorite Fraud"
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Last week I was at a scientific conference in which career development was a major topic. The audience included mostly scientists at an early stage in their careers, but also a few older scientists, like myself, who were to provide advice on how to manage laboratories and careers.

Popular discussion topics included how to run lab meetings and deal with the egos of graduate students and postdocs. My particular advice included: Keep current with experimental technologies, and evaluate papers on a technical basis before trusting their conclusions.

I'm sure that this advice sounded to some like the musings of a compulsive technogeek, but it was prompted by an incident that happened when I was a postdoc.

http://snipurl.com/3oygs


The Science of Happiness
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

If recent scientific research on happiness—and there has been quite a bit—has proved anything, it's that happiness is not a goal. It's a process. Although our tendency to be happy or not is partly inborn, it's also partly within our control.

And, perhaps more surprising, happiness brings success, not the other way around. Though many people think happiness is elusive, scientists have actually pinned it down and know how to get it.

For years, many in the field of psychology saw the science of happiness as an oxymoron. "We got no respect," says Ed Diener, a professor of psychology at the University of Illinois, who began studying happiness in 1981. "Critics said you couldn't study happiness because you couldn't measure it." In the mid-1990s, he and a few other researchers started to prove the naysayers wrong.

http://snipurl.com/3p08t 


Diatom Nanostructures Bend Light
from BBC News Online

Simple marine algae called diatoms have evolved intricate structures that allow them to manipulate light. Visible light is strongly diffracted when it passes through tiny holes in their silica-based cell walls, scientists say.

Understanding the physical principles that allow diatoms to trap solar energy more efficiently may also help develop new synthetic replicas. This research was presented at the BA Science Festival in Liverpool.

Nature started to evolve complex colour and light manipulating systems during the Cambrian explosion—about 500 million years ago. Scientists have been inspired by the natural systems that are found in wide range of organisms—including peacocks, butterflies and beetles. These single-celled marine algae are found in almost all aquatic environments on Earth.

http://snipurl.com/3p0bc


Cold Water Rings Dinner Bell for West Coast Salmon
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

A federal oceanographer says a flip-flop in atmospheric conditions is creating a feast for salmon and other sea life off the West Coast, reversing a trend that contributed to a virtual shutdown of West Coast salmon fishing this summer.

Bill Peterson of NOAA Fisheries in Newport, Ore., said Tuesday the change in cycle of an atmospheric condition known as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation last fall has brought cold water flows from the Gulf of Alaska, which are carrying an abundance of tiny animals known as copepods that are the foundation of the food chain.

It's unknown how long the good times will last, but Peterson said ocean surveys of chinook salmon in June found lots of yearling juveniles, which should grow up to be plentiful stocks of adults by 2010. Coho surveys start in a couple weeks.

http://snipurl.com/3p0hd


Old Forests Capture Plenty of Carbon
from Nature News

Old forests continue to accumulate carbon at a much greater rate than researchers had previously thought, making them more important as carbon sinks that must be factored into global climate models, researchers say.

Until recently, it was assumed that very old forests no longer absorbed carbon. The only new growth occurred in the small spaces that opened up when large old trees died and decomposed, releasing their accumulated carbon. The forests at large were therefore considered to be carbon neutral, and accounted as such in climate models.

In the past decade or so, murmurs of disagreement with this idea have grown louder, and individual projects have found that even very old forests are capable of storing carbon thanks to tree growth, the addition of new trees and a decreased rate of respiration in old trees.

http://snipurl.com/3p0ik


Arthroscopic Knee Surgery Questioned for Some Arthritis Patients
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

(Associated Press) Two studies call into question whether many people with arthritis are needlessly undergoing one of the most common operations in America: arthroscopic knee surgery.

One finds that surgery is no better than medication and physical therapy for relieving the pain and stiffness of moderate or severe arthritis. The other reveals that tears in knee cartilage—which often prompt such surgeries—are very common without causing symptoms.

Experts said the new studies and other evidence show arthroscopic knee surgery still has a place, such as after a recent injury, but shouldn't be done routinely for osteoarthritis. ... The studies were published in Thursday's New England Journal of Medicine.

http://snipurl.com/3p9bw

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 20, 2008, 09:20:09 PM
http://www.dailytech.com/A+Melting+Arctic+Happy+News+for+Mankind/article12882.htm
arctic melting may be good news

Recent short-term gains in Arctic ice coverage indicate nothing about the eventual state of the Arctic. Answers to the long-term status of the region lie in the realm of a scientific branch known as paleoclimatology. What does it tell us?

The Earth is currently in the geologic epoch known as the Holocene. This began nearly 12,000 years ago when the last ice age (more precisely, the Weichsal glacial) ended. Temperatures warmed, glaciers began to retreat, and the Arctic began to melt. This began what is called an interglacial: a warmer period between glaciation.

We tend to think of the poles as immutable, but geologically speaking, permanent polar ice is a rare phenomenon, comprising less than 10% of history. Icecaps form briefly between interglacials, only to melt as the next one begins -- this time around will be no different.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 20, 2008, 10:18:08 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 20, 2008, 09:20:09 PM
http://www.dailytech.com/A+Melting+Arctic+Happy+News+for+Mankind/article12882.htm
arctic melting may be good news

Recent short-term gains in Arctic ice coverage indicate nothing about the eventual state of the Arctic. Answers to the long-term status of the region lie in the realm of a scientific branch known as paleoclimatology. What does it tell us?

The Earth is currently in the geologic epoch known as the Holocene. This began nearly 12,000 years ago when the last ice age (more precisely, the Weichsal glacial) ended. Temperatures warmed, glaciers began to retreat, and the Arctic began to melt. This began what is called an interglacial: a warmer period between glaciation.

We tend to think of the poles as immutable, but geologically speaking, permanent polar ice is a rare phenomenon, comprising less than 10% of history. Icecaps form briefly between interglacials, only to melt as the next one begins -- this time around will be no different.


Good news for who? For humans? We're too stuck in this want for a static environment. Human civilization won't be able to cope all that well with any sort of global climate change. For other life forms? Yes and no. Some organisms will benefit, some wont, just like what happens when any environmental change occurs. If there is a large scale extinction event, it will take no more than 20 million years years before the diversity of life on this planet is as large, or larger, than it is now. The question is, will humans survive favorably? We are emergent enough in our consciousness to be affected by greater events than just growth, predatorial evasion, foraging, and reproduction. Do we want to live in a medieval world again, or one with human civilization torn apart on a wide scale?

Me, I like my bugs. Some of my bugs are remnants of the last ice age. I like them a lot, and would like to keep them around if possible. If not possible, I want to at least keep around the ones that can make it, cause I like bugs. I'm not so into most people, but thats my reason. Climate change is going to happen. Hopefully it won't happen so fast that my bugs won't make it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 20, 2008, 11:08:41 PM
i am not a scientist so the articles veracity? you decide.
the claims they make, no flooding, northwest passage opening, access to oil and gas reserves and fishing grounds, polarbears will be fine more bio mass in oceans etc don't sound bad for human survival i see no link to humans being forced to a feudal survival society. i also don't see any statements about the speed of change being unnaturally fast so maybe your bugs will be OK too...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 21, 2008, 03:37:31 AM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 20, 2008, 11:08:41 PM
i am not a scientist so the articles veracity? you decide.
the claims they make, no flooding, northwest passage opening, access to oil and gas reserves and fishing grounds, polarbears will be fine more bio mass in oceans etc don't sound bad for human survival i see no link to humans being forced to a feudal survival society. i also don't see any statements about the speed of change being unnaturally fast so maybe your bugs will be OK too...

Warming of ocean temperatures is going to change the climate regardless of the change in shore ice. Ocean currents are driven by temperature change. Ocean temperature is what drives weather, and also climate on the continents. I'm not sure about the information on the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. I do know that other smaller glaciers such as the ones in iceland and the US are shrinking. It is true that water levels will not change due to melting of ocean ice because ice is less dense than the liquid, thus taking up less overal space. Its the glacial caps you have to worry about for that. I do not agree that humans are having no effect on climate change, and I do not agree that the melting of the arctic ice will not have an effect on climate. Any change on the order of thousands of years and not millions is going to cause some level of extinctions. We have proof of effects by climate change. Some examples:

The Joshua Tree, once thriving in Joshua Tree National Park, is expected to be extinct within the part in the next 20-50 years due to climate change.

The Bristlecone pines of the Green mountains, the oldest organisms on earth, are dying fast due to climatic change. The worlds oldest tree, once doing well 10 years ago, is nearly dead, along with most other trees in the area. This tree is over 2000 years old, and just a branch is left alive now.

Pikas, an extraordinary rodent with a language of over 200 'words', once thriving in the great basin at higher altitudes, are dwindling in numbers because they can't handle the rising temperatures, and this is, as the others, a recent developement. Indeed, look at sky islands, isolated pockets, boreal relics communities and species, all dwindling because they are caught on these islands and there is no place to go, no way out, no way to traverse the land around. They are stuck, and they will go extinct if things continue this way.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on September 21, 2008, 04:06:58 AM
Not to mention that the excess CO2 in the atmosphere is fucking with the ocean's pH and is destroying coral reefs.
link (http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=coral-grief-warming-climate-threatens-reef-destruction)

I don't even want to think about what would happen if the ocean's buffer is overcome.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: BADGE OF HONOR on September 21, 2008, 04:11:02 AM
Basically the entire ocean is fucked.  Between the plastic and the changing temperature and the overfishing, a lot of species are suffering. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 04:17:27 AM
you will have to excuse me for being a sceptic, when i was growing up we were in the beginning of an ice age and the scientists and media told us all to panic because of the coming food shortages, mass extinctions and endless winters.

being a sceptic and not a scientist i am trying to keep my opinions on the subject as common sense as possible. It seems to be a fairly even split between the man made and natural cycle proponents (in my view it is undecided ), yes climate change kills some species but the direct effects of pollution will do far more harm(amphibians), I don't trust politicians who use the issue or manipulate scientist (grant money)  or to create fears about the issue to gain power.
I suspect that the size and resilience of nature is not being given enough respect.   
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on September 21, 2008, 04:57:32 AM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 04:17:27 AM
you will have to excuse me for being a sceptic, when i was growing up we were in the beginning of an ice age and the scientists and media told us all to panic because of the coming food shortages, mass extinctions and endless winters.

being a sceptic and not a scientist i am trying to keep my opinions on the subject as common sense as possible. It seems to be a fairly even split between the man made and natural cycle proponents (in my view it is undecided ), yes climate change kills some species but the direct effects of pollution will do far more harm(amphibians), I don't trust politicians who use the issue or manipulate scientist (grant money)  or to create fears about the issue to gain power.
I suspect that the size and resilience of nature is not being given enough respect.   
Only the media reported about an ice age.  No reputable scientist agreed with it.  Just for future reference, the media does a horrific job of reporting science.  Second, there is a food shortage, but it is not here, it's in third-world nations.  It would be a lot worse if not for the green revolution.  As for the even split.  That is false.  There is not a single scientific organization that doubts global warming.

Now, you are right to doubt politicians.  But the people who actually study the Earth are a lot more trustworthy.  Scientists don't gain power from fear, scientists gain acclaim from disproving other scientists.  There is much more to be gained from an individual scientist to go against the mainstream and prove them all wrong.

As for nature's resilience, it will survive.  But nature as we know it isn't.  While I am positive that global warming will not destroy life, it most definitely can cause a lot of death.  Climate change has lead to mass extinction in the past, and humans are causing very rapid climate change right now.  Carbon dioxide does absorb electromagnetic radiation from the sun.  This does translate into heat.  Humans are releasing huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.  Not to mention that carbon dioxide reacts with water to form carbonic acid and the huge amounts of it have already altered the ocean's pH.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 05:38:43 AM
the split is over cause, man made vs natural cycle not if global warming is happening , the other split is between those who think it is increasing at a disastrous rate and those who say we cant predict. on the first split I go with undecided leaning slightly toward natural cycle, on the second I say cant predict yet

QuoteIt would be a lot worse if not for the green revolution
:cn:

politicians have influence on scientific opinion when they hold the purse strings "grants", politicians use those influenced opinions to create fear in the public and gain power from it.

QuoteClimate change has lead to mass extinction in the past,
global warming ??    ice ages, volcanoes, meteor strikes i have heard of causing extinctions can you give an example of global warming doing the same ??..



Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 05:51:50 AM
news reporting on what scientists were saying

time magazine ice age
http://neoconexpress.blogspot.com/2007/02/time-like-newsweek-predicted-iceage-in.html#

and news week
Newsweek 1975: Scientists Predict Massive Global Cooling



Newsweek Magazine, April 28th 1975:
There are ominous signs that the Earth's weather patterns have begun to change dramatically and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production - with serious political implications for just about every nation on Earth. The drop in food output could begin quite soon, perhaps only 10 years from now. The regions destined to feel its impact are the great wheat-producing lands of Canada and the U.S.S.R. in the North, along with a number of marginally self-sufficient tropical areas - parts of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indochina and Indonesia - where the growing season is dependent upon the rains brought by the monsoon.

The evidence in support of these predictions has now begun to accumulate so massively that meteorologists are hard-pressed to keep up with it. In England, farmers have seen their growing season decline by about two weeks since 1950, with a resultant overall loss in grain production estimated at up to 100,000 tons annually. During the same time, the average temperature around the equator has risen by a fraction of a degree - a fraction that in some areas can mean drought and desolation. Last April, in the most devastating outbreak of tornadoes ever recorded, 148 twisters killed more than 300 people and caused half a billion dollars' worth of damage in 13 U.S. states.

To scientists, these seemingly disparate incidents represent the advance signs of fundamental changes in the world's weather. The central fact is that after three quarters of a century of extraordinarily mild conditions, the earth's climate seems to be cooling down. Meteorologists disagree about the cause and extent of the cooling trend, as well as over its specific impact on local weather conditions. But they are almost unanimous in the view that the trend will reduce agricultural productivity for the rest of the century. If the climatic change is as profound as some of the pessimists fear, the resulting famines could be catastrophic. "A major climatic change would force economic and social adjustments on a worldwide scale," warns a recent report by the National Academy of Sciences, "because the global patterns of food production and population that have evolved are implicitly dependent on the climate of the present century."

A survey completed last year by Dr. Murray Mitchell of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reveals a drop of half a degree in average ground temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere between 1945 and 1968. According to George Kukla of Columbia University, satellite photos indicated a sudden, large increase in Northern Hemisphere snow cover in the winter of 1971-72. And a study released last month by two NOAA scientists notes that the amount of sunshine reaching the ground in the continental U.S. diminished by 1.3% between 1964 and 1972.

To the layman, the relatively small changes in temperature and sunshine can be highly misleading. Reid Bryson of the University of Wisconsin points out that the Earth's average temperature during the great Ice Ages was only about seven degrees lower than during its warmest eras - and that the present decline has taken the planet about a sixth of the way toward the Ice Age average. Others regard the cooling as a reversion to the "little ice age" conditions that brought bitter winters to much of Europe and northern America between 1600 and 1900 - years when the Thames used to freeze so solidly that Londoners roasted oxen on the ice and when iceboats sailed the Hudson River almost as far south as New York City.

Just what causes the onset of major and minor ice ages remains a mystery. "Our knowledge of the mechanisms of climatic change is at least as fragmentary as our data," concedes the National Academy of Sciences report. "Not only are the basic scientific questions largely unanswered, but in many cases we do not yet know enough to pose the key questions."

Meteorologists think that they can forecast the short-term results of the return to the norm of the last century. They begin by noting the slight drop in overall temperature that produces large numbers of pressure centers in the upper atmosphere. These break up the smooth flow of westerly winds over temperate areas. The stagnant air produced in this way causes an increase in extremes of local weather such as droughts, floods, extended dry spells, long freezes, delayed monsoons and even local temperature increases - all of which have a direct impact on food supplies.

"The world's food-producing system," warns Dr. James D. McQuigg of NOAA's Center for Climatic and Environmental Assessment, "is much more sensitive to the weather variable than it was even five years ago." Furthermore, the growth of world population and creation of new national boundaries make it impossible for starving peoples to migrate from their devastated fields, as they did during past famines.

Climatologists are pessimistic that political leaders will take any positive action to compensate for the climatic change, or even to allay its effects. They concede that some of the more spectacular solutions proposed, such as melting the Arctic ice cap by covering it with black soot or diverting arctic rivers, might create problems far greater than those they solve. But the scientists see few signs that government leaders anywhere are even prepared to take the simple measures of stockpiling food or of introducing the variables of climatic uncertainty into economic projections of future food supplies. The longer the planners delay, the more difficult will they find it to cope with climatic change once the results become grim reality.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 21, 2008, 08:26:00 AM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 04:17:27 AM
you will have to excuse me for being a sceptic, when i was growing up we were in the beginning of an ice age and the scientists and media told us all to panic because of the coming food shortages, mass extinctions and endless winters.

being a sceptic and not a scientist i am trying to keep my opinions on the subject as common sense as possible. It seems to be a fairly even split between the man made and natural cycle proponents (in my view it is undecided ), yes climate change kills some species but the direct effects of pollution will do far more harm(amphibians), I don't trust politicians who use the issue or manipulate scientist (grant money)  or to create fears about the issue to gain power.
I suspect that the size and resilience of nature is not being given enough respect.   

Scientists are seldom the ones who spread panic. The ones who spread panic are the people in the media who take the summaries of the scientific paper, summarize those and then twist it to make it sound far beyond what it says. Thus you get perspectives which make it seem like scientific opinion is jumping back and forth, while the scientist have been cautions and just amassing data all along, some data says one thing, some says the other, all conclusions tenative till well supported.

I can see what you are saying though. The desctruction of tropical rainforest by logging and slash and burn, the killing of the oceans by chemicals, anoxic zones created by eutrophication in the gulf of mexico, low flows on rivers due to water overuse, all these other human caused events are making a massive change and they are not talked about, because people would rather speculate over some nebulous thing than sit down and actually make changes about things that are concrete. Make changes like limiting water use, fertilizer and pesticide use, saving rainforest land, cleaning up chemicals, actually doing something physical about the impact humans are having on the planet. People don't want to do it, one, because its easier to just argue, 2, because it costs money, and 3 because it means that people will have to change their lifestyles. The last one is the biggest one, by the way.

Also, just as a note, volcanic eruptions, continental drift, ect, all effect extinction rates specifically because of climate change. When people talk of global warming they think too local, too weather related. When people think of this in relation to extinction, they don't think local enough! Many species are isolated, specialists that can only survive within a certain climate. As the climate changes, they either have to move, change their biology, or go extinct. Local climate is a character of many factors, but is deeply effected by world and regional climate change. We still have no clue why the last ice age occured, or why it is ending. We have hypotheses, but we don't really know why global warming and cooling cycles occur. Regional and local is much easier. You can look at ocean currents and vegitation and human influences. But we don't know the bigger picture. Its all laden with chaos.

We should be very deeply interested however. There is absolutly no evidence to suggest that we will as a species in all certainty survive the next million years (or as a lineage, for that matter). We can't tell the future. We have no clue what will happen next. So we need to be very careful, because our very existence is a fluke and who knows how long we are around for. The planet will be around without us but we can't survive without the biosphere.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 09:14:19 AM
kai
I kind of figured with you being in biology you would have a reasonable take on this. The fear mongering is my pet peeve with environmentalism, being stewards of the earth should be obvious, when i see the fear being spread i suspect ulterior/political motives or people buying the hype spread by those that have them.

on local extinction i agree niche species would be the most vulnerable , it is also true that nature abhors a vacuum better adapted life will always move in.

i don't know exactly how biodiversity works but it seems that bio diversity prospers in warm conditions and struggles in colder ones, the bigger threat to diversity i think may be us directly, pesticide/genetic seed companies, humans dragging life around the globe to environments it doesn't belong, plus all the pollution etc you already mentioned. the threat this in turn poses to us can come in unexpected forms (beehive collapse) and show up quickly


edit to add -- biodiversity also would seem to suffer during times of rapid change and prosper in times of steady or slow change, again i suspect the above mentioned human threats would be more likely to cause rapid change than changes to global temperature.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on September 21, 2008, 03:15:35 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 05:38:43 AM
the split is over cause, man made vs natural cycle not if global warming is happening , the other split is between those who think it is increasing at a disastrous rate and those who say we cant predict. on the first split I go with undecided leaning slightly toward natural cycle, on the second I say cant predict yet
When I say global warming, I mean human caused global warming.  Warming from increased COs[ levels.  And lets look at the dissenting organizations.  link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change#Statements_by_dissenting_organizations)  Oh shit, there are none!  There's just a handful of nutjobs.

Quote
QuoteIt would be a lot worse if not for the green revolution
:cn:

politicians have influence on scientific opinion when they hold the purse strings "grants", politicians use those influenced opinions to create fear in the public and gain power from it.
link (http://www.actionbioscience.org/biotech/borlaug.html)
The green revolution changed how crops were grown to make it more efficient.  This has shit all to do with politicians.  Politicians are fucking liars, don't listen to them.

Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 05:51:50 AM
news reporting on what scientists were saying

time magazine ice age
http://neoconexpress.blogspot.com/2007/02/time-like-newsweek-predicted-iceage-in.html#

and news week
Newsweek 1975: Scientists Predict Massive Global Cooling
I just fucking told you that the media is unreliable.  For fuck's sake there's a man who covers just how bad journalists are at covering science.  link (http://www.badscience.net/)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on September 21, 2008, 04:00:59 PM
Just for fun, some academic sources related to global warming:
http://www.bren.ucsb.edu/academics/courses/203/Readings/SlipperySlope%2017Jun04v21.pdf (http://www.bren.ucsb.edu/academics/courses/203/Readings/SlipperySlope%2017Jun04v21.pdf)
http://www.pnas.org/content/97/18/9875.full (http://www.pnas.org/content/97/18/9875.full)
http://www.elmhurst.edu/~chm/vchembook/globalwarmA.html (http://www.elmhurst.edu/~chm/vchembook/globalwarmA.html)
http://www.uwsp.edu/geo/faculty/ritter/geog101/textbook/climate_systems/climate_change.html (http://www.uwsp.edu/geo/faculty/ritter/geog101/textbook/climate_systems/climate_change.html)
http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/resources/oceanography-book/evidenceforwarming.htm (http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/resources/oceanography-book/evidenceforwarming.htm)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 21, 2008, 05:12:23 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 09:14:19 AM
kai
I kind of figured with you being in biology you would have a reasonable take on this. The fear mongering is my pet peeve with environmentalism, being stewards of the earth should be obvious, when i see the fear being spread i suspect ulterior/political motives or people buying the hype spread by those that have them.

on local extinction i agree niche species would be the most vulnerable , it is also true that nature abhors a vacuum better adapted life will always move in.

i don't know exactly how biodiversity works but it seems that bio diversity prospers in warm conditions and struggles in colder ones, the bigger threat to diversity i think may be us directly, pesticide/genetic seed companies, humans dragging life around the globe to environments it doesn't belong, plus all the pollution etc you already mentioned. the threat this in turn poses to us can come in unexpected forms (beehive collapse) and show up quickly


edit to add -- biodiversity also would seem to suffer during times of rapid change and prosper in times of steady or slow change, again i suspect the above mentioned human threats would be more likely to cause rapid change than changes to global temperature.



Biodiversity both initially flounders and then increases during and after times of rapid change. steady and slow change tends to have a gradual effect on biodiversity. Instead of a marked drop and leap, its a gradual curve. There is a hypothesis called punctuated equilibrium, that says that lineages change the greatest at punctuated intervals, usually after a catastrophic event. The Permian-Triassic Extinction event lead way to the age of reptiles. The Cretaceous-Tertiary event lead to the "age of mammals". And then we have the 10-20 million year precambrian diversification (most often more incorrectly called the cambrian explosion), caused most likely by the newly oxygenated conditions. This caused a broad diversification of lineages, but also was the end of the Ediacaran life from the period just before. The post Cambrian extinction event saw the loss of many of the weird body plans you would find in the Burgess Shale fossil beds. The point is, we see life's history on earth as having periods of slow change punctuated by catastrophic upheaval leading to extinction and diversification. The tree of life is more like the bush of life, with a few lineages making it and the rest not.

The reason you see diversification after extinction is as you noted above, open niches do not tend to stay open long. Millions of open niches will soon be filled (over millions of years) by diversification of other lineages that made it. Still, 99% percent of all species that ever existed are nonextant. We're left with the 1% of life that actually made it. And there is nothing to say that diversity used to be higher or is higher now, except possibly in angiosperms and insects (I'd argue that insects have been working their way up since the mid paleozoic and aside from the current human induced extinction event, there seems to be no limit to the diversity that can come out of the insect body plan).

Biodiversty prospers when the greatest number of niches are available. The perfect example of this is tropical rainforests. However, climate change will affect the rainforest in the same way that climate change will affect all ecosystems. I'm not so sure whats going to happen. I do know that humans are screwing diversity to hell right now.

I once heard a lecture in undergraduate about biodiversity. The professor told a story about how he was confronted by a teacher once, a chemistry teacher who believed that it would be okay to destroy all life on the planet if it would keep humans alive for one more moment. He didn't know how to argue this with his teacher, he was stunned. He never wanted us to be left the same way, so he gave us some reasons to value biodiversity, things like for medicinal value, for food, for all the environmental tasks they do that we often take for granted, for aesthetic value, but also for the intrinsic value of live itself. I've been reading Reinventing the Sacred as I've noted elsewhere on this forum, and what strikes me as the most important point in that book is the emergence of agency, will, values that are intrinsic to living organisms, from bacterium to mammals, an unremovable part of the system of life. Free will is apparent, because agency is irreducible to physics.

--

Theres another essay I'm thinking of, by Barbara McClintock, the Nobel prize winner that worked with Corn genetics. It doesn't have so much to do with the above, but it has more to do with respect, and the kind of spiritual bond I see myself having with life. Many people wondered how she could work on such a long living organism as corn, when everyone else was working with bacteria. She said "you have to develop a relationship with your organism, you have to be patient and listen to what it has to say". Her patient and respectful relationship with her organism lead to our modern understanding of how genes move around in the DNA molecule, how they can be turned on and off. I want to see myself as having that bond with Cheumatopsyche (http://www.troutnut.com/hatch/1913/Caddisfly-Cheumatopsyche-Little-Sister-Sedges) as she had with Zea (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maize), but I also feel that bond to all insects.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 05:13:38 PM
just for fun some articles claiming there is a debate amongst scientist on whether warming is Anthropogenic (man caused)
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/news_press_release,176495.shtml
http://www.petitionproject.org/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-481613/Global-warming-Its-natural-say-experts.html
http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=110107A
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/lieberman-warner-debate-senator-rohrabacher-do-you-really-think-the-world-is-filled-with-morons/
http://canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm  also talks about political pressure put on scientist

http://canadafreepress.com/2006/harris061206.htm paleoclimatologist Professor Tim Patterson testified, "There is no meaningful correlation between CO2 levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO2 levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years."
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/317/5834/36?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=eske+willerslev&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=8641
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/07/06/greenland_ice_yields_hope_on_climate/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 05:18:28 PM
kia i am all in favor of valuing bio diversity, well written explanation.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 21, 2008, 05:36:45 PM
And just because:

(http://www.troutnut.com/im_regspec/picture_1342_medium.jpg)

(http://www.troutnut.com/im_regspec/picture_1341_medium.jpg)

Pimp some (I believe) pictures of Cheumatopsyche. Larvae of Cheumatopsyche species have a number of diagnostic characters, but one of the most striking things that most Cheumatopsyche larvae have when alive is the emerald green abdomen. The head sclerites also don't seem to have any patterns, which is true for all Nearctic species in the genus. There are a number of diagnostic characters which I would have to look at to be sure, such as the shape of the fortrochantin (notched), the size of the poststernite sclerites on the prothorax (usually small but in some species can be large, which can confuse you with the genus Hydropsyche except if they are larger the anteromedial emargination of the frontoclypeus lacks a medial notch), the shape of the sternites on the 9th abdominal segment (notched postereorly), and just make sure there isn't a tubercle at the anterior margin of the underside of the head (which would make it genus Potamyia). I learned all of that through patience.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 05:44:21 PM
troutnut. com - i am guessing a big fish can be caught with one? cool looking bug by the way
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on September 21, 2008, 05:52:35 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 05:13:38 PM
just for fun some articles claiming there is a debate amongst scientist on whether warming is Anthropogenic (man caused)
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/news_press_release,176495.shtml
http://www.petitionproject.org/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-481613/Global-warming-Its-natural-say-experts.html
http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=110107A
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/lieberman-warner-debate-senator-rohrabacher-do-you-really-think-the-world-is-filled-with-morons/
http://canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm  also talks about political pressure put on scientist

http://canadafreepress.com/2006/harris061206.htm paleoclimatologist Professor Tim Patterson testified, "There is no meaningful correlation between CO2 levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO2 levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years."
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/317/5834/36?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=eske+willerslev&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=8641
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/07/06/greenland_ice_yields_hope_on_climate/
Why no academic sources?  Why nothing from university websites?  Why no peer review articles?

Also,  :lulz:@ you citing the DailyMail.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 21, 2008, 06:07:21 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 05:44:21 PM
troutnut. com - i am guessing a big fish can be caught with one? cool looking bug by the way


Caddisfly larvae are aquatic, almost all species have aquatic larvae in that order, and the rest are semiaquatic (http://www.uksafari.com/caddisfly3.htm). As adults they have vestigial mouthparts, can drink but can't feed, and look very much like moths. As larvae, their forms and habitats are diverse, from temporal ponds to streams, lakes, wetlands, springs and seeps, waterfalls, big rivers, and there are even species that inhabit tidepools (http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/119646779/abstract?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0). In addition to that, caddisfly larvae produce silk which they use to construct net seine retreats or other underwater capture net apparati (http://www.westol.com/~towhee/images2/caddisfly-nets.jpg), portable cases (http://images.google.com/images?um=1&hl=en&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Aen-US%3Aofficial&q=caddisfly+cases&btnG=Search+Images), and do other amazing behavioral things. Cheumatopsyche species are part of the family Hydropsychidae, the net-seine spinning caddisflies. These construct annular structures from which they hang silk nets that look like fishing seines (http://www.xerces.org/CD-ROM%20for%20web/id/Trichoptera/Hydropsychidae/Hydropsychidae_nets/Hydropsychid_net_all_650.jpg) to collect debris or invertebrates.

Since caddisflies are common in trout streams, trout fishers tend to be the people most interested in them, outside of Trichopterology and aquatic ecology.

Edit: was looking for some cooler pictures of Hydropsychid nets and found these:

(http://www-staff.lboro.ac.uk/~gymfj2/images/CaddisNets.jpg)

(http://www.royal-flyfishing.com/royalportal/cms/upload/bilder/Berichte/Entomologie/Kcherfliegen/Kcherfliege_Hydropsyche_siltalai.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 06:46:43 PM
Quote from: Vene on September 21, 2008, 05:52:35 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 05:13:38 PM
just for fun some articles claiming there is a debate amongst scientist on whether warming is Anthropogenic (man caused)
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/news_press_release,176495.shtml
http://www.petitionproject.org/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-481613/Global-warming-Its-natural-say-experts.html
http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=110107A
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/lieberman-warner-debate-senator-rohrabacher-do-you-really-think-the-world-is-filled-with-morons/
http://canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm  also talks about political pressure put on scientist

http://canadafreepress.com/2006/harris061206.htm paleoclimatologist Professor Tim Patterson testified, "There is no meaningful correlation between CO2 levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO2 levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years."
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/317/5834/36?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=eske+willerslev&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=8641
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/07/06/greenland_ice_yields_hope_on_climate/
Why no academic sources?  Why nothing from university websites?  Why no peer review articles?

Also,  :lulz:@ you citing the DailyMail.

if you haven't already made up your mind look them up! the articles  give names jobs/universities of dissenting scientist i am just making the point that there is debate, yes the daily mail is biased (duh ) i culled out most of the wing nut links i have for that reason..

again just to be clear i am not saying global warming is absolutely not man made, i am saying it is being debated i may lean slightly on the side of natural cycles but i have come to no conclusion.
the fear mongering "we are all going to die imminent disaster" wingnuttery is highly suspect (AL gore kool aid ) and is about as dumb as saying there are no environmental problems the environment is there to be raped and pillaged by mankind at will
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on September 21, 2008, 06:51:42 PM
http://blog.wired.com/defense/2008/09/stiletto-vs-dru.html

Anyone seen this?  It's a new Pentagon boat.  Top speed of sixty knots.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on September 21, 2008, 07:09:34 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 06:46:43 PM
Quote from: Vene on September 21, 2008, 05:52:35 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 05:13:38 PM
just for fun some articles claiming there is a debate amongst scientist on whether warming is Anthropogenic (man caused)
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/news_press_release,176495.shtml
http://www.petitionproject.org/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-481613/Global-warming-Its-natural-say-experts.html
http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=110107A
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/06/05/lieberman-warner-debate-senator-rohrabacher-do-you-really-think-the-world-is-filled-with-morons/
http://canadafreepress.com/2007/global-warming020507.htm  also talks about political pressure put on scientist

http://canadafreepress.com/2006/harris061206.htm paleoclimatologist Professor Tim Patterson testified, "There is no meaningful correlation between CO2 levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO2 levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years."
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/317/5834/36?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=eske+willerslev&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=8641
http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2007/07/06/greenland_ice_yields_hope_on_climate/
Why no academic sources?  Why nothing from university websites?  Why no peer review articles?

Also,  :lulz:@ you citing the DailyMail.

if you haven't already made up your mind look them up! the articles  give names jobs/universities of dissenting scientist i am just making the point that there is debate, yes the daily mail is biased (duh ) i culled out most of the wing nut links i have for that reason..

again just to be clear i am not saying global warming is absolutely not man made, i am saying it is being debated i may lean slightly on the side of natural cycles but i have come to no conclusion.
the fear mongering "we are all going to die imminent disaster" wingnuttery is highly suspect (AL gore kool aid ) and is about as dumb as saying there are no environmental problems the environment is there to be raped and pillaged by mankind at will
I'll stick to reading the actual science.  There's a reason I first went to the journals (followed by educational sites).  The 'global warming debate' is the same as the 'evolution-creation debate.'  It doesn't fucking exist.  The debate is more about the long and short term effects of warming, not whether or not it's happening.  The planet is warming, humans are (partially) responsible.  It can cause some major damage.

And Al Gore can just fuck off.  Stop.  Listening.  To.  Politicians.  Gore is not a scientist, he does not represent scientists.  I don't give a shit what Al Gore says.  I give a shit what the Federation of American Scientists (http://www.fas.org/programs/energy/index.html) says.  I give a shit what the American Meteorological Society (http://www.ametsoc.org/policy/climatechangeresearch_2003.html) says.  I give a shit what the Royal Meteorological Society (http://www.rmets.org/news/detail.php?ID=332) says.  I give a shit what the Canadian Federation of Earth Sciences] says.  Not what some fucking politician says. (http://www.geoscience.ca/climatechange.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 07:20:21 PM
missing the point ...
the warming is not being debated scientist are good at taking measurements
the cause is being debated
the effects are being debated
the rate of warming is being debated
the political solutions to the conclusions being jumped to are being debated
the effects of political influence on scientists opinions on the above debates are being debated

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 21, 2008, 07:35:56 PM
Solutions would be good. If either of you have any I'm sure that the scientific community would be interested, because as far as I know, we don't have a clue how to fix it either.

Just thinking some more about Hydropsychid caddisflies....I would love to get an aquarium set up that could be easily viewed so I could take tones and tones of pictures of hydropsychid net retreats, actually, of hydropsychoidea net retreats in general. I mean, philopotamids make elongate sack nets with extremely fine mesh, Polycentropodids may trumpet shaped nets or open ended tube nets, Psychomyiids build complex tube networks on rocks out of sand, Dipseudopsids make their tube networks underground with entrance and exit holes and build a net within one tube through which they siphon water to collect detritus. Its just all so cool.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 21, 2008, 07:46:49 PM
Hydropsychid caddisflies interesting but a bit over my head i was on the verge of moving up from lures to fly fishing when i moved to the city so never got into studying aquatic bugs/fish feeding..  the size, color, type, movement, placement, of lures to attract trout in varying water temps, conditions i have a good experiential  knowledge of..

on solutions-  my only idea is for scientists to do more studying/research (which they do any way)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 21, 2008, 11:13:14 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 07:46:49 PM
Hydropsychid caddisflies interesting but a bit over my head i was on the verge of moving up from lures to fly fishing when i moved to the city so never got into studying aquatic bugs/fish feeding..  the size, color, type, movement, placement, of lures to attract trout in varying water temps, conditions i have a good experiential  knowledge of..

on solutions-  my only idea is for scientists to do more studying/research (which they do any way)

The only reason it sounds like its over your head is because I'm using terms that you aren't familiar with. Most biology, while not for idiots, can be understood by nonbiologists if terms are explained and processes are described in detail. People know what a flower looks like. So you open a flower up and show them the different parts inside and what functions they have, and you use metaphor and visuals. Most people think biology goes over their heads because we use a scientific language, its faster, but in the vernacular most of it makes sense.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on September 22, 2008, 01:46:53 AM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 07:20:21 PM
missing the point ...
the warming is not being debated scientist are good at taking measurements
the cause is being debated
the effects are being debated
the rate of warming is being debated
the political solutions to the conclusions being jumped to are being debated
the effects of political influence on scientists opinions on the above debates are being debated


Ah, I understand what you're saying now.  Sorry.  I tend to get a little overzealous when I think I'm dealing with pseudoscience (and denying AGW is pseudoscience).  I guess that's what I get for engaging people like creationists and people who deny the globe is warming at all.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 22, 2008, 03:04:06 AM
Quote from: Kai on September 21, 2008, 11:13:14 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 07:46:49 PM
Hydropsychid caddisflies interesting but a bit over my head i was on the verge of moving up from lures to fly fishing when i moved to the city so never got into studying aquatic bugs/fish feeding..  the size, color, type, movement, placement, of lures to attract trout in varying water temps, conditions i have a good experiential  knowledge of..

on solutions-  my only idea is for scientists to do more studying/research (which they do any way)

The only reason it sounds like its over your head is because I'm using terms that you aren't familiar with. Most biology, while not for idiots, can be understood by nonbiologists if terms are explained and processes are described in detail. People know what a flower looks like. So you open a flower up and show them the different parts inside and what functions they have, and you use metaphor and visuals. Most people think biology goes over their heads because we use a scientific language, its faster, but in the vernacular most of it makes sense.


Natural biology was my favorite class in high school, we spent a day at a swamp/pond collecting specimens and the rest of the year identifying every thing we found. My lab partner and I ended up with more specimens than any one else, we even swam in the pond dragging our nets and were the only ones to catch a fish (northern pike)most of the class were "eww swamp water we don't want to get our feet wet"... your guess is correct the science language is the part i am missing or have forgotten
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 22, 2008, 06:37:32 AM
Quote from: Vene on September 22, 2008, 01:46:53 AM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 07:20:21 PM
missing the point ...
the warming is not being debated scientist are good at taking measurements
the cause is being debated
the effects are being debated
the rate of warming is being debated
the political solutions to the conclusions being jumped to are being debated
the effects of political influence on scientists opinions on the above debates are being debated


Ah, I understand what you're saying now.  Sorry.  I tend to get a little overzealous when I think I'm dealing with pseudoscience (and denying AGW is pseudoscience).  I guess that's what I get for engaging people like creationists and people who deny the globe is warming at all.
no  worries i get overzealous my self when i think i am talking to the "theory is fact the sky is falling crowd "...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 01, 2008, 07:08:30 PM
Today's Headlines - October 1, 2008

Machu Picchu's Far-Flung Residents
from Science News

High in Peru's Andes, the skeletons of people buried at the famous Inca site of Machu Picchu tell a tale of displacement and devoted service. A new chemical analysis of these bones supports the previously postulated idea that Inca kings used members of a special class of royal retainers from disparate parts of the empire to maintain and operate the site, which served as a royal estate.

Dramatic differences in the remains' ratios of certain chemical isotopes that collect in bone indicate that Machu Picchu's permanent residents spent their early lives in varied regions east or southeast of the site, say anthropologist Bethany Turner of Georgia State University in Atlanta and her colleagues.
Some Machu Picchu inhabitants had emigrated from spots along the central South American coast, while others hailed from valleys high in the Andes.

Inca royalty, who regularly visited the site, were not buried at Machu Picchu. They were buried at nearby Cuzco, the capital of the empire.

http://snipurl.com/3yygn


New California Academy of Sciences a Natural Wonder
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

World-class, unparalleled, greatest, biggest, most diverse, greenest and eco-grooviest. Able to leap tall buildings in a single rave, the new state-of-the-art and state-of-the-planet incarnation of the California Academy of Sciences is generating kilowatts of excitement and kudos.

Last weekend marked the long-awaited grand reopening of the academy, which is unusual in that it houses an aquarium, planetarium, natural history museum and educational programs under one roof. In commemoration of the very big deal that all of this is, several hundred butterflies were released at its Saturday debut in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, starting two days of hoopla that included music, Chinese acrobats and a Native American blessing.

But the star attraction is the building itself, designed by Pritzker Prize winner Renzo Piano ... and poised to be one of the world's greenest buildings.

http://snipurl.com/3xob6


New Birdlike Dinosaur Found in Argentina
from National Geographic News

A new predatory dinosaur with a birdlike breathing system found in Argentina may help scientists better understand the evolution of birds' lung systems. The elephant-size dinosaur Aerosteon riocoloradensis lived 85 million years ago during the Cretaceous period.

The fossil provides the first evidence of dinosaur air sacs, which pump air into the lungs and are used by modern-day birds, said Paul Sereno, the project's lead researcher and a National Geographic explorer-in-residence. 

Scientists have known dinosaurs used the pumplike apparatus to breathe, but the new find cements the connection between dinosaur and avian evolution, said Sereno, a paleontologist at the University of Chicago.

http://snipurl.com/3yxtm


The 'Secret Jews' of San Luis Valley
from Smithsonian Magazine

One September day in 2001, Teresa Castellano, Lisa Mullineaux, Jeffrey Shaw and Lisen Axell were having lunch in Denver. Genetic counselors from nearby hospitals and specialists in inherited cancers, the four would get together periodically to talk shop. That day they surprised one another: they'd each documented a case or two of Hispanic women with aggressive breast cancer linked to a particular genetic mutation. The women had roots in southern Colorado, near the New Mexico border.

... Curiously, the genetic mutation that caused the virulent breast cancer had previously been found primarily in Jewish people whose ancestral home was Central or Eastern Europe. Yet all of these new patients were Hispanic Catholics.

... As a result, families in this remote high-desert community have had to come to grips with a kind of knowledge that more and more of us are likely to face. For the story of this wayward gene is the story of modern genetics, a science that increasingly has the power both to predict the future and to illuminate the past in unsettling ways.

http://snipurl.com/3yy8p


Liquid Lenses Promise Picture-Perfect Phone Cam Photos
from Scientific American

TROY, N.Y.—Despite their ubiquity, cell phones are not known for their ability to take picture-perfect photos. But budding "liquid lens" technology promises to change that by providing phone photogs with the autofocus capabilities lacking in today's cellular optics.

The latest advance in this area comes from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, here, where researchers have developed a liquid lens by placing a few drops of water into a cylindrical hole drilled in a Teflon surface and using a small speaker (that plays a high-frequency sound) to provide the resonance needed to move the water back and forth, changing the focus of the lens.

Light passing through the droplets transforms them into a mini camera lens, which is capped on both sides with plastic or glass. The experiment, led by Amir Hirsa ..., used the liquid lens to capture 250 images per second.

http://snipurl.com/3yymg


Searching for Clarity: A Primer on Medical Studies
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Everyone, it seemed, from the general public to many scientists, was enthralled by the idea that beta carotene would protect against cancer. In the early 1990s, the evidence seemed compelling that this chemical, an antioxidant found in fruit and vegetables and converted by the body to vitamin A, was a key to good health.

There were laboratory studies showing how beta carotene would work. There were animal studies confirming that it was protective against cancer. There were observational studies showing that the more fruit and vegetables people ate, the lower their cancer risk. So convinced were some scientists that they themselves were taking beta carotene supplements.

Then came three large, rigorous clinical trials that randomly assigned people to take beta carotene pills or a placebo. And the beta carotene hypothesis crumbled.

http://snipurl.com/3yysj


Carbon Sale Raises $40 Million
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

NEW YORK, Sept. 29—The country's first cap-and-trade auction for greenhouse gas reduction raised nearly $40 million for Northeastern states to spend on renewable energy technologies and energy-efficiency programs, officials of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, which ran the auction, said Monday.

In the absence of a federal government program to cap the amount of carbon dioxide that power plants pump out of their smokestacks, 10 Northeastern states established the initiative to set their own limits and force all fossil fuel plants to buy allowances to cover excess emissions.

The initiative is being closely watched nationally as a model for efforts to reduce emissions and stem global warming. In the sealed online auction Thursday, energy, financial and environmental organizations paid $3.07 per ton of excess emissions, and all 12.5 million carbon allowances were sold, the initiative reported. Most of the bidders were power generators.

http://snipurl.com/3yyz0


What Can You Do with a 12-Million-Digit Prime Number?
from the Christian Science Monitor

The scientific world is abuzz this week with news that researchers at UCLA have discovered a prime number with more than 10 million digits. The find qualifies them for a $100,000 prize from the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) and undeniable geek cred, but a decidedly unscientific survey of comments from around the web concludes that the overall response to the announcement is: So what?

... The hunt for large primes requires massive computing power—the production of which is prohibitively expensive for a single organization. Distributive computing—the same kind UCLA used to find their megaprime—makes a supercomputer out of many smaller individual machines, using the web to stitch all that power together.

The EFF Cooperative Computing Awards provide an incentive for everyday Internet users to contribute to solving great scientific problems. The method is the message.

http://snipurl.com/3yzdv


Report: Everglades in Decline as Restoration Lags
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla.—A multibillion-dollar effort to restore Florida's Everglades has made little progress amid funding shortfalls, bureaucratic red tape and disagreements, according to a congressionally mandated report that warns the vast wetland is in peril.

The National Research Council, in findings Monday, warned that degradation of the Everglades could become irreversible if action isn't taken quickly.

"The Everglades ecosystem is continuing to decline. It's our estimate that we're losing the battle to save this thing," said William Graf, the report's committee chairman and head of the department of geography at the University of South Carolina at Columbia.

http://snipurl.com/3yzq6


Experts Say Herd Mentality Rules in Financial Crisis
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Reuters)—Herd mentality rules during a financial crisis because people are wired to follow the crowd when times are uncertain, experts say.

Brain and behavior studies clearly show that when information is scarce and threats seem imminent, people often stop listening to their own logic and look to see what others are doing.

"People are afraid, and the reason they are afraid is there is tremendous uncertainty right now in the markets," Gregory Berns, a neuroeconomist at Emory University in Atlanta who studies the biology of economic behavior, said in a telephone interview. Berns puts people in magnetic resonance imaging or MRI scanners while he tests their responses to various scenarios, and studies patterns of their brain activation.

http://snipurl.com/3yzyg

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 02, 2008, 08:03:55 AM
HIV Decades Older Than Thought

"The AIDS virus has been circulating among people for about 100 years, decades longer than scientists had thought, a new study suggests.

Genetic analysis pushes the estimated origin of HIV back to between 1884 and 1924, with a more focused estimate at 1908.

Previously, scientists had estimated the origin at around 1930. AIDS wasn't recognized formally until 1981 when it got the attention of public health officials in the United States.

Scientists say HIV descended from a chimpanzee virus that jumped to humans in Africa, probably when people butchered chimps. Many individuals were probably infected that way, but so few other people caught the virus that it failed to get a lasting foothold, researchers say.

But the growth of African cities may have changed that by putting lots of people close together and promoting prostitution, Worobey suggested. "Cities are kind of ideal for a virus like HIV," providing more chances for infected people to pass the virus to others, he said.

Perhaps a person infected with the AIDS virus in a rural area went to what is now Kinshasa, Congo, "and now you've got the spark arriving in the tinderbox," Worobey said.

Key to the new work was the discovery of an HIV sample that had been taken from a woman in Kinshasa in 1960. It was only the second such sample to be found from before 1976; the other was from 1959, also from Kinshasa.

Researchers took advantage of the fact that HIV mutates rapidly. So two strains from a common ancestor quickly become less and less alike in their genetic material over time. That allows scientists to "run the clock backward" by calculating how long it would take for various strains to become as different as they are observed to be. That would indicate when they both sprang from their most recent common ancestor.

The new work used genetic data from the two old HIV samples plus more than 100 modern samples to create a family tree going back to these samples' last common ancestor. Researchers got various answers under various approaches for when that ancestor virus appeared, but the 1884-to-1924 bracket is probably the most reliable, Worobey said."

http://www.livescience.com/health/081001-ap-hiv-origin.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: singer on October 02, 2008, 11:42:55 AM
Well, that pretty much puts the "secret side effect of the Salk Vaccine" theory to rest.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 02, 2008, 06:07:59 PM
Quote from: singer on October 02, 2008, 11:42:55 AM
Well, that pretty much puts the "secret side effect of the Salk Vaccine" theory to rest.
Nope.  This story is part of the conspiracy too!!!  :tinfoilhat:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: singer on October 02, 2008, 10:57:07 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 02, 2008, 06:07:59 PM
Quote from: singer on October 02, 2008, 11:42:55 AM
Well, that pretty much puts the "secret side effect of the Salk Vaccine" theory to rest.
Nope.  This story is part of the conspiracy too!!!  :tinfoilhat:

Of course... what WAS I thinking?    :oops:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 03, 2008, 12:39:45 PM
Today's Headlines - October 2, 2008

Water's Role in Martian Chemistry Becoming Clearer
from Science News

Perched on a vast plain above the arctic circle of the Red Planet, NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has found new evidence that liquid water was once present in the north polar region and interacted with minerals there. Phoenix scientists reported the findings September 29 during a NASA press briefing.

Two Phoenix experiments identified calcium carbonates and clays in soil samples scooped up by the craft's robotic arm. On Earth, both minerals are associated with the presence of liquid water.

Carbonates such as limestones form on Earth when carbon dioxide from the atmosphere dissolves in liquid water, making carbonic acid. The acid eats away at rocks, which eventually become carbonate deposits such as the White Cliffs of Dover.

http://snipurl.com/3zsdm


Space Smash-Up Turned Planets to Dust
from National Geographic News

A dust cloud surrounding a nearby star 300 light-years from Earth may be all that remains from the collision of two rocky planets, researchers say.

The planets may have been similar to Earth in size, age, and distance from their sun. The bodies circled a binary star, or a pair of stars locked in tight rotation, known as BD +20 307. Until now, no other binary stars close to our solar system have shown evidence of having planets.

Using optical and x-ray telescopes to estimate the volume and temperature of BD +20 307's dust cloud, researchers concluded that it must have been produced by the violent collision of two planet-size bodies. Such planets would have been prime locations for the possible evolution of extraterrestrial life, experts say.

http://snipurl.com/3zsgs


New Genetic Test for Flu Virus Means Results in 4 Hours
from the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Registration Required)

ATLANTA (Associated Press)—The government approved a new genetic test for the flu virus Tuesday that will allow labs across the country to identify flu strains within four hours instead of four days.

The timesaving test could be crucial if a deadly new strain emerges, federal health officials said. The new test also could help doctors make better treatment decisions during a conventional flu season.

The new test was developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Applied Biosystems Inc. of Foster City, Calif. The Food and Drug Administration approved the test kit Tuesday, and state health labs are expected to start using it this fall.

http://snipurl.com/401du


The First Sound Bites
from Science News

William Jennings Bryan was rarely at a loss for words. His impassioned oratory spellbound congressmen during his two terms in the U.S. House and thrilled thousands of voters during the presidential campaigns of 1896 and 1900. But during his third run for the White House, 100 years ago, Bryan had trouble speaking in the intimacy of his own home.

"Mr. Bryan seemed a little nervous when he first started, much more so, he said, than he ever felt in facing an audience of ten thousand people," Harold Voorhis recalled. Voorhis, an agent for the National Phonograph Company, was partly responsible for the candidate's discomfort: He had brought a phonograph into the library of Bryan's house in Lincoln, Neb., to record some of his speeches, old and current.

... Whether for profit or prestige, the 1908 campaign was the first in which presidential candidates recorded their own voices for the mass market. ... The sound-bite era was born.

http://snipurl.com/3zuwp


Applying Science to Alternative Medicine
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

More than 80 million adults in the United States are estimated to use some form of alternative medicine, from herbs and megavitamins to yoga and acupuncture. But while sweeping claims are made for these treatments, the scientific evidence for them often lags far behind: studies and clinical trials, when they exist at all, can be shoddy in design and too small to yield reliable insights.

Now the federal government is working hard to raise the standards of evidence, seeking to distinguish between what is effective, useless and harmful or even dangerous.

"The research has been making steady progress," said Dr. Josephine P. Briggs, director of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, a division of the National Institutes of Health. "It's reasonably new that rigorous methods are being used to study these health practices."

http://snipurl.com/40063


EPA Sets Nuke Waste Dump Radiation Standard
from the San Francisco Chronicle

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—No one knows what the Earth will be like in a million years. But a proposed nuclear waste dump in Nevada must be designed to ensure that people living near it a million years from now are exposed to no more than 100 millirems of radiation annually.

And over the next 10,000 years, radiation exposure to the waste dump's neighbors may be no more than 15 millirems a year, or about the amount of exposure in an X-ray. People receive about 350 millirems a year of radiation on average from all background sources.

After three years of deliberations, the Environmental Protection Agency announced on Tuesday its radiation health standard for the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, a system of underground caverns 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas where the government hopes to keep highly radioactive commercial and military nuclear waste.

http://snipurl.com/400dn


NASA's Half Century of Space Exploration
from the Orlando Sentinel

The Sentinel celebrates NASA's 50th birthday with a series of articles and out-of-this-world photo galleries.

What lies ahead? With half a century of amazing accomplishments behind it, NASA is entering a second space age beset by uncertainty and searching for a renewal of "the right stuff."

Browse every launch of the space shuttle, from Columbia's first mission in 1981 to the most recent flight. And while you're at it, test your knowledge of space trivia. For example, what weird object saved the Apollo 13 crew from certain death?

http://snipurl.com/400ld


Study: AIDS Virus in Human Circulation for 100 Years
from USA Today

NEW YORK (Associated Press)—The AIDS virus has been circulating among people for about 100 years, decades longer than scientists had thought, a new study suggests. Genetic analysis pushes the estimated origin of HIV back to between 1884 and 1924, with a more focused estimate at 1908.

Previously, scientists had estimated the origin at around 1930. AIDS wasn't recognized formally until 1981 when it got the attention of public health officials in the United States.

The new result is "not a monumental shift, but it means the virus was circulating under our radar even longer than we knew," says Michael Worobey of the University of Arizona, an author of the new work. The results appear in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

http://snipurl.com/400xe


Driving to Vote Could Be Hazardous
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

CHICAGO (Associated Press)—Could voting for president be hazardous to your health? An analysis of Election Day traffic deaths dating back to Jimmy Carter's 1976 win suggests yes, but the authors say that's no reason not to go to the polls.

The study found that on average, 24 more people died in car crashes during voting hours on presidential election days than on other October and November Tuesdays. That amounts to an 18 percent increased risk of death. And compared with non-election days, an additional 800 people suffered disabling injuries.

The results were pretty consistent on all eight presidential Election Days that were analyzed, up to George W. Bush's victory over John Kerry in 2004. "This is one of the most off-the-wall things I've ever read, but the science is good," said Roy Lucke, senior scientist at Northwestern University's Center for Public Safety. He was not involved in the study, which appears in Wednesday's Journal of the American Medical Association.

http://snipurl.com/40158


Using Math to Explain How Life on Earth Began
from Scientific American

Back in March the press went crazy for Martin A. Nowak's study on the value of punishment. A Harvard University mathematician and biologist, Nowak had signed up some 100 students to play a computer game in which they used dimes to punish and reward one another. The popular belief was that costly punishment would promote cooperation between two equals, but Nowak and his colleagues proved the theory wrong.

Instead they found that punishment often triggers a spiral of retaliation, making it detrimental and destructive rather than beneficial. Far from gaining, people who punish tend to escalate conflict, worsen their fortunes and eventually lose out. "Nice guys finish first," headlines cheered.

It wasn't the first time Nowak's computer simulations and mathematics forced a rethinking of a complex phenomenon. In 2002 he worked out equations that can predict the way cancer evolves and spreads, such as when mutations emerge in a metastasis and chromosomes become unstable.

http://snipurl.com/401q3

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on October 03, 2008, 03:19:45 PM
Set topic sticky, by the way.  I think it deserves it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 03, 2008, 10:35:46 PM
QuoteApplying Science to Alternative Medicine
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

More than 80 million adults in the United States are estimated to use some form of alternative medicine, from herbs and megavitamins to yoga and acupuncture. But while sweeping claims are made for these treatments, the scientific evidence for them often lags far behind: studies and clinical trials, when they exist at all, can be shoddy in design and too small to yield reliable insights.

Now the federal government is working hard to raise the standards of evidence, seeking to distinguish between what is effective, useless and harmful or even dangerous.

It's about fucking time!!!  The FDA has been way too leinent on quackery for the last 7 years.

Quote"The research has been making steady progress," said Dr. Josephine P. Briggs, director of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, a division of the National Institutes of Health. "It's reasonably new that rigorous methods are being used to study these health practices."

http://snipurl.com/40063

LOL!  The CAM people actually do real research now?  I'd love to see that.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 03, 2008, 11:13:11 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 03, 2008, 10:35:46 PM
QuoteApplying Science to Alternative Medicine
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

More than 80 million adults in the United States are estimated to use some form of alternative medicine, from herbs and megavitamins to yoga and acupuncture. But while sweeping claims are made for these treatments, the scientific evidence for them often lags far behind: studies and clinical trials, when they exist at all, can be shoddy in design and too small to yield reliable insights.

Now the federal government is working hard to raise the standards of evidence, seeking to distinguish between what is effective, useless and harmful or even dangerous.

It's about fucking time!!!  The FDA has been way too leinent on quackery for the last 7 years.

Quote"The research has been making steady progress," said Dr. Josephine P. Briggs, director of the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, a division of the National Institutes of Health. "It's reasonably new that rigorous methods are being used to study these health practices."

http://snipurl.com/40063

LOL!  The CAM people actually do real research now?  I'd love to see that.

I think if they studied hard they'd find that most of "alternative medicine" is psychosomatic, if it works at all.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on October 03, 2008, 11:31:55 PM
I'd go to bat for certain herbal remedies, out of firsthand experience, but most of it (Bach flower remedy theory) are completely nuts.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 03, 2008, 11:41:47 PM
If homeopathy ever gets popular in the United States, I swear that I WILL KILL A MOTHERFUCKER!!!   :evilmad:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on October 03, 2008, 11:44:07 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 03, 2008, 11:41:47 PM
If homeopathy ever gets popular in the United States, I swear that I WILL KILL A MOTHERFUCKER!!!   :evilmad:

It can't replace allopathic medicine totally, but it makes people feel well.  Most holistic doctors will recommend exercise and diet before telling you to go lick a flubutu root or something.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on October 05, 2008, 01:16:47 AM
Quote from: Felix on October 03, 2008, 11:44:07 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 03, 2008, 11:41:47 PM
If homeopathy ever gets popular in the United States, I swear that I WILL KILL A MOTHERFUCKER!!!   :evilmad:

It can't replace allopathic medicine totally, but it makes people feel well.  Most holistic doctors will recommend exercise and diet before telling you to go lick a flubutu root or something.
Homeopathy is just water.  It doesn't even matter what they started with because it is so diluted that not a single atom of the original substance is left.  It's a damn placebo.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 05, 2008, 01:27:53 AM
The Amazing Randi on Homeopathy:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWE1tH93G9U
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on October 06, 2008, 07:07:42 AM
Quote from: Vene on October 05, 2008, 01:16:47 AM
Quote from: Felix on October 03, 2008, 11:44:07 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 03, 2008, 11:41:47 PM
If homeopathy ever gets popular in the United States, I swear that I WILL KILL A MOTHERFUCKER!!!   :evilmad:

It can't replace allopathic medicine totally, but it makes people feel well.  Most holistic doctors will recommend exercise and diet before telling you to go lick a flubutu root or something.
Homeopathy is just water.  It doesn't even matter what they started with because it is so diluted that not a single atom of the original substance is left.  It's a damn placebo.

Oh, that.  Nevermind, I was referring to naturopathy.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on October 07, 2008, 06:17:15 AM
Most "Naturopathic" doctors that I have (extremely unfortunate) experience with have been complete fuckinh DANGEROUS quacks... however, I do have a strong interest in herbal and chiropractic medicine, which is often very legitimate.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 08, 2008, 01:21:42 PM
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/319/5865/905b (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/319/5865/905b)

Students, Postdocs and professors dance their PhD's. The dances include "Dynamical and chemical evolution of blue compact dwarf galaxies.", "Transcription factors involved in developmental and growth control: Regulation of human g-globin and fos gene expression.", and "Refitting repasts: a spatial exploration of food processing, sharing, cooking, and disposal at the Dunefield Midden campsite, South Africa."

Its a bit fun to see them flailing around and realize that its not just improvisation, a choreographer actually worked with them to produce these dances based on dissertations.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 09, 2008, 05:26:34 PM
October 7, 2008

2 Japanese, 1 American Share Nobel Physics Prize
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

STOCKHOLM, Sweden (Associated Press)—Two Japanese citizens and a Japanese-born American won the 2008 Nobel Prize in physics for discoveries in the world of subatomic physics, the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences announced Tuesday.

American Yoichiro Nambu, 87, of the University of Chicago, won half of the prize for the discovery of a mechanism called spontaneous broken symmetry in subatomic physics.

Makoto Kobayashi and Toshihide Maskawa of Japan shared the other half of the prize for discovering the origin of the broken symmetry that predicts the existence of at least three families of quarks in nature.

http://snipurl.com/459su


Infertility Patients Caught in the Embryo Debate
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Six years of frustration and heartbreak. That's how Gina Rathan recalls her attempts to become pregnant. Finally, she and her husband, Cheddi, conceived a daughter, now 3, through in vitro fertilization. About a year later, she became pregnant with a second child, naturally. Their family was complete.

Then, a year ago, the Fountain Valley couple received a bill reminding them that their infertility journey wasn't quite over. They owed $750 to preserve three frozen embryos they'd created but hadn't used. "I don't see them as not being life yet," says Gina Rathan, 42, a pharmaceutical sales representative. "I thought, 'How can I discard them when I have a beautiful child from that IVF cycle?'"

Many other former infertility patients also appear to be grappling over the fate of embryos they have no plans to use: An estimated 500,000 embryos are in cryopreservation in the United States.

http://snipurl.com/44gwi


Where the Wild Things Are
from the Economist

Lake Baikal holds a fifth of the world's unfrozen fresh water. It is home to thousands of species of plants and animals that are found nowhere else. Its northern shores, as anyone using the Integrated Biodiversity Assessment Tool (IBAT), a new online database, can easily discover, form part of a World Heritage site.

... If Transneft, a Russian firm that first proposed a few years ago to build an oil pipeline through the Baikal region, had been able to see all this information—including detailed maps of especially biodiverse spots and the threatened species that inhabit them—at the click of a mouse then it might have altered its plans and avoided those spots.

... That, at any rate, is the sort of thing Conservation International, the charity that conceived IBAT, had in mind when it decided to bring together as much data on biodiversity as it could in a single database, to be unveiled at the forthcoming World Conservation Congress in Barcelona.

http://snipurl.com/43cg2


Fewer Male Reptiles Due to Warming—And That's Good?
from National Geographic News

A trend toward more females and fewer males in a type of Australian reptile may actually benefit the species in the short-term, a discovery that's contrary to previous research, a new study says.

As temperatures rise due to global warming, so does the proportion of female spotted skinks, reptiles found only on Australia's island state of Tasmania. In recent years researchers have shown concern that climate change will push the reptiles into extinction by causing their young to be born of one gender, thus limiting future reproduction.

Temperature-driven gender also occurs in other reptiles, such as crocodiles and turtles. But an increase in female spotted skinks could lead to larger populations of the reptiles, experts say. The research is described online this week in the Journal of Animal Ecology.

http://snipurl.com/411o8


How White Roofs Shine Bright Green
from the Christian Science Monitor

Can you help save the planet by painting your roof white? Hashem Akbari thinks so. Global warming's complexity and momentum have led to a try-everything approach by scientists. In that spirit, Dr. Akbari offers his simple yet profound innovation for slowing that warming way down.

It has long been known that a white roof makes a dwelling cooler. That saves energy and cuts carbon emissions. But until Akbari, a researcher at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California, picked up a pencil to do the calculations, few realized the major climate effect that millions of white rooftops could have by reflecting sunlight back into space.

It turns out that a 1,000 square foot area of rooftop painted white has about the same one-time impact on global warming as cutting 10 tons of carbon dioxide emissions, he and his colleagues write in a new study soon to be published in the journal Climatic Change.

http://snipurl.com/4211m


One Quarter of World's Mammals Face Extinction
from Scientific American

The baiji dolphin is functionally extinct, orangutans are disappearing and even some species of bats—the most numerous of mammals—are dying out. A new survey of the world's 5,487 mammal species—from rodents to humans—reveals that one in four are facing imminent extinction.

"Mammal species that are just declining, not necessarily near extinction, that's 50 percent," says conservation biologist Jan Schipper of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which keeps the Red List of Threatened Species. "And 836 species—especially rodents and bats—we determined they are threatened but we don't know how threatened, because we don't know enough about them."

Schipper and more than 1,700 scientific colleagues spent the past five years surveying the state of the world's mammals. The results, published in Science to coincide with IUCN's conference on biodiversity this week, reveal that 1,139 mammals around the globe are threatened with extinction and the populations of 52 percent of all mammal species are declining.

http://snipurl.com/44b2l


Top Psychiatrist Didn't Report Drug Makers' Pay
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

One of the nation's most influential psychiatrists earned more than $2.8 million in consulting arrangements with drug makers from 2000 to 2007, failed to report at least $1.2 million of that income to his university and violated federal research rules, according to documents provided to Congressional investigators.

The psychiatrist, Dr. Charles B. Nemeroff of Emory University, is the most prominent figure to date in a series of disclosures that is shaking the world of academic medicine and seems likely to force broad changes in the relationships between doctors and drug makers.

... The Congressional inquiry, led by Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, is systematically asking some of the nation's leading researchers to provide their conflict-of-interest disclosures, and Mr. Grassley is comparing those documents with records of actual payments from drug companies. The records often conflict, sometimes starkly.

http://snipurl.com/44keh


Rock Offers Mirror-Image Clues to Life's Origins
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

For more than 150 years, scientists have known that the most basic building blocks of life—chains of amino acid molecules and the proteins they form—almost always have the unusual characteristic of being overwhelmingly "left-handed." The molecules, of course, have no hands, but they are almost all asymmetrical in a way that parallels left-handedness.

This observation, first made in the 1800s by French chemist Louis Pasteur, is taught to introductory organic chemistry students—until recently with the caveat that nobody knew how this came to be.

But research into the question has picked up in recent years, focusing on a 200-pound chunk of rock found 40 years ago in Murchison, Australia. A meteorite that broke off an asteroid long ago, it brought to Earth a rich collection of carbon-based material from far away in the solar system.

http://snipurl.com/44kid


Chaos May Make You See 'Things'
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Confusing times make for dangerous times, suggests new research that serves as a caution during the current financial crisis.

The possibility of an economic meltdown is bad enough. Worse might be a hasty response born of little more than the powerful human need to impose order—even false order—on a riotous world.

Research published in last week's journal Science doesn't address the pros and cons of any specific economic or political policy. But experiments done by Adam Galinsky, social psychologist and professor at Northwestern University in Illinois, and Jennifer Whitson, professor of management at the University of Texas-Austin, demonstrated that people who can't make sense of an out-of-control situation will trick themselves into seeing patterns or drawing connections that don't exist.

http://snipurl.com/44kx1


Nobel Medicine Prize Row as HIV Scientist Is Excluded
from the Times (London)

Three scientists who discovered the causes of the two most lethal sexually-transmitted infections, Aids and cervical cancer, have been honoured with the Nobel Prize for Medicine.

Professor Luc Montagnier and Professor Françoise Barré-Sinoussi, both from France, were awarded the prestigous accolade for identifying HIV, the virus that causes Aids, while Professor Harald zur Hausen was recognised for tracing the human papillomavirus (HPV) as the cause of cervical cancer.

While the prizes have been welcomed as richly deserved, the HIV part of the award has caused controversy because the Nobel Assembly has overlooked the claims of a third scientist who played a pivotal role in the discovery of HIV. Professor Robert Gallo, an American, is widely accepted to have identified the human immunodeficiency virus independently ...

http://snipurl.com/44l48

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 09, 2008, 05:27:28 PM
October 8, 2008

'Glowing' Jellyfish Grabs Nobel
from BBC News Online

A clever trick borrowed from jellyfish has earned two Americans and one Japanese scientist a share of the chemistry Nobel Prize.

Martin Chalfie, Roger Tsien and Osamu Shimomura made it possible to exploit the genetic mechanism responsible for luminosity in the marine creatures. Today, countless scientists use this knowledge to tag biological systems.

Glowing markers will show, for example, how brain cells develop or how cancer cells spread through tissue. But their uses really have become legion: they are now even incorporated into bacteria to act as environmental biosensors in the presence of toxic materials.

http://snipurl.com/46dy2


Fuming Over Formaldehyde
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention failed to act for at least a year on warnings that trailers housing refugees from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita contained dangerous levels of formaldehyde, according to a House subcommittee report released Monday.

Instead, the CDC's Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry demoted the scientist who questioned its initial assessment that the trailers were safe as long as residents opened a window or another vent, the report said.

That appraisal was produced in February 2007 at the request of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which had received thousands of complaints about fumes since providing the trailers to families left homeless by the devastating 2005 hurricanes. One year later, FEMA and CDC reversed course and acknowledged that formaldehyde levels in the trailers were five times higher than are typically found in new housing.

http://snipurl.com/45j0t


Firm Says Test Judges Risk For Common Breast Cancers
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

A biotech company today will begin offering the first genetic test to assess a woman's risk for the most common forms of breast cancer, reigniting debate about the growing number of unregulated genetic tests.

The test by Decode Genetics of Reykjavik, Iceland, a respected pioneer in genetic research, promises to determine a woman's risk through a simple blood sample or cheek swab. Previously, the only tests for breast cancer risk were for relatively rare genes, leaving most women with no way to assess their individual genetic predisposition.

"What this does for women is allow them to assess their personal risk for the common forms of breast cancer," said Kári Stefánsson, Decode's chief executive. "That's what you need to do to make early diagnoses or take preventive measures. This test will most definitely save lives."

http://snipurl.com/46dto


Cold-Medicine Makers Issue Warning for Kids Under 4
from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON—The makers of cold and cough medicines said Tuesday they are voluntarily warning parents not to give their products to children younger than 4, a move negotiated in private with federal drug regulators during the past six months.

Medications with the new warning labels will appear in stores and pharmacies immediately, though experts continue to debate at what age the over-the-counter remedies may be safe and effective. The new labels also advise against using antihistamines to sedate youngsters.

Last winter, the companies agreed to discourage the use of the products in children younger than 2. Each year, drug companies sell 95 million packs of pediatric-cold medicine, generating about $300 million in revenue. More than 7,000 children are taken to hospitals annually because of adverse reactions, primarily due to accidental overdoses.

http://snipurl.com/46e76 


Citizen Enforcers Take Aim
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... The public urge for punishment that helped delay the passage of Washington's economic rescue plan is more than a simple case of Wall Street loathing, according to scientists who study the psychology of forgiveness and retaliation.

The fury is based in instincts that have had a protective and often stabilizing effect on communities throughout human history. Small, integrated groups in particular often contain members who will stand up and—often at significant risk to themselves—punish cheaters, liars and freeloaders.

Scientists debate how common these citizen enforcers are, and whether an urge to punish infractions amounts to an overall gain or loss, given that it is costly for both parties. But recent research suggests that in individuals, the fairness instinct is a highly variable psychological impulse, rising and falling in response to what is happening in the world.

http://snipurl.com/45jc7


'Deepest Ever' Living Fish Filmed
from BBC News Online

The "deepest ever" living fish have been discovered, scientists believe. A UK-Japan team found the 17-strong shoal at depths of 7.7km (4.8 miles) in the Japan Trench in the Pacific—and captured the deep sea animals on film.

The scientists have been using remote-operated landers designed to withstand immense pressures to comb the world's deepest depths for marine life.

Monty Priede from the University of Aberdeen said the 30cm-long (12in), deep-sea fish were surprisingly "cute." The fish, known as Pseudoliparis amblystomopsis, can be seen darting about in the darkness of the depths, scooping up shrimps.

http://snipurl.com/45ji2


The Long, Wild Ride of Bipolar Disorder
from Science News

Children who grow up with the psychiatric ailment known as bipolar disorder rarely grow out of it. Almost half of youngsters who suffered from bipolar's severe, rapid-fire mood swings at around age 11 displayed much of the same emotional volatility at ages 18 to 20, even if the condition had improved for a while during their teens, according to the first long-term study of children diagnosed with the disorder.

Bipolar disorder took off with a vengeance in these kids. Initial episodes, often periods of frequent, dramatic mood swings, lasted for up to three years. Second episodes lasted for slightly more than one year, while third episodes continued for roughly 10 months.

During these periods, youngsters can veer back and forth several times a day between a manic sense of euphoria and a serious, even suicidal depression, say psychiatrist Barbara Geller of Washington University in St. Louis and her colleagues. Manic euphoria typically includes grandiose delusions or hallucinations.

http://snipurl.com/45jm0


Nanotech Comes Alive
from Nature News

Molecular nanostructures—the basic architectural elements of nanotechnology—have been replicated in bacterial cells. The research proves that nature's cellular machinery can be commandeered to mass-produce complex structures and devices for molecular-scale engineering.

Together with their colleagues, Nadrian Seeman of New York University and Hao Yan of Arizona State University in Tempe speculate that their method might lead to the merging of nanotechnology and Darwinian natural selection, in which such molecular devices could be created and improved by some artificial evolutionary pressure.

The technique, reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, relies on the fact that the nanostructures in question are made from DNA, the genetic material of living cells.

http://snipurl.com/45jo6


No Nobel for You: Top 10 Nobel Snubs
from Scientific American

Every year, the Nobel Foundation in Stockholm, Sweden, announces up to three winners each in the scientific disciplines of chemistry, physics, and physiology or medicine. ... And every year, there are murmurings—some louder than others—about the Nobel-worthy scientists who were overlooked. In 1974, when Jocelyn Bell Burnell was left out of the physics prize, her fellow astronomer and Nobel reject, Fred Hoyle, told reporters it was a "scientific scandal of major proportions."

Physician-inventor Raymond Damadian famously took out full-page newspaper ads protesting his omission from the 2003 Nobel for MRI technology. This year, some will be asking questions about Robert Gallo, who did not share today's Nobel for medicine or physiology with Luc Montagnier and Francoise Barre-Sinoussi.

Nobel committee proceedings are notoriously shrouded in secrecy, so it's impossible to know all the details behind how each prizewinner is chosen, especially the more recent ones. But, according to Nobel historians, most award exclusions seem to relate to one or more of these criteria: limited slots available (Nobel rules limit the number of recipients to three for each category); ambiguity over who made the crucial contribution; and lack of experience and/or reputation within one's research community.

http://snipurl.com/45jum


Task Force Says Those Over 75 Don't Need Colon Cancer Screening
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

PHILADELPHIA (Associated Press)—Most people over 75 should stop getting routine colon cancer tests, according to a government health task force that also rejected the latest X-ray screening technology.

The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force—in a break with other medical and cancer organizations—opted not to give its stamp of approval to the newest tests: CT colonography, an X-ray test known as virtual colonoscopy, and a stool DNA test. The panel said more research is needed.

The task force for the first time did endorse three tests and said everyone age 50 to 75 should get screened with one of them: a colonoscopy of the entire colon every 10 years; a sigmoidoscopy of the lower colon every 5 years, combined with a stool blood test every three years; a stool blood test every year.

http://snipurl.com/45k72

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 10, 2008, 03:32:44 PM
October 9, 2008

Mercury Flyby Reveals Bright Craters, Long Rays
from National Geographic News

A new look at the solar system's innermost planet is revealing bright young craters and an extensive pattern of rays, suggesting that Mercury undergoes weathering processes like those on the moon.

NASA's MESSENGER ... spacecraft turned toward Earth in the wee hours of Tuesday morning and began transmitting images and data from its second planetary flyby.

A previous flyby in January was the first in a series of maneuvers designed to position MESSENGER in orbit around Mercury in 2011. That encounter imaged 20 percent of the planet's surface that had never been seen before. The latest images represent the first spacecraft views of the northern portion of Mercury, encompassing another 30 percent of the surface missed during previous missions.

http://snipurl.com/46lml


A Gift From the '70s: Energy Lessons
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The presidential candidates claim to see America's energy future, but their competing visions have a certain vintage quality. They've revived that classic debate: the hard path versus the soft path.

The soft path, as Amory Lovins defined it in the 1970s, is energy conservation and power from the sun, wind and plants—the technologies that Senator Barack Obama emphasizes in his plan to reduce greenhouse emissions. Senator John McCain is more enthusiastic about building nuclear power plants, the quintessential hard path.

As a rule, it's not a good idea to revive anything from the 1970s. But this debate is the exception, and not just because the threat of global warming has raised the stakes. The old lessons are as good a guide as any to the future, as William Tucker argues in "Terrestrial Energy," his history of the hard-soft debate.

http://snipurl.com/46ltt


Blood Test Finds Coronary Disease
from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

A simple blood test could soon replace expensive and invasive exams to detect coronary artery disease. The test, announced Wednesday by doctors at Duke, is being developed after the discovery of genetic markers that show the presence and intensity of blockage in coronary artery disease, said a Duke cardiologist who co-authored research on the link.

Such a blood test could save millions of dollars annually by allowing some patients to avoid risky procedures in which catheters are inserted into patients' arteries.

"I think it is a big deal," Dr. William E. Kraus, a Duke cardiologist, said in an interview Wednesday. "What we want is a test that tells us the status of your disease today and if what you have is heart disease." Kraus' research was published in the medical journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Genetics.

http://snipurl.com/47jpz


Plunge in Markets Brings Another Kind of Depression
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A Porter Ranch man who murdered his family and killed himself last weekend as he faced financial ruin is the latest and most extreme case of a wave of distress washing over the American psyche.

... The tragic case of the Rajaram family is at the bleakest edge of the economic turmoil that is rattling Americans' emotional well-being. Worries about home foreclosures, job losses and plunging stock prices have sparked a surge in mental health problems.

"The closest I have seen to this in the last 10 to 20 years is the spike after 9/11," said Richard Chaifetz, chief executive of ComPsych Corp., a Chicago-based company that coordinates mental health referrals for employers. "But this is more geographically dispersed and is not going to get better in a month."

http://snipurl.com/46lwo


Studies Lift Hopes for Great Lakes Wind Turbine Farms
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

CHICAGO—Picture 100,000 wind turbines rising from the Great Lakes off Michigan's shores, casting spinning shadows on the water and producing electricity for the entire Upper Midwest.

This surreal image is conjured by a study released last Tuesday by the Michigan State University Land Policy Institute. It analyzed wind potential in the Great Lakes and found that 100,000 turbines off Michigan's coasts could produce 321,000 megawatts of energy.

That scenario, however, is highly unlikely because of the cost and environmental and other considerations. But wind power advocates hope it is a starting point for development of the world's first freshwater, offshore wind farms—in the Great Lakes.

http://snipurl.com/46m20


Pentagon Researches Alternative Treatments
from USA Today

WASHINGTON—The Pentagon is seeking new ways to treat troops suffering from combat stress or brain damage by researching such alternative methods as acupuncture, meditation, yoga and the use of animals as therapy, military officials said.

"This new theme is a big departure for our cautious culture," Dr. S. Ward Casscells, the Pentagon's assistant secretary for health affairs, told USA TODAY.

Casscells said he pushed hard for the new research, because "we are struggling with" post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) "as we are with suicide and we are increasingly willing to take a hard look at even soft therapies."

So far this year, the Pentagon is spending $5 million to study the therapies. In the previous two years, the Pentagon had not spent any money on similar research, records show.

http://snipurl.com/46m9d


Great Balls of Fire
from Nature News

A space rock a few metres across exploded over northern Sudan early in the morning of Tuesday 7 October. The small asteroid mostly disintegrated when it collided with Earth's atmosphere, but fragments may have reached the surface.

Such an event happens roughly every three months. But this is "the first time we were able to discover and predict an impact before the event," says Donald Yeomans, manager of NASA's Near-Earth Object (NEO) programme at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.

The story began on Sunday evening, when astronomers with the Catalina Sky Survey near Tucson, Arizona, discovered the incoming object, dubbed 2008 TC3. By the next morning, three organizations—NASA's NEO office, the Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and NeoDys in Pisa, Italy—confirmed that the asteroid was racing towards Earth.

http://snipurl.com/46mfy


University: Stem-Cell Study Used Falsified Data
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

MINNEAPOLIS (Associated Press)—The University of Minnesota has concluded that falsified data were used in a 2001 article published by one of its researchers on adult stem cells. The school is asking that the article be retracted.

The conclusion follows an 18-month investigation into research published by stem-cell expert Dr. Catherine Verfaillie. The investigation clears Verfaillie of misconduct but points to a former graduate student, Dr. Morayma Reyes, who is now an assistant professor at the University of Washington.

The university blames Verfaillie for "inadequate training and oversight," and says it has asked for a retraction of the published article, which appeared in the journal Blood. Reyes said it was an honest error and there was no intent to deceive.

http://snipurl.com/46pzh


Newly Discovered Fungus Strips Pollutants from Oil
from New Scientist

A humble fungus could help oil companies clean up their fuel to meet tightening emissions standards. The fungus, recently discovered in Iran, grows naturally in crude oil and removes the sulphur and nitrogen compounds that lead to acid rain and air pollution.

Worldwide, government are imposing increasingly severe limits on how much of those compounds fuels can contain. Oil producers are searching for more efficient ways to strip sulphur and nitrogen from their products.

The standard way to "desulphurise" crude oil involves reacting it with hydrogen at temperatures of 455°C and up to 204 times atmospheric pressure (roughly 21 million pascals or 3000 psi). It achieves less than perfect results. Micro-organisms able to metabolise sulphur and nitrogen have the potential to achieve the same endpoint under more normal conditions.

http://snipurl.com/46qc5


St. Louis Festival Brings Out Science's Cool Side
from the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Registration Required)

ST. LOUIS (Associated Press)—From medicine cabinets to the fermented beer in the fridge, Americans are surrounded by science all the time. The St. Louis Science Center is launching a festival this week to help people better understand, and enjoy, the ways that science plays a role in everyday lives. St. Louis was chosen from about 20 American cities to host SciFest, which is based on a popular English gathering called the Cheltenham Science Festival.

"There's this potpourri for the intellectually stimulated," said Doug King, president and chief executive of the St. Louis Science Center. Most presentations are an hour long, and scientists will tackle topics from the latest developments in stem cell science to the physics of rock guitar—using riffs from Vivaldi to Queen to illustrate points.

... Presentations will be interactive, with scientists giving demonstrations, engaging audiences in the conversation and keeping their talks at a relatable level, he said. Topics include everything from University of Texas professor and author Diandra Leslie-Pelecky on the "Physics of NASCAR" to Harvard physicist Giovanni Fazio on the birth and death of stars.

http://snipurl.com/47k1s

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 13, 2008, 12:08:34 PM
October 10, 2008

Scientists Explore New Source of Stem Cells
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Scientists have converted cells from human testes into stem cells that grew into muscle, nerve cells and other kinds of tissue, according to a study published Wednesday in the online edition of Nature.

The stem cells offer another potential alternative to embryonic stem cells for researchers who aim to treat diseases such as diabetes and Parkinson's by replacing damaged or malfunctioning cells with custom-grown replacements.

Scientists have also derived flexible adult stem cells from skin, amniotic fluid and menstrual blood. The new cells were created from sperm-making cells obtained from testicular biopsies of 22 men. They are theoretically superior to traditional embryonic stem cells because they can be obtained directly from male patients and used to grow replacement tissue that their bodies won't reject, Sabine Conrad of the University of Tuebingen in Germany and her colleagues wrote.

http://snipurl.com/47q4x


Venus Flytraps Caught in Shrinking Natural Habitat
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

GREEN SWAMP PRESERVE, N.C. (Associated Press)—Laura Gadd pauses at the edge of a pristine savanna, delicately lifting her feet to avoid trampling any venus flytraps hidden underfoot.

Buried below wisps of wire grass, a few of the plants advertise their presence with a single white flower—perched atop a long stem like a flag of surrender. Gadd finds a half-dozen this day, enough to warrant a spray of glue and inconspicuous powder used to identify the plants and track down poachers who pluck them.

... One of nature's most recognized wonders, the venus flytrap's ability to snatch living prey makes it a favorite of elementary school science classes everywhere. ... Booming growth and development along the coast threatens to overrun the few sensitive and thin populations of venus flytraps that still exist in the wild.

http://snipurl.com/44ltu


Malaria Parasites Use "Cloaking Devices" to Trick Body
from National Geographic News

Malaria parasites use elaborate forms of deception, such as molecular mimicry, to fool the human immune system, new gene studies say. The discovery could lead to new vaccines for the disease, which kills millions and is rapidly becoming resistant to treatment.

Gene sequencing of two parasites, Plasmodium vivax and Plasmodium knowlesi, comes six years after researchers unraveled the genome of Plasmodium falciparum, the malaria parasite that causes the most fatal infections worldwide. Gene sequencing determines the order of chemical building blocks in a species's DNA.

While P. vivax is rarely fatal and causes less severe infections, it accounts for more than a third of about 500 million infections, most of them in Asia.

http://snipurl.com/46qfy


Taking Hard New Look at a Greenspan Legacy
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

George Soros, the prominent financier, avoids using the financial contracts known as derivatives "because we don't really understand how they work." Felix G. Rohatyn, the investment banker who saved New York from financial catastrophe in the 1970s, described derivatives as potential "hydrogen bombs."

And Warren E. Buffett presciently observed five years ago that derivatives were "financial weapons of mass destruction, carrying dangers that, while now latent, are potentially lethal."

One prominent financial figure, however, has long thought otherwise. And his views held the greatest sway in debates about the regulation and use of derivatives—exotic contracts that promised to protect investors from losses, thereby stimulating riskier practices that led to the financial crisis. For more than a decade, the former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan has fiercely objected whenever derivatives have come under scrutiny in Congress or on Wall Street.

http://snipurl.com/47ku8


Goldmine Bug DNA May Be Key to Alien Life
from New Scientist

A bug discovered deep in a goldmine and nicknamed "the bold traveller" has got astrobiologists buzzing with excitement. Its unique ability to live in complete isolation of any other living species suggests it could be the key to life on other planets.

A community of the bacteria Candidatus Desulforudis audaxviator has been discovered 2.8 kilometres beneath the surface of the Earth in fluid-filled cracks of the Mponeng goldmine in South Africa. Its 60°C home is completely isolated from the rest of the world, and devoid of light and oxygen.

Dylan Chivian of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, California, studied the genes found in samples of the fluid to identify the organisms living within it, expecting to find a mix of species. Instead, he found that 99.9% of the DNA belonged to one bacterium, a new species. The remaining DNA was contamination from the mine and the laboratory.

http://snipurl.com/47vm0


Scientific Journals: Publish and Be Wrong
from the Economist

In economic theory the winner's curse refers to the idea that someone who places the winning bid in an auction may have paid too much. Consider, for example, bids to develop an oil field. Most of the offers are likely to cluster around the true value of the resource, so the highest bidder probably paid too much.

The same thing may be happening in scientific publishing, according to a new analysis. With so many scientific papers chasing so few pages in the most prestigious journals, the winners could be the ones most likely to oversell themselves—to trumpet dramatic or important results that later turn out to be false.

This would produce a distorted picture of scientific knowledge, with less dramatic (but more accurate) results either relegated to obscure journals or left unpublished. In Public Library of Science (PloS) Medicine, an online journal, John Ioannidis, an epidemiologist at Ioannina School of Medicine, Greece, and his colleagues, suggest that a variety of economic conditions, such as oligopolies, artificial scarcities and the winner's curse, may have analogies in scientific publishing.

http://snipurl.com/47v8v


Only One Person Has Survived Rabies without Vaccine—But How?
from Scientific American

Four years after she nearly died from rabies, Jeanna Giese is being heralded as the first person known to have survived the virus without receiving a preventative vaccine. But Giese (pronounced Gee-See) says she would gladly share that honor with others if only doctors could show that the treatment used to save her could spare other victims as well.

"They shouldn't stop 'till it's perfected," said Giese, now 19, during a recent interview about physicians' quest to refine the technique that may have kept her alive. Giese's wish may come true. Another young girl infected with rabies is still alive more than a month after doctors induced a coma to put her symptoms on hold, just as they did with Giese.

Yolanda Caicedo, an infectious disease specialist at Hospital Universitario del Valle in Cali, Colombia, who is treating the latest survivor, confirmed reports in the Colombian newspaper El País that the victim is an eight-year-old girl who came down with symptoms in August, about a month after she was bitten by an apparently rabid cat.

http://snipurl.com/47vgk


Nearly 300 New Marine Species Found Near Australia
from National Geographic News

Scientists have found 274 new species of corals, starfish, sponges, shrimps, and crabs 1.2 miles (2 kilometers) beneath the surface of Australia's Southern Ocean.

"We know very little about the deep sea," said lead scientist Nic Bax, a marine biologist with Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) in Hobart, Tasmania. "Finding out how much live coral is down there, and how large those communities are, is very exciting." 

Some of the corals were found to be about 2,000 years old, said Bax. CSIRO made the discoveries in two separate voyages to marine reserves located 100 to 200 nautical miles off the southern coast of Tasmania, Australia.

http://snipurl.com/47vso


'Unbreakable' Encryption Unveiled
from BBC News Online

Perfect secrecy has come a step closer with the launch of the world's first computer network protected by unbreakable quantum encryption at a scientific conference in Vienna.

The network connects six locations across Vienna and in the nearby town of St Poelten, using 200 km of standard commercial fibre optic cables. Quantum cryptography is completely different from the kinds of security schemes used on computer networks today.

These are typically based on complex mathematical procedures which are extremely hard for outsiders to crack, but not impossible given sufficient computing resources or time. But quantum systems use the laws of quantum theory, which have been shown to be inherently unbreakable.

http://snipurl.com/47vwo


Cosmic Eye Telescope Used to Spot Distant Galaxy
from the Telegraph (UK)

Scientists have used a "cosmic eye" to "look back in time" and glimpse a galaxy formation similar to the Milky Way which could give clues to the formation of the Universe. Using a technique that employs gravity from a galaxy in the foreground as an enormous zoom lens, researchers were able to see into the distant Universe.

The cosmic eye allowed scientists to observe a young star-forming galaxy, which lies about 11 billion light years from Earth, as it appeared just two billion years after the Big Bang.

Teams from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in the US and Durham and Cardiff Universities in the UK believe their findings show for the first time how the galaxy might evolve to become a spiral system like the Milky Way.

http://snipurl.com/47wfk

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 13, 2008, 12:52:04 PM
I was going to post something about "the bold traveller" story.  It's amazing the different environments we are finding life in.  I'd love to know how it got that far down in the earth in the first place.

Also, do we actually have quantum computers now?  I thought that they were still 2-5 years away.

The rabies story was interesting too, but I don't have anything interesting to add to it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 13, 2008, 01:19:01 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 13, 2008, 12:52:04 PM
I was going to post something about "the bold traveller" story.  It's amazing the different environments we are finding life in.  I'd love to know how it got that far down in the earth in the first place.

Also, do we actually have quantum computers now?  I thought that they were still 2-5 years away.

The rabies story was interesting too, but I don't have anything interesting to add to it.

About the bold traveler story, I think people see something cool, but then they go off and become idiotic about it. They find this organism that can live in complete isolation, in anoxic conditions and chemosynthetically. Then they go off and talk about it being the key to life on other planets. I look at this organism, and say who cares about other planets, we may have found a relic organism from one of the earliest periods of earths history, leading us ever closer to the supreme question of biogenesis, "How the hell did life come about, anyway?" I feel the same way about the deep ocean vents.

I've heard the rabies story before. If this ends up working, its a confirmation that the earlier cure was not just a fluke. It reminds me of a story I read a couple years ago, about doctors using slow revival methods to bring heart attack patients back from the dead without severe neural trauma.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on October 13, 2008, 06:50:17 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 13, 2008, 12:52:04 PM
Also, do we actually have quantum computers now?  I thought that they were still 2-5 years away.

http://www.physorg.com/news11087.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 13, 2008, 07:07:11 PM
Quote from: Felix on October 13, 2008, 06:50:17 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 13, 2008, 12:52:04 PM
Also, do we actually have quantum computers now?  I thought that they were still 2-5 years away.

http://www.physorg.com/news11087.html

Quote"It seems absolutely bizarre that counterfactual computation – using information that is counter to what must have actually happened – could find an answer without running the entire quantum computer," said Kwiat, a John Bardeen Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering and Physics at Illinois. "But the nature of quantum interrogation makes this amazing feat possible."

Sometimes called interaction-free measurement, quantum interrogation is a technique that makes use of wave-particle duality (in this case, of photons) to search a region of space without actually entering that region of space.

Utilizing two coupled optical interferometers, nested within a third, Kwiat's team succeeded in counterfactually searching a four-element database using Grover's quantum search algorithm. "By placing our photon in a quantum superposition of running and not running the search algorithm, we obtained information about the answer even when the photon did not run the search algorithm," said graduate student Onur Hosten, lead author of the Nature paper. "We also showed theoretically how to obtain the answer without ever running the algorithm, by using a 'chained Zeno' effect."

:asplode:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 16, 2008, 03:09:21 AM
October 13, 2008

Paul Krugman Wins Economics Nobel
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Paul Krugman, a professor at Princeton University and an Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times, was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Science on Monday.

"It's been an extremely weird day, but weird in a positive way," Mr. Krugman said in an interview on his way to a meeting for the Group of Thirty, an international body from the public and private sectors that discusses international economics.

Mr. Krugman received the award for his work on international trade and economic geography. In particular, the prize committee lauded his work for "having shown the effects of economies of scale on trade patterns and on the location of economic activity."

http://snipurl.com/4bdr1 


Numbers Don't Add Up for U.S. Girls
from Science News

A combination of peer pressure, gender stereotyping and low expectations contributes to turning potentially gifted kids—especially girls—away from mathematics, wasting a precious national resource, a new study suggests.

The study, by cancer biochemist Janet Mertz of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and her collaborators, appears in the November Notices of the American Mathematical Society.

Mertz's team tallied the participants in top international competitions for high school students, the William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition and the International Mathematical Olympiad, and other data. While girls were underrepresented on all countries' teams, some countries, including the United States, often had no girls on a team.

http://snipurl.com/48wnr


Shark "Virgin Birth" Confirmed
from National Geographic News

A female blacktip shark in Virginia fertilized her own egg without mating with a male shark, new DNA evidence shows. This is the second time scientists have used DNA testing to verify shark parthenogenesis—the process that allows females of some species to produce offspring without sperm.

The female shark, dubbed Tidbit, died during a routine physical exam before the pregnancy was identified. A necropsy—an animal autopsy—after her death revealed she was carrying a near-term pup fetus that was about 12 inches (30 centimeters) in length.

Tidbit was caught in the wild when she was very young and reached sexual maturity in a tank at the Virginia Aquarium in Virginia Beach, where she lived for eight years.

http://snipurl.com/48wt7


Mismanaged Tourism Threaten Galapagos Islands
from the Seattle Times

A few weeks ago, 19 Ecuadorean citizens detained on these world-renowned islands were marched onto a plane and sent back to the continent under armed guard. Their crime? Illegal migration.

So far this year, the government has expelled 1,000 of its citizens from the Galápagos—a living laboratory of unique animal and plant species—who were there without residency and work permits. It also has "normalized" 2,000 others, in effect giving most of them a year to leave.

The migrants are attracted not by the tortoises or blue-footed boobies but by the islands' booming economy, which offers plentiful jobs and good pay. Typical wages run 70 percent higher than on Ecuador's mainland, the public schools are good and violent crime is nonexistent. Last year, Ecuador was stung by a United Nations warning that the islands, whose human population has doubled in 10 years to about 30,000, are at risk from overcrowding and mismanaged tourism.

http://snipurl.com/48zg8


Doubling of Kids' Vitamin D Intake Urged
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

(Associated Press)—The nation's leading pediatricians group says children—from newborns to teens—should get double the usually recommended amount of vitamin D because of evidence that it may help prevent serious diseases.

To meet the new recommendation of 400 units daily, millions of children will need to take daily vitamin D supplements, the American Academy of Pediatrics said. That includes breast-fed infants—even those who get some formula, too, and many teens who drink little or no milk.

Baby formula contains vitamin D, so infants on formula only generally don't need supplements. However, the academy recommends breast-feeding for at least the first year of life, and breast milk is sometimes deficient.

http://snipurl.com/4bdyt 


US Tourist Set for Space Station
from BBC News Online

US space tourist Richard Garriott has successfully blasted off into space, following in the footsteps of his astronaut father. Mr Garriott has paid about $30m (£17m) for his 10-day trip to the International Space Station (ISS).

The Soyuz TMA-13 spacecraft, mounted on a three-stage rocket, launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, at 0701 GMT (0801 BST; 0301 EDT). Richard's father, Owen Garriott, spent 60 days on a US space station in 1973. He took extensive photographs of the Earth's surface during his stay on the Skylab orbital outpost.

Owen, 77, will support his son from mission control in Moscow. Richard Garriott, a 47-year-old computer game designer, is joined on the flight by US astronaut Mike Fincke, who becomes the space station's commander, and Russian flight engineer Yuri Lonchakov.

http://snipurl.com/4bdsy


World's Oldest Footprints Found in Nevada?
from National Geographic News

Scientists believe they have uncovered Earth's oldest known footprints in the mountains of Nevada—a fossil find that suggests animals have been walking around about 30 million years longer than previously thought, according to new research.

The controversial tracks—described by one skeptical scientist as "paired rows of dots"— may indicate animals had legs in the late Protozoic era, about 570 million years ago, according to lead researcher Loren Babcock.

The discovery is the strongest evidence to suggest animals were able to move about on their own appendages during the Ediacaran period, before the Cambrian period "explosion." During the Cambrian complex animals rapidly emerged and replaced simple multicellular animals, said the Ohio State University professor.

http://snipurl.com/4agfn


A Green Revolution for Africa?
from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

"When we started," Rajiv Shah recalled over a late-evening coffee at the Serena Hotel in Nairobi, Kenya, "developing-world agriculture seemed very much out of fashion." That was before the food riots and rice tariffs and dire predictions of mass starvation that accompanied the global rise in food prices last spring.

And it was before the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, for which Shah has worked since 2001, made agriculture, particularly African agriculture, a top priority. Agriculture may have been unfashionable four years ago, when Shah and others on the foundation's "strategic opportunities" team began discussing an agriculture initiative, but it is fashionable now.

This is partly a result of market forces leading to the prospect of severe food shortages; but it is also partly because of the market-making power of the Gates Foundation itself. Bill Gates began this year with a promise to nearly double the foundation's commitment to agricultural development with $306 million in additional grants.

http://snipurl.com/4ahtl


Craft Flies 16 Miles From Moon Of Saturn
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The international Cassini space probe flew within 16 miles of the surface of Saturn's moon Enceladus last week—a breathtakingly close flyby designed to gather dust and water particles that will help scientists better understand the recently discovered geysers that spew constantly from the moon's south pole.

"Cassini flew closest to the equator of Enceladus to collect those particles and then went into the plume coming out of the south pole at a much greater height," said project scientist Robert Pappalardo.

The main goal of the mission, he said, is to determine if the dust and ice particles drifting above the moon's equator are the same or different from those that spit out of the geysers. "This is how we hope to learn more about the history and evolution of Enceladus, and about whether there's liquid water involved in the generation of the plume," he said.

http://snipurl.com/4atiq


Herceptin Brings New Age in Breast Cancer Care
from USA Today

Barbara Bradfield has lived to see dramatic changes in breast cancer. When she was diagnosed in 1989, Bradfield's tumor—which produced an overabundance of a protein called HER2—was considered especially deadly. Today, women with tumors like hers have some of the best survival rates in breast cancer.

Experts say the drug that has kept Bradfield healthy for so long, Herceptin, has changed the nature of breast cancer and helped doctors better understand what causes the disease.

In the 10 years since it was approved, doctors say Herceptin also has encouraged the development of a growing arsenal of new therapies that target cancer cells but spare patients from many of the grueling side effects of traditional chemotherapy. Bradfield, who received chemo before and during her Herceptin therapy, developed permanent hearing loss and numbness in her fingers because of those older drugs.

http://snipurl.com/4bdvy

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 16, 2008, 03:27:17 AM
Also, thought I'd get a jump on this.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081014134015.htm (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081014134015.htm)

While paleontologists may scour remote, exotic places in search of prehistoric specimens, Tufts researchers have found what they believe to be the world's oldest whole-body fossil impression of a flying insect in a wooded field behind a strip mall in North Attleboro, Mass.

Though, the verdict is still out on whether its a flying insect or not, and if so, whether it had full flight capacities or rudiments composes of leg endites and exites forming thoracic sidelobes. (The origin of wings from the endites and exites of thoracic appendanges has been pretty much confirmed by Drosophila genetic manipulation since the '80, yet there are still some people that hold on tight to the old paranotal lobe hypothesis. I don't get it.)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 16, 2008, 07:27:50 PM
I'm especially interested in the mindfulness article in this one. The Tiktalik fossil is another.




October 16, 2008

"Fishapod" Had World's First Known Neck, Study Says
from National Geographic News

The skull of a 375-million-year-old Arctic fossil fish reveals that the "fishapod" could nod its head up and down and may have breathed air, a new study says. These new clues may help explain how our fish ancestors evolved into land dwellers.

The fossil fish—called Tiktaalik roseae—was discovered in the Canadian Arctic in 2004 and provides the 'missing link' between fish and land vertebrates, according to scientists.

The new study confirms that the prehistoric fish, which had limblike fins, heralded a momentous departure from water for vertebrates (animals with backbones) but that this evolutionary transition wasn't as sudden as previously thought.

http://snipurl.com/4e581


Bypassing Paralyzed Nerves
from Science News

It's a case of mind over muscle, by way of machine. By electronically connecting a monkey's forearm muscles to its brain, researchers gave a temporarily paralyzed monkey the ability to clench those muscles.

An electrode implanted in the monkey's brain picked up the electrical signal from a single neuron, and the monkey learned to control the activity of that neuron to regain control of its wrist—even if the neuron was in a sensory rather than a muscle-controlling region of the brain.

It's a powerful demonstration of the brain's flexibility, and the first time that scientists have electronically linked a single neuron to an animal's own muscles, researchers report in the Oct. 16 Nature.

http://snipurl.com/4e5de


See the World—And Help Conserve It
from Scientific American

Rain forests and tundra, deserts and savannas, mountaintops and undersea reefs. No spot on the planet is too remote for the movement that has changed the face of leisure travel. Ecotourism, in all its various guises—green tourism, sustainable tourism, adventure travel—has gained traction as enthusiasts seek to experience the earth's wonders while treading lightly on them.

Lately a new subset of this boom has emerged. "Voluntourism" ramps the ecological impulse up a notch, providing ways for vacationers to help save the world's sustainable resources. The trend has been described as a kind of mini version of the Peace Corps. Depending on your interests, you could find yourself repairing trails leading to Old Faithful, tracking sharks in the Atlantic, or mixing cement for housing in the Andes.

Voluntourism is becoming a significant growth sector of the travel industry. Online trip planner Travelocity, for example, now partners with tour operators such as GlobeAware, Cross-Cultural Solutions and Take Pride in America, which specialize in launching voluntourists on service-oriented vacations.

http://snipurl.com/4e5hb


American Icons Aren't the Animals They Used to Be
from New Scientist

Some iconic American animals—wolves, bears and bison—are not the creatures that they used to be. The problem is hybridisation, the "contamination" of one species' DNA with that of another. Does this matter? Should hybrid populations get the same protection as pure-bred ones?

Conservationists are debating, for example, whether the western grey wolf should have been removed from the Endangered Species list because genetic studies suggest some of them are wolf-coyote hybrids.

Grey wolves are not the only ones mixing up their historical genomes. Six of the 15 bison herds in the US have pieces of cattle DNA. Meanwhile, polar bears are mating with grizzlies, resulting in hybrid "grolar bears." Opinions are divided about how much this should affect conservation initiatives. Some say it depends on how heavily the human hand has played a role in introducing hybrids.

http://snipurl.com/4e5qn


Commentary: What Makes Science 'Science'?
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

A science educator surveyed science graduates who were teachers-in-training on their understanding of key terminology, and his findings revealed a serious problem.

Graduates, from a range of science disciplines and from a variety of universities in Britain and around the world, have a poor grasp of the meaning of simple terms and are unable to provide appropriate definitions of key scientific terminology.

So how can these hopeful young trainees possibly teach science to children so that they become scientifically literate? How will school-kids learn to distinguish the questions and problems that science can answer from those that science cannot and, more importantly, the difference between science and pseudoscience?

http://snipurl.com/4e5y9



Does This Explain Muskrat Love?
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Scientists have confirmed what poets have long known: Absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Working with mouse-like rodents called prairie voles, scientists have found that close monogamous relationships alter the chemistry of the brain, fostering the release of a compound that builds loyalty but also plays a role in depression during times of separation.

The scientists found that after four days away from their mates, male voles experienced changes in the emotional center of their brains, causing them to become unresponsive and lethargic. When given a drug that blocked the changes, however, lonely voles emerged from their funk.

http://snipurl.com/4e6hf



FDA Looks into BPA Advocate's Donation to Science Center
from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Federal officials are investigating whether the chairman of a panel about to make a pivotal ruling on the safety of bisphenol A has been compromised by a large donation that was disclosed by the Journal Sentinel on Sunday.

The Food and Drug Administration is reviewing all documents to ensure that Martin Philbert complied with the agency's disclosure requirements, said FDA spokesman Michael Herndon. Philbert serves as chairman of the FDA subcommittee that is reviewing an earlier FDA ruling on the safety of the controversial chemical.

"We have no reason to believe that Dr. Philbert has done anything other than act in good faith on this matter," Herndon said. The move comes after several congressmen, citing the Journal Sentinel story, called for Philbert to step down or return the $5 million given to the center he directs.

http://snipurl.com/4e6tj


Internet Millionaire Takes Aim at Mars
from the Christian Science Monitor

Hawthorne, Calif.—Every morning, Elon Musk steels himself to once again do battle with gravity. A multimillionaire who made his fortune as cofounder of PayPal, Mr. Musk has spent six years and $100 million of his own money designing rockets for his company, Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX). In August, he watched helplessly as a design flaw allowed Newtonian forces to triumph over his Falcon 1—the third failure in as many launches.

... It took a fourth launch on Sept. 28, preceded by a family visit to Disneyland's Space Mountain to calm Musk's nerves, for Falcon 1 to become the first privately developed, liquid-fuel rocket to orbit Earth.

Having passed that milestone ... SpaceX is on a trajectory to revolutionize space transportation. Musk wants to make it more affordable through much cheaper launches. His larger ambition is to transport astronauts in Space X's rocket capsule, effectively providing the National Aeronautics and Space Administration with an alternative to the space shuttle, due to be mothballed in 2010.

http://snipurl.com/4e78x


Calming the Mind's Chatter
from the Baltimore Sun

They're crescendoing like the finale of Beethoven's "Ninth": Bailouts, buyouts. Recession, depression. Enter the meditative practice of mindfulness. Born of Buddhist roots, it's increasingly recognized as a measure to calm the mind's chatter and elevate the brain's thinking and organizational processes.

Mindfulness seminars. Mindfulness books. Even the medical mainstream is taking note—the Sept. 17 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association had a piece titled "Mindfulness in Medicine."

... Mindfulness is built around the premise of disengaging from overly emotional responses and extraneous thoughts that clutter the mind's ability to think clearly. By using techniques such as breathing, visual imagery and meditation to slow down and focus on the present, the theory goes, a person can tap into a higher level of awareness.

http://snipurl.com/4e7pd


Bottled Water Has Contaminants Too, Study Finds
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

(Associated Press)—Tests on leading brands of bottled water turned up a variety of contaminants often found in tap water, according to a study released Wednesday by an environmental advocacy group.

The findings challenge the popular impression—and marketing pitch—that bottled water is purer than tap water, the researchers say. However, all the brands met federal health standards for drinking water. Two violated a California state standard, the study said.

An industry group branded the findings "alarmist." Joe Doss, president of the International Bottled Water Association, said the study is based on the faulty premise that a contaminant is a health concern "even if it does not exceed the established regulatory limit or no standard has been set."

http://snipurl.com/4e7v2

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on October 16, 2008, 09:43:37 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 16, 2008, 03:09:21 AMShark "Virgin Birth" Confirmed
from National Geographic News

A female blacktip shark in Virginia fertilized her own egg without mating with a male shark, new DNA evidence shows. This is the second time scientists have used DNA testing to verify shark parthenogenesis—the process that allows females of some species to produce offspring without sperm.

The female shark, dubbed Tidbit, died during a routine physical exam before the pregnancy was identified. A necropsy—an animal autopsy—after her death revealed she was carrying a near-term pup fetus that was about 12 inches (30 centimeters) in length.

Tidbit was caught in the wild when she was very young and reached sexual maturity in a tank at the Virginia Aquarium in Virginia Beach, where she lived for eight years.

http://snipurl.com/48wt7
I didn't realize that parthenogenesis was an option for "[a]ll non-mammal vertebrate species."  I was under the impression that only whiptail lizards did it.  Makes me wonder how common it really is.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 16, 2008, 09:58:17 PM
Quote from: Vene on October 16, 2008, 09:43:37 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 16, 2008, 03:09:21 AMShark "Virgin Birth" Confirmed
from National Geographic News

A female blacktip shark in Virginia fertilized her own egg without mating with a male shark, new DNA evidence shows. This is the second time scientists have used DNA testing to verify shark parthenogenesis—the process that allows females of some species to produce offspring without sperm.

The female shark, dubbed Tidbit, died during a routine physical exam before the pregnancy was identified. A necropsy—an animal autopsy—after her death revealed she was carrying a near-term pup fetus that was about 12 inches (30 centimeters) in length.

Tidbit was caught in the wild when she was very young and reached sexual maturity in a tank at the Virginia Aquarium in Virginia Beach, where she lived for eight years.

http://snipurl.com/48wt7
I didn't realize that parthenogenesis was an option for "[a]ll non-mammal vertebrate species."  I was under the impression that only whiptail lizards did it.  Makes me wonder how common it really is.

Parthenogenesis often occurs in insects. It could potentially occur in any organism, I think, but in insects particularly because the sex chromosomes are the same, two for a female and one for a male. So, to get a male in insects you just subtract an X. In vertebrates, its usually XY, so you can't parthenogenicaly get males, but you can get females. Its essentially natural cloning.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on October 16, 2008, 10:15:20 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 16, 2008, 09:58:17 PM
Quote from: Vene on October 16, 2008, 09:43:37 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 16, 2008, 03:09:21 AMShark "Virgin Birth" Confirmed
from National Geographic News

A female blacktip shark in Virginia fertilized her own egg without mating with a male shark, new DNA evidence shows. This is the second time scientists have used DNA testing to verify shark parthenogenesis—the process that allows females of some species to produce offspring without sperm.

The female shark, dubbed Tidbit, died during a routine physical exam before the pregnancy was identified. A necropsy—an animal autopsy—after her death revealed she was carrying a near-term pup fetus that was about 12 inches (30 centimeters) in length.

Tidbit was caught in the wild when she was very young and reached sexual maturity in a tank at the Virginia Aquarium in Virginia Beach, where she lived for eight years.

http://snipurl.com/48wt7
I didn't realize that parthenogenesis was an option for "[a]ll non-mammal vertebrate species."  I was under the impression that only whiptail lizards did it.  Makes me wonder how common it really is.

Parthenogenesis often occurs in insects. It could potentially occur in any organism, I think, but in insects particularly because the sex chromosomes are the same, two for a female and one for a male. So, to get a male in insects you just subtract an X. In vertebrates, its usually XY, so you can't parthenogenicaly get males, but you can get females. Its essentially natural cloning.
I can see why it doesn't work for mammals though because there have actually been experiments where an embryo has been fertilized with the genes from two ovum.  It dies during development.  That's where the theory of genomic imprinting came from and there are some genes that are expressed differently depending on which sex it came from.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 16, 2008, 10:36:31 PM
Quote from: Vene on October 16, 2008, 10:15:20 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 16, 2008, 09:58:17 PM
Quote from: Vene on October 16, 2008, 09:43:37 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 16, 2008, 03:09:21 AMShark "Virgin Birth" Confirmed
from National Geographic News

A female blacktip shark in Virginia fertilized her own egg without mating with a male shark, new DNA evidence shows. This is the second time scientists have used DNA testing to verify shark parthenogenesis—the process that allows females of some species to produce offspring without sperm.

The female shark, dubbed Tidbit, died during a routine physical exam before the pregnancy was identified. A necropsy—an animal autopsy—after her death revealed she was carrying a near-term pup fetus that was about 12 inches (30 centimeters) in length.

Tidbit was caught in the wild when she was very young and reached sexual maturity in a tank at the Virginia Aquarium in Virginia Beach, where she lived for eight years.

http://snipurl.com/48wt7
I didn't realize that parthenogenesis was an option for "[a]ll non-mammal vertebrate species."  I was under the impression that only whiptail lizards did it.  Makes me wonder how common it really is.

Parthenogenesis often occurs in insects. It could potentially occur in any organism, I think, but in insects particularly because the sex chromosomes are the same, two for a female and one for a male. So, to get a male in insects you just subtract an X. In vertebrates, its usually XY, so you can't parthenogenicaly get males, but you can get females. Its essentially natural cloning.
I can see why it doesn't work for mammals though because there have actually been experiments where an embryo has been fertilized with the genes from two ovum.  It dies during development.  That's where the theory of genomic imprinting came from and there are some genes that are expressed differently depending on which sex it came from.

I've heard things about lesbian couples wanting to have kids together and some sort of experiments into that. Do you know anything about that?

Edit: I freely admit that vertebrates are not my specialty, much less mammals.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on October 16, 2008, 10:44:05 PM
This (http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11601-bone-stem-cells-turned-into-primitive-sperm-cells.html) is the last thing that I've heard about turning ovum into sperm.  I have no idea where it's gone if there has been any progress.  The wikipedia page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Female_sperm) doesn't have any more recent information.  I can only assume that it hasn't worked yet.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 17, 2008, 03:01:43 AM
Yesterday's news


October 15, 2008

Sloan Sky Survey's 3-D Guide to the Final Frontier
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

SUNSPOT, N.M.—It's fair to say that Dan Long has seen more of the universe than anyone but God.

... This summer, after eight years of charting the cosmos, Long and his colleagues completed the deepest, most comprehensive map of the heavens ever produced.

Known as the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, it is a remarkable three-dimensional model of the universe that allows an observer to travel, as if by rocket ship, from the dwarf galaxies hugging the skirts of the Milky Way to the frontier campfires of the most distant quasars, blazing billions of light-years away.

http://snipurl.com/4dpok


Cooling Climate 'Consensus' of 1970s Never Was
from Science News

The reasons to disbelieve that humans are causing global warming are many and varied, skeptics say. For example: Natural factors such as long-term variations in solar radiation are causing the rise in worldwide average temperature.

The urban heat island effect is skewing modern weather data, so the warming observed in recent decades isn't real. And besides, not long ago experts all believed the Earth was cooling, not warming.

Actually, research has shown that many such ideas are bogus. ... Now, new research also skewers the global warming skeptics' claim that, in the 1970s, scientists believed that an ice age was imminent.

http://snipurl.com/4cp8n 


What Being Neat or Messy Says about Political Leanings
from Scientific American

Researchers insist they can tell someone's politlcal affiliation by looking at the condition of their offices and bedrooms. Messy? You're a lefty. A neatnik? Welcome to the Right.

According to a controversial new study, set to be published in The Journal of Political Psychology, the bedrooms and offices of liberals, who are generally thought of as open, tend to be colorful and awash in books about travel, ethnicity, feminism and music, along with music CDs covering folk, classic and modern rock, as well as art supplies, movie tickets and travel memorabilia.

Conservatives, on the other hand, tend to surround themselves with calendars, postage stamps, laundry baskets, irons and sewing materials in their personal spaces, according to the study. Their bedrooms and offices are well-lighted and decorated with sports paraphernalia and flags—especially American ones.

http://snipurl.com/4cppd


Outcry at Scale of Inheritance Project
from Nature News

The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) handed out the first payments in a multi-million-dollar project to explore epigenomics last month. But some researchers are voicing concerns about the scientific and economic justification for this latest 'big biology' venture.

Epigenetics, described as "inheritance, but not as we know it," is now a blisteringly hot field. It is concerned with changes in gene expression that are typically inherited, but not caused by changes in gene sequence.

In theory, epigenetic studies can help explain how the millions of cells in the human body can carry identical DNA but form completely different cell types, and perhaps why certain cells are susceptible to disease. The NIH's epigenomics initiative is a plan for such studies on a grand scale ... 

http://snipurl.com/4cq0e


After Acai, What Is Amazon's Next "Cinderella Fruit"?
from National Geographic News

In the rainforests of Peru's remote Pacaya-Samiria National Reserve, mothers don't make kids eat their carrots. Instead, kids munch on aguaje, a crisp, neon yellow palm fruit covered in maroon scales. It tastes a bit like a carrot, but packs three times the vitamin A punch.

Aguaje is just one of more than a hundred wild and domesticated fruits available to people each year in this 8,000-square-mile chunk of protected Amazon wetland at the confluence of two rivers in northeastern Peru.

And with so much variety and abundance, it's not surprising that these fruits form the centerpiece of the local diet. The reserve's 100,000 residents depend on them for many nutrients—like vitamins, protein, and oils—that the rest of us normally get from a variety of other foods, including vegetables and nuts.

http://snipurl.com/4cynr


NASA to Reboot Hubble Space Telescope
from New Scientist

NASA will attempt to revive the $2 billion Hubble Space Telescope on Wednesday, officials say. The telescope was idled two weeks ago by an equipment failure.

The breakdown of a computer needed to relay science data to Earth prompted NASA to postpone until next year a long-awaited space shuttle mission to upgrade the orbital observatory. That flight, which had been slated for lift-off on Tuesday, was rescheduled for February.

Engineers plan to send commands to the telescope early on Wednesday to switch over to a backup computer that has not even been turned on since before the telescope arrived in orbit 18 years ago.

http://snipurl.com/4cyt6


Thinking Anew About a Migratory Barrier: Roads
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

SALTESE, Mont.—Dr. Chris Servheen spends a lot of time mulling a serious scientific question: why didn't the grizzly bear cross the road? The future of the bear may depend on the answer.

The mountains in and around Glacier National Park teem with bears. A recently concluded five-year census found 765 grizzlies in northwestern Montana, more than three times the number of bears as when it was listed as a threatened species in 1975.

To the south lies a swath of federally protected wilderness much larger than Yellowstone, where the habitat is good, and there are no known grizzlies. They were wiped out 50 years ago to protect sheep. One of the main reasons they have not returned is Interstate 90.

http://snipurl.com/4cz0v


Expedition Set for 'Ghost Peaks'
from BBC News Online

It is perhaps the last great Antarctic expedition—to find an explanation for why there is a great mountain range buried under the White Continent. The Gamburtsevs match the Alps in scale but no-one has ever seen them because they are covered by up to 4km of ice.

Geologists struggle to understand how such a massif can have formed and persisted in the middle of Antarctica. Now, an international team is setting out on a deep-field survey to try to get some answers.

The group comprises scientists, engineers, pilots and support staff from the UK, the US, Germany, Australia, China and Japan. The ambitious nature of the project—working in Antarctica's far interior—has required an exceptional level of co-ordination and co-operation.

http://snipurl.com/4cz6o


Number of Devil's Hole Pupfish Increasing
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The tiny Devil's Hole pupfish, found only in a small, deep pool in the desert near Death Valley, has been teetering on the brink of extinction for years. In the spring of 2006 there were only 38 of them, down from roughly 500 in the mid-1990s.

The reasons for the decline are unclear. But government scientists trying to reverse the trend appear to be enjoying a bit of success.

The autumn count of the iridescent blue fish has risen for three years, to 126 this fall, the first steady increase in more than a decade. Convinced that the pupfish problems are tied to a shortage of nutrients, biologists took the unusual step of feeding the fish.

http://snipurl.com/4cord


TB Victim Remains Re-write History of Disease
from the Telegraph (UK)

The discovery of two nine thousand year old tuberculosis victims demolishes the conventional wisdom that humans caught the disease from cows, claims a new study.

Scientists have traditionally believed that tuberculosis was caught from the infected milk of cattle at a time when humans first started domesticating animals around six thousand years go.

But the discovery of two much older victims—a mother and a child—finally proves that the human strain most likely existed before its bovine equivalent. It is hoped the findings reported in the Public Library of Science One journal, will help scientists trace the route of the disease which still kills thousands of people every year.

http://snipurl.com/4dpwc


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:31:41 AM
October 24, 2008

Cancer Drug Shows Promise Against MS
from USA Today

A leukemia drug was about 70% more effective than a standard therapy in treating early multiple sclerosis, according to clinical trial results in this week's New England Journal of Medicine.

In multiple sclerosis, or MS, the immune system attacks myelin, the sheath that enables nerve cells to conduct impulses between the brain and other parts of the body.

The drug, alemtuzumab, is a monoclonal antibody that depletes the body of the white blood cells that attack myelin, which are eventually replaced by new white blood cells that don't. For reasons not yet clear, though, alemtuzumab raised patients' risk of autoimmune diseases of the thyroid or platelets, and one study participant died as a result.

http://snipurl.com/4n3pn


Flying Syringes and Other Bold Ideas
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

BANGKOK, Oct. 22—The charitable foundation founded by Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates has awarded 104 grants, each for $100,000, in a bid to inject entrepreneurial boldness and risk-taking into the often staid world of medical research.

Announced in Bangkok, the grants are the first stage of a $100 million, five-year project the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation hopes will encourage research into innovative medical ideas that it feels now have little chance of development, largely because of how funding is distributed.

In making its picks, the foundation has rejected the widespread practice of peer review—assigning other specialists in a field to evaluate research—because, in the words of Tadataka Yamada, the foundation's director of global health, "peer review—by definition almost—excludes innovation because innovation has no peers."

http://snipurl.com/4n37g


Team Records 'Music' from Stars
from BBC News Online

Scientists have recorded the sound of three stars similar to our Sun using France's Corot space telescope. A team writing in Science journal says the sounds have enabled them to get information about processes deep within stars for the first time.

If you listen closely to the sounds of each star ...you'll hear a regular repeating pattern. These indicate that the entire star is pulsating. You'll also note that the sound of one star is very slightly different to the other. That's because the sound they make depends on their age, size and chemical composition.

The technique, called "stellar seismology," is becoming increasingly popular among astronomers because the sounds give an indication of what is going on in the stars' interior.

http://snipurl.com/4n2xr


Drought Resistance Is the Goal, but Methods Differ
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

GRAND ISLAND, Neb.—To satisfy the world's growing demand for food, scientists are trying to pull off a genetic trick that nature itself has had trouble accomplishing in millions of years of evolution. They want to create varieties of corn, wheat and other crops that can thrive with little water.

As the world's population expands and global warming alters weather patterns, water shortages are expected to hold back efforts to grow more food. People drink only a quart or two of water every day, but the food they eat in a typical day, including plants and meat, requires 2,000 to 3,000 quarts to produce.

For companies that manage to get "more crop per drop," the payoff could be huge, and scientists at many of the biggest agricultural companies are busy tweaking plant genes in search of the winning formula.

http://snipurl.com/4n2hi


Mysterious 'Dead Water' Effect Caught on Film
from New Scientist

In 1893, Norwegian explorer Fridtjof Nansen and his ship Fram were victims of a strange phenomenon as he sailed past the Nordenskiöld Archipelago, north of Siberia. Nansen wrote afterwards: "Fram appeared to be held back, as if by some mysterious force, and she did not always answer the helm ..."

Nansen called the effect "dead water ..." Research has already shown that dead water occurs when an area of water consists of two or more layers of water with different salinity, and hence density ...

Now French scientists recreating that scenario in a lab tank have revealed new detail of the phenomenon and even captured the effect on video. The work will help scientists to better understand dead water and the behaviour of stratified sea patches.

http://snipurl.com/4lvvd


Study Probes Clouds' Climate Role
from BBC News Online

An international team of scientists is hoping to shed light on how clouds over the Pacific Ocean are affecting global climate and weather systems. The clouds, some of which are bigger than the US, reflect sunlight back into space and cool the ocean below.

The team hopes to learn more about the clouds' properties and if pollution from activities such as mining affect the formation of these systems. The month-long study will involve more than 200 experts from 10 countries.

A team of 20 climate and cloud experts from the UK's National Centre for Atmospheric Science (NCAS) are taking part in the expedition, which will be based in Chile. Hugh Coe, the lead scientist for the British consortium, said the project would help improve the accuracy of climate change models.

http://snipurl.com/4mobm 


Creationists Declare War Over the Brain
from New Scientist

"You cannot overestimate," thundered psychiatrist Jeffrey Schwartz, "how threatened the scientific establishment is by the fact that it now looks like the materialist paradigm is genuinely breaking down. You're gonna hear a lot in the next calendar year about ... how Darwin's explanation of how human intelligence arose is the only scientific way of doing it ... Materialism needs to start fading away and non-materialist causation needs to be understood as part of natural reality."

His enthusiasm was met with much applause from the audience gathered at the UN's east Manhattan conference hall on 11 September for an international symposium called Beyond the Mind-Body Problem: New Paradigms in the Science of Consciousness.

Earlier Mario Beauregard, ... co-author of The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul, told the audience that the "battle" between "maverick" scientists like himself and those who "believe the mind is what the  brain does" is a "cultural war."

http://snipurl.com/4lxoj


New Critter Webcam: Hot Undersea Action!
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Armchair adventurers with high-speed Internet have a new window into the natural world. National Geographic has added an underwater WildCam to its portfolio  that includes Mashatu Game Reserve in Botswana and others that allow viewers to watch the activities of grizzlies, polar bears and other charismatic 
megafauna.

The new camera pans the undersea world 66 feet below the surface at Glover's Reef, a World Heritage Site on the barrier reef off the Central American country of Belize. Think of it as one of those video fish tanks, but the fish are real.

Web watchers can see wild marine life swim past in real time—at least during daylight hours. The reef has crystal-clear waters, colorful reef fish and the hypnotic sashaying of sea fans and soft corals.

http://snipurl.com/4nt3r


Britain to Allow Animal-Human Hybrid Embryos for Research
from the Seattle Times

LONDON (Associated Press)—British plans to allow scientists to use hybrid animal-human embryos for stem-cell research won final approval from lawmakers Wednesday in a sweeping overhaul of sensitive science laws.

The House of Commons also clarified laws that allow the screening of embryos to produce babies with suitable bone marrow or other material for transplant to sick siblings. It was the first review of embryo science in Britain in almost 20 years.

The legislators voted 355-129 to authorize the proposals after months of sometimes bitter debate that has pitted Prime Minister Gordon Brown's government and scientists against religious leaders, anti-abortion campaigners and others anxious about medical advances.

http://snipurl.com/4n4c8


Hubble Back to Work This Weekend, NASA Says
from National Geographic News

The Hubble Space Telescope could resume scientific observations as early as this weekend, NASA officials said Thursday.

The 18-year-old spacecraft has not gathered data since September 27, when its data formatter, which sends information back to Earth, stopped working.

Last week NASA engineers put several key Hubble computers and all of its scientific instruments into safe mode so the team could switch to a backup formatter. Although the data formatter turned on, it mysteriously reset after a matter of hours, as did a backup computer used to manage Hubble's suite of cameras and other instruments.

http://snipurl.com/4nq68

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:41:11 AM
And this, because it has great implications to biologists.

DNA Barcoding All Our Flora and Fauna
from the Telegraph (UK)

Imagine going for a walk and spotting a wild flower. Its beauty and fragrance delight you but the name eludes you. No problem. You whip out a hand-held scanner, about the size of a mobile phone, and pop a fragment of a leaf into the device. A few seconds, and the read-out tells you that you're looking at a pyramidal orchid. Satisfied, you continue on your way.

Sound far-fetched? Not at all. Scientists are currently gathering a DNA barcode for every species of plant and animal on the planet. It won't be long before everyone, from experts to amateurs, will be able to scan the world's flora and fauna as if they were checking out groceries at a supermarket, to look up or confirm their identities.

There are numerous practical uses, too. Such a device would let you scan fish at the fishmonger's to check if it's been labelled properly, work out exactly what is in your mixed vegetable soup, and confirm whether a piece of furniture really has come from a renewable forest, as the retailer claims.

http://snipurl.com/4kigk

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:44:44 AM
October 21, 2008

Virtual Fossils from 425 Million-year-old Volcanic Ash
from American Scientist

What is a fossil? This word can mean many things, but it usually refers to the mineralized skeleton of some extinct organism—a trilobite or dinosaur, for example—which resists degradation and thus survives the eons largely intact. The fossil record of such hard parts, however, captures only a minority of invertebrates, because up to two-thirds of these species are soft-bodied—they have no shells at all.

Fortunately, circumstances occasionally conspire to preserve evidence of these creatures. In an American Scientist article, a research team relates such an example, one that reveals an amazing amount of detail about animals that lived during the Silurian Period.

... More than a decade ago, they found a diverse, well-preserved assemblage of largely soft-bodied fossils from the Silurian Period in Herefordshire, England. Because they are from a typical marine setting, these remarkable fossils provide important insights into the early evolution of life in the ocean.

http://snipurl.com/4ja6p


Space Probe Is On Its Way
from the San Antonio Express-News

A new space probe from San Antonio's Southwest Research Institute left Earth with a flawless launch Sunday to begin a two-year mission that will chart the boundaries of the solar system.

The Interstellar Boundary Explorer soared into space aboard an Orbital Space Sciences Pegasus rocket that fired as planned at 12:48 p.m. CDT, moments after dropping from the belly of a modified airliner that flew across the South Pacific near Kwajalein Atoll.

... The institute's Dave McComas is the lead scientist on the $169 million NASA-funded probe, which is the first to focus on the heliosphere, a protective balloon that the hot solar wind inflates around the solar system, protecting it from the dangerous radiation in the galaxy beyond. IBEX will study the distant region where the solar wind collides with the cold space of the interstellar medium.

http://snipurl.com/4j6dn


Personalized Cancer Treatment Offers New Range of Options
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The one thing Kevin Carlberg refused to face after his diagnosis with brain cancer in 2002 was anyone's estimate for how long he might live. His doctors and his family all knew the number: six to 18 months.

"I understand the averages," says Carlberg, a rock musician who had just released a CD and was two months from his wedding date when he was told he had the worst stage of the worst kind of brain cancer, glioblastoma. "But every person is different."

Those words could serve as the new mantra in medicine. After having his tumor removed and undergoing chemotherapy and radiation, he received a novel treatment that was designed using his own white blood cells and proteins taken from his tumor to prod his immune system into recognizing and attacking more cancer in his body. It's an example of a growing healthcare strategy known as personalized medicine.

http://snipurl.com/4jcfg 


Geoengineering: How to Cool Earth—At a Price
from Scientific American

When David W. Keith, a physicist and energy expert at the University of Calgary in Alberta, gives lectures these days on geoengineering, he likes to point out how old the idea is. People have been talking about deliberately altering climate to counter global warming, he says, for as long as they have been worrying about global warming itself.

As early as 1965, when Al Gore was a freshman in college, a panel of distinguished environmental scientists warned President Lyndon B. Johnson that carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fuels might cause "marked changes in climate" that "could be deleterious." Yet the scientists did not so much as mention the possibility of reducing emissions.

Instead they considered one idea: "spreading very small reflective particles" over about five million square miles of ocean, so as to bounce about 1 percent more sunlight back to space—"a wacky geoengineering solution," Keith says, "that doesn't even work." In the decades since, geoengineering ideas never died, but they did get pushed to the fringe ... Three recent developments have brought them back into the mainstream.

http://snipurl.com/4j8y2


Molecules That Matter
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

"Molecules That Matter," a traveling exhibit that opened to the public at the newly renovated Chemical Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia earlier this month, ties the history of the 20th century to a handful of the most influential molecules of the period.

The goal of the exhibit is simple: to help the public, who typically cringes at memories from high school chemistry classes, to connect chemical discoveries to the products they use everyday.

And connect it does. Brightly colored models of penicillin G, DDT, and Prozac molecules ... hover above visitors from the exhibit ceiling. Contemporary art and artifacts—including marble sculptures of genetically-modified rats and a 1960 magazine cover addressing the controversy surrounding "the pill"—mingle in the museum. A display case of consumer products born out of the 20th century chemical discoveries, like Tupperware and pantyhose, allows visitors to follow a timeline of chemistry's rise to popular prominence.

http://snipurl.com/4j9co


Fatty Acids Clue to Alzheimer's
from BBC News Online

Controlling the level of a fatty acid in the brain could help treat Alzheimer's disease, an American study has suggested.

Tests on mice showed that reducing excess levels of the acid lessened animals' memory problems and behavioural changes. Writing in Nature Neuroscience, the team said fatty acid levels could be controlled through diet or drugs.

A UK Alzheimer's expert called the work "robust and exciting." ... Scientists from Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease and the University of California looked at fatty acids in the brains of normal mice and compared them with those in mice genetically engineered to have an Alzheimer's-like condition. They identified raised levels of a fatty acid called arachidonic acid in the brains of the Alzheimer's mice.

http://snipurl.com/4j9hz


Migrating Pollock Could Lead to a New Dispute with Russia
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

DUTCH HARBOR, ALASKA—America's biggest catch lands here and at nearby ports every year: more than 2 billion pounds of Alaskan pollock to feed a global appetite for fish sticks, fast-food sandwiches and imitation crabmeat.

The tightly managed Alaskan pollock fishery has been a rare success story in the U.S., which has seen the collapse of species such as New England cod and now imports 80% of its seafood.

Yet the careful management that helped make Alaskan pollock a billion-dollar industry could unravel as the planet warms. Pollock and other fish in the Bering Sea are moving to higher latitudes as winter ice retreats and water temperatures rise. Alaskan pollock are becoming Russian pollock, swimming across an international boundary in search of food and setting off what could become a geopolitical dispute.

http://snipurl.com/4jcku 


Risk of Disease Rises With Water Temperatures
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

When a 1991 cholera outbreak that killed thousands in Peru was traced to plankton blooms fueled by warmer-than-usual coastal waters, linking disease outbreaks to epidemics was a new idea.

Now, scientists say, it is a near-certainty that global warming will drive significant increases in waterborne diseases around the world.

Rainfalls will be heavier, triggering sewage overflows, contaminating drinking water and endangering beachgoers. Higher lake and ocean temperatures will cause bacteria, parasites and algal blooms to flourish. Warmer weather and heavier rains also will mean more mosquitoes, which can carry the West Nile virus, malaria and dengue fever. Fresh produce and shellfish are more likely to become contaminated.

http://snipurl.com/4kaop


Rock Records Dino 'Dance Floor'
from BBC News Online

Scientists have identified an amazing collection of dinosaur footprints on the Arizona-Utah border in the US. There are so many prints—more than 1,000—that geologists have dubbed the site "a dinosaur dance floor."

Located within the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument, the marks were long thought simply to be potholes gouged out of the rock by years of erosion. A paper describing the 190-million-year-old footprints is published in the palaeontology journal Palaios.

"Get out there and try stepping in their footsteps, and you feel like you are playing the game 'Dance Dance Revolution' that teenagers dance on," says Professor Marjorie Chan from the University of Utah.

http://snipurl.com/4kb4g   


A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:47:26 AM
October 21, 2008

Virtual Fossils from 425 Million-year-old Volcanic Ash
from American Scientist

What is a fossil? This word can mean many things, but it usually refers to the mineralized skeleton of some extinct organism—a trilobite or dinosaur, for example—which resists degradation and thus survives the eons largely intact. The fossil record of such hard parts, however, captures only a minority of invertebrates, because up to two-thirds of these species are soft-bodied—they have no shells at all.

Fortunately, circumstances occasionally conspire to preserve evidence of these creatures. In an American Scientist article, a research team relates such an example, one that reveals an amazing amount of detail about animals that lived during the Silurian Period.

... More than a decade ago, they found a diverse, well-preserved assemblage of largely soft-bodied fossils from the Silurian Period in Herefordshire, England. Because they are from a typical marine setting, these remarkable fossils provide important insights into the early evolution of life in the ocean.

http://snipurl.com/4ja6p


Space Probe Is On Its Way
from the San Antonio Express-News

A new space probe from San Antonio's Southwest Research Institute left Earth with a flawless launch Sunday to begin a two-year mission that will chart the boundaries of the solar system.

The Interstellar Boundary Explorer soared into space aboard an Orbital Space Sciences Pegasus rocket that fired as planned at 12:48 p.m. CDT, moments after dropping from the belly of a modified airliner that flew across the South Pacific near Kwajalein Atoll.

... The institute's Dave McComas is the lead scientist on the $169 million NASA-funded probe, which is the first to focus on the heliosphere, a protective balloon that the hot solar wind inflates around the solar system, protecting it from the dangerous radiation in the galaxy beyond. IBEX will study the distant region where the solar wind collides with the cold space of the interstellar medium.

http://snipurl.com/4j6dn


Personalized Cancer Treatment Offers New Range of Options
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The one thing Kevin Carlberg refused to face after his diagnosis with brain cancer in 2002 was anyone's estimate for how long he might live. His doctors and his family all knew the number: six to 18 months.

"I understand the averages," says Carlberg, a rock musician who had just released a CD and was two months from his wedding date when he was told he had the worst stage of the worst kind of brain cancer, glioblastoma. "But every person is different."

Those words could serve as the new mantra in medicine. After having his tumor removed and undergoing chemotherapy and radiation, he received a novel treatment that was designed using his own white blood cells and proteins taken from his tumor to prod his immune system into recognizing and attacking more cancer in his body. It's an example of a growing healthcare strategy known as personalized medicine.

http://snipurl.com/4jcfg 


Geoengineering: How to Cool Earth—At a Price
from Scientific American

When David W. Keith, a physicist and energy expert at the University of Calgary in Alberta, gives lectures these days on geoengineering, he likes to point out how old the idea is. People have been talking about deliberately altering climate to counter global warming, he says, for as long as they have been worrying about global warming itself.

As early as 1965, when Al Gore was a freshman in college, a panel of distinguished environmental scientists warned President Lyndon B. Johnson that carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fuels might cause "marked changes in climate" that "could be deleterious." Yet the scientists did not so much as mention the possibility of reducing emissions.

Instead they considered one idea: "spreading very small reflective particles" over about five million square miles of ocean, so as to bounce about 1 percent more sunlight back to space—"a wacky geoengineering solution," Keith says, "that doesn't even work." In the decades since, geoengineering ideas never died, but they did get pushed to the fringe ... Three recent developments have brought them back into the mainstream.

http://snipurl.com/4j8y2


Molecules That Matter
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

"Molecules That Matter," a traveling exhibit that opened to the public at the newly renovated Chemical Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia earlier this month, ties the history of the 20th century to a handful of the most influential molecules of the period.

The goal of the exhibit is simple: to help the public, who typically cringes at memories from high school chemistry classes, to connect chemical discoveries to the products they use everyday.

And connect it does. Brightly colored models of penicillin G, DDT, and Prozac molecules ... hover above visitors from the exhibit ceiling. Contemporary art and artifacts—including marble sculptures of genetically-modified rats and a 1960 magazine cover addressing the controversy surrounding "the pill"—mingle in the museum. A display case of consumer products born out of the 20th century chemical discoveries, like Tupperware and pantyhose, allows visitors to follow a timeline of chemistry's rise to popular prominence.

http://snipurl.com/4j9co


Fatty Acids Clue to Alzheimer's
from BBC News Online

Controlling the level of a fatty acid in the brain could help treat Alzheimer's disease, an American study has suggested.

Tests on mice showed that reducing excess levels of the acid lessened animals' memory problems and behavioural changes. Writing in Nature Neuroscience, the team said fatty acid levels could be controlled through diet or drugs.

A UK Alzheimer's expert called the work "robust and exciting." ... Scientists from Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease and the University of California looked at fatty acids in the brains of normal mice and compared them with those in mice genetically engineered to have an Alzheimer's-like condition. They identified raised levels of a fatty acid called arachidonic acid in the brains of the Alzheimer's mice.

http://snipurl.com/4j9hz


Migrating Pollock Could Lead to a New Dispute with Russia
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

DUTCH HARBOR, ALASKA—America's biggest catch lands here and at nearby ports every year: more than 2 billion pounds of Alaskan pollock to feed a global appetite for fish sticks, fast-food sandwiches and imitation crabmeat.

The tightly managed Alaskan pollock fishery has been a rare success story in the U.S., which has seen the collapse of species such as New England cod and now imports 80% of its seafood.

Yet the careful management that helped make Alaskan pollock a billion-dollar industry could unravel as the planet warms. Pollock and other fish in the Bering Sea are moving to higher latitudes as winter ice retreats and water temperatures rise. Alaskan pollock are becoming Russian pollock, swimming across an international boundary in search of food and setting off what could become a geopolitical dispute.

http://snipurl.com/4jcku 


Risk of Disease Rises With Water Temperatures
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

When a 1991 cholera outbreak that killed thousands in Peru was traced to plankton blooms fueled by warmer-than-usual coastal waters, linking disease outbreaks to epidemics was a new idea.

Now, scientists say, it is a near-certainty that global warming will drive significant increases in waterborne diseases around the world.

Rainfalls will be heavier, triggering sewage overflows, contaminating drinking water and endangering beachgoers. Higher lake and ocean temperatures will cause bacteria, parasites and algal blooms to flourish. Warmer weather and heavier rains also will mean more mosquitoes, which can carry the West Nile virus, malaria and dengue fever. Fresh produce and shellfish are more likely to become contaminated.

http://snipurl.com/4kaop


Rock Records Dino 'Dance Floor'
from BBC News Online

Scientists have identified an amazing collection of dinosaur footprints on the Arizona-Utah border in the US. There are so many prints—more than 1,000—that geologists have dubbed the site "a dinosaur dance floor."

Located within the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument, the marks were long thought simply to be potholes gouged out of the rock by years of erosion. A paper describing the 190-million-year-old footprints is published in the palaeontology journal Palaios.

"Get out there and try stepping in their footsteps, and you feel like you are playing the game 'Dance Dance Revolution' that teenagers dance on," says Professor Marjorie Chan from the University of Utah.

http://snipurl.com/4kb4g   


A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:49:22 AM
October 21, 2008

Virtual Fossils from 425 Million-year-old Volcanic Ash
from American Scientist

What is a fossil? This word can mean many things, but it usually refers to the mineralized skeleton of some extinct organism—a trilobite or dinosaur, for example—which resists degradation and thus survives the eons largely intact. The fossil record of such hard parts, however, captures only a minority of invertebrates, because up to two-thirds of these species are soft-bodied—they have no shells at all.

Fortunately, circumstances occasionally conspire to preserve evidence of these creatures. In an American Scientist article, a research team relates such an example, one that reveals an amazing amount of detail about animals that lived during the Silurian Period.

... More than a decade ago, they found a diverse, well-preserved assemblage of largely soft-bodied fossils from the Silurian Period in Herefordshire, England. Because they are from a typical marine setting, these remarkable fossils provide important insights into the early evolution of life in the ocean.

http://snipurl.com/4ja6p


Space Probe Is On Its Way
from the San Antonio Express-News

A new space probe from San Antonio's Southwest Research Institute left Earth with a flawless launch Sunday to begin a two-year mission that will chart the boundaries of the solar system.

The Interstellar Boundary Explorer soared into space aboard an Orbital Space Sciences Pegasus rocket that fired as planned at 12:48 p.m. CDT, moments after dropping from the belly of a modified airliner that flew across the South Pacific near Kwajalein Atoll.

... The institute's Dave McComas is the lead scientist on the $169 million NASA-funded probe, which is the first to focus on the heliosphere, a protective balloon that the hot solar wind inflates around the solar system, protecting it from the dangerous radiation in the galaxy beyond. IBEX will study the distant region where the solar wind collides with the cold space of the interstellar medium.

http://snipurl.com/4j6dn


Personalized Cancer Treatment Offers New Range of Options
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The one thing Kevin Carlberg refused to face after his diagnosis with brain cancer in 2002 was anyone's estimate for how long he might live. His doctors and his family all knew the number: six to 18 months.

"I understand the averages," says Carlberg, a rock musician who had just released a CD and was two months from his wedding date when he was told he had the worst stage of the worst kind of brain cancer, glioblastoma. "But every person is different."

Those words could serve as the new mantra in medicine. After having his tumor removed and undergoing chemotherapy and radiation, he received a novel treatment that was designed using his own white blood cells and proteins taken from his tumor to prod his immune system into recognizing and attacking more cancer in his body. It's an example of a growing healthcare strategy known as personalized medicine.

http://snipurl.com/4jcfg 


Geoengineering: How to Cool Earth—At a Price
from Scientific American

When David W. Keith, a physicist and energy expert at the University of Calgary in Alberta, gives lectures these days on geoengineering, he likes to point out how old the idea is. People have been talking about deliberately altering climate to counter global warming, he says, for as long as they have been worrying about global warming itself.

As early as 1965, when Al Gore was a freshman in college, a panel of distinguished environmental scientists warned President Lyndon B. Johnson that carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from fossil fuels might cause "marked changes in climate" that "could be deleterious." Yet the scientists did not so much as mention the possibility of reducing emissions.

Instead they considered one idea: "spreading very small reflective particles" over about five million square miles of ocean, so as to bounce about 1 percent more sunlight back to space—"a wacky geoengineering solution," Keith says, "that doesn't even work." In the decades since, geoengineering ideas never died, but they did get pushed to the fringe ... Three recent developments have brought them back into the mainstream.

http://snipurl.com/4j8y2


Molecules That Matter
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

"Molecules That Matter," a traveling exhibit that opened to the public at the newly renovated Chemical Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia earlier this month, ties the history of the 20th century to a handful of the most influential molecules of the period.

The goal of the exhibit is simple: to help the public, who typically cringes at memories from high school chemistry classes, to connect chemical discoveries to the products they use everyday.

And connect it does. Brightly colored models of penicillin G, DDT, and Prozac molecules ... hover above visitors from the exhibit ceiling. Contemporary art and artifacts—including marble sculptures of genetically-modified rats and a 1960 magazine cover addressing the controversy surrounding "the pill"—mingle in the museum. A display case of consumer products born out of the 20th century chemical discoveries, like Tupperware and pantyhose, allows visitors to follow a timeline of chemistry's rise to popular prominence.

http://snipurl.com/4j9co


Fatty Acids Clue to Alzheimer's
from BBC News Online

Controlling the level of a fatty acid in the brain could help treat Alzheimer's disease, an American study has suggested.

Tests on mice showed that reducing excess levels of the acid lessened animals' memory problems and behavioural changes. Writing in Nature Neuroscience, the team said fatty acid levels could be controlled through diet or drugs.

A UK Alzheimer's expert called the work "robust and exciting." ... Scientists from Gladstone Institute of Neurological Disease and the University of California looked at fatty acids in the brains of normal mice and compared them with those in mice genetically engineered to have an Alzheimer's-like condition. They identified raised levels of a fatty acid called arachidonic acid in the brains of the Alzheimer's mice.

http://snipurl.com/4j9hz


Migrating Pollock Could Lead to a New Dispute with Russia
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

DUTCH HARBOR, ALASKA—America's biggest catch lands here and at nearby ports every year: more than 2 billion pounds of Alaskan pollock to feed a global appetite for fish sticks, fast-food sandwiches and imitation crabmeat.

The tightly managed Alaskan pollock fishery has been a rare success story in the U.S., which has seen the collapse of species such as New England cod and now imports 80% of its seafood.

Yet the careful management that helped make Alaskan pollock a billion-dollar industry could unravel as the planet warms. Pollock and other fish in the Bering Sea are moving to higher latitudes as winter ice retreats and water temperatures rise. Alaskan pollock are becoming Russian pollock, swimming across an international boundary in search of food and setting off what could become a geopolitical dispute.

http://snipurl.com/4jcku 


Risk of Disease Rises With Water Temperatures
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

When a 1991 cholera outbreak that killed thousands in Peru was traced to plankton blooms fueled by warmer-than-usual coastal waters, linking disease outbreaks to epidemics was a new idea.

Now, scientists say, it is a near-certainty that global warming will drive significant increases in waterborne diseases around the world.

Rainfalls will be heavier, triggering sewage overflows, contaminating drinking water and endangering beachgoers. Higher lake and ocean temperatures will cause bacteria, parasites and algal blooms to flourish. Warmer weather and heavier rains also will mean more mosquitoes, which can carry the West Nile virus, malaria and dengue fever. Fresh produce and shellfish are more likely to become contaminated.

http://snipurl.com/4kaop


Rock Records Dino 'Dance Floor'
from BBC News Online

Scientists have identified an amazing collection of dinosaur footprints on the Arizona-Utah border in the US. There are so many prints—more than 1,000—that geologists have dubbed the site "a dinosaur dance floor."

Located within the Vermilion Cliffs National Monument, the marks were long thought simply to be potholes gouged out of the rock by years of erosion. A paper describing the 190-million-year-old footprints is published in the palaeontology journal Palaios.

"Get out there and try stepping in their footsteps, and you feel like you are playing the game 'Dance Dance Revolution' that teenagers dance on," says Professor Marjorie Chan from the University of Utah.

http://snipurl.com/4kb4g   


A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Eve on October 27, 2008, 01:40:54 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:49:22 AM
A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4



:x
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on October 27, 2008, 02:58:26 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:31:41 AMCreationists Declare War Over the Brain
from New Scientist

"You cannot overestimate," thundered psychiatrist Jeffrey Schwartz, "how threatened the scientific establishment is by the fact that it now looks like the materialist paradigm is genuinely breaking down. You're gonna hear a lot in the next calendar year about ... how Darwin's explanation of how human intelligence arose is the only scientific way of doing it ... Materialism needs to start fading away and non-materialist causation needs to be understood as part of natural reality."

His enthusiasm was met with much applause from the audience gathered at the UN's east Manhattan conference hall on 11 September for an international symposium called Beyond the Mind-Body Problem: New Paradigms in the Science of Consciousness.

Earlier Mario Beauregard, ... co-author of The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul, told the audience that the "battle" between "maverick" scientists like himself and those who "believe the mind is what the  brain does" is a "cultural war."

http://snipurl.com/4lxoj
:cramstipated:
I really shouldn't have read some of the comments.  Surprise, surprise an IDiot found this.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 27, 2008, 03:55:28 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:31:41 AM

Flying Syringes and Other Bold Ideas
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

BANGKOK, Oct. 22—The charitable foundation founded by Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates has awarded 104 grants, each for $100,000, in a bid to inject entrepreneurial boldness and risk-taking into the often staid world of medical research.

Announced in Bangkok, the grants are the first stage of a $100 million, five-year project the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation hopes will encourage research into innovative medical ideas that it feels now have little chance of development, largely because of how funding is distributed.

In making its picks, the foundation has rejected the widespread practice of peer review—assigning other specialists in a field to evaluate research—because, in the words of Tadataka Yamada, the foundation's director of global health, "peer review—by definition almost—excludes innovation because innovation has no peers."


http://snipurl.com/4n37g

:facepalm: 

I hope they are prepared to deal with all the woo-woo that is going to be thrown their way.


QuoteCreationists Declare War Over the Brain
from New Scientist

"You cannot overestimate," thundered psychiatrist Jeffrey Schwartz, "how threatened the scientific establishment is by the fact that it now looks like the materialist paradigm is genuinely breaking down. You're gonna hear a lot in the next calendar year about ... how Darwin's explanation of how human intelligence arose is the only scientific way of doing it ... Materialism needs to start fading away and non-materialist causation needs to be understood as part of natural reality."

His enthusiasm was met with much applause from the audience gathered at the UN's east Manhattan conference hall on 11 September for an international symposium called Beyond the Mind-Body Problem: New Paradigms in the Science of Consciousness.

Earlier Mario Beauregard, ... co-author of The Spiritual Brain: A neuroscientist's case for the existence of the soul, told the audience that the "battle" between "maverick" scientists like himself and those who "believe the mind is what the  brain does" is a "cultural war."

http://snipurl.com/4lxoj
I'm seriously beginning to think that there is not a single science that these guys will accept. They won't be happy until all of modern science is dead.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 27, 2008, 04:03:55 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:44:44 AM
Molecules That Matter
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

"Molecules That Matter," a traveling exhibit that opened to the public at the newly renovated Chemical Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia earlier this month, ties the history of the 20th century to a handful of the most influential molecules of the period.

The goal of the exhibit is simple: to help the public, who typically cringes at memories from high school chemistry classes, to connect chemical discoveries to the products they use everyday.

And connect it does. Brightly colored models of penicillin G, DDT, and Prozac molecules ... hover above visitors from the exhibit ceiling. Contemporary art and artifacts—including marble sculptures of genetically-modified rats and a 1960 magazine cover addressing the controversy surrounding "the pill"—mingle in the museum. A display case of consumer products born out of the 20th century chemical discoveries, like Tupperware and pantyhose, allows visitors to follow a timeline of chemistry's rise to popular prominence.

http://snipurl.com/4j9co
:fap: I really hope this makes its way to somewhere in the Midwest because I would love to see it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 27, 2008, 04:07:30 PM
Quote from: Eve on October 27, 2008, 01:40:54 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:49:22 AM
A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4



:x

You haven't heard of traumatic insemination yet, have you?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traumatic_insemination

Read, read the references, enjoy.  :evil:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 27, 2008, 04:10:40 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 27, 2008, 03:55:28 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:31:41 AM

Flying Syringes and Other Bold Ideas
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

BANGKOK, Oct. 22—The charitable foundation founded by Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates has awarded 104 grants, each for $100,000, in a bid to inject entrepreneurial boldness and risk-taking into the often staid world of medical research.

Announced in Bangkok, the grants are the first stage of a $100 million, five-year project the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation hopes will encourage research into innovative medical ideas that it feels now have little chance of development, largely because of how funding is distributed.

In making its picks, the foundation has rejected the widespread practice of peer review—assigning other specialists in a field to evaluate research—because, in the words of Tadataka Yamada, the foundation's director of global health, "peer review—by definition almost—excludes innovation because innovation has no peers."


http://snipurl.com/4n37g

:facepalm: 

I hope they are prepared to deal with all the woo-woo that is going to be thrown their way.

I know, I read that and thought WTF FFS.  :roll: Peer review is the reason our scientific journals are not full of bullshit.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Eve on October 27, 2008, 04:43:08 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 04:07:30 PM
Quote from: Eve on October 27, 2008, 01:40:54 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:49:22 AM
A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4



:x

You haven't heard of traumatic insemination yet, have you?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traumatic_insemination

Read, read the references, enjoy.  :evil:

:weary: Should not have read that right before making lunch.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on October 27, 2008, 05:18:14 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 04:07:30 PM
Quote from: Eve on October 27, 2008, 01:40:54 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:49:22 AM
A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4



:x

You haven't heard of traumatic insemination yet, have you?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traumatic_insemination

Read, read the references, enjoy.  :evil:
It's not any worse than rape flight in mallards. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallard)
"When they pair off with mating partners, often one or several drakes will end up "left out". This group will sometimes target an isolated female duck — chasing, pestering and pecking at her until she weakens (a phenomenon referred to by researchers as rape flight), at which point each male will take turns copulating with the female. Male Mallards will also occasionally chase other males in the same way. (In one documented case, a male Mallard copulated with another male he was chasing after it had been killed when it flew into a glass window.)"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on October 27, 2008, 05:21:40 PM
This is great material for when you get all those "nature is the perfect template for human behavior" hippies and wiccans.

"So, I can gang rape you?  Hey, mallards do it..."
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 27, 2008, 09:35:10 PM
Quote from: Vene on October 27, 2008, 05:18:14 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 04:07:30 PM
Quote from: Eve on October 27, 2008, 01:40:54 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:49:22 AM
A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4



:x

You haven't heard of traumatic insemination yet, have you?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traumatic_insemination

Read, read the references, enjoy.  :evil:
It's not any worse than rape flight in mallards. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallard)
"When they pair off with mating partners, often one or several drakes will end up "left out". This group will sometimes target an isolated female duck — chasing, pestering and pecking at her until she weakens (a phenomenon referred to by researchers as rape flight), at which point each male will take turns copulating with the female. Male Mallards will also occasionally chase other males in the same way. (In one documented case, a male Mallard copulated with another male he was chasing after it had been killed when it flew into a glass window.)"

No, see, thats similar to gang rape. Traumatic insemination is similar to someone jamming a knife into the abdomen of a female bodied person, cutting into their uterus, and then penetrating in with your penis.

Bedbugs are insect gore.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on October 27, 2008, 10:23:44 PM
Good point Kai.  I just like pointing out fucked up shit in nature.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on October 28, 2008, 03:47:50 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 09:35:10 PM
Quote from: Vene on October 27, 2008, 05:18:14 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 04:07:30 PM
Quote from: Eve on October 27, 2008, 01:40:54 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 27, 2008, 11:49:22 AM
A Taste for Blood
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With his soft voice and friar's manner, Louis Sorkin hardly seems the type to flout the sensible advice of a nursery rhyme. Yet on a recent afternoon at the American Museum of Natural History, Mr. Sorkin, a renowned entomologist, did precisely, luridly that.

He took a glass jar swarming with thousands of hungry specimens of Cimex lectularius, better known as bedbugs. The small, roachy-looking bloodsuckers have been spreading through the nation's homes and hotels at such a hyperventilated pace that by next year they are expected to displace cockroaches and termites as America's leading domestic pest insect. To better understand their habits, Mr. Sorkin has cultivated a personal bedbug colony—very personal.

... Mr. Sorkin and his bedbugs are featured in the newly published "Dark Banquet," a jaunty, instructive and charmingly graphic look at nature's born phlebotomists—creatures from wildly different twigs of the phylogenetic tree that all happen to share a fondness for blood.

http://snipurl.com/4kar4



:x

You haven't heard of traumatic insemination yet, have you?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traumatic_insemination

Read, read the references, enjoy.  :evil:
It's not any worse than rape flight in mallards. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mallard)
"When they pair off with mating partners, often one or several drakes will end up "left out". This group will sometimes target an isolated female duck — chasing, pestering and pecking at her until she weakens (a phenomenon referred to by researchers as rape flight), at which point each male will take turns copulating with the female. Male Mallards will also occasionally chase other males in the same way. (In one documented case, a male Mallard copulated with another male he was chasing after it had been killed when it flew into a glass window.)"

No, see, thats similar to gang rape. Traumatic insemination is similar to someone jamming a knife into the abdomen of a female bodied person, cutting into their uterus, and then penetrating in with your penis.

Bedbugs are insect gore.

:lmnuendo:


I think I just came up with another HP slashfic story...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 28, 2008, 03:49:46 PM
 :x :x :x :x :x :x :x :x :x :lulz: :argh!:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 29, 2008, 01:52:43 AM
October 27, 2008

Half of Doctors Routinely Prescribe Placebos
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Half of all American doctors responding to a nationwide survey say they regularly prescribe placebos to patients. The results trouble medical ethicists, who say more research is needed to determine whether doctors must deceive patients in order for placebos to work.

The study involved 679 internists and rheumatologists chosen randomly from a national list of such doctors. In response to three questions included as part of the larger survey, about half reported recommending placebos regularly. Surveys in Denmark, Israel, Britain, Sweden and New Zealand have found similar results.

The most common placebos the American doctors reported using were headache pills and vitamins, but a significant number also reported prescribing antibiotics and sedatives.

http://snipurl.com/4poxu


Supersonic Car Targets 1,000 mph
from BBC News Online

The British team that claimed the land speed record in 1997, taking a car through the sound barrier for the first time, is planning to go even faster. RAF pilot Andy Green made history in 1997 when he drove the Thrust SSC jet-powered vehicle at 763mph (1,228km/h).

Now he intends to get behind the wheel of a car that is capable of reaching 1,000mph (1,610km/h). Known as Bloodhound, the new car will be powered by a rocket bolted to a Eurofighter-Typhoon jet engine.

The team-members have been working on the concept for the past 18 months and expect to be ready to make their new record attempt in 2011.

http://snipurl.com/4n4hv


Watching Yellowstone's Wolves
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

... Yellowstone rangers say this is the best place on Earth to watch wolves in the wild. But 13 years after being reintroduced to Yellowstone, they remain polarizing animals, generating endless controversy and furious litigation.

On Friday, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service took steps to revive a 2007 proposal to remove the gray wolf of the northern Rockies from the Endangered Species List. Environmentalists howled, calling it a last-gasp effort by the Bush administration to delist wolves.

The Fish and Wildlife Service had officially delisted the wolves in March, and afterward wildlife officials in Wyoming, Idaho and Montana developed management plans that included hunting seasons. In Wyoming, anyone could shoot a wolf at any time in most of the state.

http://snipurl.com/4pqiu


Congress Questions FDA Objectivity on BPA
from USA Today

Congress is stepping in to ask questions about chemical industry influence in drafting a Food and Drug Administration report about the safety of a controversial chemical in baby bottles.

In August, the FDA declared the chemical, bisphenol A, or BPA, safe, a determination greeted skeptically by consumer groups who argue that hundreds of scientific studies suggest it may cause serious harm.

According to a letter to the FDA from Reps. John Dingell and Bart Stupak sent last week, the FDA hired a private consulting group with strong industry ties to perform some of its analyses of BPA.

http://snipurl.com/4pqmi


Two Greenhouse Gases on the Rise Worry Scientists
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—Carbon dioxide isn't the only greenhouse gas that worries climate scientists. Airborne levels of two other potent gases—one from ancient plants, the other from flat-panel screen technology—are on the rise, too. And that's got scientists concerned about accelerated global warming.

The gases are methane and nitrogen trifluoride. Both pale in comparison to the global warming effects of carbon dioxide, produced by the burning of coal, oil and other fossil fuels. In the past couple of years, however, these other two gases have been on the rise, according to two new studies. The increase is not accounted for in predictions for future global warming and comes as a nasty surprise to climate watchers.

Methane is by far the bigger worry. It is considered the No. 2 greenhouse gas based on the amount of warming it causes and the amount in the atmosphere. The total effect of methane on global warming is about one-third that of man-made carbon dioxide.

http://snipurl.com/4qqrg 


The Barnyard Strategist
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... Proposition 2 [in California], co-sponsored by the Humane Society and Farm Sanctuary, the biggest farm-animal-rights group in the United States, focuses on what are considered the worst animal-confinement systems in factory farms.

The ballot initiative, which [California] voters will decide on Nov. 4, requires that by 2015 farm animals be able to stand up, lie down, turn around and fully extend their limbs. In effect that translates into a ban on the two-foot-wide crates that tightly confine pregnant pigs and calves raised for veal—a space so small that they can't turn around.

... Peter Singer, a professor of bioethics at Princeton University and a leading figure in the animal rights movement, compares Proposition 2 to Barack Obama's presidential campaign, calling Proposition 2 the "other historic ballot this November." If it passes, it would affect more animals—almost 20 million—than any ballot measure has in U.S. history.

http://snipurl.com/4pp2e


Vaccine Reduces Diarrheal Illness in Infants
from the Dallas Morning News (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—A vaccine against rotavirus, the leading cause of diarrhea in infants, has led to a dramatic drop in hospitalization and emergency room visits since it came on the market two years ago, doctors reported Saturday.

A bonus: the vaccine seems to be preventing illness even in unvaccinated children by cutting the number of infections in the community that kids can pick up and spread. ... Results were reported Saturday at an infectious diseases conference in Washington.

Before the vaccine, more than 200,000 U.S. children were taken to emergency rooms and more than 55,000 were hospitalized each year with rotavirus, which causes vomiting and diarrhea, mostly from January through May. Worldwide, the virus kills 1,600 young children each day.

http://snipurl.com/4pr4b


New Moon Rover Mixes Old-School Smarts With Latest Tech
from National Geographic News

With six-wheel drive, active suspension, and computerized navigation, a new battery-powered truck being field tested this week in Arizona sounds like the next generation of sport-utility vehicles.

But when the final model rolls out in 2019, only an exclusive group of highly trained professionals will get to drive it—the next astronauts to land on the moon.

The new lunar rover, informally known as the Chariot, is a prototype being developed as part of NASA's Constellation program, which aims to put people back on the moon by 2020. The current version combines 35 years of technological advances with lessons learned from the original "moon buggies" used during the Apollo missions of the 1970s.

http://snipurl.com/4prc4


Never Say Die: Why We Can't Imagine Death
from Scientific American

... After all, the brain is like any other organ: a part of our physical body. And the mind is what the brain does—it's more a verb than it is a noun. Why do we wonder where our mind goes when the body is dead? Shouldn't it be obvious that the mind is dead, too?

And yet people in every culture believe in an afterlife of some kind or, at the very least, are unsure about what happens to the mind at death.

... The common view of death as a great mystery usually is brushed aside as an emotionally fueled desire to believe that death isn't the end of the road. And indeed, a prominent school of research in social psychology called terror management theory contends that afterlife beliefs, as well as less obvious beliefs, behaviors and attitudes, exist to assuage what would otherwise be crippling anxiety about the ego's inexistence.

http://snipurl.com/4prhn


The Evidence Gap: Quickly Vetted, Treatment Is Offered to Patients
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

After a surgeon removed a cancerous lump from Karen Medlock's breast in November, he recommended radiation, a routine next step meant to keep cancer from recurring. But he did not send her for the kind of radiation most women have received for decades.

Instead, the surgeon referred her to a center in Oakland, Calif., specializing in a newer form of treatment where radioactive "seeds" are inserted in the tumor site. It could be completed in only five days instead of the six weeks typically required for conventional treatment, which irradiates the entire breast using external beams.

To Ms. Medlock, it seemed an obvious choice. The newer treatment—given through a system called MammoSite—has been performed on about 45,000 breast cancer patients in this country since the Food and Drug Administration cleared it for use in 2002. Only when Ms. Medlock, 49, sought a second opinion did she learn a startling truth: MammoSite is still highly experimental.

http://snipurl.com/4qqiu

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 29, 2008, 01:56:10 AM
October 28, 2008

Seven of the Greatest Scientific Hoaxes
from New Scientist

For this week's issue, New Scientist includes a review of "The Sun and the Moon" by Matthew Goodman, which tells the story of the great moon hoax of 1835.

That got an editor there thinking about other great scientific hoaxes in the past. After doing a bit of digging, she was amazed by how many there were—and at the variety and creativity of the hoaxes. The result is a review of seven of the best.

Of course, there are serious cases of scientific fraud, such as the stem cell researchers recently found guilty of falsifying data and the South Korean cloning fraud. The stories included here, however, are not so serious.

http://snipurl.com/4r4qw


Quantum Chaos
from Scientific American

In 1917 Albert Einstein wrote a paper that was completely ignored for 40 years. In it he raised a question that physicists have only recently begun asking themselves: What would classical chaos, which lurks everywhere in our world, do to quantum mechanics, the theory describing the atomic and subatomic worlds?

The effects of classical chaos, of course, have long been observed—Kepler knew about the motion of the moon around the earth and Newton complained bitterly about the phenomenon. At the end of the 19th century the American astronomer William Hill demonstrated that the irregularity is the result entirely of the gravitational pull of the sun.

So thereafter, the great French mathematician-astronomer-physicist Henri Poincaré surmised that the moon's motion is only mild case of a congenital disease affecting nearly everything. In the long run, Poincaré realized, most dynamic systems show no discernible regularity or repetitive pattern. The behavior of even a simple system can depend so sensitively on its initial conditions that the final outcome is uncertain.

http://snipurl.com/4r4iq


Nearby Star System Looks a Little Like Home
from Science News

In the annals of planethood, astronomers consider the star Epsilon Eridani a member of the fabulous four. Along with Fomalhaut, Beta Pictoris and Vega, Epsilon Eridani is one of the first four stars scientists have found that has an icy ring of debris, an indication that the star has begun the process of forming planets.

Epsilon Eridani just got more fabulous: Researchers have discovered that the star, only 10.5 light-years from the sun, sports two inner asteroid belts in addition to the icy ring on the outskirts of the Epsilon Eridani system.

In both location and mass, Epsilon Eridani's innermost asteroid belt is a virtual twin of the solar system's asteroid belt. The second asteroid belt is farther out and about 20 times more massive than the solar system's belt. This belt circles Epsilon Eridani at a distance roughly that at which Uranus orbits the sun.

http://snipurl.com/4r445


Baby Dinosaur Had Full-Grown Bite
from New Scientist

A rare baby dinosaur skull—only the size of a rat's head—confirms Heterodontosaurus as one of the most unusual of all dinosaurs.

The 45-millimetre skull has features characteristic of a juvenile—large "puppy dog" eye sockets, and a snub nose—but it also sports the meat-tearing canine teeth normally associated with adults. The fossil was newly identified after being examined in a South African museum.

Intriguingly, while it has canines at the front of the mouth, it also has molars behind—a pattern more often seen in mammals.

http://snipurl.com/4prl2


Trail of Odd Anthrax Cells Led FBI to Army Scientist
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

In late October 2001, lab technician Terry Abshire placed a tray of anthrax cells under a microscope and spotted something so peculiar she had to look twice. It was two weeks after the country's worst bioterrorism attack, and Abshire, like others at the Army's Fort Detrick biodefense lab, was caught up in a frenzied search for clues that could help lead to the culprit. Down the hall, Bruce E. Ivins, the respected vaccine specialist, was looking, too.

Abshire focused her lens on a moldlike clump. Anthrax bacteria were growing here, but some of the cells were odd: strange shapes, strange textures, strange colors. These were mutants, or "morphs," genetic deviants scattered among the ordinary anthrax cells like chocolate chips in a cookie batter.

Unknowingly, Abshire had discovered a key to solving the anthrax case. But it would take nearly six years to develop the technology to allow FBI investigators to use it. Ultimately the evolving science led investigators to Ivins and a strikingly original collection of anthrax spores that became the focus of the FBI's probe.

http://snipurl.com/4qqkx 


'New Prostate' Grown Inside Mouse
from BBC News Online

Scientists have grown new prostate glands in mice, in another advance for stem cell technology. The team from San Francisco were able to isolate single cells with the ability to generate an entire prostate.

The technique, reported in the journal Nature, could shed light on how prostate tumours develop. However, any thoughts it could lead to transplants in men who have had the gland removed to beat cancer have been played down.

... The US researchers were able to track down a type of stem cell which divides to form the different cell types in the gland. When these mouse stem cells were transplanted back into mice, they developed into entirely new glands.

http://snipurl.com/4pqrg


Salt and High Blood Pressure: New Concerns Raised
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Ah, salt. It gives personality to chips, balance to bread and flavor to scrambled eggs, guacamole, tomato sauce and just about everything else that comes in a can, jar or squeeze bottle. Salt is such a mealtime staple it can be hard to imagine life without a shaker on the table.

But as far back as the 1960s, physicians linked salt to high blood pressure, a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke. Today, more than 65 million Americans have hypertension—repeatedly high blood pressure—according to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, and 59 million more have pre-hypertension, a level higher than normal that can also lead to health problems.

... To help people do what they can't seem to do on their own, in the last few years a consumer advocacy group and several medical organizations and health experts have been pushing for legislation that would regulate sodium content in the foods we buy.

http://snipurl.com/4qw8o


Science Projects for the Real World
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

It's great to see young scientists and engineers setting their minds on assistive technologies. Rather than building war-fighting exoskeletons and ray guns, students at two Massachusetts schools are designing prototypes to help people navigate around their workplaces and neighborhoods.

Science students at Bromfield School in Harvard are crafting a "cane" that will alert its carrier to obstacles and drops more than 20 feet away. The cane might not be a cane at all, once it's completed. Sunglasses or a belt buckle embedded with lasers and other sensors are also possible.

The device will talk in one of two ways: either via a changing Braille interface, or with a computerized voice. It might be able to break in on your iTunes listening, to warn you that a subway staircase is ahead, for instance.

http://snipurl.com/4r51a


Ice Sheet Secrets Set to Be Seen
from BBC News Online

The secrets of the largest ice sheet on earth are to be revealed under plans to map the Antarctic landscape in detail for the first time.

A team including Edinburgh scientists is to travel across East Antarctica in a four-year project to explore the land hidden beneath the ice-covered region.

Radar instruments will be used to penetrate the ice, which is several kilometres thick. They hope to examine the composition and density of the underlying rock. The area covers an area that is half the size of the United States.

http://snipurl.com/4r555   


Thoreau Is Rediscovered as a Climatologist
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

CONCORD, Mass.—Henry David Thoreau endorsed civil disobedience, opposed slavery and lived for two years in a hut in the woods here, an experience he described in "Walden." Now he turns out to have another line in his résumé: climate researcher.

He did not realize it, of course. Thoreau died in 1862, when the industrial revolution was just beginning to pump climate-changing greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. In 1851, when he started recording when and where plants flowered in Concord, he was making notes for a book on the seasons.

Now, though, researchers at Boston University and Harvard are using those notes to discern patterns of plant abundance and decline in Concord—and by extension, New England—and to link those patterns to changing climate.

http://snipurl.com/4rw50

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 29, 2008, 04:03:45 AM
Quote from: Kai on October 29, 2008, 01:52:43 AM
October 27, 2008

Half of Doctors Routinely Prescribe Placebos
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Half of all American doctors responding to a nationwide survey say they regularly prescribe placebos to patients. The results trouble medical ethicists, who say more research is needed to determine whether doctors must deceive patients in order for placebos to work.

The study involved 679 internists and rheumatologists chosen randomly from a national list of such doctors. In response to three questions included as part of the larger survey, about half reported recommending placebos regularly. Surveys in Denmark, Israel, Britain, Sweden and New Zealand have found similar results.

The most common placebos the American doctors reported using were headache pills and vitamins, but a significant number also reported prescribing antibiotics and sedatives.

http://snipurl.com/4poxu
:lulz: I love Placebo studies.  It shows that the mind is better at healing diseases than many medicines are.

Quote
Never Say Die: Why We Can't Imagine Death
from Scientific American

... After all, the brain is like any other organ: a part of our physical body. And the mind is what the brain does—it's more a verb than it is a noun. Why do we wonder where our mind goes when the body is dead? Shouldn't it be obvious that the mind is dead, too?

And yet people in every culture believe in an afterlife of some kind or, at the very least, are unsure about what happens to the mind at death.

... The common view of death as a great mystery usually is brushed aside as an emotionally fueled desire to believe that death isn't the end of the road. And indeed, a prominent school of research in social psychology called terror management theory contends that afterlife beliefs, as well as less obvious beliefs, behaviors and attitudes, exist to assuage what would otherwise be crippling anxiety about the ego's inexistence.

http://snipurl.com/4prhn
I can't remember if Dennett mentioned terror management theory in "Breaking the Spell" but he did talk about the idea that man is unable to cope with the fact that at some point our mind/soul/personality will cease to exist.  Many religions have been built up around this fear.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 29, 2008, 04:06:59 AM
Quote from: Kai on October 29, 2008, 01:56:10 AM
October 28, 2008

Seven of the Greatest Scientific Hoaxes
from New Scientist

For this week's issue, New Scientist includes a review of "The Sun and the Moon" by Matthew Goodman, which tells the story of the great moon hoax of 1835.

That got an editor there thinking about other great scientific hoaxes in the past. After doing a bit of digging, she was amazed by how many there were—and at the variety and creativity of the hoaxes. The result is a review of seven of the best.

Of course, there are serious cases of scientific fraud, such as the stem cell researchers recently found guilty of falsifying data and the South Korean cloning fraud. The stories included here, however, are not so serious.

http://snipurl.com/4r4qw

This prooves that all science is fake!!1!
  \
:mullet:

Also, Sokal = Discordian Saint.
QuoteQuantum Chaos
from Scientific American

In 1917 Albert Einstein wrote a paper that was completely ignored for 40 years. In it he raised a question that physicists have only recently begun asking themselves: What would classical chaos, which lurks everywhere in our world, do to quantum mechanics, the theory describing the atomic and subatomic worlds?

The effects of classical chaos, of course, have long been observed—Kepler knew about the motion of the moon around the earth and Newton complained bitterly about the phenomenon. At the end of the 19th century the American astronomer William Hill demonstrated that the irregularity is the result entirely of the gravitational pull of the sun.

So thereafter, the great French mathematician-astronomer-physicist Henri Poincaré surmised that the moon's motion is only mild case of a congenital disease affecting nearly everything. In the long run, Poincaré realized, most dynamic systems show no discernible regularity or repetitive pattern. The behavior of even a simple system can depend so sensitively on its initial conditions that the final outcome is uncertain.

http://snipurl.com/4r4iq
Awesome.  I still need to do more reading on Chaos Theory.  I have a bunch of e-books on it but I never have enough time.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 31, 2008, 04:01:18 AM
October 29, 2008

Copper Ruins in Jordan Bolster Biblical Record of King Solomon
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A massive copper smelting plant in the biblical land of Edom is at least three centuries older than researchers previously believed, placing it firmly in the traditional timeline of King Solomon, considered the greatest ruler of Israel, researchers reported Monday.

The existence of Solomon 3,000 years ago has been questioned by some scholars over the last two decades because of the paucity of archaeological evidence supporting the biblical record and the belief that there were no complex societies in Israel or Edom capable of building fortresses, monuments and other sophisticated public works, such as large mines, in the 10th century BC.

"This is the most hotly debated period in biblical archaeology today," said archaeologist Thomas E. Levy of UC San Diego, who reported the new radiocarbon dates for the copper smelting operation in modern-day Jordan in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipurl.com/4s2jh


The Mysterious Cough, Caught on Film
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In Roald Dahl's novel "The B.F.G.," the title character, a big friendly giant, captures dreams in glass jars. At Pennsylvania State University, a professor of engineering has captured something less whimsical but no less ephemeral—a cough—on film.

The image, published online Oct. 9 by The New England Journal of Medicine, was created by schlieren photography, which "takes an invisible phenomenon and turns it into a visible picture," said the engineering professor, Gary Settles, who is the director of the university's gas dynamics laboratory.

Schlieren is German for "streaks"; in this case it refers to regions of different densities in a gas or a liquid, which can be photographed as shadows using a special technique.

http://snipurl.com/4s60g


Staph Germs Harder Than Ever to Treat, Studies Say
from USA Today

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—Drug-resistant staph bacteria picked up in ordinary community settings are increasingly acquiring "superbug" powers and causing far more serious illnesses than they have in the past, doctors reported Monday. These widespread germs used to be easier to treat than the dangerous forms of staph found in hospitals and nursing homes.

"Until recently we rarely thought of it as a problem among healthy people in the community," said Dr. Rachel Gorwitz of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Now, the germs causing outbreaks in schools, on sports teams and in other social situations are posing a growing threat.

A CDC study found that at least 10% of cases involving the most common community strain were able to evade the antibiotics typically used to treat them.

http://snipurl.com/4s69a


Does Nature Break the Second Law of Thermodynamics?
from Scientific American

Science has given humanity more than its share of letdowns. It has set limits to our technology, such as the impossibility of reaching the speed of light; failed to overcome our vulnerabilities to cancer and other diseases; and confronted us with inconvenient truths, as with global climate change.

But of all the comedowns, the second law of thermodynamics might well be the biggest. It says we live in a universe that is becoming ever more disordered and that there is nothing we can do about it. The mere act of living contributes to the inexorable degeneration of the world.

No matter how advanced our machines become, they can never completely avoid wasting some energy and running down. Not only does the second law squash the dream of a perpetual-motion machine, it suggests that the cosmos will eventually exhaust its available energy and nod off into an eternal stasis known as heat death.

http://snipurl.com/4s6iq 


Solar Thermal Power May Make Sun-Powered Grid a Reality
from Popular Mechanics

Planted in the New Mexico desert near Albuquerque, the six solar dish engines of the Solar Thermal Test Facility at Sandia National Laboratories look a bit like giant, highly reflective satellite dishes. Each one is a mosaic of 82 mirrors that fit together to form a 38-ft-wide parabola. The mirrors' precise curvature focuses light onto a 7-in. area.

At its most intense spot, the heat is equivalent to a blistering 13,000 suns, producing a flux 13 times greater than the space shuttle experiences during re-entry. "That'll melt almost anything known to man," says Sandia engineer Chuck Andraka. "It's incredibly hot."

The heat is used to run a Stirling engine, an elegant 192-year-old technology that creates mechanical energy from an external heat source, as opposed to the internal fuel combustion that powers most auto­mobile engines. ... The configuration of the dish and engine represent the fruit of more than a decade of steady improvements, developed in collaboration with Arizona-based Stirling Energy Systems.

http://snipurl.com/4s6mz


Arctic Ice Thickness 'Plummets'
from BBC News Online

The thickness of Arctic sea ice "plummeted" last winter, thinning by as much as 49 centimetres (1.6ft) in some regions, satellite data has revealed.

A study by UK researchers showed that the ice thickness had been fairly constant for the previous five winters. The team from University College London added that the results provided the first definitive proof that the overall volume of Arctic ice was decreasing.

The findings have been published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters. "The ice thickness was fairly constant for the five winters before this, but it plummeted in the winter after the 2007 minimum," lead author Katharine Giles told BBC News.

http://snipurl.com/4s6u3


Vitamin E, Selenium Don't Prevent Prostate Cancer
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—The government is stopping part of a major study of whether vitamin E and selenium prevent prostate cancer—because the supplements aren't working and there's a hint of risk. More than 35,000 men age 50 and older have been taking one or both supplements or dummy pills as part of a study called the SELECT trial.

But the National Cancer Institute announced Monday that they will be getting letters in the next few days telling them to quit the pills. An early review of the data shows neither supplement, taken alone or together, is preventing prostate cancer.

Of more concern, slightly more users of vitamin E alone were getting prostate cancer—and slightly more selenium-only users were getting diabetes, the NCI said.

http://snipurl.com/4s75a 


Electricity Found on Saturn Moon—Could It Spark Life?
from National Geographic News

Recently identified electrical activity on Saturn's largest moon bolsters arguments that Titan is the kind of place that could harbor life. At a brisk -350 degrees Fahrenheit (-180 Celsius), Titan is currently much too cold to host anything close to life as we know it, scientists say.

But a new study reports faint signs of a natural electric field in Titan's thick cloud cover that are similar to the energy radiated by lightning on Earth. Lightning is thought to have sparked the chemical reactions that led to the origin of life on our planet.

"As of now, lightning activity has not been observed in Titan's atmosphere," said lead author Juan Antonio Morente of the University of Granada in Spain. But, he said, the signals that have been detected "are an irrefutable proof for the existence of electric activity."

http://snipurl.com/4s97d


Diabetes Drug Costs Are Soaring
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

CHICAGO (Associated Press)—Americans with diabetes nearly doubled their spending on drugs for the disease in just six years, with the bill last year climbing to an eye-popping $12.5 billion.

Newer, costlier drugs are driving the increase, said researchers, despite a lack of strong evidence for the new drugs' greater benefits and safety. And there are more people being treated for diabetes. The new study follows updated treatment advice for Type 2 diabetes, issued last week. In those recommendations, an expert panel told doctors to use older, cheaper drugs first.

And a second study, also out yesterday, adds to evidence that metformin—an inexpensive generic used reliably for decades—may prevent deaths from heart disease while the newer, more expensive Avandia didn't show that benefit.

http://snipurl.com/4s8o0


Surveillance Technology: If Looks Could Kill
from the Economist

Monitoring surveillance cameras is tedious work. Even if you are concentrating, identifying suspicious behaviour is hard. Suppose a nondescript man descends to a subway platform several times over the course of a few days without getting on a train. Is that suspicious? Possibly.

Is the average security guard going to notice? Probably not. A good example, then—if a fictional one—of why many people would like to develop intelligent computerised surveillance systems.

The perceived need for such systems is stimulating the development of devices that can both recognise people and objects and also detect suspicious behaviour. Much of this technology remains, for the moment, in laboratories. But Charles Cohen, the boss of Cybernet Systems, a firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, ... says behaviour-recognition systems are getting good, and are already deployed at some security checkpoints.

http://snipurl.com/4s9at

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 31, 2008, 04:05:14 AM
October 30, 2008

BPA Ruling Flawed, Panel Says
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Food and Drug Administration ignored scientific evidence and used flawed methods when it determined that a chemical widely used in baby bottles and in the lining of cans is not harmful, a scientific advisory panel has found.

In a highly critical report to be released yesterday, the panel of scientists from government and academia said the FDA did not take into consideration scores of studies that have linked bisphenol A (BPA) to prostate cancer, diabetes and other health problems in animals when it completed a draft risk assessment of the chemical last month.

The panel said the FDA didn't use enough infant formula samples and didn't adequately account for variations among the samples. Taking those studies into consideration, the panel concluded, the FDA's margin of safety is "inadequate."

http://snipurl.com/4tmy0


New Minerals Point to Wetter Mars
from BBC News Online

A Nasa space probe has discovered a new category of minerals spread across large regions of Mars. The find suggests liquid water remained on Mars' surface a billion years later than scientists had previously thought.

The US Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) spacecraft found evidence of hydrated silica, better known as opal.

The discovery adds to the growing body of evidence that water played a crucial role in shaping the Martian landscape and—possibly—in sustaining life. Hydrated, or water-containing, minerals are telltale signs of when and where water was present on ancient Mars.

http://snipurl.com/4tn2q 


Older Donated Blood Is Linked to Infection Risk
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Hospitalized patients who received blood that had been stored for more than four weeks were nearly three times as likely to develop infections as those who received fresher blood, researchers said Tuesday.

The blood itself was not infected, but the stored blood's release of chemical agents called cytokines may have affected the recipients' immune systems, rendering them more susceptible to infections, said Dr. Raquel Nahra of Sparks Regional Medical Center in Fort Smith, Ark.

The patients typically suffered an increase in urinary-tract infections, pneumonia and infections associated with intravenous lines, but those who were infected were no more likely to die, Nahra told a Philadelphia meeting of the American College of Chest Physicians.

http://snipurl.com/4tmd9


Monitor Shifts from Print to Web-Based Strategy
from the Christian Science Monitor

The Christian Science Monitor plans major changes in April 2009 that are expected to make it the first newspaper with a national audience to shift from a daily print format to an online publication that is updated continuously each day.

The changes at the Monitor will include enhancing the content on CSMonitor.com, starting weekly print and daily e-mail editions, and discontinuing the current daily print format.

... While the Monitor's print circulation, which is primarily delivered by US mail, has trended downward for nearly 40 years, "looking forward, the Monitor's Web readership clearly shows promise," said Judy Wolff, chairman of the Board of Trustees of The Christian Science Publishing Society.

http://snipurl.com/4sc4m 


Danger Lurking in Your Bottle of Red
from the Times (London)

Wines from 13 different countries contain potentially hazardous levels of metals, according to a chemical analysis by British scientists.

The findings suggest that the health benefits of drinking red wine may often be counter-balanced by risks posed by excessive levels of metals such as copper, manganese and vanadium, researchers at Kingston University said.

Wines whould also be labelled with their ion metal content, and manufacturers need to introduce new methods to remove the potentially hazardous material from their products, they said. Metal ions are charged atoms, which play an important role in body biochemistry but which can also be hazardous in excess amounts.

http://snipurl.com/4u9em


Is Setting Clock Back Good for Your Ticker?
from the Seattle Times

Turning your clock back one hour Sunday for the end of daylight-saving time could do your own ticker some good.

Researchers have found a 5 percent drop in heart-attack deaths and hospitalizations the day after clocks are reset each year to standard time, according to a study in the new issue of The New England Journal of Medicine.

The Swedish researchers also found that the onset of daylight-saving time in the spring appears to increase the risk of heart attacks. ... The risk also rises on holidays and anniversaries, although no one knows why ...

http://snipurl.com/4u9gv


Tiny Mercury Had Huge Volcanic Eruptions
from National Geographic News

Our solar system's smallest planet has seen an enormous amount of volcanic activity, according to scientists studying information from the latest Mercury flyby.

Images returned earlier this month from NASA's MESSENGER (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging) spacecraft reveal about 3,600 cubic miles (15,000 cubic kilometers) of solidified lava inside a single crater on Mercury's western hemisphere.

That's enough lava to fill the entire Baltimore-Washington metropolitan area to a height 12 times that of the Washington Monument, according to Maria Zuber of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who is a co-investigator for the mission.

http://snipurl.com/4u9j4


Farm Chemicals Can Indirectly Hammer Frogs
from Science News

Atrazine, the second-most widely used agricultural pesticide in America, can pose a toxic double whammy to tadpoles.

The weed killer not only increases the likelihood that massive concentrations of flatworms will thrive in the amphibians' ponds, a new study reports, but also diminishes the ability of larval frogs to fight infection with these parasites.

Moreover, the new data show, runoff of phosphate fertilizer into pond water can amplify atrazine's toxicity. The fertilizer does this by boosting the production of algae on which snails feed. Those snails serve as a primary, if temporary, host for the parasitic flatworms, which can sicken frogs.

http://snipurl.com/4u9l0


Smart Amoebas Reveal Origins of Primitive Intelligence
from New Scientist

Amoebas are smarter than they look, and a team of US physicists think they know why. The group has built a simple electronic circuit that is capable of the same "intelligent" behaviour as Physarum, a unicellular organism—and say this could help us understand the origins of primitive intelligence.

In recent years, the humble amoeba has surprised researchers with its ability to behave in an "intelligent" way. Last year, Liang Li and Edward Cox at Princeton University reported that the Dictyostelium amoeba is twice as likely to turn left if its last turn was to the right and vice versa, which suggests the cells have a rudimentary memory.

... In the past, biologists have suggested that there are natural oscillators within the cells that can change their frequency in response to a changing environment. But that can't be the complete picture, say the researchers, because the amoeba's response is short-lived.

http://snipurl.com/4u9o4


Are You Evil? Profiling That Which Is Truly Wicked
from Scientific American

TROY, N.Y.—The hallowed halls of academia are not the place you would expect to find someone obsessed with evil (although some students might disagree). But it is indeed evil—or rather trying to get to the roots of evil—that fascinates Selmer Bringsjord, a logician, philosopher and chairman of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute's Department of Cognitive Science here.

He's so intrigued, in fact, that he has developed a sort of checklist for determining whether someone is demonic, and is working with a team of graduate students to create a computerized representation of a purely sinister person.

"I've been working on what is evil and how to formally define it," says Bringsjord, who is also director of the Rensselaer AI & Reasoning Lab (RAIR). "It's creepy, I know it is."

http://snipurl.com/4u9q2

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Golden Applesauce on October 31, 2008, 04:38:33 AM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on October 29, 2008, 04:03:45 AM

Quote
Never Say Die: Why We Can't Imagine Death
from Scientific American

... After all, the brain is like any other organ: a part of our physical body. And the mind is what the brain does—it's more a verb than it is a noun. Why do we wonder where our mind goes when the body is dead? Shouldn't it be obvious that the mind is dead, too?

And yet people in every culture believe in an afterlife of some kind or, at the very least, are unsure about what happens to the mind at death.

... The common view of death as a great mystery usually is brushed aside as an emotionally fueled desire to believe that death isn't the end of the road. And indeed, a prominent school of research in social psychology called terror management theory contends that afterlife beliefs, as well as less obvious beliefs, behaviors and attitudes, exist to assuage what would otherwise be crippling anxiety about the ego's inexistence.

http://snipurl.com/4prhn
I can't remember if Dennett mentioned terror management theory in "Breaking the Spell" but he did talk about the idea that man is unable to cope with the fact that at some point our mind/soul/personality will cease to exist.  Many religions have been built up around this fear.

If you'd read the article, you'd notice that it's not about fear, but about it being really hard to imagine being not conscious.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Golden Applesauce on October 31, 2008, 04:46:41 AM
QuoteBringsjord acknowledges that the endeavor to create pure evil, even in a software program, does raise ethical questions, such as, how researchers could control an artificially intelligent character like E if "he" was placed in a virtual world such as Second Life, a Web-based program that allows people to create digital representations of themselves and have those avatars interact in a number of different ways.

"I wouldn't release E or anything like it, even in purely virtual environments, without engineered safeguards," Bringsjord says. These safeguards would be a set of ethics written into the software, something akin to author Isaac Asimov's "Three Laws of Robotics" that prevent a robot from harming humans, requires a robot to obey humans, and instructs a robot to protect itself—as long as that does not violate either or both of the first two laws.

"Because I have a lot of faith in this approach," he says, "E will be controlled."

:lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz:

Ignoring for the moment that a glorified Eliza will not be able to do any real harm... this is what our AI developers need to do more of.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on November 01, 2008, 01:36:16 PM
Yeah, I was reading about this on Technoccult.  Its a pretty brilliant idea.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cramulus on November 01, 2008, 01:59:28 PM
Quote from: Dr. Gilbert Grissom on October 31, 2008, 04:01:18 AM
Diabetes Drug Costs Are Soaring
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

CHICAGO (Associated Press)—Americans with diabetes nearly doubled their spending on drugs for the disease in just six years, with the bill last year climbing to an eye-popping $12.5 billion.

this does not surprise me
fucking drug addicts
too lazy to make their own insulin
get a working pancreas, spags!  :argh!:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 03, 2008, 06:30:59 PM
November 3, 2008

Ancient Iceman Has No Modern Kin
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

The 5,000-year-old mummy Öetzi, found in a glacier in the European alps 17 years ago and believed to be an ancestor of modern Europeans, actually belonged to a different genetic family and may have no living descendants, researchers report today in Current Biology.

The researchers sequenced mitochondrial DNA extracted from Öetzi's intestines, offering the oldest complete mtDNA sequence of modern humans.

"We sort of assume when we look at populations today we see representations of [ancient populations] as well," Joanna Mountain an anthropological geneticist at Stanford University who was not involved in the study, told The Scientist. The current study, she said, "counters that thinking."

http://snipurl.com/4ut9e


Conservation: Managed to Death
from the Economist

If ever there were a graphic illustration of the tragedy of the commons, it is the plummeting of the world's stocks of bluefin tuna. Because they live in the high seas, these fish belong to everyone, and are thus no one's responsibility. The result is that the bluefin has been doomed to decades of poor management.

Matters, though, appear to be reaching a crisis. In a study to be published soon in Conservation Letters, a group of scientists led by Brian MacKenzie, of the Technical University of Denmark, describe how they ran a computer model of the species's population dynamics.

Their conclusion is that even if fishing for bluefin were banned, the population in the north-east Atlantic and Mediterranean will probably collapse. The current management plan, to reduce quotas gradually over the next 15 years, will cause it to fall so far that bluefins in the area will qualify as critically endangered, the highest category of risk in the lexicon of conservation.

http://snipurl.com/4wfrm


Science Advice for the Next President
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Nearly 180 organizations representing the interdependent arenas of science, academia and business are urging the next president to appoint a White House science adviser by Inauguration Day and give the position cabinet-level rank.

In letters sent Thursday to Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama, the organizations said scientific and technical advice was needed now more than ever given the importance of the entwined issues of energy security and climate change, mounting issues and opportunities in medicine, and problems in science education and American innovation and competitiveness.

The letters reflect broadening concern that the White House has not been sufficiently stressing science.

http://snipurl.com/4wfyh


On Mars, Phoenix Lander's End Appears to Be Near
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The death watch is on for NASA's Phoenix lander, the first spacecraft to sample water on another planet.

Buffeted by dust storms and chilled by temperatures as low as minus-141 degrees Fahrenheit from the impending arrival of the Martian winter, Phoenix is clinging to life, but barely, NASA officials said Friday.

... Days earlier, Phoenix fell silent, going into safe mode to save battery power. ... The lander, however, failed to awaken from its latest sleep Friday, alerting NASA officials to the possibility that the end could be very near.

http://snipurl.com/4wg1k


FDA Panel Accepts Findings on BPA
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Food and Drug Administration made mistakes when determining that a widely used chemical found in baby bottles and other plastics was harmless and the agency should redo its risk assessment, an FDA advisory panel ruled yesterday.

But the report's authors told the Science Board advisory panel that they could not say whether BPA was harmful or whether it should be banned in food and beverage containers. They left that to FDA Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach to decide.

How von Eschenbach will respond is unclear, especially as the Bush administration winds down. The FDA said earlier this week that it plans to do more research, which will probably take years.

http://snipurl.com/4wg5c


Archaeologists Report Finding Oldest Hebrew Text
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

JERUSALEM (Reuters)—Archaeologists in Israel said on Thursday they had unearthed the oldest Hebrew text ever found, while excavating a fortress city overlooking a valley where the Bible says David slew Goliath.

The dig's uncovering of the past near the ancient battlefield in the Valley of Elah, now home to wineries and a satellite station, could have implications for the emotional debate over the future of Jerusalem, some 20 km (12 miles) away.

Archaeologists from the Hebrew University said they found five lines of text written in black ink on a shard of pottery dug up at a five-acre (two-hectare) site called Elah Fortress, or Khirbet Qeiyafa.

http://snipurl.com/4wgjx


Obesity Blamed for Doubling Rate of Diabetes Cases
from USA Today

ATLANTA (Associated Press)—The nation's obesity epidemic is exacting a heavy toll: The rate of new diabetes cases nearly doubled in the United States in the past 10 years, the government said Thursday. The highest rates were in the South, according to the first state-by-state review of new diagnoses.

The worst was in West Virginia, where about 13 in 1,000 adults were diagnosed with the disease in 2005-07. The lowest was in Minnesota, where the rate was 5 in 1,000. Nationally, the rate of new cases climbed from about 5 per 1,000 in the mid-1990s to 9 per 1,000 in the middle of this decade.

Roughly 90% of cases are Type 2 diabetes, the form linked to obesity. The findings dovetail with trends seen in obesity and lack of exercise—two health measures where Southern states also rank at the bottom.

http://snipurl.com/4wgm9


DNA Legacy of Ancient Seafarers
from BBC News Online

Scientists have used DNA to re-trace the migrations of a sea-faring civilisation which dominated the Mediterranean thousands of years ago.

The Phoenicians were an enterprising maritime people from the territory of modern-day Lebanon. They established a trading empire throughout the Mediterranean Sea in the first millennium BC.

A new study by an international team has now revealed the genetic legacy they imparted to modern populations. The researchers estimate that as many as one in 17 men from the Mediterranean may have Phoenician ancestry.

http://snipurl.com/4wgpk


NASA Defends Rocket to Moon
from the Times (London)

Ares is meant to be the rocket that will launch a new era of lunar exploration. Instead it is in danger of crashing into its own launch tower or of shaking its astronauts to death. Nasa has strongly defended the $20 billion back-to-the-Moon programme after claims from its own engineers that its rocket design could be dangerously flawed.

One senior engineer resigned from his post, complaining of "catastrophic-level risks," while others are moonlighting on a rival design project, codenamed Jupiter, convinced that they can get man to the Moon quicker, safer and more cheaply than the apparently troubled Ares.

"Nasa has a big reality check coming and I can't begin to guess how it will all turn out," Jeff Finckenor, a structural design engineer at the Nasa Marshall Space Flight Centre in Alabama, said in a memo to colleagues explaining his departure.

http://snipurl.com/4wgt9


Melamine Problem Widespread in China
from the Seattle Times

BEIJING (Associated Press)—First it was infant formula. Then, dairy-based products from yogurt to chocolate.

Now chicken eggs have been contaminated with melamine, and an admission by state-run media that the industrial chemical is regularly added to animal feed in China fueled fears Friday that the problem could be more widespread, affecting fish, meat and who knows what else.

Peter Dingle, a toxicity expert at Murdoch University in Perth, Australia, said, however, that aside from the tainted baby formula that killed at least four Chinese infants and left 54,000 children hospitalized just over a month ago, it is unlikely humans will get sick from melamine.

http://snipurl.com/4wgx7

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 03, 2008, 06:32:27 PM
October 31, 2008

Experts Identify Fungus Suspected in Bat Die-Off
from National Public Radio

In the northeastern United States, bats have been dying by the thousands, struck down by a strange ailment called "white-nose syndrome." A mysterious, fuzzy white fungus appears on the noses and skin of afflicted hibernating bats, which then often starve to death.

Alan Hicks, a bat specialist with the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, alerted the world to white-nose syndrome in early 2007 after hearing reports of dead bats in caves near Albany.

Now, researchers have identified the mold they consider a possible cause of the disease, reporting their findings Thursday in the online edition of the journal Science. It's a fragile, unusual form of Geomyces fungi, which usually live in cold places such as Antarctica, says David Blehert, lead author of the study.

http://snipurl.com/4vgi2


Hubble Up and Running, With a Picture to Prove It
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

After an electrical malfunction caused it to go dormant a month ago, the Hubble Space Telescope is back in business.

To show that the orbiting eye still has the same chops as ever, astronomers from the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore used Hubble's wide-field planetary camera 2 to record an image of a pair of smoke-rings galaxies known as Arp 147.

The galaxies, about 450 million light-years away in the constellation Cetus, apparently collided in the recent cosmic past. According to Mario Livio, of the space telescope institute, one of the galaxies passed through the other, causing a circular wave, like a pebble tossed into a pond, that has now coalesced into a ring of new blue stars.

http://snipurl.com/4urmp


Radiation Detectors' Value Is Questioned
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Officials at the Department of Homeland Security have overstated the performance of costly new radiation detectors designed to prevent the importation of radiological materials that could be used in bombs, according to an unreleased government report.

The department's Domestic Nuclear Detection Office has claimed in a recent report that new tests show the detection machines, known as Advanced Spectroscopic Portal monitors, can more accurately detect and identify radioactive materials than existing equipment in use across the country, the Government Accountability Office said in its report.

... But auditors who have examined the test results said the office's claims cannot be backed up by statistical evidence. That's because the data collected from what is called the Phase 3 test was too limited, according to the report by the GAO, the investigative arm of Congress.

http://snipurl.com/4urys


2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami Biggest in 600 Years
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

NEW YORK (Associated Press)—The tsunami that killed 230,000 people in 2004 was the biggest in the Indian Ocean in some 600 years, two new geological studies suggest.

That long gap might explain how enough geological stress built up to power the huge undersea earthquake that launched the killer waves four years ago, researchers said.

The work appears in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature. Two research teams report that by digging pits and taking core samples in Thailand and northern Sumatra, they found evidence that the last comparably large tsunami struck between the years 1300 and 1400.

http://snipurl.com/4us3a


New NASA Capsule Orion Resembles Apollo
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Reporting from Edwards Air Force Base—NASA rolled out its next-generation space capsule here Wednesday, revealing a bulbous module that is scheduled to carry humans back to the moon in 2020 and eventually onward to Mars.

Unlike the space-plane shape of the shuttles, the new Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle looks strikingly similar to the old Apollo space capsule that carried Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins to the moon and back in 1969, with Armstrong and Aldrin becoming the first humans to walk on the lunar surface.

There is one key difference, however. The test module, unveiled at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center, is substantially bigger—16.5 feet in diameter compared with Apollo 11's 12.8 feet.

http://snipurl.com/4urrg


Stone Age Innovation Out of Africa
from Science News

Technological revolutions rocked our world long before the information age. Between 80,000 and 60,000 years ago, it was spurts of innovative toolmaking, rather than extreme climate changes, in southern Africa's Stone Age cultures that heralded a human exodus out of Africa, a new investigation suggests.

Environmental changes in southern Africa, including those brought on by a massive volcanic eruption in Sumatra around 74,000 years ago, played a secondary role at best in instigating ancient cultural advances and intercontinental migrations, say geologist Zenobia Jacobs of the University of Wollongong, Australia, and her colleagues.

Other researchers regard ancient climate fluctuations as key motivators of human movement out of Africa. Jacobs' team dated sediment at nine sites that have yielded remains of either of two key toolmaking traditions in southern Africa, known as the Still Bay and Howieson's Poort industries.

http://snipurl.com/4utea


Polar Warming 'Caused by Humans'
from BBC News Online

The rise in temperatures at Earth's poles has for the first time been attributed directly to human activities, according to a study. The work, by an international team, is published in Nature Geoscience journal.

In 2007, the UN's climate change body presented strong scientific evidence the rise in average global temperature is mostly due to human activities. ... At the time, there was not sufficient evidence to say this for sure about the Arctic and Antarctic.

Now that gap in research has been plugged, according to scientists who carried out a detailed analysis of temperature variations at both poles. Their study indicates that humans have indeed contributed to warming in both regions.

http://snipurl.com/4uscw


Sporting Champions Pass on Mental Toughness to Their Children
from the Telegraph (UK)

Sporting champions are more likely to have children who go on to succeed in their own right because mental toughness is inherited, new research suggests.

... In study published Wednesday, scientists studied 219 sets of twins to work out the influence of genetics and environment on four character traits associated with mental toughness. They were control over life, commitment, confidence and the ability to face new challenges.

Author Dr Tony Vernon at the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada, concluded that genetics played a more important role—52 per cent—than environmental factors—48 per cent.

http://snipurl.com/4usl0


Fighting With Photons
from the Economist

Like so much else in science fiction, the ray gun was invented by H.G. Wells. ... Science fiction, though, it has remained. Neither hand-held pistols nor giant, orbiting anti-missile versions of the weapon have worked.

But that is about to change. The first serious battlefield ray gun is now being deployed. And the next generation, now in the laboratory, is coming soon.

The deployed ray gun (or "directed-energy weapon" ... ) is known as Zeus. It is not designed to kill. Rather, its purpose is to allow you to remain at a safe distance when you detonate unexploded ordnance, such as the homemade roadside bombs that plague foreign troops in Iraq.

http://snipurl.com/4uspq


"Spider God" Temple Found in Peru
from National Geographic News

A 3,000-year-old temple featuring an image of a spider god may hold clues to little-known cultures in ancient Peru.

People of the Cupisnique culture, which thrived from roughly 1500 to 1000 B.C., built the temple in the Lambayeque valley on Peru's north coast.

The adobe temple, found this summer and called Collud, is the third discovered in the area in recent years. The finds suggest that the three valley sites may have been part of a large capital for divine worship, said archaeologist Walter Alva, director of the Royal Tombs of Sipán Museum.

http://snipurl.com/4usw0

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on November 03, 2008, 08:35:07 PM
Quote from: Kai on November 03, 2008, 06:30:59 PM
Science Advice for the Next President
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Nearly 180 organizations representing the interdependent arenas of science, academia and business are urging the next president to appoint a White House science adviser by Inauguration Day and give the position cabinet-level rank.

In letters sent Thursday to Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama, the organizations said scientific and technical advice was needed now more than ever given the importance of the entwined issues of energy security and climate change, mounting issues and opportunities in medicine, and problems in science education and American innovation and competitiveness.

The letters reflect broadening concern that the White House has not been sufficiently stressing science.

http://snipurl.com/4wfyh
I like this idea, but I thought that every Cabinet member had a department directly under them.  How would that work with a science advisor? Would the Executive branch have to be rearranged with the "Secretary of Science" being over things like NASA, EPA, FDA, etc? 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 03, 2008, 09:37:37 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on November 03, 2008, 08:35:07 PM
Quote from: Kai on November 03, 2008, 06:30:59 PM
Science Advice for the Next President
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Nearly 180 organizations representing the interdependent arenas of science, academia and business are urging the next president to appoint a White House science adviser by Inauguration Day and give the position cabinet-level rank.

In letters sent Thursday to Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama, the organizations said scientific and technical advice was needed now more than ever given the importance of the entwined issues of energy security and climate change, mounting issues and opportunities in medicine, and problems in science education and American innovation and competitiveness.

The letters reflect broadening concern that the White House has not been sufficiently stressing science.

http://snipurl.com/4wfyh
I like this idea, but I thought that every Cabinet member had a department directly under them.  How would that work with a science advisor? Would the Executive branch have to be rearranged with the "Secretary of Science" being over things like NASA, EPA, FDA, etc? 

Theres a Press secretary, but there isn't a department of press.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on November 03, 2008, 10:01:12 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on November 03, 2008, 08:35:07 PM
Quote from: Kai on November 03, 2008, 06:30:59 PM
Science Advice for the Next President
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Nearly 180 organizations representing the interdependent arenas of science, academia and business are urging the next president to appoint a White House science adviser by Inauguration Day and give the position cabinet-level rank.

In letters sent Thursday to Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama, the organizations said scientific and technical advice was needed now more than ever given the importance of the entwined issues of energy security and climate change, mounting issues and opportunities in medicine, and problems in science education and American innovation and competitiveness.

The letters reflect broadening concern that the White House has not been sufficiently stressing science.

http://snipurl.com/4wfyh
I like this idea, but I thought that every Cabinet member had a department directly under them.  How would that work with a science advisor? Would the Executive branch have to be rearranged with the "Secretary of Science" being over things like NASA, EPA, FDA, etc? 
Would that be a bad thing?  Who better to run scientific departments than a scientist?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on November 03, 2008, 11:05:38 PM
Quote from: Kai on November 03, 2008, 09:37:37 PM
Theres a Press secretary, but there isn't a department of press.
True, but that's not a Cabinet position either.

After actually doing some reasearch I found that Bush does have a science advisor (that he never listens to) who is the head of the Office of Science & Technology Policy (http://www.ostp.gov/cs/home).  I would assume what these people in the article are wanting an expansion of OSTP with the head being promoted to Cabinet level.  Like I said, not a horrible idea but I have no idea what this person would actually do or even have the power to do.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Golden Applesauce on November 03, 2008, 11:39:33 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on November 03, 2008, 11:05:38 PM
Quote from: Kai on November 03, 2008, 09:37:37 PM
Theres a Press secretary, but there isn't a department of press.
True, but that's not a Cabinet position either.

After actually doing some reasearch I found that Bush does have a science advisor (that he never listens to) who is the head of the Office of Science & Technology Policy (http://www.ostp.gov/cs/home).  I would assume what these people in the article are wanting an expansion of OSTP with the head being promoted to Cabinet level.  Like I said, not a horrible idea but I have no idea what this person would actually do or even have the power to do.

Anybody who can tell the president "You're a fucking moron, eliminating Drosophila research is fucking retarded" is a good idea.  It would be nice to have issues like endangered species, global warming, etc. be decided by scientists, rather than senators and their horde of lobbyists.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on November 03, 2008, 11:53:05 PM
Yes, listen to us scientists.
                             \
(http://letsstartabeat.files.wordpress.com/2008/05/dr_strangelove-763806.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 04, 2008, 04:47:38 PM
November 4, 2008

The Safety Gap
from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

In the belly of an industrial district south of Lyon, France, just past a sulfurous oil refinery and a synthetic vanilla plant, sits a run-down, eight-story factory that makes aspirin, the first pharmaceutical blockbuster.

The Lyon factory is the last of its kind. No other major facility in Europe or the United States makes generic aspirin anymore. The market has been taken over by low-cost Chinese producers. 

... European factories close; Chinese ones open. Consumers like their commodities cheap, in the case of aspirin as with everything else. China now produces about two-thirds of all aspirin and is poised to become the world's sole global supplier in the not-too-distant future. But are the Chinese factories safe? Who knows? The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the European Medicines Agency and other competent government regulators rarely, if ever, inspect them.

http://snipurl.com/4xoa9


Scientists to Measure Effects of Earthquakes on Acropolis
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

ATHENS, Greece (Associated Press)—For thousands of years the Acropolis has withstood earthquakes, weathered storms and endured temperature extremes, from scorching summers to winter snow.

Now scientists are drawing on the latest technology to install a system that will record just how much nature is affecting the 2,500-year-old site. They hope their findings will help identify areas that could be vulnerable, allowing them to target restoration and maintenance.

Scientists are installing a network of fiber optic sensors and accelerographs—instruments that measure how much movement is generated during a quake.

http://snipurl.com/4wh1s


Persistence Pays Off With New Drug for Gout
from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News & Observer

The line of work Dr. Mike Hershfield has pursued for most of his 32-year research career at Duke University is basically scientific social service. He adopts orphans.

Specifically, he takes on so-called orphan diseases—afflictions so rare that the big pharmaceutical companies have no financial incentive to develop treatments.

Hershfield and his team at Duke are among more than a dozen research groups at Duke, UNC-Chapel Hill and private biotech companies in the Research Triangle Park area that have contributed to a wave of new treatments for people suffering from diseases such as immune disorders, rare cancers and cystic fibrosis. Each disease afflicts fewer than 200,000 Americans, but all the orphan diseases added together strike an estimated 25 million.

http://snipurl.com/4xo11


Extra-Nutritious Bioengineered Foods Still Years Away
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

For years, advocates of agricultural biotechnology have promised a future in which foods will be genetically engineered to give more nutrition and to prevent chronic diseases, in which crops will be modified to thrive in salty soil or hot or dry climates and in which consumers will benefit directly from science's ability to tweak other characteristics of plants.

So far, however, that has generally not happened, and the main beneficiaries of agricultural biotechnology remain farmers battling pests and weeds that threaten staple crops such as soybeans, corn and cotton, as well as the companies that develop and produce genetically modified seeds.

But last week, consumers were reminded of what might be available in the future. Researchers at the British-government-sponsored John Innes Center announced that they had developed a purple tomato that has high levels of beneficial anthocyanins—antioxidants known to neutralize potentially harmful oxygen molecules, or free radicals, in the body and reduce the risk of heart disease and cancer. The genes for the purple tomato came from snapdragons.

http://snipurl.com/4z8b0



Many More Children on Medication, Study Says
from the Baltimore Sun

Hundreds of thousands more children are taking medications for chronic diseases, with a huge spike over a four-year period in the number given drugs to treat conditions once seen primarily in adults and now linked to what has become an epidemic of childhood obesity.

In a study appearing yesterday in the journal Pediatrics, researchers saw surges in the number of U.S. children taking prescription medicines for diabetes and asthma, with smaller increases in those taking drugs for high blood pressure or high cholesterol. All of those conditions, to varying degrees, have been associated with obesity.

Though doctors have been seeing the trend in their practices, "the rate of rise is what's surprising," said Dr. Donna R. Halloran, a pediatrician at St. Louis University in Missouri and one of the study's authors.

http://snipurl.com/4z8si


Unknotting Knot Theory
from Science News

Sometimes, a simple, even childish question turns out to be connected to the deepest secrets of the universe. Here's one: How many different ways can you tie your shoelaces?

Mathematicians have been puzzling over that question for a century or two, and the main thing they've discovered is that the question is really, really hard. In the last decade, though, they've developed some powerful new tools inspired by physics that have pried a few answers from the universe's clutches.

Even more exciting is that the new tools seem to be the tip of a much larger theory that mathematicians are just beginning to uncover. That larger mathematical theory, if it exists, may help crack some of the hardest mathematical questions there are, questions about the mathematical structure of the three- and four-dimensional space where we live.

http://snipurl.com/4z8x2


Success in Treating Childhood Anxiety
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

More than 80 percent of children suffering from the most common psychiatric disorders—anxieties and phobias that can make them fear the future and avoid trick-or-treating—dramatically improved on a combination of medication and 12 weeks of therapy, researchers reported last week in the biggest study of its kind.

Nearly 60 percent were helped by either the antidepressant alone or the cognitive behavioral therapy program that was developed by a Temple University psychologist two decades ago and is now used around the world.

The Coping Cat program—aka Coping Bear in Canada and Coping Koala in Australia—encourages children to recognize, experience and then master their fears. ... Estimates of the number of children with debilitating anxieties or social phobias vary wildly. Many experts think it is about 10 percent of American children and adolescents.

http://snipurl.com/4z967


Researcher Seeks Clues to Aging in Our DNA
from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Here's the dilemma. At a fundamental level, we age because our cells stop dividing and multiplying. So why shouldn't medical science try to extend our lifespans and improve our health in old age by making sure our cells keep proliferating?

The answer is cancer. Any measures we take to keep tissues growing might raise the odds of cancer, which is characterized by cells that never stop dividing.

Patricia Opresko lives at the intersection of this quandary. A researcher at the University of Pittsburgh's Graduate School of Public Health, Dr. Opresko studies the basic mechanisms of why cells age, partly by specializing in a rare premature aging malady known as Werner syndrome.

http://snipurl.com/4z9ac


Utilities Putting New Energy Into Geothermal Sources
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

RENO, NV—Not far from the blinking casinos of this gambler's paradise lies what could be called the Biggest Little Power Plant in the World.

Tucked into a few dusty acres across from a shopping mall, it uses steam heat from deep within the Earth's crust to generate electricity. Known as geothermal, the energy is clean, reliable and so abundant that this facility produces more than enough electricity to power every home in Reno, population 221,000.

... Geothermal energy may be the most prolific renewable fuel source that most people have never heard of. Although the supply is virtually limitless, the massive upfront costs required to extract it have long rendered geothermal a novelty. But that's changing fast as this old-line industry buzzes with activity after decades of stagnation.

http://snipurl.com/4zbp4 


Study: Sex on TV Linked to Teen Pregnancies
from MSNBC

In the world of television programming, sex sells—perhaps a little too well with young viewers, a new study suggests.

The RAND Corp. study is the first of its kind to identify a link between teenagers' exposure to sexual content on TV and teen pregnancies. The study, released Monday and published in the November edition of the journal Pediatrics, found that teens exposed to high levels of sexual content on television were twice as likely to be involved in a pregnancy in the following three years as teens with limited exposure.

The study's authors are quick to point out that the factors leading to teen pregnancies are varied and complex—but they say it's important for parents, teachers and pediatricians to understand that TV can be one of them.

http://snipurl.com/4zgmk

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 06, 2008, 09:23:33 PM
November 6, 2008

Unknown "Structures" Tugging at Universe, Study Says
from National Geographic News

Something may be out there. Way out there. On the outskirts of creation, unknown, unseen "structures" are tugging on our universe like cosmic magnets, a controversial new study says.

Everything in the known universe is said to be racing toward the massive clumps of matter at more than 2 million miles (3.2 million kilometers) an hour—a movement the researchers have dubbed dark flow.

The presence of the extra-universal matter suggests that our universe is part of something bigger—a multiverse—and that whatever is out there is very different from the universe we know, according to study leader Alexander Kashlinsky, an astrophysicist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland. The theory could rewrite the laws of physics.

http://snipurl.com/5660v 


Obama Promises New Era of Scientific Innovation
from New Scientist

Tuesday, the American people chose Barack Obama as the country's 44th president, promising a sea change in US policy that could affect not just the US, but the whole world. New Scientist takes a look at what Obama has pledged over the lengthy presidential campaign, to see what his administration will mean for science and technology.

In September, Obama unveiled a comprehensive Science and Technology Policy. In it he promised to lead a new era of scientific innovation in America and to restore integrity to US science policy. This would be achieved by doubling the federal investment in basic research and by addressing the "grand challenges" of the 21st century, he said. The rhetoric gained him the public endorsement of 61 Nobel laureates.

Obama lacks a science background, though, and over the past 50 years it has been Republican, rather than Democratic administrations, that have tended to spend more on science. Whether Obama and his team can buck this trend in the current dire financial situation remains to be seen.

http://snipurl.com/554xp


Oldest Evidence for Complex Life in Doubt
from Science News

Chemical biomarkers in ancient Australian rocks, once thought to be the oldest known evidence of complex life on Earth, may have infiltrated long after the sediments were laid down, new analyses suggest.

The evidence was based on biomarkers—distinctive chemical compounds produced today by modern-day relatives of cyanobacteria and other complex life forms. In 1999, a team of researchers contended that the biomarkers in the 2.7-billion–year-old rocks pushed back the origins of cyanobacteria by at least 550 million years and of eukaryotes by about a billion years.

Although some scientists interpret the new findings, published in the Oct. 23 Nature, as disproving the older dates, others contend that the results still allow for the presence of the organisms or their kin at that time.

http://snipurl.com/5552v 


At Specialty Garage, Making Hybrids Even Greener
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

SAN FRANCISCO—The fig tree and the philodendron are the first things that meet the eye in the repair bay of Luscious Garage. Then the two Toyota Priuses come into focus—one with a slightly dented rear door, the other on a lift with two tires off and rusty brake rotors exposed.

Then comes the eerie sense that something is missing: grime. "You could eat off her floor," said Sara Bernard, the customer in need of brake repair.

The only hybrid specialty garage run by a woman has opened in the Bay Area, which has more Priuses—70,000 as of 2006—than most states. And while its owner, Carolyn Coquillette, has a preoccupation with cleanliness that may not be unique in a mechanic's shop, her ubiquitous recycling containers (for paper, plastic, rubber, metal and oil) and the solar panels on her roof set Luscious apart. So does its specialty: giving hybrid owners the option of going fully electric.

http://snipurl.com/5558a


Authorities Hope Beetle Invasion Can Be Ground to a Halt
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

WORCESTER, Mass. (Associated Press)—A wood-devouring beetle has gained a foothold in New England, and authorities plan to cut down large numbers of infested trees and grind them up to stop the pest from spreading to the region's celebrated forests and ravaging the timber, tourism and maple-syrup industries.

The infestation of Asian longhorned beetles in the Worcester area marks the fourth time the pests have been found in trees in the United States and the closest they have ever come to New England's great woods, which erupt in dazzling colors in the fall.

"This insect scares us to death because, if it ever got loose in the forests of New England, it would be just about impossible to contain and it'd change the landscape dramatically," said Tom McCrumm, coordinator of the Massachusetts Maple Producers Association.

http://snipurl.com/555cz


Folic Acid, B Vitamins Offer No Cancer Protection
from USA Today

Researchers have more disappointing news for people who hope to protect their health with vitamins.

In the longest-running trial of its kind, doctors found that folic acid and other B vitamins didn't prevent breast cancer or cancer in general, according to a seven-year study of 5,442 women in today's Journal of the American Medical Association.

Researchers randomly assigned some of the women to take the supplements—folic acid, vitamin B-6 and vitamin B-12—and others to get placebos. Neither the women nor their doctors knew which pills they were taking—a type of trial that is widely considered the "gold standard" for medical evidence.

http://snipurl.com/555hz 


Golf Secret Not All in the Wrists
from BBC News Online

After decades of research, the world may be closer to the perfect golf swing. The key, according to University of Surrey engineer Robin Sharp, is not to use full power from the start, but to build up to it quickly.

Surprisingly, the wrists do not play a critical role in the swing's outcome, according to the new model. The analysis also shows that while bigger golfers might hit the ball further, it is not by much.

Any golfer will tell you that the idea of swinging harder to hit farther is not as straightforward as it might seem; the new results indicate that how—and when—the power develops is the key to distance. Professor Sharp's work is based on a little-used model in which a golfer employs three points of rotation: the shoulders relative to the spine, the arms relative to the shoulders and the wrists relative to the arms.

http://snipurl.com/555ll


Scientists Work at Recruiting "Good Bugs"
from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON—For years, it has been easy to walk into a drugstore or health-food outlet and buy a variety of "probiotics"—natural dietary supplements such as Acidophilus or Lactinex—off the shelf to treat conditions such as children's eczema or traveler's diarrhea.

Unlike antibiotics, these self-help products don't kill germs, but they supposedly confer health benefits, the way vitamins and certain minerals do. Existing probiotics haven't been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or subjected to rigorous clinical trials. When tested, their effectiveness has been mixed, medical researchers said.

Scientists these days are trying to design "good bugs," novel forms of bacteria created in the laboratory to prevent or cure specific diseases, including HIV and cancer.

http://snipurl.com/555wt


Five Ways Brain Scans Mislead Us
from Scientific American

Over the past few hundred years, as scientists have grappled with understanding the source of the amazing processing power in our skulls, they have employed a number of metaphors based on familiar technologies of their given era. The brain has been thought of as a hydraulic machine (18th century), a mechanical calculator (19th century) and an electronic computer (20th century).

Today, early in the 21st century, we have another metaphor driven by the capabilities of the current technology—this time colorful images from modern brain scans. Evolutionary psychologists, for example, have conceptualized the brain as a Swiss Army knife, with a collection of specialized modules that have evolved to solve specific problems in our evolutionary history ...

... Scientists often use metaphors such as these as aids in understanding and explaining complex processes, but this practice necessarily oversimplifies the intricate and subtle realities of the physical world. As it turns out, the role of those blobs of color that we see in brain images is not as clear-cut as we have been led to believe.

http://snipurl.com/55cld 


Science-Fiction Author Michael Crichton Dies at 66
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Best-selling author Michael Crichton, who wrote such novels as "The Andromeda Strain" and "Jurassic Park," and created the popular TV drama "ER," has died at 66, his family said Wednesday.

Crichton, a medical doctor turned novelist whose books have sold more than 150 million copies worldwide, died "unexpectedly" Tuesday in Los Angeles after a private battle with cancer, his family said.

... Crichton was born in Chicago on Oct. 23, 1942 and wrote his first novels under pen names while attending Harvard Medical School. "The Andromeda Strain," which was published in 1969, became his first best-seller. In addition to "Jurassic Park" and its sequel, "The Lost World," which became blockbuster Hollywood films, Crichton wrote "Congo," "The Terminal Man," "Prey" and "State of Fear" among others.

http://snipurl.com/55fu9

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 17, 2008, 04:10:46 PM
November 14, 2008

First Images Captured of Alien Solar System
from New Scientist

Two new planetary systems have been imaged in the Milky Way: a star boasting three planetary siblings and another harbouring one at a large distance from its star.

Other candidate planets have been imaged near stars. But the new pictures are the first to capture the slow crawl of the planets around their host stars, confirming that they are indeed orbiting the stars.

"It's great to see the quest for direct imaging of extrasolar planets finally bearing fruit," says Ray Jayawardhana of the University of Toronto, who was not associated with the two new studies. Direct images can detect planets at much greater distances from their stars than the techniques most commonly used today. Such faraway worlds could challenge the prevailing model of how planets form.

http://snipurl.com/5f53s


Young Innovators Learn to Pitch Big Ideas
from the Christian Science Monitor

You've got a world-changing idea. And a passion to make it happen. That's good. But you need a third element: The ability to "pitch" your idea to venture capitalists and others who can help turn your dream into reality.

Budding business tycoons or Hollywood script writers know the importance of marketing themselves and their projects. But those in the nonprofit world, whose goal is altruistic, may never have thought about how to put a dazzling sheen on their quick "elevator pitch."

Learning what goes into a perfect pitch was just one of the practical skills taught to a group of up-and-coming "social innovators" last month at the 12th annual PopTech conference in Camden, Maine. PopTech has always been a place to hear about new ideas to improve the world. But this year, greater efforts have been made to turn those ideas into a reality, says its curator and executive director, Andrew Zolli.

http://snipurl.com/5eymu


U.N. Report Sees New Pollution Threat
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

BEIJING—A noxious cocktail of soot, smog and toxic chemicals is blotting out the sun, fouling the lungs of millions of people and altering weather patterns in large parts of Asia, according to a report released Thursday by the United Nations.

The byproduct of automobiles, slash-and-burn agriculture, wood-burning kitchen stoves and coal-fired power plants, these plumes of carbon dust rise over southern Africa, the Amazon basin and North America. But they are most pronounced in Asia, where so-called atmospheric brown clouds are dramatically reducing sunlight in many Chinese cities and leading to decreased crop yields in swaths of rural India, say a team of more than a dozen scientists who have been studying the problem since 2002.

Combined with mounting evidence that greenhouse gases are leading to a rise in global temperatures, the report's authors called on governments both rich and poor to address the problem of carbon emissions.

http://snipurl.com/5exvf 


Same-Sex Heart Transplants Have Better Outcomes, Study Finds
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Heart transplant patients are as much as 25% more likely to survive if the sex of the donor is the same as the patient's, researchers said Wednesday. The results surprised experts because, for most types of transplants, sex differences are irrelevant as long as a good immunocompatability is achieved.

The worst results were in men who received hearts from smaller women, suggesting that the pumping capacity of the organ is crucial to the success of the procedure, according to the study, presented at a New Orleans meeting of the American Heart Assn.

But women were also somewhat more likely to reject transplants from males, perhaps because of lingering immune stimulation from earlier pregnancies, experts said.

http://snipurl.com/5ewll


Advice and Comment
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

From climate change and science education to energy and the space program, President Obama will be faced with a host of pressing issues in science, medicine and technology when he takes office in January.

The choices he makes—and the actions he takes—will affect all of us, immediately and far into the future, in ways both obvious and unforeseen.

Which problems should he tackle first? What is the top priority? What is most important? The San Diego Union-Tribune asked local scientists, doctors, teachers and thinkers for their ideas and insights. 

http://snipurl.com/5eyt3


How Rocks Evolve
from the Economist

Evolution has come a long way since Charles Darwin's time. Today it is not only animals and plants that are seen as having evolved over time, but also things that involve the hand of humans, like architecture, music, car design and even governments. Now rocks, too, seem to be showing evolutionary characteristics.

Rocks are made from minerals, which like all matter are composed of individual chemical elements. What makes minerals special is the way that the atoms of those elements are arranged in lattices which create unique crystalline structures and shapes. Today more than 4,000 different minerals can be found on Earth. When the planet began to be formed, however, few existed.

Curious as to how this great variety came about, Robert Hazen of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, DC, and a team of colleagues set out on their own voyage of discovery. Their study, just published in American Mineralogist, explores the history of minerals by identifying how much of the diversity was created by the rocks alone and how much of it was created by the evolution of life.

http://snipurl.com/5f4w3 


Exploring Old Rome Without Air (or Time) Travel
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ROME—First Google Earth turned millions of Internet users into virtual travelers who could fly to any spot on the globe. Then its Sky feature took them to other galaxies. Now Google Earth has embraced a frontier dating back 17 centuries: ancient Rome under Constantine the Great.

Soaring above a virtual reconstruction of the Forum and the Palatine Hill or zooming into the Colosseum to get a lion's-eye view of the stands, Google Earth's 400 million users will be able to explore the ancient capital as easily "as any city can be explored today," Michael T. Jones, chief technology officer of Google Earth, said Wednesday at a news conference at Rome's city hall.

Ancient Rome 3D, as the new feature is known, is a digital elaboration of some 7,000 buildings recreating Rome circa A.D. 320, at the height of Constantine's empire, when more than a million inhabitants lived within the city's Aurelian walls.

http://snipurl.com/5eqos


New Autism Loci Discovered
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Two large-scale genetic analyses have turned up a trio of new sites associated with autism, including a large-effect allele that seems to reduce the risk of developing the debilitating brain disorder, researchers reported Wednesday at the American Society of Human Genetics meeting in Philadelphia.

Last year, the Autism Genome Project Consortium performed the largest genome-wide linkage scan to date with around 10,000 SNPs in 1,181 families with at least two affected individuals. The group flagged a handful of genomic regions harboring autism susceptibility genes, although none of the linkage results were statistically significant.

Now, a team led by Dan Arking, a geneticist at Johns Hopkins University, has ramped up the SNP count to include around 500,000 markers in 802 affected pairs of siblings. They then eliminated all the error-prone or uninformative SNPs to amass a collection of 180,000 high-quality markers for their analysis. "It's the cleanest best set of markers you can imagine," Arking said at a press conference.

http://snipurl.com/5f58y


New Ice Age Predicted—But Averted by Global Warming?
from National Geographic News

Deep ice sheets would cover much of the Northern Hemisphere thousands of years from now—if it weren't for us pesky humans, a new study says.

Emissions of greenhouse gases—such as the carbon dioxide, or CO2, that comes from power plants and cars—are heating the atmosphere to such an extent that the next ice age, predicted to be the deepest in millions of years, may be postponed indefinitely.

"Climate skeptics could look at this and say, CO2 is good for us," said study leader Thomas Crowley of the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. But the idea that global warming may be staving off an ice age is "not cause for relaxing, because we're actually moving into a highly unusual climate state," Crowley added.

http://snipurl.com/5f5ix


Bridge's Fall Blamed on Design
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON—Bridge design errors that went unnoticed for decades and a failure to limit heavy construction on the span led to the Minnesota highway bridge collapse that killed 13 people last year, federal investigators said Thursday.

Fractures in undersized steel plates in the Minneapolis I-35W bridge ultimately caused the structure to shift and break apart on Aug. 1, 2007, according to testimony at a National Transportation Safety Board hearing.

Some 111 vehicles were on the deck truss bridge spanning the Mississippi River near downtown Minneapolis during the evening rush hour when some of the main trusses failed, causing about 1,000 feet of the bridge to fall into the river.

http://snipurl.com/5gh5i

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on November 17, 2008, 05:50:03 PM
   

The world has never seen such freezing heat

By Christopher Booker
Last Updated: 12:01am GMT 16/11/2008

A surreal scientific blunder last week raised a huge question mark about the temperature records that underpin the worldwide alarm over global warming. On Monday, Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), which is run by Al Gore's chief scientific ally, Dr James Hansen, and is one of four bodies responsible for monitoring global temperatures, announced that last month was the hottest October on record.

Dr James Hansen, and is one of four bodies responsible for monitoring global temperatures, announced that last month was the hottest October on record.

This was startling. Across the world there were reports of unseasonal snow and plummeting temperatures last month, from the American Great Plains to China, and from the Alps to New Zealand. China's official news agency reported that Tibet had suffered its "worst snowstorm ever". In the US, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration registered 63 local snowfall records and 115 lowest-ever temperatures for the month, and ranked it as only the 70th-warmest October in 114 years.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/11/16/do1610.xml
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on November 17, 2008, 05:52:35 PM
Quote from: Kai on November 17, 2008, 04:10:46 PMHow Rocks Evolve
from the Economist

Evolution has come a long way since Charles Darwin's time. Today it is not only animals and plants that are seen as having evolved over time, but also things that involve the hand of humans, like architecture, music, car design and even governments. Now rocks, too, seem to be showing evolutionary characteristics.

Rocks are made from minerals, which like all matter are composed of individual chemical elements. What makes minerals special is the way that the atoms of those elements are arranged in lattices which create unique crystalline structures and shapes. Today more than 4,000 different minerals can be found on Earth. When the planet began to be formed, however, few existed.

Curious as to how this great variety came about, Robert Hazen of the Carnegie Institution in Washington, DC, and a team of colleagues set out on their own voyage of discovery. Their study, just published in American Mineralogist, explores the history of minerals by identifying how much of the diversity was created by the rocks alone and how much of it was created by the evolution of life.
As if there aren't enough people out there confused by the theory of evolution.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 17, 2008, 10:20:31 PM
Ugh. Yeah.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 19, 2008, 02:29:43 AM
November 17, 2008

Mockingbird Specimens Sparked Darwin's Theory
from the Guardian (UK)

The significance of the two birds lying side by side on a purple cushion with tags dangling from their feet is easy to miss. But the subtle differences—a strip of white on the wing, a smudge of dark on the breast—set Charles Darwin on course to develop the most important scientific theory ever conceived: the evolution of species through natural selection.

The mockingbirds are perhaps the most important specimens Darwin collected from the Galapagos during his five-year voyage aboard HMS Beagle in the 1830s, and today they go on show as part of a major exhibition at the Natural History Museum in London.

It reveals Darwin as a tenacious scientist, a pragmatic lover, and a man pained by losing his religion. The exhibition is the centrepiece of a nationwide programme to mark the 200th anniversary of Darwin's birthday next February.

http://snipurl.com/5mtfy


The Child Trap: The Rise of Overparenting
from the New Yorker

... It used to be known as "spoiling." Now it is called "overparenting"—or "helicopter parenting" or "hothouse parenting" or "death-grip parenting." The term has changed because the pattern has changed.

It still includes spoiling—no rules, many toys—but two other, complicating factors have been added. One is anxiety. Will the child be permanently affected by the fate of the [late lamented] hamster? Did he touch the corpse, and get a germ? The other new element—at odds, it seems, with such solicitude—is achievement pressure.

The heck with the child's feelings. He has a nursery-school interview tomorrow. Will he be accepted? If not, how will he ever get into a good college? Overparenting is the subject of a number of recent books, and they all deplore it in the strongest possible terms.

http://snipurl.com/5mk0s


Bounty Lies Ahead in Scallop Fishery
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Scallop fishermen on the East Coast can look forward to a big catch of the succulent shellfish a few years from now, a recent survey of sea scallops from Massachusetts to North Carolina suggests.

The survey, conducted by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole, found a spike in the number of young scallops or "recruits" that keep a fishery thriving.

After six poor years for recruits, Georges Bank, a prime fishing ground stretching from Newfoundland to Cape Cod, had its highest number of the small scallops since 2000, and the mid-Atlantic region had nearly its highest population of them since 1979.

http://snipurl.com/5ml0r


EPA Advisers Seek Perchlorate Review
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Environmental Protection Agency's scientific advisers have warned the agency that it should delay final action on its decision not to set a federal drinking-water standard for perchlorate, a chemical in rocket fuel, because the computer model underlying the decision may have flaws.

In a letter last week, the heads of EPA's Science Advisory Board and its drinking water committee urged EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson to extend the public comment period on its preliminary determination to not regulate perchlorate. That decision is set to become final next month.

Perchlorate, which is present in the water systems of 35 states, accumulates in the body from consuming water, milk, lettuce and other common products and has been linked in scientific studies to thyroid problems in pregnant women, newborns and infants.

http://snipurl.com/5mknn


That Burger You're Eating Is Mostly Corn
from Scientific American

If you thought you were eating mostly grass-fed beef when you bit into a Big Mac, think again: The bulk of a fast-food hamburger from McDonald's, Burger King or Wendy's is made from cows that eat primarily corn, or so says a new study of the chemical composition of more than 480 fast-food burgers from across the nation.

And it isn't only cows that are eating corn. There is also evidence of a corn diet in chicken sandwiches, and even French fries get a good slathering of the fat that makes them so tasty from being fried in corn oil.

"Corn has been criticized as being unsustainable based on the unusual amount of fertilizer, water and machinery required to bring it to harvest," says geobiologist Hope Jahren of the University of Hawaii at Manoa's School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology, who led the research. "We are getting a picture of the American diet on a national scale by using chemistry, which is quite objective."

http://snipurl.com/5f5dm


Science Reporting by Press Release
from the Columbia Journalism Review

A dirty little secret of journalism has always been the degree to which some reporters rely on press releases and public relations offices as sources for stories. But recent newsroom cutbacks and increased pressure to churn out online news have given publicity operations even greater prominence in science coverage.

"What is distressing to me is that the number of science reporters and the variety of reporting is going down. What does come out is more and more the direct product of PR shops," said Charles Petit, a veteran science reporter and media critic, in an interview.

Petit has been running MIT's online Knight Science Journalism Tracker since 2006, where he has posted more than 4,000 critiques involving approximately 20,000 articles.

http://snipurl.com/5hi5t


Tiny Radio Tags Offer Rare Glimpse into Bees' Universe
from National Geographic News

... Honeybees contribute some $15 billion to the U.S. economy every year, pollinating 90 major crops, everything from fruits to nuts. Most of us take these foods for granted, rarely realizing the vital role tiny creatures play in making them thrive.

Put simply, says zoologist Martin Wikelski, "Everything depends on pollinators." That's one reason this leader in the study of small-animal migration has begun examining the mostly unknown universe of bee movement.

Wikelski is pioneering the use of supersmall radio tracking tags that fit on the backs of bees, a technological breakthrough that may provide him and other scientists with a direct view of the pollinators' flight patterns.

http://snipurl.com/5mubg


Feed Your Brain: News from Neuroscience
from Science News

WASHINGTON, D.C.—More than 30,000 neuroscientists from around the world gathered in Washington, D.C., November 15–19 for the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.

Presentations covered the science of nerves and brains on scales from molecules to societies.

From among the first day's presentations, Science News staffers report on the latest neural insights into psychopaths, liars and baby rats separated from their mothers, as well as new research on how a tiny parasite disrupts rats' ingrained fear of cats and how a rat mother's favoritism for outgoing pups influences developing social skills.

http://snipurl.com/5muoa


Long-Lost Lunar Photos Get Another Day in the Sun
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—The old moon has never looked this good. Mankind's first up-close photos of the lunar landscape have been rescued from four decades of dusty storage, and they've been restored to such a high quality that they rival anything taken by modern cameras.

NASA and some private space business leaders spent a quarter million dollars rescuing the historic photos from early NASA lunar robotic probes and restoring them in an abandoned McDonald's.

The first refurbished image was released Thursday—a classic of the moon with Earth rising in the background. "This is an incredible image," said private space entrepreneur Dennis Wingo, who spearheaded the project.

http://snipurl.com/5mvbi


Study: Vitamin C, E Pills Do Not Prevent Cancer
from USA Today

(Associated Press)—Vitamin C or E pills do not help prevent cancer in men, concludes the same big study that last week found these supplements ineffective for warding off heart disease.

The public has been whipsawed by good and bad news about vitamins, much of it from test-tube or animal studies and hyped manufacturer claims. Even when researchers compare people's diets and find that a vitamin seems to help, the benefit may not translate when that nutrient is obtained a different way, such as a pill.

"Antioxidants, which include vitamin C and vitamin E, have been shown as a group to have potential benefit," but have not been tested individually for a long enough time to know, said Howard Sesso of Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

http://snipurl.com/5pgjo

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 19, 2008, 12:26:41 PM
November 18, 2008

Report to Congress: Gulf War Syndrome Is Real
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Contradicting nearly two decades of government denials, a congressionally mandated scientific panel has concluded that Gulf War syndrome is real and still afflicts nearly a quarter of the 700,000 U.S. troops who served in the 1991 conflict.

The report cited two chemical exposures consistently associated with the disorder: the drug pyridostigmine bromide, given to troops to protect against nerve gas, and pesticides that were widely used—and often overused—to protect against sand flies and other pests.

"The extensive body of scientific research now available consistently indicates that Gulf War illness is real, that it is a result of neurotoxic exposures during Gulf War deployment, and that few veterans have recovered or substantially improved with time," according to the report presented today to Secretary of Veterans Affairs James Peake.

http://snipurl.com/5puf2


In Bias Test, Shades of Gray
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Last year, a team of researchers at Harvard made headlines with an experiment testing unconscious bias at hospitals. Doctors were shown the picture of a 50-year-old man—sometimes black, sometimes white—and asked how they would treat him if he arrived at the emergency room with chest pains indicating a possible heart attack. Then the doctors took a computer test intended to reveal unconscious racial bias.

The doctors who scored higher on the bias test were less likely than the other doctors to give clot-busting drugs to the black patients, according to the researchers, who suggested addressing the problem by encouraging doctors to test themselves for unconscious bias.

The results were hailed by other psychologists as some of the strongest evidence that unconscious bias leads to harmful discrimination. But then two other researchers, Neal Dawson and Hal Arkes, pointed out a curious pattern in the data.

http://snipurl.com/5rl6h


16th-Century Mapmaker's Intriguing Knowledge
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

How was it that a German priest writing in Latin and living in a French city far from the coast became the first person to tell the world that a vast ocean lay to the west of the American continents? That is one of the bigger mysteries in the history of the Renaissance.

But it is not the only one involving Martin Waldseemueller, a map-making cleric whose own story is sufficiently obscure that his birth and death dates aren't known for certain.

Waldseemueller appears to have also known something about the contours of South America's west coast years before Vasco Núñez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama and Ferdinand Magellan sailed around the bottom of the continent. History books record them as the first Europeans to bring back knowledge of the Pacific Ocean.

http://snipurl.com/5rlpw 


Wind from the North
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

WEST CAPE, Prince Edward Island—Scattered across remote potato fields here, soaring white wind turbines generate electricity for a surprising customer 650 miles to the south: Massachusetts.

And much more Canadian renewable energy could be coming. From the rolling farmlands of the Maritime provinces to the shores of Lake Ontario, developers are building or planning nearly four dozen wind and hydroelectric projects in the next four years, enough to power more than a million homes.

Canada is the biggest exporter of oil to the United States, and one might expect environmentalists to cheer the prospect of exchanging a little of our dependence on foreign oil for dependence on foreign wind. But some fear that a flood of clean power from Canada will undercut New England's efforts to become a national leader in green energy and technology.

http://snipurl.com/5rlyg 


Woolly Rhino's Ancient Migration
from BBC News Online

Palaeontologists have pieced together the fossilised skull of the oldest example yet found of a woolly rhinoceros in Europe.

The 460,000-year-old skull, which was found in Germany, had to be reconstructed from 53 fragments. The extinct mammals reached a length of three-and-a-half metres in adulthood and, unlike their modern relatives, were covered in shaggy hair.

Details of the work appear in the journal Quaternary Science Reviews. The team says the find from Germany fills a gap in our understanding of how these animals evolved.

http://snipurl.com/5rmhu


Memory Loss: Special Report
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

We collect memories well into adulthood, but at some point, we start to lose them. How to tell the difference between memory lapse and signs of a disorder?

The L.A. Times provides a series of articles on the early warning signs of Alzhimer's disease, how much our bad habits and lifestyle choices may affect memory and tips for preventing memory loss, among other topics.

Other articles in the series focus on case studies and interviews that explore the causes and impact of forgetfulness.

http://snipurl.com/5puc1


World's Oldest Nuclear Family Unearthed in Germany
from the Guardian (UK)

DNA extracted from bones and teeth in a 4,600-year-old stone age burial has provided the earliest evidence for the nuclear family as a social structure. The find consists of two parents and two sons who were buried together after being killed in a violent conflict over some of the most fertile farming land in Europe.

The archaeologists who examined the bones said the burial provides evidence of a shift in social organisation from communal living to societies with large social differences between people.

"It provides evidence that will allow us to understand the rise of societies that are more modern," said Dr Alistair Pike, an archaeologist at Bristol University who was a member of the team.

http://snipurl.com/5rmwd


Big Particle Collider Repairs to Cost $21 Million
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

GENEVA (Associated Press)—Fixing the world's largest atom smasher will cost at least 25 million francs ($21 million) and may take until early summer, its operator said Monday.

An electrical failure shut down the Large Hadron Collider on Sept. 19, nine days after the $10 billion machine started up with great fanfare. The European Organization for Nuclear Research recently said that the repairs would be completed by May or early June.

Spokesman James Gillies said the organization know as CERN is now estimating the restart will be at the end of June or later. "If we can do it sooner, all well and good. But I think we can do it realistically (in) early summer," he said. The organization has blamed the shutdown on the failure of a single, badly soldered electrical connection.

http://snipurl.com/5rnl7


Study: Scrutiny Has Chilling Effect on Scientists
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

When Pennsylvania's Patrick Toomey criticized a small group of federally funded sex studies—demanding "Who thinks this stuff up?" on the floor of Congress—his proposal to yank the funding was narrowly defeated.

A subsequent federal review of nearly 200 research grants, most of them sex- or drug-related, found that all had public-health value—with goals such as preventing the spread of AIDS. At the time, it seemed as if Toomey and other critics, such as the nonprofit Traditional Values Coalition, had failed. Perhaps not entirely, according to a new survey by a Rutgers University sociologist.

The 2003 controversy had a "chilling effect" on many of the researchers in question, leading some to drop important lines of research and a few to change jobs, survey author Joanna Kempner found. Of the 82 sex researchers surveyed, more than half said they now remove sex-related "red flag" words from the titles and summaries of their grant proposals. Removed words or phrases included "gay," "lesbian," "bathhouses" and "needle exchange."

http://snipurl.com/5rnud 


Life Viewed Through the Microscope
from Scientific American

Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but it is also in the eye of a honeybee, the eggs of a lobster and the surface of petrified wood—as is evident from a selection of images entered in the 2008 Olympus BioScapes Digital Imaging Competition.

In its fifth year, the competition honors superior images of living organisms or their components attained with the help of light microscopy.

The judges chose 10 winners and awarded honorable mention to many others, evaluating entries based on the scientific value of the images, aesthetics and the difficulty of capturing the information displayed. This year, as in the past, competitors were free to bring out specific features through pseudo-coloring and other computer enhancements.

http://snipurl.com/5rorf

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 24, 2008, 03:32:32 AM
November 21, 2008

Teenagers' Internet Socializing Not a Bad Thing
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Good news for worried parents: All those hours their teenagers spend socializing on the Internet are not a bad thing, according to a new study by the MacArthur Foundation.

"It may look as though kids are wasting a lot of time hanging out with new media, whether it's on MySpace or sending instant messages," said Mizuko Ito, lead researcher on the study, "Living and Learning With New Media." "But their participation is giving them the technological skills and literacy they need to succeed in the contemporary world ..."

... The study, part of a $50 million project on digital and media learning, used several teams of researchers to interview more than 800 young people and their parents and to observe teenagers online for more than 5,000 hours.

http://snipurl.com/62cpl


New Finds at King Herod's Tomb: 2,000-Year-Old Frescoes
from National Geographic News

Archaeologists exploring King Herod's tomb complex near Jerusalem have uncovered rare Roman paintings as well as two sarcophagi, or stone coffins, that could have contained the remains of Herod's sons.

In May 2007, veteran Hebrew University archaeologist Ehud Netzer solved one of Israel's great archaeological mysteries when he first uncovered the remains of Herod's first century-B.C. grave at the Herodium complex, located 9 miles south of Jerusalem.

King Herod, appointed by the Romans to rule Judea between 37 and 4 B.C., is renowned for his monumental construction projects, including the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem, the Caesarea complex, and the palace atop Masada. Herod constructed Herodium as a massive and lavish administrative, residential, and burial center.

http://snipurl.com/62d9d


USDA Panel Approves Rules for Labeling Farmed Fish 'Organic'
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

For the first time, a federal advisory board has approved criteria that clear the way for farmed fish to be labeled "organic," a move that pleased aquaculture producers even as it angered environmentalists and consumer advocates.

The question of whether farmed fish could be labeled organic—especially carnivorous species such as salmon that live in open-ocean net pens and consume vast amounts of smaller fish—has vexed scientists and federal regulators for years.

The standards approved Wednesday by the National Organic Standards Board would allow organic fish farmers to use wild fish as part of their feed mix provided it did not exceed 25 percent of the total and did not come from forage species, such as menhaden, that have declined sharply as the demand for farmed fish has skyrocketed.

http://snipurl.com/62e6p


Gobekli Tepe: The World's First Temple?
from Smithsonian Magazine

Six miles from Urfa, an ancient city in southeastern Turkey, Klaus Schmidt has made one of the most startling archaeological discoveries of our time: massive carved stones about 11,000 years old, crafted and arranged by prehistoric people who had not yet developed metal tools or even pottery.

The megaliths predate Stonehenge by some 6,000 years. The place is called Gobekli Tepe, and Schmidt, a German archaeologist who has been working here more than a decade, is convinced it's the site of the world's oldest temple.

... Gobekli Tepe sits at the northern edge of the Fertile Crescent—an arc of mild climate and arable land from the Persian Gulf to present-day Lebanon, Israel, Jordan and Egypt—and would have attracted hunter-gatherers from Africa and the Levant. And partly because Schmidt has found no evidence that people permanently resided on the summit of Gobekli Tepe itself, he believes this was a place of worship on an unprecedented scale—humanity's first "cathedral on a hill."

http://snipurl.com/62sup


Plumbing the Oceans Could Bring Limitless Clean Energy
from New Scientist

For a company whose business is rocket science Lockheed Martin has been paying unusual attention to plumbing of late. The aerospace giant has kept its engineers occupied for the past 12 months poring over designs for what amounts to a very long fibreglass pipe.

It is, of course, no ordinary pipe but an integral part of the technology behind Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC), a clean, renewable energy source that has the potential to free many economies from their dependence on oil.

"This has the potential to become the biggest source of renewable energy in the world," says Robert Cohen, who headed the US federal ocean thermal energy programme in the early 1970s.

http://snipurl.com/62tad


Desert Drawn: A Hard Place
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

To the casual eye, the old Freeman property west of the Salton Sea is a corrugated landscape of sandy washes and barren wasteland, a bit of low desert baking in the heat of a late October sun.

But Brad Hollingsworth, curator of herpetology at the San Diego Natural History Museum, knows the emptiness is a mirage. Though hardly fecund with life, this parched patch of land is home—or could be home—to an enormously diverse variety of wildlife, from the hairy scorpions, flat-tailed horned lizards and sidewinders that Hollingsworth studies to prairie falcons, bobcats and the occasional bighorn sheep that come down from the rust-colored Santa Rosa Mountains to forage.

"It's a matter of perception," Hollingsworth says, squinting in the bright sunlight. "If you don't know what you're looking for, there seems to be nothing here, just a big, empty desert."

http://snipurl.com/62tvv 


Iron Age Neckband Discovered by Man and His Metal Detector
from the Daily Mail (UK)

For 40 years, Maurice Richardson has been braving all weathers to scour the countryside with his trusty metal detector, dreaming of buried treasure. But he almost ignored an unpromising-sounding beep as he searched for debris from a wartime air crash while being pelted with rain.

However the 59-year-old is glad his curiosity got the better of him after his persistence in digging through more than two feet of Nottinghamshire mud yielded a stunning 2,000-year-old gold treasure.

Now the artefact, an Iron Age torc, has been sold for a mammoth £350,000, and Tuesday it was unveiled at the British Museum as the most valuable discovery in recent times.

http://snipurl.com/62vz4


Criminology: Can the Can
from the Economist

A place that is covered in graffiti and festooned with rubbish makes people feel uneasy. And with good reason, according to a group of researchers in the Netherlands. Kees Keizer and his colleagues at the University of Groningen deliberately created such settings as a part of a series of experiments designed to discover if signs of vandalism, litter and low-level lawbreaking could change the way people behave.

They found that they could, by a lot: doubling the number who are prepared to litter and steal. The idea that observing disorder can have a psychological effect on people has been around for a while.

In the late 1980s George Kelling, a former probation officer who now works at Rutgers University, initiated what became a vigorous campaign to remove graffiti from New York City's subway system, which was followed by a reduction in petty crime. ... But the idea remains a controversial one, not least because it is often difficult to account for other factors that could influence crime reduction ...

http://snipurl.com/63ess


Risk of Lung, Other Cancers Soars for People with HIV
from the Baltimore Sun

Twenty-five years ago, a diagnosis of AIDS was a nearly immediate death sentence.

But now that patients with the AIDS virus are living longer, doctors are discovering a new set of complications: People with HIV have a much higher risk of developing certain cancers—lung, liver, head and neck, to name a few—and doctors fear that a cancer epidemic among this group could be coming.

Researchers in Maryland, home to one of the nation's largest AIDS populations per capita, are among the leaders in an effort to solve what has become something of a medical mystery. "We're seeing people we have treated successfully for HIV at much higher risk" for cancer, said Dr. Kevin J. Cullen, director of the University of Maryland's Greenebaum Cancer Center. "The reasons aren't fully understood."

http://snipurl.com/63gat


Artificial Heart Keeps Teen Alive for 118 Days
from the Miami Herald (Registration Required)

Wearing a hospital mask over her face and a long scar on her chest, 14-year-old D'Zhana Simmons stood up from her wheelchair. She took a few tentative steps, sat down in front of the TV cameras and began to talk.

Barely audible, D'Zhana told how she lived for 118 days without a heart, in limbo between transplant operations, her blood circulated by a pair of mechanical pumps. "Thank you," she said Wednesday, holding back tears, to the Holtz Children's Hospital transplant doctors sitting with her.

From July 4, when a first heart transplant failed, until Oct. 29, when she was well enough for another heart, D'Zhana's chest cavity was empty, doctors said. Beside her during that time was an artificial heart with two pumps. One took over for the heart's right ventricle, pumping blood to the girl's lungs; the other did the work of the left ventricle, pumping blood through her body.

http://snipurl.com/63hpy

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 25, 2008, 05:16:43 PM
November 24, 2008

Vast Mars Glaciers Are Spotted
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

In a discovery that partly answers the question of where all the water went on Mars, scientists have found vast, debris-covered glaciers much nearer the equatorial region than anyone had expected, according to a report Friday in the journal Science.

The glaciers, estimated to contain at least as much water as Lake Huron and possibly as much as the entire Great Lakes, were found by ground-penetrating radar on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter spacecraft.

"We have found a big chunk of the missing water that people have known must be there," said Ali Safaeinili, a member of the radar team at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge.

http://snipurl.com/6idso 


Massive Prehistoric Fort Emerges From Welsh Woods
from National Geographic News

Cloaked by time's leafy shroud, the prehistoric settlement of Gaer Fawr lies all but invisible beneath a forest in the lush Welsh countryside.

It's hard to imagine how it once dominated the landscape: a massive Iron Age fortress commanded by warrior chiefs who loomed over the everyday lives of their people.

But now we can, thanks to a digital recreation of the 2,900-year-old site following a painstaking survey by the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales. The Iron Age hill fort in central Wales was a major feat of civil engineering, researchers say.

http://snipurl.com/69l24


Foes of Stem Cell Research Now Face Tough Battle
from the San Francisco Chronicle

(Associated Press)—When the Bush presidency ends, opponents of embryonic stem cell research will face a new political reality that many feel powerless to stop.

President-elect Barack Obama is expected to lift restrictions on federal money for such research. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., also has expressed interest in going ahead with legislation in the first 100 days of the new Congress if it still is necessary to set up a regulatory framework.

"We may lose it, but we're going to continually fight it and offer the ethical alternative," said Rep. Joe Pitts, R-Pa. "I don't know what the votes will be in the new Congress ... but it's very possible we could lose this thing."

http://snipurl.com/6ie98 


New Rule Would Discount Warming as Risk Factor for Species
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Bush administration is finalizing changes to the Endangered Species Act that would ensure that federal agencies would not have to take global warming into account when assessing risks to imperiled plants and animals.

The proposed rule changes, which were obtained by The Washington Post, are under review by the Office of Management and Budget and are close to being published in the Federal Register.

The main purpose of the new regulations, which were first unveiled in August, is to eliminate a long-standing provision of the Endangered Species Act that requires an independent scientific review by either the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service or the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of any federal project that could affect a protected species.

http://snipurl.com/6iezt


Humans and Light Pollution Blamed as Fireflies Disappear
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

BAN LOMTUAN, Thailand—Thousands of fireflies fill the branches of trees along the Mae Klong River, flashing on and off in unison—relentless and silent, two times a second, deep into the night. Nobody knows why.

The fireflies, all males, sit on the tips of the leaves and synchronize their flashes into a single mating call—and then continue without a pause as if they were driven by an invisible motor.

"It's one of the most amazing things you'll ever see," said Sara Lewis, a professor of biology at Tufts University. Evolutionary biologists have studied synchronous flashing for 200 years, she said, and it remains a mystery.

http://snipurl.com/6iflb


Teed Up: The Long-Haul Golf Ball
from the Times (London)

It has long been known that the secret of how far a golf ball flies lies in its dimples. Now scientists believe they understand the forces at work, as air flows over the ball's surface.

Their work could be the key to a new generation of far more accurate, ultra-long-distance golf balls.

They cracked the problem by deploying the kind of extreme computing power usually reserved for predicting global weather patterns or the behaviour of sub-atomic particles. However, a set of super-computers ... still had to run for 300 hours before they were able to see the exact flow of air around a ball, and its dimples, in flight.

http://snipurl.com/6ih3v


Where Environment Is Just Right for Learning
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

STAFFORD TOWNSHIP, N.J.—As Caitlin Campbell was growing up at the Jersey Shore, the little worlds within the world around her—the flocks of egrets, the pods of migrating dolphins, the scores of tiny minnows she could scoop up in her hands—captured her attention longer than any video game or television program.

So in the eighth grade when she learned about a program called MATES, a first-of-its-kind Ocean County high school where she could delve so deeply into marine and environmental sciences that some courses could be credited toward college, she was onboard.

"I realized I could take a passion and an interest I have for the environment and the water and channel into something positive, into a future career," said Campbell, 17, a senior from Brick Township and one of 230 students at the Marine Academy of Technology and Environmental Science.

http://snipurl.com/6iinl


Copernicus' Grave, Remains Confirmed by DNA Testing
from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

WARSAW, Poland (Associated Press)—Researchers on Thursday said they have identified the remains of Nicolaus Copernicus by comparing DNA from a skeleton and hair retrieved from one of the 16th-century astronomer's books.

The findings could put an end to centuries of speculation about the exact resting spot of Copernicus, a priest and astronomer whose theories identified the Sun, not the Earth, as the center of the universe.

Polish archaeologist Jerzy Gassowski told a news conference that forensic facial reconstruction of the skull, missing the lower jaw, that his team found in 2005 buried in a Roman Catholic Cathedral in Frombork, Poland, bears striking resemblance to existing portraits of Copernicus.

http://snipurl.com/6ij15


Astronauts Try to Work Out Kinks in Urine Machine
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

HOUSTON (Associated Press)—Astronauts hope they have a solution for getting a pivotal piece of equipment working so it can convert urine and sweat into drinkable water and allow the international space station to grow to six crew members.

Flight controllers asked station commander Michael Fincke on Sunday to change how a centrifuge is mounted in the $154 million water recycling system. The centrifuge is on mounts and Mission Control asked Fincke to remove them.

... The astronauts have been working for the past three days to get the system running so that it can generate samples for testing back on Earth, but the urine processor only operates for two hours at a time before shutting down.

http://snipurl.com/6ik64


Brain Reorganizes to Make Room for Math
from Science News

WASHINGTON—It takes years for children to master the ins and outs of arithmetic. New research indicates that this learning process triggers a large-scale reorganization of brain processes involved in understanding written symbols for various quantities.

The findings support the idea that humans' ability to match specific quantities with number symbols, a skill required for doing arithmetic, builds on a brain system that is used for estimating approximate quantities. That brain system is seen in many nonhuman animals.

When performing operations with Arabic numerals, young adults, but not school-age children, show pronounced activity in a piece of brain tissue called the left superior temporal gyrus, says Daniel Ansari of the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada. Earlier studies have linked this region to the ability to associate speech sounds with written letters, and musical sounds with written notes.

http://snipurl.com/6ikun

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on November 25, 2008, 06:26:08 PM
Quote from: Kai on November 25, 2008, 05:16:43 PM
Foes of Stem Cell Research Now Face Tough Battle
from the San Francisco Chronicle

(Associated Press)—When the Bush presidency ends, opponents of embryonic stem cell research will face a new political reality that many feel powerless to stop.

President-elect Barack Obama is expected to lift restrictions on federal money for such research. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., also has expressed interest in going ahead with legislation in the first 100 days of the new Congress if it still is necessary to set up a regulatory framework.

"We may lose it, but we're going to continually fight it and offer the ethical alternative," said Rep. Joe Pitts, R-Pa. "I don't know what the votes will be in the new Congress ... but it's very possible we could lose this thing."

http://snipurl.com/6ie98 


(http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/609/smallestviolinwz4.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cainad (dec.) on November 26, 2008, 02:34:04 AM
QuoteCriminology: Can the Can
from the Economist

A place that is covered in graffiti and festooned with rubbish makes people feel uneasy. And with good reason, according to a group of researchers in the Netherlands. Kees Keizer and his colleagues at the University of Groningen deliberately created such settings as a part of a series of experiments designed to discover if signs of vandalism, litter and low-level lawbreaking could change the way people behave.

They found that they could, by a lot: doubling the number who are prepared to litter and steal. The idea that observing disorder can have a psychological effect on people has been around for a while.

In the late 1980s George Kelling, a former probation officer who now works at Rutgers University, initiated what became a vigorous campaign to remove graffiti from New York City's subway system, which was followed by a reduction in petty crime. ... But the idea remains a controversial one, not least because it is often difficult to account for other factors that could influence crime reduction ...

http://snipurl.com/63ess

That is cool.

I mean, that is REALLY cool. I wonder what it can tell us about PosterGASMing and other activities that make places seem weirder without damaging them.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on November 28, 2008, 09:51:20 PM
I don't like it, in fact. IMO, Graffiti can be used to pretty up otherwise boring places, and I'd be sad if it's coupled with a rise in criminal activity. But it's probably part of the general "messy" feeling it gives, so I suppose that "tagged" (stupid scribbles) walls and alleys are worse than the ones with colourful "pieces" (art) on them.

Also, that's my university. I wonder if this Kees Keizer guy did the experiments in my hometown as well, in which case I should try to find the locations, right?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on November 28, 2008, 09:54:40 PM
wait i should read the article first, the experiments they conducted were pretty cool:

QuoteHis group’s first study was conducted in an alley that is frequently used to park bicycles. As in all of their experiments, the researchers created two conditions: one of order and the other of disorder. In the former, the walls of the alley were freshly painted; in the latter, they were tagged with graffiti (but not elaborately, to avoid the perception that it might be art). In both states a large sign prohibiting graffiti was put up, so that it would not be missed by anyone who came to collect a bicycle. All the bikes then had a flyer promoting a non-existent sports shop attached to their handlebars. This needed to be removed before a bicycle could be ridden.

When owners returned, their behaviour was secretly observed. There were no rubbish bins in the alley, so a cyclist had three choices. He could take the flyer with him, hang it on another bicycle (which the researchers counted as littering) or throw it to the floor. When the alley contained graffiti, 69% of the riders littered compared with 33% when the walls were clean.

To remove one possible bias—that litter encourages more litter—the researchers inconspicuously picked up each castaway flyer. Nor, they say, could the effect be explained by litterers assuming that because the spraying of graffiti had not been prevented, it was also unlikely that they would be caught. Littering, Dr Keizer observes, is generally tolerated by the police in Groningen.

QuoteThe other experiments were carried out in a similar way. In one, a temporary fence was used to close off a short cut to a car park, except for a narrow gap. Two signs were erected, one telling people there was no throughway and the other saying that bicycles must not be left locked to the fence. In the “order” condition (with four bicycles parked nearby, but not locked to the fence) 27% of people were prepared to trespass by stepping through the gap, whereas in the disorder condition (with the four bikes locked to the fence, in violation of the sign) 82% took the short cut.

Nor were the effects limited to visual observation of petty criminal behaviour. It is against the law to let off fireworks in the Netherlands for several weeks before New Year’s Eve. So two weeks before the festival the researchers randomly let off firecrackers near a bicycle shed at a main railway station and watched what happened using their flyer technique. With no fireworks, 48% of people took the flyers with them when they collected their bikes. With fireworks, this fell to 20%.

The most dramatic result, though, was the one that showed a doubling in the number of people who were prepared to steal in a condition of disorder. In this case an envelope with a €5 ($6) note inside (and the note clearly visible through the address window) was left sticking out of a post box. In a condition of order, 13% of those passing took the envelope (instead of leaving it or pushing it into the box). But if the post box was covered in graffiti, 27% did. Even if the post box had no graffiti on it, but the area around it was littered with paper, orange peel, cigarette butts and empty cans, 25% still took the envelope.

The researchers’ conclusion is that one example of disorder, like graffiti or littering, can indeed encourage another, like stealing. Dr Kelling was right. The message for policymakers and police officers is that clearing up graffiti or littering promptly could help fight the spread of crime.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 05, 2008, 03:49:04 AM
December 3, 2008

U.S. Lags In Providing College Access, Study Finds
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Other countries are outpacing the United States in providing access to college, eroding an educational advantage the nation has enjoyed for decades, according to a study released today by the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education.

The nonprofit research group contends that if left unaddressed, the development will harm U.S. competitiveness in the near future.

"I don't know what it's going to take to get our nation to wake up to what's happening with regard to the education deficit we're building," said William E. Kirwan, chancellor of the University System of Maryland, who will present a similar study by the College Board on improving access to higher education next week.

http://snipurl.com/72ke3


Triple Helix: Designing a New Molecule of Life
from Scientific American

For all the magnificent diversity of life on this planet, ranging from tiny bacteria to majestic blue whales, from sunshine-harvesting plants to mineral-digesting endoliths miles underground, only one kind of "life as we know it" exists.

All these organisms are based on nucleic acids—DNA and RNA—and proteins, working together more or less as described by the so-called central dogma of molecular biology: DNA stores information that is transcribed into RNA, which then serves as a template for producing a protein. The proteins, in turn, serve as important structural elements in tissues and, as enzymes, are the cell's workhorses.

Yet scientists dream of synthesizing life that is utterly alien to this world—both to better understand the minimum components required for life (as part of the quest to uncover the essence of life and how life originated on earth) and, frankly, to see if they can do it. That is, they hope to put together a novel combination of molecules that can self-organize, metabolize (make use of an energy source), grow, reproduce and evolve.

http://snipurl.com/71hru 


Amphibian Extinctions: Is Global Warming Off the Hook?
from National Geographic News

The world's amphibians are in dire straits—but global warming may not be the problem, a new study suggests. Previous research has pinned steep declines in amphibian species on rising global temperatures, which are said to be fueling the growth of a deadly fungus.

Most experts agree that the disease-causing chytrid fungus Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis is taking a terrible toll on frogs and toads. One in three species worldwide is threatened with extinction.

"There seems to be convincing evidence that chytrid fungus is the bullet killing amphibians," said University of South Florida biologist Jason Rohr, lead author of the study, published in a recent issue of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "But the evidence that climate change is pulling the trigger is weak at this point."

http://snipurl.com/71hl5


Top 10 Innovations of 2008
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

The life sciences move fast. Across the globe, companies are constantly churning out new products that they say will make your research smarter.

For six years, the Scientist has ranked the vendors of life science equipment in its Life Science Industry Awards. Now, to recognize winning combinations of invention, vision and utility, the magazine presents its first-ever ranking of the best innovations to hit the life science market in the past year.

A panel of expert judges was asked to sort through the year's offerings and pick the ones likely to have the biggest impact. Our judges—David Piston, Simon Watkins, Klaus Hahn, and Steven Wiley—are all known for pushing the technical boundaries, and have collectively published more than 700 scholarly articles.

http://snipurl.com/718at


Born to Run? Little Ones Get Test for Sports Gene
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

BOULDER, Colo.—When Donna Campiglia learned recently that a genetic test might be able to determine which sports suit the talents of her 2 ½-year-old son, Noah, she instantly said, Where can I get it and how much does it cost?

... In health-conscious, sports-oriented Boulder, Atlas Sports Genetics is playing into the obsessions of parents by offering a $149 test that aims to predict a child's natural athletic strengths. The process is simple. Swab inside the child's cheek and along the gums to collect DNA and return it to a lab for analysis of ACTN3, one gene among more than 20,000 in the human genome.

... In this era of genetic testing, DNA is being analyzed to determine predispositions to disease, but experts raise serious questions about marketing it as a first step in finding a child's sports niche ...

http://snipurl.com/6ykjn


Stress Reduction: Why You Need to Get a Grip and How
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Stocks are falling. Companies are handing out pink slips. Home values are collapsing. Financial icons are folding. And Americans' stress is rising.

The 2008 Stress in America survey, conducted by the American Psychological Assn. and released in October, found that stress levels have increased significantly over the last two years, particularly in the last six months. Money and the economy top the list of concerns.

As the economy plummets and stress levels soar, people need to find ways to manage their stress—or more than their investments will suffer. Chronic unresolved stress weakens the immune system, ... and when stress increases, so does inflammation, contributing to stroke, arthritis, Type 2 diabetes, periodontal disease and frailty. Additionally, studies have shown, the cumulative effects of unresolved psychological stress contribute to heart disease and high blood pressure.

http://snipurl.com/6zvzm


A Land Rush in Wyoming Spurred by Wind Power
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WHEATLAND, Wyo.—The man who came to Elsie Bacon's ranch house door in July asked the 71-year-old widow to grant access to a right of way across the dry hills and short grasses of her land here. Ms. Bacon remembered his insistence on a quick, secret deal.

The man, a representative of the Little Rose Wind Farm of Boulder, Colo., sought an easement for a transmission line to carry his company's wind-generated electricity to market. ...

A quiet land rush is under way among the buttes of southeastern Wyoming, and it is changing the local rancher culture. The whipping winds cursed by descendants of the original homesteaders now have real value for out-of-state developers who dream of wind farms or of selling the rights to bigger companies.

http://snipurl.com/6ykov


Experts Debate CyberKnife for Prostate Cancer
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

When Georgetown University Hospital bought a new high-tech system in 2001 to treat patients with radiation, doctors at first used the computerized, robotic device only for brain and spinal tumors that would be difficult if not impossible to fight any other way.

But Georgetown, along with Virginia Hospital Center and others around the country, is now aggressively marketing the $4 million machine, known as the CyberKnife, for early prostate cancer, one of the most common cancers. That trend has sparked an intense debate about whether it represents an important advancement or the latest example of an expensive and potentially profitable new technology proliferating too soon.

While its advocates say the CyberKnife offers prostate cancer patients a safe and effective—and much more convenient—alternative to traditional radiation treatment, many experts fear that it could leave many men unnecessarily vulnerable to recurrences or potentially serious complications.

http://snipurl.com/6wkos


Food Crunch Opens Doors to Bioengineered Crops
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

KUNMING, China (Associated Press)—Zeng Yawen's outdoor laboratory in the terraced hills of southern China is a trove of genetic potential—rice that thrives in unusually cool temperatures, high altitudes or in dry soil; rice rich in calcium, vitamins or iron.

"See these plants? They can tolerate the cold," Zeng says as he walks through a checkerboard of test fields sown with different rice varieties on the outskirts of Kunming, capital of southwestern China's Yunnan province. "We can extract the cold-tolerant gene from this plant and use it in a genetically manipulated variety to improve its cold tolerance ..."

In a mountainous place like Yunnan, and in many other parts of the developing world, such advantages can tip the balance between hunger and a decent living. And China is now ready to tip that scale in favor of genetically modified crops.

http://snipurl.com/6ylhd


Apollo 8: The Mission that Changed Everything
from the Guardian (UK)

It has proved to be the most enduring image we have of our fragile world. Over a colourless lunar surface, the Earth hangs like a gaudy Christmas bauble against a deep black background.

The planet's blue disc—half in shadow—is streaked with faint traces of white, yellow and brown while its edge is sharply defined. There is no blurring that might be expected from the blanket of oxygen and nitrogen that envelops our planet.

Our atmosphere is too thin to be seen clearly from the Moon: a striking reminder—if we ever needed one—of the frailty of the biosphere that sustains life on Earth.

http://snipurl.com/6yl0y

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 05, 2008, 03:54:41 AM
December 2, 2008

A New Picture of the Early Earth
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The first 700 million years of Earth's 4.5-billion-year existence are known as the Hadean period, after Hades, or, to shed the ancient Greek name, Hell.

That name seemed to fit with the common perception that the young Earth was a hot, dry, desolate landscape interspersed with seas of magma and inhospitable for life. Even if some organism had somehow popped into existence, the old story went, surely it would soon have been extinguished in the firestorm of one of the giant meteorites that slammed into the Earth when the young solar system was still crowded with debris.

... Norman H. Sleep, a professor of geophysics at Stanford, recalled that in 1986 he submitted a paper that calculated the probability of life surviving one of the giant, early impacts. It was summarily rejected because a reviewer said that obviously nothing could have lived then. That is no longer thought to be true.

http://snipurl.com/714t2 


Drug 'Could Cure Jet Lag'
from the Telegraph (UK)

A new cure for jet lag, which can reset the body's natural sleep rhythms, could be on the market within three years after tests proved successful. The new pill works by mimicking the effects of melatonin, the so-called sleep hormone, on the body.

Results of trials on the drug, called tasimelteon, published in the Lancet medical journal, show that it can cut the amount of time that it takes sufferers to fall asleep and keep them asleep for longer. The new drug is also likely to be less addictive than other more traditional medications used to help sleep, such as valium.

Writing in the Lancet Dr Daniel Cardinali, from the University of Buenos Aires in Argentina, who reviewed the results of the study, said that the findings would be welcomed by "shift-workers, airline crew, tourists, football teams and many others".

http://snipurl.com/715db


DNA Gleaned from Ancient Coral Unlocks Clues about Warming
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

The skeletons in the Earth's closet reveal not only a dark past. They also cast a light on its future.

That is what Tim Shank discovered when he sent an underwater robot to sweep up a basket full of broccoli-like fossils from volcanoes under the sea. Shank, a researcher at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, found skeletons of 35,000- to 40,000-year-old corals littered on the New England Seamounts in the North Atlantic. He took them back to his laboratory, extracted what he could of their remaining DNA fragments, and started to piece together their past.

Their story—and similar ones gleaned from the DNA of ancient spiders entombed in ice cores, and the bones of dodos and woolly mammoths—tells us how ancient creatures survived or disappeared as a result of dramatic climate changes. That, in turn, provides a preview of how today's flora and fauna might react to global warming.

http://snipurl.com/714y9


1 in 5 Young Adults Has Personality Disorder
from USA Today

CHICAGO (Associated Press)—Almost one in five young American adults has a personality disorder that interferes with everyday life, and even more abuse alcohol or drugs, researchers reported Monday in the most extensive study of its kind.

The disorders include problems such as obsessive or compulsive tendencies and anti-social behavior that can sometimes lead to violence. The study also found that fewer than 25% of college-aged Americans with mental problems get treatment.

One expert said personality disorders may be overdiagnosed. But others said the results were not surprising since previous, less rigorous evidence has suggested mental problems are common on college campuses and elsewhere. Experts praised the study's scope—face-to-face interviews about numerous disorders with more than 5,000 young people ages 19 to 25—and said it spotlights a problem college administrators need to address.

http://snipurl.com/7150x 


Dig Unearths Stone Age Sculptures
from BBC News Online

Rare artefacts from the late Stone Age have been uncovered in Russia. The site at Zaraysk, 150km south-east of Moscow, has yielded figurines and carvings on mammoth tusks.

The finds also included a cone-shaped object whose function, the authors report in the journal Antiquity, "remains a puzzle." Such artistic artefacts have been found in the nearby regions of Kostenki and Avdeevo, but this is the first such discovery at Zaraysk.

The Upper Palaeolithic is the latter part of the Stone Age, during which humans made the transition from functional tool-making to art and adornment.

http://snipurl.com/7153g


Huge Impact Crater Uncovered in Canadian Forest
from National Geographic News

About 1,100 years ago a space rock the size of a big tree stump slammed into western Canada, carving an amphitheater-like crater into the ground and littering it with meteorites, a new study found.

The rock that made the newly identified crater might have created a sky show similar to the one that tore across northern Alberta's skies in the early evening hours of November 20.

But unlike the recent fireball—which broke apart as it streaked through Earth's atmosphere—the meteorite that carved the newly announced crater would have stayed solid until impact. "You need to have that wallop," said study author Christopher Herd, an associate professor of earth and atmospheric sciences at the University of Alberta in Edmonton.

http://snipurl.com/6wp5l


First Inventory of Life at Poles
from BBC News Online

The first comprehensive inventory of the sea and land animals living in a polar region has been carried out by British and German scientists.

A team from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) and Hamburg University found that Antarctica's South Orkney Islands were surprisingly rich in life. More than 1,200 species were counted, including five new to science.

The data, published in the Journal of Biogeography, will help to monitor how the animals respond to future changes. David Barnes, from BAS, said: "This is the first time this has been done, not just anywhere in Antarctica, but anywhere in either polar region."

http://snipurl.com/6zq2i 


Polar Opposites
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

In the 2003 science fiction movie "The Core," the Earth stood still. Or more precisely, its molten outer core stopped flowing, spelling an end to the planet's protective magnetic field and the beginning of a slew of global catastrophes ...

... It's all utterly implausible except for one thing: Every once in a while, the Earth's magnetic field does actually, sort of, disappear.

Or more precisely, the field reverses polarity, switching magnetic poles so that a compass needle that once pointed north now points south. Such reversals have happened many times over the history of the Earth. Some scientists say there's evidence to suggest the poles are preparing to flip again.

http://snipurl.com/6w5av 


Report Sounds Alarm Over Bioterror
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Seven years after the 2001 anthrax attacks, a congressionally ordered study finds a growing threat of biological terrorism and calls for aggressive defenses on par with those used to prevent a terrorist nuclear detonation.

Due for release this week, a draft of the study warns that future bioterrorists may use new technology to make synthetic versions of killers such as Ebola, or genetically modified germs designed to resist ordinary vaccines and antibiotics.

The bipartisan report faults the Bush administration for devoting insufficient resources to prevent an attack and says U.S. policies have at times impeded international biodefense efforts while promoting the rapid growth of a network of domestic laboratories possessing the world's most dangerous pathogens.

http://snipurl.com/6ykqo


Remains of the Slave Ship Trouvadore Found
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Texas researchers have discovered the wreck of the slave ship Trouvadore, which slammed into a reef off the coast of the Turks and Caicos Islands in 1841, freeing the 193 Africans who were being brought to the U.S. South for a life of servitude.

It is the only known wreck of a ship involved in the illegal slave trade, said marine archaeologist Don Keith, president of the underwater archaeology institute Ships of Discovery in Corpus Christi, Texas.

One of the female Africans on board was shot by the crew, but the rest escaped and were rescued by local authorities. Their descendants may now make up a significant proportion of the 30,000 residents of the island country. The Spanish crew members were captured and sent to Cuba for trial. Their fate is unknown.

http://snipurl.com/6zvqt

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on December 05, 2008, 06:01:04 AM
Quote from: Kai on December 05, 2008, 03:54:41 AM
1 in 5 Young Adults Has Personality Disorder
from USA Today

CHICAGO (Associated Press)—Almost one in five young American adults has a personality disorder that interferes with everyday life, and even more abuse alcohol or drugs, researchers reported Monday in the most extensive study of its kind.

The disorders include problems such as obsessive or compulsive tendencies and anti-social behavior that can sometimes lead to violence. The study also found that fewer than 25% of college-aged Americans with mental problems get treatment.

One expert said personality disorders may be overdiagnosed. But others said the results were not surprising since previous, less rigorous evidence has suggested mental problems are common on college campuses and elsewhere. Experts praised the study's scope—face-to-face interviews about numerous disorders with more than 5,000 young people ages 19 to 25—and said it spotlights a problem college administrators need to address.

http://snipurl.com/7150x 
This number seemed really high until I saw that they included depression in the study.  Now the numbers seem low. I figured that the percentage of college aged students with depression would be a lot higher than 7%. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 05, 2008, 03:24:12 PM
I'M THE GUY WHO SUCKS

PLUS I GOT DEPRESSION.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 05, 2008, 03:54:12 PM
Quote from: Nigel on December 05, 2008, 03:24:12 PM
I'M THE GUY WHO SUCKS

PLUS I GOT DEPRESSION.

:/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on December 05, 2008, 04:09:46 PM
QuoteThe finds also included a cone-shaped object whose function, the authors report in the journal Antiquity, "remains a puzzle."


It was obviously for the Pterodactyls.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 07, 2008, 12:08:01 AM
Quote from: Kai on December 05, 2008, 03:54:12 PM
Quote from: Nigel on December 05, 2008, 03:24:12 PM
I'M THE GUY WHO SUCKS

PLUS I GOT DEPRESSION.

:/

From http://achewood.com/index.php?date=08042003 :

(http://m.assetbar.com/achewood/autaux?b=M%5ea11f09b8576e606bcb5038dfdb92fb821&u=http%3A%2F%2Fachewood.com%2Fcomic.php%3Fdate%3D08042003)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on December 08, 2008, 01:00:14 AM
photosynthetic slugs wtf?

Quote
Two quite different groups of sea slugs have evolved ways of using the ability of plants to convert the sun's energy into sugars and other nutrients. In simple terms they have become "solar powered".

http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall.cfm?base=solarpow (http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall.cfm?base=solarpow)

I want photosynthesis too!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 08, 2008, 02:09:57 AM
Quote from: Regret on December 08, 2008, 01:00:14 AM
photosynthetic slugs wtf?

Quote
Two quite different groups of sea slugs have evolved ways of using the ability of plants to convert the sun's energy into sugars and other nutrients. In simple terms they have become "solar powered".

http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall.cfm?base=solarpow (http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall.cfm?base=solarpow)

I want photosynthesis too!

Me too... no fair!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 08, 2008, 11:27:09 PM
Quote from: Regret on December 08, 2008, 01:00:14 AM
photosynthetic slugs wtf?

Quote
Two quite different groups of sea slugs have evolved ways of using the ability of plants to convert the sun's energy into sugars and other nutrients. In simple terms they have become "solar powered".

http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall.cfm?base=solarpow (http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall.cfm?base=solarpow)

I want photosynthesis too!

ProTIP: Most corals are "solar powered" too. All lichens are.

Its endosymbiosis with algae, and its awesome. It doesn't surprise me that some nudibranchs are doing it. What surprises me is the storage, not of the whole algae, but just of the plastids. The reason it suprises and excites me is because this is the way plants evolved, through endosymbiosis of photosynthetic bacteria. Thats how algae came about, and then other types of animals ate that type of algae and made a NEW type. Srsly, I think its dinoflagellates that came about by tertiary endosymbiosis. Anyway, that you see this indicates that there may be an eventual movement towards total endosymbiosis and animals that not only contain plastids but transfer them during reproduction. Its pretty incredible.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on December 09, 2008, 12:46:46 AM
Quote from: Kai on December 08, 2008, 11:27:09 PM
Quote from: Regret on December 08, 2008, 01:00:14 AM
photosynthetic slugs wtf?

Quote
Two quite different groups of sea slugs have evolved ways of using the ability of plants to convert the sun's energy into sugars and other nutrients. In simple terms they have become "solar powered".

http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall.cfm?base=solarpow (http://www.seaslugforum.net/showall.cfm?base=solarpow)

I want photosynthesis too!

ProTIP: Most corals are "solar powered" too. All lichens are.

Its endosymbiosis with algae, and its awesome. It doesn't surprise me that some nudibranchs are doing it. What surprises me is the storage, not of the whole algae, but just of the plastids. The reason it suprises and excites me is because this is the way plants evolved, through endosymbiosis of photosynthetic bacteria. Thats how algae came about, and then other types of animals ate that type of algae and made a NEW type. Srsly, I think its dinoflagellates that came about by tertiary endosymbiosis. Anyway, that you see this indicates that there may be an eventual movement towards total endosymbiosis and animals that not only contain plastids but transfer them during reproduction. Its pretty incredible.

hence the 'wtf?'

this reminds me of a scifi book about mars where mons olympus was one living creature chockfull of endosymbiosis but i forgot what the book was called.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 09, 2008, 06:37:36 AM
Well, its like I said essentially the way most algal groups evolved. Algae before they were photosynthetic were probably all free living and heterotropic, obtaining food from the environment.

There are some microorganisms that still do exactly what those nudibranchs do. There is a whole division of algae that have endosymbiotic cyanobacteria more or less changed from the non endosymbiotic type. There is so much weird stuff out there.

I mean, think of diatoms here for a second. First of all, they're photosynthetic by secondary endosymbiosis, so a bluegreen was eaten by a brown was eaten by some organism that became a yellow-green algae. Diatoms then evolved this hard exterior frustule which is composed of silicon dioxide, so basically glass. The frustule is in two parts, a bottom layer and a top layer. The two parts overlap each other like a petri dish. And you start thinking about how these things move, they actually excrete a fluid that pushes them along, a sort of microscopic slime trail. And they have this weird life cycle which involves both asexual and sexual elements.

So, you got this photosynthetic organism, with weird life cycle and a glass case that moves itself around like a slug. And THEN you start looking at all the amazing shapes and surface structures of these frustules, pits, ridges, grooves, pores.

Do I need to talk about lichens? Do I need to go into the fact that a fungus is basically a mat of fillamentous cell structures that dissolves dead or decaying organic matter, and then creates these elaborate reproductive structures which we then eat? Do I have to talk about catepilars that build underwater nets to filter food, or snakes that can dorsoventrally flatten their bodies to glide through the air? Should I even consider mentioning fungus that feeds off of radioactive decay, tubeworms that live around thermal vents several km down in the ocean, tardigrades that can survive in outer space?

This world is bizarre and wonderful and wild and evolution is a beautiful game that shows the best that the emergent creativity in the universe has to offer. I don't know how ANYONE can fail to be entertained, amazed, intrigued, engrossed, or amused with this planet. I don't know how anyone can be bored with living things. Every time I LOOK I hear about Acacia trees that have sugar glands and hollow horns so that ants will nest and protect, or colossal squid 8 meters long with huge claws on their suckers, or orangutans fishing with spears, or FUCK even bacteria or turfgrass or CORN is interesting if you look hard enough. Barbara McClintock pretty much put the period on that idea. I could go on and on for hours about these things.

I don't know how anyone can't.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 09, 2008, 07:11:28 AM
No no no, I'll go on. I'm inspired now. Theres this caddisfly larva in the family Polycentropodidae. It makes this tube like web and lines of silk running outward from the edges. It senses when its prey is near, feels the vibrations on the threads and darts out to grab its prey, and this is all going on underwater.

Dragonfly naiads have a hinged and fanged lower jaw that shoots out alien style to catch food, sometimes fish sized organisms.

Back to the algae again, there are these organisms called Euglenoids. They are photosynthetic but heterotrophic, just like the nudibranchs above. They can get energy from the plastids and they can eat stuff. Plus, they have this weird exoskelleton that can change shape from a sphere to almost any sort of spheroid.

Or maybe to grasses. Grasses have some of the most amazing and complex flowers you will ever see, and include everything from woody bamboo to kentucky blue. They are almost all wind polinated too.

And speaking of polination, no really. Think of all the species of insects and plants that are made possible by the pollination symbiosis. First just consider directly all the plants that have flowers that are pollinated in some way by insects, and the insects that directly pollinate them. So, this includes most flowering plants excluding those that are wind pollinated, as well as thousands of species of insects.

Now consider all those organisms that live on and around those plants.

Now consider all those organisms that feed on those plants.

Now consider all those organisms that feed on the organisms that are feeding on those plants, or are feeding on the pollinators of those plants, or are feeding on the organisms that live and feed on those plants, etc etc etc, ad infinitum.

Ecology is fucking amazing and wild and FUCK.

YOU start thinking of all the connections begining with one species and increase the bounds outwards until it includes everything living on this planet and all the interactions with the environment RIGHT NOW, and then extend that forward and backward in time and see if you don't start sobbing like a little child at the immensity of it like I am right now, like I am whenever I consider it, like people do when they stare at the stars and consider the distance. YOU start looking at the connections, and maybe the reason I wrote The Process will become clear and obvious, because when you reach that threshold, when you consider the cell to the biosphere, a single organism to world ecology, bacteria to all the complexity, the past workings of creativity, the future workings of creativity, the innate capacity for creativity and tie it all together you are standing at the door of infinity, and you glimpse the Process that overlies it all and it destroys you and rebuilds you from the inside out until you are whole. Once you start considering THIS immensity, the stars seem close, and the distances small, because the innate emergent creativity here, on this planet, is greater than anything we have found out there, or daresay will ever find.

You want amazement, you want awe, you want eternal excitement? Do you want to see GOD every day in every single drop of water, every single dust mote or grain of soil?


Go into Biology. Srsly.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on December 09, 2008, 12:31:51 PM
I nominate the last two posts as not only :potd:, but Verriwung blog worthy.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on December 09, 2008, 02:15:47 PM
:mittens: for Kai.  That was awesome.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on December 09, 2008, 03:14:22 PM
Kai, I keep wondering about whether humans will turn out as endosymbionts of corporations or nations or stuff. Do you think that might happen? (or perhaps endosymbiosis is the wrong word if the organism is actually exclusively made up of its symbionts).

And if so, do you think that perhaps human's particular kind of self-conscious thought could make the species have a sort of choice in the matter? Unlike, for example, the bacteria that live in our intestines?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 09, 2008, 04:32:19 PM
Thank you. I was on a roll last night and as much as I hate writing, it just seemed to come out Joycean style. This is the sort of thing I think about in the late hours of the night. Note I wrote this 1 am eastern time. Afterwards I spent an hour just looking at the drawings in Wiggins' book. If you want it for Verriwung it needs some cleaning up because I refer to the above posts.

@ Zero: I don't think endosymbiont is the right word for what you are considering. Endosymbiont is a biological term that describes an organism that lives within  another organism but there is either benefit for both parties or neither is harmed (as opposed to parasitic relationships). For example, the algae (phycobiont) portion of lichens (the other portion being the fungus, the mycobiont) is an endosymbiont.

What I think you are refering to is some type of dependent system, but its social in nature so I don't think biological terms would work. In biology, a symbiontic relationship would be termed 'obligate'.


The bactera in our intestines, the gut fauna in genera, is another mutualist relationship like the above. I'm not really sure what you are asking I guess. Symbiotic relationships are pretty much confined to biology by definition.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 09, 2008, 06:21:30 PM
December 8, 2008

Lack of Sleep Has Genetic Link with Type 2 Diabetes
from Science News

Sleep is a mystery. Although no one knows exactly why, it's required for good health. But now, scientists have found a surprisingly clear connection between sleep and a healthy body: the regulation of sugar levels in the blood.

The new studies, all online December 7 in Nature Genetics, describe the first genetic link between sleep and type 2 diabetes, a disease marked by high blood sugar levels.

... The investigations by three international teams of researchers suggest the trends of rising diabetes and falling sleep are linked via a protein that senses the sleep-inducing hormone melatonin. The research places bodily rhythms, including the clock that sets human sleep cycles, squarely in the blood sugar business.

http://snipurl.com/7nigh


Large Hadron Collider to Get Helium Leak Warning System
from the Times (London)

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is to have an early-warning system installed to guard against a repeat of the catastrophic fault that caused the world's largest atom-smasher to break down nine days after it was switched on in September.

CERN, the European particle physics laboratory near Geneva, is to fit the accelerator with 100 miles (160km) of cables and 2,000 crates of electronic monitors, so that engineers will be alerted to potentially hazardous abnormalities before they can cause serious damage.

The £4 billion "big bang machine," which was switched on to global acclaim on September 10, was shut down after a huge helium leak caused extensive damage to many of its magnets.

http://snipurl.com/7nhy9 


Religious 'Shun Nanotechnology'
from BBC News Online

Attitudes to nanotechnology may be determined by religious and cultural beliefs, suggest researchers writing in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

They say religious people tend to view nanotechnology in a negative light. The researchers compared attitudes in Europe and the US and looked at religious and cultural backgrounds.

They say the findings have implications for scientists and politicians making policy decisions to regulate the use of nanotechnology. The researchers compared attitudes to nanotechnology in 12 European countries and the US.

http://snipurl.com/7nhv5


Study: Poverty Dramatically Affects Children's Brains
from USA Today

A new study finds that certain brain functions of some low-income 9- and 10-year-olds pale in comparison with those of wealthy children and that the difference is almost equivalent to the damage from a stroke.

"It is a similar pattern to what's seen in patients with strokes that have led to lesions in their prefrontal cortex," which controls higher-order thinking and problem solving, says lead researcher Mark Kishiyama, a cognitive psychologist at the University of California-Berkeley. "It suggests that in these kids, prefrontal function is reduced or disrupted in some way."

The study adds to a growing body of evidence that shows how poverty afflicts children's brains. Researchers have long pointed to the ravages of malnutrition, stress, illiteracy and toxic environments in low-income children's lives. Research has shown that the neural systems of poor children develop differently from those of middle-class children ...

http://snipurl.com/7nhrg


Pre-Columbian Tribes Had BBQs, Parties on Grave Sites
from National Geographic News

Some pre-Hispanic cultures in South America had elaborate celebrations at their cemeteries, complete with feasting and drinking grounds much like modern barbecue pits, according to a new archaeological study.

Excavations of 12th- and 13th-century burial mounds in the highlands of Brazil and Argentina revealed numerous earthen ovens. The finds suggest that the graves were also sites of regular festivals held to commemorate the death of the community's chief.

"After they buried an important person on the burial grounds, they feasted on meat that had been steamed in the earth ovens and drank maize beer," said archaeologist and study co-author José Iriarte.

http://snipurl.com/7nimi 


Termites Show Complexity of Biofuel Work
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Researchers have scooped soil near the Quabbin Reservoir, visited a Russian volcano, and scoured the bottom of the sea looking for microbes that hold the key to new biofuels. Now, they are investigating deeper into the belly of termites.

The otherwise dreaded insect is a model bug bioreactor, adept at the difficult task of breaking down wood and turning it into fuel. Learning the secret of that skill could open the door to creating a new class of plant-based fuels to offset the nation's reliance on petroleum products. What scientists have learned so far, however, suggests it won't be easy to duplicate nature.

Over the past year, several studies elucidating termite innards have appeared in mainstream science journals. And last month, Japanese researchers added their own report on just how termites digest wood. A key, they said, can be found within termites' bodies like nested Russian dolls—a bacteria that lives within a microorganism that lives within the termite gut.

http://snipurl.com/7nhng


Self-Injury on the Rise Among Young People
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The revelation was shocking enough. That a growing number of teenagers and young adults deliberately embed needles, paper clips or staples in their skin may have seemed unthinkable before an Ohio radiologist presented disturbing proof at a medical meeting Wednesday.

Even more disturbing than his X-rays and accompanying report, however, could be the size and pervasiveness of the trend from which it derives—self-injury. Cutting, burning and biting one's body is a habit increasingly taken up by young people who find themselves simply unable to cope with stress. Embedding appears to represent a more extreme form of the disorder.

"We always saw a little bit of this, but it was in people already identified as having a psychiatric disorder," says Janis Whitlock, a prominent researcher on self-injury at Cornell University. "What doesn't seem to make much sense is why we're seeing it so much in seemingly healthy kids."

http://snipurl.com/7nhjd


Brain of 'Most Studied' Amnesiac Will Be Evaluated
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Henry Gustav Molaison, who died Sunday at the age of 82, will be remembered as the man who could not remember.

Better known by his initials, H.M., Molaison was unable to form new memories. Every face, every event was experienced anew. His amnesia—the unforeseen consequence of brain surgery—made him "the most studied individual in the history of science," said Dr. James Brewer, a neurologist at University of California San Diego.

Over the course of half a century, H.M. (initials were used to protect his privacy) was the object of hundreds of studies, some of which fundamentally changed science's understanding of brain structure, memory function and neurological disease. Even after his death, that work will continue.

http://snipurl.com/7nib7 


What Happens When Silicon Can Shrink No More?
from New Scientist

In 1965, a year before the first pocket calculator was invented, a young physicist from Silicon Valley, Gordon Moore, made a daring prediction. He claimed that the number of components squeezed onto a single silicon chip would double about every two years. And double, and double and continue to double. If he had been right, the best silicon chips today would contain an unbelievable 100 million single components.

The true figure is more like 2 billion: Moore had underestimated how fast the shrinking trend would take off. Since the mid-1970s, though, his "law" has been a bankable certainty, influencing economic, social and scientific developments in ways that are hard to overstate.

... Can the trend go on? Reports of the imminent death of Moore's law have been around almost as long as the law itself, and have always proved exaggerated. But now there is concrete cause for concern. The smallest features on today's state-of-the-art chips are just a few nanometres across. At the current rate of shrinking, they will reach the size of a few silicon atoms by about 2020.

http://snipurl.com/7nip6 


In Defense of Teasing
from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

... Today teasing has been all but banished from the lives of many children. In recent years, high-profile school shootings and teenage suicides have inspired a wave of "zero tolerance" movements in our schools.

... And we are phasing out teasing in many other corners of social life as well. Sexual-harassment courses advise work colleagues not to tease or joke. Marriage counselors encourage direct criticism over playful provocation. No-taunting rules have even arisen in the N.B.A. and the N.F.L. to discourage "trash talking."

The reason teasing is viewed as inherently damaging is that it is too often confused with bullying. But bullying is something different; it's aggression, pure and simple. ... By contrast, teasing is a mode of play, no doubt with a sharp edge, in which we provoke to negotiate life's ambiguities and conflicts. And it is essential to making us fully human.

http://snipurl.com/7nhfk
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on December 09, 2008, 10:58:55 PM
Quote from: Kai on December 09, 2008, 06:21:30 PM

Religious 'Shun Nanotechnology'
from BBC News Online

Attitudes to nanotechnology may be determined by religious and cultural beliefs, suggest researchers writing in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

They say religious people tend to view nanotechnology in a negative light. The researchers compared attitudes in Europe and the US and looked at religious and cultural backgrounds.

They say the findings have implications for scientists and politicians making policy decisions to regulate the use of nanotechnology. The researchers compared attitudes to nanotechnology in 12 European countries and the US.

http://snipurl.com/7nhv5

:weary:  Do you ever get the feeling that shortly after the discovery of fire that there was a religious person there telling the whole tribe about how evil this new-fangled fire thing was and how it would completely destroy all of humanity?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on December 10, 2008, 12:02:40 AM
Quote from: Kai on December 09, 2008, 04:32:19 PM
Thank you. I was on a roll last night and as much as I hate writing, it just seemed to come out Joycean style. This is the sort of thing I think about in the late hours of the night. Note I wrote this 1 am eastern time. Afterwards I spent an hour just looking at the drawings in Wiggins' book. If you want it for Verriwung it needs some cleaning up because I refer to the above posts.

@ Zero: I don't think endosymbiont is the right word for what you are considering. Endosymbiont is a biological term that describes an organism that lives within  another organism but there is either benefit for both parties or neither is harmed (as opposed to parasitic relationships). For example, the algae (phycobiont) portion of lichens (the other portion being the fungus, the mycobiont) is an endosymbiont.

What I think you are refering to is some type of dependent system, but its social in nature so I don't think biological terms would work. In biology, a symbiontic relationship would be termed 'obligate'.


The bactera in our intestines, the gut fauna in genera, is another mutualist relationship like the above. I'm not really sure what you are asking I guess. Symbiotic relationships are pretty much confined to biology by definition.

ok cause the question wasn't so much about terminology, as it was about the future of the human race.

i can see corporations or nations or some super-human structure become sort of organisms. where, in the long run, human individuality (or freedom, or happiness, something) becomes second to the survival of this organism. it's already happening, if you listen to our rants about the Machine.
i see some kind of parallel with the kind of symbiosis present with intestinal bacteria, or mitochondria, or multicellular organisms for that matter. it seems to be a natural way of things, creating larger structures out of smaller elements. emergence. i'm not sure if i'd like to see humans end up that way, but i wonder if our self-conscious thought, being able to realize if it would happen, could make us be different?
it's a bit far-fetched, i know, but you know me, i wonder about these things at night ... ;-)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 10, 2008, 12:28:13 AM
Ants.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on December 10, 2008, 01:18:33 AM
yeah, so do you want to be an ant?

(heh, "waking life" reference)

ETA: do you want your far-offspring to be an ant?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 10, 2008, 02:07:07 AM
Quote from: Triple Zero on December 10, 2008, 01:18:33 AM
yeah, so do you want to be an ant?

(heh, "waking life" reference)

ETA: do you want your far-offspring to be an ant?

No. Then again, it would take a drastic change in human physiology to support such perfect communal behavior. Ants, bees, wasps, termites, and other social insects do it with pheromones that essentially control the workers.  I guess if you could  find a way to absolutely control people it would happen, but I don't think humans would enter by choice, not all of them anyway.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Golden Applesauce on December 10, 2008, 05:41:24 AM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on December 09, 2008, 10:58:55 PM
Quote from: Kai on December 09, 2008, 06:21:30 PM

Religious 'Shun Nanotechnology'
from BBC News Online

Attitudes to nanotechnology may be determined by religious and cultural beliefs, suggest researchers writing in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.

They say religious people tend to view nanotechnology in a negative light. The researchers compared attitudes in Europe and the US and looked at religious and cultural backgrounds.

They say the findings have implications for scientists and politicians making policy decisions to regulate the use of nanotechnology. The researchers compared attitudes to nanotechnology in 12 European countries and the US.

http://snipurl.com/7nhv5

:weary:  Do you ever get the feeling that shortly after the discovery of fire that there was a religious person there telling the whole tribe about how evil this new-fangled fire thing was and how it would completely destroy all of humanity?

Well, they were right, now weren't they?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on December 10, 2008, 07:56:13 PM
bad source, big jump to reach conclusion in title, interesting topic
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/3660141/Men-under-threat-from-gender-bending-chemicals.html

By Urmee Khan
Last Updated: 8:48AM GMT 08 Dec 2008

Scientists are warning that manmade pollutants which have escaped into the environment mimic the female sex hormone oestrogen.

The males of species including fish, amphibians, birds, and reptiles have been feminised by exposure to sex hormone disrupting chemicals and have been found to be abnormally making egg yolk protein, normally made by females, according to the report by Chem Trust, environmental group.

The authors claim that the chemicals found in food packaging, cleaning products, plastics, sewage and paint cause genital deformities, reduce sperm count and "feminise" males.

Fish have been specifically affected by the gender changing chemicals. In one study, half the male fish in British lowland rivers had signs of being feminised - as chemicals which block the male hormone androgen had been released- leading to the development of eggs in their testes.

Although the report only looked at the impact of gender bending chemicals on the animal world, its authors say the findings have disturbing implications for human health.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 11, 2008, 08:21:01 PM
December 10, 2008



Mystery Pyramid Built by Newfound Ancient Culture?
from National Geographic News

Several stone sculptures recently found in central Mexico point to a previously unknown culture that likely built a mysterious pyramid in the region, archaeologists say.

Archaeologists first found the objects about 15 years ago in the valley of Tulancingo, a major canyon that drops off into Mexico's Gulf Coast.

Most of the 41 artifacts "do not fit into any of the known cultures of the Valley of Tulancingo, or the highlands of central Mexico," said Carlos Hernández, an archaeologist at Mexico's National Institute of Anthropology and History in the central state of Hidalgo.

http://snipurl.com/7p5ex


Vitamins 'Do Not Cut Cancer Risk'
from BBC News Online

Taking vitamin C or E does not reduce the risk of prostate cancers—or other forms of the disease, two large US studies suggest.

Both trials were set up following some evidence that taking supplements might have a positive effect.

But one study of 35,533 men, and a second of 15,000 doctors, found no evidence that cancer rates were any lower in those taking supplements. Both studies feature in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

http://snipurl.com/7qis6 


Crashless Cars: Making Driving Safer
from Scientific American

... Within a few decades, experts say, many advanced cars will be able to avoid most crashes. At some point, in fact, they will drive themselves.

The main motivations for these innovations are clear enough. Some six million motor vehicle traffic accidents occurred in the U.S. in 2006, according to the National Highway and Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA).

... In the meantime, despite continuing calls for greater investment in mass transit, American roads are only growing more crowded. Similar circumstances prevail in the rest of the world, particularly in developing nations, where auto ownership is skyrocketing. Accident statistics indicate that driver error is the main cause of safety problems on the road ...

http://snipurl.com/7p5my


Malaria Vaccine Closer to Reality
from Science News

Firing new shots in the malaria war, a vaccine still in the testing stage is now a step closer to becoming a public health reality.

Two new reports, from Kenya and Tanzania, show that the vaccine halves a child's risk of getting malaria, setting the stage for an even larger trial that researchers hope will provide the definitive evidence needed for approval of what would be the first vaccine for the disease. The new studies appear in the Dec. 11 New England Journal of Medicine.

"This is the only malaria vaccine to have reached this level of testing. It's remarkable," says William Collins, a malaria researcher at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. "I think this justifies the usefulness of moving on to the more large-scale trial."

http://snipurl.com/7p5p7 


Researchers Put a Microscope on Food Allergies
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

CHICAGO—For 5-year-old Sean Batson, even a grandmother's kiss is to be feared. "My mother was wearing lipstick, and when she kissed Sean's cheek, it broke out in hives," said his mother, Jennifer Batson.

... The daily struggle of living with Sean's allergies to nearly unavoidable foods and food products—soy, eggs and milk, traces of which can turn up even in nonfoods like lipstick—prompted Mrs. Batson and her husband, Tim, to participate in a project that scientists are calling the most comprehensive food allergy study to date.

The international study, led by Dr. Xiaobin Wang and Dr. Jacqueline A. Pongracic of Children's Memorial Hospital here, is searching for causes of food allergy by looking at hundreds of families in Boston, Chicago and Anhui Province in China.

http://snipurl.com/7p65j


Top 10 Science Stories of 2008
from Time

The magazine presents its selection of the most significant science stories of the year. At the top of the list: Good news! The Large Hadron Collider (LHC)—the massive particle accelerator straddling the Swiss-French border—didn't destroy the world! The bad news: The contraption didn't really work either.

In second place: the Phoenix Mars Lander. For all the times robot probes have orbited or landed on Mars, none had ever visited its polar region—where the greatest concentrations of ice and water (and arguably the most evidence of life) are to be found.

Third on the list: Living things don't get a whole lot humbler than a bacterium, with its few hundred thousand genetic base pairs and its stripped-down physical design. Still, you try inventing one. That's what geneticist J. Craig Venter—one of the two men credited with mapping the human genome—managed to do.

http://snipurl.com/7p6qy


Neanderthal Genome Already Giving Up Its Secrets
from New Scientist

Half the Neanderthal genome has been decoded and the rest should be sequenced by year's end, a scientist involved in the project told a human evolution conference last week.

Researchers will roll out a rough draft of the Neanderthal nuclear genome after their sequencers have read every letter in the genome on average once—"1x coverage" in genomics speak.

However, the fragmentary state of the DNA sample—from bones recovered in Czech Republic—means that the first draft will offer only a tantalizing glimpse of the genome to researchers who hope to better understand Neanderthal biology and human evolution. Some 38,000 years of decay has left the DNA in tatters and strewn with contamination from bacteria and human handlers.

http://snipurl.com/7ph1e


International Science Exam Shows Plateau in U.S. Performance
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

U.S. students are doing no better on an international science exam than they were a decade ago, a plateau in performance that leaves educators and policymakers worried about how schools are preparing students to compete in an increasingly global economy.

Results of the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), released Tuesday, show how fourth- and eighth-graders in the United States measure up to peers in dozens of countries. U.S. students showed gains in math at both grades. But average science performance, although still stronger than in many countries, has stagnated since 1995.

Students in Singapore, Taiwan and Japan outperformed U.S. fourth-graders in science. So did students in the Chinese region of Hong Kong, counted as a separate participant. The U.S. students had an average score of 539 on a 1,000-point scale, higher than peers in 25 countries.

http://snipurl.com/7ph6v


Put All Eggs in One Nest? Birds Factor in Climate, Location
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

For biologists, the question wasn't about priority—as in which came first, the chicken or the egg—but quantity: Why do some bird species lay just one egg per nest, while others produce them by the nestful?

In a novel study published Tuesday in the journal PLoS Biology, researchers say they might have an answer: It's all about prudence, as in not putting all of your eggs in one nest—only a lot more complicated.

Scientists at UCSD, Stanford University and Johannes Gutenberg University in Germany analyzed decades of data on the clutch size (the number of eggs typically laid in a nest) of 5,290 bird species, more than half of all the known bird species in the world.

http://snipurl.com/7phvd


Black Hole Confirmed in Milky Way
from BBC News Online

There is a giant black hole at the centre of our galaxy, a study has confirmed.

German astronomers tracked the movement of 28 stars circling the centre of the Milky Way, using two telescopes in Chile. The black hole is four million times heavier than our Sun, according to the paper in The Astrophysical Journal.

Black holes are objects whose gravity is so great that nothing—including light—can escape them. According to Dr Robert Massey, of the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS), the results suggest that galaxies form around giant black holes in the way that a pearl forms around grit.

http://snipurl.com/7qijm

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 11, 2008, 08:23:11 PM
December 11, 2008

Survey Documents Popularity of Alternative Treatments
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

More than one-third of U.S. adults and nearly 12 percent of children use alternatives to traditional medicine, according to a large federal survey released today that documents how entrenched acupuncture, herbal remedies and other once-exotic therapies have become.

The survey of more than 32,000 Americans in 2007, which for the first time included children, found that use of yoga, "probiotics," fish oil and other "complementary and alternative" therapies held steady among adults since the last national survey five years earlier, and that such treatments have become part of health care for many youngsters.

... The most commonly used are dietary supplements and herbal products such as echinacea, flax seed oil and ginseng, followed by deep breathing exercises, meditation, chiropractors, massage and yoga.

http://snipurl.com/7quez


Sun's Cycles Can Forecast Floods, Drought?
from National Geographic News

The sun's fluctuations can help predict extreme climatic events on Earth decades ahead of time, new research suggests. Solar cycles are 11-year phases during which the sun's activity ebbs and flows, accompanied by an increase in sunspots on the sun's surface.

The cycles, which are driven by the sun's magnetic turbulence, may influence weather systems on Earth, particularly the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, a periodic climatic system associated with floods and droughts mostly in the Southern Hemisphere.

"The sun is the engine of our climate," said lead study author Robert Baker, of the University of New England in Australia. "It's like a vibrating string—its past vibrations can be used to predict future vibrations."

http://snipurl.com/7quws


Did Our Cosmos Exist Before the Big Bang?
from New Scientist

Abhay Ashtekar remembers his reaction the first time he saw the universe bounce. "I was taken aback," he says. He was watching a simulation of the universe rewind towards the big bang.

Mostly the universe behaved as expected, becoming smaller and denser as the galaxies converged. But then, instead of reaching the big bang "singularity," the universe bounced and started expanding again. What on earth was happening?

Ashtekar wanted to be sure of what he was seeing, so he asked his colleagues to sit on the result for six months before publishing it in 2006. And no wonder. The theory that the recycled universe was based on, called loop quantum cosmology (LQC), had managed to illuminate the very birth of the universe—something even Einstein's general theory of relativity fails to do.

http://snipurl.com/7qv2t


The Dirty Side of Clean Coal
from Scientific American

... Coal's benefits are considerable: cheap, plentiful energy that simultaneously injects cash into the poorest regions of the country. Coal holds such power that no U.S. administration—Republican or Democrat—has ever tried to stop mountaintop removal.

The full environmental cost is never tallied. No other energy source emits as much carbon dioxide when burned.

Coal is so cheap—and so plentiful—that experts generally agree global warming will never be contained until industrialized nations find a way to cap those emissions. And before coal burns, it has to be ripped from the ground.

http://snipurl.com/7qvbw


New Window on the High-Energy Universe
from Science News

VANCOUVER, Canada—Curtain up! Light the lights! In its first four months of monitoring the heavens from orbit, NASA's Fermi Gamma Ray Telescope has unveiled the activity of celestial objects that emit powerful gamma rays—photons that pack 20 million to more than 300 billion times the energy of visible light.

The orbiting observatory features the first detectors in space capable of recording the most energetic of these photons. For now, Fermi's flurry of first findings—which include new discoveries about gamma-ray bursts as well as the energetic radiation emitted by rapidly spinning stellar corpses called pulsars, several never before recorded—poses new puzzles.

But ultimately the discoveries will offer new insight into the origin of these powerful emissions and the activity of some of the most enigmatic objects in the cosmos, says Peter Michelson of Stanford University ...

http://snipurl.com/7qvgg


WHO: Cancer to Be World's Top Killer by 2010
from USA Today

ATLANTA (Associated Press)—Cancer will overtake heart disease as the world's top killer by 2010, part of a trend that should more than double global cancer cases and deaths by 2030, international health experts said in a report released Tuesday.

Rising tobacco use in developing countries is believed to be a huge reason for the shift, particularly in China and India, where 40% of the world's smokers now live.

So is better diagnosing of cancer, along with the downward trend in infectious diseases that used to be the world's leading killers.

http://snipurl.com/7qwud


Water Found in Hot Planet's Orbit
from BBC News Online

Scientists say they have found evidence for water vapour in the atmosphere of a planet 63 light-years from Earth. The "hot Jupiter" planet's surface temperatures exceed 900C.

Writing in the journal Nature the scientists say their discovery may help find planets that can support life.

In a separate study, Nasa say they have found carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of the same planet. The planet known as HD 189733b is classed as a hot Jupiter due to its fiery molten centre and heavily gaseous atmosphere, which mimics the atmosphere of Jupiter, the gas giant in our own galaxy.

http://snipurl.com/7qx11


Deal Struck on Forests in Climate Talks
from the Seattle Times

POZNAN, Poland (Associated Press)—Negotiators broke an impasse Wednesday on including forest conservation in a new climate change agreement, guaranteeing a voice for native peoples who live in forests and rewarding India and China for replanting depleted lands.

Environmentalists said the compromise text, agreed in a committee at the U.N. climate talks, was an important step that cleared the way to discuss politically sensitive questions on how countries will be compensated for protecting their woodlands.

Though activists said they were disappointed that four countries, including the United States, deleted any specific reference to the "rights" of indigenous people, the agreement recognizes "the full and effective participation" of local communities. Activists hope the reference will give indigenous people a say in the way forests are managed.

http://snipurl.com/7qxdf


Politics Choke Clean-Air Efforts
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

Death came to Donora, a small steel town in western Pennsylvania, in the form of a black fog. Trapped by unusual weather conditions in October 1948, a blanket of smokestack pollution killed 20 people and sickened thousands. Overwhelmed doctors scurried to fashion oxygen tents out of spare bedsheets.

... It was the nation's most dramatic evidence of the dangers of air pollution, and it spawned a cleanup effort so successful that, today, many people rarely give a thought to the air they breathe.

Yet in June 2005, a panel of scientists appointed by the Environmental Protection Agency determined that the air was still too dirty.

http://snipurl.com/7qy3d 


Cancer-Busting Protein Has Scientists' Attention
from the Detroit Free Press

WASHINGTON—It's a tiny molecule with a nondescript name—p53—but it has an awesome responsibility: preventing more than half of all human cancers. Some scientists call it the "guardian angel," "guardian of the genome" or the "dictator of life and death."

P53 is a protein, a string of 393 chemical units stored in the DNA of most of the body's cells. Normally, p53 works to suppress malignant tumors. When it's missing or mutated, however, it can't carry out its lifesaving mission and lets cancerous cells run amok.

Scientists are developing drugs to repair or restore damaged p53 in mice, but so far none of those drugs is ready to treat human cancers. Almost 50,000 papers about p53 have been published in scientific journals, but its workings are still not fully understood, and it's little known outside the worlds of biology and medicine.

http://snipurl.com/7qyf4
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on December 11, 2008, 08:40:33 PM
Quote from: Kai on December 11, 2008, 08:23:11 PM
P53 is a protein, a string of 393 chemical units stored in the DNA of most of the body's cells.
:facepalm:
There is so much wrong with this sentence that I have no option but to weep.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 11, 2008, 08:54:48 PM
Yes. Ugh. Proteins are composed of ammino acids and they are not stored in DNA, and if they were they would be stored in ALL cells.

:x
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 16, 2008, 10:27:13 PM
http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2008/12/over_1000_new_species_discover.php (http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2008/12/over_1000_new_species_discover.php) (NSFF&S)

Loads of new species from the Mekong River in Southeast Asia. The article talks briefly about something I discussed before, that species new to western science and newly described under the ICZN does not mean that they were previously unknown to people. Its somewhat semantics and somewhat the removal of western culturocentrism.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 16, 2008, 10:42:12 PM
Quote from: Kai on December 16, 2008, 10:27:13 PM
http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2008/12/over_1000_new_species_discover.php (http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2008/12/over_1000_new_species_discover.php) (NSFF&S)

Loads of new species from the Mekong River in Southeast Asia. The article talks briefly about something I discussed before, that species new to western science and newly described under the ICZN does not mean that they were previously unknown to people. Its somewhat semantics and somewhat the removal of western culturocentrism.

That's something I've found amusing in reading articles in the past... when Western biologists "discover" a new species which they found because the natives of the region described it and told them where to look.  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 17, 2008, 04:23:37 AM
Yeah. Which incidentally is one of the many reasons why prestige goes not to the person that "discovers" a "new" species but to the one that formally describes and names it. That, and a person who writes the description, makes the drawings or pictures, fits the organism into an ecological biological and systematic scheme and publishes it is doing all the work.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 17, 2008, 02:26:06 PM
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/322/5907/1506 (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/322/5907/1506)

Cool Science article I read last night about how branching in and of organs is determined. There are a number of factors involved: the growth cone, which is the branching structure itself, the proteins that induce a growth cone to branch or keep it from branching, and the coordination that has to occur between nerves, vessels and epithelial tissue. Its in some ways quite a bit more simple of a system than I thought it would be.

If you can't see the whole thing, abstract is here: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/322/5907/1506 (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/322/5907/1506)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 08, 2009, 05:42:22 PM
Drill for Natural Gas, Pollute Water
from Scientific American

In July a hydrologist dropped a plastic sampling pipe 300 feet down a water well in rural Sublette County, Wy. and pulled up a load of brown oily water with a foul smell. Tests showed it contained benzene, a chemical believed to cause aplastic anemia and leukemia, in a concentration 1,500 times the level safe for people. The results sent shockwaves through the energy industry and state and federal regulatory agencies.   

Sublette County is the home of one of the nation's largest natural gas fields, and many of its 6,000 wells have undergone a process pioneered by Halliburton called hydraulic fracturing, which shoots vast amounts of water, sand and chemicals several miles underground to break apart rock and release the gas.  The process has been considered safe since a 2004 study by the Environmental Protection Agency found that it posed no risk to drinking water. ... Today fracturing is used in 9 out of 10 natural gas wells in the United States.

Over the last few years, however, a series of contamination incidents have raised questions about that EPA study and ignited a debate over whether the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing may threaten the nation's increasingly precious drinking water supply.

http://snipurl.com/5t87m 


Your Body Is Mine
from Science News

WASHINGTON—It sounds like a lost episode of The Twilight Zone. A man enters a laboratory, dons a special headset and shakes hands with a woman sitting across from him. In a matter of seconds, he feels like he's inside the woman's skin, reaching out and grasping his own hand.

Strange as it sounds, neuroscientists have induced this phenomenon in a series of volunteers. People can experience the illusion that either a mannequin or another person's body is their own body, says Valeria Petkova of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. She and Karolinska colleague Henrik Ehrsson call this reaction the "body-swap illusion."

"Our subjects experienced this illusion as being exciting and strange, and often said that they wanted to come back and try it again," says Petkova, who reported the findings November 17 at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.

http://snipurl.com/5sbo8


Bugs, Brains and Trivia
from Smithsonian Magazine

Entomology students aren't normally the ones under the microscope, but at the annual Linnaean Games, a national insect trivia competition, they are scrutinized as closely as their own six-legged subjects.

Before a crowd of more than a thousand, the larval scholars—mostly PhD candidates—struggle with categories like "Name That Pest" and "Know Your Bug Families." They tackle current events—this year, expect questions on the emerald ash borer, a beetle poised to wipe out the nation's ash trees—and high culture. Who wrote the poem "My Butterfly?" (Robert Frost.) Who composed "Flight of the Bumblebee?" (Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.)

But the ant lion's share of the 16 questions at the championships, held Nov. 18 at the Entomological Society of America's meeting in Reno, Nev., will likely be along the lines of this pop quiz: "Name the family of beetles that has one set of eyes on the top of its body and one set below."

http://snipurl.com/5sbwg


Tunnelling Nanotubes: Life's Secret Network
from New Scientist

Had Amin Rustom not messed up, he would not have stumbled upon one of the biggest discoveries in biology of recent times. It all began in 2000, when he saw something strange under his microscope. A very long, thin tube had formed between two of the rat cells that he was studying. It looked like nothing he had ever seen before.

His supervisor, Hans-Hermann Gerdes, asked him to repeat the experiment. Rustom did, and saw nothing unusual. When Gerdes grilled him, Rustom admitted that the first time around he had not followed the standard protocol of swapping the liquid in which the cells were growing between observations. Gerdes made him redo the experiment, mistakes and all, and there they were again: long, delicate connections between cells. This was something new—a previously unknown way in which animal cells can communicate with each other.

Gerdes and Rustom, then at Heidelberg University in Germany, called the connections tunnelling nanotubes. Aware that they might be onto something significant, the duo slogged away to produce convincing evidence and eventually published a landmark paper in 2004.

http://snipurl.com/5sckf


Found: An Ancient Monument to the Soul
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In a mountainous kingdom in what is now southeastern Turkey, there lived in the eighth century B.C. a royal official, Kuttamuwa, who oversaw the completion of an inscribed stone monument, or stele, to be erected upon his death. The words instructed mourners to commemorate his life and afterlife with feasts "for my soul that is in this stele."

University of Chicago archaeologists who made the discovery last summer in ruins of a walled city near the Syrian border said the stele provided the first written evidence that the people in this region held to the religious concept of the soul apart from the body. By contrast, Semitic contemporaries, including the Israelites, believed that the body and soul were inseparable, which for them made cremation unthinkable, as noted in the Bible.

Circumstantial evidence, archaeologists said, indicated that the people at Sam'al, the ancient city, practiced cremation. The site is known today as Zincirli (pronounced ZIN-jeer-lee). Other scholars said the find could lead to important insights into the dynamics of cultural contact and exchange in the borderlands of antiquity where Indo-European and Semitic people interacted in the Iron Age.

http://snipurl.com/5sd0e 


Less Stress May Help Cancer Patients Live Longer, Study Finds
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Psychological counseling, muscle relaxation and other strategies for reducing stress in breast cancer patients can cut their risk of death from the disease by more than half, according to a study published online Monday in the journal Cancer.

The study also found that psychological interventions reduced the risk that tumors would come back by 45%. Even when tumors returned, patients who received the counseling had six more cancer-free months compared with those who did not.

The researchers, led by psychology professor Barbara Andersen of Ohio State University, focused on stress reduction as a primary reason why patients appeared to benefit from group counseling sessions. But other scientists said there still wasn't enough evidence to support that idea.

http://snipurl.com/5se26


Great Pyramid Mystery to Be Solved by Hidden Room?
from National Geographic News

A sealed space in Egypt's Great Pyramid may help solve a centuries-old mystery: How did the ancient Egyptians move two million 2.5-ton blocks to build the ancient wonder?

The little-known cavity may support the theory that the 4,500-year-old monument to Pharaoh Khufu was constructed inside out, via a spiraling, inclined interior tunnel—an idea that contradicts the prevailing wisdom that the monuments were built using an external ramp.

The inside-out theory's key proponent, French architect Jean-Pierre Houdin, says for centuries Egyptologists have ignored evidence staring them in the face. "The paradigm was wrong," Houdin said. "The idea that the pyramids were built from the outside was just wrong. How can you resolve a problem when the first element you introduce in your thinking is wrong?"

http://snipurl.com/5t8tw


Big Hop Forward: Scientists Map Kangaroo's DNA
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

SYDNEY, Australia (Associated Press)—Taking a big hop forward in marsupial research, scientists say they have unraveled the DNA of a small kangaroo named Matilda. And they've found the Aussie icon has more in common with humans than scientists had thought. The kangaroo last shared a common ancestor with humans 150 million years ago.

"We've been surprised at how similar the genomes are," said Jenny Graves, director of the government-backed research effort. "Great chunks of the genome are virtually identical."

The scientists also discovered 14 previously unknown genes in the kangaroo and suspect the same ones are also in humans, Graves said.

http://snipurl.com/5tb1z


EPA Moves to Ease Air Rules for Parks
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Environmental Protection Agency is finalizing new air-quality rules that would make it easier to build coal-fired power plants, oil refineries and other major polluters near national parks and wilderness areas, even though half of the EPA's 10 regional administrators formally dissented from the decision and four others criticized the move in writing.

Documents obtained by The Washington Post show that the administration's push to weaken Clean Air Act protections for "Class 1 areas" nationwide has sparked fierce resistance from senior agency officials. All but two of the regional administrators objecting to the proposed rule are political appointees.

The proposal would change the practice of measuring pollution levels near national parks, which is currently done over three-hour and 24-hour increments to capture emission spikes during periods of peak energy demand; instead, the levels would be averaged over a year. Under this system, spikes in pollution would no longer violate the law.

http://snipurl.com/5wu4w


Doctors Transplant Windpipe with Stem Cells
from USA Today

LONDON (Associated Press)—Doctors have given a woman a new windpipe with tissue grown from her own stem cells, eliminating the need for anti-rejection drugs.

"This technique has great promise," said Dr. Eric Genden, who did a similar transplant in 2005 at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. That operation used both donor and recipient tissue. Only a handful of windpipe, or trachea, transplants have ever been done.

If successful, the procedure could become a new standard of treatment, said Genden, who was not involved in the research. The results were published online Wednesday in the medical journal, The Lancet.

http://snipurl.com/5wuhh

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 08, 2009, 05:45:30 PM
December 16, 2008

Hard Task for New Team on Energy and Climate
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON—The team President-elect Barack Obama introduced on Monday to carry out his energy and environmental policies faces a host of political, economic, diplomatic and scientific challenges that could impede his plans to address global warming and America's growing dependence on dirty and uncertain sources of energy.

Acknowledging that a succession of presidents and Congresses had failed to make much progress on the issues, Mr. Obama vowed to press ahead despite the faltering economy and suggested that he would invest his political capital in trying to break logjams.

... Shortly after Mr. Obama spoke, transition officials confirmed that he would select Senator Ken Salazar, a first-term Democrat from Colorado, as interior secretary. Mr. Salazar's appointment will complete the team of environmental and energy officials in the new administration. The most pressing environmental issue for the incoming team will almost certainly be settling on an effective and politically tenable approach to the intertwined issues of energy security and global warming.

http://snipurl.com/8f3wv


Uncertainty Clouds Transition at NASA
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

These are awkward times at NASA, which may or may not have a new leader soon and may or may not be on the verge of building a brand-new moon rocket.

There has been a kerfuffle about a tense discussion in the headquarters library between NASA Administrator Michael Griffin and the leader of President-elect  Barack Obama's transition team for the agency. There have been reports of cost overruns and delays in major NASA missions. Someone leaked an e-mail in which Griffin referred to a Bush administration "jihad" against the space shuttle. A former NASA official blasted the agency in an op-ed column. The comments posted on space blogs are full of rancor, accusations and anxiety.

Hovering over everything are cosmic quantities of uncertainty, a real problem in an agency in which missions are planned many years in advance, broad strategies take decades to implement and the engineering is customized down to the last bolt.

http://snipurl.com/89fwo


Hawaii's Honeyeater Birds Tricked Taxonomists
from Science News

Five species of Hawaiian birds have made fools of taxonomists for more than 200 years, thanks to a fine bit of evolutionary illusion-making.

O'o and kioea birds, now extinct, specialized in feeding on flower nectar using long, curved bills and split tongues tipped with brushes or fringe. Since Captain Cook's expedition introduced the birds to western science, they have been classified in the honeyeater family with similar-looking nectar sippers living in New Guinea and Australia.

DNA from museum specimens of the Hawaiian species shows that the birds weren't a kind of honeyeater at all, according to Robert Fleischer of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. Instead the Hawaiians' resemblance to the western Pacific birds offers a new and dramatic example of how evolution within different lineages can converge on similar forms for similar jobs, he and his colleagues report online December 11 in Current Biology.

http://snipurl.com/89lxf


New Study Firmly Ties Hormone Use to Breast Cancer
from USA Today

SAN ANTONIO (Associated Press)—Taking menopause hormones for five years doubles the risk for breast cancer, according to a new analysis of a big federal study that reveals the most dramatic evidence yet of the dangers of these still-popular pills.

Even women who took estrogen and progestin pills for as little as a couple of years had a greater chance of getting cancer. And when they stopped taking them, their odds quickly improved, returning to a normal risk level roughly two years after quitting.

Collectively, these new findings are likely to end any doubt that the risks outweigh the benefits for most women. It is clear that breast cancer rates plunged in recent years mainly because millions of women quit hormone therapy and fewer newly menopausal women started on it, said the study's leader, Dr. Rowan Chlebowski of Harbor-UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles.

http://snipurl.com/89hk9 


Obesity 'Controlled by the Brain'
from BBC News Online

Seven new gene variants discovered by scientists suggest strongly that obesity is largely a mind problem.

The findings suggest the brain plays the dominant role in controlling appetite, and that obesity cannot easily be blamed on metabolic flaws. Two international studies, published in Nature Genetics, examined samples from thousands of people for the tiniest genetic changes.

Many of the seven key variants seem to be active in the brain. This suggests that the brain's impact on appetite and eating behaviour may be more important that any genetic variation which alters the body's ability to lay down or burn up fat.

http://snipurl.com/89i0n


Darwin's Living Legacy—Evolutionary Theory 150 Years Later
from Scientific American

When the 26-year-old Charles Darwin sailed into the Galápagos Islands in 1835 onboard the HMS Beagle, he took little notice of a collection of birds that are now intimately associated with his name. The naturalist, in fact, misclassified as grosbeaks some of the birds that are now known as Darwin's finches.

After Darwin returned to England, ornithologist and artist John Gould began to make illustrations of a group of preserved bird specimens brought back in the Beagle's hold, and the artist recognized them all to be different species of finches.

... Darwin's famed finches play a continuing role in providing answers. The scientist had assumed that evolution proceeded slowly, over "the lapse of ages," a pace imperceptible to the short lifetime of human observers. Instead the finches have turned into ideal research subjects for studying evolution in real time because they breed relatively rapidly, are isolated on different islands and rarely migrate.

http://snipurl.com/89mav


Airborne Laser Lets Rip on First Target
from New Scientist

Imagine swarms of aircraft patrolling the skies, zapping missiles, aircraft or even satellites in low Earth orbit with invisible, ultrapowerful laser beams. Such laser battles in the sky may not be such a long way off, after a megawatt laser weapon was fired from an aircraft for the first time.

Although the Airborne Laser (ABL) was fired from a stationary plane at a target on the ground just a few metres away, the test marked a milestone for the weapon, developed by aerospace firms Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman.

The laser was 12 years in the making and cost $4.3 billion, putting it vastly over budget. The US Missile Defense Agency (MDA) calls it the answer to "rogue states" or terror groups who equip themselves with intercontinental ballistic missiles, such as Scuds. Yet the ABL may soon be used to shoot down a much wider range of devices—including aircraft—and is just one of a number of laser weapons now being readied for military use.

http://snipurl.com/89mvn 


Lost Species Slowly Emerge from the Greater Mekong
from the Times (London)

Striped rabbits, bright pink millipedes laced with cyanide and a spider bigger than a dinner plate are among a host of new species discovered in a remote wildlife hotspot.

The Greater Mekong is described as one of the last scientifically unexplored regions of the world and it abounds in life seen nowhere else in the world.

So little is known about the ecology of the region that previously unknown animals and plants have been turning up at a rate of two a week for a decade. At least 1,068 new species were identified in the Greater Mekong from 1997 to 2007 along with several thousand tiny invertebrates.

http://snipurl.com/89pr8


Enceladus Has 'Spreading Surface'
from BBC News Online

A US space agency (Nasa) probe has witnessed a moon of Saturn do something very unusual and Earth-like.

Pictures of the icy satellite Enceladus suggest its surface splits and spreads apart—just like the ocean floor on our planet splits to create new crust. The information was released at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco.

The data from the Cassini spacecraft is said to strengthen the idea that Enceladus harbours a sub-surface sea. "Bit by bit, we're accumulating the evidence that there is liquid water on Enceladus," said Carolyn Porco, team leader of the Cassini imaging group and one of the senior scientists on the mission.

http://snipurl.com/8fav4 


FDA Will Continue To Study Bisphenol A
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Food and Drug Administration, criticized by its own scientific advisers for ignoring available data about health risks posed by a chemical found in everyday plastic, said yesterday it has no plans to amend its position on the substance but will continue to study it.

The agency has been reviewing its risk assessments for bisphenol A, a chemical used to harden plastic that is found in a wide variety of products, from baby bottles to compact discs to the lining of canned goods. The chemical, commonly called BPA, mimics estrogen and may disrupt the body's carefully calibrated endocrine system.

BPA is found in the urine of more than 90 percent of the U.S. population, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Scientists believe it is most easily ingested after leaching from plastic containers into food and drink. In September, the first large study of BPA in humans found that people with higher levels of bisphenol A had higher rates of heart disease, diabetes and liver abnormalities.

http://snipurl.com/8fb8s

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 08, 2009, 05:46:33 PM
December 15, 2008

Mood Mixed as Climate Summit Ends
from BBC News Online

The UN climate summit has ended with delegates taking very different views on how much it has achieved. Western delegates said progress here had been encouraging, but environment groups said rich countries had not shown enough ambition.

Developing nations were angry that more money was not put forward to protect against climate impacts. The meeting is the halfway point on a two-year process aimed at reaching a deal in Copenhagen by the end of 2009.

As envisaged at last year's conference in Bali, that agreement is supposed to have two major elements—an expanded Kyoto Protocol-style deal committing industrialised countries to deeper emission cuts in the mid-term, perhaps by 2020, and a longer-term agreement encompassing all countries.

http://snipurl.com/7yyk7


Study of Tumor Recurrence May Change Drug Guidelines
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A particularly fast-growing form of breast cancer should be treated aggressively after surgery even when tumors are very small, according to new research that could alter treatment for one in five women diagnosed with breast cancer.

The research, reported Friday at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, focuses on the 15 percent to 20 percent of women with breast cancer who test positive for an amplification of the HER2 gene, which is typically among the most aggressive forms of the disease.

Today, a targeted therapy called Herceptin, made by the biotech company Genentech, has greatly improved the odds for women with HER2-positive cancer. Recent studies show the drug reduces the recurrence of these cancers by about half.

http://snipurl.com/7yz9d


Atomic John
from the New Yorker

The single, blinding release of pure energy over Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945, marked a startling and permanent break with our prior understandings of the visible world. Yet for more than sixty years the technology behind the explosion has remained a state secret.

The United States government has never divulged the engineering specifications of the first atomic bombs, not even after other countries have produced generations of ever more powerful nuclear weapons. In the decades since the Second World War, dozens of historians have attempted to divine the precise mechanics of the Hiroshima bomb ...

But the most accurate account of the bomb's inner workings ... has been written by a sixty-one-year-old truck driver from Waukesha, Wisconsin, named John Coster-Mullen, who was once a commercial photographer, and has never received a college degree.

http://snipurl.com/7z22s


New Rule Expands DNA Collection to All People Arrested
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Immigration and civil liberties groups condemned a new U.S. government policy to collect DNA samples from all noncitizens detained by authorities and all people arrested for federal crimes.

The new Justice Department rule, published Wednesday and effective Jan. 9, dramatically expands a federal law enforcement database of genetic identifiers, which is now limited to storing information about convicted criminals and arrestees from 13 states.

Congress authorized the expansion in 2005, citing the power of DNA as a tool in crime solving and prevention.

http://snipurl.com/83yes


The Remedist: John Maynard Keynes
from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

... Today, [John Maynard] Keynes is justly enjoying a comeback. For the same "intellectual edifice" that [Alan] Greenspan said has now collapsed was what supported the laissez-faire policies Keynes quarreled with in his times.

Then, as now, economists believed that all uncertainty could be reduced to measurable risk. So asset prices always reflected fundamentals, and unregulated markets would in general be very stable.

By contrast, Keynes created an economics whose starting point was that not all future events could be reduced to measurable risk. There was a residue of genuine uncertainty, and this made disaster an ever-present possibility, not a once-in-a-lifetime "shock." Investment was more an act of faith than a scientific calculation of probabilities. And in this fact lay the possibility of huge systemic mistakes.

http://snipurl.com/83xka


The Living Dead and the Afterlife
from the Times (London)

... [Near Death Experiences] are so common, so vivid and so life-transforming—survivors frequently become more compassionate, religious and serene as a result of what they experience—that scientists, philosophers, priests, psychologists and cultists all want a piece of the action.

Their problem is that the human mind is unreachable. We can't see what's going on in there. Even if we could rush cardiac-arrest patients into an MRI scanner, we'd only see lights in the brain. We wouldn't know what they meant.

But now NDEs are to be scientifically investigated in a US and UK study involving 25 hospitals. This is co-ordinated by Dr Sam Parnia at Southampton University and is designed to find 1,500 survivors of cardiac arrests—"clinical death"—who tell such stories.

http://snipurl.com/83zow


T. Rex, Other Dinosaurs Had Heads Full of Air
from National Geographic News

Dinosaurs were airheads—and that's not just because they had tiny brains, a new study says.

New 3-D scans of the skulls of Tyrannosaurus rex and other dinosaurs reveal the creatures had more empty space inside their heads than previously thought. These air spaces made the skulls light but strong and could have helped dinosaurs breathe, communicate, and hunt.

The extra room may even have paved the way for flight in some species. "Air is a neglected system that is actually an important contributor to what animals do," said study co-author Lawrence Witmer, a paleontologist at Ohio University in Athens.

http://snipurl.com/840ef


Stock Market Game May Predict Eco Disasters
from New Scientist

Stock markets could forecast the availability of water more accurately than the best computer models used by environmental scientists. That's the idea behind the launch of an online market which invites "traders" to gamble on future water levels in dams in Australia.

The Australian Knowledge Exchange works by giving traders A$100,000 (US$65,000) play money and 1000 stocks in each of five reservoirs in New South Wales. The stocks pay out each month according to the level of the dam. If the dam is full, they are worth $100. Traders can profit by buying stocks for less than their final value, or by selling them for more.

The online market is the brainchild of a team from the government agency CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems in Canberra, Australia, and the University of Karlsruhe, Germany.

http://snipurl.com/840t3


Tools with Handles Even More Ancient
from Science News

In a gripping instance of Stone Age survival, Neandertals used a tarlike substance to fasten sharpened stones to handles as early as 70,000 years ago, a new study suggests.

Stone points and sharpened flakes unearthed in Syria since 2000 contain the residue of bitumen—a natural, adhesive substance—on spots where the implements would have been secured to handles of some type, according to a team led by archaeologist Eric Boëda of University of Paris X, Nanterre.

The process of attaching a tool to a handle is known as hafting. The Neandertals likely found the bitumen in nearby tar sands, the team reports.

http://snipurl.com/841gr 


Carbon Nanotube Clothing Could Take Charge in an Emergency
from Scientific American

A soldier is badly wounded on the battlefield in Afghanistan or Iraq by a roadside explosive. As he lies beside his vehicle, unable to reach his radio to contact his unit on his location and condition, blood from the wound seeps into his shirt. Luckily, its fibers are coated with cylindrical, nanosize carbon molecules that contain antibodies able to detect the presence of albumin, a protein common in blood.

The shirt senses that its wearer is bleeding and sends a signal through the shirt's carbon nanotubes ... that activates an emergency radio-frequency beacon on the soldier's belt. This distress call is picked up by a nearby patrol that rushes to the aid of their wounded comrade.

This may be the stuff of science fiction, but ongoing development of fabrics coated with carbon nanotubes and other nanoscale substances could someday make such smart clothing a reality, says Nicholas Kotov, an engineering professor at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor.

http://snipurl.com/842o5

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on January 08, 2009, 07:24:08 PM
Good roundup. I enjoyed the 'Tunneling Nanotube' and the 'Hawaiian Birds' stories, thanks Kai!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on January 10, 2009, 04:45:41 AM
This is just awesome.
Scripps scientists develop first examples of RNA that replicates itself indefinitely (http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-01/sri-ssd010909.php)

A few years after Tracey Lincoln arrived at Scripps Research from Jamaica to pursue her Ph.D., she began exploring the RNA-only replication concept along with her advisor, Professor Gerald Joyce, M.D., Ph.D., who is also Dean of the Faculty at Scripps Research. Their work began with a method of forced adaptation known as in vitro evolution. The goal was to take one of the RNA enzymes already developed in the lab that could perform the basic chemistry of replication, and improve it to the point that it could drive efficient, perpetual self-replication.

"This is the only case outside biology where molecular information has been immortalized," says Joyce.

But the main value of the work, according to Joyce, is at the basic research level. "What we've found could be relevant to how life begins, at that key moment when Darwinian evolution starts." He is quick to point out that, while the self-replicating RNA enzyme systems share certain characteristics of life, they are not themselves a form of life.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 15, 2009, 10:47:55 PM
http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/01/prehistoric_venomous_mammal_ca.php (http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/01/prehistoric_venomous_mammal_ca.php)

Solenodon species finally caught on video. This is one of two species in the Carribean that are the last of a lineage dating back to the time of the dinosaurs. The species today are very similar to what they would have been like 65 million years ago. Plus, its another one of those venomous mammals, like the Platypus, although unlike the platypus its a live bearer. More or less, it looks like a giant rat tailed shrew and reminds me of a ROUS. One of those animals you ordinarily would only see dead (like the Giant squid), so seeing it alive and filmed is pretty awesome.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nast on January 15, 2009, 11:07:55 PM
Quote from: Kai on January 15, 2009, 10:47:55 PM
http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/01/prehistoric_venomous_mammal_ca.php (http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/01/prehistoric_venomous_mammal_ca.php)

Solenodon species finally caught on video. This is one of two species in the Carribean that are the last of a lineage dating back to the time of the dinosaurs. The species today are very similar to what they would have been like 65 million years ago. Plus, its another one of those venomous mammals, like the Platypus, although unlike the platypus its a live bearer. More or less, it looks like a giant rat tailed shrew and reminds me of a ROUS. One of those animals you ordinarily would only see dead (like the Giant squid), so seeing it alive and filmed is pretty awesome.

It's also ADORABLE!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on January 16, 2009, 10:32:36 AM
Good photo spread here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthpicturegalleries/3901029/Mount-Mabu-Mozambique-Scientists-discover-new-forest-with-undiscovered-species-on-Google-Earth.html (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthpicturegalleries/3901029/Mount-Mabu-Mozambique-Scientists-discover-new-forest-with-undiscovered-species-on-Google-Earth.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 16, 2009, 12:11:12 PM
Quote from: Telarus on January 16, 2009, 10:32:36 AM
Good photo spread here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthpicturegalleries/3901029/Mount-Mabu-Mozambique-Scientists-discover-new-forest-with-undiscovered-species-on-Google-Earth.html (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthpicturegalleries/3901029/Mount-Mabu-Mozambique-Scientists-discover-new-forest-with-undiscovered-species-on-Google-Earth.html)

I love this sort of shit.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 16, 2009, 03:29:15 PM
http://catalogue-of-organisms.blogspot.com/2009/01/tafkami-walks.html (http://catalogue-of-organisms.blogspot.com/2009/01/tafkami-walks.html)

A really bizarre amoeboid that moves by walking. It extends a pseudopod forward and latches to the substrate, pulls itself up over the pseudopod until that is behind it, and then stretches out a new one releasing the old one.

People also have no clue where to place it taxonomically. No mitochondria either.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 16, 2009, 04:09:45 PM
This picture cracks me up:

(http://www.telegraph.co.uk/telegraph/multimedia/archive/01210/chameleon_1210443i.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on January 16, 2009, 07:46:00 PM
mmmmmmmm chameleon pringle
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 23, 2009, 12:46:21 AM
http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/01/climbing_catfish_found_named.php (http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/01/climbing_catfish_found_named.php) Climbing catfish!

http://www.livescience.com/health/080118-super-contacts.html Electronic contacts!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on January 23, 2009, 02:47:08 AM
Quotehttp://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/01/climbing_catfish_found_named.php Climbing catfish!

a fish with legs, fun for all creationists
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on January 23, 2009, 03:14:05 AM
Kai, you're gonna love this one:
Why Darwin was wrong about the tree of life (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126921.600-why-darwin-was-wrong-about-the-tree-of-life.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 23, 2009, 07:40:02 PM
Quote from: Vene on January 23, 2009, 03:14:05 AM
Kai, you're gonna love this one:
Why Darwin was wrong about the tree of life (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126921.600-why-darwin-was-wrong-about-the-tree-of-life.html)

yeah yeah yeah! As you get closer and closer to LUCA (Last Universal Common Ancestor), the 'tree' becomes a mess of gene exchange between species.

the tree (or better yet, bush) analogy works for the apomorphic Eukaryota, but for Archaea, Bacteria, and the basal common ancestors you really can't resolve any sort of tree like structure, and as the article says this is because of things like horizontal gene transfer.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;284/5423/2124 (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;284/5423/2124) This article has some awesome clarification of all this stuff.

This.

(http://www.sciencemag.org/content/vol284/issue5423/images/medium/se2497604002.gif)

Compared with this.

(http://www.sciencemag.org/content/vol284/issue5423/images/medium/se2497604003.gif)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on January 23, 2009, 09:14:34 PM
Yeah, but creotards and IDiots are still going to take it completely out of context.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 23, 2009, 09:28:06 PM
Quote from: Vene on January 23, 2009, 09:14:34 PM
Yeah, but creotards and IDiots are still going to take it completely out of context.

Fuck those worthless bags of shit. Let them have bloodletting and leeches.

Kai,

Has absolutely no sympathy for purposefully ignorant fucks right now.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on January 23, 2009, 11:07:22 PM
 :lulz: I approve of this attitude.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on January 25, 2009, 01:52:07 AM
I'm bored, so it's cancer time.

Cancer-causing gene discovery suggests new therapies (http://news.ucsf.edu/releases/cancer-causing-gene-discovery-suggests-new-therapies/)

When the protein myc is broken it can cause cancer.  For a while research has focused on it's effect on transcription, but researchers at the University of California, San Fransisco have shown that it can effect the final stages of protein synthesis.  This may allow for new methods for treating cancer, or more accurately, using old methods to treat cancer.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 31, 2009, 07:02:53 AM
January 29, 2009



Peanut Product Recall Grows in Salmonella Scare
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON--One of the largest food contamination scares in the nation's history grew far larger on Wednesday as a Georgia peanut plant that federal regulators said knowingly shipped contaminated food recalled even more products.

Already, more than 400 consumer products, including Jenny Craig nutritional bars and Keebler Peanut Butter Sandwich Crackers, have been recalled after eight people died and more than 500 people in 43 states, half of them children, were sickened by salmonella poisoning.

On Wednesday, the Peanut Corporation of America, whose plant in Blakely, Ga., is the source of the contamination, expanded its recall from all products made since July to all those made since Jan. 1, 2007. The company supplied some of the largest food makers in the nation.

http://snipr.com/axzoc



Are Doctors Minimizing Side Effects of Statins?
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Doctors who prescribe an increasingly popular family of drugs to prevent strokes and heart attacks may be downplaying the wide range of side effects, said a UCSD researcher who helped analyze nearly 900 studies of cholesterol-lowering statins.

Physicians who fail to recognize those complications--willfully or through ignorance--could put patients at risk of developing more serious health problems, according to the review, published yesterday by the American Journal of Cardiovascular Drugs.

Memory loss, insomnia, numbness in the fingers and toes, sexual dysfunction, weight gain, vision impairment and several dozen other conditions that surfaced in the studies are rarely blamed on statins when they occur outside clinical trials, the report said. Muscle and liver damage are the best-known side effects. But even then, too many doctors dismiss muscle soreness, pain and weakness as symptoms linked to other factors such as aging, the review concluded.

http://snipr.com/axzqh



Feb. 17 Digital TV Conversion Is Still on After House Vote
from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--Bucking the Obama administration, House Republicans on Wednesday defeated a bill to postpone the upcoming transition from analog to digital television broadcasting to June 12--leaving the current Feb. 17 deadline intact for now.

The 258-168 vote failed to clear the two-thirds threshold needed for passage. It's a victory for the GOP members, who warn that postponing the transition would confuse consumers.

The House Republicans say a delay also would burden wireless companies and public safety agencies waiting for the spectrum that will be vacated by the switchover, and create added costs for television stations that would have to continue broadcasting both analog and digital signals for four more months.

http://snipr.com/axzsk



Birth of Octuplets Rattles Fertility Experts
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

Even as the birth of octuplets at Kaiser Permanente Bellflower Medical Center drew attention and applause from around the country, questions arose Tuesday about whether the mother's doctors did enough to prevent such a risky pregnancy.

The chances that the eight babies born Monday were conceived naturally are infinitesimal, infertility specialists and doctors in maternal-fetal medicine say. Today's reproductive experts have the tools and the know-how to avoid such high-risk pregnancies--and often try desperately to do so.

"When we see something like this in the general fertility world, it gives us the heebie-jeebies," said Michael Tucker, a clinical embryologist in Atlanta and a leading researcher in infertility treatment. Tucker added that in his opinion, "if a medical practitioner had anything to do with it, there's some degree of inappropriate medical therapy there."

http://snipr.com/axzui



One Concussion Enough: Sports Study
from the Toronto Star

A single head blow during their playing days can leave athletes with significant physical and mental problems three decades after they've hung up their equipment, a new Canadian study says.

In the longest-term look ever at concussions in sports, University of Montreal researchers showed that athletes who had suffered even one minor bell ringing on the ice or football field had measurable brain and body reflex impairments 30 years later.

"You don't need to be knocked out or lose consciousness. A ding is enough to make these brain changes," said senior study author Maryse Lassonde, a University of Montreal neuropsychologist. "If you see stars, that's enough ... and we can see the effects many years later," said Lassonde, who has been neuropsychologist for the Montreal Canadiens for 11 years. The research was published online Tuesday by the journal Brain.

http://snipr.com/axzvu



Primate Dialects Recorded in South America--A First
from National Geographic News

The accents and dialects that add so much variety--and sometimes confusion--to everyday life are not unique to humans, and they may be more common in primates than previously thought.

Researchers have found the first evidence for regional vocal differences in a South American primate, the pygmy marmoset. Marmoset groups in Ecuador were recorded using unique vocalizations when communicating over distances up to 64 feet.

"The variations could be linked to habitat, with different pitches and durations being useful in different densities of forest," said lead researcher Stella de la Torre, an ecologist at the Universidad San Francisco de Quito in Ecuador. However, de la Torre suggests, it is also possible that the differences are the result of social interactions.

http://snipr.com/axzxi



Kidney Donors Have a Normal Life Span, Study Finds
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Potential kidney donors can stop worrying about the long-term effects such a donation might have on their health and longevity.

The first long-term study of kidney donors has found that people who give kidneys to others not only have a normal life span, they also have fewer kidney problems than the general population--perhaps because they are healthier to begin with.

"We've suspected all along that kidney donation is a safe practice, but there has never been a long-term study with large numbers of patients in the United States," said Dr. Hassan N. Ibrahim of the University of Minnesota Medical School, who led the study. The report published today in the New England Journal of Medicine analyzed the outcome for nearly 3,700 donors who were studied for as long as 40 years.

http://snipr.com/axzzf



Spent Nuclear Fuel: Deadly Trash Heap or Renewable Energy Source?
from Scientific American

... In 1987 Congress passed legislation that required the Department of Energy (DoE) to take possession of and properly store the spent fuel from the nation's 104 nuclear reactors by the then far-off date of February 1998. Now 11 years behind schedule, the DoE's primary response--to bury it deep within Yucca Mountain--is no closer to being a permanent solution.

The Energy Department last June finally applied to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) ... for a license to build the repository at Yucca. But taxpayers still spend roughly $1 billion a year in fines paid by the federal government to utilities to compensate them for the delay.

All told, the nuclear reactors in the U.S. produce more than 2,000 metric tons of radioactive waste a year, according to the DoE--and most of it ends up sitting on-site because there is nowhere else to put it. ... In 1972 General Electric Co. closed a building in Morris, Ill., that would have presented another alternative solution to the problem of nuclear waste: reprocessing.

http://snipr.com/ay026



Six Biggest Mysteries of Our Solar System
from New Scientist

Once upon a time, 4.6 billion years ago, something was brewing in an unremarkable backwater of the Milky Way. The ragbag of stuff that suffuses the inconsequential, in-between bits of all galaxies--hydrogen and helium gas with just a sprinkling of solid dust--had begun to condense and form molecules. Unable to resist its own weight, part of this newly formed molecular cloud collapsed in on itself. In the ensuing heat and confusion, a star was born--our sun.

We don't know exactly what kick-started this process. Perhaps, with pleasing symmetry, it was the shock wave from the explosive death throes of a nearby star. It was not, at any rate, a particularly unusual event. It had happened countless times since the Milky Way itself came into existence about 13 billion years ago, and in our telescopes we can see it still going on in distant parts of our galaxy today. As stars go, the sun is nothing out of the ordinary.

And yet, as far as we know, it is unique. From a thin disc of stuff left over from its birth, eight planets formed, trapped in orbit by its gravity. One of those planets settled into a peculiarly tranquil relationship with its star and its fellow planets. Eventually, creatures emerged on it that began to wonder how their neighbourhood came to be as it is--and could formulate six enduring mysteries of our familiar, and yet deeply mysterious, solar system.

http://snipr.com/ay03v



New Science Could Help Solve Climate Crisis
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

LONDON (Reuters)--A new science that seeks to fight climate change using methods like giant space mirrors might not work on its own, but when combined with cuts in greenhouse gases it may help reverse global warming, a research report said.

In the report published on Wednesday, researchers at Britain's University of East Anglia assessed the climate cooling potential of "geoengineering" schemes that also include pumping aerosol into the atmosphere and fertilizing the oceans with nutrients.

"We found that some geoengineering options could usefully complement mitigation, and together they could cool the climate, but geoengineering alone cannot solve the climate problem," said Professor Tim Lenton, the report's lead author. Geoengineering involves large-scale manipulation of the environment in an attempt to combat the potentially devastating effects of increased atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) levels.

http://snipr.com/ay069



Been a while, hasn't it? Truth is, I get these from my adviser, and what with everything going on with him right now, he hasn't really had the time to pay attention I think.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 31, 2009, 07:14:04 PM
Well, that concussion thing is mildly alarming, as I've had perhaps three or four. :(
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on February 01, 2009, 02:39:37 AM
Anyone see this one?
'An extinct animal has been brought back to life for the first time after being cloned from frozen tissue.'
http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?action=post;topic=17231.270;num_replies=278
Died shortly after birth due to lung defects, but still significant, no?
next up..... Raptors!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 01, 2009, 04:40:35 AM
I don't think that this is the link you are talking about....:/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 01, 2009, 05:29:21 AM
http://whyfiles.org/shorties/276locust/ (http://whyfiles.org/shorties/276locust/)

Legs Touching: Why locusts swarm.

srsly.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Template on February 01, 2009, 09:51:59 PM
Quote from: Iptuous on February 01, 2009, 02:39:37 AM
Anyone see this one?
'An extinct animal has been brought back to life for the first time after being cloned from frozen tissue.'
http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?action=post;topic=17231.270;num_replies=278
Died shortly after birth due to lung defects, but still significant, no?
next up..... Raptors!


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/4409958/Extinct-ibex-is-resurrected-by-cloning.html

Got that for ya
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 01, 2009, 10:03:13 PM
I WANT TO TOUCH MY LEGS TO YOUR LEGS
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 01, 2009, 10:04:01 PM
There are delicious mammoths waiting to be brought back from extinction.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 01, 2009, 10:09:23 PM
Quote from: The Mormons Will Begin Arriving By Bus on February 01, 2009, 10:04:01 PM
There are delicious mammoths waiting to be brought back from extinction.

Honestly, I care less about mammoths and more about the more recent extinctions.

Just think if we could bring back passenger pidgeons.

Kai,

would love to live to see that day.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on February 01, 2009, 10:11:05 PM
i want mammoth steak now!!!! get you ass in gear scientists
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on February 01, 2009, 11:41:02 PM
T-Bone Rex!

didnt the Flintstones have a brontoburger?

i'll have the double dodo burger deluxe :D
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cainad (dec.) on February 02, 2009, 06:13:37 AM
Quote from: The Mormons Will Begin Arriving By Bus on February 01, 2009, 10:03:13 PM
I WANT TO TOUCH MY LEGS TO YOUR LEGS

How gregarious!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Requia ☣ on February 02, 2009, 08:49:19 AM
Quote from: Kai on February 01, 2009, 10:09:23 PM
Quote from: The Mormons Will Begin Arriving By Bus on February 01, 2009, 10:04:01 PM
There are delicious mammoths waiting to be brought back from extinction.

Honestly, I care less about mammoths and more about the more recent extinctions.

Just think if we could bring back passenger pidgeons.

Kai,

would love to live to see that day.

I want a giant ground sloth.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 02, 2009, 12:56:07 PM
http://catalogue-of-organisms.blogspot.com/2009/02/of-gregarines.html (http://catalogue-of-organisms.blogspot.com/2009/02/of-gregarines.html)

a group of the parasitic Sporozoans (Protozoa), about the systematics etcetera. Thanks again Cat. of organisms for informing on obscure clades of life.

http://bedbugger.com/2009/02/01/lou-sorkin-and-bill-schutt-feeding-lous-bed-bug-colony/ (http://bedbugger.com/2009/02/01/lou-sorkin-and-bill-schutt-feeding-lous-bed-bug-colony/)

A very disturbing video of bedbug colonies and feeding by the writers of Dark Banquet.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on February 02, 2009, 04:42:05 PM
Quote from: Requiem on February 02, 2009, 08:49:19 AM
Quote from: Kai on February 01, 2009, 10:09:23 PM
Quote from: The Mormons Will Begin Arriving By Bus on February 01, 2009, 10:04:01 PM
There are delicious mammoths waiting to be brought back from extinction.

Honestly, I care less about mammoths and more about the more recent extinctions.

Just think if we could bring back passenger pidgeons.

Kai,

would love to live to see that day.

I want a giant ground sloth.
TITCM(egafauna)

(http://www.pts.org.tw/~web02/beasts/evidence/prog5/images/evi_megatherium_large.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 02, 2009, 08:43:36 PM
Today's Headlines - February 2, 2009



Glaciers around the World Found Shrinking for 18th Year
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

BERLIN - Glaciers from the Andes to Alaska and across the Alps shrank as much as 10 feet, the 18th year of retreat and twice as fast as a decade ago, as global warming threatens an important supply of the world's water.

Alpine glaciers lost on average 0.7 meters of thickness in 2007, data published yesterday by the University of Zurich's World Glacier Monitoring Service showed. The melting extends an 11-meter retreat since 1980.

"One year doesn't tell us much, it's really these long-term trends that help us to understand what's going on," Michael Zemp, a researcher at the University of Zurich's Department of Geography, said in an interview. "The main thing that we can do to stop this is reduce greenhouse gases" that are blamed for global warming.

http://snipr.com/b5r5y



Triceratops' Horns Were for Fighting, Research Shows
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The dinosaurs' headgear wasn't just ornamentation, says a Claremont researcher. Probably the creatures battled for mating supremacy the way modern horned mammals do.

Many types of dinosaurs had elaborate sets of horns and frills, and scientists have argued for decades about whether such features were strictly ornamental or meant for fighting. A Claremont researcher has now found firm evidence that they were meant for internecine warfare.

Andrew A. Farke, curator of the Raymond M. Alf Museum of Paleontology on the campus of the Webb Schools, and his colleagues studied fossilized bones from Triceratops specimens in museums throughout North America. Triceratops had a pair of massive horns on its head and a shorter horn on its snout, as well as a shield-like frill around its neck.

http://snipr.com/b5ra7



Acid Oceans 'Need Urgent Action'
from BBC News Online

The world's marine ecosystems risk being severely damaged by ocean acidification unless there are dramatic cuts in CO2 emissions, warn scientists.

More than 150 top marine researchers have voiced their concerns through the "Monaco Declaration," which warns that changes in acidity are accelerating.

The declaration, supported by Prince Albert II of Monaco, builds on findings from an earlier international summit.

http://snipr.com/b5r90



Excess Blood Sugar Could Harm Cognition
from Science News

Chronically elevated blood levels of the simple sugar glucose may contribute to poor cognitive function in elderly people with diabetes, a study in the February Diabetes Care suggests. But whether these levels add to a person's risk of developing dementia is unclear, the study authors say.

People with diabetes face a risk of old-age dementia that's roughly 50 percent greater than those without diabetes, past studies have shown. Research has also hinted that surges in blood sugar might account for some of that added risk. Many previous studies have tested for elevated blood glucose by obtaining a snapshot blood sample taken after a person has fasted for a day.

In the new study, Tali Cukierman-Yaffe, an endocrinologist at Tel-Aviv University and McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada, teamed with an international group of colleagues to assess blood glucose levels in nearly 3,000 diabetes patients by measuring A1c, shorthand for HbA1c or glycosylated hemoglobin. Since sugar in the blood sticks to the hemoglobin protein in red blood cells, the A1c test reveals an average sugar level over two or three months.

http://snipr.com/b5rbe



Jetting Their Way to a Better Understanding of Global Warming
from Scientific American

BOULDER--Scientists have taken the first crack at solving a fundamental climate mystery, criss-crossing the globe in a souped-up corporate jet to determine where and when greenhouse gases enter and leave the atmosphere.

An understanding of how these climate-warming gases move about the globe is a critical prerequisite for any policy aimed at curbing global warming, scientists said Thursday, and information gained over the next three years will play a crucial role in sharpening future predictions and improving their accuracy.

Using a high performance jet, scientists will take a series of "slices" of the atmosphere over the next few years from pole to pole and from the surface to the atmosphere's upper reaches. ... Scientists running the instruments say they have seen several "wonderful jewels" in the raw data that challenge current thinking and assumptions.

http://snipr.com/b5rc1



Extinct Ibex Is Resurrected by Cloning
from the Telegraph (UK)

The Pyrenean ibex, a form of wild mountain goat, was officially declared extinct in 2000 when the last-known animal of its kind was found dead in northern Spain.

Shortly before its death, scientists preserved skin samples of the goat, a subspecies of the Spanish ibex that live in mountain ranges across the country, in liquid nitrogen.

Using DNA taken from these skin samples, the scientists were able to replace the genetic material in eggs from domestic goats, to clone a female Pyrenean ibex, or bucardo as they are known. It is the first time an extinct animal has been cloned.

http://snipr.com/b5rfa



Mars Rover May Be Feeling its Age - Finally
from the San Francisco Chronicle

Spirit, the aged and somewhat creaky Mars rover, is stalled on the Red Planet with a touch of bewilderment, but earthbound engineers are confident they'll get the mobile explorer up and running smoothly soon.

The Spirit and its sister rover, Opportunity, landed on Mars five years ago for what was designed as a 90-day mission, but have far exceeded all expectations, exploring successfully on opposite sides of the planet ever since. The only signs of age have been a little wear on the wheels and problems with some of their onboard instruments.

Lately, though, the Spirit apparently is disoriented. The robot vehicle has failed to obey radio commands from Earth to start driving, and has been unable to find the sun, NASA scientists say.

http://snipr.com/b5rg0



Where Do Comets Come From?
from New Scientist

Few cosmic apparitions have inspired such awe and fear as comets. The particularly eye-catching Halley's Comet, which last appeared in the inner solar system in 1986, pops up in the Talmud as "a star which appears once in seventy years that makes the captains of the ships err." In 1066, the comet's appearance was seen as a portent of doom before the Battle of Hastings; in 1456, Pope Callixtus III is said to have excommunicated it.

Modern science takes a more measured view. Comets such as Halley's are agglomerations of dust and ice that orbit the sun on highly elliptical paths, acquiring their spectacular tails in the headwind of charged particles streaming from the sun. We even know their source: they are Kuiper belt objects (KBOs) tugged from their regular orbits by Neptune and Uranus.

But there's a problem. Certain comets, such as Hale-Bopp, which flashed past Earth in 1997, appear simply too infrequently in our skies. Their orbits must be very long, far too long to have an origin in the Kuiper belt. The conclusion of many astronomers is that the known solar system is surrounded in all directions by a tenuous halo of icy outcasts, thrown from the sun's immediate vicinity billions of years ago by the gravity of the giant planets.

http://snipr.com/b5rgg



Geologist: No Big Energy Bursts at Alaska Volcano
from the San Diego Union-Tribune

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Associated Press) -- Groans and steam emanated from Mount Redoubt yet another day, but the volcano showed no dramatic burst of energy, geologists noted Sunday.

"It looks like a volcano that wants to erupt, and our general impression is that it's more likely to erupt than not," said Tina Neal with the Alaska Volcano Observatory.

As a precaution, Elmendorf Air Force Base near Anchorage, about 100 miles northeast of Redoubt, was moving five C-17 cargo planes to McChord Air Force Base in Washington.

http://snipr.com/b5rhn



Running on Empty: The Pros and Cons of Fasting
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Something about the way Americans eat isn't working -- and hasn't been for a long time. The number of obese Americans is now greater than the number who are merely overweight, according to government figures released last month. It's as if once we taste food, we can't stop until we've gorged ourselves.

Taking that inclination into account, some people are adopting an unusual solution to overeating. Rather than battling temptation in grocery stores, restaurants and their own kitchens, they simply don't eat. At least not at certain times of the day or specific days of the week.

Called intermittent fasting, this rather stark approach to weight control appears to be supported by science, not to mention various religious and cultural practices around the globe. ... "There is something kind of magical about starvation," says Dr. Marc Hellerstein, a professor of endocrinology, metabolism and nutrition at UC Berkeley, who studies fasting.

http://snipr.com/b5rkr

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 02, 2009, 09:36:17 PM
Quote from: Cainad on February 02, 2009, 06:13:37 AM
Quote from: The Mormons Will Begin Arriving By Bus on February 01, 2009, 10:03:13 PM
I WANT TO TOUCH MY LEGS TO YOUR LEGS

How gregarious!

:lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 02, 2009, 09:40:39 PM
Quote from: Kai on February 02, 2009, 12:56:07 PM
http://catalogue-of-organisms.blogspot.com/2009/02/of-gregarines.html (http://catalogue-of-organisms.blogspot.com/2009/02/of-gregarines.html)

a group of the parasitic Sporozoans (Protozoa), about the systematics etcetera. Thanks again Cat. of organisms for informing on obscure clades of life.

http://bedbugger.com/2009/02/01/lou-sorkin-and-bill-schutt-feeding-lous-bed-bug-colony/ (http://bedbugger.com/2009/02/01/lou-sorkin-and-bill-schutt-feeding-lous-bed-bug-colony/)

A very disturbing video of bedbug colonies and feeding by the writers of Dark Banquet.

I am absolutely fucking terrified of bedbugs. I had to go on medication for it last year. I probably shouldn't have clicked that link, it was sort of my own personal 1 man 1 cup.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 03, 2009, 11:59:57 AM
http://other95.blogspot.com/2009/02/circus-of-spineless-35-regeneration.html (http://other95.blogspot.com/2009/02/circus-of-spineless-35-regeneration.html)

Circus of the Spineless, a monthly blog circus about invertebrates.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 05, 2009, 07:17:58 PM
Today's Headlines - February 5, 2009

Fossil of 43-Foot Super Snake Titanoboa Found in Colombia
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Researchers excavating a coal mine in South America have found the fossilized remains of the mother of all snakes, a nightmarish tropical behemoth as long as a school bus and as heavy as a Volkswagen Beetle.

Modern boas and anacondas ... have been known to swallow Chihuahuas, cats and other small pets, but this prehistoric monster ate giant turtles and primitive crocodiles.

"This is amazing. It challenges everything we know about how big a snake can be," said herpetologist Jack Conrad of the American Museum of Natural History in New York, who was not involved in the research.

http://snipr.com/bckp4



Telescope Sees Smallest Exoplanet
from BBC News Online

The smallest planet yet found outside the Solar System has been detected by a French space telescope. The rocky world is less than twice the size of Earth.

Only a handful of planets have so far been found with a mass comparable to Earth, Venus, Mars or Mercury. The discovery was made by Corot, an orbiting observatory with a 27cm-diameter telescope to search for planets orbiting other stars.

About 330 of these "exoplanets" have been discovered so far. But most of them have been gas giants similar to Jupiter or Neptune. "For the first time, we have unambiguously detected a planet that is 'rocky' in the same sense as our own Earth," said Malcolm Fridlund, Corot project scientist from the European Space Agency (Esa). "We now have to understand this object further to put it into context, and continue our search for smaller, more Earth-like objects with Corot ..."

http://snipr.com/bckrj



Octuplet Mother Also Gives Birth to Ethical Debate
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

LOS ANGELES--Public opinion seems to be cresting against her, her own mother is rattled, and now fertility experts are suggesting the case of Nadya Suleman and her octuplets constitutes a breach of medical guidelines.

Suleman, 33, gave birth to six boys and two girls by Caesarean section Jan. 26 at a Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Bellflower, Calif. The miraculous event ... quickly drew criticism after it was revealed that Suleman is single, unemployed, lives with her mother and already has six children--including twins--ranging in age from 2 to 7.

... The birth of eight babies to a woman who becomes responsible for 14 children is attracting a different set of worries from the medical community, particularly fertility doctors, who say it goes against the mission of their work: to minimize high-risk, multiple-birth pregnancy and safely provide a woman with a single healthy baby.

http://snipr.com/bckt4



Study Links TV Viewing by Teens to Depression
from the Columbus Dispatch

All the time your teen spends in front of the television could increase his risk of becoming depressed as an adult, according to a new study.

Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh and Harvard Medical School looked at the media habits of 4,142 healthy adolescents and calculated that each additional hour of television watched a day boosted the odds of becoming depressed by 8 percent. Other forms of media didn't affect the risk of depression, according to the study published Tuesday in the Archives of General Psychiatry.

The results don't prove that TV viewing itself causes depression, said Brian Primack of Pitt's Center for Research on Health Care, who led the study.

http://snipr.com/bckuv



Science Found Wanting in Nation's Crime Labs
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Forensic evidence that has helped convict thousands of defendants for nearly a century is often the product of shoddy scientific practices that should be upgraded and standardized, according to accounts of a draft report by the nation's pre-eminent scientific research group.

The report by the National Academy of Sciences is to be released this month. People who have seen it say it is a sweeping critique of many forensic methods that the police and prosecutors rely on, including fingerprinting, firearms identification and analysis of bite marks, blood spatter, hair and handwriting.

The report says such analyses are often handled by poorly trained technicians who then exaggerate the accuracy of their methods in court. It concludes that Congress should create a federal agency to guarantee the independence of the field, which has been dominated by law enforcement agencies, say forensic professionals, scholars and scientists who have seen review copies of the study. Early reviewers said the report was still subject to change.

http://snipr.com/bckwf



Hormone May Predict 'Baby Blues'
from BBC News Online

Measuring levels of a hormone midway through pregnancy may predict a woman's risk of postnatal depression, say US researchers.

In a study of 100 women, levels of the pCRH hormone at 25 weeks helped predict three-quarters of those who developed the "baby blues." The researchers said, if proven in larger studies, the test could be used routinely to screen for depression. The findings are published in Archives of General Psychiatry.

Postnatal depression generally starts within four to six weeks of giving birth and affects 10-15% of mothers. Known risk factors include a history of depression, stressful life events, a lack of social support, low self-esteem, anxiety or stress during pregnancy.

http://snipr.com/bckyx



New Step Reported in Untangling Nature vs Nurture
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--Untangling the mystery of inherited versus acquired traits may be a step closer. Arguments have been long and contentious over how much people inherit and how much they are influenced by their environments.

Researchers led by Frances Rice and Anita Thapar of Britain's Cardiff University focused on reports that smoking by the mother during pregnancy increased the chance of low birth weight and anti-social behavior in children.

The researchers studied 533 children who were genetically related to the mother that carried them and 195 who resulted from egg donations and thus were not genetically related to the mother. The children were aged from 4 to 10 and had been conceived at clinics in the United Kingdom and United States. "What we have been able to confirm is that cigarette smoke in pregnancy does lower birth weight regardless of whether the mother and child are genetically related or not," Thapar said. However, that was not the case with anti-social behavior in children ...

http://snipr.com/bcl2h



Digital TV Conversion Delayed Until June 12
from the San Francisco Chronicle

Television viewers who rely on sets with antennas to pick up their broadcast signals have about four extra months to get ready for the nation's switch to digital TV.

The House of Representatives voted 264 to 158 Wednesday to move back the Feb. 17 deadline to June 12, sending the fast-tracked legislation to President Obama, who has promised to sign it.

The vote, largely along party lines, gives approximately 6.5 million unprepared households more time to prepare for the day when all analog TV broadcasts are turned off. ... Consumers who rely on traditional over-the-air broadcasts will need to upgrade to a pay TV service such as cable or satellite, use a TV with a digital tuner or buy a converter box for their older analog television sets.

http://snipr.com/bclq2



Halting Hormone Therapy Reduces Breast Cancer Risk Quickly
from Time

Six years after a landmark federal study established that hormone-replacement therapy (HRT) increases the risk of breast cancer in postmenopausal women, researchers are still trying to tease out exactly how the hormones interfere with women's health.

The assumption has always been that stopping hormone therapy would lead to a corresponding drop in breast-cancer risk, but now newly published data from the original trial ... suggest that the benefit occurs much more immediately than previously thought.

The finding is a contentious one. The authors of the new paper, which appears in the Feb. 5 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, found that the rate of breast cancer in postmenopausal women fell just two years after they stopped hormone therapy and continued to decline yearly.

http://snipr.com/bcl6v



First Deep Sea Observatory Looks at Climate Change
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

ABOARD RESEARCH VESSEL POINT LOBOS, Off the California Coast (Associated Press)--A crane on a ship deck hoisted a 502-pound video camera and plopped it into the ocean for a 3,000-foot descent to the world of neon-glowing jellyfish, bug-eyed red rock cod and other still unknown slithery critters.

The so-called Eye-in-the-Sea camera would be added to the first observatory operating in deep sea water and become part of a new kind of scientific exploration to assess the impacts of climate change on marine life.

... The camera is one of many instruments powered by the Monterey Accelerated Research Station or MARS, an underwater observatory that began operating in November off the California coast. Other instruments measure currents and seismic activity, while another part studies how higher acidity would affect marine life.

http://snipr.com/bcla3

February 4, 2009



When Dreams Come True
from Science News

Dreams don't just bubble up at night and then evaporate like morning dew once the sun rises. What you dream shapes what you think about your upcoming plans and your closest confidants, especially if nighttime reveries fit with what's already convenient to believe, a new report finds.

In an effort to understand whether people take their dreams seriously, Carey Morewedge of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh and Michael Norton of Harvard University surveyed 149 college students attending universities in India, South Korea or the United States about theories of dream function.

People across cultures often assume that dreams contain hidden truths, much as Sigmund Freud posited more than a century ago, Morewedge and Norton report in the February Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. In fact, many individuals consider dreams to provide more meaningful information regarding daily affairs than comparable waking thoughts do, the two psychologists conclude.

http://snipr.com/ba9vo



Early Whales Gave Birth on Land, Fossils Reveal
from National Geographic News

It's an evolutionary discovery Darwin himself would have been proud of. Forty-seven million years ago primitive whales gave birth on land, according to a study published this week that analyzes the fossil of a pregnant whale found in the Pakistani desert.

It is the first fetal fossil from the group of ancient amphibious whales called Archaeoceti, as well as the first from an extinct species called Maiacetus inuus. When the fossil was discovered, nine years ago, University of Michigan paleontologist Philip Gingerich was thrown off by the jumble of adult and fetal-size bones.

"The first thing we found [were] small teeth, then ribs going the wrong way," Gingerich said. Later, "it was just astonishing to realize why the specimen in the field was so confusing." The head-first position of the fetus was especially telling. Land mammals are generally born head first, and marine mammals are born tail first.

http://snipr.com/ba9yk



Can Bacteria Rescue the Oil Industry?
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

... Until only a few years ago, the majority of researchers doubted the possibility of any living matter in oil reservoirs that were sealed off for 200-500 million years.

Despite the discovery of hyperthermophilic life in Yellowstone geysers as early as the 1960s, it wasn't until the early 1990s that a number of researchers started reporting life in oil reserves 3-4 kilometers beneath the surface. Many researchers were skeptical that the found biomatter could be anything but contamination.

... Geologists and physicists dominate the science of oil extraction, but the subtle capabilities of microorganisms reveal new approaches to unlocking the full potential of oil reserves--reserves that have been inaccessible using established technology.

http://snipr.com/9mtrf



Google Earth Provides Dizzying 3D Views of Mars
from New Scientist

Mars enthusiasts can fly from the towering peak of Olympus Mons to Mars Pathfinder's peaceful resting place in an add-on to the latest version of the desktop application Google Earth, which was released on Monday.

The new Mars map amasses some 1000 gigabytes of data from a range of Mars probes, including NASA's Viking orbiters, Europe's Mars Express orbiter, and six landers, such as NASA's twin rovers, to create a three-dimensional view of the planet at a wide range of scales.

"What we've done is bring all that information into one single, easy-to-use platform," says Matthew Hancher of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California. "Everything that's ever gone to Mars has been put together to give us this unified view of the planet."

http://snipr.com/baa1t



Half of Britons Do Not Believe in Evolution, Survey Finds
from the Guardian (UK)

Half of British adults do not believe in evolution, with at least 22% preferring the theories of creationism or intelligent design to explain how the world came about, according to a survey.

The poll found that 25% of Britons believe Charles Darwin's theory of evolution is "definitely true," with another quarter saying it is "probably true." Half of the 2,060 people questioned were either strongly opposed to the theory or confused about it.

The Rescuing Darwin survey ... found that around 10% of people chose young Earth creationism--the belief that God created the world some time in the last 10,000 years--over evolution.

http://snipr.com/baa3i



Exploring the Folds of the Brain--And Their Links to Autism
from Scientific American

One of the first things people notice about the human brain is its intricate landscape of hills and valleys. These convolutions derive from the cerebral cortex, a two- to four-millimeter-thick mantle of gelatinous tissue packed with neurons sometimes called gray matter that mediates our perceptions, thoughts, emotions and actions.

... The cortex of large-brained mammals expanded considerably over the course of evolution much more so than the skull. Indeed, the surface area of a flattened human cortex equivalent to that of an extra-large pizza is three times larger than the inner surface of the braincase. Thus, the only way the cortex of humans and other brainy species can fit into the skull is by folding.

... New research indicates that a network of nerve fibers physically pulls the pliable cortex into shape during development and holds it in place throughout life. Disturbances to this network during development or later, as a result of a stroke or injury, can have far-reaching consequences for brain shape and neural communication. These discoveries could therefore lead to new strategies for diagnosing and treating patients with certain mental disorders.

http://snipr.com/baa5c



That Buzzing Sound: The Mystery of Tinnitus
from the New Yorker

I noticed the sound one evening about a year ago. At first, I thought an alarm had been set off. Then I realized that the noise--a high-pitched drone--was mainly in my right ear. It has been with me ever since.

The tone varies, from a soft whoosh like a shower to a piercing screech resembling a dental drill. When I am engaged in work at the hospital or in the laboratory, it seems distant. But in idle moments it gets louder and more annoying, once even jarring me from a dream.

Tinnitus--the false perception of sound in the absence of an acoustic stimulus, a phantom noise--is one of the most common clinical syndromes in the United States, affecting twelve percent of men and almost fourteen percent of women who are sixty-five and older. It only rarely afflicts the young, with one significant exception: those serving in the armed forces. Tinnitus affects nearly half the soldiers exposed to blasts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

http://snipr.com/baaad



Tracking Forest Creatures on the Move
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

BARRO COLORADO ISLAND, Panama--We were tramping doggedly through the forest in pursuit of white-faced capuchins, those familiar organ-grinder monkeys with the wild hair, piercing eyes and impatient scowls of little German professors. Capuchins are said to be exceptionally quick-witted, and that morning they might as well have been swinging from their Phi Beta Kappa keys.

... "Nothing seems to slow them down," Dr. [Margaret] Crofoot said. "They never stop moving." Neither did Dr. Crofoot, 29, who is tall, blond and sporty and who reminded me of the actress Laura Dern in "Jurassic Park."

Capuchins are smart, gorgeous and socially sophisticated, and Dr. Crofoot has relished the many hours spent studying them with the traditional field research tools of binoculars, notebook and a saint's portion of patience. Yet she and other scientists who work here at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute are thrilled with a new system for tracking their subjects that could help revolutionize the labor-intensive business of field biology.

http://snipr.com/baac1



Bolivia: The Saudi Arabia of Lithium?
from the Seattle Times

UYUNI, Bolivia--In the rush to build the next generation of hybrid or electric cars, a sobering fact confronts both automakers and governments seeking to lower their reliance on foreign oil: Almost half of the world's lithium, the mineral needed to power the vehicles, is found in Bolivia--a country that may not be willing to surrender it easily.

Japanese and European companies are trying to strike deals to tap the resource, but a nationalist sentiment about the lithium is building in the government of President Evo Morales, an ardent critic of the United States who already has nationalized Bolivia's oil and natural-gas industries.

For now, the government talks of closely controlling the lithium and keeping foreigners at bay. Adding to the pressure, indigenous groups in the remote salt desert where the mineral lies are pushing for a share in the eventual bounty.

http://snipr.com/baaef



Methane Rain Formed New Lake on Saturn Moon
from National Geographic News

Methane rains on Saturn's moon Titan may have created a new lake about four times the size of Yellowstone National Park, scientists say. The new lake covers about 13,000 square miles. It's part of a system of lakelike features around Titan's south pole.

Scientists have been studying what appear to be methane lakes near both of Titan's poles since the craft arrived in the Saturnian system in 2004. The work suggests the large, frigid moon also has methane rain.

The new lake could simply be a shallow marsh, the scientists admit, but data suggest the rainstorm that created it might have been torrential enough to form something deeper.

http://snipr.com/baa7i
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 05, 2009, 07:19:31 PM
January 30, 2009



New Look at Food Safety After Peanut Tainting
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Christopher Meunier, 7, had not been sick since he was a toddler, but in late November, he suddenly had a high fever and bloody diarrhea and started vomiting. ... Hospitalized for six days, Christopher had salmonella poisoning, making him one of more than 500 people sickened across the country after eating peanut butter or peanut products made at a Peanut Corporation of America plant in Blakely, Ga.

The Food and Drug Administration has charged that the company knowingly shipped contaminated products to some of the largest food makers in the country from a plant that was never designed to make peanut butter safely, causing one of the most extensive food recalls in history. The company responded that it disagreed with some of the agency's findings and that it had "taken extraordinary measures to identify and recall all products that have been identified as presenting a potential risk."

Food scares have become as common as Midwestern tornadoes. Cantaloupes, jalapeños, lettuce, spinach and tomatoes have all been subject to major recalls in recent years. ... A clutch of legislative proposals this year would offer fixes to the system ...

http://snipr.com/b068g



MRIs Reveal Possible Source of Woman's Super-Memory
from USA Today

A Southern California man employed in the entertainment business is the fourth person verified by scientists to have an ultra-rare memory gift: He recalls in detail most days of his life, as well as the day and date of key public events, says Larry Cahill, who co-leads a project on people with super-memory. The name of the latest "bona fide" won't be released by scientists because he's a research subject, but he is free to identify himself.

Meanwhile, MRI scans on Jill Price, 43, the Los Angeles religious school administrator who in 2006 was the first person confirmed to have such an ability, reveal two abnormally large areas in her brain.

That discovery could lead to breakthroughs on how memories are formed and kept, says Cahill, a neuroscientist at the University of California-Irvine. Price went public last year with the publication of her book, The Woman Who Can't Forget.

http://snipr.com/b06c0



Eccentric Exoplanet Gets Hot Flashes
from National Geographic News

A distant Jupiter-like planet on an eccentric orbit swings so close to its parent star that its temperature spikes by about 1,260 degrees Fahrenheit (682 degrees Celsius) in only six hours, a new study reports.

Then as rapidly as it heats up, the extrasolar planet cools back down after zipping past its star, said lead study author Gregory Laughlin, an astronomer at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

The planet's path is unique, Laughlin noted. Most known "hot Jupiters" have tight, roughly circular orbits. They are tidally locked, showing only one face to their stars, just as the moon does to Earth. "But this planet has the most eccentric orbit of any discovered," he said. Its elongated elliptical path makes it impossible for the world to be tidally locked, "so it's guaranteed to bring the planet spinning in every 111 days for a harrowing encounter."

http://snipr.com/b06f9



Balancing the Risks and Rewards of a Power Source
from Scientific American

... Since 1979, after Three Mile Island partially melted down, U.S. nuclear reactors have had to shut down for a year or more for repairs or other safety improvements 46 times, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists. For example, in February 2000 a steam generator tube abruptly ruptured at the Indian Point nuclear power plant in Buchanan, N.Y.--a potential problem first identified in 1997 that had not been fixed.

All told, only four incidents in the history of the nuclear power industry have been worse than the cavity [that caused a shut-down] of Davis-Besse [near Toledo, Ohio], and two have been roughly equivalent, according to the NRC, such as a radioactive steam pipe burst at PSEG's Salem nuclear generating station in New Jersey.

Even as the U.S. considers building as many as 26 new reactors, 51 of the 104 currently operating have received clearance from the NRC to extend their generating lives by 20 or more years. And the remainder are either under review by the agency or expected to apply. The question: Are they safe?

http://snipr.com/b06gl



Wolves and the Balance of Nature in the Rockies
from Smithsonian Magazine

Roger Lang looked at two black wolves looking back at him. "I knew they wouldn't get them all," he said, steadying his binoculars on the steering wheel of his pickup truck. "Some of them were trapped. Some were shot from helicopters. They culled nine and actually thought they got the whole pack. But you can see they didn't."

Sloping down to the Madison River, Lang's 18,000-acre Sun Ranch in southwest Montana is an Old West tableau of rippling prairie, plunging streams, ghostly bands of elk, browsing cattle--and, at the moment, two wolves poised like sentinels on a knoll beneath the snowy peaks of the Madison Range.

... Lang has a close-up view of one of the most dramatic and contentious wildlife experiments in a century--the reintroduction of wolves to the northern Rocky Mountains, where they were wiped out long ago. Caught in Canada and flown to Yellowstone, 41 wolves were released in the area between 1995 and 1997, restoring the only missing member of the park's native mammals.

http://snipr.com/b06it



American Attitudes to Stem-Cell Therapies Are Changing Fast
from the Economist

For the past eight years, America's government has declined to fund new research into one of the world's most promising medical technologies: the use of human embryonic stem cells to repair or replace damaged tissue in the diseased and injured. Embryonic stem cells are special for two reasons, one scientific and one ethical. ... But it was this destruction of potential human life that disturbed George Bush and his supporters.

Barack Obama has promised to reverse the ban. When that happens, American academics will no longer have to watch enviously from the sidelines as their colleagues in Australia, Britain, China, the Czech Republic, Israel, Singapore and South Korea push ahead. But though the legislative wheels have yet to start turning, the mood has already shifted.

One sign of this shift came on January 23rd when the country's Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted permission for the first clinical trial of a therapy based on human embryonic stem cells to Geron, a firm based in Menlo Park, California. Geron was able to ask for permission, and the FDA was able to grant it, because the ban does not apply to privately financed research. America, it seems, is back in the stem-cell business.

http://snipr.com/b06l2



Mammoth-Killing Comet Questioned
from BBC News Online

A study of wildfires after the last ice age has cast doubt on the theory that a giant comet impact wiped out woolly mammoths and prehistoric humans.

Analysis of charcoal and pollen records from around 13,000 years ago showed no evidence of continental-scale fires the cometary impact theory suggests. However, the results showed increased fires after periods of climate change.

The research is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The cometary impact hypothesis holds that an enormous comet slammed into or exploded over North America in the Younger Dryas period some 12,900 years ago. The idea was first mooted by Richard Firestone of Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory in the US and colleagues in 2007.

http://snipr.com/b06n8



How Inventors Plan to Change Football
from the Christian Science Monitor

Football is mostly a game of throwing, running, and tackling-all human feats. Players use strength and strategy to propel the ball across the goal line. What could make it better?

According to some inventors, plenty. Technology, they say, can make the game faster, more fair, and less dangerous for players. The National Football League (NFL) is slow to adopt certain changes, but these plucky tinkerers push on, driven by a desire to solve problems, a love of the game, and hopes that their designs gain a few more yards each year.

Take the chains that have been used for decades to measure a first down. Super Bowls have been decided by inches, depending on how far the ball was advanced on certain plays. That leaves a lot of room for human error, says Alan Amron, a professional inventor from Woodbury, N.Y. He is the brains behind motorized squirt guns. Surveyors get very accurate measurements using gyroscopes and laser beams, he says. Why not apply that to football?

http://snipr.com/b06or



Common Chemical Causes Locusts to Swarm
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--A chemical that affects people's moods also can transform easygoing desert locusts into terrifying swarms that ravage the countryside, scientists report. "Here we have a solitary and lonely creature, the desert locust. But just give them a little serotonin, and they go and join a gang," observed Malcolm Burrows of the University of Cambridge in England.

The brain chemical serotonin has been linked to mood in people. It plays a role in sexual desire, appetite, sleep, memory and learning, too.

Under certain conditions, locusts triple the amount of serotonin in their systems, changing the insects from loners to pack animals, Burrows and his co-authors report in Friday's edition of the journal Science.

http://snipr.com/b06qs



Baby Neurons Glue New Memories
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

New findings suggest a hypothesis for a much-debated question in neuroscience: what exactly is the role of new neurons born in the adult human brain? These brain cells may help link memories of events that occurred within a week or two of each other, a paper published in Neuron reports.

"It's really novel, and I think it's quite informative," said behavioral neuroscientist Andrea Chiba of the University of California, San Diego, who was not involved in the work.

Fred Gage a neuroscientist at the Salk Institute in La Jolla, Calif., published a controversial study in 1998 identifying the formation of new neurons in the adult hippocampus, a brain region associated with memory. Til then, neuroscience dogma had held that humans are born with all of the neurons they will ever have. But the function of these newly formed cells has never been identified.

http://snipr.com/b06sc

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 05, 2009, 07:19:52 PM
February 3, 2009



Google Earth Fills Its Watery Gaps
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Two and a half years ago, the software engineers behind Google Earth, the searchable online replica of the planet, were poised to fill an enormous data gap, adding the two-thirds of the globe that is covered by water in reality and was blue, and blank, online.

... "We had this arbitrary distinction that if it was below sea level it didn't count," recalled John Hanke, the Internet entrepreneur who co-created the progenitor of Google Earth, called Keyhole, and moved to Google when the company bought his company in 2004.

That oversight had to be fixed before the months and months of new programming and data collection could culminate in the creation of simulated oceans. On Monday, the ocean images underwent the most significant of several upgrades to Google Earth, with the new version downloadable free at earth.google.com, according to the company.

http://snipr.com/b7xpi



Animal Eggs No Good for Cloning?
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Cloned human embryos express the genes required for pluripotency, but animal-human hybrids do not, according to a study published Monday in the journal Cloning and Stem Cells.

The findings pave the way for isolating human embryonic stem cells from therapeutic cloning--a landmark that has never been achieved after Woo-suk Hwang's discredited cloning experiments--but call into question the utility of interspecies embryos.

"These eggs simply do not reprogram," lead author Robert Lanza, chief scientific officer of Advanced Cell Technology in Worcester, Mass., said of the human-animal hybrid embryos. "That puts the nail on the coffin for that whole line of work."

http://snipr.com/b7xr5



Ocean Iron Plan Approved as Researchers Show Algae Absorb CO2
from the Guardian (UK)

Seeding the oceans with iron is a viable way to permanently lock carbon away from the atmosphere and potentially tackle climate change, according to scientists who have studied how the process works naturally in the ocean.

The study, from researchers at the University of Southampton, is published following the announcement earlier this week that scientists from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany were finally given the go-ahead for a controversial experiment to drop several tonnes of iron into the Southern Ocean. Some environmentalists are concerned that the long-term ecological effects of iron seeding are unknown.

Ocean geo-engineering using iron as a fertiliser for microscopic creatures in the ocean is seen as a possible way to slow down global warming. Marine algae and other phytoplankton capture vast quantities of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they grow, but this growth is often limited by a lack of essential nutrients such as iron.

http://snipr.com/b7xui



The Big Fix
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The economy will recover. It won't recover anytime soon. It is likely to get significantly worse over the course of 2009, no matter what President Obama and Congress do. And resolving the financial crisis will require both aggressiveness and creativity. In fact, the main lesson from other crises of the past century is that governments tend to err on the side of too much caution--of taking the punch bowl away before the party has truly started up again.

"The mistake the United States made during the Depression and the Japanese made during the '90s was too much start-stop in their policies," said Timothy Geithner, Obama's choice for Treasury secretary ... Japan announced stimulus measures even as it was cutting other government spending. Franklin Roosevelt flirted with fiscal discipline midway through the New Deal, and the country slipped back into decline.

Geithner arguably made a similar miscalculation himself last year as a top Federal Reserve official who was part of a team that allowed Lehman Brothers to fail. But he insisted that the Obama administration had learned history's lesson. "We're just not going to make that mistake," Geithner said. "We're not going to do that. We'll keep at it until it's done, whatever it takes."

http://snipr.com/b7xw3



Cancer Protection Secret Revealed
from BBC News Online

Scientists say they have discovered a missing link in the way cells protect themselves against cancer. They have uncovered how cells switch a gene called p53, which can block the development of tumours, on and off.

The researchers say the finding has important implications for cancer treatment and diagnosis. The study, published in Genes And Development, was carried out by teams of scientists in Singapore and the University of Dundee.

The p53 gene, first discovered 30 years ago, plays a vital role in keeping the body healthy by ordering damaged cells to commit suicide, or by stopping them dividing while key repair work is carried out. In half of all cancers the gene is either damaged or inactive, giving damaged cells a free rein to keep dividing and form cancer.

http://snipr.com/b7xzw



Local Police Want Right to Jam Wireless Signals
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

As President Obama's motorcade rolled down Pennsylvania Avenue on Inauguration Day, federal authorities deployed a closely held law enforcement tool: equipment that can jam cellphones and other wireless devices to foil remote-controlled bombs, sources said.

It is an increasingly common technology, with federal agencies expanding its use as state and local agencies are pushing for permission to do the same. Police and others say it could stop terrorists from coordinating during an attack, prevent suspects from erasing evidence on wireless devices, simplify arrests and keep inmates from using contraband phones.

But jamming remains strictly illegal for state and local agencies. Federal officials barely acknowledge that they use it inside the United States, and the few federal agencies that can jam signals usually must seek a legal waiver first.

http://snipr.com/b7y1o



'Normal' Levels of Bad Cholesterol May Be Too High
from USA Today

The bottom isn't just dropping out of the stock market. It's also giving way in a critical measure of heart risk.

Two new studies indicate that the threshold of what doctors consider "normal" levels of bad cholesterol, or LDL, may be too high, leaving thousands of people vulnerable to heart attacks and strokes.

One of the studies, led by Gregg Fonarow of UCLA, examined 131,000 hospital admissions for heart disease and found that at least half of the patients had normal LDL levels. The other study, called JUPITER, involved 18,000 people. It showed that giving a cholesterol-lowering statin to older people with normal LDL cut their risk of heart attack and stroke in half.

http://snipr.com/b7y3t



A Leap for Teleporting, Between Ions Feet Apart
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Without quite the drama of Alexander Graham Bell calling out, "Mr. Watson, come here!" or the charm of the original "Star Trek" television show, scientists have nonetheless achieved a milestone in communication: teleporting the quantum identity of one atom to another a few feet away.

The contraption is a Rube Goldberg-esque mix of vacuum chambers, fiber optics, lasers and semitransparent beam splitters in a laboratory at the Joint Quantum Institute in Maryland.

"Even in the far future, "Star Trek" transporters will probably remain a fantasy, but the mechanism could form an important component in new types of communication and computing.

Quantum teleportation depends on entanglement, one of the strangest of the many strange aspects of quantum mechanics. Two particles can become "entangled" into a single entity, and a change in one instantaneously changes the other even if it is far away.

http://snipr.com/b7y5n



First Chocoholics in U.S. Found in New Mexico?
from National Geographic News

Chocolate lovers are a dedicated bunch. Hershey's sales and profits rose even in the brutal final quarter of 2008, and a thousand years ago ancient Americans may have walked hundreds of miles to procure the bittersweet stuff, a new study suggests.

Chemical residues found on pottery jar shards reveal that the practice of drinking chocolate had spread at least as far north as Chaco Canyon in northern New Mexico by A.D. 1000 to 1125--400 years earlier than chocolate was thought to have reached what is now the United States.

The discovery suggests a vast trade network helped deliver chocolate from Central America, where the seeds of the cacao tree were first transformed into beverages some 3,000 years ago.

http://snipr.com/b7y9l



Wreck of HMS Victory Found in English Channel
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

American salvagers say they have discovered the long-sought wreck of HMS Victory, the mightiest and most technologically advanced warship of its time, which sank during a violent storm in the English Channel in 1744.

Armed with as many as 110 massive bronze cannons and carrying a crew of 900 men and 100 supernumeraries, the Victory was lost with all hands and reportedly with a treasure of gold bullion whose value is estimated at $1 billion.

In a news conference Monday in London, Greg Stemm, chief executive of Odyssey Marine Exploration in Tampa, Fla., said the company found the remains in 330 feet of water more than 60 miles from where the vessel was thought to have sunk--exonerating the captain, Sir John Balchin, from the widespread accusation that he had let it run aground through faulty navigation.

http://snipr.com/b7y7d

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on February 06, 2009, 08:09:00 AM
Quote from: Kai on February 05, 2009, 07:17:58 PM

Half of Britons Do Not Believe in Evolution, Survey Finds
from the Guardian (UK)

Half of British adults do not believe in evolution, with at least 22% preferring the theories of creationism or intelligent design to explain how the world came about, according to a survey.

The poll found that 25% of Britons believe Charles Darwin's theory of evolution is "definitely true," with another quarter saying it is "probably true." Half of the 2,060 people questioned were either strongly opposed to the theory or confused about it.

The Rescuing Darwin survey ... found that around 10% of people chose young Earth creationism--the belief that God created the world some time in the last 10,000 years--over evolution.

http://snipr.com/baa3i
This survey was bullshit, btw.  The question they asked is whether people agreed that "evolution alone is not enough to explain the complex structures of some living things, so the intervention of a designer is needed at key stages".  Very obviously biased wording.  It would have been better to ask something like "Do you believe that the theory of evolution explains the diversity of life on earth?"  You would have gotten very different numbers from that survey.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on February 06, 2009, 11:34:55 AM
Quote from: New Scientist

Read our related editorial: The Obama factor, revealed

HITLER and Mussolini both had the ability to bend millions of people to their fascist will. Now evidence from psychology and neurology is emerging to explain how tactics like organised marching and propaganda can work to exert mass mind control.

Scott Wiltermuth of Stanford University in California and colleagues have found that activities performed in unison, such as marching or dancing, increase loyalty to the group. "It makes us feel as though we're part of a larger entity, so we see the group's welfare as being as important as our own," he says.

Wiltermuth's team separated 96 people into four groups who performed these tasks together: listening to a song while silently mouthing the words, singing along, singing and dancing, or listening to different versions of the song so that they sang and danced out of sync. In a later game, when asked to decide whether to stick with the group or strive for personal gain, those in the non-synchronised group behaved less loyally than the rest (Psychological Science, vol 20, p 1).

Psychologist Jonathan Haidt at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville thinks this research helps explain why fascist leaders, amongst others, use organised marching and chanting to whip crowds into a frenzy of devotion to their cause, though these tactics can be used just as well for peace, he stresses. Community dances and group singing can ease local tension, for example - a theory he plans to test experimentally (Journal of Legal Studies, DOI: 10.1086/529447).

Meanwhile, the powerful unifying effects of propaganda images are being explored by Charles Seger at Indiana University at Bloomington. His team primed students with pictures of their university - college sweatshirts or the buildings themselves - then asked how highly they scored on different emotions, such as pride or happiness. The primed students gave a strikingly similar emotional profile, in contrast with non-primed students (Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, DOI: 10.1016/j.jesp.2008.12.004).

Interest in the idea of a herd mentality has been renewed by work into mirror neurons - cells that fire when we perform an action or watch someone perform a similar action. It suggests that our brains are geared to mimic our peers. "We are set up for 'auto-copy'," says Haidt.
Interest in the idea of a herd mentality has been renewed by research into mirror neurons

Neurological evidence seems to back this idea. Vasily Klucharev, at the Donders Centre for Cognitive Neuroimaging in Nijmegen, the Netherlands, found that the brain releases more of the reward chemical dopamine when we fall in line with the group consensus (Neuron, vol 61, p 140). His team asked 24 women to rate more than 200 women for attractiveness. If a participant discovered their ratings did not tally with that of the others, they tended to readjust their scores. When a woman realised her differing opinion, fMRI scans revealed that her brain generated what the team dubbed an "error signal". This has a conditioning effect, says Klucharev: it's how we learn to follow the crowd.

Sauce (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126945.300)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 06, 2009, 04:36:01 PM
http://membracid.wordpress.com/2009/02/05/new-research-on-bedbug-insecticide-resistance/

Time to get paranoid. About bedbugs.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 06, 2009, 05:00:52 PM
http://catalogue-of-organisms.blogspot.com/2009/02/blinding-me-with-science.html (http://catalogue-of-organisms.blogspot.com/2009/02/blinding-me-with-science.html)

awesome stuff and commentary on this week's Science journal. plus a radial mouth arthropod with AQUATIC WINGS!

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 09, 2009, 01:33:30 PM
 February 6, 2009

Evolution: Unfinished Business
from the Economist

The miracles of nature are everywhere: on landing, a beetle folds its wings like an origami master; a lotus leaf sheds muddy water as if it were quicksilver; a spider spins a web to entrap her prey, but somehow evades entrapment herself. Since the beginning of time, people who have thought about such things have seen these marvels as examples of the wisdom of God; even as evidence for his existence.

But 200 years ago, on February 12th 1809, a man was born who would challenge all that. The book that issued the challenge, published half a century later, in 1859, offered a radical new view of the living world and, most radical of all, of humanity's origins. The man was Charles Robert Darwin. The book was On the Origin of Species. And the challenge was the theory of evolution by natural selection.

Since Darwin's birth, the natural world has changed beyond recognition. Then, the modern theory of atoms was scarcely six years old and the Earth was thought to be 6,000. There was no inkling of the size of the universe beyond the Milky Way, and radioactivity, relativity and quantum theory were unimaginable. Yet of all the discoveries of 19th- and early 20th-century science ... only evolution has failed to find general acceptance outside the scientific world.

http://snipr.com/beurh



Tamiflu No Longer Works for Dominant Flu Strain
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A milder than usual U.S. flu season is masking a growing concern about widespread resistance to the antiviral drug Tamiflu and what that means for the nation's preparedness in case of a dangerous pandemic flu.

Tamiflu, the most commonly used influenza antiviral and the mainstay of the federal government's emergency drug stockpile, no longer works for the dominant flu strain circulating in much of the country, government officials said Tuesday.

Of samples tested since October, almost 100% of the strain--known as type A H1N1--showed resistance to Tamiflu. In response, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued new guidelines to physicians in December. Doctors were told to substitute an alternative antiviral, Relenza, for Tamiflu, or to combine Tamiflu with an older antiviral, rimantadine, if the H1N1 virus was the main strain circulating in their communities.

http://snipr.com/beuvz



Dark Days for Green Energy
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Wind and solar power have been growing at a blistering pace in recent years, and that growth seemed likely to accelerate under the green-minded Obama administration. But because of the credit crisis and the broader economic downturn, the opposite is happening: installation of wind and solar power is plummeting.

Factories building parts for these industries have announced a wave of layoffs in recent weeks, and trade groups are projecting 30 to 50 percent declines this year in installation of new equipment, barring more help from the government.

Prices for turbines and solar panels, which soared when the boom began a few years ago, are falling. Communities that were patting themselves on the back just last year for attracting a wind or solar plant are now coping with cutbacks.

http://snipr.com/beuzm



The Genes That Turn 'Three' Red
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Researchers have completed the first-ever genome-wide scan of synesthesia, a condition in which sensory stimuli cross wires and combine such that people "see" sounds or "taste" shapes, according to a study published online Thursday in the American Journal of Human Genetics.

Investigators at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics at the University of Oxford pinpointed four areas of the genome associated with the disorder. Those regions contain genes that have been associated with autism and dyslexia, as well as genes involved in different aspects of brain development, and further analysis could illuminate how genetics drives complex cognitive traits, the authors say.

"It's exciting that we have a study about the genetic basis of synesthesia--finally," said Noam Sagiv, a cognitive neuroscientist at Brunel University in the UK, who was not involved in the research. Until now "we've just been guessing," he said, by "using data based on prevalence estimates."

http://snipr.com/bev24



Auroras: What Powers the Greatest Light Show on Earth?
from New Scientist

A few times a day, a gigantic explosion shakes the Earth's magnetic shield, triggering a chain of events that lights up the polar skies with dazzling auroras. These explosions are substorms, and how they happen has long been a mystery. Until now, no one has been able to explain how they gather the energy to create such spectacular displays, or what happens to trigger them.

Now a flotilla of NASA satellites is finally providing answers. They could help us understand not only one of nature's greatest spectacles, but also help predict more serious space weather, which can endanger satellites and astronauts, and even scramble electrical systems on Earth.

The northern and southern lights have fascinated people throughout human history, and there has been no shortage of attempts to explain them. ... In the late 1600s, Edmond Halley was the first to correctly link the aurora to the Earth's magnetic field, though it wasn't until the 1950s that scientists confirmed that the display is created when electrons are funnelled by magnetic fields into the upper atmosphere.

http://snipr.com/bev5u



Earliest Animals Were Sea Sponges, Fossils Hint
from National Geographic News

Fossil steroids found underground in Oman show that early Earth was the scene of a sea sponge heyday more than 635 million years ago.

The ancient chemicals--similar to modern natural steroids such as estrogen and testosterone--are now the oldest known fossil evidence of animal life, says a new study led by Gordon Love of the University of California, Riverside.

Based on chemical signatures inside sedimentary rocks, Love and colleagues think the sponges likely grew in colonies that blanketed areas of the ocean floor. Back then the supercontinent Rodinia, which had been Earth's dominant landmass for at least 350 million years, was in the process of breaking up, and the climate was extremely cold worldwide. Sponges evolved in shallow ocean basins, because the deeper seas did not yet contain oxygen, a necessity for almost all life.

http://snipr.com/bev6u



How Dad's Age Increases Baby's Risk of Mental Illness
from Scientific American

... The idea that a father's age could affect the health of his children was first hinted at a century ago by an unusually perceptive and industrious doctor in private practice in Stuttgart, Germany. Wilhelm Weinberg ... managed to publish 160 scientific papers without the benefit of colleagues, students or grants. His papers, written in German, did not attract much attention initially; most geneticists spoke English. It was not until years later that some of Weinberg's papers were recognized as landmarks.

One of these was a 1912 study noting that a form of dwarfism called achondroplasia was more common among the last-born children in families than among the first-born. Weinberg didn't know why that was so, but he speculated that it might be related to the age of the parents, who were obviously older when their last children were born. Weinberg's prescient observation was confirmed decades later when research showed that he was half right: the risk of dwarfism rose with the father's age but not the mother's.

Since then, about 20 inherited ailments have been linked to paternal age, including progeria, the disorder of rapid aging, and Marfan syndrome, a disorder marked by very long arms, legs, fingers and toes, as well as life-threatening heart defects. More recent studies have linked fathers' age to prostate and other cancers in their children. And in September 2008 researchers linked older fathers to an increased risk of bipolar disorder in their children.

http://snipr.com/bev9o



Commercial Fishing Is Barred in Parts of Arctic
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Federal fisheries managers have voted to bar all commercial fishing in U.S. waters from north of the Bering Strait and east to the Canadian border in light of the rapid climate changes that are transforming the Arctic.

In a unanimous vote yesterday, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council ruled that scientists and policymakers need to better assess how global warming is affecting the region before allowing fishing on stocks such as Arctic cod, saffron cod and snow crab.

"There's concern over unregulated fishing, there's concern about warming, there's concern about how commercial fishing might affect resources in the region, local residents and subsistence fishing and the ecosystem as a whole," said Bill Wilson, a council aide. Environmentalists and fishing interests praised the move as sensible, given the changes to ice cover and other features of the Arctic environment.

http://snipr.com/bevcp



Lack of Sunshine Found to Trigger MS
from the Guardian (UK)

Women who are not exposed to sufficient sunshine in pregnancy may be at risk of giving birth to a child who will get multiple sclerosis in adulthood, research reveals today.

Oxford University researchers have identified a link between a shortage of the "sunshine vitamin"-vitamin D-and a specific gene which appears to be involved in the onset of the devastating and incurable disease.

Women are already urged to take folic acid in pregnancy to reduce the chances of a child being born with spina bifida. The research findings suggest that vitamin D could before long be advised for pregnant women as well-especially those who do not get much exposure to sunlight. The researchers think it is possible that vitamin D could play a part in other diseases which affect the immune system too.

http://snipr.com/bevfb



Study: Climate Change May Reshuffle Western Weeds
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

SALT LAKE CITY (Associated Press)--Climate change will likely shuffle some of the West's most troublesome invasive weeds, adding to the burden faced by farms and ranchers in some areas and providing opportunities for native plant restoration in others, according to a new study.

In many cases, a warming climate will provide more welcoming conditions for invasive plants to get a foothold, spread quickly and crowd out native species, the study by Princeton University researchers said.

But some invasives may retreat from millions of acres in the West--at least briefly--and offer an opportunity for land managers to re-establish native plants, the study said. The window for action, though, will probably be limited. "We're going to have to be in the right place at the right time before something else gains a foothold," said Bethany Bradley, a biogeographer at Princeton and lead author on the study.

http://snipr.com/bevhs

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on February 09, 2009, 06:15:35 PM
Quote from: Kai on February 09, 2009, 01:33:30 PM
Earliest Animals Were Sea Sponges, Fossils Hint
from National Geographic News

Fossil steroids found underground in Oman show that early Earth was the scene of a sea sponge heyday more than 635 million years ago.

The ancient chemicals--similar to modern natural steroids such as estrogen and testosterone--are now the oldest known fossil evidence of animal life, says a new study led by Gordon Love of the University of California, Riverside.

Based on chemical signatures inside sedimentary rocks, Love and colleagues think the sponges likely grew in colonies that blanketed areas of the ocean floor. Back then the supercontinent Rodinia, which had been Earth's dominant landmass for at least 350 million years, was in the process of breaking up, and the climate was extremely cold worldwide. Sponges evolved in shallow ocean basins, because the deeper seas did not yet contain oxygen, a necessity for almost all life.

http://snipr.com/bev6u
Considering the way sponges live and how basal their morphology is, them being the first animals isn't a shock.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 19, 2009, 06:20:43 PM
February 9, 2009



The Tiny, Slimy Savior of Global Coral Reefs?
from the Christian Science Monitor

Coral reefs, already declining in many areas around the world, face even tougher times ahead, say scientists. Warming and increasingly acidic oceans, combined with other stresses could conceivably spell the end for reefs as we know them, they warn.

But Andrew Baker, a scientist at the University of Miami's Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, has a more optimistic view. He thinks that corals have an innate - if limited - capacity to adapt to rising temperatures. And he theorizes that people may be able to help them along.

Earlier this year, Mr. Baker, a 2008 Pew Fellow, launched a project to study the relationship between reef-building coral polyps (a relative of jellyfish) and their symbiotic algae. ... During a so-called bleaching event, corals lose their algae and, greatly weakened, can die. Baker hopes to preempt such bleaching events, which have become more frequent in the past 50 years as temperatures have risen globally, by "inoculating" corals with a more heat-resistant strain of algae.

http://snipr.com/bksp2



Women Have Hormonal Cues for Baby Cuteness
from Science News

Everyone oohs and ahs over babies. Ironically, new research suggests that young women taking oral contraceptives are especially good at picking out babies with the most adorable little mugs.

Female sex hormones sensitize women to differences in babies' cuteness, propose psychologist Reiner Sprengelmeyer of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland and his colleagues. When given choices between computer-manipulated images of a baby's face, premenopausal women discern gradations in the cuteness of the face better than either postmenopausal women or men of all ages, Sprengelmeyer's group reports in the February Psychological Science.

In the new study, young women taking hormone-boosting contraceptive pills outdid those not taking contraceptives, as well as premenopausal women in general, at detecting babies' cuteness.

http://snipr.com/bkssg



Jamming Bacterial Chat Could Yield New Antibiotics
from New Scientist

In the future, the most effective antibiotics might be those that don't kill any bacteria. Instead the drugs will simply prevent the bacteria from talking with one another.

Drug-resistant bugs are winning the war against standard antibiotics as they evolve resistance to even the most lethal drugs. It happens because a dose of antibiotics strongly selects for resistance by killing the most susceptible bacteria first.

If, however, researchers can identify antibiotics that neutralise dangerous bacteria without killing them, the pressure to evolve resistance can be reduced. One way to do that is to target the constant stream of chatter that passes between bacteria as molecular signals.

http://snipr.com/bksum



Egyptian Archaeologists Unveil 30 Mummies from Recently Discovered Tomb
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

CAIRO (Associated Press) -- A storehouse of 30 Egyptians mummies has been unearthed inside a 2,600-year-old tomb, in a new round of excavations at the vast necropolis of Saqqara outside Cairo, archeologists said Monday.

The tomb was located at the bottom of a 36 foot (11-meter) deep shaft, announced Egypt's top archaeologist Zahi Hawass and eight of the mummies were in sarcophagi, while the rest had been placed in niches along the wall.

Hawass described the discovery as a "storeroom for mummies," dating to 640 B.C. and the 26th Dynasty, which was Egypt's last independent kingdom before it was overthrown by a succession of foreign conquerors beginning with the Persians.

http://snipr.com/bksvk



Pentagon Issues 'Credits' To Offset Harm to Wildlife
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Pentagon has been funding Texas A&M University to pay landowners near a Texas military post to protect endangered bird species on their land under a secretive program designed to free the military to conduct training activities that would damage the birds' habitats inside the post's boundaries, documents show.

Despite complaints that the program is a boondoggle for the landowners, some federal officials are pushing to replicate it at other military sites and in federal highway projects. The program's effectiveness has been questioned by several military officials, federal wildlife authorities and an independent consulting firm, which recommended that the Army cancel it.

Initially championed by former president George W. Bush and some of his political allies, the "recovery credit system" at Fort Hood in central Texas has so far paid out nearly $4.4 million to contractors and landowners.

http://snipr.com/bksz0



'Silver Sensation' Seeks Cold Cosmos
from BBC News Online

Stare into the curve of Herschel's mirror too long and you get a slightly giddy feeling that comes from not being able to judge where its surface really starts. It is enchanting, spectacular and - at 3.5m in diameter - it will soon become the biggest telescope mirror in space, surpassing that of Hubble.

The great 18th Century astronomer William Herschel would have been astonished by the silver sensation that now bears his name.

The European Space Agency (Esa) is certainly very proud of its new observatory. It has been working on the venture for more than 20 years. "The mirror is an enormous piece of hardware," enthused Thomas Passvogel, Esa's programme manager on the Herschel space observatory.

http://snipr.com/bkt0y



Bushfires and Global Warming: Is There a Link?
from the Guardian (UK)

Scientists are reluctant to link individual weather events to global warming, because natural variability will always throw up extreme events. However, they say that climate change loads the dice, and can make severe episodes more likely.

Some studies have started to say how much global warming contributed to severe weather. Experts at the UK Met Office and Oxford University used computer models to say man-made climate change made the killer European heatwave in 2003 about twice as likely. In principle, the technique could be repeated with any extreme storm, drought or flood - which could pave the way for lawsuits from those affected.

Bob Brown, a senator who leads the Australian Greens, said the bushfires showed what climate change could mean for Australia. "Global warming is predicted to make this sort of event happen 25%, 50% more," he told Sky News. "It's a sobering reminder of the need for this nation and the whole world to act and put at a priority our need to tackle climate change."

http://snipr.com/bktd2



"Noah's Flood" Not Rooted in Reality, After All?
from National Geographic News

The ancient flood that some scientists think gave rise to the Noah story may not have been quite so biblical in proportion, a new study says.

Researchers generally agree that, during a warming period about 9,400 years ago, an onrush of seawater from the Mediterranean spurred a connection with the Black Sea, then a largely freshwater lake. That flood turned the lake into a rapidly rising sea.

A previous theory said the Black Sea rose up to 195 feet (60 meters), possibly burying villages and spawning the tale of Noah's flood and other inundation folklore. But the new study--largely focused on relatively undisturbed underwater fossils--suggests a rise of no more than 30 feet (10 meters).

http://snipr.com/bkt3x



Cognitive Computing Project Aims to Reverse-Engineer the Mind
from Wired

Imagine a computer that can process text, video and audio in an instant, solve problems on the fly, and do it all while consuming just 10 watts of power. It would be the ultimate computing machine if it were built with silicon instead of human nerve cells.

Compare that to current computers, which require extensive, custom programming for each application, consume hundreds of watts in power, and are still not fast enough. So it's no surprise that some computer scientists want to go back to the drawing board and try building computers that more closely emulate nature.

"The plan is to engineer the mind by reverse-engineering the brain," says Dharmendra Modha, manager of the cognitive computing project at IBM Almaden Research Center. In what could be one of the most ambitious computing projects ever, neuroscientists, computer engineers and psychologists are coming together in a bid to create an entirely new computing architecture that can simulate the brain's abilities for perception, interaction and cognition.

http://snipr.com/bkt50



Great Unknowns
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

With each passing day, we seem a step closer to comprehending the genome, gaining important insights into deadly diseases, and understanding the makeup of our universe.

But for some scientists, knowing what we can't figure out is just as important. A little-known discipline of science called computational intractability studies the boundaries of our understanding - not questions of the philosophical realm (Is there a god? An afterlife?) but of the everyday computational realm.

Think of an airline trying to allocate its planes at airports most efficiently, or a FedEx delivery man trying to deliver hundreds of packages to hundreds of locations using the shortest possible route. We know answers exist, but it turns out that calculating the solutions to such kinds of problems could take too long, even if all the world's most powerful computers were to work together on them.

http://snipr.com/bkt6g

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 19, 2009, 06:21:22 PM
February 10, 2009



Genes Offer New Clues in Old Debate on Species' Origins
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Charles Darwin called it the "mystery of mysteries," a problem so significant and one he was so sure he had solved that he named his world-changing work after it: On the Origin of Species. So he might be surprised to learn that 150 years after the publication of his book, the study of how species originate, a process known as speciation, is not only one of the field's most active areas of study, but also one of its most contentious.

While researchers agree that many of the recent breakthroughs would have come as a huge surprise to the grand old man, they seem to disagree about almost everything else, from what a species is to what exactly is meant by the origin of species and even whether Darwin shed any light on the process at all.

"Speciation is definitely one of the big-picture grand themes of evolutionary biology," said Mary Jane West-Eberhard, an evolutionary biologist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. She described study of the process as "an apparent turmoil that might be misunderstood by an outsider as a caldron of doubts and uncertainties but that in fact is a vitally alive science."

http://snipr.com/bmktk



Drugs Are Found to Block HIV In Monkeys
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

AIDS researchers who were gathered in Montreal yesterday heard encouraging results from studies of three strategies for preventing HIV infection using pharmaceuticals, particularly in women.

Two experiments in monkeys showed that antiretroviral (ARV) drugs, given by mouth or by vaginal gel, were highly effective in blocking infection by the virus that causes AIDS. A third study, in 3,100 women in the United States and Africa, showed a small amount of protection from a vaginal gel that acts by binding up the AIDS virus and preventing it from invading cells.

Many experts believe that, short of a vaccine, a virus-blocking substance that could be inserted in the vagina or rectum before sexual activity would be the most important tool in fighting the AIDS pandemic. Numerous topical microbicides have been tried, but none have worked, and two have actually increased the risk of infection.

http://snipr.com/bmky8



Vitamins Do Older Women Little Good
from U.S. News and World Report

(HealthDay News)--In yet another blow to the dietary supplement industry, researchers find no evidence that multivitamin use helps older women ward off heart disease and cancer, the top two killers of women, respectively.

"Women can be encouraged by the fact that these vitamins seem to do no harm, but they also seem to confer no benefit," said study co-author Sylvia Wassertheil-Smoller, a professor of epidemiology and population health at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City.

"The kind of vitamins you get from diet is quite different, because foods are very complex and have a lot of chemicals we don't know about that interact with each other. [Eating a varied diet] is not the same as distilling it into a pill. The message is to eat a well-balanced diet, exercise and maintain weight."

http://snipr.com/bml0u



'Arctic Unicorns' in Icy Display
from BBC News Online

A BBC team used aerial cameras to film the creatures during their epic summer migration, as they navigated through cracks in the melting Arctic sea ice. They believe the footage, which forms part of the BBC Natural History Unit's new series Nature's Great Events, is the first of its kind.

Narwhal are sometimes called "Arctic unicorns" because of the long, spiral tusk that protrudes from their jaws. The appendages can reach more than 2m (7ft) in length; scientists believe males use them to attract potential mates.

The BBC crew headed to the Arctic in June 2008, to film the tusked animals' summer migration. At this time of year, temperatures begin to rise above freezing and the thick sea ice starts to melt, creating a complex network of cracks that cover the white expanse.

http://snipr.com/bml3v



Large Hadron Collider to Stay Switched Off for a Year
from the Times (London)

The restart of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the "Big Bang machine" that suffered a catastrophic fault days after it was switched on last September, has been delayed until the autumn.

Officials at the CERN particle physics laboratory near Geneva have postponed the injection of new proton beams into the LHC until late September, meaning that the world's largest atom-smasher will have been mothballed for a year.

The decision to move the restart back by two months from July will allow engineers to install and test early warning and protection systems that should prevent serious damage in the event of further faults. The first particle collisions are now scheduled for late October. CERN will also take the unusual step of running the particle accelerator through most of next winter, to make up for lost time in collecting physics data.

http://snipr.com/bml5s



How Life Has Preserved Its Mystery
from the Telegraph (UK)

"Wonders are there many," observed the Greek dramatist Sophocles, "but none more wonderful than man." And rightly so, for we, as far as we can tell, are the sole witnesses of the splendours of the universe--though consistently less impressed by this privileged position than would seem warranted.

The chief reason for that lack of astonishment has always been that the practicalities of our everyday lives are so simple and effortless as to seem unremarkable. ... We reproduce, and play no part in the transformation of the fertilised egg into a fully formed embryo with its 4,000 functioning parts. We tend to our children's needs, but effortlessly they grow to adulthood, replacing along the way virtually every cell in their bodies.

These practicalities are not in the least bit simple, but in reality are the simplest things we know--because they have to be so. If our senses did not accurately capture the world around us, were the growth from childhood not virtually automatic, then "we" would never have happened.

http://snipr.com/bml8a



Birds Shift North as Globe Warms
from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--When it comes to global warming, the canary in the coal mine isn't a canary at all. It's a purple finch. As the temperature across the U.S. has gotten warmer, the purple finch has been spending its winters more than 400 miles farther north than it used to. And it's not alone.

An Audubon Society study to be released today found that more than half of 305 birds species in North America, a hodgepodge that includes robins, gulls, chickadees and owls, are spending the winter about 35 miles farther north than they did 40 years ago.

The purple finch was the biggest northward mover. Its wintering grounds are now more along the latitude of Milwaukee, Wis., instead of Springfield, Mo.

http://snipr.com/bmld1



Lunacy and the Full Moon
from Scientific American

Across the centuries, many a person has uttered the phrase "There must be a full moon out there" in an attempt to explain weird happenings at night. Indeed, the Roman goddess of the moon bore a name that remains familiar to us today: Luna, prefix of the word "lunatic." Greek philosopher Aristotle and Roman historian Pliny the Elder suggested that the brain was the "moistest" organ in the body and thereby most susceptible to the pernicious influences of the moon, which triggers the tides.

Belief in the "lunar lunacy effect," or "Transylvania effect," as it is sometimes called, persisted in Europe through the Middle Ages, when humans were widely reputed to transmogrify into werewolves or vampires during a full moon. Even today many people think the mystical powers of the full moon induce erratic behaviors, psychiatric hospital admissions, suicides, homicides, emergency room calls, traffic accidents, fights at professional hockey games, dog bites and all manner of strange events.

One survey revealed that 45 percent of college students believe moonstruck humans are prone to unusual behaviors, and other surveys suggest that mental health professionals may be still more likely than laypeople to hold this conviction. In 2007 several police departments in the U.K. even added officers on full-moon nights in an effort to cope with presumed higher crime rates.

http://snipr.com/bmlk9



Salamanders "Completely Gone" Due to Global Warming?
from National Geographic News

Silent and secretive creatures, salamanders are just as quietly falling off the map in tropical forests throughout Central America, a new study says.

Two common species surveyed in the 1970s in cloud forests of southern Mexico and Guatemala are extinct, and several others have plummeted in number, researchers say. The tiny amphibians seem to be on the same downward spiral as their frog cousins, which have been mysteriously declining for years.

Scientists have identified chytrid, a fast-killing fungus that may spread in waves, as responsible for wiping out frogs around the world. But among the Central American salamanders, "there's no way we can attribute the declines we've found to chytrid," said study author David Wake, an biologist at the University of California, Berkeley.

http://snipr.com/bmln6



Super Clocks: More Accurate Than Time Itself
from New Scientist

For those physicists and philosophers puzzled by nature's fourth dimension, Patrick Gill has a wry response. "Time," he says, "is what you measure in seconds."

For Gill, that is a statement of professional pride. He is what you might call Britain's top timekeeper. Within the windowless - and largely clockless - cream-brick confines of the UK's National Physical Laboratory (NPL), near London, Gill and his colleagues are busy developing the next, staggeringly accurate generation of atomic clocks.

These tiny timepieces are the devices that ensure radio, television and mobile-phone transmissions stay in sync, prevent the internet from turning into a mess of missing data packets, make GPS accurate enough to navigate by, and safeguard electricity grids from blackout. They are, in short, the heartbeat of modern life.

http://snipr.com/bmmfb

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 19, 2009, 06:22:12 PM
February 12, 2009



Scientists Wary About Orbital Debris After Satellites Collide
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Associated Press)--Scientists are keeping a close eye on orbital debris created when two communications satellites--one American, the other Russian--smashed into each other hundreds of miles above the Earth. NASA said it will take weeks to determine the full magnitude of the unprecedented crash and whether any other satellites or even the Hubble Space Telescope are threatened.

The collision, which occurred nearly 500 miles over Siberia on Tuesday, was the first high-speed impact between two intact spacecraft, NASA officials said. "We knew this was going to happen eventually," said Mark Matney, an orbital debris scientist at Johnson Space Center in Houston.

NASA believes any risk to the international space station and its three astronauts is low. It orbits about 270 miles below the collision course.

http://snipr.com/br4kg



Going Where Darwin Feared to Tread
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

In biology's most famous book, On the Origin of Species, Charles Darwin steered clear of applying his revolutionary theory of evolution to the species of greatest interest to his readers--their own.

He couldn't avoid it forever, of course. He eventually wrote another tome nearly as famous, The Descent of Man. But he knew in 1859, when Species was published, that to jump right into a description of how human beings had tussled with the environment and one another over eons, changing their appearance, capabilities and behavior in the process, would be hard for people to accept. Better to stick with birds and barnacles.

Darwin was born 200 years ago today. On the Origin of Species will be 150 years old in a few months. There's no such reluctance now. The search for signs of natural selection in human beings has just begun. It will ultimately be as revelatory as Newton's description of the mathematics of motion 322 years ago, or the unlocking of the atom's secrets that began in the late 1800s.

http://snipr.com/br4nl



Seeing the World in Half-View
from Scientific American

A patient named Sally recently suffered a stroke that damaged her right parietal lobe without affecting other parts of the brain. The left side of her body--controlled by the right hemisphere--was paralyzed. But she was mentally normal and continued to remain the talkative, intelligent woman that she was before the stroke.

Yet Sally's father observed other disturbing symptoms to which--oddly enough--Sally herself seemed oblivious. When she attempted to move around the room in her wheelchair, she would sometimes bump into objects on her left.

Further testing confirmed that Sally was largely indifferent to objects and events on her left, even though she was not blind to them; once her attention was drawn to them, she could see them. Her eyesight was normal; her problem was in attending to the left. For example, when she ate, she would consume only the food on the right, ignoring the left side of the plate. ... Sally's deficits indicate that she suffers from hemineglect (or simply neglect), which can also occur in isolated form, unaccompanied by major paralysis.

http://snipr.com/br4pu



Duplication in Genomes May Separate Humans from Apes
from Science News

Although it may not be as dramatic as the Big Bang birthing the universe, an explosion of DNA duplication in the common ancestor of humans, chimpanzees and gorillas may be responsible for many of the differences among the species, a new study suggests. The big blowup happened 8 million to 12 million years ago, but its effects are still apparent today.

Human and great ape genes are notoriously similar, with few differences in the genetic letters that make up the instruction manual for building each of the primates. But gorillas, orangutans, chimpanzees and humans are obviously different. A new analysis of the entire genomes of humans and their ape cousins, published in the Feb. 11 Nature, suggests the differences may have roots in DNA duplications.

Researchers led by Evan Eichler, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at the University of Washington in Seattle, compared the genomes of macaques, orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos and humans. The scientists found that chunks of the genomes had been copied and rearranged, sometimes multiple times, within each of the lineages.

http://snipr.com/br4sf



How Your Looks Betray Your Personality
from New Scientist

The history of science could have been so different. When Charles Darwin applied to be the "energetic young man" that Robert Fitzroy, the Beagle's captain, sought as his gentleman companion, he was almost let down by a woeful shortcoming that was as plain as the nose on his face.

Fitzroy believed in physiognomy--the idea that you can tell a person's character from their appearance. As Darwin's daughter Henrietta later recalled, Fitzroy had "made up his mind that no man with such a nose could have energy." Fortunately, the rest of Darwin's visage compensated for his sluggardly proboscis: "His brow saved him."

The idea that a person's character can be glimpsed in their face dates back to the ancient Greeks. It was most famously popularised in the late 18th century by the Swiss poet Johann Lavater, whose ideas became a talking point in intellectual circles. In Darwin's day, they were more or less taken as given. It was only after the subject became associated with phrenology, which fell into disrepute in the late 19th century, that physiognomy was written off as pseudoscience. Now the field is undergoing something of a revival.

http://snipr.com/br4v7



Evolution Revolution: Pace Is Speeding Up
from the Seattle Times

Blue eyes typically are associated with beauty, or perhaps Frank Sinatra. But to University of Wisconsin anthropologist John Hawks, they represent an evolutionary mystery. For nearly all of human history, everyone in the world had brown eyes. Then, between 6,000 and 10,000 years ago, the first blue-eyed baby was born somewhere near the Black Sea.

For some reason, that baby's descendants gained a 5 percent evolutionary advantage over their brown-eyed competitors, and today the number of people with blue eyes tops half a billion. "What does it mean?" said Hawks, who studies the forces that have shaped the human species for the past 6 million years.

Nobody knows. It is one of the unanswered questions about evolution that persist 200 years after the birth of Charles Darwin, whose birthday will be celebrated worldwide Thursday.

http://snipr.com/br4xu



Blood Cells Filmed in Formation
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Researchers have helped resolved a long-standing debate about which precursors in the developing mammalian embryo give rise to blood cells, after tracking the birth of these cells using in-vivo imaging that lasts for days, according a report in this week's Nature.

The study is one of a handful of papers to come out in recent months to examine the question of hematopoietic cell origin. "I would say the nice thing about the latest paper is that everything is seen live--which hasn't been possible before," said Francoise Dieterlen-Lievre of the Cellular and Molecular Embryology Institute in Nogent-sur-Marne, France, who was not involved in the study.

One challenge with tracking the cells' origin is that blood cells can migrate within the organism quite literally in a heartbeat, said Timm Schroeder of the GSF-Institute of Stem Cell Research in Neuherberg, Germany, the study's main author. "The problem is that we roughly know where these cells appear," he said, adding that "If you don't continuously watch it happen, then you can never exclude that the [blood] cells migrated from a different site."

http://snipr.com/br4zq



In New Procedure, Artificial Arm Listens to Brain
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Amanda Kitts lost her left arm in a car accident three years ago, but these days she plays football with her 12-year-old son, and changes diapers and bearhugs children at the three Kiddie Cottage day care centers she owns in Knoxville, Tenn.

Ms. Kitts, 40, does this all with a new kind of artificial arm that moves more easily than other devices and that she can control by using only her thoughts. "I'm able to move my hand, wrist and elbow all at the same time," she said. "You think, and then your muscles move."

Her turnaround is the result of a new procedure that is attracting increasing attention because it allows people to move prosthetic arms more automatically than ever before, simply by using rewired nerves and their brains. The technique, called targeted muscle reinnervation, involves taking the nerves that remain after an arm is amputated and connecting them to another muscle in the body, often in the chest.

http://snipr.com/br52c



Two Favorite Galaxies Face One Big Collision
from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

The Andromeda and Milky Way galaxies, with their 1.2 trillion stars, are on course to collide at 1 million miles an hour. While humanity eventually might need sunglasses and seat belts for the rocky cosmic ride, there's no immediate need for panic. The smashup won't even begin to occur for another 2 billion years.

But James Lombardi Jr., an associate professor of physics at Allegheny College in Meadville, Crawford County, has worked for years to develop a computer model to explain stellar collisions. That knowledge also has provided him insight into the dynamics of intergalactic collisions.

He and two of his students have used his model to simulate stellar collisions that could occur when the Milky Way and Andromeda sideswipe each other and eventually coalesce into a giant egg-shaped galaxy.

http://snipr.com/br54g



Prostate Cancer Urine Test Hope
from BBC News Online

US scientists have moved a step closer to a simple urine test to distinguish between the benign and aggressive forms of prostate cancer. Some prostate cancers are slow-growing, while others require rapid treatment.

But telling them apart can be difficult and some patients undergo unnecessary surgery or radiation treatment. The latest study, published in Nature, links a group of small molecules produced by the body to the aggressive form of the disease.

In theory, testing for their presence should enable doctors to determine whether a patient has an aggressive form of prostate cancer--and requires urgent action. In contrast, patients with benign prostate cancer often end up dying of other conditions because their tumours are so slow to develop.

http://snipr.com/br56o

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 19, 2009, 06:24:41 PM
February 13, 2009



Researchers Map Genetic Codes for Cold Virus
from the Baltimore Sun

University of Maryland researchers have mapped the genetic codes for all known strains of the virus that causes the common cold, according to a study published yesterday in the journal Science. Understanding the genetic makeup of the virus could offer scientists clues on how to fight the common cold and possibly discover a cure, scientists said.

"There is real promise now, based on full understanding of this virus, that we have never had before," said Dr. Stephen B. Liggett, director of the cardiopulmonary genomics program at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. "My goal is to get at the root cause. Let's get, perhaps, a single pill [that] will kill the virus that day, that moment, and within six hours you are cured. And it is possible."

Of course, such a discovery might take time, he said. Until now, fighting the cold was a mystery, because scientists knew little about the genetic makeup of the virus that causes it.

http://snipr.com/btf4o



Tiny Songbirds Log Long Days While Migrating
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Tiny songbirds such as martins and thrushes can travel as far as 311 miles a day in their annual migrations between the Americas -- three times as far as researchers had previously believed -- biologists found in the first study to track the birds to their wintering grounds and back.

The birds fly two to six times as fast heading north in the spring as they do heading south in the fall, perhaps in a competition to reach the best breeding sites and attract the fittest mates, ornithologist Bridget Stutchbury of York University in Toronto reported today in the journal Science, which released the study online Thursday.

One industrious female martin flew the 4,660 miles from the Amazon basin to Pennsylvania in only 13 days -- with four of them spent on stopovers. The new data were obtained using miniature geolocators, about the size and weight of a dime, attached to the birds' backs much like a schoolchild's backpack.

http://snipr.com/btf7n



Big Science Role Is Seen in Global Warming Cure
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON--Steven Chu, the new secretary of energy, said Wednesday that solving the world's energy and environment problems would require Nobel-level breakthroughs in three areas: electric batteries, solar power and the development of new crops that can be turned into fuel.

Dr. Chu, a physicist, spoke during a wide-ranging interview in his office, where his own framed Nobel Prize lay flat on a bookcase, a Post-it note indicating where it should be hung on the wall. He addressed topics that included global warming, renewable energy sources like solar and wind power, the use of coal and a proposed repository for nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.

Dr. Chu said a "revolution" in science and technology would be required if the world is to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels and curb the emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases linked to global warming.

http://snipr.com/btfaa



First Draft of Neanderthal Genome Unveiled
from New Scientist

The first draft of the genome of a 38,000 year-old Neanderthal is complete, scientists announced Thursday.

Early glimpses of the genome, which was sequenced by Svante Pääbo, of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and colleagues, have already cast new light on the ancient human species that went extinct more than 25,000 years ago.

"This will be the first time the entire genome of an extinct organism has been sequenced," Pääbo told the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, in Chicago. Now study of the more complete genome will allow scientists to examine Neanderthals' relationship with modern humans as never before. A preliminary analysis of the sequence suggests that Neanderthals contributed few, if any, genes to humans via inbreeding.

http://snipr.com/btfc6



Obese Moms' Kids at Higher Risk of Birth Defects
from USA Today

Women who are obese when they conceive have an increased risk of delivering babies with birth defects, a report suggests. Obese women's risk of having babies with heart defects, cleft palates, hydrocephaly--a buildup of cerebrospinal fluid in the brain--and other birth defects also increased, but not as much as that of spina bifida.

Obesity is a body mass index, or BMI, of 30 or more. BMI is calculated using weight and height. A 5-foot-4-inch woman at 174 pounds has a BMI of 30. In 2004, a third of U.S. women 15 and older were obese, the authors write in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

The report, a review of 39 studies, found that obese women's babies were more than twice as likely to have spina bifida, a failure of the spine to close during early pregnancy. The extra number of cases in obese women vs. normal-weight women was small, about one in 2,000 births.

http://snipr.com/btfem



Simulation Targets Early Cosmos
from BBC News Online

Scientists have used a supercomputer to simulate what the Universe was like as the first galaxies were forming. The model maps how matter is thought to have been distributed a few hundred million years after the Big Bang.

The work should help astronomers hunt down ancient galaxies using the latest telescope technologies--they will know what to look for. The simulation has been produced by scientists at Durham University's Institute of Computational Cosmology.

"The calculation we've done has predictions for what we should see in a few years' time when the massive telescopes in the Southern Hemisphere are fitted with new instrumentation--cameras and detectors--to observe early epochs, stretching right back to when the Universe was less than a tenth of its present age," said Durham researcher Dr Carlton Baugh.

http://snipr.com/btfhd



Secret of Love Boils Down to Chemistry in New Study
from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--Like any young woman in love, Bianca Acevedo has exchanged valentine hearts with her fiancé. But the New York neuroscientist knows better. The source of love is in the head, not the heart.

She's one of the researchers in a relatively new field focused on explaining the biology of romantic love. The unpoetic explanation is that love mostly can be understood through brain images, hormones and genetics. That seems to be the case for the newly in love, the long in love and the brokenhearted.

"It has a biological basis. We know some of the key players," said Larry Young, of the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Emory University in Atlanta. There, he studies the brains of an unusual monogamous rodent to get a better clue about what goes on in the minds of people in love.

http://snipr.com/btfjf



Mars Mission Has Some Seeing Red
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

PASADENA, Calif.--In a "clean room" in Building 150 of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory is something that looks very much like a flying saucer. It's a capsule containing a huge, brawny Mars rover, a Hummer compared with the Mini Coopers that have previously rolled across the Red Planet.

This is the Mars Science Laboratory, the space agency's next big mission to the most Earth-like planet in the solar system. But it's been a magnet for controversy, and a reminder that the robotic exploration of other worlds is never a snap, especially when engineers decide to get ambitious.

The launch has been delayed for two years because of technical glitches. Approved at $1.63 billion, the mission's price tag will be at least $2.2 billion, NASA now estimates. Critics say the cost has really quadrupled since the project was first dreamed up. What no one can doubt is that ambitious missions tend to become costly ones, which jangles the nerves of officials who know how easy it is for a Mars mission to go bust.

http://snipr.com/btfmc



Greenhouse Gases: Accounting from Above
from the Economist

Sometimes it is worth looking at the big picture. That is the idea behind monitoring greenhouse gases from space. In January the Japanese space agency, JAXA, launched Ibuki, the first satellite dedicated to monitoring carbon dioxide and methane. Later this month the American space agency, NASA, is due to launch the Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO), which is also designed to monitor carbon dioxide.

The new satellites will work as carbon accountants by keeping a close eye on how the Earth breathes and returning regular audits. Ibuki, which means "breath" in Japanese, orbits the Earth approximately every 100 minutes at an average altitude of 667km. It will gather data from 56,000 points around the globe with two detectors.

One is a spectrometer that measures sunlight reflected from the Earth's surface. Both carbon dioxide and methane absorb energy from sunlight and both leave a unique signature that can be measured to detect changes in intensity. JAXA says Ibuki can detect carbon-dioxide changes of around one part per million, which is akin to detecting the change in salinity produced by four drops of salt water in a 200-litre bathtub of water. The second detector takes readings of clouds and other aerosols in the Earth's atmosphere that can reflect or absorb radiation.

http://snipr.com/btfr4



Darwin at 200 and the Evolving Cancer Fight
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

Evolution may still provoke controversy in some classrooms, but in the laboratory, Charles Darwin's theories are propelling new research. As the world celebrates his 200th birthday today, Carlo Maley of Philadelphia's Wistar Institute is using the evolutionary prism to understand not a species, but a disease: cancer.

Maley views cancer as an evolutionary process. At the root of the disease is our distant ancestry as single-celled organisms and the tendency for our cells to occasionally revert to their old ways. Our resemblance to organisms such as amoebae might not seem obvious until you examine a human cell in detail. Among other things, we share a system of storing and encoding information in DNA and many of the same genes.

The big difference is that human cells are programmed to cooperate, thus working together to make an organ or a body work, while microbes are selfish, each one competing for better ways to survive and reproduce.

http://snipr.com/btfus

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 19, 2009, 06:28:20 PM
February 16, 2009



Earthlings Try Eavesdropping on a Cosmic Party Line
from the Wall Street Journal

Long Beach, Calif--Radio astronomer Jill Tarter has her ear at the keyhole of the cosmos, listening for a signal from life beyond Earth. For decades, she and her colleagues have surveyed the sky in vain. The recent discovery of so many worlds around other suns, though, has renewed her resolve -- and so has the prospect of greater public support.

In a display of private sector science, her cause -- the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) -- has been embraced by a geek-chic collective of technocrats, info-moguls, activists and wishful thinkers, from Bill Gates to Cameron Diaz, who gathered in Long Beach, Calif., last week at the conclave of an influential enterprise called TED. The acronym stands for "Technology, Entertainment, Design."

Now in its 25th year, its invitation-only conference is the nexus of a global talk circuit whose video essays on science, culture, design and economics have been viewed via the web more than 100 million times and translated into 25 languages. It's grown adept at raising the venture capital of idealism.

http://snipr.com/bzdjj



Carbon Burial Research Grows as Huge Experiment Begins
from Wired

Chicago--A landmark Energy Department project to bury carbon dioxide produced by humans has begun as workers sunk a huge drill bit into Illinois ground this week, signaling continued support for a climate change mitigation strategy that has fallen out of favor in many circles.

The start of drilling marks the launch a geological sequestration project that will deposit a million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the ground by 2012. While that's nothing compared to the several billion tons of CO2 that humans emit yearly, it's the geology of the site that makes the development exciting. The CO2 will be piped into a geological formation that underlies parts of Illinois, Indiana and Kentucky that could eventually hold more than 100 billion tons of CO2.

"This is going to be a large-scale injection of 1 million metric tons, one of the largest injections to date in the U.S." project manager Robert Finley said at the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting Sunday.

http://snipr.com/bzdlh



Why Birds Collide With Airplanes
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

While delivering a lecture at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, years ago, I was asked to address a group of students who had recently lost their fathers in a military airplane crash at nearby Elmendorf Air Force Base. Their jet had been brought down because of a "bird strike" - birds flying into the aircraft's engine. Twenty-four people died.

... A student asked, "Why do birds collide with airplanes, and how can we prevent such collisions?" That is a question that the aviation world has tried to answer for years.

...In the 1980s, before my trip to Alaska, I undertook a biological study of why birds cannot get out of the way of aircraft. My investigation took me from Logan International Airport to a sea gull nesting area on Monomoy Island.

http://snipr.com/bzdnh



The Computer as a Road Map to Unknowable Territory
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Last year, as the financial meltdown was getting underway, a scientist named Yaneer Bar-Yam developed a computer model of the economy. Instead of the individuals, companies and brokers that populate the real economy, the model used virtual actors. The computer world allowed Bar-Yam to do what regulators cannot do in real life. It allowed him to change the way actors behaved and then study how those changes rippled through a complex ecosystem.

The fundamental principle behind the model was simple. Human beings regularly solve problems by imagining how particular behaviors can lead to specific outcomes. Regulators, managers and leaders try to do the same thing on a bigger scale. But in a system as complex as the economy, where feedback loops of rumor, fear and misinformation regularly trigger panic and herd behavior, the ability of individuals to forecast outcomes can diminish rapidly.

... Bar-Yam wanted to understand why the economy was so unstable. Commentators were focused on the housing crisis, but Bar-Yam was not sure whether the bursting of the real estate bubble was upstream or downstream of the instability in the economy.

http://snipr.com/bzdpg



Dance Duet Helps Male Birds Mate
from BBC News Online

It is the ultimate "gentleman's agreement." Rather than compete for females, male long-tailed manakins co-operate with their friends.

The tropical birds pair up to perform a courtship song and dance, but the alpha male gets the girl every time. Meanwhile his "wingman" spends five years playing second fiddle. But he eventually inherits the mating site.

The dance, dubbed "backwards leapfrog," was filmed in Costa Rica by zoologists from the University of Wyoming. At first glance, it appears like a competitive "dance-off." But in fact it is a co-operative pact between buddies, says Dr David McDonald, of Wyoming University.

http://snipr.com/bzdr7



Sponge's Secret Weapon Restores Antibiotics' Power
from Science News

CHICAGO -- A chemical from an ocean-dwelling sponge can reprogram antibiotic resistant bacteria to make them vulnerable to medicines again, new evidence suggests.

Ineffective antibiotics become lethal once again for bacteria treated with the sponge compound, chemist Peter Moeller reported February 13 at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting. "The potential is outstanding. This could revolutionize our approach to thinking about how infections are treated," comments Carolyn Sotka of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Oceans and Human Health Initiative in Charleston, S.C.

Everything living in the ocean survives in a microbial soup, under constant bombardment from bacterial assaults. Researchers led by Moeller, of Hollings Marine Laboratory in Charleston, found a sponge thriving in the midst of dead organisms. This anomalous life amidst death raised an obvious question, says Moeller: "How is this thing surviving when everything else is dead?"

http://snipr.com/bzdx7



Making the Grid Work for Renewable Energy
from Scientific American

The new acting chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission wants to use "creative mechanisms" within the agency's authority to promote energy efficiency and renewable energy.

As the head of FERC, Jon Wellinghoff said he will prioritize infrastructure efficiency and the integration of renewable energy into the grid, and will support the use of distributed and demand-side resources, which he described as "very underutilized in this country."

"These are very consistent with the new administration's goals," Wellinghoff told reporters at a Platts Energy Podium event yesterday. The acting FERC chief said he would meet with Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Carol Browner, the White House coordinator for energy and climate policy, [the] week [of February 15].

http://snipr.com/bzdxz



Ocean Survey Reveals Hundreds of 'Bipolar' Species
from New Scientist

Poles apart, but intimately linked. Of the thousands of species that populate Antarctica and the Arctic, it seems hundreds are "bipolar": found at both ends of the 11,000 kilometre span between the poles.

The surveys, part of the international Census of Marine Life, also suggest the Antarctic acts as a cold incubator for species that populate the deep sea around the planet. As ice ages come and go, and the ice shelf advances and retreats, species are isolated, evolve, then released to the global sea floor.

The 235 species that we believe are found at both poles include a great variety of animals, says Julian Gutt of the Alfred Wegner Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Germany. The easiest ones to explain are the large migrating organisms, such as whales and birds. But the list also includes a large number of animals that are thought to live relatively sedentary lives.

http://snipr.com/bze0e



Could 'Liquid Wood' Replace Plastic?
from the Christian Science Monitor

Almost 40 years ago, American scientists took their first steps in a quest to break the world's dependence on plastics. But in those four decades, plastic products have become so cheap and durable that not even the forces of nature seem able to stop them. A soupy expanse of plastic waste - too tough for bacteria to break down - now covers an estimated 1 million square miles of the Pacific Ocean.

Sensing a hazard, researchers started hunting for a substitute for plastic's main ingredient, petroleum. They wanted something renewable, biodegradable, and abundant enough to be inexpensive.

Though they stumbled upon a great candidate early on, many US chemists had given up on it by the end of the 1990s. The failed wonder material: lignin, the natural compound that lends strength to trees. A waste product from paper production, much of the lignin supply is simply burned as fuel. But while many scientists turned to other green options, a German company, Tecnaro, says it found the magic formula. Its "liquid wood" can be molded like plastic, yet biodegrades over time.

http://snipr.com/bze2d



Report Says Federal Salmon Recovery Strategy Needs 'Immediate Change'
from the Oregonian

Next month, U.S. District Judge James Redden will hear oral arguments in the ongoing lawsuit over the operation of federal dams in the Columbia and Snake rivers and their impact on protected salmon. Redden's ruling will have broad implications for a national salmon recovery plan that recently came under harsh criticism from a group of retired wildlife managers and salmon experts calling themselves the Council of Elders.

This month, the Elders weighed in on the federal government's salmon recovery strategy. In a word, it's a mess, they say. "How can a federal agency that's supposed to be following the law here come up with something that's so bad?" asked Jim Martin, salmon adviser to former Gov. John Kitzhaber and one of the report's authors.

The report alleges corruption of the political process, mismanagement and subversion of the Endangered Species Act in the government's salmon recovery effort, which costs hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

http://snipr.com/bze3k

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 19, 2009, 06:29:10 PM
February 17, 2009



Perseverence Is Paying Off for a Test of Relativity in Space
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

STANFORD, Calif.--For 46 years, Francis Everitt, a Stanford University physicist, has promoted the often perilous fortunes of Gravity Probe B, perhaps the most exotic, "Star Trek"-ish experiment ever undertaken in space. Finally, with emergency financial help from a pair of unusual sources, success is at hand.

Conceived in the late 1950s, financed by $750 million from NASA and launched into orbit in 2004, the Gravity Probe B spacecraft has sought to prove two tenets of Einstein's theory of general relativity.

The first, called the geodetic effect, holds that a large celestial body like Earth will warp time the way a rubber sheet stretches when a bowling ball is placed on it. The second, known as frame-dragging, occurs when the rotation of a large body "twists" nearby space and time; turn the resting bowling ball, and the rubber sheet twists.

http://snipr.com/c1pxn



Deadly Bacteria Defy Drugs, Alarming Doctors
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

When Ruth Burns had surgery to relieve a pinched nerve in her back, the operation was supposed to be an "in-and-out thing," recalled her daughter, Kacia Warren.

But Burns developed pneumonia and was put on a ventilator. Five days later, she was discharged--only to be rushed by her daughter to the hospital hours later, disoriented and in alarming pain.

Seventeen days after the surgery, the 67-year-old nurse was dead. Burns had developed meningitis--an infection of the fluid that surrounds the spinal cord and brain. The culprit was Acinetobacter baumannii, a bug that preys on the weak in hospitals. Worse, it was a multi-drug-resistant strain.

http://snipr.com/c1q7a



Scientists Warn of Persistent 'Dead Zones' in Bay, Elsewhere
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

CHICAGO--Healing low-oxygen aquatic "dead zones" in the Chesapeake Bay and hundreds of other spots worldwide will be trickier than previously imagined, leading scientists on the issue said Sunday.

That's because the low oxygen levels that make it impossible for most organisms to survive also kill bacteria crucial to removing nitrogen from the water. Dead zones are caused primarily by excess nutrients--nitrogen and phosphorus--that feed massive algae blooms.

Those, in turn, soak up most of the water's oxygen and leave little for other life forms--a condition known as hypoxia. In recent years there have been extensive efforts to reduce nitrogen and phosphorus loads in the Chesapeake Bay, the Gulf of Mexico and other areas with dead zones. But those efforts have not yielded the expected results, scientists said at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

http://snipr.com/c1qak



US Seeks Mercury Reduction Treaty
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

NAIROBI (Associated Press)--The Obama administration reversed years of US policy yesterday by calling for a treaty to cut mercury pollution, which it described as the world's gravest chemical problem.

Some 6,000 tons of mercury enter the environment each year, about a third generated by power stations and coal fires. Much settles into the oceans where it enters the food chain and is concentrated in predatory fish like tuna. Children and fetuses are particularly vulnerable to poisoning by the toxic metal, which can cause birth defects, brain damage, and peeling skin.

Daniel Reifsnyder, the deputy assistant secretary of state for environment and sustainable development, told a global gathering of environmental ministers in Nairobi that the United States wants negotiations on limiting mercury to begin this year and conclude within three.

http://snipr.com/c1qi1



Alien Life 'May Exist Among Us'
from BBC News Online

Never mind Mars, alien life may be thriving right here on Earth, a major science conference has heard. Our planet may harbour forms of "weird life" unrelated to life as we know it, according to Professor Paul Davies, a physicist at Arizona State University.

This "shadow life" may be hidden in toxic arsenic lakes or in boiling deep sea hydrothermal vents, he says. He has called on scientists to launch a "mission to Earth" by trawling hostile environments for signs of bio-activity.

Weird life could even be living among us, in forms which we don't yet recognise, he told the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) meeting in Chicago. "We don't have to go to other planets to find weird life. It could be right in front of our noses-or even in our noses ..."

http://snipr.com/c1qkh



'Super X-ray' to Shed New Light on the Ancient World
from the Times (London)

A scientific instrument is to transform research into the ancient world by using a light ten billion times brighter than the Sun to reveal the secrets of statues, mummies and sarcophagi.

The imaging facility at the Diamond Light Source in Oxfordshire will allow objects weighing up to two tonnes to be examined in brilliant X-ray light, to expose clues to their construction and contents.

Three Egyptian bronze figurines from the British Museum will be among the first treasures to be investigated by the Joint Engineering, Environmental and Processing beamline or Jeep. It uses intense radiation known as synchrotron light, generated by the Diamond Light Source, which allows scientists to see through solid objects and to show structural details that cannot be seen by standard X-rays.

http://snipr.com/c1qmi



Treatment for Injury Puts Patient's Blood to Work
from the Seattle Times

Two of the Pittsburgh Steelers' biggest stars, Hines Ward and Troy Polamalu, used their own blood in an innovative injury treatment before winning the Super Bowl.

The early promise of the procedure--commonly called platelet-rich plasma therapy--is reassuring experts in sports medicine that it could eventually improve the treatment of stubborn injuries like tennis elbow and knee tendinitis for athletes of all types.

It "has the potential to revolutionize not just sports medicine but all of orthopedics," said Dr. Allan Mishra, an assistant professor of orthopedics at Stanford University Medical Center and one of the primary researchers in the field.

http://snipr.com/c1qqc



Special Series: Darwin Turns 200
from Science News

Charles Darwin was born February 12, 1809. A Science News special series features an account of Darwin's life and work, the history of the theory of evolution, modern work in evolutionary science, and an interactive timeline of milestones in life's development and the scientific work to understand it.

This special Web edition of Science News includes expanded versions of articles from the magazine's print edition plus two additional features, all commemorating the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin.

In addition to exploring Darwin's life and science, the series includes five reports from the frontiers of research in evolutionary science.

http://snipr.com/c1qs3



Graphene Electronics Inches Closer to Mass Production
from Scientific American

Silicon has transformed the digital world, but researchers are still eager to find substances that will make integrated circuits smaller, faster and cheaper. High on the list is graphene--planar sheets of honeycomb carbon rings just one atom thick.

This nanomaterial sports a range of properties--including ultrastrength, transparency (because of its thinness) and blisteringly fast electron conductivity--that make it promising for flexible displays and superspeedy electronics. Isolated only four years ago, graphene already appears in prototype transistors, memories and other devices.

But to go from lab benches to store shelves, engineers need to devise methods to make industrial quantities of large, uniform sheets of pure, single-ply graphene. Researchers are pursuing several processing routes, but which approach will succeed remains unclear. "We've seen claims by groups that say that they can coat whole silicon wafers with monolayer sheets of graphene cheaply," reports James M. Tour, a chemist at Rice University. "But so far no one has publicly demonstrated it."

http://snipr.com/c1qy3



Evolution in Black and White
from Smithsonian Magazine

Shortly after he completed his second term as president in 1909, Teddy Roosevelt took a year-long hunting safari in Africa under the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution. ... Roosevelt's safari experiences, regaled in his book African Game Trails (1910) gave him strong opinions about how animals blended, or did not blend, with their surroundings.

... Roosevelt scoffed at notions of the protective value of coloration for two reasons. First, the horse-mounted hunter extraordinaire had little difficulty spotting, stalking and bagging big game .... Clearly animals' colors did not protect them from him. And second, while at the time the fact of evolution was widely accepted by scientists (and Roosevelt), Darwin's explanation of the primary role of natural selection as the mechanism of evolution was not.

Natural selection had fallen out of favor, in particular over the matter of animal coloration. Many naturalists in the 1890s had criticized Darwinian explanations of coloration as wholly lacking evidence, and offered other explanations. For instance, some suggested that coloration was directly caused by external factors such as climate, light or diet.

http://snipr.com/c1r2c

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 19, 2009, 06:31:38 PM
Quote from: Kai on February 06, 2009, 04:36:01 PM
http://membracid.wordpress.com/2009/02/05/new-research-on-bedbug-insecticide-resistance/

Time to get paranoid. About bedbugs.

:x NOT READING IT!

Just tell me when it's time to move to Alaska.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2009, 07:51:44 PM
February 18, 2009



First Carbon-Free Polar Station Opens in Antarctica
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

PRINCESS ELISABETH BASE, Antarctica (Reuters) -- The world's first zero-emission polar research station opened in Antarctica on Sunday and was welcomed by scientists as proof that alternative energy is viable even in the coldest regions.

Pioneers of Belgium's Princess Elisabeth station in East Antarctica said if a station could rely on wind and solar power in Antarctica -- mostly a vast, icy emptiness -- it would undercut arguments by skeptics that green power is not reliable.

"If we can build such a station in Antarctica we can do that elsewhere in our society. We have the capacity, the technology, the knowledge to change our world," Alain Hubert, the station's project director, told Reuters at the inauguration ceremony.

http://snipr.com/c4ajy



The Cellphone, Navigating Our Lives
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The cellphone is the world's most ubiquitous computer. The four billion cellphones in use around the globe carry personal information, provide access to the Web and are being used more and more to navigate the real world. And as cellphones change how we live, computer scientists say, they are also changing how we think about information.

It has been 25 years since the desktop, with its files and folders, was introduced as a way to think about what went on inside a personal computer. The World Wide Web brought other ways of imagining the flow of data. With the dominance of the cellphone, a new metaphor is emerging for how we organize, find and use information. New in one sense, that is. It is also as ancient as humanity itself. That metaphor is the map.

"The map underlies man's ability to perceive," said Richard Saul Wurman, a graphic designer who was a pioneer in the use of maps as a generalized way to search for information of all kinds before the emergence of the online world.

http://snipr.com/c4ame



GM Battles Rage down on the Farm
from BBC News Online

Pressure is mounting from some scientists for Europe to end its resistance to genetically modified (GM) crops but fears remain about the impact of such technology on the rights of farmers.

Many American farmers like the ease of operating a GM system which involves regular spraying of chemicals which kill weeds but don't hurt their crops.

The problem is that GM pollen can blow across fields and anti-GM campaigners say the fear of being prosecuted for growing GM accidentally leads many farmers to give up traditional methods and take the GM route for a quiet life.

http://snipr.com/c4ao2



A Green Visitor Makes its Approach
from Science News

A first-time visitor to the inner solar system -- already spotted with the naked eye from some locales -- could make a spectacle of itself when it comes closest to Earth on February 24.

First spotted by a young Chinese astronomy student Quanzhi Ye in 2007, Comet Lulin will pass within 61 million kilometers of Earth, about 41 percent of the Earth-sun distance. Named for the observatory in Taiwan where it was discovered, Lulin has a greenish cast because sunlight illuminates two gases -- cyanogen and diatomic carbon -- in its Jupiter-sized atmosphere.

Astronomers estimate that the comet will reach a maximum brightness of 4th or 5th magnitude, which means that it may be dimly visible to the naked eye from some dark-sky locales at closest approach. With binoculars or a small telescope, it should be an easy target.

http://snipr.com/c4aov



Semiconductor Tech Diagnoses Eye Disease over the Internet
from Wired

An imaging analysis technique developed to find defects in semiconductors is being used to diagnose the eye problems associated with diabetes over the internet.

Pictures of a diabetic patient's retina, the inner surface of the eye, are uploaded to a server that compares them to a database of thousands of other images of healthy and diseased eyes. Algorithms can assign a disease level to the new eye image by looking at the same factors, mainly damage to blood vessels, that an eye doctor would.

Right now, ophthalmologist Andrew Chaum of the University of Tennessee double checks the system's work, but he expects the algorithm to be diagnosing patients on its own within three months. "At that point, the system becomes completely automated with just oversight from me," Chaum said. "That's unique. There isn't anything like that going on anywhere in the world."

http://snipr.com/c4aqz



First Liquid Water May Have Been Spotted on Mars
from New Scientist

NASA's Phoenix lander may have captured the first images of liquid water on Mars - droplets that apparently splashed onto the spacecraft's leg during landing, according to some members of the Phoenix team.

The controversial observation could be explained by the mission's previous discovery of perchlorate salts in the soil, since the salts can keep water liquid at sub-zero temperatures. Researchers say this antifreeze effect makes it possible for liquid water to be widespread just below the surface of Mars, but point out that even if it is there, it may be too salty to support life as we know it.

A few days after Phoenix landed on 25 May 2008, it sent back an image showing mysterious splotches of material attached to one of its legs. Strangely, the splotches grew in size over the next few weeks, and Phoenix scientists have been debating the origin of the objects ever since.

http://snipr.com/c4ats



Can America's West Stay Wild?
from the Christian Science Monitor

In 1993, Washington State classified its Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit, a burrowing one-pound resident of sagebrush thickets, as endangered. Farming and other human activity had greatly limited the deep-soil habitat available to the bunny.

...By 2003, fewer than 30 rabbits lived in the wild, down from 250 in 1995. By 2004, they were all gone. For many, the disappearance of this tiny denizen of sagebrush thickets is a cautionary tale. Captive breeding programs are a noble last resort, they say. But in this case, not enough was done to save the wild population, they charge.

...Here, the tale of the pygmy rabbit intersects with a long-raging acrimonious debate in the US West. Just over half the land in the West is public land. And what are public lands for - the preservation of "pristine" nature or resource extraction? Historically, management of these lands by state and federal agencies has favored resource extractors far more than conservationists would like. But as western economies change and demographics shift, this emphasis on extraction makes less and less sense, economists say.

http://snipr.com/c4avm



Report: Fetal Stem Cells Trigger Tumors in Ill Boy
from the Richmond Times Dispatch

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- A family desperate to save a child from a lethal brain disease sought highly experimental injections of fetal stem cells - injections that triggered tumors in the boy's brain and spinal cord, Israeli scientists reported Tuesday.

Scientists are furiously trying to harness different types of stem cells - the building blocks for other cells in the body - to regrow damaged tissues and thus treat devastating diseases. But for all the promise, researchers have long warned that they must learn to control newly injected stem cells so they don't grow where they shouldn't, and small studies in people are only just beginning.

Tuesday's report in the journal PLoS Medicine is the first documented case of a human brain tumor - albeit a benign, slow-growing one - after fetal stem cell therapy, and hammers home the need for careful research.

http://snipr.com/c4axv



Museum Secrets Unmasked by "Museomics" Technologies
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

from National Geographic News

In museum display cases and dusty drawers worldwide, a burst of new technologies is now unlocking otherwise hidden secrets from fossils, fur, and other relics of a vanished past.

The phenomenon, called museomics, gives new life to musty old objects. Stephan Schuster, a molecular biologist and biochemist at Pennsylvania State University, coined the term. With colleague Webb Miller, Schuster last year reconstructed most of the mammoth genome using hair that had been sitting in a Russian museum for 200 years.

"No effort was made to freeze it or dry it. It's just hair in a drawer. And [our attempts to recover DNA] worked. This is what gave us the idea for trying to attempt something like museomics," Schuster said.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/02/090217-museomics.html



Major Cache of Fossils Unearthed in L.A.
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Workers excavating an underground garage on the site of an old May Co. parking structure in Los Angeles' Hancock Park got more than just a couple hundred new parking spaces. They found the largest known cache of fossils from the last ice age, an assemblage that has flabbergasted paleontologists.

Researchers from the George C. Page Museum at the La Brea tar pits have barely begun extracting the fossils from the sandy, tarry matrix of soil, but they expect the find to double the size of the museum's collection from the period, already the largest in the world.

Among their finds, to be formally announced today, is the nearly intact skeleton of a Columbian mammoth -- named Zed by researchers -- a prize discovery because only bits and pieces of mammoths had previously been found in the tar pits.

http://snipr.com/c4ag8

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2009, 07:52:30 PM
February 19, 2009



Drugs Can Save Hearts and Cash
from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

It's much cheaper and just as effective to treat some heart attacks with drugs instead of also trying to snake a stent into a clogged artery, scientists at Duke University report today in the New England Journal of Medicine.

The findings could prompt significant savings for many of the estimated 1.2 million Americans who suffer heart attacks each year. Wire mesh stents open clogged arteries and can save lives when used within a few hours of a heart attack, but they're no more beneficial than clot-busting drugs alone if the attack occurred a day or so before the patient sought treatment.

Forgoing stents in those cases could save an average of $7,000 per patient--or $700 million for the estimated 100,000 U.S. heart attack patients who don't need them.

http://snipr.com/c6roz



Study Calls for Oversight of Forensics in Crime Labs
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Crime laboratories around the country are grossly underfunded, lack a scientific foundation and are compromised by critical delays in analyzing physical evidence, according to a broad study of forensic techniques published Wednesday by the National Academy of Sciences, the nation's premier scientific body.

Among its many criticisms, the study counted a backlog of 359,000 requests for forensic analysis in 2005, a 24 percent increase in delays since 2002. A survey of crime laboratories found 80 percent of them to be understaffed.

A new federal agency is needed to regulate these laboratories, standardize forensic techniques and pay for research, according to the report, which was financed by Congress in 2005.

http://snipr.com/c6rrh



Brain Scans "Read Minds" With Surprising Accuracy
from National Geographic News

Could MRI someday stand for Mind Reading Imagery? Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) technology can tell what people are thinking with startling accuracy, a new study found. Volunteers were shown two different patterns, then asked to picture one or the other.

Using fMRI brain scans, the researchers predicted--at better than 80 percent--which of the two patterns each person was actively holding in memory 11 seconds later. By measuring blood flow, fMRI images reveal which groups of neurons are active.

Some of the visual cortex's neurons are associated more with vertical visual patterns, and others with horizontal or angled patterns, explained neuroscientist Frank Tong of Vanderbilt University, who led the study. That distinction allowed the team to predict which pattern volunteers had in mind, even well after the images were removed from the screen.

http://snipr.com/c6rt8



It's All Systems Go for Europa
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

NASA announced plans Wednesday to embark on a mammoth 20-year project to send a spacecraft to Jupiter's ice-covered moon Europa as its next flagship mission to search for life elsewhere in the solar system.

The mission, which could cost as much as $3 billion, will be managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge. It will focus on the possibility that in the gigantic ocean thought to be hidden under the moon's thick cover of ice is a habitable zone where rudimentary forms of life could exist.

The probe will launch in 2020 in tandem with another orbiter built by the European Space Agency that will focus on Jupiter's largest moon, Ganymede.

http://snipr.com/c6rv9



Are Bad Sleeping Habits Driving Us Mad?
from New Scientist

Take anyone with a psychiatric disorder and the chances are they don't sleep well. The result of their illness, you might think. Now this long-standing assumption is being turned on its head, with the radical suggestion that poor sleep might actually cause some psychiatric illnesses or lead people to behave in ways that doctors mistake for mental problems.

The good news is that sleep treatments could help or even cure some of these patients. Shockingly, it also means that many people, including children, could be taking psychoactive drugs that cannot help them and might even be harmful.

No one knows how many people might fall into this category. "That is very frightening," says psychologist Matt Walker from the University of California, Berkeley. "Wouldn't you think that it would be important for us as a society to understand whether 3 percent, 5 percent or 50 percent of people diagnosed with psychiatric problems are simply suffering from sleep abnormalities?"

http://snipr.com/c6rx5



Galaxy Mix: No Dark Matter Required
from Science News

Darth Vaders of astronomy, step aside. Purveyors of theories of dark matter--the invisible, as-yet-undetected material supposedly needed for galaxy formation--have a seat. Astronomers say they have found evidence that the gravitational collapse of visible, swirling gas may suffice to make some dwarf galaxies.

Astronomers base the surprising claim, reported in the Feb. 19 Nature, on new ultraviolet observations of the Leo ring--a vast cloud of hydrogen and helium gas that orbits two massive galaxies in the constellation Leo.

The cloud may be a pristine leftover from the formation of these galaxies, essentially unchanged since the early universe. Indeed, since the ring was discovered some 25 years ago, astronomers have scrutinized it with state-of-the art radio and visible-light telescopes and found no evidence of stars, nothing except the gas.

http://snipr.com/c6rya



Study Suggests How Alzheimer's Attacks Brain
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

CHICAGO (Reuters)--U.S. scientists proposed a new theory Wednesday of how Alzheimer's disease kills brain cells they said opens new avenues of research into treatments for the fatal, brain-wasting disease.

They believe a chemical mechanism that naturally prunes away unwanted brain cells during early brain development somehow gets hijacked in Alzheimer's disease.

"The key player we're focusing on is a protein called APP," said Marc Tessier-Lavigne, executive vice president of research drug discovery at the U.S. biotechnology company Genentech Inc , whose study appears in the journal Nature. Tessier-Lavigne said amyloid precursor protein, or APP - a key building block in brain plaques found in Alzheimer's disease - is the driving force behind this process.

http://snipr.com/c6rzs



Scientists Await Action on Stem Cells
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

At the National Institutes of Health, officials have started drafting guidelines they will need to start funding human embryonic stem cell research that has been off-limits for nearly eight years.

At the University of California at San Francisco, scientists are poised to dismantle the cumbersome bureaucracy they created to segregate experiments that were acceptable under the federal restrictions from studies that were not.

... But in the month since Inauguration Day, the moment they have been awaiting has not come, prompting some to ask: When will President Obama deliver on his campaign promise to lift one of the most contentious policies imposed by his predecessor?

http://snipr.com/c6s2c



A Quantum Threat to Special Relativity
from Scientific American

Our intuition, going back forever, is that to move, say, a rock, one has to touch that rock, or touch a stick that touches the rock, or give an order that travels via vibrations through the air to the ear of a man with a stick that can then push the rock--or some such sequence. This intuition, more generally, is that things can only directly affect other things that are right next to them.

...Every time we think we can come up with an exception to this intuition--say, flipping a switch that turns on city street lights (but then we realize that this happens through wires) or listening to a BBC radio broadcast (but then we realize that radio waves propagate through the air)--it turns out that we have not, in fact, thought of an exception. Not, that is, in our everyday experience of the world.

We term this intuition "locality." Quantum mechanics has upended many an intuition, but none deeper than this one. And this particular upending carries with it a threat, as yet unresolved, to special relativity--a foundation stone of our 21st-century physics.

http://snipr.com/c6s3k



A Protein May Detect Colon Cancer's Spread
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

A study led by Philadelphia researchers shows that an intestinal protein can be used to find colon cancer's early, normally undetectable spread to nearby tissue, an advance that may help early-stage patients decide whether they need chemotherapy after surgery.

The study is a coup for lead author Scott A. Waldman, the Thomas Jefferson University scientist who has spent 16 years studying the remarkable molecule, guanylyl cyclase 2C, or GCC.

But the findings, published in today's Journal of the American Medical Association, also illustrate the increasingly blurry line between experimental tests and commercialized versions. With the advent of new ways to analyze the abnormal activity of genes and proteins in diseased tissue, novel molecular tests are being rushed to market, despite little oversight and unanswered questions about how to ensure safety and reliability.

http://snipr.com/c6s5b
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2009, 08:20:20 PM
February 20, 2009



ReCaptcha: How to Turn Blather into Books
from the Christian Science Monitor

When you buy a concert ticket on Ticketmaster, post something for sale on Craigslist, or poke an old friend on Facebook, you may not know it, but you're helping to put millions of books online in a vast free library.

To access these websites, you must decipher two squiggly words to prove that you're not a computer program designed to spam the site. Once it knows you're human, the website lets you continue.

Those two decoded words don't disappear, however. In fact, your brain has deciphered words that had baffled the scanning software used for an enormous project to digitize every public domain book in the world.

http://snipr.com/cav6d



Hope over Peanut Allergy 'Cure'
from BBC News Online

A group of children with peanut allergies have had their condition effectively cured, doctors believe.

A team from Cambridge's Addenbrooke's Hospital exposed four children to peanuts over a six-month period, gradually building up their tolerance.

By the end the children were eating the equivalent of five peanuts a day. It is the first time a food allergy has been desensitised in such a way, although a longer-term follow up is now needed to confirm the findings.

http://snipr.com/cav7x



Into Space with a Camcorder - Kepler Prepares to Find ET's Home
from the Times (London)

A telescope likened to a giant camcorder will be launched into space early next month in an attempt to find where extra terrestrials live.

The findings of the Kepler mission are predicted to define mankind's place in the universe by establishing whether planets that can sustain life are common or if Earth is an accidental freak. Discoveries provided by the space telescope will, astronomers maintain, determine the direction of space exploration for many years to come.

Nasa's Kepler telescope will investigate thousands of stars within the Milky Way over 42 months in the expectation of detecting planets like our own. Among the myriad it locates are expected to be about 50 that are similar enough to Earth to sustain life, however outlandish a form it takes.

http://snipr.com/cav8q



Anti-Aging: A Little Stress May Keep Cells Youthful
from Science News

A lot of stress can turn your hair gray, but a little stress can actually delay aging. A protein tied to protecting cells from stress also helps slow aging, a new study finds.

The research, published February 20 in Science, identifies a key regulator of a mechanism cells use to prevent protein damage from stress.

Exposure to heat, cold or heavy metals can damage proteins and unravel them from their usual conformations -- trauma that can cause cell death. But cells have a damage-limiting mechanism called the heat shock response to combat these and other stresses.

http://snipr.com/cavae



Are We about to Eliminate AIDS?
from New Scientist

What if we could rid the world of AIDS? The notion might sound like fantasy: HIV infection has no cure and no vaccine, after all. Yet there is a way to completely wipe it out - at least in theory. What's more, it would take only existing medical technology to do the job.

Here's how it works. If someone who is HIV positive takes antiretroviral-drug therapy they can live a long life and almost never pass on the virus, even through unprotected sex. So if everyone with HIV were on therapy, there would be little or no transmission. Once all these people had died, of whatever cause, the virus would be gone for good.

It's a simple idea, but the obstacles to implementing it worldwide are enormous. ... Yet the idea of eliminating HIV is so appealing, and the benefit to humanity so huge, that scientists and policy-makers are seriously considering the concept, albeit on regional scales.

http://snipr.com/cave5



Scientists Make Advances on 'Nano' Electronics
from Wired

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Two U.S. teams have developed new materials that may pave the way for ever smaller, faster and more powerful electronics as current semiconductor technology begins to reach the limits of miniaturization.

One team has made tiny transistors -- the building block of computer processors -- a fraction of the size of those used on advanced silicon chips. Another has made a film material capable of storing data from 250 DVDs onto a surface the size of a coin.

Both advances, published on Thursday in the journal Science, use nanotechnology -- the design and manipulation of materials thousands of times smaller than the width of a human hair. Nanotechnology has been hailed as a way to make strong, lightweight materials, better cosmetics and even tastier food.

http://snipr.com/cavfx



The E.P.A.'s Move to Regulate Carbon: A Stopgap Solution
from Time

On the long list of things that keep coal industry executives awake at night is the possibility that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will begin to regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant. Now it seems that nightmare is at hand.

On Feb. 17, E.P.A. Administrator Lisa Jackson announced that the agency would reconsider a Bush Administration decision not to regulate CO2 emissions from new coal power plants. The next day, she backed up that statement by telling the New York Times she was considering acting on an April 2007 Supreme Court decision that empowers the EPA to regulate CO2 as a pollutant under the Clean Air Act.

If the E.P.A. exercises that authority as expected -- a process that would likely play out over months -- it could potentially be one of the farthest-reaching regulations in U.S. history, affecting the way we use electricity, the way we drive and more.

http://snipurl.com/caz3j



FDA Approves Brain-Zapping Device to Relieve OCD
from USA Today

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Patients suffering from obsessive, distressing thoughts have a new treatment option: a pacemaker-like device that relieves anxiety with electrical jolts to the brain.

The Food and Drug Administration on Thursday approved Medtronic's Reclaim device as the first implant to treat obsessive-compulsive disorder, which causes uncontrollable worries, such as fear of germs or dirt.

Patients suffering from the disorder try to relieve their anxiety with obsessive behavior, such as washing their hands or checking locks repeatedly. ... While about 2.2 million Americans have the disorder, the new device would only be available to a small group of patients who don't respond to other treatments, such as antidepressant drugs and therapy.

http://snipr.com/cavjr



Scientists Find Genes to Protect Wheat from Rust
from the Boston Globe

LONDON (Reuters) - Scientists have pinpointed two genes that protect wheat against devastating fungal diseases found worldwide, potentially paving the way to hardier wheat strains, international researchers reported on Thursday.

New research published in the journal Science showed how the genes provide resistance to leaf rust, stripe rust and powdery mildew, diseases responsible for millions of hectares of lost wheat yield each year.

"Improving control of fungal rust diseases in cereals through breeding varieties with durable rust resistance is critical for world food security," Simon Krattinger of the Institute of Plant Biology in Zurich and colleagues, wrote in one of the studies.

http://snipr.com/cavll



Bird-Like Lungs Powered Giant Pterosaur Flight
from New Scientist

Scans of fossils have cracked the mystery of pterosaur power. The biggest animals ever to fly drew their energy from bird-like lungs that they evolved 70 million years before the first birds took to the air.

Leathery-winged pterosaurs evolved 220 million years ago, from the same group of reptiles that gave rise to crocodiles, dinosaurs, and later birds. Yet how pterosaurs powered their flight had been a mystery because their ribcages were thought to be inflexible, making their breathing inefficient.

Leon Claessens of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, realised that view might be mistaken after pterosaur specialist Dave Unwin at the University of Leicester, UK, showed him a fossil Rhamphorhynchus with a beautifully preserved ribcage.

http://snipr.com/cavml

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on February 20, 2009, 08:37:11 PM
Quote from: Kai on February 20, 2009, 08:20:20 PM
ReCaptcha: How to Turn Blather into Books
from the Christian Science Monitor

When you buy a concert ticket on Ticketmaster, post something for sale on Craigslist, or poke an old friend on Facebook, you may not know it, but you're helping to put millions of books online in a vast free library.

To access these websites, you must decipher two squiggly words to prove that you're not a computer program designed to spam the site. Once it knows you're human, the website lets you continue.

Those two decoded words don't disappear, however. In fact, your brain has deciphered words that had baffled the scanning software used for an enormous project to digitize every public domain book in the world.

http://snipr.com/cav6d
:fap: There's not else for me to say, this is a great use of time and energy.  For some reason, I don't find captchas irritating anymore.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 21, 2009, 04:06:59 PM
Quote from: Vene on February 20, 2009, 08:37:11 PM
Quote from: Kai on February 20, 2009, 08:20:20 PM
ReCaptcha: How to Turn Blather into Books
from the Christian Science Monitor

When you buy a concert ticket on Ticketmaster, post something for sale on Craigslist, or poke an old friend on Facebook, you may not know it, but you're helping to put millions of books online in a vast free library.

To access these websites, you must decipher two squiggly words to prove that you're not a computer program designed to spam the site. Once it knows you're human, the website lets you continue.

Those two decoded words don't disappear, however. In fact, your brain has deciphered words that had baffled the scanning software used for an enormous project to digitize every public domain book in the world.

http://snipr.com/cav6d
:fap: There's not else for me to say, this is a great use of time and energy.  For some reason, I don't find captchas irritating anymore.

what books would be considered out of copyright? That is, how far into the past does copywrite extend now, 1920, 1930?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on February 22, 2009, 01:19:52 AM
Last time I checked copyrights expire after 75 years.  But, I could be wrong.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 22, 2009, 02:13:58 AM
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.html#hlc

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 22, 2009, 03:51:06 AM
Or this:

http://www.copyright.cornell.edu/public_domain/

More comprehensive.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Adios on February 22, 2009, 04:23:51 AM
Quote from: Kai on September 21, 2008, 05:12:23 PM
Quote from: fnord mote eris on September 21, 2008, 09:14:19 AM
kai
I kind of figured with you being in biology you would have a reasonable take on this. The fear mongering is my pet peeve with environmentalism, being stewards of the earth should be obvious, when i see the fear being spread i suspect ulterior/political motives or people buying the hype spread by those that have them.

on local extinction i agree niche species would be the most vulnerable , it is also true that nature abhors a vacuum better adapted life will always move in.

i don't know exactly how biodiversity works but it seems that bio diversity prospers in warm conditions and struggles in colder ones, the bigger threat to diversity i think may be us directly, pesticide/genetic seed companies, humans dragging life around the globe to environments it doesn't belong, plus all the pollution etc you already mentioned. the threat this in turn poses to us can come in unexpected forms (beehive collapse) and show up quickly


edit to add -- biodiversity also would seem to suffer during times of rapid change and prosper in times of steady or slow change, again i suspect the above mentioned human threats would be more likely to cause rapid change than changes to global temperature.



Biodiversity both initially flounders and then increases during and after times of rapid change. steady and slow change tends to have a gradual effect on biodiversity. Instead of a marked drop and leap, its a gradual curve. There is a hypothesis called punctuated equilibrium, that says that lineages change the greatest at punctuated intervals, usually after a catastrophic event. The Permian-Triassic Extinction event lead way to the age of reptiles. The Cretaceous-Tertiary event lead to the "age of mammals". And then we have the 10-20 million year precambrian diversification (most often more incorrectly called the cambrian explosion), caused most likely by the newly oxygenated conditions. This caused a broad diversification of lineages, but also was the end of the Ediacaran life from the period just before. The post Cambrian extinction event saw the loss of many of the weird body plans you would find in the Burgess Shale fossil beds. The point is, we see life's history on earth as having periods of slow change punctuated by catastrophic upheaval leading to extinction and diversification. The tree of life is more like the bush of life, with a few lineages making it and the rest not.

The reason you see diversification after extinction is as you noted above, open niches do not tend to stay open long. Millions of open niches will soon be filled (over millions of years) by diversification of other lineages that made it. Still, 99% percent of all species that ever existed are nonextant. We're left with the 1% of life that actually made it. And there is nothing to say that diversity used to be higher or is higher now, except possibly in angiosperms and insects (I'd argue that insects have been working their way up since the mid paleozoic and aside from the current human induced extinction event, there seems to be no limit to the diversity that can come out of the insect body plan).

Biodiversty prospers when the greatest number of niches are available. The perfect example of this is tropical rainforests. However, climate change will affect the rainforest in the same way that climate change will affect all ecosystems. I'm not so sure whats going to happen. I do know that humans are screwing diversity to hell right now.

I once heard a lecture in undergraduate about biodiversity. The professor told a story about how he was confronted by a teacher once, a chemistry teacher who believed that it would be okay to destroy all life on the planet if it would keep humans alive for one more moment. He didn't know how to argue this with his teacher, he was stunned. He never wanted us to be left the same way, so he gave us some reasons to value biodiversity, things like for medicinal value, for food, for all the environmental tasks they do that we often take for granted, for aesthetic value, but also for the intrinsic value of live itself. I've been reading Reinventing the Sacred as I've noted elsewhere on this forum, and what strikes me as the most important point in that book is the emergence of agency, will, values that are intrinsic to living organisms, from bacterium to mammals, an unremovable part of the system of life. Free will is apparent, because agency is irreducible to physics.

--

Theres another essay I'm thinking of, by Barbara McClintock, the Nobel prize winner that worked with Corn genetics. It doesn't have so much to do with the above, but it has more to do with respect, and the kind of spiritual bond I see myself having with life. Many people wondered how she could work on such a long living organism as corn, when everyone else was working with bacteria. She said "you have to develop a relationship with your organism, you have to be patient and listen to what it has to say". Her patient and respectful relationship with her organism lead to our modern understanding of how genes move around in the DNA molecule, how they can be turned on and off. I want to see myself as having that bond with Cheumatopsyche (http://www.troutnut.com/hatch/1913/Caddisfly-Cheumatopsyche-Little-Sister-Sedges) as she had with Zea (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maize), but I also feel that bond to all insects.


This Kai is why I respect you so much.

I will not claim a scientific mind but it seems to me both man and nature are working hand in hand (no surprise as mankind is of nature) to enable any climate changes that may occur. One major volcano instill the equivalent of XX years of man polluting. Or some such. It honestly seems change is a natural thing and is going to happen. Does this excuse the human tendency for rushing onto the sword blade? No.

Kai, also if the polar ice caps do melt what are some of the things we could expect? I seriously think the ocean levels would rise. How would this additional weight affect the continental plates? Would volcanos be affected as the geological pressure increases?  There are two Super volcanos I am aware of and those would seem to be the great catastrophic events that COULD occur. If the plates started shifting the landscape is obviously going to change. It is even possible the US could be split in two. I know that is a worst case scenario but there are many sub-worst case scenarios that could occur as well.

This is an interesting topic.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 22, 2009, 04:55:16 AM
Hawk:

I'm a biologist, and have little background with hydrology, geology and climatology outside the context of freshwater ecosystems. I would expect if the continental icecaps melted, sea level would rise, high tides would be higher and low tides would be not as low, but thats just common sense really. I don't know what sort of effect this would have geologically, if any. If the reduction in ice caps change the temperature regime near the poles, we may see some changes in ocean current, and therefore weather patterns and climate. I don't really know. In fact, I feel a little uncomfortable speculating about it because I know so little about it.

What I do know about this planet goes something like this.

About 250  million years ago, at the end of the Permian era, there was the most massive extinction of life this planet has ever seen. Over 50% of all families and over 80% of all genera we are aware of went extinct. They no longer show up in the fossil record after that point. That includes over 90% of all known marine species, 70% of all terrestrial vertebrate species, and the only known widespread insect extinction event. That was the last time trilobites were seen on this planet. No one is really sure how it happened; there are hypotheses about impacts, volcanic eruptions, oceanic hypoxia, supercontinent formation, or any number of other things.

The surviving species eventually recovered the diversity of this planet. As I have said before, it is doubtful there are many more species now than there were before, at least moving into the triassic era. I talked about insects being the exception, but at the begining of the mesozoic most of the insect orders and families were firmly entrenched.

This, however, is the note to think about:

After the Permian extinction event, recovery of ecosystems and species numbers took 4-6 million years. We know this from the fossil record. Evolution is a slow process, and while life recovers and fills the planet much faster than the first time billions of years ago, it still would take several million years to see some sort of return to stability, or whatever counts as stability on this planet.

So, are we willing to screw this up? The planet and life will survive, but will WE survive? Are we willing to live in meager conditions for several MILLION years, waiting for a clean up on a mess we made?

We don't understand this planet. We don't understand biology, geology, climate, volcanism, the movements of oceans and continents, the ebb and flow of energy in ecology, the relationship of all these things to our parent star. We make believe we get it, that we are the intelligent tinkerers, while at the same time discarding seemingly "useless parts". If we fuck things up enough so we can't live here, there isn't going to be any sort of executive meeting. Thats it, we're done, the planet is borked for at least 4 million years, so we're all FUCKED.

What that says to me is we should be very very careful, unwilling to take short term risks, and very willing to take precautionary action.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Adios on February 22, 2009, 05:08:24 AM
I certainly agree we should take precautionary measures, starting from the beginning of the industrial era. 20/20 hindsight which is seemingly beyond the people who prosper from things to see.

I guess this has given me the reason to go digging around now to educate myself.

Damn, ruin a lazy man.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on February 22, 2009, 05:09:08 AM
I liked the whole post, but this was just fantastic Kai.  :mittens:

Quote from: Kai on February 22, 2009, 04:55:16 AMThis, however, is the note to think about:

After the Permian extinction event, recovery of ecosystems and species numbers took 4-6 million years. We know this from the fossil record. Evolution is a slow process, and while life recovers and fills the planet much faster than the first time billions of years ago, it still would take several million years to see some sort of return to stability, or whatever counts as stability on this planet.

So, are we willing to screw this up? The planet and life will survive, but will WE survive? Are we willing to live in meager conditions for several MILLION years, waiting for a clean up on a mess we made?

We don't understand this planet. We don't understand biology, geology, climate, volcanism, the movements of oceans and continents, the ebb and flow of energy in ecology, the relationship of all these things to our parent star. We make believe we get it, that we are the intelligent tinkerers, while at the same time discarding seemingly "useless parts". If we fuck things up enough so we can't live here, there isn't going to be any sort of executive meeting. Thats it, we're done, the planet is borked for at least 4 million years, so we're all FUCKED.

What that says to me is we should be very very careful, unwilling to take short term risks, and very willing to take precautionary action.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Adios on February 22, 2009, 05:37:13 AM
30 sites so far and every one seems slanted to their own OPINION and are thereby considered untrustworthy.

Anyone have any decent links for those who want to know?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 22, 2009, 03:00:26 PM
Opinions are like assholes.

That being said, if you want to know about climate, ask a climatologist. If you want to know about geology, ask a geologist. Continue ad infinitum. A scientist who specializes in a certain field is going to be much more accurate than public interest groups, nonspecialists, and the general public. For example, I know some excellent biologists. I deeply value their opinions in their particular specializations, but I wouldn't, for example, ask them for their opinion on global climate change. They may have allegorical evidence related to their research but its not going to be anything more than that. An ecologist might be better, but still not quite as good as going to a climatologist.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 26, 2009, 02:17:18 PM
February 25, 2009



From One Genome, Many Types of Cells. But How?
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

One of the enduring mysteries of biology is that a variety of specialized cells collaborate in building a body, yet all have an identical genome. Somehow each of the 200 different kinds of cells in the human body--in the brain, liver, bone, heart and many other structures--must be reading off a different set of the hereditary instructions written into the DNA.

The system is something like a play in which all the actors have the same script but are assigned different parts and blocked from even seeing anyone else's lines. The fertilized egg possesses the first copy of the script; as it divides repeatedly into the 10 trillion cells of the human body, the cells assign themselves to the different roles they will play throughout an individual's lifetime.

How does this assignment process work? The answer, researchers are finding, is that a second layer of information is embedded in the special proteins that package the DNA of the genome. This second layer, known as the epigenome, controls access to the genes, allowing each cell type to activate its own special genes but blocking off most of the rest.

http://snipr.com/cmd7p



Sunshine Vitamin Diminishes Risk of Colds, Flu
from Science News

Getting plenty of vitamin D--more than diet can offer--appears to provide potent protection against colds, flu and even pneumonia, a new study reports. Although the amount of protection varies by season, the trend is solid: As the amount of vitamin D circulating in blood climbs, risk of upper respiratory tract infections falls.

Though that's not too surprising, the researchers found one unexpected trend: "In people with preexisting lung disease, such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease--or COPD, low levels of vitamin D act like an effect modifier," says Adit Ginde, an emergency room physician at the University of Colorado Denver School of Medicine in Aurora who led the study.

The findings appear in the Feb. 23 Archives of Internal Medicine. In people with lung disease, he says, low levels of the sunshine vitamin "magnify many-fold" the apparent vulnerability to infection seen in people with healthy lungs.

http://snipr.com/cmdac



Giant Observatories Augur New Era of Cosmology
from Scientific American

Four centuries ago Galileo pointed his spyglass toward the heavens and astronomy changed forever. As the world celebrates the 400th anniversary of the telescope, another cosmological revolution is coming: The Giant Magellan Telescope (GMT), Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) and European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT)--all expected to see first light by 2020--will dwarf the biggest observatories in use today.

The largest, the 42-meter (138-foot) E-ELT, will gather 15 times more light than today's 10-meter (33-foot) optical telescopes. TMT, with its 30-meter- (98.5-foot-) diameter primary mirror, and GMT, delivering the resolving power of a 24.5-meter (80-foot) reflector, will also outclass any current optical telescope.

Astronomers have always wanted bigger telescopes to resolve ever fainter objects. Large-diameter telescopes, essentially big light buckets, collect more photons for a given amount of observing time. Bigger mirrors also boost a telescope's angular resolution, or its ability to measure the separation between two close objects. This next generation of big telescopes follows the leap in technology achieved with the W. M. Keck Observatory on Mauna Kea, Hawaii, in the 1990s.

http://snipr.com/cmdc4



Superhuman: The Secrets of the Ice Man
from New Scientist

Perched on the edge of an Antarctic ice sheet, Lewis Gordon Pugh surveys the waves. At 0°C, water does not get much colder than the sea beneath him. Undeterred, Pugh unzips his jacket, strips down to his swimming trunks and dives in.

Most of us would start to hyperventilate uncontrollably if we dived into such cold water. Pugh doesn't even gasp in pain but instead starts swimming. In December 2005, when Pugh took this plunge (pictured above), he went on to swim a kilometre in just over 18 minutes. Many ordinary people would drown after just a few minutes in such cold water. Pugh, however, not only survived but went on to make several more long-distance swims in extremely cold water. So what makes him able to keep swimming in such extreme cold?

A study of Pugh published last month has confirmed that his response to cold water is anything but normal. Remarkably, though, while Pugh may have some innate advantages, it seems his near-superhuman ability is largely down to training--so perhaps it could be something we are all able to learn.

http://snipr.com/cmdel



Child Abuse Alters Stress-Fighting Gene, Study Says
from National Geographic News

Childhood abuse can permanently alter the way a key stress-fighting gene works, leaving victims more vulnerable to stressful events throughout their lives, new research reveals.

Scientists compared the brains of suicide victims who had been abused as children with the brains of non-abused suicide victims and people who died of other causes. It seems that we see in the genome the mark of childhood abuse," said study co-author Moshe Szyf of Montreal's McGill University. The finding was published this week in the journal Nature Neuroscience.

The genes we inherit are marked with chemicals that help determine how they will perform their functions. In this case, the abuse victims' underlying DNA was not changed. Instead, a particular gene's expression was dampened, causing the brain to produce fewer calming hormones.

http://snipr.com/cmdi4



The Evolutionary Role of Cookery
from the Economist

You are what you eat, or so the saying goes. But Richard Wrangham, of Harvard University, believes that this is true in a more profound sense than the one implied by the old proverb. It is not just you who are what you eat, but the entire human species. And with Homo sapiens, what makes the species unique in Dr. Wrangham's opinion is that its food is so often cooked.

Cooking is a human universal. No society is without it. No one other than a few faddists tries to survive on raw food alone. And the consumption of a cooked meal in the evening, usually in the company of family and friends, is normal in every known society. Moreover, without cooking, the human brain (which consumes 20-25% of the body's energy) could not keep running. Dr. Wrangham thus believes that cooking and humanity are coeval.

In fact ... he thinks that cooking and other forms of preparing food are humanity's "killer app": the evolutionary change that underpins all of the other--and subsequent--changes that have made people such unusual animals.

http://snipr.com/cmdku



A Drink a Day Raises Women's Risk of Cancer, Study Indicates
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

For years, many women have been buoyed by the news about one of life's guilty pleasures: That nightly glass of wine may not only take the edge off a day but also improve their health. Now it turns out that sipping pinot noir might not be such a good idea after all.

A new study involving nearly 1.3 million middle-aged British women--the largest ever to examine alcohol and cancer in women--found that just one glass of chardonnay, a single beer or any other type of alcoholic drink per day increases the risk of a variety of cancers.

"That's the take-home message," said Naomi E. Allen of the University of Oxford, who led the study being published March 4 in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. "If you are regularly drinking even one drink per day, that's increasing your risk for cancer." Understandably, the study may leave many women scratching their heads, given all the talk about red wine being something akin to a fountain of youth.

http://snipr.com/cmdpc



The 3 R's? A Fourth Is Crucial, Too: Recess
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The best way to improve children's performance in the classroom may be to take them out of it.

New research suggests that play and down time may be as important to a child's academic experience as reading, science and math, and that regular recess, fitness or nature time can influence behavior, concentration and even grades.

A study published this month in the journal Pediatrics studied the links between recess and classroom behavior among about 11,000 children age 8 and 9. Those who had more than 15 minutes of recess a day showed better behavior in class than those who had little or none. Although disadvantaged children were more likely to be denied recess, the association between better behavior and recess time held up even after researchers controlled for a number of variables, including sex, ethnicity, public or private school and class size.

http://snipr.com/cmdyb



Beauty and the Brain, Women Use More Than Men
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--Beauty is in the brain of the beholder. Go to any museum and there will be men and women admiring paintings and sculpture. But it turns out they are thinking about the sight differently. Men process beauty on the right side of their brains, while women use their whole brain to do the job, researchers report in Tuesday's electronic edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

They even explain it differently. Novelist Margaret Wolfe Hungerford: "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." Essayist David Hume: "Beauty in things exists merely in the mind which contemplates them."

Researchers were surprised by the finding. "It is well known that there are differences between brain activity in women and men in cognitive tasks," said researcher Camilo J. Cela-Conde of the University of Baleares in Palma de Mallorca, Spain. "However, why should this kind of difference appear in the case of appreciation of beauty?"

http://snipr.com/cmdzr



Drug Recommended to Prevent Prostate Cancer in Some Older Men
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Healthy men over 55 who are concerned enough about the risk of prostate cancer to undergo annual PSA screening should consider taking the drug finasteride daily to reduce their risk of developing the disease, according to a new prevention guideline released Tuesday.

"If a man is interested enough in being screened, then at least he ought to have the benefits of a discussion" with his doctor about taking the drug, Dr. Barnett S. Kramer of the National Institutes of Health said at a news conference revealing the guideline.

Kramer was co-chairman of the panel that developed the recommendation for the American Society of Clinical Oncology and the American Urological Assn. It will be published in the March issues of the Journal of Clinical Oncology and the Journal of Urology. The most likely initial candidates to take the drug would be men who are African American or who have a father or brother with the disease, factors which sharply increase risk [of cancer]...

http://snipr.com/cme1y

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 27, 2009, 05:00:24 PM
February 26, 2009



Polar Year 'Hailed as a Success'
from BBC News Online

Scientists and policymakers marked the official end of the International Polar Year (IPY) Wednesday at the World Meteorological Organization in Geneva. The 60-country, $1.2bn effort has seen knowledge about the poles--and their influence on the rest of the planet--increase hugely.

That knowledge is not just about ice and polar bears, but also about Arctic peoples and global climate systems. The WMO has released its preliminary report "The State of Polar Research."

The summary of results outlines what has been learned so far from IPY projects: sea level rises due to the melting of ice sheets, sea-ice decreases in the Arctic, anomalous warming in the Southern Ocean, and the storage and release of methane in permafrost. The IPY effort is the largest international science collaboration since the International Geophysical Year, which took place 50 years ago--and comes at a critical time.

http://snipr.com/couo8



Placebo Effect: A Cure in the Mind
from Scientific American

A man whom his doctors referred to as "Mr. Wright" was dying from cancer of the lymph nodes. Orange-size tumors had invaded his neck, groin, chest and abdomen, and his doctors had exhausted all available treatments. Nevertheless, Mr. Wright was confident that a new anticancer drug called Krebiozen would cure him ...

Mr. Wright was bedridden and fighting for each breath when he received his first injection. But three days later he was cheerfully ambling around the unit, joking with the nurses. Mr. Wright's tumors had shrunk by half, and after 10 more days of treatment he was discharged from the hospital. And yet the other patients in the hospital who had received Krebiozen showed no improvement.

Over the next two months, however, Mr. Wright became troubled by press reports questioning the efficacy of Krebiozen and suffered a relapse. His doctors decided to lie to him: an improved, doubly effective version of the drug was due to arrive the next day, they told him. Mr. Wright was ecstatic. The doctors then gave him an injection that contained not one molecule of the drug--and he improved even more than he had the last time.

http://snipr.com/coutz



After NASA's Carbon Observatory Crashes, Scientists Ask, 'What's Next?'
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Nine years of work disappeared in five minutes Tuesday when a NASA satellite crashed into the icy, black waters near the South Pole. Now climate scientists who worked on the ambitious effort to map the world's carbon dioxide are trying to figure out what comes next.

The $278 million Orbiting Carbon Observatory was designed to monitor how CO2 enters and exits the Earth's atmosphere--hoping to yield a picture of a rhythm that is much like taking a breath. Forests and oceans absorb the greenhouse gas from the atmosphere, while burning fossil fuels and decaying plant and animal life send more back.

There is a delicate balance between the two processes that shifts with seasons and weather patterns--plants, for example, pull in more CO2 in spring than in winter, when many lose their leaves. But while scientists have a basic understanding of the carbon cycle, they can't account for all the CO2 humans produce, said Scott Denning, a professor at Colorado State University who worked on the NASA project's science team.

http://snipr.com/couwy



Ancient Shipwreck's Stone Cargo Linked to Apollo Temple
from National Geographic News

For a few days back in July 2007, it was hard for archaeologist Deborah Carlson to get any work done at her site off the Aegean coast of western Turkey. She was leading an underwater excavation of a 2,000-year-old shipwreck, but the Turkish members of her crew had taken time off to vote in national elections. So things were quiet at her camp on an isolated cape called Kizilburun.

The shipwreck's main cargo was 50 tons of marble--elements of a huge column sent on an ill-fated journey to a temple, Carlson thought. But she didn't know which temple, so she used all her days off to drive around the area looking at possibilities.

There were a lot--western Turkey, once part of ancient Greece and later in the Roman Empire, is home to sites like Ephesus and Troy. But Carlson had narrowed down her choices to a list of nearby temples that were in use in the first century BC--the likely date of the shipwreck's column.

http://snipr.com/cov46



FDA Says Firm Faked Generic-Drug Tests
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

India's largest drugmaker has falsified laboratory tests for generic drugs that had been approved for sale in the United States, officials at the Food and Drug Administration say.

The FDA cited the fraudulent laboratory tests yesterday as it took the unusual step of stopping its review of all pending applications from Ranbaxy Laboratories. Federal investigators said the problems centered on the company's plant in Paonta Sahib, which has produced 25 drugs that have been approved by the FDA. Most of those medications are not thought to be on U.S. pharmacy shelves; since September, Ranbaxy has been prevented from exporting more than two dozen drugs to the United States.

The FDA is not seeking a recall, because regulators do not believe the drugs pose a health risk.

http://snipr.com/covdm



Geoducks: Happy as Clams
from Smithsonian Magazine

Craig Parker popped his head above the surf, peeled off his dive mask and clambered aboard the Ichiban. We were anchored 50 yards offshore from a fir-lined peninsula that juts into Puget Sound. Sixty feet below, where Parker had spent his morning, the seafloor was flat and sandy--barren, to unschooled eyes, except for the odd flounder or orange sea pen. Parker's eyes, though, were well trained.

Wearing a neoprene dry suit, he stood in the boat surrounded by the morning's haul: a glistening payload of an absurdly proportioned shellfish defined by a mass of pudgy, lolling flesh. Buried in the muck beneath Puget Sound lives the Pacific Northwest's most profitable marine creature, a mollusk so valuable that gangsters have traded it for narcotics: the geoduck (pronounced "gooey duck"), the world's largest burrowing clam.

... Forty years ago this mollusk was virtually unknown outside the Northwest. Today Puget Sound fishermen sell four million pounds of it each year, or about two million clams' worth.

http://snipr.com/covg6



Study: Change Lifestyle, Cut Cancer Risk
from CBS News

Authors of a joint American-British study say about a third of the cancer cases reported every year in the United States could be prevented, "through lifestyle."

The researchers claim to have crafted the most systematic policy report ever on cancer prevention, using data already available from existing research on cancer risk and prevention.

Aside from avoiding smoking, which is still the best way to statistically reduce your chances of a cancer diagnosis, CBS News correspondent Richard Roth reports that, according to the study, maintaining a healthy lifestyle is the most important thing you can do. The research, based on data collected in Brazil, China, Britain and the U.S., suggests that about a third (34 percent) of all cancer cases in America could be prevented simply by people eating better, exercising more and maintaining healthier weights.

http://snipr.com/covia



Study: Antarctic Glaciers Slipping Swiftly Seaward
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

GENEVA (Associated Press)--Antarctic glaciers are melting faster across a much wider area than previously thought, scientists said Wednesday--a development that could lead to an unprecedented rise in sea levels.

A report by thousands of scientists for the 2007-2008 International Polar Year concluded that the western part of the continent is warming up, not just the Antarctic Peninsula.

Previously most of the warming was thought to occur on the narrow stretch pointing toward South America, said Colin Summerhayes, executive director of the Britain-based Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research and a member of International Polar Year's steering committee. But satellite data and automated weather stations indicate otherwise.

http://snipr.com/covk3



Study of Diets Shows What Truly Counts: Calories
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Two decades after the debate began on which diet is best for weight loss, a conclusion is starting to come into focus. And the winner is ... not low-carb, not low-fat, not high protein but ... any diet.

That is, any diet that is low in calories and saturated fats and high in whole grains, fruits and vegetables--and that an individual can stick with for a lifetime--is a reasonable choice for people who need to lose weight. That's the conclusion of a study published online Wednesday by the New England Journal of Medicine, research that represents the longest, largest and most rigorous test of several popular diet strategies.

In light of another highly regarded study published last year that reached a similar conclusion, medical experts are embracing the back-to-basics idea that the simple act of cutting calories is most important when it comes to losing weight.

http://snipr.com/covln



Prions Complicit in Alzheimer's Disease
from Science News

Prion protein, notorious for causing the brain-wasting mad cow and Creutzfeldt-Jakob diseases, may also be a coconspirator in Alzheimer's disease, a new study in mice suggests.

In mad cow and Creutzfeldt-Jakob diseases, misshapen prion proteins do the damage. But the new paper, appearing February 26 in Nature, offers evidence that the harmless version of the prion protein assists the amyloid-beta protein responsible for brain cell death in Alzheimer's disease.

"It's pretty sensational," comments Adriano Aguzzi, a neuropathologist at the University of Zurich. "What's tremendously electrifying is that prion protein may be a genetic sensor for extremely toxic, small concentrations of A-beta."

http://snipr.com/covnb
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 01, 2009, 05:14:53 AM
February 27, 2009



Roll-Up Solar Cells Printed Like Money
from National Geographic News

Printing presses normally used to make Australian dollar bills produced solar power cells in a trial near Melbourne last week. The giant machines arranged and stamped flexible solar panels onto plastic film.

The cells were only 3 percent efficient, meaning they could convert only a small amount of solar energy into electricity.

But Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) project leader Gerry Wilson told Australian ABC News he expects the output to more than double by next year and top 10 percent after that. He said he hoped the solar cells would be ready for mass production in five years.

http://snipr.com/cr8nw



Obama's Budget Would Boost Science
from Science News

In his not-exactly-State-of-the-Union address to Congress Tuesday night, President Obama promised that his administration would boost support for science. ... The official "outline" of the first Obama budget ... asks Congress to fatten the National Science Foundation, for example, with an extra $7 billion--a hefty 16 percent increase over last year's funding.

The new budget document argues that "investments in science and technology foster economic growth, create millions of high-tech, high-wage jobs that allow American workers to lead the global economy" and more. For that reason, the budget document says, the president's proposed budget for fiscal year 2010 is aimed at beginning to move toward a doubling of federal funding for basic research over the next 10 years. The actual increase in the coming year would be $950 million, it says.

The Energy Department would see lots of boosts. Most of the dollar figures mentioned in today's budget document reflect money already targeted to be spent from the stimulus. This includes $3.4 billion for low-carbon coal technologies, including the carbon sequestration.

http://snipr.com/cr8ru



Prints Are Evidence of Modern Foot in Prehumans
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Footprints uncovered in Kenya show that as early as 1.5 million years ago an ancestral species, almost certainly Homo erectus, had already evolved the feet and walking gait of modern humans.

An international team of scientists, in a report Friday in the journal Science, said the well-defined prints in an eroding bluff east of Lake Turkana "provided the oldest evidence of an essentially modern humanlike foot anatomy" and added to the picture of Homo erectus as the prehumans who took long evolutionary strides--figuratively and, now it seems, also literally.

Where the individuals who made the tracks were going, or why, is beyond knowing by the cleverest scientist. The variability of the separation between some steps, researchers said, suggests that they were picking their way over an uneven surface, muddy enough to leave a mark as an unintended message from an extinct species for the contemplation of its descendants.

http://snipr.com/cr8ur



Salt Solution: Cheap Power from the River's Mouth
from New Scientist

Stand on the banks of the Rhine where it flows into the North Sea, near the port of Rotterdam in the Netherlands, and you'll witness a vast, untapped source of energy swirling in the estuary. According to Dutch engineer Joost Veerman, it's possible to tap this energy without damaging the environment or disrupting the river's busy shipping.

For rather than constructing a huge barrage or dotting the river bed with turbines, Veerman and his colleagues at Wetsus, the Dutch Centre for Sustainable Water Technology in Leeuwarden, believe they can tap energy locked up in the North Sea's saltwater by channelling it, along with fresh water from the Rhine, into a novel kind of battery.

... "Salinity power" exploits the chemical differences between salt and fresh water, and this project only hints at the technology's potential: from the mouth of the Ganges to the Mississippi delta, almost every large estuary could produce a constant flow of green electricity, day and night, rain or shine, without damaging sensitive ecosystems or threatening fisheries.

http://snipr.com/cr8wa



Tools Unearth 13,000 Years of History
from the Denver Post

It turns out that the first people to get in on Boulder real estate were the Clovis--a nomadic people who lived 13,000 years ago. We know this from a cache of Clovis tools buried beneath the lawn of biotech entrepreneur Patrick Mahaffy.

The 83 stone implements--including bi facial knives and a tool resembling a double-bitted ax--were unearthed in May by a landscaping crew. It is one of only two known Clovis caches. The other is in Washington state.

"There is a magic to these artifacts," said Mahaffy, who backed a $7,000 analysis of the knife and ax blades. Mahaffy said landscapers were digging out a space to build a fish pond when their shovels struck stone, unearthing the space where the tools had been buried. Reporting of the find was delayed until the analysis was complete, officials involved in the venture said.

http://snipr.com/cr8yq



Study of Fossils Shows Prehistoric Fish Had Sex
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

BANGKOK, Thailand (Associated Press)--The fossilized remains of two pregnant fish indicate that sex as we know it--fertilization of eggs inside a female--took place as much as 30 million years earlier than previously thought, researchers said Thursday.

Scientists from Australia and Britain studying 380 million-year-old fossils of the armored placoderm fish, or Incisoscutum richiei, said they were initially confused when they realized that the two fish were carrying embryos. They originally thought the fish laid their eggs before fertilization.

"Once we found embryos in this group, we knew they had internal fertilization. But how the hell are they doing it?" said John Long, the head of sciences at the Museum Victoria in Melbourne who wrote a paper on the discovery that appeared in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

http://snipr.com/cr92p



The Kindness of Crowds
from the Economist

According to a much-reported survey carried out in 2002, Britain then had 4.3m closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras--one for every 14 people in the country. That figure has since been questioned, but few doubt that Britons are closely scrutinised when they walk the streets. This scrutiny is supposed to deter and detect crime. Even the government's statistics, though, suggest that the cameras have done little to reduce the worst sort of criminal activity, violence.

That may, however, be about to change, and in an unexpected way. It is not that the cameras and their operators will become any more effective. Rather, they have accidentally gathered a huge body of data on how people behave, and particularly on how they behave in situations where violence is in the air.

This means that hypotheses about violent behaviour which could not be tested experimentally for practical or ethical reasons, can now be examined in a scientific way. And it is that which may help violence to be controlled.

http://snipr.com/cr94u



'Oldest English Words' Identified
from BBC News Online

Some of the oldest words in English have been identified, scientists say. Reading University researchers claim "I," "we," "two" and "three" are among the most ancient, dating back tens of thousands of years.

Their computer model analyses the rate of change of words in English and the languages that share a common heritage. The team says it can predict which words are likely to become extinct--citing "squeeze," "guts," "stick" and "bad" as probable first casualties.

"We use a computer to fit a range of models that tell us how rapidly these words evolve," said Mark Pagel, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Reading. "We fit a wide range, so there's a lot of computation involved; and that range then brackets what the true answer is and we can estimate the rates at which these things are replaced through time."

http://snipr.com/cr96u



Indonesia's Psychedelic Fish Named a New Species
from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram

JAKARTA, Indonesia (Associated Press)--A funky, psychedelic fish that bounces on the ocean floor like a rubber ball has been classified as a new species, a scientific journal reported.

The frogfish--which has a swirl of tan and peach zebra stripes that extend from its aqua eyes to its tail--was initially discovered by scuba diving instructors working for a tour operator a year ago in shallow waters off Ambon island in eastern Indonesia.

The operator contacted Ted Pietsch, lead author of a paper published in this month's edition of Copeia, the journal of the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists, who submitted DNA work identifying it as a new species. The fish--which the University of Washington professor has named "psychedelica"--is a member of the antennariid genus, Histiophryne, and like other frogfish, has fins on both sides of its body that have evolved to be leg-like.

http://snipr.com/cr99p



Scientists Meet to Save Lascaux Cave from Fungus
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

PARIS (Associated Press)--Geologists, biologists and other scientists convened Thursday in Paris to discuss how to stop the spread of fungus stains--aggravated by global warming--that threaten France's prehistoric Lascaux cave drawings.

Black stains have spread across the cave's prehistoric murals of bulls, felines and other images, and scientists have been hard-pressed to halt the fungal creep.

Marc Gaulthier, who heads the Lascaux Caves International Scientific Committee, said the challenges facing the group are vast and global warming now poses an added problem.

http://snipr.com/cr9e3

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on March 01, 2009, 05:30:44 AM
Quote from: Kai on February 27, 2009, 05:00:24 PM

Placebo Effect: A Cure in the Mind
from Scientific American

A man whom his doctors referred to as "Mr. Wright" was dying from cancer of the lymph nodes. Orange-size tumors had invaded his neck, groin, chest and abdomen, and his doctors had exhausted all available treatments. Nevertheless, Mr. Wright was confident that a new anticancer drug called Krebiozen would cure him ...

Mr. Wright was bedridden and fighting for each breath when he received his first injection. But three days later he was cheerfully ambling around the unit, joking with the nurses. Mr. Wright's tumors had shrunk by half, and after 10 more days of treatment he was discharged from the hospital. And yet the other patients in the hospital who had received Krebiozen showed no improvement.

Over the next two months, however, Mr. Wright became troubled by press reports questioning the efficacy of Krebiozen and suffered a relapse. His doctors decided to lie to him: an improved, doubly effective version of the drug was due to arrive the next day, they told him. Mr. Wright was ecstatic. The doctors then gave him an injection that contained not one molecule of the drug--and he improved even more than he had the last time.

http://snipr.com/coutz

I'm glad that more people are putting research into placebos.  The healing power of the mind is fascinating.  It's strange how just a slight change in attitude can have such a huge effect on your health.  I know that there's only so much that placebos can do but we need to see how far we can push them. At the very least for the shits and giggles.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on March 01, 2009, 02:53:34 PM
Placebos are one of the most potent drugs known to man, probably, and certainly one of the most multipurpose. They just get a bad rap because they don't *do* anything.

The price doesn't help much either.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 01, 2009, 11:52:32 PM
Wouldn't it just be better to change the way doctors go about post treatment, and their interactions with patients?

I mean, technically, a placebo can be a 5 cent sugar pill.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on March 02, 2009, 01:29:08 AM
Technically, a placebo can be a free television program, as long as people think it works. I'm pretty sure the 'you get what you pay for' sentiment is mostly a cultural anomaly that causes cheap working placebos to be generally unknown. Placebos cease to be useful if they need to be twice as expensive as the real drug they replace in order to be half as effective.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 02, 2009, 08:00:51 PM
http://invertdiary.ebaker.me.uk/2009/03/circus-of-spineless-issue-36.html (http://invertdiary.ebaker.me.uk/2009/03/circus-of-spineless-issue-36.html)

One of those blog circuses, this one with a mess of articles about invertebrates.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on March 06, 2009, 02:06:06 AM
Protein Structure Determined in Living Cells (http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-03/guf-psd030509.php)

"The function of a protein is determined both by its structure and by its interaction partners in the cell. Until now, proteins had to be isolated for analyzing them. An international team of researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University, Goethe University, and the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) has, for the first time, determined the structure of a protein in its natural environment, the living cell. Using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, the researchers solved the structure of a protein within the bacterium Escherichia coli."

This astounds me.  I have used NMR in the past, and I never would have thought it would be able to not only be a viable technique on living organisms, let alone good enough to determine the structure in a living organism.  There is just so much noise to remove, not to mention keeping it alive the entire time.  The solvents I've used are all the sort of thing that would be incredibly toxic to anything alive.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 06, 2009, 02:30:37 AM
Quote from: Vene on March 06, 2009, 02:06:06 AM
Protein Structure Determined in Living Cells (http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-03/guf-psd030509.php)

"The function of a protein is determined both by its structure and by its interaction partners in the cell. Until now, proteins had to be isolated for analyzing them. An international team of researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University, Goethe University, and the Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies (FIAS) has, for the first time, determined the structure of a protein in its natural environment, the living cell. Using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, the researchers solved the structure of a protein within the bacterium Escherichia coli."

This astounds me.  I have used NMR in the past, and I never would have thought it would be able to not only be a viable technique on living organisms, let alone good enough to determine the structure in a living organism.  There is just so much noise to remove, not to mention keeping it alive the entire time.  The solvents I've used are all the sort of thing that would be incredibly toxic to anything alive.


This astounds me, because we still don't know how protein gated channels work, and now maybe we can figure out how.

I remember actually POSTING somewhere on here when I heard that from my professor years ago. That we had no clue how something as basic as a gated channel actually worked mechanically blew me away.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on March 06, 2009, 03:07:13 AM
My copy of Molecular Biology of the Cell (http://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Biology-Cell-Bruce-Alberts/dp/0815341059/ref=pd_bxgy_b_text_b)[/u] actually does describe how some channels work (like the Na+ and K[su[]+[/sup] pumps in neurons).  Like the ball and chain model.
(http://www.nature.com/horizon/livingfrontier/background/thumbs/proteins_f2.jpg)

But, there is still a lot that is not understood or poorly understood.  For example, the section on peroxisome transport has a lot of handwaving and generalities.  Naturally, this means there is still a lot unknown.

Also, long term potentiation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_term_potentiation) blew my mind.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 06, 2009, 03:14:54 AM
Quote from: Vene on March 06, 2009, 03:07:13 AM
My copy of Molecular Biology of the Cell (http://www.amazon.com/Molecular-Biology-Cell-Bruce-Alberts/dp/0815341059/ref=pd_bxgy_b_text_b)[/u] actually does describe how some channels work (like the Na+ and K[su[]+[/sup] pumps in neurons).  Like the ball and chain model.
(http://www.nature.com/horizon/livingfrontier/background/thumbs/proteins_f2.jpg)

But, there is still a lot that is not understood or poorly understood.  For example, the section on peroxisome transport has a lot of handwaving and generalities.  Naturally, this means there is still a lot unknown.

Also, long term potentiation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_term_potentiation) blew my mind.

As I was explained though, the models are just guesses, we don't REALLY know which one is right.  Theres the ball and chain but theres other ones that do just as good of a job. People like models, but the map isn't the territory.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on March 06, 2009, 03:22:16 AM
No arguments here, just commenting based on my limited knowledge.  Actually, from my understanding, science tends to constantly work on limited knowledge and try to zero in on the best model possible.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 09, 2009, 03:33:58 AM
March 5, 2009

Scientists Discover Potential Tool Against HIV
from the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Registration Required)

Scientists at the University of Minnesota reported Wednesday that they found a way to block transmission of the virus that causes AIDS in animals, raising hopes of a potential breakthrough in the battle against the worldwide epidemic.

The scientists were able to prevent infection in a group of female monkeys by treating them with a gel containing a common food additive, known as glycerol monolaurate or GML, before they were exposed to the virus.

The discovery, reported in the journal Nature, could lead to a novel and effective way to prevent sexual transmission in women, said Dr. Ashley Haase, who led the study with fellow microbiologist Patrick Schlievert.

http://snipr.com/d5fou



New Saturn Moon: Tiny Gem Found in Outer Ring
from National Geographic News

A faint pinprick of light embedded in one of Saturn's outermost rings is now the 61st moon known to be circling the giant planet, astronomers announced Tuesday.

Images taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft over a 600-day stretch revealed the tiny moonlet moving in a partial ring known as a ring arc that extends about a sixth of the way around Saturn's faint G ring.

Based on its brightness, astronomers estimate that the as-yet-unnamed moon is a third of a mile wide. This is tiny as far as moons go, but the object is likely the largest in its neighborhood.

http://snipr.com/d5fs4



Will a Bendable Laser Scalpel Make the Cut?
from Scientific American

Laser technology has proved to be an invaluable surgical tool, be it to improve eyesight, repair torn retinas, zap kidney stones, or to delicately remove spinal tumors. Still, despite more than four decades of use in the operating room, laser surgery has been limited by the fact that its energy travels in straight lines.

This means that a laser works best on areas that can be reached with a straight shot. Maneuvering the beam so that it can reach out-of-the-way areas--without damaging healthy tissue--is sometimes done, using a series of mirrors to guide the laser beam, but this typically dilutes the laser's strength.

An approach to laser surgery on the market for barely more than a year, however, seeks to add a new level of flexibility to optical scalpels by directing the infrared energy of a high-intensity carbon dioxide (CO2) laser through a flexible fiber tube lined with reflective material. This gives the surgeon the ability to snake the laser safely through the body to wherever it is needed without losing any of the beam's strength.

http://snipr.com/d5fwz



Dancing Black Hole Twins Spotted
from BBC News Online

Researchers have seen the best evidence yet for a pair of black holes orbiting each other within the same galaxy.

While such "binary systems" have been postulated before, none has ever been conclusively spotted. The new black hole pair is dancing significantly closer than the prior best binary system candidate.

The work, published in the journal Nature, is in line with the theory of growth of galaxies, each with a black hole at its centre.

http://snipr.com/d5g4c



Out-of-Sync Days Throw Heart and Metabolism Out of Whack
from Science News

Sleeping during the day and staying awake at night can lead to heart and metabolic problems, even after just a few days of the out-of-sync schedule, a new study reports. The results, published online March 2 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, may help explain the high rates of heart disease, diabetes and obesity among people who work the graveyard shift.

"The problems of shift work affect so many people, but there are very few studies that address the underlying mechanisms," comments Eve Van Cauter, a sleep researcher at the University of Chicago. "This is what [the researchers] have done, and elegantly so."

Based on Bureau of Labor Statistics data, the researchers estimate that 8.6 million people in the United States are shift workers.

http://snipr.com/d5gao



Bid to Undo Bush Memo on Threats to Species
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A few weeks before he left office, President George W. Bush told federal officials that, in effect, they did not have to bother getting the advice of wildlife experts before taking actions that might harm plants or animals protected by the Endangered Species Act.

On Tuesday, President Obama said that, in effect, they did. At a visit to the Interior Department marking its 150th anniversary, the president said he had signed a memorandum directing the Interior and Commerce Departments to review a regulation that the Bush administration issued Dec. 16.

The regulation lifted longstanding requirements that agencies contemplating actions that might affect endangered species consult with scientists from the Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service and to take their guidance into account.

http://snipr.com/d5ge4



The Bark of Love
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

When male wolves feel amorous, they are famously known to howl. When male cheetahs find themselves in the same spot, so to speak, they resort to a more modest bark, a staccato yip that scientists say does much more than simply catch a receptive female's ear.

The so-called "stutter-bark," according to new research, seems literally to turn the female on, triggering a cascade of reproductive hormones that results in the release of eggs for fertilization.

"We think this is the first known case of mammalian ovulation by acoustic inducement," said Matthew Anderson, a researcher in the San Diego Zoo's behavioral biology division who recently documented the discovery with Fred Bercovitch, associate director of the zoo's Conservation Research Department. The cheetah research is part of the zoo's larger experiment in "sensory ecology," an effort to better understand how animals use sound (and other signals) to communicate.

http://snipr.com/d5gjp



Sebelius, DeParle Named to Health-Care Posts
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

President Obama on Monday named Nancy-Ann DeParle as director of the White House Office of Health Reform, rounding out the leadership of the team that will direct his administration's efforts to revamp the nation's ailing health-care system.

Obama also formally named Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius as his secretary of health and human services during a ceremony in the White House East Room. Sebelius and DeParle will be charged with helping to craft and sell the administration's ambitious effort to revamp the nation's health-care system and extend access to the 46 million people in the country who lack coverage, while attempting to rein in runaway costs.

In brief remarks, Obama reaffirmed his plans to push ahead on the initiative, despite warnings from some Republicans and others, who say that it will prove too costly and politically perilous, especially given the nation's severe fiscal problems.

http://snipr.com/d5goi



Vatican Signals Its Embrace of Science
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

ROME (Associated Press)--The Vatican sought Tuesday to show that it isn't opposed to science and evolutionary theory, hosting a conference on Charles Darwin and trying to debunk the idea that it embraces creationism or intelligent design.

Some of the world's top biologists, paleontologists and molecular geneticists joined theologians and philosophers for the five-day seminar marking the 150th anniversary of Darwin's "The Origin of Species."

Cardinal William Levada, head of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said the Catholic Church doesn't stand in the way of scientific realities like evolution, saying there was a "wide spectrum of room" for belief in both the scientific basis for evolution and faith in God the creator.

http://snipr.com/d5gql



A Bizarre Universe May Be Lurking in the Shadows
from New Scientist

It is 3.30am on 26 December 2007 in McMurdo, Antarctica. The crew at the long-duration balloon facility have stayed up all night in sub-zero temperatures, waiting for the winds to subside. Finally, the gigantic balloon lifts off. Filled with about a million cubic metres of helium, it soars high into the stratosphere carrying an experiment called ATIC.

For 19 days, ATIC circled the South Pole, studying cosmic rays coming from space. Then, nearly a year later, the ATIC team made a stunning announcement: they found that more high-energy electrons had left their mark on the experiment than expected.

That might not sound like much, but the result is remarkable because it might be a telltale sign of dark matter, the invisible stuff thought to make up about 85 per cent of matter in the universe.

http://snipr.com/d5gt9

March 6, 2009




Real-time Flood Forecasting
from American Scientist

When geography teachers instruct their students about the great rivers of the world, the Amazon, Nile, Yangtze, Mississippi and Yellow usually head the list. Those are truly large rivers, but they earn their distinction by length. ... When it comes to flood control and prediction, peak discharge per unit area of watershed (specific peak discharge) is the essential criterion, because it describes a river's volatility.

The five rivers that lead in this category may be unfamiliar to you. All are found on the island of Taiwan. ... The explanation for their singular flows is relatively simple: Taiwan is very steep and very wet.

... In Taiwan the floods originate in the mountains as huge amounts of water channel toward the river basins. The channels converge in the race to the ocean. The changes in the volumes of flow in just a few moments can be spectacular. Can these flows be predicted? The question is a critical one for the millions of people who live in Taiwan's lowlands. Between 2001 and 2005, researchers worked on a project to create a real-time flood-forecasting model for complex river systems, with the specific and immediate goal of forecasting the torrents that arrive in the Tamsui River Basin.

http://snipr.com/d8qen



Yucca No Longer Option for Waste Site
from the Nevada Appeal

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--For two decades, a ridge of volcanic rock 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas known as Yucca Mountain has been the sole focus of government plans to store highly radioactive nuclear waste. Not anymore.

Despite the $13.5 billion that has been spent on the project, the Obama administration says it's going in a different direction. It slashed funding for Yucca Mountain in its recently announced budget.

And on Thursday, Energy Secretary Steven Chu told a Senate hearing that the Yucca Mountain site no longer was viewed as an option for storing reactor waste, brushing aside criticism from several Republican lawmakers. Instead, Chu said the Obama administration believes the nearly 60,000 tons of used reactor fuel can remain at nuclear power plants while a new, comprehensive plan for waste disposal is developed.

http://snipr.com/d8qwj



Horses Tamed a Millennium Earlier than Previously Thought
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The horse, its four slender legs accomplishing astonishing feats of strength and endurance, has provided humans with far more than transportation from point A to point B.

It has allowed us to travel long distances for trade, carry heavy loads, move our societies around more freely and, inevitably, conduct more efficient warfare. Arguably the most important domesticated animal, the horse also has provided humans with meat and milk. Now we have a better idea of when this complex and vital human-horse relationship began.

New evidence, including more slender leg bones, bit-pitted teeth and mare's milk residue in pottery, indicate that the horse was domesticated on the steppes of Central Asia at least 5,500 years ago, more than 1,000 years earlier than previously believed and 2,000 years before it appeared in Europe.

http://snipr.com/d8r1b



When Perfectionism Becomes a Problem
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

By the time Jared Kant was 12, he had to stop doing his homework with a pencil because the eraser was too tempting.

If he made a mistake on one word, he would feel compelled to erase a whole sentence. If one letter was not shaped and spaced just so, the whole word had to go. He would sometimes erase right through homework papers. The same with tests.

Kant, now 26 and working as a research coordinator in Boston, learned firsthand what a growing body of psychological research has recently begun to document: The line between admirably high standards and painful pathology can be exceedingly thin. "The dividing line," says Kant, "is distress."

http://snipr.com/d8r4i



Marital Woes May Harm Her Heart
from the Salt Lake Tribune

Ladies: A rocky relationship may do more than just break your heart. A new University of Utah study shows the more strained a woman's marriage is, the more likely she is to suffer depression--and that can lead to a higher risk for "metabolic syndrome," a group of risk factors for heart disease, stroke and diabetes.

And your husbands? Anger, conflict and hostility can lead to depression for them, too, they reported in questionnaires. But unlike women--and for reasons researchers are still exploring--it doesn't translate into hypertension, obesity around the waistline, high blood sugar, high triglycerides and low levels of HDL, or "good" cholesterol.

One explanation for the difference may be chalked up to women's heightened sensitivity to relationship problems--an observation borne out in a growing body of research on marriage and health.

http://snipr.com/d8skc



Obama Goes 'All In' for Science
from New Scientist

Never has so much money been pumped into science so quickly and with so much hanging on a successful outcome. The full scope of President Barack Obama's agenda to revitalise the ailing US economy has now been revealed, and it is arguably the biggest bet on science and technology in history.

The Obama administration's latest attempt to tackle the problems facing the US is a record $3.6 trillion budget request for 2010. This has come hard on the heels of a $787 billion "stimulus package" designed to give the US economy a shot in the arm.

Both are packed with funding for science and technology ventures, from healthcare research to an electricity supergrid. The stimulus alone hands out more than $20 billion for basic research and about $50 billion to support renewable power and energy efficiency.

http://snipr.com/d8rhe



Nanotechnology Goes to War
from the Guardian (UK)

Wouldn't it be handy if everything we needed to build the next generation of portable devices and robots were available on a microchip? You could just plug in a navigation system, a radar sensor, cryogenic cooling system, or even a miniature power unit.

For laboratory applications, there would be micro versions of everything from mass spectrometers to magnetic sensors. The Defence Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa), the Pentagon's extreme science wing, aims to provide all this, and more, in handy "matchbook size" electronic packages.

... We have come to expect devices to get smaller, cheaper and more powerful over time. Now the revolution is spreading to other types of device. The development of mems (microelectromechanical systems) has already paved the way for "lab-on-a-chip" chemical analysis. Such breakthroughs tend to come from the military rather than industry.

http://snipr.com/d8rki



'No Proof' of Bee Killer Theory
from BBC News Online

Scientists say there is no proof that a mysterious disease blamed for the deaths of billions of bees actually exists, the BBC has been told.

For five years increasing numbers of unexplained bee deaths have been reported worldwide, with US commercial beekeepers suffering the most. The term Colony Collapse Disorder was coined to describe the illness. But many experts now say that the term is misleading and there is no single, new ailment killing the bees.

... The unexplained nature of the affliction, with empty hives and no clearly defined infection, has stumped scientists. Since the 1980s a rising tide of ailments has assaulted the honeybee, including the varroa mite and many deadly viruses.

http://snipr.com/d8rnj



Boston Globe Kills Health/Science Section, Keeps Staff
from the Columbia Journalism Review

It is the end of an era that began more than 25 years ago, when test-tube babies and compact discs were new. This week, the Boston Globe stopped running its highly regarded Monday Health/Science section and began placing its content in the paper's trendy new "g" lifestyle tabloid, as well as its business section.

It is the latest casualty at the struggling but storied New England paper, located in what is arguably the center of the health, science, and technology universe. According to health and science editor Gideon Gil, the Globe's nine-person specialty staff is expected to stay intact--at least for now--and coverage of everything from stem cells to climate change will still have high priority in the paper.

"I don't see it as a serious retreat," said Gil. "The content is all running in the paper, but going in different places. ... It's entirely occasioned by the need to cut costs. We have found a way to continue to provide essentially the same level of coverage while saving money. To me that shows a continuing commitment to covering health and science in a major way out of recognition that those are crucial topics for our community, areas that make Boston distinctive."

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Heaters Might Stave Off Doom for Bats
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

ALBANY, N.Y. (Associated Press)--Bats afflicted with a mysterious and deadly disorder might be able to make it through winter with the help of heated boxes placed in hibernation caves, a pair of researchers say.

The biologists stress that the boxes being tested this winter are not intended to cure "white-nose syndrome," which has killed upward of a half million bats in three winters from New England to West Virginia.

But, in an article published online Thursday in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, they suggest the little heated havens could help stricken bats preserve enough precious energy to survive hibernation season.

http://snipr.com/d8s9b

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 09, 2009, 03:34:56 AM
March 4, 2009



In a Lonely Cosmos, a Hunt for Worlds Like Ours
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Someday it might be said that this was the beginning of the end of cosmic loneliness.

Presently perched on a Delta 2 rocket at Cape Canaveral is a one-ton spacecraft called Kepler. If all goes well, the rocket will lift off about 10:50 Friday evening on a journey that will eventually propel Kepler into orbit around the Sun. There the spacecraft's mission will be to discover Earth-like planets in Earth-like places--that is to say, in the not-too-cold, not-too-hot, Goldilocks zones around stars where liquid water can exist.

The job, in short, is to find places where life as we know it is possible.

http://snipr.com/d2u5c



What a Dinosaur Handprint Reveals
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Steven Spielberg got it wrong. In his classic 1993 film "Jurassic Park," the director showed Tyrannosaurus rex, Velociraptor and other carnivorous dinosaurs walking with their forearms hanging down like a monkey's and their palms more or less parallel to the ground--a posture derisively referred to by paleontologists as the "bunny position."

A growing body of evidence, however, has suggested that the creatures were physically unable to assume this position because their wrist bones would not turn in such a fashion.

Now, the first unequivocal handprint of a 198-million-year-old crouching carnivore confirms the speculation, providing clear evidence that the front limb struck the ground on its side, like a karate chop, and thus would have been of little use for walking.

http://snipr.com/d2ua0



Popular Acid Blockers, Anticlotting Drug Don't Mix
from Science News

In a finding sure to cause many cardiac patients some old-fashioned heartburn, researchers report that a commonly prescribed class of acid-blocking drugs interferes with anticlotting medications routinely given to heart patients discharged from the hospital.

The study, coupled with two earlier reports that have recently led to a stern warning from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration about mixing the drugs, might change doctors' practices.

"A lot of us just prescribe things out of habit," says study coauthor P. Michael Ho, a cardiologist at the Denver Veterans Affairs Medical Center. "My hope is that this study makes physicians think twice."

http://snipr.com/d2ubx



Future TV Screens Seen in Coffee Stains
from New Scientist

The rings left behind by spilled coffee have inspired a new way to make ultrathin coatings for LCD and plasma flat-screens.

In LCDs, transparent conductive coatings are used to form an electrode on the surface of the screen, while in plasma TVs they provide a shield that prevents electromagnetic fields from straying. The traditional techniques for making such coatings include sputtering a fine layer of indium tin oxide onto the surface. ITO is highly conductive and transparent to visible light, but the process is expensive, requiring clean rooms and vacuum chambers.

Ivan Vakarelski at the Institute of Chemical and Engineering Sciences in Singapore realised that coffee stains could point the way to a cheaper alternative. Spill coffee and the evaporating liquid drives coffee particles to the edges of the spill, which ultimately produces the circular stain. ... Vakarelski and his colleagues figured that if they could mimic the process in a controlled fashion, they could create a pattern of granules of other materials to form a nanoscale conductive coating.

http://snipr.com/d2ueg



Dolphin-Inspired Man-Made Fin Works Swimmingly
from Scientific American

The human body does many things well, but swimming isn't one of them. We're embarrassingly inefficient in the water, able to convert just 3 or 4 percent of our energy into forward motion. ... But a new, dolphin-inspired fin promises to fuel the biggest change in human-powered swimming in decades, putting beyond-Olympian speeds within reach of just about anyone.

Culminating decades of research, engineer and inventor Ted Ciamillo, an inventor and engineer in Athens, Ga., who made his name (and fortune) building high-performance bicycle brakes, created what he has dubbed the Lunocet, a 2.5-pound (1.1-kilogram) monofin made of carbon fiber and fiberglass that attaches to an aluminum foot plate at a precise 30-degree angle.

With almost three times the surface area of conventional swim fins, the semiflexible Lunocet provides plenty of propulsion. The key to the 42-inch- (one-meter-) wide fin's speed: its shape and angle, both of which are modeled with scientific precision on a dolphin's tail. These sprinters of the sea can swim up to 33 miles (53 kilometers) per hour and turn up to 80 percent of their energy into thrust.

http://snipr.com/d2ugn



Space Rock Makes Close Approach
from BBC News Online

An asteroid which may be as big as a ten-storey building has passed close by the Earth, astronomers say. The object, known as 2009 DD45, thought to be 21-47m (68-152ft) across, raced by our planet at 1344 GMT on Monday.

The gap was just 44,750 miles; a fifth of the distance between our planet and the Moon. It is in the same size range as a rock which exploded over Siberia in 1908 with the force of 1,000 atomic bombs.

The object was first reported on Saturday by the Siding Spring Survey, a near-Earth object search programme in Australia. It was confirmed by the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Centre (MPC), which catalogues Solar System objects.

http://snipr.com/d2uih



Going Green: Entire Swedish City Switches to Biofuels
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

KALMAR, Sweden--Though a fraction of Chicago's size, this industrial city in southeast Sweden has plenty of similarities with it, including a long, snowy winter and a football team the town's crazy about.

One thing is dramatically different about Kalmar, however: It is on the verge of eliminating the use of fossil fuels, for good, and with minimal effect on its standard of living.

The city of 60,000--and its surrounding 12-town region, with a quarter-million people--has traded in most of its oil, gas and electric furnaces for community "district heat," produced at plants that burn sawdust and wood waste left by timber companies. Hydropower, nuclear power and windmills now provide more than 90 percent of the region's electricity.

http://snipr.com/d2uli



All Systems Go
from The Scientist (Registration Required)

On April 22, 2006, Nitin Baliga, a microbiologist at the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, was spending a lazy Saturday afternoon at home, when he noticed an enticing email in his inbox from his ISB collaborator Richard Bonneau. The subject line: "woooooohoooooo!"

Baliga's team had just constructed a new model that could predict the molecular-level responses of a free-living cell to genetic and environmental changes. That cell, however, was not Escherichia coli or yeast. It was the little-known archaeon Halobacterium salinarum, a tiny extremophile that thrives in highly saline lakes such as the Great Salt Lake and the Dead Sea.

The model was accurately predicting Halobacterium's dynamics at the genome scale. But could it predict new molecular-level responses to changes in environmental conditions not tested in the initial data used to construct the model? Yes, Bonneau had just found out, and he was so thrilled that he couldn't wait to share his findings--or finish his sentences.

http://snipr.com/9kzks



Oldest Fossil Brain Found in "Bizarre" Prehistoric Fish
from National Geographic News

Digital x-ray images of a "bizarre" 300 million-year-old shark relative have revealed the oldest known fossilized brain, researchers announced Monday.

The unusual discovery raises hopes that scientists will find other ancient brains and use them to study how gray matter has evolved, said John Maisey, a paleontologist at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. "The brain ... is remarkably soft tissue--brain tissue is mostly water," Maisey said. "To preserve anything is quite remarkable."

The fossil was found in an iniopterygian, an extinct ancestor of modern ratfishes, which are distant relatives of sharks and rays. Maisey said the ancient fish, which swam in an ocean that once covered the midwestern U.S., would have fit in the palm of a human hand.

http://snipr.com/d2uqa



Birth Control for Animals
from Popular Science

"Mother Goose" might soon be an anachronism. In wildlife biology, concerns about animal populations often stem from unnatural declines; in a few cases, however, that concern can be a result of too many animals, not too few, as some once-threatened species have returned with a vengeance.

Now a group of researchers is fighting back with a familiar (to humans, at least) tactic: birth control. Deer and Canada geese, in particular, have overtaken parts of North America in such magnitude that they're wreaking havoc on the environment, on human sanity and on public safety.

... "A lot of the problems are occurring in urban areas, but people don't necessarily want the animals shot, so we're trying to be responsive to those kinds of issues," said Dr. Kathleen Fagerstone, research program manager at the National Wildlife Research Center in Fort Collins, Colo., where the contraception programs were developed.

http://snipr.com/d2usz

February 23, 2009



Search for Life Heads to the Outer Solar System
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Europa vs. Titan. They're two moons in the outer solar system, both circling gas giants but otherwise as alien from each other as alien can be. One orbits Jupiter and is a crusty iceball with signs of a very deep subsurface ocean. The other orbits Saturn and has a thick atmosphere, dramatic weather, lakes of liquid hydrocarbons, methane rain, and sand dunes of organic material the color of coffee grounds.

Both have long been celebrated in film and fiction... In real life, both are prime targets in the search for life beyond Earth. The problem is that it is neither simple nor cheap to send a probe to these distant worlds. NASA has faced a bureaucratic quandary: Which moon should have priority?

For many months and years, two scientific camps polished their proposals, each hoping that its moon would get official sanction as NASA's next "flagship" mission to the outer solar system. The answer finally arrived last week: Europa, and by extension the whole Jupiter system, will be first.

http://snipr.com/chhe0



UCLA Class Project: Find Bin Laden
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

UCLA geographers think they have a good idea where Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden has been hiding.

Using standard geographical tools routinely employed to locate endangered species and fugitive criminals, the group said there is a high probability that Bin Laden has been hiding in one of three buildings in the northwestern Pakistani city of Parachinar, a longtime hide-out for mujahedin fighters.

"He may be sitting there right now," said UCLA biogeographer Thomas W. Gillespie, who led the study published online Tuesday in the MIT International Review, an interdisciplinary journal of international affairs.

http://snipr.com/chhi4



These Toes Were Made for Running
from Wired

If you've ever wondered why humans don't have long, prehensile toes that would turn our feet into extra hands, here's an answer: stubby toes may be custom-made for running.

Biomechanical analysis shows that long toes require more energy and generate more shock than short toes, making them one of many adaptations that may have helped our savannah-dwelling ancestors chase their prey.

"Longer toes require muscles to do more work, and exert stronger forces to maintain stability, compared to shorter toes," said University of Calgary anthropologist Campbell Rolian. "So long as we were engaged in substantial amounts of running, natural selection would favor individuals with shorter toes."

http://snipr.com/chhjq



Closing the Net on Illegal Fishing
from BBC News Online

"The problem of illegal fishing is enormously widespread," observes Michael Lodge, an OECD fisheries expert. "We have estimated the problem as being as much as 20% of the global catch."

Since 2000, the UN has been warning about the grave consequences of overfishing in the world's seas. However, the impact of illegal fishing is adding to the strain on the already overexploited oceans.

The skippers of the illegal fishing boats tend to favour the waters of some of the poorest nations, which are often inadequately policed as a result of a lack of resources.

http://snipr.com/chhmb



One-Shot Jab for Every Type of Flu 'Ready in 5 Years'
from the Times (London)

A universal therapy or vaccine for every type of flu is "within our grasp", according to scientists who have identified proteins that can neutralise most strains of the virus that affect humans.

The discovery of three immune proteins that are effective against a broad range of influenza viruses promises to provide a new line of defence against a pandemic, and could prevent many of the 250,000 deaths from seasonal flu that occur worldwide every year.

A treatment based on the research is expected to begin patient trials during the winter of 2010-11, and could be ready for widespread use within five years.

http://snipr.com/chhop



Satellite Will Track Carbon Dioxide
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Thirty billion tons of carbon dioxide waft into the air from the burning of fossil fuels each year. About half stays in the air. The other half disappears. Where it all goes, nobody quite knows.

With the Orbiting Carbon Observatory, a NASA satellite scheduled to be launched on Tuesday from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, scientists hope to understand better the comings and goings of carbon dioxide, the main heat-trapping gas behind the warming of the planet.

The new data could help improve climate models and the understanding of the "carbon sinks," like oceans and forests, that absorb much of the carbon dioxide.

http://snipr.com/chhq0



Flexible Electronic Books to Hit Market Soon
from New Scientist

GADGET-makers have long promised us a flexible electronic book, but actually producing a robust, bendy screen has proved tough - until now.

Plastic Logic, a display technology company based in Cambridge, UK, says it will launch the first flexible electronic book in January.

The two most popular e-books on the market, the Sony Reader and Amazon Kindle, are paperback book-sized devices that use first-generation black and white electronic "ink" displays. ... The problem is, the transistors that [control the ink display] sit on a layer of glass, making the displays fragile.

http://snipr.com/chhrp



Chimp Attack Highlights Increased Drug Use among Pets
from National Geographic News

Minutes before a pet chimp attacked a woman in Connecticut last weekend, he may have been given the anti-anxiety medication Xanax because he was agitated, according to statements by his owner that she later retracted.

The chimp attack raises questions about increased use of anti-anxiety medications among more common pets.

Demand for anti-anxiety medications for pets is growing, in part because of increased public awareness of the drugs' potential benefits, said animal-behavior expert Bonnie Beaver of Texas A&M University's College of Veterinary Medicine. It's not known, however, exactly how many pets are taking such drugs, Beaver said.

http://snipr.com/chhvi



Fermilab, European Accelerator Race for Glory
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

CHICAGO (Associated Press)--So, does the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory's Tevatron accelerator have a shot against the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland? It may not be the question all the boys at the end of bar are asking -- but it gets particle physicists psyched.

After all, they're racing to find evidence of a hypothetical particle called the Higgs boson, better known as the "God Particle" because it is believed to give mass to the matter that makes up the universe.

"This has been the holy grail of high energy physics for the last 30 years," Joe Lykken, a senior scientist at Fermilab in the Chicago suburb of Batavia, said Wednesday.

http://snipr.com/chhwt



Rescue Flight
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

People started gathering at the Lighthouse Missionary Baptist Church in southwestern Kentucky before sunrise. ... It was the first Friday in December, 23 degrees at dawn and nearly windless. Everyone was looking up.

Operation Migration's four ultralight planes floated into view over some oak and maple trees, then passed over the small, white chapel. ... At 200 feet, the first pilot, Chris Gullikson, was perfectly visible in his [plane's] open cockpit.

...Gullikson and the other trike pilots were going to pick up the 14 juvenile whooping cranes that they were, little by little, leading south for the winter. Traditionally, and for many millenniums, cranes learned to migrate by following other cranes. But traditions have changed.

http://snipr.com/chhxw

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 09, 2009, 03:36:05 AM
March 2, 2009

Researchers Find Safer Way to Produce Stem Cell Alternative
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Scientists have developed what appears to be a safer way to create a promising alternative to embryonic stem cells, boosting hopes that such cells could sidestep the moral and political quagmire that has hindered the development of a new generation of cures.

The researchers produced the cells by using strands of genetic material, instead of potentially dangerous genetically engineered viruses, to coax skin cells into a state that appears biologically identical to embryonic stem cells.

"It's a leap forward in the safe application of these cells," said Andras Nagy of Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, who helped lead the international team of researchers that described the work in two papers being published online by the journal Nature. "We expect this to have a massive impact on this field."

http://snipr.com/cxoy7


What Happens When a Language Dies?
from National Geographic News

India is extraordinary for its linguistic and cultural diversity. According to official estimates, the country is home to at least 400 distinct tongues, but many experts believe the actual number is probably around 700.

But, in a scenario replicated around the globe, many of India's languages are at risk of dying out. The effects could be culturally devastating. Each language is like a key that can unlock local knowledge about medicinal secrets, ecological wisdom, weather and climate patterns, spiritual attitudes, and artistic and mythological histories.

In rural Indian villages, Hindi or English are in vogue with younger generations, and are often required travelling to larger towns for work. In big cities, colonization, as well as globalization, has also spurred a switch to English and other popular languages.

http://snipr.com/cxoxf


Revealed: Scientific Evidence for the 2001 Anthrax Attacks
from New Scientist

Key forensic evidence in the US anthrax attacks of 2001 has been revealed. The FBI had previously prevented the scientists involved from speaking publicly about their findings in case this interfered with court proceedings, but last August, after chief suspect Bruce Ivins committed suicide, the case collapsed and the FBI lifted many of the restrictions.

Last week, some of the scientists involved revealed their results at a scientific meeting in Baltimore, Maryland.

These show how the FBI traced the spores used in the attacks to a single flask at a US government lab, but they don't explain why the FBI made Ivins—who worked at the US Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID)—the chief suspect.

http://snipr.com/cxowr


Black Hole Constant Makes Unexpected Appearance
from Science News

If you were orbiting a rotating black hole, you might be in for a wild ride of dizzying and seemingly unpredictable gyrations. Yet more than 40 years ago, a physicist found a mathematical constant that revealed regularity in that ride.

Now a similar constant has been discovered in a mild-mannered Newtonian system, reports a paper in the Feb. 13 Physical Review Letters.

The findings could be mere coincidence, nothing more than a mathematical curiosity, comments astrophysicist Saul Teukolsky of Cornell University. But, he says, they could shed light on the mysterious conditions of rotating black holes, which are predicted to exist by Einstein's general relativity equations.

http://snipr.com/cxow7


How HIV Stays One Step Ahead of Immune System

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is one of the fastest-evolving entities known. That's why no one has yet been able to come up with a vaccine: The virus mutates so rapidly that what works today in one person may not work tomorrow or in others.

A study published Wednesday in the journal Nature confirms that dizzying pace of evolution on a global scale.

"It's very clear there's a battle going on between humans and this virus, and the virus is evolving to become unrecognized by the immune system," said Dr. Bruce Walker, one of the researchers and director of the Ragon Institute, at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. "It does make clear what a huge challenge making a vaccine is."

http://snipr.com/cxovl


Explorers Begin Epic Arctic Trek
from BBC News Online

A British team has begun a gruelling trek to the North Pole to discover how quickly the Arctic sea-ice is melting.

Renowned Arctic explorer Pen Hadow and two companions were dropped onto the ice by plane some 1,700km (670 miles) north of Canada on Saturday night.

During their 1,000km journey, they plan to take measurements of the thickness of the ice. It will be the most detailed survey of its kind this season, and should be completed in late May.

http://snipr.com/cxov3


Car Seat Tests Reveal 'Flaws'
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

In a government crash-test video, the infant car seat flies off its base, smashing the baby dummy—still strapped into the carrier—upside down and face-first into the back of the driver's seat. Think what could happen in a real crash.

This seat was one of 31 that either flew off their bases or exceeded injury limits in a series of frontal crashes conducted by federal researchers using 2008 model year vehicles, a Tribune investigation found. The test results were never publicized, and even some infant-seat makers were unaware of their existence.

The Tribune found the results buried in thousands of pages of test reports from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. These tests are used to rate the safety of cars, not the child restraints in them. What the newspaper unearthed calls into question the rigor of safety standards for such seats.

http://snipr.com/cxoui


Vatican Conference a Sign Church, Evolution Co-exist
from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

A conference on evolution to be held this week at the Vatican is a sign that for many devout Christians, there is no conflict between the ideas of Charles Darwin and faith in God.

Devout Christians often are portrayed as if they view evolutionary biology as an attack on the Bible's account of creation, and scientists are portrayed as atheists. While there are high-profile examples of both, a truce was reached long ago in most major Christian traditions, including some streams of evangelicalism.

The Vatican conference, which marks the 150th anniversary of Darwin's "On the Origin of Species," is one example of scientists and theologians working together to transcend the culture wars and forge a lasting peace.

http://snipr.com/cxotp


Fossil Skull of Giant Toothy Seabird Found in Peru
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LIMA, Peru (Associated Press)—The unusually intact fossilized skull of a giant, bony-toothed seabird that lived up to 10 million years ago was found on Peru's arid southern coast, researchers said Friday.

The fossil is the best-preserved cranium ever found of a pelagornithid, a family of large seabirds believed to have gone extinct some 3 million years ago, said Rodolfo Salas, head of vertebrate paleontology at Peru's National History Museum.

The museum said in a statement that the birds had wingspans of up to 20 feet and may have used the toothlike projections on their beaks to prey on slippery fish and squid. But studying members of the Pelagornithidae family has been difficult because their extremely thin bones—while helpful for keeping the avian giants aloft—tended not to survive as fossils.

http://snipr.com/cxot0


Big Job Awaits Kansas Gov. Sebelius as Health Chief
from the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)—As President Barack Obama's health secretary, Kathleen Sebelius immediately will face a host of difficult policy issues that touch the lives of every family.

Obama planned to introduce Sebelius, the Democrat governor of Kansas, on Monday as his nominee to lead the Health and Human Services Department. The announcement would come before the president this week hosts lawmakers of both parties and representatives of major interest groups, from insurers to drug companies to consumers, at a White House summit on health care reform.

If confirmed by the Senate, Sebelius will play a leading role in Obama's ambitious effort to overhaul the health care system. But critical problems await her at the department, a vast bureaucracy that handles everything from Medicare to cancer research and food safety.

http://snipr.com/cxori

February 24, 2009



Politics in the Guise of Pure Science
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... Dr. [Roger] Pielke, a professor in the environmental studies program at the University of Colorado, is the author of The Honest Broker, a book arguing that most scientists are fundamentally mistaken about their role in political debates. As a result, he says, they're jeopardizing their credibility while impeding solutions to problems like global warming.

Most researchers, Dr. Pielke writes, like to think of themselves in one of two roles: as a pure researcher who remains aloof from messy politics, or an impartial arbiter offering expert answers to politicians' questions. Either way, they believe their research can point the way to correct public policies, and sometimes it does--when the science is clear and people's values aren't in conflict.

But climate change, like most political issues, isn't so simple. While most scientists agree that anthropogenic global warming is a threat, they're not certain about its scale or its timing or its precise consequences .... And while most members of the public want to avoid future harm from climate change, they have conflicting values about which sacrifices are worthwhile today.

http://snipr.com/ck014



Simple Elixir Called a 'Miracle Liquid'
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

It's a kitchen degreaser. It's a window cleaner. It kills athlete's foot. Oh, and you can drink it. Sounds like the old "Saturday Night Live" gag for Shimmer, the faux floor polish plugged by Gilda Radner. But the elixir is real. It has been approved by U.S. regulators. And it's starting to replace the toxic chemicals Americans use at home and on the job.

The stuff is a simple mixture of table salt and tap water whose ions have been scrambled with an electric current. Researchers have dubbed it electrolyzed water--hardly as catchy as Mr. Clean. But at the Sheraton Delfina in Santa Monica, some hotel workers are calling it el liquido milagroso--the miracle liquid.

That's as good a name as any for a substance that scientists say is powerful enough to kill anthrax spores without harming people or the environment.

http://snipr.com/ck03f



New Safety, New Concerns in Tests for Down Syndrome
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

A handful of biotech companies are racing to market a new generation of tests for Down syndrome, a development that promises a safer way to spot the most common genetic cause of mental retardation early in pregnancy even as it weaves a thicket of moral, medical, political and regulatory concerns.

Doctors recommend that all pregnant women be offered screening for Down syndrome, and about half of women undergo the tests. But the current tests often produce confusing, ambiguous results, unnecessarily alarming couples or falsely reassuring them. The new tests are designed to offer more definitive results early in the pregnancy.

But with the first new approach due to become available this spring, the tests are renewing questions about why regulators do not require such innovations to be proved reliable before being offered to the public.

http://snipr.com/ck06a



New Tactics in the Fight against Tuberculosis
from Scientific American

Bubonic plague, smallpox, polio, HIV--the timeline of history is punctuated with diseases that have shaped the social atmospheres of the eras, defined the scope of science and medicine, and stolen many great minds before their time. But there is one disease that seems to have stalked humanity far longer than any other: tuberculosis.

... Today TB ranks second only to HIV among infectious killers worldwide, claiming nearly two million lives annually, even though existing drugs can actually cure most cases of the disease. The problem is that many people lack access to the medicines, and those who can obtain the drugs often fail to complete the lengthy treatment regimen.

Additionally, TB is evolving faster than our therapies are. In recent years, investigators have observed a worrying rise in the number of cases resistant to more than one of the first-line drugs used to treat the illness. Even more alarming, we have begun to see the emergence of strains that are resistant to every last one of the antibiotic defenses. ... As bleak as this state of affairs is, we have reason to be hopeful.

http://snipr.com/ck083



Cod in the Act of Evolution
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Charles Darwin and his theory of evolution are getting a lot of attention this month, the 200th anniversary of his birth. Much has happened over those two centuries.

Evolution still brings to mind the kind of change that happens over millions of years, such as humans evolving from forerunners of apes. But there is increasing evidence that species can evolve quite quickly, within our lifetimes, and that human intervention in the natural world is speeding up that process. Take, for example, the cod fish, a New England icon.

Cod, once plentiful in the region's waters, are increasingly rare because of overfishing. But perhaps more important is the fact that large cod are especially rare. The reason: Decades of intense fishing for the largest cod have meant the species has evolved along the lines of the survivors, which is to say, smaller cod.

http://snipr.com/ck0c0



Failure Hits Nasa's 'CO2 Hunter'
from BBC News Online

Nasa's first mission to measure carbon dioxide (CO2) from space has failed following a rocket malfunction. Officials said the fairing--the part of the rocket which covers the satellite on top of the launcher--had failed to separate properly.

Officials said the satellite had now crashed in Antarctica. The Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO) was intended to help pinpoint the key locations on our planet's surface where the gas is being emitted and absorbed.

Nasa officials confirmed the launch had failed at a press conference held at 1300 GMT. The $270m mission was launched on a Taurus XL--the smallest ground-launched rocket currently in use by the US space agency.

http://snipr.com/ck0dm



Researchers Hope Dallas Inmates Can Help Unlock Medical Mystery
from the Dallas Morning News (Registration Required)

The Dallas County Jail is the site of one of the most comprehensive studies ever undertaken of a dangerous, drug-resistant bacterial infection that has alarmed health officials across the nation.

Last month, the Parkland Memorial Hospital staff began handing out medicated cleansing cloths to hundreds of participating inmates to see whether the cloths will stop the spread of the infectious, flesh-eating bacteria methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA.

It's part of a three-year University of Chicago study of the spread of staph infections in the jail that began last year. The medical research team selected Dallas County's jails over the Los Angeles County jail system--the nation's largest. ...The Chicago research team hopes to publish its results next year.

http://snipr.com/ck0f9



Beaker-Ready Projects? Colleges Have Quite a Few
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON--The acting director of the National Institutes of Health begged university administrators to avoid even applying for stimulus money unless the universities planned to hire people almost immediately.

... Not a problem, the administrators said, in interviews. After working under flat federal research financing for years, scientists are ecstatic. "This is a miracle, I think," A. J. Stewart Smith, the dean for research at Princeton, said. "It is redressing this terrible problem where the success rate for excellent proposals was very low."

From proposed animal research laboratories at the University of Arizona, the University of Nebraska and the University of Pennsylvania to empty floors in laboratory buildings at the University of California, Irvine, Ohio State University and Southern Illinois University, colleges across the country have hundreds of shovel- and beaker-ready projects in the sciences that could collectively cost tens of billions and begin within weeks.

http://snipr.com/ck0ha



Report: U.S.-Funded Family Planning "Pays for Itself"
from the Seattle Times

NEW YORK (Associated Press)--Publicly funded family planning prevents nearly 2 million unintended pregnancies and more than 800,000 abortions in the United States each year, saving billions of dollars, according to new research intended to counter conservative objections to expanding the program.

The data is in a report being released today by the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive-health think tank whose research is generally respected even by experts and activists who don't share its advocacy of abortion rights.

Report co-author Rachel Benson Gold called the family-planning program "smart government at its best," asserting that every dollar spent on it saves taxpayers $4 in costs associated with unintended births to mothers eligible for Medicaid-funded natal care. Despite such arguments, federal funding for family planning is a divisive issue.

http://snipr.com/ck0j1



Research Finds Anger Ultimately Can Kill You
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--How the heart handles anger seems to predict who's at risk for a life-threatening irregular heartbeat. Negative emotions like hostility and depression have long been considered risks for developing heart disease, and deaths from cardiac arrest rise after disasters such as earthquakes.

But research released Monday goes a step farther, uncovering a telltale pattern in the EKGs of certain heart patients when they merely recall a maddening event--an anger spike that foretold bad news.

In already vulnerable people, "anger causes electrical changes in the heart," said Dr. Rachel Lampert, a Yale University cardiologist who led the work. When that happens even in the doctor's office, "that means they're more likely to have arrhythmias when they go out in real life."

http://snipr.com/ck0lf

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 10, 2009, 03:21:35 AM
March 9, 2009


Science of Time: What Makes Our Internal Clock Tick
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

In warp-speed modern America, time has become one of our most precious resources. We manage it, and we expend it carefully.

Ironic, then, that a resource as precious as seconds, minutes and hours is so poorly understood and so routinely misestimated by modern humans—by 15% to 25% in either direction, depending on the individual and the acuity of his or her time perception.

But understanding our ability to perceive time—and to use time to make sense of our world—is one of the newest and most sweeping frontiers of neuroscience. Says UCLA neuroscientist Dean Buonomano: "In order to understand the nature of the human mind, we must unravel the mystery of how the brain tells time, in both normal and pathological states."

http://snipurl.com/dg42x


Skeptics Dispute Climate Worries and Each Other
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

More than 600 self-professed climate skeptics are meeting in a Times Square hotel this week to challenge what has become a broad scientific and political consensus: that without big changes in energy choices, humans will dangerously heat up the planet.

The three-day International Conference on Climate Change — organized by the Heartland Institute, a nonprofit group seeking deregulation and unfettered markets — brings together political figures, conservative campaigners, scientists, an Apollo astronaut and the president of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Klaus.

Organizers say the discussions, which began Sunday, are intended to counter the Obama administration and Democratic lawmakers, who have vowed to tackle global warming with legislation requiring cuts in the greenhouse gases that scientists have linked to rising temperatures.

http://snipurl.com/dg439


Bionic Eye Gives Blind Man Sight
from BBC News Online

A man who lost his sight 30 years ago says he can now see flashes of light after being fitted with a bionic eye. Ron, 73, had the experimental surgery seven months ago at London's Moorfield's eye hospital.

He says he can now follow white lines on the road, and even sort socks, using the bionic eye, known as Argus II. It uses a camera and video processor mounted in sunglasses to send captured images wirelessly to a tiny receiver on the outside of the eye.

In turn, the receiver passes on the data via a tiny cable to an array of electrodes which sit on the retina—the layer of specialised cells that normally respond to light found at the back of the eye.

http://snipurl.com/dg43n


New Life for 'Clean Coal' Project
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Deep inside the economic stimulus package is a $1 billion prize that, in five short words, shows the benefits of being in power in Washington.

The funding, for "fossil energy research and development," is likely to go to a power plant in a small Illinois town, a project whose longtime backers include a group of powerful lawmakers from the state, among them President Obama.

They were unable to prevent the "clean coal" research project known as FutureGen from being abruptly killed last year by the Bush administration, which had created it and promoted it across the world as an environmentally sound way to produce power. But now those same Illinois legislators ... control the White House and hold key leadership positions in Washington, and FutureGen is on the verge of resurrection.

http://snipurl.com/dg443


Carbon Capture and Storage: Trouble in Store
from the Economist

A recent American television advertisement features a series of trustworthy-looking individuals affirming their faith in the potential of "clean coal." ... The idea that clean coal, or to be more specific, a technology known as carbon capture and storage (CCS), will save the world from global warming has become something of an article of faith among policymakers too.

CCS features prominently in all the main blueprints for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. The Stern Review, a celebrated report on the economics of climate change, considers it "essential." It provides one of the seven tranches of emissions cuts proposed by Robert Socolow of Princeton University. The International Energy Agency (IEA) reckons the world will need over 200 power plants equipped with CCS by 2030 to limit the rise in average global temperatures to about 3°C—a bigger increase than many scientists would like.

...Despite all this enthusiasm, however, there is not a single big power plant using CCS anywhere in the world. Utilities refuse to build any, since the technology is expensive and unproven. ... In short, the world's leaders are counting on a fix for climate change that is at best uncertain and at worst unworkable.

http://snipurl.com/dg44l


Obama Aims to Shield Science from Politics
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

When President Obama lifts restrictions on funding for human embryonic stem cell research today, he will also issue a presidential memorandum aimed at insulating scientific decisions across the federal government from political influence, officials said yesterday.

"The president believes that it's particularly important to sign this memorandum so that we can put science and technology back at the heart of pursuing a broad range of national goals," Melody C. Barnes, director of Obama's Domestic Policy Council, told reporters during a telephone briefing yesterday.

Although officials would not go into details, the memorandum will order the Office of Science and Technology Policy to "assure a number of effective standards and practices that will help our society feel that we have the highest-quality individuals carrying out scientific jobs and that information is shared with the public," said Harold Varmus, who co-chairs Obama's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

http://snipurl.com/dg44y


Six Firms Stop Sales of Hard-Plastic Baby Bottles
from the San Francisco Chronicle

Bending to growing public and legal pressure that began in San Francisco, six major companies have agreed to stop selling hard-plastic baby bottles containing bisphenol A, an industrial chemical suspected of harming human development.

The purveyors of baby-care products—Playtex Products Inc., Gerber, Evenflo Co., Avent America Inc., Dr. Brown and Disney First Years—said they no longer will market the shatter-proof polycarbonate bottles and some other baby products in the United States.

Polycarbonate is made of bisphenol A, widely used in hundreds of commercial applications, including the inside lining of metal food and drink containers, epoxy resins and polyvinyl chloride plastics. ... Health officials cautious about possible ill effects believe that infants and children are at the greatest risk because of their quickly developing bodies and sensitive systems.

http://snipurl.com/dg45b


Kitchen Pest Is a Hero to Scientists Meeting in Chicago
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

Buzzing with excitement, the "fly people" swarmed into Chicago last week to hear the latest news about an unsung hero of science: the humble fruit fly.

The public may see the insect mainly as a kitchen pest, but to the 1,500 scientists attending the 50th annual Drosophila Research Conference, Drosophila melanogaster is one of the most important research animals in genetics, an encyclopedia of knowledge packed into a critter a tenth of an inch long.

By breeding fruit flies, early 20th Century scientists figured out the location of genes controlling certain traits, creating the first crude genetic map. In 2000, Drosophila was one of the first multicellular organisms to have its genome fully sequenced, providing a full blueprint of the organism.

http://snipurl.com/dg45y


"Nuclear Archaeologists" Find World War II Plutonium
from National Geographic News

A plutonium sample recently found at a U.S. waste dump is leftover from a batch used in 1945 for the world's first nuclear bomb test, a team of chemists has announced.

A nuclear waste cleanup team unearthed the 13.5-ounce (400-milliliter) sample in a waste pit at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington, where it was sealed in a glass jar and enclosed in a safe.

The discovery highlights new techniques in the emerging field of nuclear archaeology that could become key factors in nuclear deterrence. Although the mysterious material was unearthed in 2004, its origins were unknown until the researchers used state-of-the art methods to identify its age and history.

http://snipurl.com/dg46i


Food Problems Elude Private Inspectors
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

When food industry giants like Kellogg want to ensure that American consumers are being protected from contaminated products, they rely on private inspectors like Eugene A. Hatfield. So last spring Mr. Hatfield headed to the Peanut Corporation of America plant in southwest Georgia to make sure its chopped nuts, paste and peanut butter were safe to use in things as diverse as granola bars and ice cream.

... Mr. Hatfield, 66, an expert in fresh produce, was not aware that peanuts were readily susceptible to salmonella—which he was not required to test for anyway. And while Mr. Hatfield was inspecting the plant to reassure Kellogg and other food companies of its suitability as a supplier, the Peanut Corporation was paying for his efforts.

... With government inspectors overwhelmed by the task of guarding the nation's food supply, the job of monitoring food plants has in large part fallen to an army of private auditors like Mr. Hatfield. And the problems go well beyond peanuts.

http://snipurl.com/dg46q

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 19, 2009, 12:47:28 AM
March 17, 2009



Blobs in Photos of Mars Lander Stir a Debate: Are They Water?
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Several photographs taken by NASA's Phoenix Mars spacecraft show what look like water droplets clinging to one of its landing struts.

Some of the scientists working on the mission are asserting that that is exactly what they were. They contend that there are pockets of liquid water just under the Martian surface even though the temperatures in the northern plains never warmed above minus 15 degrees Fahrenheit during the six months of Phoenix's operations last year.

The scientists believe that salts may have lowered the freezing temperature of the Martian water droplets to perhaps minus 90 degrees, or more than 120 degrees colder than the usual freezing temperature of 32 degrees for pure water. Nilton O. Renno, a professor of atmospheric, oceanic and space sciences at the University of Michigan who proposed the hypothesis, was careful to say, "This is not a proof."

http://snipr.com/dztmn



North America's Smallest Dino Predator
from Science News

Paleontologists rummaging through museum drawers in Canada have discovered the remains of North America's smallest carnivorous dinosaur--a theropod about the size of a chicken.

The first fossils of the 1.9-kilogram Hesperonychus elizabethae, which lived about 75 million years ago, were actually unearthed in southern Alberta in 1982, says Nicholas Longrich, a vertebrate paleontologist at the University of Calgary in Canada.

But they lay forgotten and unstudied until Longrich and colleague Phil Currie of the University of Alberta in Edmonton rediscovered them, along with the fragmentary remains of several other specimens, the team reports online March 16 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/dztof



Therapy to Suppress Peanut Allergies Is Reported
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

After years of frustration, allergists meeting in Washington proclaimed a small but significant victory against life-threatening peanut allergies.

Five children, long urged to avoid peanuts like the plague, today tote peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches in their lunch boxes, blithely share candy with friends and accept snacks at other people's homes without quizzing their hosts on the treats' ingredients.

The children appear to have lost their allergies, said Dr. Wesley Burks, a Duke University pediatric allergist who presented the results of two clinical trials Sunday at a meeting of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology.

http://snipr.com/dztqb



Twenty Years of the World Wide Web
from the Economist

"Information Management: A Proposal." That was the bland title of a document written in March 1989 by a then little-known computer scientist called Tim Berners-Lee who was working at CERN, Europe's particle physics laboratory, near Geneva.

Mr Berners-Lee is now, of course, Sir Timothy, and his proposal, modestly dubbed the World Wide Web, has fulfilled the implications of its name beyond the wildest dreams of anyone involved at the time.

In fact, the Web was invented to deal with a specific problem. In the late 1980s, CERN was planning one of the most ambitious scientific projects ever, the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC. ... As the first few lines of the original proposal put it, "Many of the discussions of the future at CERN and the LHC era end with the question--'Yes, but how will we ever keep track of such a large project?'' This proposal provides an answer to such questions."

http://snipr.com/dzu53



Close Call Puts Focus on Traffic Jam in Space
from the Christian Science Monitor

Two Space Age surprises--a close encounter between the International Space Station and a speeding piece of space junk, and an earlier collision between a US and a Russian satellite--are adding urgency to the efforts to improve collision alerts and reduce risks from space debris.

Earlier this month, the US Air Force announced that it is designing a pilot program to extend a suite of satellite tracking and debris-related services to include civilian US and foreign satellite operators. The goal is to help operators reduce the possibility that their hardware could end up as space junk.

At the UN Conference on Disarmament, currently meeting in Geneva, the European Union offered a draft voluntary "code of conduct" for reducing the risk of collisions and lowering the likelihood of adding more junk to the spent rockets, dead satellites, paint chips, a tool bag and other detritus already orbiting Earth. Private groups have already been building and linking data from their own space-surveillance networks to provide information to satellite operators.

http://snipr.com/dzu6i



The Fall and Rise of the Right Whale
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga.--The biologists had been in the plane for hours, flying back and forth over the calm ocean. They had seen dolphins, leatherback turtles, a flock of water birds called gannets and even a basking shark--but not what they were looking for.

Then Millie Brower, who was peering with intense concentration through a bubblelike window fitted into the plane's fuselage, announced "nine o'clock, about a mile off." The plane made a stomach-churning lurch as the pilots banked left and began to circle. And there, below, were a right whale mother and her new calf, barely breaking the surface, lolling in the swells.

The researchers, from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Georgia Wildlife Trust, are part of an intense effort to monitor North Atlantic right whales, one of the most endangered, and closely watched, species on earth. As a database check eventually disclosed, the whale was Diablo, who was born in these waters eight years ago.

http://snipr.com/dzu89



Color Vision: How Our Eyes Reflect Primate Evolution
from Scientific American

To our eyes, the world is arrayed in a seemingly infinite splendor of hues, from the sunny orange of a marigold flower to the gunmetal gray of an automobile chassis, from the buoyant blue of a midwinter sky to the sparkling green of an emerald. It is remarkable, then, that for most human beings any color can be reproduced by mixing together just three fixed wavelengths of light at certain intensities.

This property of human vision, called trichromacy, arises because the retina, the layer of nerve cells in the eye that captures light and transmits visual information to the brain, uses only three types of light-absorbing pigments for color vision. One consequence of trichromacy is that computer and television displays can mix red, green and blue pixels to generate what we perceive as a full spectrum of color.

Although trichromacy is common among primates, it is not universal in the animal kingdom. ... How did it evolve? Building on decades of study, recent investigations into the genetics, molecular biology and neurophysiology of primate color vision have yielded some unexpected answers as well as surprising findings about the flexibility of the primate brain.

http://snipr.com/dzua8



Russia to Approve New Moon Rocket
from BBC News Online

Russian space officials are to select the winning proposal for a new rocket intended to carry cosmonauts on missions to the Moon.

This will mark the first time since 1964 that the Russian space programme has made the Moon its main objective. It will be only the second time since the collapse of the Soviet Union that Moscow has endorsed the development of a new space vehicle.

The rocket is expected to fly its first test mission in about 2015. According to the objectives given by the Russian space agency (Roscosmos) to industry, a future rocket should be able to hoist a payload three times heavier than Russia's veteran Soyuz spacecraft, including twice the number of crew, and use environmentally friendly propellants.

http://snipr.com/dzuf5



Italy Dig Unearths Female 'Vampire' in Venice
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

ROME (Associated Press)--An archaeological dig near Venice has unearthed the 16th-century remains of a woman with a brick stuck between her jaws--evidence, experts say, that she was believed to be a vampire. The unusual burial is thought to be the result of an ancient vampire-slaying ritual. It suggests the legend of the mythical bloodsucking creatures was tied to medieval ignorance of how diseases spread and what happens to bodies after death, experts said.

The well-preserved skeleton was found in 2006 on the Lazzaretto Nuovo island, north of the lagoon city, amid other corpses buried in a mass grave during an epidemic of plague that hit Venice in 1576.

"Vampires don't exist, but studies show people at the time believed they did," said Matteo Borrini, a forensic archaeologist and anthropologist at Florence University who studied the case over the last two years. "For the first time we have found evidence of an exorcism against a vampire."

http://snipr.com/dzugw



An Entertaining Chemist Proves Science Can Be Fun
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

Grand Hank--self-proclaimed world heavyweight champion of science--is donning his funky green safety goggles, bouncing from foot to foot, nodding as his assistant explains why it's important to keep safe in the lab. "Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to The Science Lab of Grand Hank!" the champ says over a thumping rap beat, scratching invisible records.

And, via live television, Tyraine Ragsdale, better known by his DJ name, Grand Hank, is off. He's rapping, performing experiments, throwing out terms like centrifugal chromatography, and generally exhorting his audience of high school students to love science.

"You, too, can be a scientist!" he shouts. "Everybody can be a scientist!" Ragsdale, 43, a burly, gregarious chemist, knows the lines by heart. For the last two decades, he has been reaching out to students around the region, combining his two loves--music and science--to inspire young people to dream big.

http://snipr.com/dzuir

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 19, 2009, 12:47:58 AM
March 16, 2009



Fermilab Provides More Constraints on the Elusive Higgs Boson
from Scientific American

The Higgs particle, the last piece of the Standard Model of particle physics menagerie that has yet to be observed, is running out of places to hide--if, that is, it exists at all. Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Ill., today narrowed the range of mass where the Higgs might be found.

The Higgs boson, named for British physicist Peter Higgs, is believed to give other elementary particles, such as the heavy W and Z bosons, their mass, so finding it or proving it does not exist would have major implications in ground-up interpretations of how the world works.

"This is a very interesting time in particle physics, because we have this Standard Model, which explains everything we've observed and everything we know about for the last 30 years with no significant deviations. And, yet, we know that the Standard Model can't be the whole story of nature," says John S. Conway, a physicist at the University of California, Davis, and a member of the Collider Detector at Fermilab (CDF) collaboration, one of two teams involved in the new mass-range results. ... "Whatever we discover," Conway adds, "it's going to be astounding."

http://snipr.com/dx7f1



Concept of 'Hypercosmic God' Wins Templeton Prize
from New Scientist

Today the John Templeton Foundation announced the winner of the annual Templeton Prize of a colossal £1 million ($1.4 million), the largest annual prize in the world.

This year it goes to French physicist and philosopher of science Bernard d'Espagnat for his "studies into the concept of reality". D'Espagnat, 87, is a professor emeritus of theoretical physics at the University of Paris-Sud, and is known for his work on quantum mechanics. The award will be presented to him by the Duke of Edinburgh at Buckingham Palace on 5 May.

D'Espagnat boasts an impressive scientific pedigree, having worked with Nobel laureates Louis de Broglie, Enrico Fermi and Niels Bohr. De Broglie was his thesis advisor; he served as a research assistant to Fermi; and he worked at CERN when it was still in Copenhagen under the direction of Bohr. He also served as a visiting professor at the University of Texas, Austin, at the invitation of the legendary physicist John Wheeler. But what has he done that's worth £1 million?

http://snipr.com/dx7ij



Biochar: Is the Hype Justified?
from BBC News Online

Green guru James Lovelock claims that the only hope of mitigating catastrophic climate change is through biochar - biomass "cooked" by pyrolysis.

It produces gas for energy generation, and charcoal - a stable form of carbon. The charcoal is then buried in the ground, making the process "carbon negative".

Researchers say biochar can also improve farm productivity and cut demand for carbon-intensive fertilisers. There's a flurry of worldwide interest in the technology, but is the hype justified?

http://snipr.com/dx7kr



Shuttle Discovery Lifts Off for Space Station
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. -- After a month of delays, the space shuttle Discovery and its crew of seven had a spectacularly uneventful liftoff on Sunday evening, rising into a cool, clear Florida twilight en route to the International Space Station.

The Discovery is carrying a last set of solar arrays for the space station and a replacement part for a water recycling system, needed to transform urine into drinkable water. NASA would like the recycling system fully functional before the station crew is expanded to six members from three, a move planned for late May.

The mission is commanded by Col. Lee J. Archambault of the Air Force. Also aboard are Cmdr. Dominic A. Antonelli of the Navy as pilot and Joseph M. Acaba, Richard R. Arnold II, John L. Phillips, Steven R. Swanson and Koichi Wakata of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency as mission specialists.

http://snipr.com/dx7m2



Airborne Pollution Dimming Skies around Much of the World
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON - The skies are dimming, for most of the world. Increases in airborne pollution have dimmed the skies by blocking sunlight over the past 30 years, researchers report in [Friday's] edition of the journal Science.

While decreases in atmospheric visibility - known as global dimming - have been reported in the past, the new study compiles satellite and land-based data for a longer period than had been available.

"Creation of this database is a big step forward for researching long-term changes in air pollution and correlating these with climate change," Kaicun Wang, assistant research scientist in the University of Maryland, said in a statement. "And it is the first time we have gotten global long-term aerosol information over land to go with information already available on aerosol measurements over the world's oceans."

http://snipr.com/dx7om



Preserving Languages Is about More Than Words
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The traditional Irish language is everywhere this time of year, emblazoned on green T-shirts and echoing through pubs. But Irish, often called Gaelic in the United States, is one of thousands of "endangered languages" worldwide. Though it is Ireland's official tongue, there are only about 30,000 fluent speakers left, down from 250,000 when the country was founded in 1922.

Irish schools teach the language as a core subject, but outside a few enclaves in western Ireland, it is relatively rare for families to speak it at home.

"There's the gap between being able to speak Irish and actually speaking it on a daily basis," said Brian O'Conchubhair, an assistant professor of Irish studies at the University of Notre Dame who grew up learning Irish in school. "It's very hard to find it in the cities; it's like a hidden culture."

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Migraine Headaches Linked to the Weather
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A variety of headache triggers are relatively well-known: red wine, chocolate, soft cheese and the beginning of the menstrual cycle. But although weather, especially changes in air pressure, is frequently cited as a headache trigger, the connection has not been shown in a large, well-designed study.

Now researchers have found that high temperatures and low air pressure can indeed trigger migraines but that there doesn't seem to be a clear association between such severe headaches and air pollution.

In a large study published online March 9 in the journal Neurology, researchers from Boston's Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and the Harvard School of Public Health decided to explore the role of pollution in headaches, because fine-particulate pollutants cause or complicate other health problems, such as heart attacks, stroke, congestive heart failure and asthma.

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Artificial Trees and Brightened Clouds May Help to Cool Us down
from the Times (London)

The threat of devastating climate change is now so great that some scientists say it is time to investigate a Plan B -- geo-engineering on a planetary scale.

Such methods of altering the world's climate may become necessary, they say, unless emissions of greenhouse gases fall within five years.

Ideas that were once the realm of science fiction -- such as creating artificial trees to absorb carbon dioxide, or reflecting sunlight away from the Earth -- are coming under serious scrutiny as temperatures and CO2 emissions continue to rise. The issue has become so pressing that the Royal Society, Britain's national academy of science, is preparing a report on the feasibility of geo-engineering.

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Google-Backed 23andMe Seeks Parkinson's Patients' Spit
from Bloomberg.com

23andMe, the gene-testing company backed by Google Inc., wants to collect DNA from the spit of 10,000 people with Parkinson's disease to hunt for common genes that may cause the illness or predict patients' response to drugs.

To entice patients to participate, the Mountain View, California-based company will offer to test them for $25, a fraction of the normal $399 fee. The quest is personal for Ann Wojcicki, who helped start 23andMe in 2006. Her husband, Google co-founder Sergey Brin, has a gene variant that increases his risk of developing the neurological condition, which afflicts his mother.

One million North Americans and more than 4 million people worldwide have Parkinson's, which causes people to tremble, shake and lose control of their body's movements. The condition comes in different forms, and its causes are poorly understood, with a handful of genes known to increase the risk. 23andMe hopes to uncover others.

http://snipr.com/dxa3d



Pushing back an Oxygen-Rich Atmosphere
from Science News

Tiny crystals of iron oxide in ancient Australian rocks offer evidence that the Earth's atmosphere held significant amounts of oxygen far earlier than previously thought, a new study suggests.

Large quantities of oxide minerals in rocks around the world indicate that the atmosphere had at least small amounts of oxygen by 2.2 billion years ago. And the presence of certain biomarkers in Australian rocks has been hailed as evidence that oxygen-making bacteria had evolved by 2.7 billion years ago, but recent studies have cast some doubt on that earlier date.

Now, analyses of rocks laid down 3.46 billion years ago in what is now Australia push back the oxygen era even further, Hiroshi Ohmoto, a geochemist at Pennsylvania State University in University Park, and his colleagues contend online March 15 in Nature Geoscience.

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Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 19, 2009, 12:48:23 AM
March 13, 2009

Second Genesis: Life, but Not as We Know It
from New Scientist

When the Nobel prizewinning physicist Richard Feynman died in 1988, his blackboard carried the inscription, "What I cannot create, I do not understand." By that measure, biologists still have a lot to learn, because no one has yet succeeded in turning a chemical soup into a living, reproducing, evolving life form. We're still stuck with Life 1.0, the stuff that first quickened at least 3.5 billion years ago. There's been nothing new under the sun since then, as far as we know.

That looks likely to change. Around the world, several labs are drawing close to the threshold of a second genesis, an achievement that some would call one of the most profound scientific breakthroughs of all time. David Deamer, a biochemist at the University of California, Santa Cruz, has been saying that scientists would create synthetic life in "five or 10 years" for three decades, but finally he might actually be right. "The momentum is building," he says. "We're knocking at the door."

Meanwhile, a no-less profound search is on for a "shadow biosphere"--life forms that are unrelated to the life we know because they are descendants of an independent origin of life.

http://snipr.com/dqbb8



Low-Level Ozone Exposure Found to be Lethal over Time
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Ozone pollution is a killer, increasing the yearly risk of death from respiratory diseases by 40% to 50% in heavily polluted cities like Los Angeles and Riverside and by about 25% throughout the rest of the country, researchers reported today.

Environmental scientists already knew that increases in ozone during periods of heavy pollution caused short-term effects, such as asthma attacks, increased hospitalizations and deaths from heart attacks.

But the 18-year study of nearly half a million people, reported Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine, is the first to show that long-term, low-level exposure to the pollutant can also be lethal.

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MIT Scientists Charged Up
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

MIT scientists have developed a battery technology that might one day allow people to charge their cellphones in 10 seconds or a drained plug-in car battery in mere minutes--reshaping the way such gadgets are integrated into our lives.

Scientists tweaked a lithium-ion battery by, in essence, creating access to the equivalent of on-ramps so that ions can easily enter an energy highway within the material. The advance allows the batteries to charge in seconds and discharge about 100 times faster than current lithium-ion batteries, according to Gerbrand Ceder, a materials science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who led the work published in the journal Nature.

"If we made a cellphone battery that could charge in 30 seconds, I think people would change their lifestyles. ... You might settle for a smaller battery, and you could almost stand by and sip your coffee and it's done," Ceder said. "That becomes a behavior modifier, and that's why I'm excited about it."

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Pluto a Planet Again--On Friday the 13th, in Illinois
from National Geographic News

It took about three minutes for members of the Illinois state senate to make the unanimous vote: "that March 13, 2009, be declared 'Pluto Day' in the State of Illinois in honor of the date its discovery was announced in 1930."

Quietly adopted on February 26, the state resolution is meant to honor Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh, who was born and raised in the farming village of Streator.

"This is one of those things that the village is very proud of," said Illinois State Senator Gary Dahl, who sponsored the resolution. "I don't think we are changing the status of the planet. We're simply asking that March 13 be declared Pluto Day and that, for the day, Pluto is a planet."

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Metamaterial Revolution: The New Science of Making Anything Disappear
from Discover

Xiang Zhang remembers the day he recognized that something extraordinary was happening around him. It was in 2000, at a workshop organized by DARPA (the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) to explore a tantalizing idea: that radical new kinds of engineered materials might enable us to extend our control over matter in seemingly magical ways.

The goal at hand, changing how objects interact with light, seemed at first blush to be routine; people had been manipulating visible light with mirrors and lenses and prisms nearly forever. But Zhang, a materials scientist then at the University of California at Los Angeles, knew those applications were limited. Based overwhelmingly on a single material, glass, the technologies were restricted by the laws of optics described in standard physics texts.

The engineers in the room hoped to smash through those barriers with materials and technologies never conceived of before. The proposals included crafting what amounts to an array of billions of tiny relays; in essence, the relays would capture light and send it back out. Depending on the specific design of the array, the light would be bent, reflected, or skewed in different ways. What could you do with a tool like that? An amazing amount, Zhang soon discovered.

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Arctic Diary: Explorers' Ice Quest
from BBC News Online

A team of polar explorers has travelled to the Arctic in a bid to discover how quickly the sea-ice is melting and how long it might take for the ocean to become ice-free in summers.

Pen Hadow, Ann Daniels and Martin Hartley will be using a mobile radar unit to record an accurate measurement of ice thickness as they trek to the North Pole.

The trio will be sending in regular diary entries, videos and photographs to BBC News throughout their expedition. The Catlin Arctic Survey team started its gruelling trek on 28 February.

http://snipr.com/dqbsn



Planning for Future Must Consider Climate Change
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--Despite years of study and analysis, the world is unprepared for climate change and needs to rethink basic assumptions that govern things as varied as choosing cars and building bridges, the National Research Council reports.


Current building, land use and planning practices assume a continuation of climate as it has been known in the past. "That assumption, fundamental to the ways people and organizations make their choices, is no longer valid," the Council, the working arm of the National Academy of Sciences, said in a report released Thursday.

... Government agencies need to step up their efforts to provide guidance to decision makers, including the establishment of a national climate service, the report said. The report said the national climate service should be linked closely to research. It noted there has been discussion of such an agency within, or led by, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which is the parent of the National Weather Service.

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New Battle Lines on Stem Cells
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

ATLANTA--Faced with a new federal policy that opens the door for more embryonic stem cell research, conservatives have geared up for a political battle at the national and state level that goes to the core of their beliefs about the sanctity of human life.

Since President Barack Obama lifted the eight-year ban on nearly all federal funding for stem cell research on Monday, conservative leaders said they have stepped up efforts to lobby Congress to preserve some restrictions. They plan to launch a far-reaching campaign to educate the public about the threat to life as well as research alternatives that are not as invasive.

"This executive order is just the beginning of the process. Our concern is how broad this will be interpreted, and will there be limitations," said Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, a conservative think-tank. "With limited tax dollars available, we should not use those funds for research that is at best morally questionable."

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Reading the Patterns of Spatial Memories
from Science News

Harry Potter had it easy: All he had to do to see another wizard's memories was peer into that wizard's swirling pensieve. Mind-reading is not so simple for everybody else. But a new study reveals that even those without magical gadgets may one day "see" someone else's memories.

In the study, which appears online March 12 in Current Biology, researchers used patterns of brain activity to accurately predict where someone was standing in a virtual room.

Each of four study participants sat down to a computer and toured a large virtual room. The room contained objects that helped volunteers get oriented, including clocks, chairs and pictures. As participants navigated through the virtual space, brain cells preserved the memory of the route taken to the final location ("turn left at the picture of the boat").

http://snipr.com/dqbzl



Has the US Patent System Gone Too Far?
from the Christian Science Monitor

When Samuel Hopkins came up with a method for improving the production of potash, it was probably just the kind of invention that President George Washington had in mind when he created the US patent system. Hopkins, who in 1790 received the first American patent ever issued, had discovered a way to increase the production of a critical resource used to make glass, soap, and soil fertilizer.

It's unclear, however, how Washington would feel about America's 6,368,227th patent. Issued to Steven Olson, it protects a "method of swinging on a swing ... in which a user positioned on a standard swing suspended by two chains from a substantially horizontal tree branch induces side to side motion by pulling alternately on one chain and then the other."

To critics of the current US Patent and Trademark Office (PTO), this kind of patent demonstrates everything that's wrong with the patent system today.

http://snipr.com/dqc1a

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 19, 2009, 12:48:45 AM
March 18, 2009



Aligning Medical Treatment with God's Plan
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

... In a study published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association, researchers found that terminally ill cancer patients were nearly three times more likely to go on breathing machines or receive other invasive treatments if religion was an important part of their decision-making process. Such treatments didn't improve a person's long-term chances, however.

"There's a sense that by not going for life-prolonging care, they're letting God down," said Holly Prigerson ... the study's senior author. "But the more aggressive care you get, the worse your quality of life in that last week."

Other recent studies have made similar connections. Religious cancer patients who had unsuccessful chemotherapy treatments were twice as likely to want heroic end-of-life measures, according to a report last year in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

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"Teen" Dinosaurs Roamed in Herds, Mass Grave Suggests
from National Geographic News

Like teenagers at the mall, young dinosaurs may have wandered in herds--fending for themselves while adults were busy nesting, according to a new report on one of the world's best preserved fossil sites.

About 90 million years ago a herd of more than 25 birdlike dinosaurs got stuck in the mud at the edge of a drying lake and perished together in modern-day China, said study co-leader Paul Sereno, a University of Chicago paleontologist.

Nearly complete skeletons of the plant-eaters were found at the Gobi desert site--some stacked on top of each other. The dig site is etched with an ancient tragedy, said Sereno, who is also a National Geographic explorer-in-residence. Plunge and scratch marks are preserved in the long-hardened mud, showing the young dinosaurs' futile attempts at escape.

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Commentary: Nobody Listens to the Real Climate Change Experts
from the Telegraph (UK)

Considering how the fear of global warming is inspiring the world's politicians to put forward the most costly and economically damaging package of measures ever imposed on mankind, it is obviously important that we can trust the basis on which all this is being proposed.

Last week two international conferences addressed this issue and the contrast between them could not have been starker.

The first in Copenhagen, billed as "an emergency summit on climate change" and attracting acres of worldwide media coverage, was explicitly designed to stoke up the fear of global warming to an unprecedented pitch. As one of the organisers put it, "this is not a regular scientific conference: this is a deliberate attempt to influence policy."

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More Evidence Links Diabetes to Alzheimer's Risk
from USA Today

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--You've heard that diabetes hurts your heart, your eyes, your kidneys. New research indicates a more ominous link: That diabetes increases the risk of getting Alzheimer's disease and may speed dementia once it strikes.

Doctors long suspected diabetes damaged blood vessels that supply the brain. It now seems even more insidious, that the damage may start before someone is diagnosed with full-blown diabetes, back when the body is gradually losing its ability to regulate blood sugar.

In fact, the lines are blurring between what specialists call "vascular dementia" and scarier classic Alzheimer's disease. Whatever it's labeled, there's reason enough to safeguard your brain by fighting diabetes and heart-related risks.

http://snipr.com/e2f8s



Wondrous Targets in the Search for Alien Life
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Astronomers and would-be space pioneers have long mooned over the possibility that life exists on Europa, Jupiter's fourth-largest satellite, or Titan, Saturn's biggest moon.

With each bit of new information, the odds seem to improve. Europa contains a vast subsurface ocean of liquid water, a potential home for life as we know it. Titan looks a lot like Earth, only with a different chemistry set. Life there, if it exists, might be as we don't know it.

For years, NASA scientists and others planned and panned, pumped and dumped various proposed missions to Titan and Europa. Last month, they made a decision, opting for a 2020 launch to Europa, with arrival at the Jupiter system anticipated in late 2025. ... A mission to Titan, NASA officials said, was technically too difficult, but one might follow if the Europa mission is a success.

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An Outbreak of Autism, or a Statistical Fluke?
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

MINNEAPOLIS--Ayub Abdi is a cute 5-year-old with a smile that might be called shy if not for the empty look in his eyes. He does not speak. When he was 2, he could say "Dad," "Mom," "give me" and "need water," but he has lost all that.

... As he is strapped into his seat in the bus that takes him to special education class, it is hard not to notice that there is only one other child inside, and he too is a son of Somali immigrants. "I know 10 guys whose kids have autism," said Ayub's father, Abdirisak Jama, a 39-year-old security guard. "They are all looking for help."

Autism is terrifying the community of Somali immigrants in Minneapolis, and some pediatricians and educators have joined parents in raising the alarm. But public health experts say it is hard to tell whether the apparent surge of cases is an actual outbreak, with a cause that can be addressed, or just a statistical fluke.

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Green Beer for Fewer Greenbacks
from Scientific American

You have probably heard of green buildings, green cars and, perhaps, even green phones. But were you aware that green beer is flowing from the taps of some U.S. breweries, and not the kind for St. Patrick's Day?

Among the leaders of the movement is Lucky Labrador Brewing Company in Portland, Ore., which for the past year has been saving big bucks by using solar energy to heat water used in the brewing process.

Lucky Labrador's first green beer, "Solar Flare Ale," was an instant sensation when it was introduced in February 2008, according to brewery co-owner Gary Geist. Sales spiked in the month following the beer's debut, Geist says. But, he notes that going solar is more about long-term benefits than about temporary sales spurts.

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'Consciousness Signature' Discovered Spanning the Brain
from New Scientist

Electrodes implanted in the brains of people with epilepsy might have resolved an ancient question about consciousness.

Signals from the electrodes seem to show that consciousness arises from the coordinated activity of the entire brain. The signals also take us closer to finding an objective "consciousness signature" that could be used to probe the process in animals and people with brain damage without inserting electrodes.

Previously it wasn't clear whether a dedicated brain area, or "seat of consciousness", was responsible for guiding our subjective view of the world, or whether consciousness was the result of concerted activity across the whole brain.

http://snipr.com/e2fge



From Arctic Soil, Fossils of a Goliath That Ruled the Jurassic Seas
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

There were monstrous reptiles in the deep, back in the time of dinosaurs.

They swam with mighty flippers, two fore and two hind, all four accelerating on attack. In their elongated heads were bone-crushing jaws more powerful than a Tyrannosaurus rex's. They were the pliosaurs, heavyweight predators at the top of the food chain in ancient seas.

Much of this was already known. Now, after an analysis of fossils uncovered on a Norwegian island 800 miles from the North Pole, scientists have confirmed that they have found two partial skeletons of a gigantic new species, possibly a new family, of pliosaurs. This extinct marine reptile was at least 50 feet long and weighed 45 tons, the largest known of its kind.

http://snipr.com/e2fhz



Scientists Gain in Struggle Against Wheat Rust
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

MEXICO CITY (Associated Press)--Researchers are deploying new wheat varieties with an array of resistant genes they hope will baffle and defeat Ug99, a highly dangerous fungus leapfrogging through wheat fields in Africa and Asia.

"Significant progress has been made," plant geneticist Ravi Singh and collaborators said in a paper presented Tuesday to leading international wheat experts at a four-day conference on combating the re-emerged, mutant form of stem rust, an old plant disease.

Scientists still spoke of a potential agricultural disaster. "A global food crisis is still a distinct possibility if governments and international institutions fail to support this rescue mission," Norman Borlaug, 94, the Nobel Prize-winning American agronomist, said in a statement.

http://snipr.com/e2fpc

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 19, 2009, 12:49:07 AM
March 12, 2009



DNA Testing Ends Mystery Surrounding Czar Nicholas II Children
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The most enduring and romantic legend of the Russian Revolution--that two children of Czar Nicholas II and his wife, Alexandra, survived the slaughter that killed the rest of their family--may finally be put to rest with the positive identification of bone fragments from a lonely Russian grave.

The czar and his family were gunned down and stabbed by members of the Red Guard early on the morning of July 17, 1918, but rumors have persisted that two of the children, the Grand Duchess Anastasia and her brother Alexei, survived ...

Those hopes were bolstered with the 1991 revelation that nine bodies of Romanov family members and servants had been found in a Yekaterinberg grave, but that a son and daughter were still missing. Now, newly analyzed DNA evidence from a second, nearby grave discovered in 2007 proves that the bones are those of two Romanov children, ending the mystery once and for all. A report on the analysis was published online Tuesday in the journal PLoS ONE.

http://snipr.com/dnufb



No Skepticism on the Energy Gap
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

On Tuesday, the final day of the Heartland Institute's conference examining whether global warming was ever a crisis, there was a fascinating moment in one session when the discussion shifted from questioning warming to assessing humanity's limited energy choices.

Climate debate aside, there appeared to be no skepticism at all about the need for an ambitious energy quest and burst of technological innovation--basically in line with the "second industrial revolution" called for by Energy Secretary Steven Chu, who was a target at other sessions for recent statements on climate risks.

The moment came during a session pairing up Don Easterbrook, an emeritus professor of geology at Western Washington University, and Michael Jungbauer, a state senator and water-resources specialist from Minnesota. ... Dr. Easterbrook, in laying out the dangers of cold spells, noted that the world doesn't have sufficient energy sources to get through such a period, particularly with the human population heading toward 9 billion.

http://snipr.com/dnuqq



Stimulus Dollars Energize Efforts to Smarten up the Electric Power Grid
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

ERLANGER, Ky.--One gizmo allows you to run the dishwasher when electricity is cheapest. Another decides when to fire up the water heater if you plan on a 6 a.m. shower. Another routes solar energy from a rooftop panel to a battery in your garage and the wiring in your house.

Outside, towers equipped with sensors tell the electric company exactly where a storm has knocked out power. The power grid itself can react to trouble, rerouting juice from a healthy part of the system or isolating itself to prevent a larger meltdown.

So far, this dramatization of "smart grid" technology is confined to an office park in northern Kentucky, but sponsor Duke Energy is one of many large utilities confident they can turn theater into reality for millions of customers, aided by billions of dollars in the federal stimulus package.

http://snipr.com/dnuuq



Blood Type Could Matter in Pancreatic Cancer
from Science News

People with type O blood are less likely to develop cancer of the pancreas than are people with type B blood, a study finds. People with type A or AB blood face a risk that falls somewhere in between, researchers report in the March 18 Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Research suggesting that blood type might influence cancer risk first emerged in the 1950s, and the idea has puzzled scientists ever since.

Because testing blood type was relatively easy to do even then, scientists did it, says study coauthor Brian Wolpin, an oncologist and epidemiologist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School in Boston. But reports over the past half-century have offered a mixed bag--some suggest blood type matters in cancer and others indicate it doesn't.

http://snipr.com/dnuwf



Climate Researchers Seek Citizen Scientists
from the Seattle Times

Valerie Hilt's yard brims with hollyhocks, hellebores and hyacinths. But it's her lilac bush that landed the Port Angeles great-grandmother in the annals of science. For 35 springs, Hilt has logged the date when the first leaf unfurls on the 20-foot-tall shrub. She also takes note of the first fragrant blossom and other milestones, like peak bloom.

... Hilt, 70, is one of the last remaining lilac watchers in a network that once included 2,500 volunteers across the Western U.S. Their handwritten postcards grew into a powerful database that researchers have used to document how rising temperatures are hastening the onset of spring.

Now, a national program is hoping to recruit a new corps of 100,000 citizen scientists to monitor climate impacts on the living world. This time, volunteers can gather data on a wide range of plant species, from dandelions to Douglas fir. Next year, the network will expand to include birds, bugs and other animals.

http://snipr.com/dnuy7



A Medical Madoff: Anesthesiologist Faked Data in 21 Studies
from Scientific American

Over the past 12 years, anesthesiologist Scott Reuben revolutionized the way physicians provide pain relief to patients undergoing orthopedic surgery for everything from torn ligaments to worn-out hips. Now, the profession is in shambles after an investigation revealed that at least 21 of Reuben's papers were pure fiction, and that the pain drugs he touted in them may have slowed postoperative healing.

"We are talking about millions of patients worldwide, where postoperative pain management has been affected by the research findings of Dr. Reuben," says Steven Shafer, editor in chief of the journal Anesthesia & Analgesia, which published 10 of Reuben's fraudulent papers.

Paul White, another editor at the journal, estimates that Reuben's studies led to the sale of billions of dollars worth of the potentially dangerous drugs known as COX2 inhibitors, Pfizer's Celebrex (celecoxib) and Merck's Vioxx (rofecoxib), for applications whose therapeutic benefits are now in question.

http://snipr.com/dnuzt



Global Warming Reaches the Antarctic Abyss
from New Scientist

Even the deepest, darkest reaches of the Antarctic abyss are feeling the heat, according to new results presented at the climate change congress in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Gregory Johnson, of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency, says even he was surprised by the findings. He says the changes could be responsible for up to 20% of the observed global sea-level rise.

As part of the CLIVAR project, Johnson and a team of international colleagues have been spending weeks at a time at sea, tracing straight lines across all of the world's oceans. As they make these traverses, they measure the temperatures of the water from the very bottom right up to the surface. The team takes its measurements along the same routes as expeditions carried out in the 1990s, which provides a picture of how things have changed in roughly one decade.

http://snipr.com/dnv1i



Commentary: The Problem of Perception
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

There is a common perception among young students that the surest path to resolving scientific controversies is to design a clever experiment, one that will definitively resolve conflicting hypotheses. However, Steven Wiley has found that most scientific controversies do not revolve around specific experimental data, but instead are disputes over data interpretation.

Data interpretations depend on a scientist's underlying assumptions and worldview. For example, a molecular biologist might think of protein expression as an outcome of mRNA levels, whereas a biochemist might think in terms of synthetic and degradation rates. Both are right, of course, but each might expect different reasons for a change in the amount of a protein.

"Our perspective and assumptions regarding how living systems work defines us as biologists, which is why arguments over interpretations can get so nasty," he says. "If another scientist disputes the validity of your viewpoint, it can impact your reputation as well as your ego."

http://snipr.com/9kzks



Tests Could Detect Ovarian Cancer Early
from the Baltimore Sun

LONDON (Associated Press)--Doctors screening women for ovarian cancer were able to pick up the disease about two years earlier than normal, according to a British study published Wednesday.

Scientists have long searched for a way to identify ovarian cancer early. [The disease] kills nearly 100,000 women worldwide every year. If it is found early, nearly 90 percent of women survive. However, most women are currently only diagnosed with the disease after it has spread, when there is only a maximum 30 percent chance of survival.

In the British study, doctors enrolled approximately 200,000 post-menopausal women aged 50 to 74 across the United Kingdom from 2001 to 2005. About 100,000 of those women received no screening tests.

http://snipr.com/dnv73



'Peking Man' Older Than Thought
from BBC News Online

Iconic ancient human fossils from China are 200,000 years older than had previously been thought, a study shows. The new dating analysis suggests the "Peking Man" fossils, unearthed in the caves of Zhoukoudian are some 750,000 years old.

The discovery should help define a more accurate timeline for early humans arriving in North-East Asia. A US-Chinese team of researchers has published its findings in the prestigious journal Nature.

The cave system of Zhoukoudian, near Beijing, is one of the most important Palaeolithic sites in the world. Between 1921 and 1966, archaeologists working at the site unearthed tens of thousands of stone tools and hundreds of fragmentary remains from about 40 early humans.

http://snipr.com/dnvcx

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 19, 2009, 12:49:30 AM
March 11, 2009



EPA Plans U.S. Registry of Greenhouse Gas Emissions
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Environmental Protection Agency plans to establish a nationwide system for reporting greenhouse gas emissions, a program that could serve as the basis for a federal cap on the buildup of carbon dioxide and other gases linked to global warming.

The registry plan, which was announced yesterday, would cover about 13,000 facilities that account for 85 to 90 percent of the nation's greenhouse gas output. It was drafted under the Bush administration but stalled after the Office of Management and Budget objected to it because the EPA based the rule on its powers under the Clean Air Act.

"Our efforts to confront climate change must be guided by the best possible information," said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson in a statement. "Through this new reporting, we will have comprehensive and accurate data about the production of greenhouse gases. This is a critical step toward helping us better protect our health and environment--all without placing an onerous burden on our nation's small businesses."

http://snipr.com/dlan0



Genetic Tests May Reveal Source of Mystery Tumors
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

When Jo Symons was found to have cancer, there was an extra complication: doctors could not tell what type of cancer she had. Tumors were found in her neck, chest and lymph nodes. But those tumors had spread there from someplace else, and her doctors could not determine whether the original site was the breast, the colon, the ovary or some other organ. Without that knowledge, they could not offer optimal treatment.

Such mystery tumors are estimated to account for 2 percent to 5 percent of all cancer, or at least 30,000 new cases a year in the United States, making them more common than brain, liver or stomach cancers. For patients, such a diagnosis can amount to a double agony--not only do they have cancer, but doctors cannot treat it properly.

But now 21st-century medicine may help. New genetic tests may pinpoint the origin of the mystery tumors. The tests, which cost more than $3,000 each, still need to prove their worth better, experts say, though some of them are hopeful.

http://snipr.com/dlap9



Top 10 Myths about Sustainability
from Scientific American

When a word becomes so popular you begin hearing it everywhere, in all sorts of marginally related or even unrelated contexts, it means one of two things. Either the word has devolved into a meaningless cliché, or it has real conceptual heft. "Green" (or, even worse, "going green") falls squarely into the first category. But "sustainable," which at first conjures up a similarly vague sense of environmental virtue, actually belongs in the second.

True, you hear it applied to everything from cars to agriculture to economics. But that's because the concept of sustainability is at its heart so simple that it legitimately applies to all these areas and more.

Despite its simplicity, however, sustainability is a concept people have a hard time wrapping their minds around. To help, Scientific American Earth 3.0 has consulted with several experts on the topic to find out what kinds of misconceptions they most often encounter. The result is a take on the top 10 myths about sustainability.

http://snipr.com/dlauw



Zapotec Digs in Mexico Show Clues to Rise and Fall
from National Geographic News

When it comes to pre-Columbian civilizations, the Aztec and Maya--known for their spectacular pyramids and temples, hieroglyphic writing systems, and elaborate, violent rituals--often overshadow the Zapotec, their less familiar counterparts centered in southern Mexico.

But the Zapotec also played a vital role in ancient Mesoamerica, and archaeologists are seeking new clues to the rise and fall of their culture and civilization, which flourished and declined in the Valley of Oaxaca at roughly the same time as the ancient Maya.

For 1,500 years, the agrarian Zapotec state spanned 800 square miles (2,000 square kilometers) and was home to at least 100,000 people. The Zapotec were pioneers in the use of agriculture and writing systems. They were gifted weavers and ceramic artisans. They built Monte Albán, one of the earliest cities in the Americas, and established a remarkably organized bureaucratic structure. But their state collapsed, and no one is exactly sure why.

http://snipr.com/dlayw



Scientists Cheer Obama's Stem Cell Reversal
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

SAN FRANCISCO (Associated Press)--Scientists are cheering President Barack Obama's lifting of federal funding restrictions on embryonic stem cell research, hopeful the move will open the financial floodgates to speed new treatments.

"It's wonderful. We are elated," said Jan Nolta, who directs the stem cell research program at the University of California at Davis. "Now that we can use the federal funds, it will just go so much more quickly."

Directors of university programs in stem cell research said that money would mean more jobs at labs, especially for students just starting their careers. Researchers and biotech entrepreneurs also expect more work. ... Though most federal grants go to academic researchers, biotech industry backers said the rule changes also could mean a windfall for private companies.

http://snipr.com/dlb75



Single Top Quark Detected
from Science News

Physicists have identified the production of the elusive single top quark, two research teams report.

Previously top quarks have been observed only when produced in pairs, as when they were initially discovered 14 years ago at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Illinois. Now, researchers using Fermilab's two detectors announced March 9 that they have detected single top quarks. The techniques used to find the singleton quarks could help to identify other rare particles, such as the Higgs boson, the scientists say.

... Quarks are fundamental particles of matter that come in six varieties known as "flavors." Ordinary matter consists mostly of two quark flavors, the "up" and "down" quarks that make up protons and neutrons. Other quarks are found in exotic subatomic particles or are created in high-energy collisions in particle accelerators. The top quark was the last flavor to be discovered experimentally, in 1995.

http://snipr.com/dlb8g



Rebuilding Greensburg Green
from Smithsonian Magazine

... Like most small Midwestern towns, Greensburg, Kansas, had been losing jobs, entertainment, and population--especially young people, with the school population cut in half in recent decades. According to [Darin] Headrick, "we were probably destined to the same outcome every other small rural town is, and that is, you're going to dry up and blow away."

Why bother rebuilding [after a devastating tornado]? "We thought: What can we do that gives our community the best chance to survive in the long term? What would make people want to move to our community?"

No one is sure who first voiced the green idea, because it occurred to many people simultaneously. They could leave to start over elsewhere, they could rebuild as before only to watch their town slowly die--or, as Bob Dixson, who has since become mayor, says, "we could rebuild in a green, energy-efficient manner that would leave a legacy to future generations." As the conversation gained momentum, the people became excited with their unique opportunity to start from scratch, to live up to their town's name--and perhaps to run an experiment that could lead others into greenness by proving its value.

http://snipr.com/dlbb7



Top Prize in Computing Goes to MIT Professor
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Barbara Liskov, a veteran Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor who created building blocks for software programming languages that were key to personal computers and the Internet, was named Tuesday the winner of the 2008 A.M. Turing Award, the most prestigious prize in computer science.

The award, known in technology circles as the Nobel Prize of computing, is named for legendary British mathematician Alan Turing, who helped the Allies break German naval codes during World War II. It will be presented to Liskov by the Association for Computing Machinery, a scientific society, at a conference in San Diego in June.

Liskov, 69, an institute professor and associate provost at MIT, is being honored for her innovations in "building the pervasive computer system designs that power daily life," the association said in a statement set to be released today. "Her achievements in programming language design have made software more reliable and easier to maintain."

http://snipr.com/dlbdj



Cosmic Strings Could Solve Positron Mystery
from Nature News

A network of 'cosmic strings' criss-crossing the Universe could be responsible for a mysterious flux of antimatter particles which has been puzzling astronomers.

Theoretical astrophysicists have long proposed the existence of cosmic strings, thinner than an atom yet stretching vast distances across the Universe. They are thought to have formed in events known as 'phase transitions'--dramatic shifts in the structure of matter that took place as the Universe cooled down shortly after the Big Bang. These strings would have strong gravitational fields, and could have helped to gather the matter that formed the first galaxies.

The idea fell from favour when detailed observations seemed to prove that strings alone could not account for galactic formation. ... But now, theoretical astrophysicist Tanmay Vachaspati at Case Western Reserve University in Ohio, suggests that space may be threaded instead with a network of much lighter strings--too lightweight to be directly responsible for galaxy formation--that could have formed during phase transitions in the Universe's unseen dark matter.

http://snipr.com/dlbfy



Sea Rise 'to Exceed Projections'
from BBC News Online

The global sea level looks set to rise far higher than forecast because of changes in the polar ice-sheets, a team of researchers has suggested. Scientists at a climate change summit in Copenhagen said earlier UN estimates were too low and that sea levels could rise by a metre or more by 2100.

The projections did not include the potential impact of polar melting and ice breaking off, they added. The implications for millions of people would be "severe," they warned. Ten percent of the world's population--about 600 million people--live in low-lying areas.

Professor Konrad Steffen from the University of Colorado, speaking at a press conference on Tuesday, highlighted new studies into ice loss in Greenland, showing it has accelerated over the last decade.

http://snipr.com/dlbjs

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Thurnez Isa on March 19, 2009, 01:26:16 AM
Quote from: Kai on March 19, 2009, 12:47:28 AM
March 17, 2009



North America's Smallest Dino Predator
from Science News

Paleontologists rummaging through museum drawers in Canada have discovered the remains of North America's smallest carnivorous dinosaur--a theropod about the size of a chicken.

The first fossils of the 1.9-kilogram Hesperonychus elizabethae, which lived about 75 million years ago, were actually unearthed in southern Alberta in 1982, says Nicholas Longrich, a vertebrate paleontologist at the University of Calgary in Canada.

But they lay forgotten and unstudied until Longrich and colleague Phil Currie of the University of Alberta in Edmonton rediscovered them, along with the fragmentary remains of several other specimens, the team reports online March 16 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/dztof




here's what a CTV artist thinks it looks like

(http://images.ctv.ca/archives/CTVNews/img2/20090316/160_ap_dino_090316.jpg)

it sooo cute
I want one
:sad:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 19, 2009, 01:46:42 AM
March 10, 2009




Scientists Learning to Target Bacteria Where They Live
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

CHICAGO--In the arms race between humans and bacteria, the ability to form "biofilms"--large aggregations of microbes embedded in a slimy matrix--has been one of the weapons the organisms use to defeat the immune system, antibiotic drugs and other threats. But scientists, who only recently recognized the role that biofilms play in antibiotic resistance, may be closing in on promising prospects for defeating pathogens.

Scientists have learned that bacteria that are vulnerable when floating around as individual cells in what is known as their "planktonic state" are much tougher to combat once they get established in a suitable place--whether the hull of a ship or inside the lungs--and come together in tightly bound biofilms.

In that state, they can activate mechanisms like tiny pumps to expel antibiotics, share genes that confer protection against drugs, slow down their metabolism or become dormant, making them harder to kill. The answer, say researchers, is to find substances that will break up biofilms.

http://snipr.com/diuof



Study Finds Plenty of Apparent Plagiarism
from Science News

If copying is the sincerest form of flattery, then journals are publishing a lot of amazingly flattering science. Of course to most of us, the authors of such reports would best be labeled plagiarists--and warrant censure, not praise.

But Harold R. Garner and his colleagues at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas aren't calling anybody names. They're just posting a large and growing bunch of research papers--pairs of them--onto the Internet and highlighting patches in each that are identical.

Says Garner: "We're pointing out possible plagiarism. You be the judge." But this physicist notes that in terms of wrong-doing, authors of the newest paper in most pairs certainly appear to have been "caught with their hands in the cookie jar."

http://snipr.com/diuqh



News Analysis: Rethink Stem Cells? Science Already Has
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

With soaring oratory, President Obama on Monday removed a substantial practical nuisance that has long made life difficult for stem cell researchers. He freed biomedical researchers using federal money (a vast majority) to work on more than the small number of human embryonic stem cell lines that were established before Aug. 9, 2001.

In practical terms, federally financed researchers will now find it easier to do a particular category of stem cell experiments that, though still important, has been somewhat eclipsed by new advances.

Until now, to study unapproved stem cell lines, researchers had to set up separate, privately financed labs and follow laborious accounting procedures to make sure not a cent of federal grant money was used on that research. No longer. The lifting of such requirements "is just a major boon for the research here and elsewhere," said Dr. Arnold Kriegstein, a stem cell researcher at the University of California, San Francisco.

http://snipr.com/diusn



Zoo Chimp 'Planned' Stone Attacks
from BBC News Online

A male chimpanzee in a Swedish zoo planned hundreds of stone-throwing attacks on zoo visitors, according to researchers. Keepers at Furuvik Zoo found that the chimp collected and stored stones that he would later use as missiles.

Further, the chimp learned to recognise how and when parts of his concrete enclosure could be pulled apart to fashion further projectiles. The findings are reported in the journal Current Biology.

There has been scant evidence in previous research that animals can plan for future events. Crucial to the current study is the fact that Santino, a chimpanzee at the zoo in the city north of Stockholm, collected the stones in a calm state, prior to the zoo opening in the morning. The launching of the stones occurred hours later--during dominance displays to zoo visitors--with Santino in an "agitated" state.

http://snipr.com/diuup



Does Eating Fewer Calories Improve the Brain?
from Scientific American

Hara hatchi bu, the Okinawan people's habit of eating only till they are 80 percent full, is thought to be one of the secrets of their extraordinary health and longevity. In addition to one of the highest percentages of people in the world who live past 100, Okinawans appear to be less prone to heart disease, diabetes and obesity.

Indeed, ever since it was discovered in the 1930s that laboratory rats fed a caloric-restricted (CR) diet lived almost twice as long as their well fed counterparts, scientists have pursued caloric restriction research in the hopes of finding novel strategies for extending human life and preventing disease.

Given the growing older population at risk for memory problems and the rising rates of obesity, the role of diet in maintaining peak brain performance has taken on added importance.

http://snipr.com/diuyc



Fish Story: Novel Study Shows Trophy Reef Catch Reduced to Small Fry
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

The photo was taken in 1957, but most of the creatures depicted appear almost primordial sea monsters from a forgotten time. They are impossibly large fish, strung heavily beneath a sign advertising "All Day Deep Sea Fishing" in the Florida Keys.

... "I swear that one of the groupers (in the photo) was almost the size of a cow, and on that trip, two customers caught what looks like a couple of tons of fish, maybe even three tons," said Paul Dayton, a biological oceanographer at UCSD's Scripps Institution of Oceanography. "All of the fish were huge."


Fast forward half a century to 2007; same dock, different world. Sport fishermen still venture out into the waters surrounding the Keys daily in search of sea monsters, but they return with fish more akin to guppies--that is, if they return with any fish at all. In a novel and visually dramatic study, Loren McClenachan, a marine biologist and graduate student at Scripps, has documented how much marine life has changed in the Florida Keys and, by extrapolation, almost everywhere else in the world.

http://snipr.com/div02



Harvard Fuels Quest to Create Life from Scratch
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Harvard scientists have created a biological machine in the lab that manufactures proteins, mimicking the activity of a cellular structure, called a ribosome, that is critical for life.

If it is verified by other scientists, the work by Harvard Medical School professor George Church would be an important step in the quest to create life from scratch.

"The reason it's a step toward artificial life is that the key component of all living systems--the one component that's basically shared by all living systems--is the ribosome," Church said in an interview Friday. "If you're going to make synthetic life that's anything like current life ... you've got to have this highly conserved, highly complicated biological machine."

http://snipr.com/div1z



Depression Increases Heart Risks in Seemingly Healthy Women
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--Severe depression may silently break a seemingly healthy woman's heart.

Doctors have long known that depression is common after a heart attack or stroke, and worsens those people's outcomes. Monday, Columbia University researchers reported new evidence that depression can lead to heart disease in the first place.

The scientists tracked 63,000 women from the long-running Nurses' Health Study between 1992 and 2004. None had signs of heart disease when the study began, but nearly 8 percent had evidence of serious depression. The depressed women were more than twice as likely to experience sudden cardiac death ... concluded the 12-year study, published Monday in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. They also had a smaller increased risk of death from other forms of heart disease.

http://snipr.com/div3e



They Tried to Outsmart Wall Street
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Emanuel Derman expected to feel a letdown when he left particle physics for a job on Wall Street in 1985.

After all, for almost 20 years, as a graduate student at Columbia and a postdoctoral fellow at institutions like Oxford and the University of Colorado, he had been a spear carrier in the quest to unify the forces of nature and establish the elusive and Einsteinian "theory of everything," hobnobbing with Nobel laureates and other distinguished thinkers. How could managing money compare? But the letdown never happened. Instead he fell in love with a corner of finance that dealt with stock options.

"Options theory is kind of deep in some way. It was very elegant; it had the quality of physics," Dr. Derman explained recently with a tinge of wistfulness, sitting in his office at Columbia, where he is now a professor of finance and a risk management consultant with Prisma Capital Partners. Dr. Derman, who spent 17 years at Goldman Sachs and became managing director, was a forerunner of the many physicists and other scientists who have flooded Wall Street in recent years ...

http://snipr.com/div53



FDA Seeks Help to Develop Rapid Test for Salmonella
from the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)-Wanted: Salmonella detector. Must work fast. Send plans and specifications to Uncle Sam, care of the Food and Drug Administration.

Frustrated that conventional lab methods can now take as long as nine days to identify the most common of food bugs, the FDA is searching for a rapid test for salmonella. Two recent outbreaks--one involving peanut butter, the other blamed on tomatoes and hot peppers--have put the agency on the spot.

Each time the FDA had pieces of the puzzle, but it took a while to fill in the complete picture. The uncertainty made consumers nervous about eating everyday foods. Food producers lost millions in forgone sales and recalled products. Lawmakers fumed. One congressman likened the government's disease detectives to the Keystone Kops. Since other outbreaks are likely to happen, FDA officials are desperately seeking anything that would make their response more efficient.

http://snipr.com/div79




SORRY about all the dumping. My adviser just got out of the hospital. Docs say he'll live. Hes been going through back logged email
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Honey on March 19, 2009, 05:49:34 PM
Thank you Kai, I appreciate being able to read these.  (Glad your advisor is gonna be ok too.)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 25, 2009, 04:16:28 PM
March 24, 2009



Exxon Valdez 20 Years Later: Oil Still Remains
from National Geographic News

Two decades after the worst oil spill in U.S. history, huge quantities of oil still coat Alaska's shores with a toxic glaze, experts say.

More than 21,000 gallons of crude oil remain of the 11 million gallons of crude oil that bled from the stranded tanker Exxon Valdez on the night of March 23, 1989.

The oil--which has been detected as far as 450 miles away from the spill site in Prince William Sound--continues to harm wildlife and the livelihoods of local people, according to conservation groups.

http://snipr.com/egiur



Space Storm Alert: 90 Seconds from Catastrophe
from New Scientist

It is midnight on 22 September 2012 and the skies above Manhattan are filled with a flickering curtain of colourful light. Few New Yorkers have seen the aurora this far south but their fascination is short-lived. ... Within 90 seconds, the entire eastern half of the US is without power.

A year later and millions of Americans are dead and the nation's infrastructure lies in tatters. ... Europe, Scandinavia, China and Japan are also struggling to recover from the same fateful event--a violent storm, 150 million kilometres away on the surface of the sun.

It sounds ridiculous. ... Yet an extraordinary report funded by NASA and issued by the US National Academy of Sciences in January this year claims it could do just that.

http://snipr.com/egiw2



Does Dark Energy Really Exist?
from Scientific American

In science, the grandest revolutions are often triggered by the smallest discrepancies. ... In our own era, a revolution began to unfold 11 years ago with the discovery of the accelerating universe. A tiny deviation in the brightness of exploding stars led astronomers to conclude that they had no idea what 70 percent of the cosmos consists of.

All they could tell was that space is filled with a substance unlike any other one that pushes along the expansion of the universe rather than holding it back. This substance became known as dark energy.

It is now over a decade later, and the existence of dark energy is still so puzzling that some cosmologists are revisiting the fundamental postulates that led them to deduce its existence in the first place.

http://snipr.com/egixx



What's So Hot About Chili Peppers?
from Smithsonian Magazine

... A wiry 40-year-old ecologist at the University of Washington, [Joshua] Tewksbury is ... looking for a wild chili with a juicy red berry and a tiny flower: Capsicum minutiflorum. He hopes it'll help answer the hottest question in botany: Why are chilies spicy?

Bolivia is believed to be the chili's motherland, home to dozens of wild species that may be the ancestors of all the world's chili varieties--from the mild bell pepper to the medium jalapeño to the rough-skinned naga jolokia, the hottest pepper ever tested.

The heat-generating compound in chilies, capsaicin, has long been known to affect taste buds, nerve cells and nasal membranes (it puts the sting in pepper spray). But its function in wild chili plants has been mysterious.

http://snipr.com/egj0q



Never Mind the Pollock 'Fractals'
from Science News

PITTSBURGH--A proposed method for authenticating artist Jackson Pollock's drip paintings does not hold up under scrutiny, a new analysis finds.

What's more, the analysis uncovered a new way to identify a mathematical fractal, Katherine Jones-Smith of Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland reported March 19 at a meeting of the American Physical Society.

A cache of 32 paintings discovered in 2003--claimed by some to be authentic Pollocks--sparked a controversy among art historians and soon brought physicists into the quagmire in an effort to identify the paintings' origins.

http://snipr.com/egj2f



Astronauts Complete Third and Final Spacewalk
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Associated Press)--Two astronauts who were teaching math and science to middle school students just five years ago went on a spacewalk together Monday, but could not free a jammed equipment shelf no matter how hard they tried.

Their path, at least, ended up clear of dangerous orbiting junk that had threatened the international space station and shuttle, and forced the joined vessels to dodge out of the way a day earlier.

Astronauts Joseph Acaba and Richard Arnold II pushed and pulled the stuck equipment storage platform as hard as they could, but finally had to give up. It was unfinished business from the previous spacewalk and one of Monday's main tasks.

http://snipr.com/egj3w



Daily Red Meat Raises Chances of Dying Early
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Eating red meat increases the chances of dying prematurely, according to a large federal study that offers powerful new evidence that a diet that regularly includes steaks, burgers and pork chops is hazardous to your health.

The study of more than 500,000 middle-age and elderly Americans found that those who consumed the equivalent of about a small hamburger every day were more than 30 percent more likely to die during the 10 years they were followed, mostly from heart disease and cancer. Sausage, cold cuts and other processed meats also increased the risk.

Previous research had found a link between red meat and an increased risk of heart disease and cancer, particularly colorectal cancer, but the new study is the first large examination of the relationship between eating meat and overall mortality.

http://snipr.com/egj5p



Cold Fusion Debate Heats Up Again
from BBC News Online

The long-standing debate about cold fusion is receiving new impetus at the American Chemical Society's national meeting in the US this week. Cold fusion, first announced 20 years ago on Monday, was claimed to be a boundless source of clean energy by Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons.

Attempts to replicate their experiments failed, but a number of researchers insist that cold fusion is possible. The meeting will see several approaches that claim to produce fusion power.

The American Chemical Society has organised sessions surrounding the research at its meetings before, suggesting that the field would otherwise have no suitable forum for debate.

http://snipr.com/egj6y



Extravagant Results of Nature's Arms Race
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Nature is reputed to be red in tooth and claw, but many arms races across the animal kingdom are characterized by restraint rather than carnage.

Competition among males is often expressed in the form of elaborate weapons made of bone, horn or chitin. The weapons often start off small and then, under the pressure of competition, may evolve to attain gigantic proportions.

... In a new review of sexual selection, a special form of natural selection that leads to outlandish armament and decoration, Douglas J. Emlen, a biologist at the University of Montana, has assembled ideas on the evolutionary forces that have made animal weapons so diverse.

http://snipr.com/egj84



Seeking Tailored Care for Advanced Prostate Cancer
from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--Prostate cancer has been left behind in the race for personalized medicine but that may be changing: Doctors are starting to attempt gene-guided treatment for men with advanced disease.

It's an approach already offered in treating breast and certain other cancers. The new prostate work is a small initial step at catching up. And it targets the men in most dire need--those whose prostate cancer has spread to the bones or other parts of the body, and hormone treatment to slow its march has quit working.

These are the men who ultimately wind up dying of prostate cancer, some 28,000 a year. "Prostate cancer has learned some tricks," says Dr. Phillip Febbo of Duke University Medical Center, who is unraveling how to decode those tricks to better direct therapy--by looking directly at the tumor's genetic signature.

http://snipr.com/egj9a

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 25, 2009, 04:25:21 PM
Quote
'Consciousness Signature' Discovered Spanning the Brain
from New Scientist

Electrodes implanted in the brains of people with epilepsy might have resolved an ancient question about consciousness.

Signals from the electrodes seem to show that consciousness arises from the coordinated activity of the entire brain. The signals also take us closer to finding an objective "consciousness signature" that could be used to probe the process in animals and people with brain damage without inserting electrodes.

Previously it wasn't clear whether a dedicated brain area, or "seat of consciousness", was responsible for guiding our subjective view of the world, or whether consciousness was the result of concerted activity across the whole brain.

http://snipr.com/e2fge

EMERGENCE.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 25, 2009, 04:30:16 PM
wait, wtf?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on March 25, 2009, 04:36:35 PM
Quote from: Kai on March 25, 2009, 04:25:21 PM
Quote
Previously it wasn't clear whether a dedicated brain area, or "seat of consciousness", was responsible for guiding our subjective view of the world

Wait, wut?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 25, 2009, 05:51:54 PM
Quote from: Enki-][ on March 25, 2009, 04:36:35 PM
Quote from: Kai on March 25, 2009, 04:25:21 PM
Quote
Previously it wasn't clear whether a dedicated brain area, or "seat of consciousness", was responsible for guiding our subjective view of the world

Wait, wut?

Yeah, apparently most neurobiologists were under the impression that consciousness is from a particular brain area. I've been under the impression that consciousness encompases all of the neurons throughout the body, so this is a nice confirmation for me.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on March 25, 2009, 07:00:41 PM
Quote from: Kai on March 25, 2009, 05:51:54 PM
Quote from: Enki-][ on March 25, 2009, 04:36:35 PM
Quote from: Kai on March 25, 2009, 04:25:21 PM
Quote
Previously it wasn't clear whether a dedicated brain area, or "seat of consciousness", was responsible for guiding our subjective view of the world

Wait, wut?

Yeah, apparently most neurobiologists were total fucking idiots. I've been under the impression that consciousness can happen through something other than pixie dust and the power of love, so this is a nice confirmation for me.

Fixed.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on March 25, 2009, 07:55:13 PM
 :lulz: I can't wait to see Michael Egnor-ant's reaction to that one.  I'm sure it will just be deny... deny.. deny.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on April 01, 2009, 02:07:28 PM
New aphrodesiac found in bacon

Today, the market for sexual enchancement supplements is dominated by Viagra and similar artificially produced pharmaceuticals, but tomorrow, it could be dominated by bacon.
Source (http://mindfsck.blogspot.com/2009/04/new-aphrodesiac-found-in-bacon.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on April 01, 2009, 06:04:43 PM
Quote from: Enki-][ on April 01, 2009, 02:07:28 PM
New aphrodesiac found in bacon

Today, the market for sexual enchancement supplements is dominated by Viagra and similar artificially produced pharmaceuticals, but tomorrow, it could be dominated by bacon.
Source (http://mindfsck.blogspot.com/2009/04/new-aphrodesiac-found-in-bacon.html)

This article seems legit.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on April 01, 2009, 08:14:20 PM
Quote from: Felix on April 01, 2009, 06:04:43 PM
Quote from: Enki-][ on April 01, 2009, 02:07:28 PM
New aphrodesiac found in bacon

Today, the market for sexual enchancement supplements is dominated by Viagra and similar artificially produced pharmaceuticals, but tomorrow, it could be dominated by bacon.
Source (http://mindfsck.blogspot.com/2009/04/new-aphrodesiac-found-in-bacon.html)

This article seems legit.
:horrormirth:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on April 02, 2009, 05:59:01 PM
Quote from: Enki-][ on April 01, 2009, 08:14:20 PM
Quote from: Felix on April 01, 2009, 06:04:43 PM
Quote from: Enki-][ on April 01, 2009, 02:07:28 PM
New aphrodesiac found in bacon

Today, the market for sexual enchancement supplements is dominated by Viagra and similar artificially produced pharmaceuticals, but tomorrow, it could be dominated by bacon.
Source (http://mindfsck.blogspot.com/2009/04/new-aphrodesiac-found-in-bacon.html)

This article seems legit.
:horrormirth:

April fool's, bitch! :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 03, 2009, 05:49:24 PM
March 31, 2009



Giant Laser Experiment Powers Up
from BBC News Online

The US has finished constructing a huge physics experiment aimed at recreating conditions at the heart of our Sun. The US National Ignition Facility is designed to demonstrate the feasibility of nuclear fusion, a process that could offer abundant clean energy.

The lab will kick-start the reaction by focusing 192 giant laser beams on a tiny pellet of hydrogen fuel. To work, it must show that more energy can be extracted from the process than is required to initiate it.

... The California-based NIF is the largest experimental science facility in the US and contains the world's most powerful laser. It has taken 12 years to build. "This is a major milestone," said Dr. Ed Moses, director of the facility. "We are well on our way to achieving what we set out to do--controlled, sustained nuclear fusion and energy gain for the first time ever in a laboratory setting."

http://snipr.com/exhj2



Multi-Drug Pill Shows Promise in Cutting Heart Disease
from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Take a little aspirin, add one part low-dose cholesterol medicine and three parts low-dose blood pressure medicine. Put it in a single pill and give to everybody older than age 45. What do you get?

Doctors don't know for sure. But the emerging dream of a cheap polypill that could be used to reduce heart attacks and strokes in vast numbers of "healthy" people moved one step closer to reality Monday.

The first large study of a single pill made up of a brew of generic drugs showed that blood pressure and cholesterol were reduced enough to theoretically cut heart disease by 60% and strokes by 50% among middle-aged people, said lead author Salim Yusuf of McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario. But there's a potential downside: People might use the pill to avoid exercising and watching their diet.

http://snipr.com/exhl5



Texas Vote Leaves Loopholes for Teaching Creationism
from New Scientist

It was a mixed bag of victory and defeat for science on Friday when the Texas Board of Education voted on their state science standards.

In a move that pleased the scientific community, the board voted to not include proposed changes that would call for the teaching of the "strengths and weaknesses" of scientific theories--code words for allowing creationist views into the classroom.

However, additional amendments that were voted through provide loopholes for creationist teaching. "It's as if they slammed the door shut with strengths and weaknesses, then ran around the house opening windows to let it in a bunch of other ways," says Dan Quinn, who was on site at the hearings. Quinn is communications director of the Texas Freedom Network, a community watchdog organisation.

http://snipr.com/exhn5



Medical Journals and Ethics: Pity the Messenger
from the Economist

In the past scientists sometimes managed to publish medical studies flogging the supposed benefits of some or other drug without disclosing that they had financial ties to the drug's manufacturer. One of the leading voices arguing for full disclosure of such connections has been the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).

Catherine DeAngelis, JAMA's editor, was even awarded the Catcher in the Rye humanitarian prize last year "because of her leadership on discussions of conflicts of interest in medicine."

So it comes as something of a shock to see her journal now engulfed by a scandal concerning its handling of precisely such a matter. The affair, which involves both non-disclosure of financial interests and alleged attempts to suppress whistle-blowers, has already drawn other medical journals into the fray. On March 20th JAMA published an editorial revising its procedures for investigating allegations of such misconduct--but this new policy has itself come under attack.

http://snipr.com/exhok



Among Climate Scientists, a Dispute Over 'Tipping Points'
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The language was apocalyptic. Last month, a leading climate scientist warned that Earth's rising temperatures were poised to set off irreversible disasters if steps were not taken quickly to stop global warming.

"The climate is nearing tipping points," the NASA climate scientist James E. Hansen wrote in The Observer newspaper of London. "If we do not change course, we'll hand our children a situation that is out of their control."

The resulting calamities, Dr. Hansen and other like-minded scientists have warned, could be widespread and overwhelming .... But the idea that the planet is nearing tipping points--thresholds at which change suddenly becomes unstoppable--has driven a wedge between scientists who otherwise share deep concerns about the implications of a human-warmed climate.

http://snipr.com/exhyw



Huge Man-Made Algae Swarm Devoured--Bad for Climate?
from National Geographic News

A giant experiment went awry at sea this month. Shrimplike animals devoured 159 square miles of artificially stimulated algae meant to fight global warming--casting serious doubt on ocean fertilization as a climate-control tool. For years, scientists have proposed supercharging algae growth by dumping tons of iron into the ocean.

Iron is a necessary element for algae photosynthesis--the process by which the plants convert sunlight into energy--but it is relatively rare in the ocean. Algae suck carbon dioxide (C02), a greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming, out of the atmosphere. The algae then generally fall to the seafloor--sequestering the CO2 indefinitely.

About a dozen such "iron fertilization" experiments have already been done--with mixed success. But experts have warned of unintended consequences, such as unpredictable reactions in the ecosystem.

http://snipr.com/exi0a



Fungus Farmers Show Way to New Drugs
from Nature News

In a mutually beneficial symbiosis, leaf-cutting ants cultivate fungus gardens, providing both a safe home for the fungi and a food source for the ants. But this 50-million-year-old relationship also includes microbes that new research shows could help speed the quest to develop better antibiotics and biofuels.

Ten years ago, Cameron Currie, a microbial ecologist then at the University of Toronto in Ontario, Canada, discovered that leaf-cutting ants carry colonies of actinomycete bacteria on their bodies.

The bacteria churn out an antibiotic that protects the ants' fungal crops from associated parasitic fungi (such as Escovopsis). On 29 March, Currie, Jon Clardy at the Harvard Medical School in Boston and their colleagues reported that they had isolated and purified one of these antifungals, which they named dentigerumycin, and that it is a chemical that has never been previously reported.

http://snipr.com/exi28



Bioscientists Focus on the New, Vast Potential of Epigenetics
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

The human genome is an indisputably stunning piece of work: 25,000 or so genes containing all of the essential instructions for building a being. Still, it's only a guide. Alone, the genome cannot construct a person. The "book of life" requires a vocabulary of attendant molecules, compounds and chemicals--a biochemical language, so to speak--to help genes write the individual story of you.

Altogether, this phenomenon is called epigenetics. Its study represents one of the cutting edges of bioscience, offering the possibility of not just curing diseases like cancer and diabetes, but preventing them altogether.

"The human epigenome is the next frontier of genomic research," said Bing Ren, an associate professor of cellular and molecular medicine at the University of California San Diego, which recently received a five-year, $16.6 million grant from the federal National Institutes of Health (NIH) to establish The San Diego Epigenome Center at the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research on campus.

http://snipr.com/exi43



Surge of College Students Pursuing 'Clean Energy' Careers
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

In what could be an encouraging sign of change in the long-standing shortage of Americans preparing for "clean energy" careers, the subject is suddenly hot on college campuses across the nation--a surge of interest largely stimulated by the specter of global warming.

Concern about climate change is galvanizing more undergraduate students to turn toward a subject involving science and engineering, some educators suggest, in much the same way that Moscow's launching of the Sputnik space satellite jolted baby boomers to turn their eyes to the stars.

What remains uncertain is whether their enthusiasm for renewable energy will carry over into graduate school and lead them to swell the ranks of Americans with advanced science and engineering degrees.

http://snipr.com/exi6m



The Ogallala Aquifer: Saving a Vital U.S. Water Source
from Scientific American

On America's high plains, crops in early summer stretch to the horizon: field after verdant field of corn, sorghum, soybeans, wheat and cotton. Framed by immense skies now blue, now scarlet-streaked, this 800-mile expanse of agriculture looks like it could go on forever. It can't.

The Ogallala Aquifer, the vast underground reservoir that gives life to these fields, is disappearing. In some places, the groundwater is already gone. This is the breadbasket of America--the region that supplies at least one fifth of the total annual U.S. agricultural harvest.

If the aquifer goes dry, more than $20 billion worth of food and fiber will vanish from the world's markets. And scientists say it will take natural processes 6,000 years to refill the reservoir. The challenge of the Ogallala is how to manage human demands on the layer of water that sprawls underneath parts of eight states from South Dakota to Texas.

http://snipr.com/exi9z
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 03, 2009, 10:26:53 PM
April 3, 2009



Top Five Famous Computer Hackers
from ABC News

April 1 is the day the Conficker computer worm was supposed to do something terrible to millions of computers running Microsoft Windows--though engineers were at a loss to say just what that something was.

So what happened? If your computer lets you read this story, we can presume it's not a smoldering wreck. But somewhere in cyberspace, some hacker, or hackers, created Conficker, and they're still out there. So are others.

Merriam-Webster has multiple definitions of "hacker"--including ... "a person who illegally gains access to and sometimes tampers with information in a computer system." But you may be surprised to know what's happened to the most famed hackers of the past. We went looking for a way to measure the top cases ... and the consensus we found was that it's hard to do.

http://snipr.com/f5gc4



Tests Nipped Risk of Tainted Pistachios in Bud
from MSNBC

TERRA BELLA, Calif. (Associated Press)--A nationwide recall of 2 million pounds of pistachios in the wake of a salmonella scare has increased calls for more stringent food testing laws.

The contamination was only detected because of voluntary testing by a manufacturer for Kraft Foods Inc. almost two weeks ago. Private auditors hired by Kraft later found problems they think caused the contamination at a supplier's processing facility in central California.

If Kraft had not tested its product, 2 million pounds of pistachios that touched off government warnings and a scare this week probably would still be on the market. Neither the Food and Drug Administration nor state laws require food manufacturers to test the safety of their products.

http://snipr.com/f5giz



Heart Muscle Renewed Over Lifetime, Study Finds
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In a finding that may open new approaches to treating heart disease, Swedish scientists have succeeded in measuring a highly controversial property of the human heart: the rate at which its muscle cells are renewed during a person's lifetime.

The finding upturns what has long been conventional wisdom: that the heart cannot produce new muscle cells and so people die with the same heart they were born with.

About 1 percent of the heart muscle cells are replaced every year at age 25, and that rate gradually falls to less than half a percent per year by age 75, concluded a team of researchers led by Dr. Jonas Frisen of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. The upshot is that about half of the heart's muscle cells are exchanged in the course of a normal lifetime, the Swedish group calculates. Its results are to be published Friday in the journal Science.

http://snipr.com/f5gll



"Hidden" Planet Found in Old Hubble Image
from National Geographic News

It took 11 years, but scientists have now found the earliest known picture of a planet outside our solar system. Using a new technique that removes starlight from an image, scientists re-examined a Hubble Space Telescope picture taken in 1998 and stripped away starlight to reveal a "hidden" world.

This planet orbits the young star HR 8799, which lies about 130 light-years away in the constellation Pegasus, noted lead study author David Lafrenière of the University of Toronto.

Last September Lafrenière and colleagues announced the first direct picture of an alien planetary system: three massive worlds circling HR 8799. The archived Hubble picture shows the outermost of that planetary trio. Although the new find is technically confirmation of a previously known planet, the discovery suggests there could be many more unknown planets waiting to be found in Hubble's archives, researchers say.

http://snipr.com/f5go0



How Infection May Spark Leukaemia
from BBC News Online

Scientists have shown how common infections might trigger childhood leukaemia. They have identified a molecule, TGF, produced by the body in response to infection that stimulates development of the disease.

It triggers multiplication of pre-cancerous stem cells at the expense of healthy counterparts. The Institute of Cancer Research study appears in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

Leukaemia occurs when large numbers of white blood cells take over the bone marrow, leaving the body unable to produce enough normal blood cells. The researchers had already identified a gen

http://snipr.com/f5gqv



Heavyweight Galaxies in the Young Universe
from Science News

Peering into the center of five of the youngest clusters of galaxies known in the universe, astronomers recently found several full-grown, cigar-chomping adults among the myriad of toddlers. The remote galaxies hail from a time when the 13.7-billion-year-old cosmos was less than 5 billion years old.

Yet measurements reveal that the bodies are just as massive as galaxies like the modern-day Milky Way, which took at least 10 billions years to mature. The findings appear to call into question the leading theory of galaxy formation, known as the dark matter model--at least as it applies to the dense regions where galaxies congregate into clusters, says Chris Collins, an astronomer at the Liverpool John Moores University in England.

He and his colleagues used the infrared Subaru telescope atop Hawaii's Mauna Kea to observe the galaxies, and the team describes the findings in the April 2 Nature.

http://snipr.com/f5gt8



Recession Might Be Good for Your Health
from the Baltimore Sun

It took a moment to make the connection, but Jake Sawyers says the recession has been good for him, or at least for his health.

"I smoke when I drink, and I drink when I go out and I've been doing less of that," said the 36-year-old Canton resident who was buying a pack of cigarettes at a neighborhood convenience store. "I am also exercising more. Maybe I have more energy because I'm not drinking and smoking as much."

Sawyers isn't alone. Data show that many people are taming their vices rather than drowning their sorrows these days--behavior that national researchers say is consistent with past recessions. The desire to drink and smoke may grow with financial pressures, but sales of some alcohol and cigarettes are dipping with disposable income.

http://snipr.com/f5gvt



Solving the Mystery of the Vanishing Bees
from Scientific American

Dave Hackenberg makes a living moving honeybees. Up and down the East Coast and often coast to coast, Hackenberg trucks his beehives from field to field to pollinate crops as diverse as Florida melons, Pennsylvania apples, Maine blueberries and California almonds.

As he has done for the past 42 years, in the fall of 2006 Hackenberg migrated with his family and his bees from their central Pennsylvania summer home to their winter locale in central Florida. The insects had just finished their pollination duties on blooming Pennsylvanian pumpkin fields and were now to catch the last of the Floridian Spanish needle nectar flow.

When Hackenberg checked on his pollinators, the colonies were "boiling over" with bees, as he put it. But when he came back a month later, he was horrified. Many of the remaining colonies had lost large numbers of workers, and only the young workers and the queen remained and seemed healthy. More than half of the 3,000 hives were completely devoid of bees. But no dead bees were in sight. "It was like a ghost town," Hackenberg said ...

http://snipr.com/f5gyg



Scientists Develop Techniques to Unravel Proteins' Mysteries
from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Proteins, the work-horse molecules necessary for virtually every human action from breathing to thinking, have proved an almost ghostly presence, daring scientists to fully grasp their structure and behavior.

Now, physicists at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee have developed powerful imaging techniques that promise to tell us much more about what proteins are and what they do, how they change shapes and how they work together in a cell. Such questions go to the heart of our quest to understand diseases and find effective drugs.

"The vast majority of diseases are caused by impairment in some kind of protein function--too much or not enough of a certain protein, or a protein that's not working properly," said Andy Greene, director of the Biotechnology and Bioengineering Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin, who was not involved in the UWM work.

http://snipr.com/f5h0k



Everglades Restoration Plan Shrinks
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

MIAMI--The Everglades have become yet another victim of the shrinking economy. Gov. Charlie Crist announced Wednesday that Florida would significantly scale back its $1.34 billion deal to restore the Everglades by buying 180,000 acres from the United States Sugar Corporation.

At a news conference in Tallahassee, Mr. Crist outlined a far more modest proposal: $530 million for 72,500 acres, with an option to buy the rest by 2019. "We feel this is the best opportunity, the best financial scenario we can present," Mr. Crist said, adding, "The economy has been what it has been, and we have to deal with the parameters we are given."

The new proposal, if approved by the South Florida Water Management District and the board of United States Sugar, would amount to the second major revision of a plan that began last June as a purchase of United States Sugar, all assets included, for $1.75 billion.

http://snipr.com/f5h35



Institute Provides Hands-on Learning
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Five years before Neil Armstrong's historic walk on the moon, an elementary school teacher in southeastern San Diego launched an after-school science club in his classroom. The only equipment he had was a worn, 40-gallon aquarium that he filled with fish, sea cucumbers and octopuses.

Forty-five years after the program's launch and nearly a decade after the death of visionary

founder Tom Watts, the Elementary Institute of Science--as it is now known--is thriving, attracting hundreds of children from throughout the county to its after-school, weekend and summer classes.

Students flock to the program and parents rave about it because the Elementary Institute of

Science offers a unique, hands-on approach to learning that usually isn't available in public schools, said Doris Anderson, the institute's longtime executive director, herself a former junior high teacher.

http://snipr.com/f5h5e

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vene on April 03, 2009, 10:40:17 PM
Quote from: Kai on April 03, 2009, 10:26:53 PMHeart Muscle Renewed Over Lifetime, Study Finds
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In a finding that may open new approaches to treating heart disease, Swedish scientists have succeeded in measuring a highly controversial property of the human heart: the rate at which its muscle cells are renewed during a person's lifetime.

The finding upturns what has long been conventional wisdom: that the heart cannot produce new muscle cells and so people die with the same heart they were born with.

About 1 percent of the heart muscle cells are replaced every year at age 25, and that rate gradually falls to less than half a percent per year by age 75, concluded a team of researchers led by Dr. Jonas Frisen of the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. The upshot is that about half of the heart's muscle cells are exchanged in the course of a normal lifetime, the Swedish group calculates. Its results are to be published Friday in the journal Science.

http://snipr.com/f5gll
I wonder if this applies to the other muscle types.


QuoteScientists Develop Techniques to Unravel Proteins' Mysteries
from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

QuoteProteins, the work-horse molecules necessary for virtually every human action from breathing to thinking, have proved an almost ghostly presence, daring scientists to fully grasp their structure and behavior.

Now, physicists at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee have developed powerful imaging techniques that promise to tell us much more about what proteins are and what they do, how they change shapes and how they work together in a cell. Such questions go to the heart of our quest to understand diseases and find effective drugs.

"The vast majority of diseases are caused by impairment in some kind of protein function--too much or not enough of a certain protein, or a protein that's not working properly," said Andy Greene, director of the Biotechnology and Bioengineering Center at the Medical College of Wisconsin, who was not involved in the UWM work.

http://snipr.com/f5h0k
This makes me  :fap:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: the other anonymous on April 03, 2009, 10:51:23 PM
Quote from: Kai on April 03, 2009, 10:26:53 PM
Recession Might Be Good for Your Health
from the Baltimore Sun

Yes, economically-enforced anorexia is always a great way to get your kids to lose weight.

-toa,
will soon be quitting smoking, too
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on April 03, 2009, 11:36:15 PM
Quote from: Kai on April 03, 2009, 10:26:53 PM
April 3, 2009



Top Five Famous Computer Hackers
from ABC News

April 1 is the day the Conficker computer worm was supposed to do something terrible to millions of computers running Microsoft Windows--though engineers were at a loss to say just what that something was.

So what happened? If your computer lets you read this story, we can presume it's not a smoldering wreck. But somewhere in cyberspace, some hacker, or hackers, created Conficker, and they're still out there. So are others.

Merriam-Webster has multiple definitions of "hacker"--including ... "a person who illegally gains access to and sometimes tampers with information in a computer system." But you may be surprised to know what's happened to the most famed hackers of the past. We went looking for a way to measure the top cases ... and the consensus we found was that it's hard to do.

http://snipr.com/f5gc4

ABC News fails at computing forever.


Again.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on April 04, 2009, 06:37:28 AM
Quote from: Kai on April 03, 2009, 05:49:24 PM
Texas Vote Leaves Loopholes for Teaching Creationism
from New Scientist

It was a mixed bag of victory and defeat for science on Friday when the Texas Board of Education voted on their state science standards.

In a move that pleased the scientific community, the board voted to not include proposed changes that would call for the teaching of the "strengths and weaknesses" of scientific theories--code words for allowing creationist views into the classroom.

However, additional amendments that were voted through provide loopholes for creationist teaching. "It's as if they slammed the door shut with strengths and weaknesses, then ran around the house opening windows to let it in a bunch of other ways," says Dan Quinn, who was on site at the hearings. Quinn is communications director of the Texas Freedom Network, a community watchdog organization.

http://snipr.com/exhn5
I honestly don't know how I feel about this whole situation. Yes, making weak and ambiguous science standards make me  :argh!:. But the Creationists had their "strength and weaknesses" language in place for a decade and didn't do much with it. The Creationists still can't win in lawsuits, where it counts. I get the feeling that this is all much ado about nothing. I just can't bring myself to care about it.  :|
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Corvidia on April 04, 2009, 09:40:23 AM
Quote from: Kai on April 03, 2009, 10:26:53 PM
April 3, 2009
Tests Nipped Risk of Tainted Pistachios in Bud
from MSNBC

TERRA BELLA, Calif. (Associated Press)--A nationwide recall of 2 million pounds of pistachios in the wake of a salmonella scare has increased calls for more stringent food testing laws.

The contamination was only detected because of voluntary testing by a manufacturer for Kraft Foods Inc. almost two weeks ago. Private auditors hired by Kraft later found problems they think caused the contamination at a supplier's processing facility in central California.

If Kraft had not tested its product, 2 million pounds of pistachios that touched off government warnings and a scare this week probably would still be on the market. Neither the Food and Drug Administration nor state laws require food manufacturers to test the safety of their products.

http://snipr.com/f5giz
This is the only time you will ever hear me praise Kraft. I would prefer not to die eating pistachios. Although it would be a delicious death.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 08, 2009, 10:06:21 PM
April 6, 2009



Brain Researchers Open Door to Editing Memory
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Suppose scientists could erase certain memories by tinkering with a single substance in the brain. Could make you forget a chronic fear, a traumatic loss, even a bad habit.

Researchers in Brooklyn have recently accomplished comparable feats, with a single dose of an experimental drug delivered to areas of the brain critical for holding specific types of memory, like emotional associations, spatial knowledge or motor skills.

The drug blocks the activity of a substance that the brain apparently needs to retain much of its learned information. And if enhanced, the substance could help ward off dementias and other memory problems.

http://snipr.com/fc4ru



Inbreeding Taking Toll on Michigan Wolves
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Michigan (Associated Press) -- The two dozen or so gray wolves that wander an island chain in northwestern Lake Superior are suffering from backbone malformations caused by genetic inbreeding, posing yet another challenge to their prospects for long-term survival, according to wildlife biologists.

Although confirmed only recently, the problem apparently has been festering for decades in the small, isolated packs in Michigan's Isle Royale National Park. The abnormalities, also found in some domestic dogs, can cause pain and partial paralysis while limiting the range of motion so crucial for predators in the wild.

The discovery raises the ethically thorny question of whether scientists should try to dilute the gene pool by introducing wolves from elsewhere, said researchers with Michigan Tech University in Houghton, which hosts a 51-year-old study of the island park's wolves and moose.

http://snipr.com/fc4xe



Research Links Poor Kids' Stress, Brain Impairment
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Children raised in poverty suffer many ill effects: They often have health problems and tend to struggle in school, which can create a cycle of poverty across generations.

Now, research is providing what could be crucial clues to explain how childhood poverty translates into dimmer chances of success: Chronic stress from growing up poor appears to have a direct impact on the brain, leaving children with impairment in at least one key area -- working memory.

"There's been lots of evidence that low-income families are under tremendous amounts of stress, and we know that stress has many implications," said Gary W. Evans, a professor of human ecology at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., who led the research. "What this data raises is the possibility that it's also related to cognitive development."

http://snipr.com/fc4z1



Rosy Complexion Denotes Health and Hormones
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

In the animal kingdom, some primates produce reddened faces in order to show off and attract mates. Humans apparently do the same, to some extent.

In a study published this week in the journal PLoS ONE, researchers at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland measured how skin color varies according to the amount of oxygen in the blood. Oxygenated blood is a bright red color, and deoxygenated blood has a slightly bluish-red color. Then they presented computerized graphics of young people's faces to study participants and allowed them to change the color of the faces to make them look as healthy as possible.

For all the faces, participants added more oxygen-rich blood color to improve a healthy appearance. A healthy appearance, the researchers note, has been shown to be a major characteristic of sexual attraction

http://snipr.com/fc502



Congress Delays Obama's Green Push
from New Scientist

At the G20 summit in London last week, Barack Obama took time out from fixing the world's financial system to promise that the US will "lead by example to reduce our carbon footprint". But back in Washington, DC, Congress was saying, in effect, "not so fast".

The basis of Obama's plan to reduce US emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 is a "cap-and-trade" system, in which emitters will be charged for every tonne of CO2 they put into the air. The cash - tens of billions of dollars of it - will go into federal funding of "green jobs" to revive the US economy with renewable energy like solar and wind power, and a smart grid to get that power to customers.

Last week, legislators in Congress began considering the laws necessary to establish the new cap-and-trade regime, but they immediately hit opposition from Democrats in coal-mining mid-western states who are fearful the measures could undermine their "brown jobs", especially in a recession. That left leading climate analyst Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center on Climate Change, saying that "the odds are [the legislation] will slip to 2010".

http://snipr.com/fc51l



Therapists Use Virtual Worlds to Address Real Problems
from Scientific American

When a troubled 13-year-old named Joe first entered the Kids in Transition program in 2007 in Camden, N.J., he hardly spoke to his therapist. Like many teens at this residential mental health treatment facility, he was admitted because he had trouble controlling his anger, had run away from home several times, and had a history of run-ins with the law, according to Heather Foley, a social worker with the program.

Therapists typically encourage patients like Joe to get at the core of their problems via face-to-face role-playing--pretending to be in a situation and having the patient practice how to handle it. But Foley says this approach was a nonstarter for Joe, whose confrontational behavior and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) impair his ability to engage and focus in this way.

When that approach failed, Foley enrolled her young patient in a program that treats teens using something familiar to most of them: the virtual world, in this case a customized one called Simulated Environment for Counseling, Training, Evaluation and Rehabilitation (SECTER).

http://snipr.com/fc52r



Getting People to Coexist With Cats
from Time

As the human population has grown in the Pantanal, the vast wetland in central Brazil, people and big cats -- namely the South American jaguar -- are encroaching increasingly on each other's territory. When conflict occurs, as it inevitably does, the cats are usually the ones who lose.

From the distance of a magazine story or a National Geographic special, it can be hard to understand why anyone would want to kill the very beautiful, very endangered jaguar. But if you're a Brazilian cattle farmer whose cows keep getting eaten by jaguars, the killing makes a little more sense.

This is the kind of situation to which conservationists might have responded by cordoning off protected habitats and reserves -- building a fence, in effect, between the wild animals and the people. But in the Pantanal, and in much of the rest of our once wild, once underpopulated world, total separation is simply not a sustainable option.

http://snipr.com/fc53a



Booting Up a Computer Pioneer's 200-Year-Old Design
from Smithsonian Magazine

When today's number crunchers want to make quick calculations, they reach for their smartphone, a device practically unimaginable two centuries ago. But in the 1820s, at least one forward-thinking mathematician envisioned a calculating machine, albeit far from portable.

Frustrated by the human errors he found in printed numerical tables, English inventor Charles Babbage designed a machine to perform mathematical functions and automatically print the results. His initial design, which called for 25,000 parts, would have weighed 15 tons and been about the size of a horse-drawn carriage.

The plans looked good on paper, but Babbage was never able to build his machine. More than a century after his death in 1871, computer historians blew the dust off his 5,000 pages of notes and drawings and wondered if his ideas could work. ... A full-scale clone of that machine is now on display in Mountain View, California, at the Computer History Museum through December 2009.

http://snipr.com/fc54f



Found: The Brain's Centre of Wisdom
from the Times (London)

Scientists have identified the seat of human wisdom by pinpointing parts of the brain that guide us when we face difficult moral dilemmas.

Sophisticated brain scanning techniques have found that humans respond by activating areas associated with the primitive emotions of sex, fear and anger as well as our capability for abstract thought.

The findings, to be published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, represent a significant incursion into territory once regarded as the domain of religion and philosophy.

http://snipr.com/fc55k



Viruses Used to Grow "Greener" Batteries
from National Geographic News

With the help of a common virus, scientists have built a battery that rivals the state-of-the-art rechargeable models now powering personal electronics and hybrid vehicles. The hope is to replace the costly, toxic electrodes currently used in lithium-ion batteries.

The researchers modified the M13 virus, which infects only bacteria, to grow proteins on its surface that attract amorphous iron phosphate.

The result: Wires just nanometers thick of the material, which is cheaper and environmentally friendlier than ones currently used to make electrodes for lithium-ion batteries.

http://snipr.com/fc56t

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 08, 2009, 10:10:15 PM
April 7, 2009



Did Scientist Predict Italy Quake?
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

More than a week ago, a scientist little known in earthquake circles made a bold prediction of a destructive earthquake in the Abruzzo region of central Italy based on spikes in radon gas. Giampaolo Giuliani went so far as to tell the mayor of a town there that it would strike within the next 24 hours.

His deadline passed and for days, nothing happened. Then, early Monday, a magnitude-6.3 earthquake struck near the town of L'Aquila, sparking a controversy around the world about whether Giuliani truly predicted the temblor or whether it was a fluke of timing.

"This happens all the time," said Tom Jordan, director of the Southern California Earthquake Center, who is also principal investigator on a worldwide project called the Collaboratory for the Study of Earthquake Predictability. "People send out predictions based on various stuff. It's always hard to evaluate."

http://snipr.com/feucq



When All You Have Left Is Your Pride
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Look around you. On the train platform, at the bus stop, in the car pool lane: these days someone there is probably faking it, maintaining a job routine without having a job to go to.

... "I have a new client, a laid-off lawyer, who's commuting in every day -- to his Starbucks," said Robert C. Chope, a professor of counseling at San Francisco State University and president of the employment division of the American Counseling Association. "He gets dressed up, meets with colleagues, networks; he calls it his Western White House. I have encouraged him to keep his routine."

The fine art of keeping up appearances may seem shallow and deceitful, the very embodiment of denial. But many psychologists beg to differ. To the extent that it sustains good habits and reflects personal pride, they say, this kind of play-acting can be an extremely effective social strategy, especially in uncertain times.

http://snipr.com/feuea



Why Does Scratching Relieve an Itch?
from Time

Medical science has deciphered many of the body's workings, down to the level of the gene, and isn't too far from using stem cells to repair its hobbled organs. But in many ways, the human body remains a vast and peculiar mystery.

Take the common itch. Everyone knows from experience that a good scratch can cure an itch, but doctors still don't understand the physiological mechanism behind the itch-scratch connection.

And that ignorance can have severe medical consequences. The common itch isn't so benign in many conditions, including shingles and AIDS, which can cause uncomfortably severe itching. Sometimes itching can occur inexplicably, without any apparent physical symptoms, and a patient's unchecked scratching can lead to excessive skin damage or worse. ... That's why a new study published [Monday] in the journal Nature Neuroscience offers some hope of lasting relief.

http://snipr.com/feugh



Sick Bats' PR Problem Could Prove to Be Deadly
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

To a public raised on vampire movies, bats are loathsome, frightening creatures - blind, flying rodents that all carry rabies, suck human blood, and get impossibly tangled in long hair.

None of it is true. But scientists trying to drum up a public outcry - and government funding - to stop a mysterious illness ravaging bat populations from Vermont to Virginia believe these myths are thwarting their efforts. The researchers say they are learning a harsh truth about the public's desire to save animals: Cuteness rules.

Despairing bat biologists want to hire a publicist - a kind of public relations batman - to give bats an image makeover and educate people about the night creatures' ecological benefits. If they could get people to care even half as much as they do about polar bears, these researchers say, desperately needed dollars and attention may follow to save the misunderstood animals.

http://snipr.com/feujv



Is Alzheimer's the Result of a Burnt-Out Brain?
from New Scientist

Healthy young adults carrying a gene variant that is a major risk factor for the disease seem to have extra activity in brain regions related to memory, even when their brains are at rest.

The gene APOE codes for a protein thought to help create, maintain and repair neuronal connections. One variant, epsilon 4, is considered the biggest risk factor for getting Alzheimer's, increasing your risk by up to 4 times if you have one copy and up to 12 if you have two. It is not known exactly how epsilon 4 ups the risk, but in people who carry it and have developed Alzheimer's, the hippocampus, which is involved in memory functions, is usually smaller.

To figure out if epsilon 4 influences brain function earlier on in life, Clare Mackay of the University of Oxford and colleagues at Imperial College London scanned the brains of 18 healthy adults with epsilon 4 and 18 controls who did not have the variant. In the scanner, the volunteers spent time performing memory tests and also doing nothing.

http://snipr.com/feunq



Virtual Stomachs Regurgitate the Mysteries of Digestion
from Scientific American

DAVIS, Calif.--Ann Wigmore was not enamored with the American diet. Having moved from Lithuania after World War I, she was appalled by our white breads and other abominations and dearly missed the treats her grandmother once prepared, including a savory "gruel made from crushed rye grain and diluted goat's milk."

One day, after struggling for years with ill health, she wandered out to an abandoned parking lot and, as she wrote in her memoir ... "There, spread out before my eyes, were hundreds of square feet of the most luscious weeds I had ever beheld." So began Wigmore's faith in the healing powers of wheatgrass, a belief that made her a pioneer of the raw foods movement ...

Although it may be easy to sneer at the most ardent adherents of "Raw Foodism," Wigmore's atavistic philosophy has influenced how most mainstream Americans eat and think about eating. ... Over the years, scientists have also had trouble dismissing the Raw Foodists.

http://snipr.com/feupq



Gravity Satellite Feels the Force
from BBC News Online

Europe's innovative Goce satellite has switched on the super-sensitive instrument that will make ultra-fine measurements of Earth's gravity. The sophisticated gradiometer will feel the subtle variations in Earth's tug as it sweeps around the globe.

The spacecraft has also fired up the British-built engine that will help maintain its orbit. Goce needs tiny but continuous levels of thrust to keep it stable and prevent it from falling out of the sky.

European Space Agency (Esa) mission manager Rune Floberghagen said all systems on the spacecraft had now been activated following the launch from Russia last month.

http://snipr.com/feusc



House Dust Yields Clue to Asthma: Roaches
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Asthma is the most common chronic disease of childhood, one that strikes the poor disproportionately. Up to one-third of children living in inner-city public housing have allergic asthma, in which a specific allergen sets off a cascade of events that cause characteristic inflammation, airway constriction and wheezing.

Now, using an experimental model that required leaving the pristine conditions of the lab for the messier ones of life, a team of scientists from the Boston University School of Medicine have discovered what that allergen is.

"For inner-city children," said the lead researcher, Dr. Daniel G. Remick, a professor of pathology, "the major cause of asthma is not dust mites, not dog dander, not outdoor air pollen. It's allergies to cockroaches."

http://snipr.com/feuwm



Climate Change Threatens Channel Islands Artifacts
from the Charlotte Examiner

SAN MIGUEL ISLAND, Calif. (Associated Press) -- Perched on the edge of this wind-swept Southern California island, archaeologist Jon Erlandson watches helplessly as 6,600 years of human culture - and a good chunk of his career - is swallowed by the Pacific surf.

It was not long ago that this tip of land on the northwest coast cradling an ancient Chumash Indian village stretched out to sea. But years of storm surge and roiling waves have taken a toll. The tipping point came last year when a huge piece broke off, drowning remnants of discarded abalone, mussel and other shellfish that held clues to an ancient human diet.

"There's an enormous amount of history that's washing into the sea every year," Erlandson said matter-of-factly during a recent hike. "We literally can't keep up."

http://snipr.com/feuyk



NASA Awaits Word on Where It Is Going Next
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

NASA has a space station, three space shuttles, two moon rockets under development, a fleet of robotic space probes, dozens of satellites, tens of thousands of employees and a budget that is creeping toward $20 billion a year. What it needs is a boss.

And one more thing, maybe: a mission that satisfies the new president of the United States.

A respected civil servant, Christopher Scolese, has been serving as acting NASA administrator since the departure on Jan. 20 of Michael D. Griffin. The Obama White House has twice been on the verge of making a formal nomination for a new head of the space agency but has pulled back both times because of grumbling from members of Congress with influence over space policy.

http://snipr.com/feuzs

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: the other anonymous on April 09, 2009, 03:45:22 AM
Oh! Now I get this thread!

Kai has teh blogs!

-toa,
is adding this to the blogroll
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on April 09, 2009, 04:23:41 AM
http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/content/news/news/1672/

QuoteScientists have turned the basic structure of DNA on its head: taking it from 4 bases to 12. This 12 base system has already been implemented in developing new forms of personalised medicine but now the researchers want to see if this more complex DNA can be self-sustaining

Fifty-six years ago, Watson and Crick described DNA as containing base pairs made up of adenine, thymine, guanine and cytosine or A-T-G and C. As far as we know, all DNA on Earth uses only these four bases (before methylation) and RNA uses uracil in place of thymine. But now Steve Benner, and colleagues from Florida, have re-written these rules and his group are testing a system that uses eight more bases.

They hope the research will shed light on how life started on Earth, by producing a self-sustaining molecule capable of Darwinian evolution and reproduction. And it's similar to the one that is thought to have appeared on Earth nearly four billion years ago.

At the American Chemical Society meeting this week, Benner described his ultimate goal to synthesize a similar molecule in his lab at the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution. His 12 letter genetic system is capable of nearly all of the actions that define a living thing — reproduction, growth and response to its environment.

"But it still isn't self-sustaining," Benner explained. "You need a graduate or post-doc to come in the morning and feed it. It doesn't look for its own food. No one has gotten that first step to work. If you start making estimates of how many molecules you have to look for in order to find one that does this, you're talking about 1 x 10^34 molecules." He said.

It sounds like something from the X-files but one day they may grow their very own alien DNA molecule in the lab.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Richter on April 29, 2009, 02:33:23 PM
http://dsc.discovery.com/space/top-10/anti-matter/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on April 29, 2009, 02:39:16 PM
Just in time for "Angels and Demons," too!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on April 29, 2009, 04:24:30 PM
LOL, every time I hear "Ancient Illuminati Threat" from that trailer I giggle for 2 minutes.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 12, 2009, 05:36:28 PM
May 11, 2009



Species Act Won't Be Used to Force Lower Emissions
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The federal bureaucracy that safeguards endangered species isn't equipped to tackle climate change, Interior Department officials said yesterday -- declining to protect Alaskan polar bears by cracking down on polluters in the Lower 48.

The decision, announced [Friday] by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, was the Obama administration's first word on an emerging environmental question.

The 35-year-old Endangered Species Act was designed to save animals from close-by threats such as hunting, trapping and logging. But, now that U.S. species from mountainsides to tropical seas are threatened by climate change, can it be used to fight a global problem?

http://snipr.com/hsp68



'Cone of Silence' Keeps Conversations Secret
from New Scientist

In Get Smart, the 1960s TV spy comedy, secret agents wanting a private conversation would deploy the "cone of silence," a clear plastic contraption lowered over the agents' heads. It never worked - they couldn't hear each other, while eavesdroppers could pick up every word. Now a modern cone of silence that we are assured will work is being patented by engineers Joe Paradiso and Yasuhiro Ono of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Their idea, revealed in US patent application 2009/0097671 on 16 April, is to make confidential conversations possible in open-plan offices and canteens. It will even let a conversing group move around a room and still remain in a secure sound bubble.

"In increasingly common open-plan offices, the violation of employees' privacy can often become an issue, as third parties overhear their conversations intentionally or unintentionally," the inventors say in their patent. Their aim is to relieve people of that concern.

http://snipr.com/hsp7y



Fears of Global Decline in Bees Dismissed as Demand for Honey Grows
from the Times (London)

The threat of a world without bees has been described as more serious than climate change. But world honeybee colonies have actually increased by almost half over the past 50 years, according to an analysis of UN figures.

While bees have been dying out in Britain, Europe and the US, managed bee numbers worldwide having been thriving because of global demand for honey, biologists suggest in the journal Current Biology. They also say that the bulk of agriculture, including wheat and rice, does not rely on pollination.

However, the growing popularity of expensive crops which need to be pollinated by bees has outstripped the growth in bee numbers, they find. This could lead to shortages in fruits like raspberries, plums, cherries and mangoes as well as Brazil and cashew nuts, they suggest.

http://snipr.com/hspor



Digital Field Guides Eliminate the Guesswork
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The traditional way to identify an unfamiliar tree is to pull out a field guide and search its pages for a matching description. One day people may pull out a smartphone instead, photographing a leaf from the mystery tree and then having the phone search for matching images in a database.

A team of researchers financed by the National Science Foundation has created just such a device -- a hand-held electronic field guide that identifies tree species based on the shape of their leaves, said Peter N. Belhumeur, a professor of computer science at Columbia and a member of the team.

The field guide, now in prototype for iPhones and other portable devices, has been tested at three sites in the northeastern United States, including Plummers Island in Maryland and Central Park in New York...

http://snipr.com/hspae



The Anatomy of Creativity
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Here's a question that has plagued philosophers, artists, and scientists alike for centuries: How was consciousness born?

One composer and a neuroscientist took a stab at answering the age-old question at a performance of a new musical work, "Self Comes to Mind," last Sunday (May 3), at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

The story tells of "the evolution of mind from brain," Adolphe told The Scientist in an interview the week before the performance. "It goes from the idea of a brain in a creature that doesn't know, to consciousness and the anxiety and dilemmas of consciousness." Each section of the music is preceded by a recording of Damasio reading a passage that describes a stage in the evolution of consciousness and the discovery of self-awareness.

http://snipr.com/hspgr



Whaling Peace Talks 'Fall Short'
from BBC News Online

Moves to make a peace deal between pro and anti-whaling nations have stalled, with no chance of agreement this year.

Countries have been talking for nearly a year in an attempt to hammer out an accord by this year's International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting. But a draft report seen by BBC News admits the process has "fallen short."

A source close to the talks blamed Japan, saying it had not offered big enough cuts in its Antarctic hunt, conducted in the name of research.

http://snipr.com/hspjb



Misread Epigenetic Signals Play Role in Leukemia
from Science News

Scientists have shed light on how a genetic mutation linked to acute myeloid leukemia may trigger the disease. The problem arises when cells misinterpret chemical tags called epigenetic marks on certain key genes, a new study shows.

Similar problems probably lie at the heart of other cancers and diseases and may represent a new category of diseases, researchers report online May 10 in Nature.

Cancer may result from many different triggering events. In some patients with the blood cancer, the trigger seems to be a rearrangement of small pieces of chromosome, researchers discovered last year. The rearrangement fuses parts of two proteins -- NUP98 and JARID1A -- together. Now, [researchers] show how the pairing of the two proteins might lead to trouble for a cell.

http://snipr.com/hspl1



Caribbean Migration Clue to Puzzle of Basking Sharks' Vanishing Act
from the Times (London)

The mystery of where basking sharks, the world's second-largest fish, disappear to for eight months of the year has intrigued scientists and fishermen for more than half a century.

It was assumed that the sharks, which have never been seen outside temperate waters, hibernated on the seabed during the winter months. Scientists have been startled, however, by a project that has tracked them to the Caribbean, indicating that they may be making global migrations.

Last year Mauvis Gore, of Marine Conservation International, placed a tracking device on a large female basking shark -- Cetorhinus maximus -- off the Isle of Man. To her astonishment, the filter-feeding shark plunged to a depth of 1,264 metres (4,147ft) and made for Newfoundland. It was the first time anyone had found a link between the populations of the eastern and western Atlantic.

http://snipr.com/hspnb



How Stereotypes Defeat the Stereotyped
from Time

As explicit discrimination has receded in the last two decades, ...those who study the effects of racism and sexism have had to cope with a difficult question: If discrimination is less powerful, why do some groups in society continue to fare worse than others? Has bias merely become better hidden, or are there other forces at work?

One theory that has gained influence among sociologists is that some members of stigmatized groups, when faced with stressful situations, expect themselves to do worse -- a prophecy that fulfills itself. These expectations, ...produce stress and threaten cognitive function. The effect is called "stereotype threat," and African-Americans, girls, even jocks have all been shown susceptible to stereotype threat.

Now a new study shows that old people are also vulnerable to the phenomenon. ...Published in the journal Experimental Aging Research, the study shows that merely reminding people that they are members of a stigmatized group (in this case, older Americans) reliably dampens their performance.

http://snipr.com/hspqh



Invasion of the Lionfish
from Smithsonian Magazine

It took as few as three lionfish to start the invasion. Or at least, that's the best guess. Genetic tests show that there weren't many.

No one knows how the fish arrived. They might have escaped into Florida's waters in 1992, when Hurricane Andrew capsized many transport boats. Or they might have been imported as an aquarium curiosity and later released.

But soon those lionfish began to breed a dynasty. They laid hundreds of gelatinous eggs that released microscopic lionfish larvae. The larvae drifted on the current. They grew into adults, capable of reproducing every 55 days and during all seasons of the year. The fish, unknown in the Americas 30 years ago, settled on reefs, wrecks and ledges. And that's when scientists, divers and fishermen began to notice.

http://snipr.com/hsps4

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 12, 2009, 05:46:33 PM
May 8, 2009



Feet Offer Clues About Tiny Hominid
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The extinct hominids commonly known as hobbits may have been small of body and brain, but their feet were exceptionally long, and they were flat.

Scientists, completing the first detailed analysis of the hominid's foot bones, say the findings bolster their controversial interpretation that these individuals belonged to a primitive population distinct from modern humans that lived as recently as 17,000 years ago on the Indonesian island of Flores.

The new anatomical evidence, being reported Thursday in the journal Nature, is unlikely to solve the mystery of just where the species--formally designated Homo floresiensis--fits in human evolution. That fact even the researchers acknowledge, and some of their critics still contend that the skull and bones are nothing more than remains of modern pygmy humans deformed by genetic or pathological disorders.

http://snipr.com/hm2xb



New Virus, Old Tale: Animals Share Bugs With Us
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Somewhere out there, somewhere along the way, a single creature got all this started. A pig, presumably. Pig Zero.

Scientists suspect that two influenza viruses common in swine, one rooted in Eurasia and the other in North America, came together in a single cell within a pig. The two viruses exchanged their genes like a couple of kids swapping school clothes. The result was a novel strain of virus, with, according to scientists, two genes from the Eurasian virus and six genes from the North American virus.

The new strain then jumped to humans. Where is unknown. Mexico is a possibility, but so far the virus hasn't been found in any Mexican swine. All of this is the latest iteration of a phenomenon dating to the dawn of mankind: zoonosis. A zoonotic disease is one that spreads from animals to humans, or vice versa.

http://snipr.com/hm31f



NASA Rescue Mission Aims to Revive Hubble
from USA Today

The Hubble Space Telescope, one of the greatest scientific instruments of all time, is about to get an extreme makeover--an overhaul so delicate and risky that NASA astronaut John Grunsfeld likens it to "brain surgery."

At 19 years old, the famous telescope is showing its age. Three of its scientific instruments are broken. Half of its six gyroscopes, which keep the Hubble pointed in the right direction, aren't working. And its batteries are slowly dying.

The seven-member crew of space shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to blast off Monday in an attempt to fix it. It will be the fifth, final and most difficult mission to service the Hubble--a mission that was judged so risky to astronauts it was canceled in 2004 before safety precautions were added to ease the concerns.

http://snipr.com/hm33a



Narcolepsy Linked to Immune System
from Science News

Scientists have identified a second genetic tie that cements a connection between a disabling sleep disorder and the immune system. Emmanuel Mignot, a sleep researcher and Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator at Stanford University, led an international team searching for the genetic causes of narcolepsy. The team reports online May 3 in Nature Genetics that several genetic markers associated with narcolepsy map to a gene important for turning immature immune T cells into microbe killers.

For decades scientists have known that people with narcolepsy are more likely to have a particular version of an immune gene called HLA-DQB1*0602. The gene belongs to a class of genes called HLA, for human leukocyte antigens, that makes key immune proteins.

... Given the association between narcolepsy and the HLA gene, the lethality of T cells intrigued scientists studying the sleep disorder. Neurons that make a wake-promoting protein called hypocretin die in people who have narcolepsy. Death of the cells means that people can't make enough hypocretin to stay awake, and they experience sudden bouts of sleep during the day and have disrupted sleep at night.

http://snipr.com/hjpdj



Hawaii's "Gentle" Volcano More Dangerous Than Thought
from National Geographic News

Hawaii's tourist-friendly Kilauea volcano is famous for its lazy rivers of lava. But a new report says the volcano, known as the world's most active, has a violent alter ego. The coastal volcano on the Big Island of Hawaii is capable of much stronger eruptions than previously thought, according to the study.

"It turns out that the volcano--known for being this nice, gentle volcano [where] you can walk up to lava flows just wearing flip-flops--has a very dangerous side," said study co-author Tim Rose, a volcanologist at the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C.

Kilauea's violent side was revealed by a layer of tephra--volcanic ash and rocks--extending many miles from the volcano. The tephra, the scientists determined, erupted some time between 1,000 and 1,600 years ago, when it apparently was blasted high enough into the air that today it would be a hazard to passenger jets.

http://snipr.com/hm3cx



Quizzing the World's First Answer Engine
from New Scientist

An ambitious attempt to create a "knowledge engine" will go live next week. Called Wolfram Alpha, it is designed to understand search requests made in everyday language and work out the answer to factual questions on almost any aspect of human knowledge.

A preview of Alpha carried out by New Scientist has revealed some of the new technology's abilities but also exposed some shortcomings. Meanwhile, in an apparent attempt to steal Alpha's thunder, Google has released a data visualisation tool that may provide stiff competition when fully developed.

Alpha was created by Stephen Wolfram, famous for the software package Mathematica. He employed more than 150 people to collect information on all the major branches of science, from the properties of the elements and the location of planets to the relationships between species and the sequence of the human genome. Economic measures, such as inflation histories for specific countries, are included, as are geographic, cultural and many other data sets.

http://snipr.com/hm3g3



Using Dead Stars to Spot Gravitational Waves
from Science News

DENVER--A bunch of dead stars could serve as ready-made recorders for gravitational waves--subtle ripples in spacetime that if discovered would be the crowning achievement of Einstein's theory of general relativity, astronomers propose. Researchers have been spending billions of dollars to perfect sensitive, kilometer-long devices on the ground and launch even more sophisticated experiments in space to detect this cosmic symphony.

The new search technique would instead rely on radio waves generated like clockwork by millisecond pulsars--the collapsed remnants of massive stars that spin about once every one to 10 milliseconds. The speed at which these pulsars rotate enables researchers to measure the timing of the waves' arrival at Earth with high accuracy.

Measuring arrival time is critical, says Frederick Jenet of the University of Texas at Brownsville and Texas Southmost College, who presented his team's proposal on May 3 at the American Physical Society meeting. Colleague Andrea Lommen of Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa., reported additional details on May 5.

http://snipr.com/hm3p7



Electric Cars and Noise: The Sound of Silence
from the Economist

When cars run on electric power they not only save fuel and cut emissions but also run more quietly. Ordinarily, people might welcome quieter cars on the roads. However, as the use of hybrid and electric vehicles grows, a new concern is growing too: pedestrians and cyclists find it hard to hear them coming, especially when the cars are moving slowly through a busy town or manoeuvring in a car park.

Some drivers say that when their cars are in electric mode people are more likely to step out in front of them. The solution, many now believe, is to fit electric and hybrid cars with external sound systems.

A bill going through the American Congress wants to establish a minimum level of sound for vehicles that are not using an internal-combustion engine, so that blind people and other pedestrians can hear them coming. The bill's proponents also want that audible alert to be one that will help people judge the direction and speed of the vehicle. A similar idea is being explored by the European Commission.

http://snipr.com/hm3rx



The Science of "Star Trek"
from Scientific American

Ever since the starship Enterprise first whisked across television screens in 1966, Star Trek has inspired audiences with its portrayal of a future, spacefaring humanity boldly going where no one has gone before.

Creator Gene Roddenberry's vision went on to spark five other TV series and now 11 movies, as a new film hits multiplexes this week. This prequel, simply titled Star Trek and directed by J. J. Abrams--the force behind TV's Lost and Fringe, among other projects--chronicles the early years of Captain Kirk and some of his Enterprise shipmates, including Spock, McCoy and Uhura.

To get a sense of how much actual science has made its way into the science fiction universe of Star Trek, ScientificAmerican.com spoke to Lawrence Krauss, author of The Physics of Star Trek, the first edition of which appeared on bookshelves in 1995.

http://snipr.com/hm3uf



Protein Structures: Structures of Desire
from Nature News

When considered up close, the blood protein from a sperm whale is a marvellous thing. Or so it seemed just over 50 years ago, when John Kendrew and other researchers at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, UK, reported that they had used X-rays to reveal the three-dimensional structure of a globular protein for the first time.

Analysis of the diffraction pattern caused by crystals of myoglobin, which was chosen for its simplicity, required one of the most powerful computers in the world at that time, and later won Kendrew a share of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with his Cavendish colleague Max Perutz. The picture it created "is more complicated than has been predicated by any theory of protein structure", Kendrew and his colleagues wrote in a Nature article.

Half a century on, X-ray crystallography's techniques are in outline the same: you need a crystal, X-rays and calculating power to make sense of the diffraction pattern. In all these three areas, however, progress has been enormous.

http://snipr.com/hm41m


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 12, 2009, 05:47:36 PM
May 7, 2009



Mild Flu Could Hit Harder in the Fall
from the Baltimore Sun

The number of swine flu cases in Mexico is stabilizing. In the U.S., though more people are being diagnosed with the virus, cases have been mostly mild, claiming two lives. And health officials have backed off on closing schools where students are sick.

It may seem as though the threat of the virus known as H1N1 has lessened. But infectious disease experts and public health officials agree: The worst is likely still to come. In pandemics of the past, flu that arrived in the spring hit harder come fall, when influenza season returned.

"If you were just to bet on the odds, you would bet H1N1 would abate in the summer and return in the winter," said Dr. William Schaffner, chairman of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in Tennessee. "The illness produced, so far, is really quite mild. But the question would be-as it circulates among humans in the Southern Hemisphere [in their winter flu season]-could it pick up a virulence gene ... that is capable of producing severe disease?"

http://snipr.com/hjoze



Officials Debate Production of H1N1 Vaccine
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

As U.S. health authorities told Congress on Wednesday that they were prepared to mass produce a vaccine against the new H1N1 influenza virus if needed, World Health Organization officials said they would convene an expert committee next week to determine if such production was necessary -- or desirable. The U.S. is expected to follow the recommendation.

Production of a vaccine against the virus in anticipation of its return in the fall might sound like an obvious step, but doing so would sharply limit the amount of seasonal flu vaccine that would be available because the new vaccine would be manufactured instead of the traditional one.

The virulence of the new strain remains unclear, but seasonal flu is a known killer. About 36,000 people die from it in the U.S. each year and tens of thousands more worldwide.

http://snipr.com/hjp3b



'Anaconda' Harnesses Wave Power
from BBC News Online

A new wave energy device known as "Anaconda" is the latest idea to harness the power of the seas. Its inventors claim the key to its success lies in its simplicity: Anaconda is little more than a length of rubber tubing filled with water.

Waves in the water create bulges along the tubing that travel along its length gathering energy. At the end of the tube, the surge of energy drives a turbine and generates electricity.

The device is being developed by Checkmate Seaenergy Ltd, which has been testing a small-scale 8m-long prototype in a wave tank in Gosport, Hampshire, owned by the science and technology company Qinetiq.

http://snipr.com/hjpbj



Face Transplant Recipient: 'I'm Not a Monster'
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

CLEVELAND (Associated Press)--When Connie Culp heard a little kid call her a monster because of the shotgun blast that left her face horribly disfigured, she pulled out her driver's license to show the child what she used to look like. Years later, as the nation's first face transplant recipient, she's stepped forward to show the rest of the world what she looks like now.

Her expressions are still a bit wooden, but she can talk, smile, smell and taste her food again. Her speech is at times a little tough to understand. Her face is bloated and squarish. Her skin droops in big folds that doctors plan to pare away as her circulation improves and her nerves grow, animating her new muscles.

... On Dec. 10, in a 22-hour operation, Dr. Maria Siemionow led a team of doctors who replaced 80 percent of Culp's face with bone, muscles, nerves, skin and blood vessels from another woman who had just died. It was the fourth face transplant in the world, though the others were not as extensive.

http://snipr.com/hjpjc



How to Build Nanotech Motors
from Scientific American

Imagine that we could make cars, aircraft and submarines as small as bacteria or molecules. Microscopic robotic surgeons, injected in the body, could locate and neutralize the causes of disease--for example, the plaque inside arteries or the protein deposits that may cause Alzheimer's disease. And nanomachines ... could penetrate the steel beams of bridges or the wings of airplanes, fixing invisible cracks before they propagate and cause catastrophic failures.

In recent years chemists have created an array of remarkable molecular-scale structures that could become parts of minute machines. James Tour and his co-workers at Rice University, for instance, have synthesized a molecular-scale car that features as wheels four buckyballs (carbon molecules shaped like soccer balls), 5,000 times as small as a human cell.

But look under the hood of the nanocar, and you will not find an engine. Tour's nanocars so far move only insofar as they are jostled by random collisions with the molecules around them, a process known as Brownian motion. This is the biggest current problem with molecular machines: we know how to build them, but we still do not know how to power them.

http://snipr.com/hjpgb



NASA's Program for Future Space Flight to Be Reviewed
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

In a major turnaround, the Obama administration intends this week to order a review of the spacecraft program that NASA had hoped would replace the space shuttle, the Orlando Sentinel has learned.

According to administration officials and industry insiders, the review would examine whether the Ares 1 rocket and Orion capsule are the best option to send astronauts into orbit by 2015. The review of the so-called Constellation program could be finished by fall.

The decision follows months of critical reports that have questioned whether Ares and Orion can overcome major financial and technical hurdles that threaten to delay a scheduled 2015 launch to the International Space Station and a return to the moon by 2020.

http://snipr.com/hjpp1



U.S. Halts Pilot Program in New York to Detect Biological Attacks
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Department of Homeland Security is dismantling a next-generation biological attack warning system in New York City subways because of technical problems, U.S. officials said.

Robert Hooks, a deputy assistant secretary, said the department no longer believes it is necessary to expand the pilot program, as he told Congress in July, because of resource and technology limits. Hooks said a long-planned alternative sensor system, set for initial deployment late next year, also will not be available nationwide until 2012, to allow for more testing.

The deactivation of the pilot program in late March marks a setback in U.S. efforts to detect biological weapons, and its disclosure comes as the Obama administration is unveiling new security priorities as part of its 2010 budget today.

http://snipr.com/hjpqs



Hunting the Mysterious Monopole
from New Scientist

They seem magical: magnets, every child's favourite science toy. Two otherwise ordinary lumps of metal draw inexorably closer, finally locking together with a satisfying snap. Yet turn one of them round and they show an entirely different, repulsive face: try as you might to make them, never the twain shall meet.

If magnets seem rather bipolar, that's because they are. Every magnet has two poles, a north and a south. Like poles repel, unlike poles attract. No magnet breaks the two-pole rule - not the humblest bar magnet, not the huge dynamo at the heart of our planet. Split a magnet in two, and each half sprouts the pole it lost. It seems that poles without their twins-magnetic "monopoles"-simply do not exist.

That hasn't stopped physicists hunting. For decades they have ransacked everything from moon rock and cosmic rays to ocean-floor sludge to find them. There is a simple reason for this quixotic quest. Our best explanations of how the universe hangs together demand that magnetic monopoles exist. If they are not plain to see, they must be hiding.

http://snipr.com/hjpt9



Now Showing: RNA Activation
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

After getting the data back from the very first experiment at her new job, Rosalyn Ram, a lab technician at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, was convinced she had messed something up. The results were decidedly "weird," she recalls.

Her lab heads, the husband-and-wife research duo David Corey and Bethany Janowski, had already shown that synthetic DNA molecules with protein-like backbones, known as peptide nucleic acids, could block gene transcription. And as a long shot, in October 2004 they had tasked the new lab tech with trying to do the same with small RNA molecules, fully expecting it not to work.

But it did work: Like the peptide nucleic acids, the RNAs targeted to the same promoter also silenced gene expression at the level of transcription. "When [Ram] saw the silencing, she thought she had done something wrong," says Janowski. "She didn't want to show me the data because she thought it was supposed to be a negative result."

http://snipr.com/9kzks



DNA Twisted into Boxes
from Nature News

A multidisciplinary team of researchers has created tiny DNA strongboxes measuring just 30 nanometres on each side. The boxes, which can be unlocked with a gene 'key', could be used for drug delivery or as sensors.

The boxes are the latest novelty to emerge from 'DNA origami,' the technique by which researchers build structures out of DNA. They use oligonucleotides, short snippets of nucleic acid bearing genetic information, to fold longer strands of DNA into a complex structure. Each box is large enough to hold a single ribosome--the cell's machine for making proteins. Previously, researchers have built tubes and even a map of the Americas using the technique.

The latest work uses the same principle. It's just a little more complicated, according to team member Jørgen Kjems, a chemist at Aarhus University in Denmark.

http://snipr.com/hjpz6

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 12, 2009, 05:50:05 PM
May 6, 2009



10 Genes, Furiously Evolving
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Evolutionary biology may sometimes seem like an arcane academic pursuit, but just try telling that to Gavin Smith, a virologist at Hong Kong University. For the past week, Dr. Smith and six other experts on influenza in Hong Kong, Arizona, California and Britain have been furiously analyzing the new swine flu to figure out how and when it evolved.

The first viruses from the outbreak were isolated late last month, but Dr. Smith and his colleagues report on their Web site that the most recent common ancestor of the new viruses existed 6 to 11 months ago. "It could just have been going under the radar," Dr. Smith said.

The current outbreak shows how complex and mysterious the evolution of viruses is. That complexity and mystery are all the more remarkable because a virus is life reduced to its essentials.

http://snipr.com/hh62n



Solar Storms Ahead: Is Earth Prepared?
from the Christian Science Monitor

When we look at the sun (carefully), it appears to be a uniform, unchanging star. But scientists and engineers have a much different perspective. To them, the sun is a dynamic, chaotic, and poorly understood caldron of thermonuclear forces, one that can spit out fierce bursts of radiation at any time.

And when Earth lies in the path of that blast, the flare can play havoc with power grids, disrupt radio communications, and disturb or disable satellites. Fifty years into the Space Age, Earth has avoided the worst the sun can deliver-so far.

But with the sun entering a period of increased activity, more frequent solar flares could be headed our way. This has many astronomers and companies asking if satellites and power grids are ready.

http://snipr.com/hh65c



Gates Funds Unorthodox Health Research
from the Times (London)

There is a magnet that can detect malaria at the flick of a switch, a flu-resistant chicken, an "antiviral" tomato and a vaccine enhanced with the use of a laser. The ideas are so bold that, as the scientists behind them admit, they can often struggle for funding.

Tuesday, though, more than 80 projects at the far edge of innovation in global health research will share millions of pounds of grants to support unorthodox thinking--and the outside chance of a world-changing discovery.

Among the recipients, announced today by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as part of their Grand Challenges initiative, are three British scientific teams pursuing novel approaches to prevent and treat infectious diseases such as tuberculosis, malaria and pneumonia, as well as viruses such as HIV.

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C. P. Snow's 'Two Cultures' Fifty Years Later
from the Telegraph (UK)

On May 7 1959, the celebrated novelist C. P. Snow mounted the podium in the Senate House in Cambridge to deliver that year's Rede Lecture. The title was "The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution," and his theme the dangerously wide gap that had opened up between scientists and "literary intellectuals."

He spoke of scientists who could scarcely struggle through a novel by Dickens, but more importantly of humanities professors who were ignorant of the Second Law of Thermodynamics, who sneered at science as an inferior branch of learning that no really cultured person needed to trouble with.

... Snow compared Britain unfavourably with the US and USSR, in terms of numbers of young people who remained in education to the age of 18 and above. The British system, he argued, forced children to specialise at an unusually early age, with snobbery dictating that the children would be pushed towards the "traditional culture" and the professions, rather than science and industry.

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Museum Puts Off DNA Testing of Lincoln Artifact
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

The strip of a pillowcase stained with the blood of Abraham Lincoln is usually locked away in a display case or safe at the Grand Army of the Republic Museum and Library in Philadelphia's Frankford section.

But Monday night it was brought out as Exhibit A during a debate among members of the museum's board over whether to allow DNA testing of the relic to solve a medical mystery. John Sotos ... asked to test the artifact to prove Lincoln had a rare genetic cancer syndrome called multiple endocrine neoplasia type 2B (MEN2B).

The museum board last night turned down Sotos' request while leaving open the possibility of future testing that may be overseen by the National Museum of Health and Medicine, part of the Armed Forces Institute of Pathology in Washington.

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Climate Change and Ethanol's Greenhouse Emissions
from the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)-The Obama administration renewed its commitment Tuesday to speed up investments in ethanol and other biofuels while seeking to deflect some environmentalists' claims that huge increases in corn ethanol use will hinder the fight against global warming.

President Barack Obama directed more loan guarantees and economic stimulus money for biofuels research and told the Agriculture Department to find ways to preserve biofuel industry jobs. The recession, as well as lower gasoline prices, has caused some ethanol producers to suffer, including some who have filed for bankruptcy.

... The reassurances to the ethanol industry came as the Environmental Protection Agency made public its initial analysis on what impact the massive expansion of future ethanol use could have on climate change.

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Targeting Risk Factors
from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Feeling that one is being treated unfairly is a sure guarantee of unhappiness and can quickly put a person into a sour mood.

But researchers at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Harvard find that it can also be hazardous to your health. Their work is part of a larger research project studying aging and health.

In the study appearing in a forthcoming issue of Brain, Behavior and Immunity, UW-Madison researcher Elliot Friedman and colleagues report that men who say they have been passed over for promotion, denied a bank loan or felt other [slights] show an increase in the level of E-selectin in their blood. This molecule is an indicator of blood vessel damage and is a marker for later heart problems ...

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Portuguese Trove of Trilobite Fossils
from Science News

Fossils unearthed at a slate quarry in northern Portugal include those of the largest known trilobites, as well as immense assemblages--some a thousand strong--that suggest the creatures exhibited social behavior.

Trilobites, an extremely successful but now long-extinct group of arthropods, strolled ancient seafloors for millions of years.

The new fossils come from rocks laid down as seafloor sediments about 465 million years ago, says Artur Sá, a paleontologist at the University of Trás-os-Montes and Alto Douro in Vila Real, Portugal. He and his colleagues describe the fossils in the May Geology.

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Bendable Concrete Heals Itself
from National Geographic News

Its not quite as advanced as Terminator technology. But a new concrete that can heal its own wounds may soon bring futuristic protection to bridges and roads.

Traditional concrete is brittle and is easily fractured during an earthquake or by overuse. By contrast, the new concrete composite can bend into a U-shape without breaking. When strained, the material forms hairline cracks, which auto-seal after a few days of light rain.

Dry material exposed by the cracks reacts with rainwater and carbon dioxide in the air to form "scars" of calcium carbonate, a strong compound found naturally in seashells, said study co-author Victor Li of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. The flexible material is just as strong after it heals, the study authors report.

http://snipr.com/hh7w2



Scientists Pinpoint Fats Danger
from BBC News Online

Scientists have identified a genetic mechanism which appears to determine which fatty deposits in the arteries have the potential to kill us. Most of these plaques pose no risk to health, but a minority burst, forming blood clots, which can cause heart attacks or strokes.

A Columbia University team pinpointed a gene which seems to make plaques more vulnerable to rupture. The American study appears in the journal Cell Metabolism.

Fatty deposits begin to form in the arteries of most people in their teens, but the vast majority are harmless. However, it is thought that around 2% of plaques have the potential to burst.

http://snipr.com/hh7xr

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 12, 2009, 05:56:45 PM
May 5, 2009



Mexican Officials Lower Flu Alert Level
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Amid signs that the H1N1 influenza outbreak in Mexico is waning, health authorities there said Monday that they were lowering the alert level and would begin allowing nonessential businesses to reopen, starting with restaurants Wednesday. Museums, churches and libraries can open a day later.

Mexican President Felipe Calderon said schools would reopen gradually. University and preparatory students will return to class Thursday, but those in lower grades will remain out until Monday to give officials more time to clean facilities.

"Today the situation is stabilizing, and we are on the way toward normalcy," Calderon said. Health Secretary Jose Angel Cordova said that no new deaths from H1N1 had occurred since Wednesday and that the number of new patients was falling. He said tests had confirmed the virus in 802 cases, fewer than half of the 2,150 samples checked.

http://snipr.com/hem8e



How to Grow New Organs
from Scientific American

... Today nearly 50 million people in the U.S. are alive because of various forms of artificial organ therapy, and one in every five people older than 65 in developed nations is very likely to benefit from organ replacement technology during the remainder of their lives.

Current technologies for organ substitution, such as whole-organ transplants and kidney dialysis machines, have saved many lives, but they are imperfect solutions that come with heavy burdens for patients.

Engineered biological tissues are customizable and immune-compatible and can therefore potentially make a significant difference in the lives of people with failing organs. They can fill other human needs as well, for example, serving as "organs on a chip" for testing the toxicity of candidate drugs.

http://snipr.com/hembg



Sun Oddly Quiet -- Hints at Next "Little Ice Age"?
from National Geographic News

A prolonged lull in solar activity has astrophysicists glued to their telescopes waiting to see what the sun will do next--and how Earth's climate might respond. The sun is the least active it's been in decades and the dimmest in a hundred years.

The lull is causing some scientists to recall the Little Ice Age, an unusual cold spell in Europe and North America, which lasted from about 1300 to 1850. The coldest period of the Little Ice Age, between 1645 and 1715, has been linked to a deep dip in solar storms known as the Maunder Minimum.

... But researchers are on guard against their concerns about a new cold snap being misinterpreted. "[Global warming] skeptics tend to leap forward," said Mike Lockwood, a solar terrestrial physicist at the University of Southampton in the U.K. He and other researchers are therefore engaged in what they call "preemptive denial" of a solar minimum leading to global cooling.

http://snipr.com/hemdw



Waves of the Future
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Just minutes after the seafloor north of the Indonesian island of Sumatra buckled on Dec. 26, 2004 ... analysts in Alaska and elsewhere knew a massive tsunami would likely follow.

Warnings were immediately issued. Phone calls were made. But the effort was too little, too late. The quake happened early on a Sunday morning. Most government offices were closed. Word was appallingly slow to reach small, isolated villages along the coasts of Thailand, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India. In many places, residents never knew what hit them.

... If a tsunami were to strike today, however, chances are much better that people in imperiled areas could be warned in time. Major elements of a global tsunami early warning system have been put in place, though some regions of the world remain uncovered.

http://snipr.com/hemg6



Here Comes the Sun. Right?
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... For the residents of Hillsboro, and for the Oregon economy, SolarWorld's presence is a welcome boon. Its employees enjoy being in start-up mode, while others like the cachet of working for a renewable-energy company--which goes down well in outdoorsy Oregon.

"Green is the way to go," says Michelle Zillig, who worked at Intel for 18 years before joining SolarWorld as a technician. "People can only have so many computers."

At first glance, the timing of SolarWorld's decision to invest $500 million in the new site during a recession, in a state with an unemployment rate second only to Michigan's, couldn't have been worse. Prices for the company's solar panels have slid about 15 percent since the factory opened, a result of growing competition and slowing demand, especially in Europe. Two manufacturers, GE Energy's solar branch and BP Solar, have cut production in East Coast plants. But new federal incentives to encourage renewable energy in the United States will give the industry a boost, analysts say.

http://snipr.com/hemhg



Mobile Food-Safety Labs Get FDA Up to Speed
from USA Today

NOGALES, Ariz.--The FDA has hit the road. A month ago, three gleaming white trailers--the Food and Drug Administration's $3 million mobile food-safety lab--rolled into this major port of entry for people and goods coming from Mexico. They joined an alphabet soup of federal agencies sifting through millions of tons of goods in search of drugs, guns, invasive plants and tainted foods.

The lab represents a new era for the agency in keeping the food supply safe, says Michael Chappell, FDA acting associate commissioner for regulatory affairs. It is a tool that can be suited up and rolled out to anyplace in the country facing the danger of contaminated food, whether at the hand of terrorists or Mother Nature.

... In the three weeks the trailers were based in Nogales before heading to their next assignment, the FDA estimates that direct contact with the truckers shaved tens of thousands of dollars in testing costs and spoiled produce. The mobile unit also may help repair the agency's reputation, which has been battered by public frustration with the contamination of such popular foods as peanuts and spinach.

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The Space Giant Is Coming
from BBC News Online

The most distant cosmic explosion ever recorded would have made a fascinating target for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), according to scientists now building the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope. The cataclysmic detonation reported last week is the most far-flung object in the Universe yet seen.

... Nasa's James Webb is designed with the purpose of imaging and studying this realm of the cosmos-and beyond-in extraordinary detail. It is scheduled for launch in 2013.

To see so far, the observatory will be the space agency's largest and most technically challenging telescope mission to date. Its primary mirror is 6.5m (21ft) across-close to three times wider than Hubble's.

http://snipr.com/hemqt



Nuclear Power Foes Not Stilled in New England
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

VERNON, Vt.-Sprawling along the Connecticut River, just a few miles from the Massachusetts border, lies Vermont Yankee, one of the country's oldest nuclear power plants and supplier of about a third of the Green Mountain State's electricity.

When the reactor first booted up in the early '70s, it was a symbol of an energy revolution in New England. Today, it is a symbol of how the region stands apart from the rest of the country, a place where skepticism of nuclear power-in the form of vocal and organized opposition- persists even as the nation gives nuclear energy a fresh look.

A march in Montpelier last week was only the latest reminder of ongoing opposition to Vermont Yankee's bid to extend its operating license 20 more years. The Vermont Public Interest Research Group wants the Vermont Yankee plant shut down, and assurances that its owner, Entergy Corp., will pay the full cost of decommissioning it.

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A Battle to Preserve a Visionary's Bold Failure
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In 1901, Nikola Tesla began work on a global system of giant towers meant to relay through the air not only news, stock reports and even pictures but also, unbeknown to investors such as J. Pierpont Morgan, free electricity for one and all. It was the inventor's biggest project, and his most audacious.

The first tower rose on rural Long Island and, by 1903, stood more than 18 stories tall. One midsummer night, it emitted a dull rumble and proceeded to hurl bolts of electricity into the sky. The blinding flashes, The New York Sun reported, "seemed to shoot off into the darkness on some mysterious errand."

But the system failed for want of money, and at least partly for scientific viability. Tesla never finished his prototype tower and was forced to abandon its adjoining laboratory. Today, a fight is looming over the ghostly remains of that site, called Wardenclyffe--what Tesla authorities call the only surviving workplace of the eccentric genius who dreamed countless big dreams while pioneering wireless communication and alternating current.

http://snipr.com/hemvt



How to Map the Multiverse
from New Scientist

Brian Greene spent a good part of the last decade extolling the virtues of string theory. He dreamed that one day it would provide physicists with a theory of everything that would describe our universe -- ours and ours alone. His bestselling book The Elegant Universe eloquently captured the quest for this ultimate theory.

"But the fly in the ointment was that string theory allowed for, in principle, many universes," says Greene, who is a theoretical physicist at Columbia University in New York. In other words, string theory seems equally capable of describing universes very different from ours. Greene hoped that something in the theory would eventually rule out most of the possibilities and single out one of these universes as the real one: ours.

So far, it hasn't -- though not for any lack of trying. As a result, string theorists are beginning to accept that their ambitions for the theory may have been misguided. Perhaps our universe is not the only one after all. Maybe string theory has been right all along.

http://snipr.com/hen00

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 12, 2009, 05:57:22 PM
May 4, 2009



Swine Flu Threat Appears to Be Easing, Officials Say
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The number of swine flu cases continued its slow climb, reaching 263 in the United States and at least 937 in 19 countries worldwide, but both Mexican and U.S. authorities expressed cautious optimism Sunday that the outbreak may not be as severe as originally feared.

U.S. officials continued to express confidence that the H1N1 virus was not unusually virulent, but they cautioned that the number of cases and deaths would rise. In Mexico, however, officials said the disease was on the decline.

"What I can say is that we're seeing encouraging signs," Dr. Richard Besser, acting director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said on ABC News' "This Week With George Stephanopoulos." "That makes us all very happy."

http://snipr.com/hc16u



Culture May Be Encoded in DNA
from Wired

Knowledge is passed down directly from generation to generation in the animal kingdom as parents teach their children the things they will need to survive. But a new study has found that, even when the chain is broken, nature sometimes finds a way.

Zebra finches, which normally learn their complex courtship songs from their fathers, spontaneously developed the same songs all on their own after only a few generations.

"We found that in this case, the culture was pretty much encoded in the genome," said Partha Mitra of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York, co-author of a study in Nature on Sunday.

http://snipr.com/hc18s



They Know What You're Thinking: Brain Scanning Makes Progress
from the Times (London)

If Adam Wilson had had a sense of making history he might have chosen his words more carefully. "Go Badgers," he wrote, in a message posted on the Twitter website last month.

The phrase, a rallying call for his university's sports team, seemed entirely unremarkable - until the research scientist revealed in a second message just how he had sent it.

"Spelling with my brain," he wrote 20 minutes later. Wilson had become the first person to post electronic messages just by thinking about them.

http://snipr.com/hc1i1



Seeking to Save the Planet, With a Thesaurus
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- The problem with global warming, some environmentalists believe, is "global warming." The term turns people off, fostering images of shaggy-haired liberals, economic sacrifice and complex scientific disputes, according to extensive polling and focus group sessions conducted by ecoAmerica, a nonprofit environmental marketing and messaging firm in Washington.

Instead of grim warnings about global warming, the firm advises, talk about "our deteriorating atmosphere." Drop discussions of carbon dioxide and bring up "moving away from the dirty fuels of the past." Don't confuse people with cap and trade; use terms like "cap and cash back" or "pollution reduction refund."

EcoAmerica has been conducting research for the last several years to find new ways to frame environmental issues and so build public support for climate change legislation and other initiatives.

http://snipr.com/hc1l6



Web-Footed Missing Link in Sea Life Evolution
from the San Francisco Chronicle

New York (Associated Press) -- Scientists say they've found a "missing link" in the early evolution of seals and walruses - the skeleton of a web-footed, otter-like creature that was evolving away from a life on land.

Those feet and other anatomical features show an early step on the way to developing flippers and other adaptations for a life in the sea, the scientists said. One expert called it "a fantastic discovery" that fills a crucial gap in the fossil record.

The 23 million-year-old creature was not a direct ancestor of today's seals, sea lions and walruses, a group known collectively as pinnipeds. It's from a different branch. But it does show what an early direct ancestor looked like, said researcher Natalia Rybczynski.

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Finding Space for All in Our Crowded Seas
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The ocean is getting crowded: Fishermen are competing with offshore wind projects, oil rigs along with sand miners, recreational boaters, liquefied gas tankers and fish farmers. So a growing number of groups -- including policymakers, academics, activists and industry officials -- now say it's time to divvy up space in the sea.

"We've got competition for space in the ocean, just like we have competition for space on land," said Andrew Rosenberg, a natural resources and environment professor at the University of New Hampshire who has advised Massachusetts on the issue. "How are you going to manage it? Is it the people with the most power win? Is it whoever got there first? Is it a free-for-all?"

To resolve these conflicts, a handful of states -- including Massachusetts, California and Rhode Island -- have begun essentially zoning the ocean, drawing up rules and procedures to determine which activities can take place and where. The federal government is considering adopting a similar approach, though any coherent effort would involve sorting out the role of 20 agencies that administer roughly 140 ocean-related laws.

http://snipr.com/hc1su



Ancient Tsunami 'Hit New York'
from BBC News Online

A huge wave crashed into the New York City region 2,300 years ago, dumping sediment and shells across Long Island and New Jersey and casting wood debris far up the Hudson River.

The scenario, proposed by scientists, is undergoing further examination to verify radiocarbon dates and to rule out other causes of the upheaval.

Sedimentary deposits from more than 20 cores in New York and New Jersey indicate that some sort of violent force swept the Northeast coastal region in 300BC.

http://snipr.com/hc1we



The Ice-Age Baby from the Deep Freeze
from the Guardian (UK)

Barely a month old, she fell into an ice age muddy river some 40,000 years ago, where a biological twist of fate led to her being almost perfectly preserved.

Astonishing pictures show Lyuba, named after the wife of the reindeer herder who discovered her in 2007 on the Yamal peninsula in Siberia. Missing only her hair and toenails, Lyuba is the best discovered example yet of a woolly mammoth spat from its tomb deep in the Russian permafrost.

An extinct group of elephants, woolly mammoths emerged some 400,000 years ago and died out perhaps just 10,000 years ago. In an echo of modern concerns about climate change, some blame their fate on a natural upswing in temperature that altered vegetation. Others accuse early human hunters.

http://snipr.com/hc1yw



Another Clue in the Case for Dark Matter
from Science News

DENVER -- Using a sensitive detector to survey the abundance of high-energy electrons and positrons in nearby reaches of space, the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope has found new evidence that may hint at the existence of dark matter, the exotic invisible material believed to make up 85 percent of the mass of the universe.

The measurements, reported May 2 at a meeting of the American Physical Society, bolster the possibility that another orbiting observatory called PAMELA (for Payload for Antimatter Matter Exploration and Light-nuclei Astrophysics) did indeed see indirect signs of dark matter, which has eluded detection ever since astronomers first proposed the material more than 75 years ago.

But it's also possible that many of the energetic electrons and positrons Fermi recorded might instead come from a more mundane astrophysical source -- dense, rapidly rotating stars called pulsars -- cautions Fermi researcher Peter Michelson of Stanford University.

http://snipr.com/hc29n



As Bats Die, Closing Caves to Control a Fungus
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (Associated Press) -- The federal Forest Service is preparing to close thousands of caves and former mines in national forests in 33 states in an effort to control a fungus that has already killed an estimated 500,000 bats.

A Forest Service biologist, Becky Ewing, said an emergency order was issued last week for caves in 20 states from Minnesota to Maine. A second order covering the Forest Service's 13-state Southern region should be issued this month.

The sites will be closed for up to a year, Ms. Ewing said. The orders follow the request in March by the Fish and Wildlife Service for people to voluntarily stay out of caves in 17 states.

http://snipr.com/hc2bz

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 12, 2009, 05:58:03 PM
May 1, 2009



Scientists See This Flu Strain as Relatively Mild
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

As the World Health Organization raised its infectious disease alert level and health officials confirmed the first death linked to swine flu inside U.S. borders, scientists studying the virus are coming to the consensus that this hybrid strain of influenza--at least in its current form--isn't shaping up to be as fatal as the strains that caused some previous pandemics.

In fact, the current outbreak of the H1N1 virus, which emerged in San Diego and southern Mexico late last month, may not even do as much damage as the run-of-the-mill flu outbreaks that occur each winter without much fanfare.

"Let's not lose track of the fact that the normal seasonal influenza is a huge public health problem that kills tens of thousands of people in the U.S. alone and hundreds of thousands around the world," said Dr. Christopher Olsen, a molecular virologist who studies swine flu at the University of Wisconsin School of Veterinary Medicine in Madison.

http://snipr.com/h5hln



Panel Advises Clarifying U.S. Plans on Cyberwar
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The United States has no clear military policy about how the nation might respond to a cyberattack on its communications, financial or power networks, a panel of scientists and policy advisers warned Wednesday, and the country needs to clarify both its offensive capabilities and how it would respond to such attacks.

The report, based on a three-year study by a panel assembled by the National Academy of Sciences, is the first major effort to look at the military use of computer technologies as weapons. The potential use of such technologies offensively has been widely discussed in recent years, and disruptions of communications systems and Web sites have become a standard occurrence in both political and military conflicts since 2000.

The report, titled "Technology, Policy, Law, and Ethics Regarding U.S. Acquisition and Use of Cyberattack Capabilities," concludes that the veil of secrecy that has surrounded cyberwar planning is detrimental to the country's military policy.

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Drug Shows Promise Against Chronic Hepatitis C
from the Baltimore Sun

LOS ANGELES (Associated Press)--An experimental drug greatly increased the number of people who appear to be cured of hepatitis C infection, according to results of mid-stage testing.

The findings also suggest the drug telaprevir, made by Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc., which sponsored the two studies, can cut treatment time from one year to six months. However, those taking the drug reported more side effects including severe rash, nausea and anemia than those on standard treatment alone.

Still, telaprevir and similar drugs that other companies are testing offer hope of a major advance against the disease, which afflicts about 3.2 million Americans and 180 million people worldwide. It is caused by a blood-borne virus that can lead to liver scarring or liver cancer. Treatment is aimed at helping the immune system eliminate the virus.

http://snipr.com/h5hs9



Birds Show Off Their Dance Moves
from BBC News Online

Some birds have a remarkable talent for dancing, two studies published in Current Biology suggest. Footage revealed that some parrots have a near-perfect sense of rhythm; swaying their bodies, bobbing their heads and tapping their feet in time to a beat.

Previously, it was thought that only humans had the ability to groove. The researchers believe the findings could help shed light on how our relationship with music and the capacity to dance came about.

One bird, Snowball, a sulphur-crested cockatoo (Cacatua galerita eleanora), came to the researchers' attention after YouTube footage suggested he might have a certain prowess for dance - especially when listening to Everybody by the Backstreet Boys.

http://snipr.com/h5htu



Huge Gene Study Shines New Light on African History
from New Scientist

The history of Africa, the cradle of humanity, is written in its genes. And now we have our best-ever view of African genetic diversity, with the publication of a huge study of the genomes of people from across the continent.

For the past 10 years, an international team led by Sarah Tishkoff of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia has toured the African continent, collecting blood samples from thousands of individuals. The results confirm Africa as the centre of human genetic diversity and, together with linguistic data, reveal a rich pattern of human migrations within the continent.

"Now we have a spectacular insight into the history of African populations," says Muntaser Ibrahim of the University of Khartoum in Sudan, a member of the team.

http://snipr.com/h5hvc



Team Claims Second Batch of Soft Dinosaur Tissue
from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

RALEIGH -- A team of researchers led by the N.C. State University scientist famed for the controversial discovery of soft tissue in the fossilized bone of a 68 million-year-old Tyrannosaurus rex in 2005 has found more soft tissue in an even older dinosaur skeleton.

Results of the more recent discovery, from the femur of an 80 million-year-old duckbill dinosaur, appear today in the journal Science. The new evidence not only undermines skeptics of Mary Schweitzer's earlier work, but also may offer clues about where more bones with such material may be found. That could help other scientists replicate the findings and investigate how such delicate material could last for such an extraordinary length of time.

... A crew including Schweitzer and some of her students dug the duckbill femur out of a Montana cliff in 2007, after other research suggested that soft tissue may be more common in bones that had been buried quickly in deep sandstone.

http://snipr.com/h5hwa



Leap Forward for Invisibility Cloaks
from Nature News

Invisibility 'carpets' that conceal objects by making bumps look flat can work under near-infrared light, two teams of physicists have shown. And making a similar device that shields objects in visible light should be relatively straightforward, they say.

Xiang Zhang and his colleagues at the University of California, Berkeley, and Michal Lipson's team at Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, have independently created slightly different versions of the silicon carpet.

In both designs, a mirrored edge that contains a bump appears flat, allowing an object to be tucked behind the bump without being seen. Infra-red light rays shone on the bump are bent by the surrounding material, making it appear that the radiation that bounces back has been reflected by a flat mirror.

http://snipr.com/h5hxy



"Dark Age" Temple Found in Turkey
from National Geographic News

An ancient temple in Turkey has been found filled with broken metal, ivory carvings, and stone slabs engraved with a dead language. The find is casting new light on the "dark age" that was thought to have engulfed the region from 1200 to 900 B.C.

Written sources from the era--including the Old Testament of the Bible, Greek Homeric epics, and texts from Egyptian pharaoh Ramses III--record the transition from the Bronze Age to the Iron Age as a turbulent period of cultural collapse, famine, and violence.

But the newfound temple suggests that may not have been the case, say archaeologists from the University of Toronto's Tayinat Archaeological Project, led by Timothy Harrison.

http://snipr.com/h5hz4



Tablet to Treat MS Seen as Huge Step Forward
from the Guardian (UK)

Campaigners for the 85,000 Britons with multiple sclerosis on Wednesday welcomed the emergence of a drug promising to greatly alleviate symptoms of the debilitating disease.

Trials of cladribine found that it offers significant benefit to the estimated 55,000 people who have relapsing-remitting MS, its commonest form, with alternating periods of good and bad health but a decline, sometimes into total paralysis, when the gaps between spells start to shorten.

Research on more than 1,300 MS patients over two years found those taking the cladribine tablet were 55% less likely to relapse than those on a placebo; they were 30% less likely to suffer worsening disability; and 80% were relapse-free, compared with 61% on the placebo. The results were presented at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology.

http://snipr.com/h5i0l



Warfare: All at Sea
from the Economist

Basing troops and equipment on foreign soil is fraught with difficulty. Even friendly countries can cut up rough at crucial moments, as America found when Turkey restricted the use of its territory and airspace during the invasion of Iraq in 2003. In an occupied country the situation is worse, as a base is a magnet for attacks. Nor can you always put your base where you need it.

If a country does not want to host it, and cannot be bribed to, that--short of invasion--is that. But no one owns the high seas, and partisans rarely have access to serious naval power. So America, still the world's only superpower and thus the one with most need for foreign bases, is investigating the idea of building military bases on the ocean.

They would, in effect, be composed of parts that can be rearranged like giant Lego bricks. The armed forces could assemble them when needed, add to them, subtract from them and eventually dismantle them when they are no longer required--and all without leaving a trace.

http://snipr.com/h5i2i

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 12, 2009, 06:01:03 PM
And finally,

Haldane - On Being the Right Size

http://irl.cs.ucla.edu/papers/right-size.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 19, 2009, 07:47:29 PM
Space Junk Raises Risks for Hubble Repair Mission
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--Space shuttle Atlantis is now in a rough orbital neighborhood-a place littered with thousands of pieces of space junk zipping around the Earth at nearly 20,000 mph.

There are more pieces of shattered satellites and used-up rockets in this region than astronauts have ever encountered. And the crew must be there for more than a week to repair the Hubble Space Telescope. As soon as the job is complete, the shuttle will scamper to safety.

The telescope orbits about 350 miles above Earth, a far dirtier place than where shuttles normally fly. And all those tiny projectiles raise the constant threat of a potentially fatal collision.

http://snipr.com/hxt8a



Mexican Genomes Show Wide Diversity
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press)--The most detailed look yet at the genetics of Mexicans is showing significant diversity, a finding that could help point the way to customized drugs and identification of people prone to certain diseases.

Researchers led by Dr. Gerardo Jimenez-Sanchez studied the genes of 300 mestizos--people of mixed Indian and European background--from six states in Mexico, and one Indian population.

They found significant differences between the mestizos and such groups as Europeans, Africans and Asians, the researchers reported in Tuesday's edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.

http://snipr.com/hxtbd



Study Links Formaldehyde to More Common Cancers
from USA Today

New research raises additional concerns about the harmful effects of formaldehyde, a common chemical found in everything from plywood to nail polish, car exhaust and cigarette smoke.

Formaldehyde has long been linked to rare tumors of the nasopharynx, which includes the back of the throat, which affect about 2,000 Americans a year, according to the American Cancer Society.

The new study--the largest to date on workplace exposures--provides further evidence linking formaldehyde with cancers of the blood and lymphatic system. These cancers are far more common, affecting nearly 140,000 Americans a year.

http://snipr.com/hxtds



'Chemical Robots' Swarm Together
from BBC News Online

In a pair of small laboratories in Prague, a swarm of tens of millions of robots is being prepared, to be set loose en masse. It is only fitting that here, in the town where the word robot was coined by author Karel Capek, the next generation of robotics should be envisioned.

But these won't be typical robots with gears and motors; they will instead be made of carefully designed chemical shells-within-shells, with receptors on their surface.

Instead of software and processors to guide them, their instructions will be written into the chemistry of their constituent parts. They are chemical robots, or as the 1.6m euro project's title has it, chobots.

http://snipr.com/hxthj



Mars Rover Spirit Is Stuck in Sand
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The long-lived rover Spirit is stuck in the sand on Mars, and controllers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge are scrambling to find a way to extricate the vehicle before it becomes entombed on the Red Planet.

"This is quite serious," said JPL's John Callas, the project manager for Spirit and its twin, Opportunity. "Spirit is in a very difficult situation. We are proceeding methodically and cautiously. It may be weeks before we try moving Spirit again."

The rover, which landed on Mars in 2004 for what was expected to be a three-month mission, was driving toward a pair of volcanic features named Von Braun and Goddard when it became ensnared in soft sand.

http://snipr.com/hxtja



A Scientist's Guide to Finding Alien Life
from Discover

Things were not looking so good for alien life in 1976, after the Viking I spacecraft landed on Mars, stretched out its robotic arm, and gathered up a fist-size pile of red dirt for chemical testing. Results from the probe's built-in lab were anything but encouraging.

... What a difference 33 years make. Back then, Mars seemed the only remotely plausible place beyond Earth where biology could have taken root. Today our conception of life in the universe is being turned on its head as scientists are finding a whole lot of inviting real estate out there.

As a result, they are beginning to think not in terms of single places to look for life but in terms of "habitable zones"--maps of the myriad places where living things could conceivably thrive beyond Earth. Such abodes of life may lie on other planets and moons throughout our galaxy, throughout the universe, and even beyond.

http://snipr.com/hxtky



China Outpaces U.S. in Cleaner Coal-Fired Plants
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

TIANJIN, China--China's frenetic construction of coal-fired power plants has raised worries around the world about the effect on climate change. China now uses more coal than the United States, Europe and Japan combined, making it the world's largest emitter of gases that are warming the planet.

But largely missing in the hand-wringing is this: China has emerged in the past two years as the world's leading builder of more efficient, less polluting coal power plants, mastering the technology and driving down the cost.

While the United States is still debating whether to build a more efficient kind of coal-fired power plant that uses extremely hot steam, China has begun building such plants at a rate of one a month.

http://snipr.com/hxtof



"Supergiant" Asteroid Shut Down Mars's Magnetic Field
from National Geographic News

A "supergiant" asteroid several times larger than the one that likely killed the dinosaurs struck Mars with such force that it shut down the planet's magnetic field, scientists say.

Based on the number of large craters present, scientists think very early Mars suffered 15 or so giant impacts within a span of about a hundred million years.

Now a new computer model suggests Mars's magnetic field may have been slowly weakened by four especially large impacts and then snuffed out completely by a fifth and final blow.

http://snipr.com/hxtpa



Nonstick Chemical Pollutes Water at Notable Levels
from Science News

A new study finds evidence that people may be exposed through drinking water to a persistent nonstick chemical at levels approaching those that trigger adverse effects in laboratory animals.

The fluorine-based nonstick chemical, PFOA or perfluorooctanoic acid, was developed by DuPont more than 50 years ago and used to launch the company's Teflon line of nonstick products. Ironically, earlier studies have shown that the nonstick agent itself sticks around a very, very long time--potentially forever.

The chemical appeared in roughly two-thirds of some 30 public water systems sampled by New Jersey's Department of Environmental Protection between 2006 and 2008, researchers report online and in an upcoming issue of Environmental Science & Technology.

http://snipr.com/hxtqt



Women 'Fight Off Disease Better'
from BBC News Online

Men really do have an excuse for supposedly being wimpy about coughs and colds-their immune systems are not as strong as women's, research suggests.

A Canadian study indicates that the female sex hormone oestrogen gives women's immune systems added bite at fighting off infection.

Oestrogen seems to counter an enzyme which blocks the inflammatory process. The McGill University study appears in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/hxttc

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 19, 2009, 07:48:28 PM
Astronauts Install New Hubble Camera
from the Baltimore Sun

The crowd of scientists watching on the big screen in the auditorium of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore went silent Thursday when it appeared a single stuck bolt might foil NASA's plans to install a powerful new camera on the Hubble Space Telescope.

Astronaut Drew Feustel had tried and failed to budge it with his power wrench. If he couldn't muscle it into submission with elbow grease alone, the 15-year-old camera would have to be reconnected. Worse, its replacement - the $150 million Wide Field Camera 3, packing more than ten times the "discovery power" of the old camera - would have to be repacked for the ride home.

"If you needed any proof that no task in space is routine, this is it," said Mario Livio, a senior scientist at the institute.

http://snipr.com/i2vxl



Study Halves Prediction of Rising Seas
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A new analysis halves longstanding projections of how much sea levels could rise if Antarctica's massive western ice sheets fully disintegrated as a result of global warming.

The flow of ice into the sea would probably raise sea levels about 10 feet rather than 20 feet, according to the analysis, published in the May 15 issue of the journal Science.

The scientists also predicted that seas would rise unevenly, with an additional 1.5-foot increase in levels along the east and west coasts of North America. That is because the shift in a huge mass of ice away from the South Pole would subtly change the strength of gravity locally and the rotation of the Earth, the authors said.

http://snipr.com/i2p7s



Is Alzheimer's Disease in Your Future?
from ABC News

It may soon be easier to predict which patients 65 and older will develop Alzheimer's disease and other dementias, researchers said.

A 15-point index including both conventional and newly identified risk factors for the conditions correctly classified 88 percent of patients according to their risk of developing dementia within six years, Deborah Barnes of the University of California San Francisco and colleagues reported online in Neurology.

More than half of patients with a high score -- 56 percent of them -- developed some form of dementia, compared with 4.2 percent of those with a low score and 22.8 percent of those who fell in between.

http://snipr.com/i2p8t



Star Crust Is Ten Billion Times Stronger Than Steel
from National Geographic News

Move over, Superman. The Man of Steel has nothing on the collapsed cores of massive snuffed-out stars, scientists say.

A new computer model suggests that the outer crusts of so-called neutron stars are the strongest known material in the universe. To determine the breaking point of a neutron star's crust, the team modeled magnetic field stresses and crust deformation for a small region of the star's surface.

The results showed that the crust of a neutron star can withstand a breaking strain up to ten billion times the pressure it would take to snap steel. "It sounds dramatic, but it's true," said study team member Charles Horowitz of Indiana University.

http://snipr.com/i2pa5



Talks Tackle Climate Change Finds
from the New Zealand Herald

Researchers at a three-day science conference starting in Wellington today are looking at implications of new work on climate change.

More than 150 scientists from around the world will look at past climates in New Zealand, Australia and Antarctica, the causes and effects of climate change specifically in the Southern Hemisphere, and their relationships with global climates.

At the weekend, the scientists will hold workshops on climate in Australasia and the Southern Hemisphere looking at analysis of ice-core, marine and terrestrial records as well as computer modelling of past climates. Geomorphologist Andrew Mackintosh of Victoria University - who was part of new research showing New Zealand glaciers have been heavily influenced by regional atmospheric conditions - has already said people should not assume warming will be uniform over the Earth.

http://tinyurl.com/ofste2



Lift-off for European Telescopes
from BBC News Online

Europe's Herschel and Planck telescopes have blasted into space on an Ariane 5 rocket from Kourou in French Guiana. The satellites are being sent into orbit to gather fundamental new insights into the nature of the cosmos.

The Ariane thundered clear of the launch pad at 1312 GMT (1412 BST) - its flight lasting just under half an hour. Mission controllers in Germany made contact with the telescopes over the Indian Ocean once they had separated from the rocket's upper-stage.

The acquisition of the signals, relayed through ground stations in Australia, will have been a moment of huge relief for everyone connected with the two observatory projects.

http://snipr.com/i2pdu



Cancer Patients Challenge the Patenting of a Gene
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

When Genae Girard received a diagnosis of breast cancer in 2006, she knew she would be facing medical challenges and high expenses. But she did not expect to run into patent problems.

Ms. Girard took a genetic test to see if her genes also put her at increased risk for ovarian cancer, which might require the removal of her ovaries. The test came back positive, so she wanted a second opinion from another test. But there can be no second opinion. A decision by the government more than 10 years ago allowed a single company, Myriad Genetics, to own the patent on two genes that are closely associated with increased risk for breast cancer and ovarian cancer, and on the testing that measures that risk.

On Tuesday, Ms. Girard, 39, who lives in the Austin, Tex., area, filed a lawsuit against Myriad and the Patent Office, challenging the decision to grant a patent on a gene to Myriad and companies like it. She was joined by four other cancer patients, by professional organizations of pathologists with more than 100,000 members and by several individual pathologists and genetic researchers.

http://snipr.com/i2pey



What You Need to Know Before Going Under the Knife
from Scientific American

Every operation starts with a cut and ends when the incision is closed. And though the closing act that follows a complicated surgery may seem almost incidental, a surgeon's choice of needles, sutures or adhesives to do the job plays a big part in how well and how quickly the patient heals.

These days, there are more tools than ever at a surgeon's disposal. The choice of which one to use is as much art as science, often boiling down to a surgeon's personal preference, says Lee Nelson, a neurosurgeon with Boulder Neurosurgical Associates in Colorado.

"Every surgeon probably uses 10 different types of sutures for different reasons," he adds. Flexibility, elasticity and strength of the materials are part of the calculation. The composition and thickness of a suture and needle depend on what the surgeon is closing.

http://snipr.com/i2ph1



Dead or Alive? Yucca Mountain Still Gets Funding
from the Miami Herald (Registration Required)

LAS VEGAS (Associated Press) -- These days, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid prefers nothing so much as a one-word description for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository long planned for his state: dead. And President Barack Obama has made clear he is looking elsewhere to solve the nation's nuclear waste problem.

But that doesn't mean people aren't still paying for it. Sometimes not even a president with the Senate majority leader at his back can easily kill a project 25 years and $13.5 billion in the making. Not quickly or cheaply, anyway.

In February, Congress allocated $288 million for the development of the site legally designated to hold the nation's radioactive waste. That was about $100 million less than what the Bush administration requested, but still enough for a staff of several hundred people to continue work. Last week, President Barack Obama proposed $196.8 million in 2010 funding for Yucca Mountain, an all-time low.

http://snipr.com/i2pic



Ginger Capsules Ease Nausea From Chemo
from the Seattle Times

(Associated Press) -- Ginger, long used as a folk remedy for soothing tummy aches, helped tame one of the most dreaded side effects of cancer treatment: nausea from chemotherapy, the first large study to test the herb for this has found.

People who started taking ginger capsules several days before a chemo infusion had fewer and less severe bouts of nausea afterward than others who were given dummy capsules, the federally funded study found.

"We were slightly beside ourselves" to see how much it helped, said study leader Julie Ryan, of the University of Rochester in New York. Results were released Thursday by the American Society of Clinical Oncology and will be presented at the group's annual meeting this month.

http://snipr.com/i2pjj

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 19, 2009, 07:49:24 PM
May 18, 2009



'Lone' Longitude Genius May Have Had Help
from New Scientist

The story of John Harrison the "lone genius" who solved the problem of finding longitude at sea is in urgent need of a rewrite.

Discoveries made during repairs to Harrison's first successful "sea clock" - completed in 1735 - suggest that others contributed to his pioneering timepieces. "Harrison is always cast as a self-taught lone genius pitted against the establishment. The truth is, that is a great over-simplification," says horologist Jonathan Betts of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, London.

Betts dismantled the device - called H1 - after it stopped last year when a connection between a spring and a swinging balance broke. "It's only when you take it apart and have it in your hands that it comes home to you: the story isn't quite the one that's told."

http://snipr.com/i9gkl



Beyond Galileo's Universe
from Science News

Four hundred years ago, astronomy embraced all that was visible. For Galileo, looking through his primitive telescope, the vistas included jewel-like stars, mountains on the moon, moons orbiting Jupiter and the glow of comet tails.

Today astronomy is often about what cannot be seen. Astronomers have known for decades that stars and galaxies are mere baubles floating on a vast sea of dark matter. More recently, astronomy's roster of Darth Vaders has expanded to include an even more mysterious force: dark energy, an entity that drives the universe to accelerate its expansion just when gravity's tug ought to be slowing it down.

On the brighter side, astronomers are beginning to learn more about the complicated processes that formed stars and galaxies, giving the universe its light. The Planck mission will test the idea that the Big Bang was accompanied by a brief burst of rapid expansion called inflation, which is thought to have created the seeds of matter from which stars and galaxies arose.

http://snipr.com/i9gmq



As Alaska Glaciers Melt, It's Land That's Rising
from New York Times (Registration Required)

JUNEAU, Alaska -- Global warming conjures images of rising seas that threaten coastal areas. But in Juneau, as almost nowhere else in the world, climate change is having the opposite effect: As the glaciers here melt, the land is rising, causing the sea to retreat.

The geology is complex, but it boils down to this: Relieved of billions of tons of glacial weight, the land has risen much as a cushion regains its shape after someone gets up from a couch. The land is ascending so fast that the rising seas -- a ubiquitous byproduct of global warming -- cannot keep pace. As a result, the relative sea level is falling, at a rate "among the highest ever recorded," according to a 2007 report by a panel of experts convened by Mayor Bruce Botelho of Juneau.

Greenland and a few other places have experienced similar effects from widespread glacial melting that began more than 200 years ago, geologists say. But, they say, the effects are more noticeable in and near Juneau, where most glaciers are retreating 30 feet a year or more.

http://snipr.com/i9gor



Scientist Say Blue Whales Returning to Alaska Waters, Likely Establishing Old Migration Route
from Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Associated Press) -- Blue whales are returning to Alaska in search of food and could be re-establishing an old migration route several decades after they were nearly wiped out by commercial whalers, scientists say.

The endangered whales, possibly the largest animals ever to live on Earth, have yet to recover from the worldwide slaughter that eliminated 99 percent of their number, according to the American Cetacean Society. The hunting peaked in 1931 with more than 29,000 animals killed in one season.

The animals used to cruise from Mexico and Southern California to Alaska, but they had mostly vanished from Alaskan waters. But several sightings of California whales in recent years off the coasts of Alaska and British Columbia suggest that the massive animals are expanding north again in search of tiny shrimp-like krill to eat, scientists contend in a recent article published in the journal Marine Mammal Science.

http://snipr.com/i9gpz



House, EPA to Tackle Climate Policy Alternatives
from the San Francisco Chronicle

(Associated Press) -- Congress and the Obama administration have two options when it comes to global warming: write a new law to deal with it or use existing ones to do the job. Both approaches await scrutiny by lawmakers and regulators Monday.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee planned to begin work on legislation that, for the first time, would limit the emissions blamed for global warming.

"It is clear that the choice is no longer between doing something and doing nothing to curb greenhouse gas pollution. It is a choice between regulation and legislation," said Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., "We believe that the bill we have crafted in the Energy and Commerce Committee ... protects consumers and provides businesses with the certainty they need to adapt to our clean energy future."

http://snipr.com/i9grn



Who Went With Columbus? Dental Studies Give Clues
from Washington Post (Registration Required)

The first planned colonial town in the New World was founded in 1494, when about 1,200 of Christopher Columbus's crew members from the 17 ships that made up his second journey to the Americas settled on the north coast of what is now the Dominican Republic.

Beset by mutiny, mismanagement, hurricanes and disease, the settlement of La Isabela lasted only a few years. The ruins remained largely intact until the 1950s, when a local official reportedly misunderstood the order from dictator Rafael Trujillo to clean up the site in preparation for visiting dignitaries, and had them mostly bulldozed into the sea. Little remained but the skeletons below ground in the church cemetery, which lay undisturbed until excavations began in 1983.

In the past few years, sophisticated chemical studies of the skeletons, especially their teeth, have begun to yield new insights into the lives and origins of Columbus's crew. The studies hint that, among other things, crew members may have included free black Africans who arrived in the New World about a decade before the slave trade began.

http://snipr.com/i9hak



New York Reports Its First Swine Flu Death
from New York Times (Registration Required)

An assistant principal at a New York City public school died of complications from swine flu in an intensive care unit of a Queens hospital on Sunday night, the first death in New York State of the flu strain that has swept across much of the world since it was first identified in April.

On Friday, Dr. Daniel Jernigan, head of flu epidemiology for the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said there had been 173 hospitalizations and 5 deaths reported to the agency. But he emphasized that most cases in the United States -- possibly "upwards of 100,000" -- were mild.

In Japan, the number of swine flu cases soared over the weekend, and authorities closed more than 1,000 schools and kindergartens.

http://snipr.com/i9hc5



The Plant That Can Water Itself
from BBC News Online

The plant, a type of rhubarb, has specially designed leaves that channel rain water to its roots. It is the only known plant in the world able to self-irrigate.

The adaptation allows the rhubarb to flourish in extreme arid conditions by collecting up to 16 times more water than other plants in the region, say the scientists who published details of the discovery in Naturwissenschaften.

Simcha Lev-Yadun, Gadi Katzir and Gidi Ne'eman of the University of Haifa, Israel first noticed the desert rhubarb when studying plants in the country's mountainous desert.

http://snipr.com/i9hdj



Women's Menstruation Genes Found
from BBC News Online

A UK-led team located two genes on chromosomes six and nine that appear to strongly influence the age at which menstruation starts.

The Nature Genetics study also provides a clue for why girls who are shorter and fatter tend to get their periods months earlier than classmates. The genes sit right next to DNA controlling height and weight.

A second paper, published in the same journal, also concludes that one of the two genes highlighted by the first study plays a key role in the timing of puberty in both girls and boys.

http://snipr.com/i9hgh



Pollution Can Change Your DNA in 3 Days, Study Suggests
from National Geographic News

Breathing in polluted air may wreak havoc on our DNA, reprogramming genes in as few as three days and causing increased rates of cancer and other diseases.

So says a new study that tracked DNA damage in 63 steel-foundry workers in Brescia, Italy, who, under their normal factory conditions, were exposed to particulate matter.

The same damage may occur in city dwellers exposed to normal air, the researchers say. Particulate matter includes suspended, tiny bits of dust, metal, or soot in the air, which can lodge deep in the lungs. Exposure to the substance has been linked to respiratory diseases, lung cancer, and heart problems.

http://snipr.com/i9hhz



UN: Growth of Slums Boosting Natural Disaster Risk
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (Associated Press) -- The rampant growth of urban slums around the world and weather extremes linked to climate change have sharply increased the risks from "megadisasters" such as devastating floods and cyclones, a U.N. report said Sunday.

The study -- which examines natural disaster trends and strategies to reduce potential catastrophes -- also noted that millions of people in rural areas are at higher risk from disasters such as landslides where forests have been stripped away or crippling droughts blamed on shifting rainfall patterns.

Much of nearly 200-page report restates warnings from previous studies about unchecked urban growth and shortsighted rural planning. But it also seeks to sharpen the apparent link between climate change and the severity and frequency of major natural disasters including severe droughts and epic storms.

http://snipr.com/i9hpc
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 19, 2009, 07:50:41 PM
May 19, 2009



What If Global-Warming Fears Are Overblown?
from Fortune

With Congress about to take up sweeping climate-change legislation, expect to hear more in coming weeks from John Christy, director of the Earth System Science Center at University of Alabama-Huntsville.

A veteran climatologist who refuses to accept any research funding from the oil or auto industries, Christy was a lead author of the 2001 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report as well as one of the three authors of the American Geophysical Union's landmark 2003 statement on climate change.

Yet despite those green-sounding credentials, Christy is not calling for draconian cuts in carbon emissions. Quite the contrary. Christy is actually the environmental lobby's worst nightmare - an accomplished climate scientist with no ties to Big Oil who has produced reams and reams of data that undermine arguments that the earth's atmosphere is warming at an unusual rate and question whether the remedies being talked about in Congress will actually do any good.

http://snipr.com/ic5dc



Mockingbirds Can Identify People and Quickly React to Those They Don't Trust, Study Finds
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Mockingbirds may look pretty much alike to people, but they can tell us apart and are quick to react to folks they don't like. Birds rapidly learn to identify people who have previously threatened their nests and sounded alarms and even attacked those folks, while ignoring others nearby, researchers report in Tuesday's edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"This shows a bird is much more perceptive of its environment than people had previously suspected," said Douglas J. Levey, a professor in the zoology department of the University of Florida.

The researchers are studying mockingbirds as part of an effort to better understand how species adapt to urbanization.

http://snipr.com/ic5fu



A Long Search for a Universal Flu Vaccine
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Two shots of measles vaccine given during childhood protect a person for life. Four shots of polio vaccine do the same. But flu shots must be taken every year. And even so, they provide less than complete protection.

The reason is that the influenza virus mutates much more rapidly than most other viruses. A person who develops immunity to one strain of the virus is not well protected from a different strain.

That is shaping up to be a major problem as the world prepares for a possible pandemic this fall from the new strain of swine flu. It is impossible to know how many people might die before a vaccine matched to that strain can be manufactured.

http://snipr.com/ic5h8



Officials Urge WHO to Change Swine Flu Alert Criteria
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

As the World Health Organization inched closer Monday to raising the infectious disease alert level to its highest stage -- and to a decision on whether to manufacture a vaccine against the novel H1N1 influenza virus -- some delegates to the WHO congress in Geneva urged the agency to change its criteria for increasing the alert level.

Current rules call for the alert to be raised to Phase 6 if community transmission of the new virus is observed in two different WHO regions. So far, such transmission has been observed only in North America, which accounts for about 95% of the nearly 9,000 confirmed infections that have been observed worldwide.

But an outbreak of the virus in Japan detected over the weekend hints that such transmission may soon be observed in Asia as well. Japanese authorities said Monday in Tokyo that there have been 135 confirmed cases of H1N1 influenza in schools in Kobe and Osaka, mostly among students and family members who have not visited North America, suggesting that the virus might have been transmitted locally.

http://snipr.com/ic5j1



Vehicle Emission Rules to Tighten
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Obama administration today plans to propose tough standards for tailpipe emissions from new automobiles, establishing the first nationwide regulation for greenhouse gases.

It will also raise fuel efficiency targets to 35.5 miles per gallon for new passenger vehicles and light trucks by 2016, four years earlier than required under the 2007 energy bill, sources close to the administration said.

The measures are significant steps forward for the administration's energy agenda by cutting greenhouse-gas emissions that contribute to climate change and by easing U.S. dependence on oil, most of which is imported.

http://snipr.com/ic5kr



Astronauts Ready to Say Goodbye to Hubble for Good
From the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

CAPE CANAVERAL (Associated Press) -- It's time for NASA to say goodbye to the Hubble Space Telescope. Astronauts on the space shuttle Atlantis Tuesday morning will gently toss the 19-year-old observatory back into orbit. That's after five successful spacewalks to install two new scientific instruments, fix two broken ones, and do general maintenance.

NASA says the handyman mission not only fixed Hubble, but it should last five to 10 more years and unlock even more mysteries of the cosmos.

There will be no more repair missions to Hubble. Sometime after 2020, NASA will send a robotic spaceship to steer Hubble back into the atmosphere and a watery grave.

http://snipr.com/ic5m4



Komodo Dragons Have Venomous Bite
from BBC News Online

Previously it was thought that Komodo mouths harboured virulent bacteria that quickly infect and subdue prey.

But an analysis of Komodo specimens has shown a well-developed venom gland with ducts that lead to their large teeth.

The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences report shows that rather than using a strong bite force, Komodos keep a vise-like grip on their prey. In this way, the venom can seep into the large wounds they make with their teeth.

http://snipr.com/ic5nz



The Birds Are Dying, and No One Knows Why
from the Miami Herald (Registration Required)

SANTIAGO, Chile -- Chilean scientists are investigating three mysterious ecological disasters that have caused the deaths of hundreds of penguins, millions of sardines and about 2,000 baby flamingos in the past few months.

The events started to unfold in March, when the remains of about 1,200 penguins were found on a remote beach in southern Chile. Then came the sardines -- tons of them -- dead and washed up on a nearby stretch of coastline. The stench forced nearby schools to close, and the army was called in to shovel piles of rotting fish off the sand.

Farther north, thousands of rare Andean flamingos abandoned their nests on a salt lake in the Atacama Desert. The eggs failed to hatch and, over a period of three months, all 2,000 chicks died. The extent of the damage was discovered in April, during an inspection.

http://snipr.com/ic5pe



Breathing Batteries Could Store 10 Times the Energy
from NewScientist

The lithium ion batteries used in laptops and cellphones, and tipped for future use in electric cars, are approaching their technological limits. But chemists in the UK say that there's a way to break through the looming energy capacity barrier - let the batteries "breathe" oxygen from the air.

A standard lithium ion battery contains a negative electrode of graphite, a positive electrode of lithium cobalt oxide, and a lithium salt-containing electrolyte. Lithium ions shuttle between the two electrodes during charging and discharging, sending electrons around the external circuit to power a gadget in the process.

The problem with that design, says Peter Bruce at the University of St Andrews, is that the lithium cobalt oxide is bulky and heavy. "The major barrier to increasing the energy density of these batteries is the positive electrode," he says. "Everyone wants to find a way to push up the amount of lithium stored there, which would raise the capacity."

http://snipr.com/ic5ro



Delaying Retirement Could Prevent Early Dementia, Say Scientists
from the Guardian (UK)

Working beyond normal retirement age might help stave off dementia, scientists said today.

Keeping the brain active later in life appears to reduce the chances of an early onset of Alzheimer's disease, according to a study of 382 men with probable dementia. The researchers suggest a significant link between later retirement and delayed symptoms.

The findings emerged from a wider study on data from 1,320 people with dementia led by members of the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College, London, and funded by the Alzheimer's Research Trust and the Medical Research Council.

http://snipr.com/ic5t4
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 15, 2009, 02:01:39 PM
Had alot alot of back logged science news articles, but I don't have time to post them all so heres just the most recent batch.

June 12, 2009



No Smoking: Historic Vote Could Bring New Limits
from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Smoking foes see a turning point in their long battle against the tobacco industry as Congress prepares to send President Barack Obama a bill giving the government broad authority to determine how cigarettes will be made, marketed and sold.

The House was scheduled to vote Friday on legislation, passed just a day before by the Senate, that for the first time would put the Food and Drug Administration in charge of regulating cigarettes and other tobacco products.

The measure puts special emphasis on dissuading some of the 3,500 young people who every day smoke a cigarette for the first time. The FDA would ban use of candied and other flavored tobacco used to entice young smokers, stop advertising that targets children, make it harder for underaged youth to buy cigarettes ...

http://snipr.com/jz4w7



WHO Calls Swine Flu Outbreak a Pandemic
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The World Health Organization yesterday declared the seven-week-old outbreak of the novel H1N1 influenza virus a pandemic, marking it as a historic global health event, one whose consequences may not be known for years.

The announcement -- expected for weeks but made with some reluctance -- essentially warns the WHO's 194 member nations to get ready for the new flu strain, which is likely to infect as much as one-third of the population in the first wave and return in later waves that may be more severe.

"The world is moving into the early days of its first influenza pandemic of the 21st century," Margaret Chan, the WHO's director general, said at an afternoon news conference in Geneva. "We anticipate this action will raise many questions and that often these questions do not have simple answers."

http://snipr.com/jz4y9



Japan's First Lunar Probe Ends Mission
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

TOKYO (Associated Press) -- Japan's first lunar probe made a controlled crash landing on the moon Thursday, successfully completing a 19-month mission to study the Earth's nearest neighbor, Japan's space agency said.

The remotely controlled satellite, named after the folklore princess Kaguya, had been orbiting the moon to map its surface and study its mineral distribution and gravity levels. It was dropped onto the surface of the moon at 3:25 am. (1825 GMT), the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, said in a statement.

"The mission was a success. Thanks to Kaguya, we will have a very detailed map of the lunar surface," said JAXA spokesman Shinichi Sobue. The Japanese space agency will analyze data sent by Kaguya and plans to publish the results online in November.

http://snipr.com/jz4zu



Population and Sustainability
from Scientific American

In an era of changing climate and sinking economies, Malthusian limits to growth are back--and squeezing us painfully. Whereas more people once meant more ingenuity, more talent and more innovation, today it just seems to mean less for each.

Less water for every cattle herder in the Horn of Africa. ... Less land for every farmer already tilling slopes so steep they risk killing themselves by falling off their fields.

... Less capacity in the atmosphere to accept the heat-trapping gases that could fry the planet for centuries to come. Scarcer and higher-priced energy and food. And if the world's economy does not bounce back to its glory days, less credit and fewer jobs. It's not surprising that this kind of predicament brings back an old sore topic: human population and whether to do anything about it.

http://snipr.com/jz520



"Human"-Faced Missing Link Found in Spain?
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Move over Ida--you're last month's news. There's a new (purported) "missing link" in town.

An 11.9-million-year-old fossil ape species with an unusually flat, "surprisingly human" face has been found in Spain. The discovery suggests humans' ape ancestors split from primitive apes in Europe, not Africa--the so-called cradle of humanity--a new study says.

The species, Anoiapithecus brevirostris, may also represent the last known common ancestor of humans and living great apes--including orangutans, gorillas, and chimpanzees--researchers say. "With this fossil, our opinion is that the origin of our family very probably took place in the Mediterranean region," said study leader Salvador Moyà-Solà of the Catalan Institute of Paleontology in Barcelona.

http://snipr.com/jz53r



Tuberculosis Bacterium Subverts Basic Cell Functions
from Science News

Tuberculosis microbes invading human immune cells carry a cargo that increases TB virulence by inducing the cells to act less like sentinels and more like bystanders, tests in mice show.

In a report in the June 11 Nature, a team hypothesizes that this initial infection strategy lays the groundwork for TB's uncanny ability to lie dormant in an infected person for years. Even though TB has been studied for hundreds of years, it still guards many secrets -- including precisely how it undercuts immune cells.

"Understanding the mechanisms by which the bacteria are having their way with our host cells will be very helpful in coming up with targets that we might hit," says Kathleen McDonough, a microbiologist at the State University of New York at Albany and the Wadsworth Center of the New York State Department of Health, also in Albany.

http://snipr.com/jz55f



Typhoons Trigger Slow Earthquakes
from BBC News Online

Typhoons can trigger imperceptible, slow earthquakes, researchers say.

Scientists report in the journal Nature that, in a seismically active zone in Taiwan, pressure changes caused by typhoons "unclamp" the fault. This gentle release causes an earthquake that dissipates its energy over several hours rather than a few potentially devastating seconds.

The researchers believe this could explain why there are relatively few large earthquakes in this region. Alan Linde from the Carnegie Institution for Science in the US and colleagues monitored movement of two colliding tectonic plates in eastern Taiwan.

http://snipr.com/jz575



Despite Odds, Cities Race to Bet on Biotech
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

KANNAPOLIS, N.C. -- Where a textile mill once drove the economy of this blue-collar town northeast of Charlotte, an imposing neoclassical complex is rising, filled with fine art, Italian marble and multimillion-dollar laboratory equipment. Three buildings, one topped by a giant dome, form the beginnings of what has been nicknamed the Biopolis, a research campus dedicated to biotechnology.

At $500 million and counting, the Biopolis, officially called the North Carolina Research Campus, is a product of a national race to attract the biotechnology industry, a current grail of economic development.

Cities like Shreveport, La., and Huntsville, Ala., are also gambling millions in taxpayer dollars on if-we-build-it-they-will-come research parks and wet laboratories, which hold the promise of low-pollution workplaces and high salaries.

http://snipr.com/jz58x



Report: Planets Will Collide in 5 Billion Years
from the San Francisco Chronicle

From chaos we all began, and to chaos we'll all return, but not for a very, very long time - 5 billion years or so, more or less.

In the journal Nature, two French scientists, using arcane mathematical models, predict that in the distant future, the Earth and planet after planet will collide with each other as an inevitable part of the solar system's long-term evolution.

For many millennia, the scientists say, the orbits of the solar system's eight planets will remain stable, just as they are today, but eventually small eccentricities in their flight paths around the sun could cause Mercury, Mars, Venus and Earth to smash into each other, either one at a time or all at once - the ultimate chaotic disaster.

http://snipr.com/jz5af



Aztec Temple Could Yield One of Antiquity's Great Treasures
from the Times (London)

Archaeologists working amid the smog and din of Mexico City may be on the verge of unlocking an extraordinary time capsule.

The leaders of a team exploring a site opened up by earthquake damage believe that they have found the first tomb of an Aztec ruler. If they are right the site may yield one of the great treasures of antiquity, the sort of haul that fires the imagination of people far beyond academic circles.

None of the finds has been put on public display but Britain will get an early preview. Fourteen gold objects from the site will feature in the British Museum's exhibition on Moctezuma II, the last great Aztec ruler. These could prove to be the early pickings of a much richer harvest.

http://snipr.com/jz5bm

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 15, 2009, 02:24:31 PM
And, some random articles/links:

Decoding antiquity: Eight scripts that still cannot be read (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20227106.000-decoding-antiquity-eight-scripts-that-still-cant-be-read.html)

Rising sea levels: Survival tips from 5000 BC (http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20227096.600-rising-sea-levels-survival-tips-from-5000-bc.html?full=true)

Why people believe invisible agents control the world (http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?action=post;topic=17231.375;num_replies=389)

Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (http://www.longnow.org/views/essays/articles/ArtFeynman.php)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on June 15, 2009, 05:04:12 PM
Quote from: Kai on June 15, 2009, 02:24:31 PM
And, some random articles/links:


Richard Feynman and the Connection Machine (http://www.longnow.org/views/essays/articles/ArtFeynman.php)


loved this one
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 15, 2009, 06:47:48 PM
June 15, 2009



Oceans Charge Up New Theory of Magnetism
from the Times (London)

Earth's magnetic field, long thought to be generated by molten metals swirling around its core, may instead be produced by ocean currents, according to controversial new research published this week.

It suggests that the movements of such volumes of salt water around the world have been seriously underestimated by scientists as a source of magnetism.

If proven, the research would revolutionise geophysics, the study of the Earth's physical properties and behaviour, in which the idea that magnetism originates in a molten core is a central tenet.

http://snipr.com/k5oo5



Agencies Target Mountaintop Mining
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- The Obama administration yesterday announced steps to reduce the environmental destruction caused in six states by mountaintop coal mining.

The government will seek to eliminate the expedited reviews that have made it easier for mining companies to blast off Appalachian mountaintops and discard the rubble into valleys where streams flow.

The agreement among three federal agencies also includes changes to tighten federal oversight and environmental screening of mountaintop coal mining in Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia.

http://snipr.com/k5oso



Humans Intrude on an Indonesian Park
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

KUTAI NATIONAL PARK, Indonesia -- Countless houses and shops built by squatters flank the 40-mile, two-lane road slicing through this national park that, once rich with orangutans and lowland rain forest, now symbolizes Indonesia's struggle to protect its rare wildlife.

As construction has intensified along the road here on the island of Borneo, it has also brought a sometimes surprising diversity of businesses to the park, including a brothel, the Dika karaoke bar and the Mitra Hotel, which was marking its recent opening with discounts of 40 percent. A new bus terminal and gas station, nearly complete, will perhaps be greeting customers soon.

At one spot by the road, Mursidin, a farmer in his 50s, was one of many people building a home from the park's trees. Using a sander and a saw hooked to a red generator, he was polishing and laying sheets of wood on the house's frame as his wife, Nuramanah, looked on.

http://snipr.com/k5ovm



Better Sleep, Better Living
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Sleep isn't just a chunk of time carved out to recharge for the following day. Increasingly, scientific evidence shows life and sleep are woven together like 800-thread-count sheets. How people fare during their waking hours has a lot to do with how they sleep -- and vice versa.

Income, employment status, relationship satisfaction and hobbies all affect sleep, according to research presented last week in Seattle at the annual meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies. And sleep affects health, relationships and decision-making.

"Sleep is related to everything," said Michael Grandner, a fellow at the Center for Sleep and Respiratory Neurobiology at the University of Pennsylvania.

http://snipr.com/k5ox3



Hydrogen Leak Sets Shuttle Launch Back 4 Days
from the San Francisco Chronicle

CAPE CANAVERAL (Associated Press) -- The potentially dangerous hydrogen gas leak that cropped up during the fueling of space shuttle Endeavour on Saturday has forced NASA to postpone the launch by at least four days.

NASA halted the countdown shortly after midnight, less than seven hours before Endeavour was due to blast off Saturday. The seven astronauts had yet to suit up.

Launch director Mike Leinbach said the leak, located at a vent line hookup on the fuel tank, was significant. Hydrogen gas is extremely volatile. "There's no way we could have continued," Leinbach said. "It's a commodity you just don't mess with."

http://snipr.com/k5p0c



Birth Control to Combat Malaria
from BBC News Online

Mosquito bites can be deadly. Anopheles mosquitoes carry the parasite that causes malaria, a disease which kills around a million people every year.

Traditionally mosquito populations have been controlled by pesticides. But scientists at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) are working on another method - using radiation to sterilize male mosquitoes.

The sterile insect technique (SIT) has worked well in reducing tsetse flies and some other insect pests, such as fruit flies. The IAEA scientists are now trying to adapt the technique to the Anopheles mosquito.

http://snipr.com/k5p1x



Gray Hair Signals Battered DNA
from ScienceNOW Daily News

If you've ever blamed your gray hair on stress, you weren't far from the truth. Genotoxic stress--the kind that can damage a cell's DNA--causes hair to whiten over time, according to a new study.

The results challenge accepted ideas about how stem cells age and may eventually lead to new ways to prevent graying and treat the more serious conditions caused by genotoxic stress, such as cancer.

For hair, life is simple. A strand grows for several years, then rests for 2 to 3 months before eventually dying and falling out. In 2004, Emi Nishimura, a dermatologist now with the Tokyo Medical and Dental University in Japan, linked this process to the hair follicle's melanocyte stem cells.

http://snipr.com/k5p3y



Editors Quit After Fake Paper Flap
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

The editor-in-chief of an open access journal has stepped down from his post after learning that the journal accepted a fake, computer-generated article for publication. So has an editorial advisory board member of a second journal published by the same company, Bentham Science Publishers.

Bambang Parmanto, a University of Pittsburgh information scientist, resigned from his editorship at The Open Information Science Journal (TOISCIJ) after reading a story on The Scientist's website [on June 10] that described a hoax paper submission to the journal. Editors at the journal claimed to have peer reviewed the article and slated it for publication pending the submission of $800 in "open access fees."

"I didn't like what happened," Parmanto told The Scientist. "If this is true, I don't have full control of the content that is accepted to this journal." Parmanto said that he had never seen the phony manuscript that was accepted by TOISCIJ.

http://snipr.com/k5p6h



Flu Pandemic Spurs Queries About Vaccine
from the Wall Street Journal

Governments and drug companies ramping up production of a vaccine against the swine-flu virus are facing a tough question: Who really needs it?

The world's biggest drug companies have started producing vaccines against the H1N1 virus and expect the first doses to be available by the fall. Many Western countries have ordered millions of doses, at a cost of more than $1 billion. But they have yet to figure out who should be first in line to get the shots, or to what extent they are even needed, given that the virus has so far proved less deadly than feared.

"We hope that clarity will come from this fog in the next two to three months," said John Oxford, professor of virology at Queen Mary, University of London.

http://snipr.com/k5p8w



EPA Chemical Database Rules a Political Hazard, Critics Say
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Reporting from Washington -- The Obama administration promised to end political meddling in scientific decisions, but some critics say the White House botched an early test on a key question of public health: how to assess the danger of industrial chemicals.

At issue is a government catalog of toxic substances that guides regulators, industries and the public on the dangers posed by certain chemicals. Environmentalists think the hazards should be assessed solely by scientists free from political influence.

But guidelines issued by the Environmental Protection Agency last month carve out a role for "White House officials" -- which could give presidential aides the ability to influence scientific deliberations.

http://snipr.com/k5oz3

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 22, 2009, 04:46:17 PM
June 16, 2009



A 'Time Bomb' for World Wheat Crop
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The spores arrived from Kenya on dried, infected leaves ensconced in layers of envelopes. Working inside a bio-secure greenhouse ... government scientists at the Cereal Disease Laboratory in St. Paul, Minn., suspended the fungal spores in a light mineral oil and sprayed them onto thousands of healthy wheat plants.

After two weeks, the stalks were covered with deadly reddish blisters characteristic of the scourge known as Ug99. Nearly all the plants were goners.

Crop scientists fear the Ug99 fungus could wipe out more than 80% of worldwide wheat crops as it spreads from eastern Africa. It has already jumped the Red Sea and traveled as far as Iran. Experts say it is poised to enter the breadbasket of northern India and Pakistan, and the wind will inevitably carry it to Russia, China and even North America -- if it doesn't hitch a ride with people first.

http://snipr.com/k87p5



Study Shows Possible Link Between Deaths and ADHD Drugs
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Children taking stimulant drugs such as Ritalin to treat attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder are several times as likely to suffer sudden, unexplained death as children who are not taking such drugs, according to a study published yesterday that was funded by the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institute of Mental Health.

While the numbers involved in the study were very small and researchers stopped short of suggesting a cause and effect, the study is the first to rigorously demonstrate a rare but worrisome connection between ADHD drugs and sudden death among children.

In doing so, the research adds to the evolving puzzle parents and doctors face in deciding whether to treat children with medication.

http://snipr.com/k88dx



Huge Pre-Stonehenge Complex Found Via "Crop Circles"
from National Geographic News

Given away by strange, crop circle-like formations seen from the air, a huge prehistoric ceremonial complex discovered in southern England has taken archaeologists by surprise.

A thousand years older than nearby Stonehenge, the site includes the remains of wooden temples and two massive, 6,000-year-old tombs that are among "Britain's first architecture," according to archaeologist Helen Wickstead, leader of the Damerham Archaeology Project.

For such a site to have lain hidden for so long is "completely amazing," said Wickstead, of Kingston University in London.

http://snipr.com/k88qe



Alcohol's Good for You? Some Scientists Doubt It
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

By now, it is a familiar litany. Study after study suggests that alcohol in moderation may promote heart health and even ward off diabetes and dementia. The evidence is so plentiful that some experts consider moderate drinking -- about one drink a day for women, about two for men -- a central component of a healthy lifestyle.

But what if it's all a big mistake? For some scientists, the question will not go away.

No study, these critics say, has ever proved a causal relationship between moderate drinking and lower risk of death -- only that the two often go together. It may be that moderate drinking is just something healthy people tend to do, not something that makes people healthy.

http://snipr.com/k88se



Solar-Powered Manned Flight: Flying Forever
from the Economist

When an airliner takes off for a transatlantic flight it needs to carry some 80 tonnes of fuel, which accounts for around one-fifth of its weight. On really long flights, fuel can account for 40% of a plane's take-off weight, so that around 20% of the fuel is used to carry the rest of the fuel.

Each tonne of fuel burned also produces 3.2 tonnes of carbon dioxide. Yet inside a hanger at a Swiss airfield is the prototype of an aircraft that does not use any fuel at all. The wings of this aircraft are almost as big as those of an airliner, but they are covered in a film of solar cells that convert sunlight into electricity to drive its engines.

Solar-powered aircraft have flown before. ... But nothing like HB-SIA, as the Swiss aircraft is known, has ever taken to the air. If it works as expected, another version will be built and this will take off, climb to 10,000 metres and, by storing some of the electricity generated during the day, continue flying through the night.

http://snipr.com/k88u1



Herschel Telescope 'Opens Eyes'
from BBC News Online

Europe's new billion-euro Herschel space observatory, launched in May, has achieved a critical milestone. The telescope has opened the hatch that has been protecting its sensitive instruments from contamination.

The procedure allowed light collected by Herschel's giant 3.5m mirror to flood its supercold instrument chamber, or cryostat, for the first time. The observatory's quest is to study how stars and galaxies form, and how they evolve through cosmic time.

The command sent on Sunday to fire two pyrotechnic bolts holding down the hatch was arguably the key moment in the European Space Agency (Esa) mission since the 14 May launch from Earth.

http://snipr.com/k88wk



Getting Up to Speed
from the New York Times Magazine

... Since it was established in 1996, the California High Speed Rail Authority ... had been working out of offices in the capital to explore how the state could build a rail line from Los Angeles to San Francisco for $33 billion, with two additional branches -- costing billions more -- eventually extending to Sacramento in the north and San Diego in the south.

It would not be an Amtrak operation but one owned by the state of California. Last November, state voters approved a $10 billion bond measure to get the project moving. Earlier this year, President Obama, who on a trip to France in April conceded he was "jealous" of European high-speed trains, submitted budget and stimulus plans that together allocated approximately $13 billion for high-speed rail over the next five years.

It seems almost certain that at least some of that money, and perhaps a significant percentage of it, will go this fall to California's project, which is the most developed of any U.S. high-speed-rail plan.

http://snipr.com/k88z3



Read This Before You Sell or Recycle Your Computer!
from the Christian Science Monitor

Last month, researchers in Britain decided to find out if people left anything behind when they sold or donated their old computer. They bought 300 used machines in several countries and from a number of sources, including eBay.

What did they find? About one-third still contained personal data on the hard drives, data that was located with just a little digging. Among the items rooted out: the test-launch information for THAAD ground-to-air defense missiles; medical records from hospitals; Social Security numbers; and proprietary commercial documents, such as business plans.

The disturbing conclusion: Even large organizations, which have legal obligations to protect their data, are sometimes lax about removing them thoroughly from discarded computers.

http://snipr.com/k8917



Charge on Single Atoms Measured
from BBC News Online

The amount of electric charge on single atoms has been measured by researchers reporting in Science. While individual atoms' charges have been measured before, the prior method required that the atoms be on the surface of a conducting material.

The new approach used a tiny tuning fork-like device that was deflected minuscule amounts by the attraction or repulsion of the atoms. The approach will aid in the design of devices such as solar cells.

... The new work hinges on the use of a research tool called an atomic force microscope, or AFM, which as its name implies can measure forces at the atomic level.

http://snipr.com/k893v



Straight Outta Michigan: The Return of Physics Rap
from New Scientist

It's nine months since the Large Hadron Collider lurched into life, sent a beam of protons whizzing through its 27-kilometer-long tunnel for just over a week - and then broke down.

Although the episode was a setback for the physics facility, it didn't stand in the way of the successful Large Hadron Rap, which appeared on virtually every news and science site at the time.

So when Michigan State University announced late last year that it would be building a new particle accelerator in East Lansing, Michigan, the physicists there asked Kate McAlpine, aka Alpinekat, to mark the occasion with a rap. Clink on headline link to watch the new Rare Isotope Rap.

http://snipr.com/k894u

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 22, 2009, 04:47:14 PM
June 17, 2009



Report on Gene for Depression Is Now Faulted
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

One of the most celebrated findings in modern psychiatry -- that a single gene helps determine one's risk of depression in response to a divorce, a lost job or another serious reversal -- has not held up to scientific scrutiny, researchers reported Tuesday.

The original finding, published in 2003, created a sensation among scientists and the public because it offered the first specific, plausible explanation of why some people bounce back after a stressful life event while others plunge into lasting despair.

The new report, by several of the most prominent researchers in the field, does not imply that interactions between genes and life experience are trivial; they are almost certainly fundamental, experts agree. But it does suggest that nailing down those factors in a precise way is far more difficult than scientists believed even a few years ago, and that the original finding could have been due to chance.

http://snipr.com/kaq54



New US Climate Report Dire, but Offers Hope
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Rising sea levels, sweltering temperatures, deeper droughts, and heavier downpours -- global warming's serious effects are already here and getting worse, the Obama administration warned on Tuesday in the grimmest, most urgent language on climate change ever to come out of any White House.

But amid the warnings, scientists and government officials seemed to go out of their way to soften the message. It is still not too late to prevent some of the worst consequences, they said, by acting aggressively to reduce world emissions of heat-trapping gases, primarily carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels.

The new report differs from a similar draft issued with little fanfare or context by George W. Bush's administration last year. It is paradoxically more dire about what's happening and more optimistic about what can be done.

http://snipr.com/kaq74



Barcodes Could Reveal Your Food's Credentials
from New Scientist

Where does your food come from? A few years ago, most consumers were satisfied with a sticker showing the country of origin. But concerns about fair trade and the environment, as well as food safety, are now driving a wave of projects aimed at tracking food from farm to shopping basket.

Though price is still the main factor determining the food that people buy, many are demanding to know more about its source. This is partly due to a series of recent food safety scandals, from major outbreaks of salmonella and E. coli to melamine showing up in baby formula and pet food.

... Most manufacturers already use barcodes or RFID chips to track their products. But with the help of cheap cellphone and Internet access it is becoming possible to collate data from remote locations around the world and make it available to the people who are actually going to eat the food.

http://snipr.com/kaq9k



US Expands Laws Protecting Atlantic Salmon
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

The federal government dramatically extended protection yesterday for the imperiled wild Atlantic salmon in Maine, declaring that the few remaining sportfish in the Penobscot, Kennebec, and Androscoggin rivers and their tributaries are endangered.

The move comes nine years after the federal government declared the fish - once such a part of American legend that one was delivered to the US president each year - endangered in eight Down East Maine rivers.

And, like then, the listing is promising to spark a political war, with state officials saying the decision will unnecessarily harm industries along the rivers that will have to undergo arduous environmental reviews.

http://snipr.com/kaqby



Skin Cancer Cream to Bust Wrinkles? 9 Double-Duty Drugs
from ABC News

Would you use a skin cancer cream to smooth out your facial wrinkles? Take a baldness drug to protect against prostate cancer? Or use Viagra to help avoid an amputation?

While most people think of medicines as single-role actors, there are a growing number of drugs that hold the potential for dual uses. Not all of these drugs are available for these hidden uses. But the so-called "off-label" use of medicines accounts for about one-fifth of all prescriptions, according to a study released last April in the New England Journal of Medicine.

... In the case of Viagra, which was administered to at least one patient to stimulate blood flow and help prevent amputation, no conclusive studies yet exist that confirm a definite benefit when used in patients at risk of amputation. But in many other cases, the alternative uses are well-known in the medical community ... and are regularly exploited.

http://snipr.com/kaqfk



Space Geology: From the Moon to Mars
from Scientific American

Forty years ago this month the lunar surface reverberated with life for the first time. Forty years from now will Mars, too, come alive?

... For now, policy makers are worried less about Mars than about the downtime between the last shuttle launch and first Ares flight, during which the U.S. will depend on Russia or private companies to launch its astronauts into orbit.

... Although Mars is still far off, at least NASA is designing spacecraft with an eye toward an eventual interplanetary flight. Planners are guided by the experiences that Harrison H. Schmitt relates in a Scientific American article.

http://snipr.com/kaqhx



Robot on a Tether Targets The Mysteries of the Deep
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Skimming past otherworldly tube worms and bizarre crustaceans as they traversed primordial sediments in inky darkness seven miles below the surface, an unmanned yellow robot two weeks ago became the world's deepest-diving unmanned submersible.

The craft, called Nereus, gave scientists on the surface their first long look at a portion of the Challenger Deep 35,768 feet down in the Mariana Trench.

... Nereus, developed and operated by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution on Cape Cod, Mass., is an engineering breakthrough because it can act as an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV), controlled by onboard computers, or as a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) tethered to a mother ship by a fiber-optic cable. Named after a Greek god who was half man and half fish, Nereus is outfitted with a mechanical arm for collecting physical samples when it is under remote control.

http://snipr.com/kaqjl



Smart Car? This One Knows When You've Had a Stroke
from Wired

BMW is building the ultimate nanny machine -- a car that will safely guide itself to a stop and notify the authorities if the driver suffers a heart attack, stroke or other medical emergency and can no longer drive. Call it the 328Mi.

The German automaker launched the project with the country's Federal Ministry of Education and Research, which wants to improve senior citizens' quality of life. BMW claims the Emergency Stop Assistant system utilizes a lot of technology already available on its cars and says it will allow seniors to feel more secure on the road.

"Our primary aim is to avoid accidents caused by health-related loss of control - or at least to reduce the severity of such accidents," Ralf Decke, project manager for Senior Smart at BMW, said in a statement.

http://snipr.com/kaqux



Oysters in Deep Trouble
from the Seattle Times

WILLAPA BAY, Pacific County -- The collapse began rather unspectacularly. In 2005, when most of the millions of Pacific oysters in this tree-lined estuary failed to reproduce, Washington's shellfish growers largely shrugged it off.

In a region that provides one-sixth of the nation's oysters -- the epicenter of the West Coast's $111 million oyster industry -- everyone knows nature can be fickle. But then the failure was repeated in 2006, 2007 and 2008. It spread to an Oregon hatchery that supplies baby oysters to shellfish nurseries from Puget Sound to Los Angeles. Eighty percent of that hatchery's oyster larvae died, too.

Now, as the oyster industry heads into the fifth summer of its most unnerving crisis in decades, scientists are pondering a disturbing theory. They suspect water that rises from deep in the Pacific Ocean -- icy seawater that surges into Willapa Bay and gets pumped into seaside hatcheries -- may be corrosive enough to kill baby oysters.

http://snipr.com/kaqxh



AcceleGlove: The Future of Motion at Your Fingertips
from the Christian Science Monitor

... A new product called the AcceleGlove, which went on sale in May, capitalizes on the shrinking cost of accelerometers and rapid processing power. The glove is studded with accelerometers, which can track the movement of a hand and individual fingers. Altogether, they allow the wearer to control other devices, from robots to video games.

AnthroTronix Inc. of Silver Springs, Md., a research and development company, hopes to adapt its AcceleGlove for law enforcement, firefighting, controlling robots in space or in dangerous industrial settings, rehabilitation, hand-motion studies, telemedicine, and as a computer interface with video games and virtual reality.

... The glove could be a teaching tool for anything from learning American Sign Language to practicing a sensitive surgical procedure. Baseball players might use the glove to study their grip and throwing motion.

http://snipr.com/kaqzs

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 22, 2009, 04:48:00 PM
June 18, 2009



Homeopathic Drugs May Harm
from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (Associated Press) -- The unsettling little secret of Zicam Cold Remedy finally spilled out this week. Though widely sold for years as a drug for colds, it was never tested by federal regulators for safety like other drugs. And that was perfectly legal -- until scores of consumers lost their sense of smell.

One little word on Zicam's label explains all this: "homeopathic."

Zicam and hundreds of other homeopathic remedies -- highly diluted drugs made from natural ingredients -- are legally sold as treatments with explicit claims of medical benefit. Yet they don't require federal checks for safety, effectiveness or even the right ingredients.

http://snipr.com/kd8jl



New Glimpses of Life's Puzzling Origins
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Some 3.9 billion years ago, a shift in the orbit of the Sun's outer planets sent a surge of large comets and asteroids careening into the inner solar system. Their violent impacts gouged out the large craters still visible on the Moon's face, heated Earth's surface into molten rock and boiled off its oceans into an incandescent mist.

Yet rocks that formed on Earth 3.8 billion years ago, almost as soon as the bombardment had stopped, contain possible evidence of biological processes. If life can arise from inorganic matter so quickly and easily, why is it not abundant in the solar system and beyond?

If biology is an inherent property of matter, why have chemists so far been unable to reconstruct life, or anything close to it, in the laboratory?

http://snipr.com/kd8t8



The Sound of Passion
from Scientific American

Imagine a quiet night like any other. Suddenly, your infant's cries break the silence. Fully loaded with emotion, the sound triggers an urge to stand up and run to your infant's room.

But, considering that your spouse is a musician and you are not, who will be the first to reach the crib? According to Dana L. Strait and a team of researchers at the University of Northwestern in Chicago, the musician should win the race.

Their latest study showed that years of musical training leave the brains of musicians better attuned to the emotional content, like anger, of vocal sounds. Ten years of cello, say, can make a person more emotionally intelligent, in some sense. So the alarm carried in a baby's cry makes a deeper impression; your spouse wins the race.

http://snipr.com/kd8uu



Dinosaur's Digits Show How Birds Got Wings
from Nature News

Birds are generally considered to be the living descendants of dinosaurs, yet differences between bird wings and dinosaur hands have long left palaeontologists struggling to explain how birds would have evolved from their dinosaur ancestors.

Birds' wings are thought to form from the fusion of the second, third and fourth digits on their hands as the embryo develops. Theropods, the predominantly carnivorous dinosaurs that included tyrannosaurids such as Tyrannosaurus rex and dromaeosaurids such as Velociraptor mongoliensis, also only had three long fingers.

... Now, a team led by Xing Xu from the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology in Beijing and James Clark from The George Washington University in Washington, DC, is proposing a simpler answer based on a new dinosaur species found in Jurassic rocks formed 156 million to 161 million years ago in the Junggar Basin in western China.

http://snipr.com/kd8wl



Review Panel Hears Rival Plans for New Spaceflights
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- NASA's goal is to return to space after the retirement of the shuttles next year, but a panel reviewing the agency's human spaceflight program heard very different ideas Wednesday on how to get there.

In dueling PowerPoint presentations before the 10-member panel, appointed by the Obama administration in April, NASA officials defended their progress in developing the next generation of rockets, while challengers said that they could do the job more quickly and less expensively.

NASA officials said the Ares I, the first rocket being developed in the agency's Constellation program, was on course for launching astronauts to the International Space Station in March 2015, despite technical hurdles and lower-than-expected budgets.

http://snipr.com/kd8zc



'FDA Has a Lot on Its Plate' as New Chief Takes Over
from USA Today

WASHINGTON -- Margaret Hamburg figured she'd follow her parents' example and pursue a career in academic medicine, perhaps as an endocrinologist.

"I'd never planned a career as a public health official," Hamburg, who was recently confirmed as the second woman to helm the Food and Drug Administration, said Tuesday in an interview with USA TODAY in the agency's Capitol Hill office.

But she changed her mind when, as an internal medicine resident in New York in the early 1980s, she began caring for patients with the condition that would come to be called AIDS. She wanted to understand how to translate medical discoveries into patient care. A quarter-century later, Hamburg, 53, leads the federal agency that arguably has the biggest impact on the public's health.

http://snipr.com/kd95y



Mobiles Boost Africa Climate Data
from BBC News Online

Gaping gaps in weather and climate data across Africa may be filled by a partnership between humanitarian groups and mobile phone companies.

The project aims to deploy 5,000 automatic weather stations across the continent mounted on phone masts.

They will gather data on aspects of weather such as rainfall and wind, and send it to national weather agencies. Former UN chief Kofi Annan says the project could help save lives of people on "the frontlines of climate change."

http://snipr.com/kd98g



People Sickened by Asbestos From Montana Mine
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Environmental Protection Agency yesterday declared its first-ever "public health emergency," saying the federal government will funnel $6 million to provide medical care for people sickened by asbestos from a mine in northwest Montana.

The declaration applies to the towns of Libby and Troy, where for decades workers dug for vermiculite, a mineral used in insulation. They were unknowingly poisoning themselves: The vermiculite was contaminated with a toxic form of asbestos, which workers carried home on their clothes.

The Department of Health and Human Services estimates that there are 500 people with asbestos-related illnesses such as lung cancer and asbestosis in the two towns, whose populations total about 3,900.

http://snipr.com/kd99n



Ultrasmall Microbes Revived After 120,000 Years On Ice
from National Geographic News

Ultrasmall microbes trapped in glacial ice for 120,000 years have been coaxed back to life, a new study says. The feat adds to evidence that long-dormant alien life on other, frozen worlds could be resurrected.

Called Herminiimonas glaciei, the purplish-brown bacteria were discovered beneath nearly two miles of Greenland ice. Researchers incubated the ancient sample in increasingly warmer water for nearly a year before the bacteria colonies grew on a petri dish.

While H. glaciei is not the oldest bacteria to be resurrected--one sample collected in Tibet was brought back to life after 750,000 years--it is the first ancient "ultramicrobacteria" to be revived and characterized in detail, said study leader Jennifer Loveland-Curtze of Pennsylvania State University.

http://snipr.com/kd9av



Could the Orang-Utan Be Our Closest Relative?
from New Scientist

These days, we tend to accept without question that humans are "the third chimpanzee." The term, coined by author Jared Diamond, refers to the notion that our closest relatives are the two chimpanzee species - the common chimp and the bonobo. But could we actually be "the second orang" - more closely related to orang-utans than chimps?

That is the controversial claim made this week by Jeffrey Schwartz of the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania and John Grehan of the Buffalo Museum of Science in New York (Journal of Biogeography, DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2699.2009.02141.x, in press.)

The idea flies in the face of mainstream scientific opinion, not least a wealth of DNA evidence pointing to our close relationship to chimps. Schwartz and Grehan do not deny the similarity between human and chimp genomes, but argue that the DNA evidence is problematic and that traditional taxonomy unequivocally tells us that our closest living relatives are orang-utans.

http://snipr.com/kd9kc


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 22, 2009, 04:49:10 PM
June 19, 2009



More Are Searching the Web for Medical Advice
from USA Today

The number of adults who turn to the Internet for health information has nearly doubled in the past two years, from 31% to 60%, according to a study. That puts the Internet in a tie for third place (with books and print materials) as the source adults most often turn to for health information.

At the top, 86% of those surveyed say they most often consult a health care professional, and 68% say they consult their family or friends first.

The increase is partly because there are more Internet users than there were when the survey was last taken in 2006, says Susannah Fox, associate director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project, a non-profit research organization.

http://snipr.com/kfusy



Lift Off for NASA's Lunar Probes
from BBC News Online

Nasa has successfully launched two spacecraft to the Moon on missions that will pave the way for a return to the lunar surface by US astronauts. LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) and a crater observation mission blasted off from Florida on an Atlas V rocket.

Data gathered by LRO will help mission planners select future landing sites and scout locations for lunar outposts. The second mission will send a rocket crashing into the Moon to scour the debris plume for evidence of water ice.

... LRO will enter a low polar orbit around the Moon at an altitude of around 31 miles - the closest any spacecraft has continually orbited Earth's natural satellite.

http://snipr.com/kfv3l



81 U.S. Healthcare Workers Found to Have H1N1 Virus
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

At least 81 U.S. healthcare workers have contracted laboratory-confirmed cases of the novel H1N1 influenza virus and about half caught the bug on the job, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said yesterday.

The finding is worrisome because it suggests that hospitals and workers are not taking sufficient preventive measures to limit spread of the virus.

If a large-scale outbreak of the virus recurs this fall, a similar infection rate could cause significant problems -- not only because it would limit the number of workers available to care for the sick, but also because the infected nurses, doctors and others could transmit the virus to debilitated patients before their own symptoms become apparent. Already-ill patients would be more likely to develop life-threatening side effects from the flu.

http://snipr.com/kfv4r



Early "Human" Is Ape After All, Discoverer Decides
from National Geographic News

Nearly 15 years ago Russell Ciochon shook our family tree when he announced that a fossil found in a Chinese cave was evidence of a new form of early human. But that was then.

Today the anthropologist announced that the fossil, a partial jaw, is from an ape after all--a "mystery ape." And as controversial as the original theory was, Ciochon's reversal is also meeting with some criticism.

The fossil was found in the 1980s in south-central China's Longgupo cave. According to Ciochon, "the jaw was very perplexing. It didn't fit in any category of hominin [early human ancestor] that we knew of in Asia, and it also didn't fit into any ape category."

http://snipr.com/kfv7s



Is Life Its Own Worst Enemy?
from New Scientist

The twin Viking landers that defied the odds to land on Mars in 1976 and 1977 had one primary goal: to find life. To the disappointment of nearly all concerned, the data they sent back was a sharp dash of cold water. The Martian surface was harsh and antibiotic and there was no sign of life.

To two NASA scientists, James Lovelock and Dian Hitchcock, this came as no surprise - in fact, they would have been amazed to see any evidence of life on Mars. A decade before Viking, Lovelock and Hitchcock, both atmospheric scientists, had used observations of the Martian atmosphere to deduce that there could be no life on the planet.

From their research arose one of the most influential, ground-breaking scientific ideas of the 20th century - the Gaia hypothesis, named after the ancient Greek goddess of the Earth, a nurturing "mother" of life. But is it correct? New scientific findings suggest that the nature of life on Earth is not at all like Gaia.

http://snipr.com/kfva6



Mammoths Survived in Britain Longer than Thought
from the Guardian (UK)

Woolly mammoths were roaming the British Isles for thousands of years longer than previously thought, a new study shows.

By analysing mammoth remains found in Condover, Shropshire, scientists concluded that the animals were probably wiped out by rapidly changing climate at the end of the last ice age rather than hunted to extinction by humans.

"Mammoths are conventionally believed to have become extinct in north-western Europe about 21,000 years ago during the main ice advance, known as the last glacial maximum," said Adrian Lister, of the Natural History Museum, in London, who led the study. "Our new radiocarbon dating of the Condover mammoths changes that by showing that mammoths returned to Britain and survived until around 14,000 years ago."

http://snipr.com/kfvmk



The Future of Military Aviation Is Unmanned
from the Seattle Times

PARIS -- On the edge of the airfield at Le Bourget, a Boeing F/A-18 Super Hornet jet fighter looms with imposing menace. In front of it sits a dinky Boeing ScanEagle -- just 4 feet long with a 10-foot wingspan -- with model-airplane looks, a little rotor turned by a two-stroke engine, and a flimsy plastic airframe.

It's the little unmanned surveillance craft, not the high-performance fighter, that is part of the new wave in military aviation at this year's Paris Air Show.

The ScanEagle -- designed and built by Boeing-owned Insitu, of the Columbia River Gorge town of Bingen, Klickitat County -- has been battle-tested in Iraq and Afghanistan, and played a key role in the April rescue of U.S. containership captain Richard Phillips from Somali pirates.

http://snipr.com/kfvoa



Maternal Screening Campaign Has False Test Results
from the Baltimore Sun

ATLANTA (Associated Press) -- A massive effort to test pregnant women for a deadly germ they can spread to their babies has yielded a bad surprise -- a high rate of wrong test results that led some infants to miss out on treatment.

A study found the test missed more of the infections than would normally be expected. If the mothers had tested positive for the Group B strep bacteria, they would have been given antibiotics during labor to cut the chances of infecting their infants.

Group B strep is a common bacteria carried in the intestines or lower genital tract, and can be spread to babies during delivery. It's harmless to most adults but in newborns can lead to blood infections, pneumonia, meningitis, mental retardation or hearing and vision loss, and death.

http://snipr.com/kfvqf



Proposed Quantum Motor Runs With a Kick
from Science News

Physicists have proposed a way to get their quantum motor running. An electric motor could be built from just two atoms held in a ring by lasers, a theoretical study published online June 8 in Physical Review Letters contends.

The new motor proposal "might be hard to implement, but it has the core of a good idea," comments Ian Spielman, a physicist at the Joint Quantum Institute in College Park, Md.

Electrical motors, like the ones in fans, convert electric current into mechanical motion, such as spinning blades. "The idea of a quantum motor is exactly the same as a mechanical motor," says study coauthor Alexey Ponomarev of the University of Augsburg in Germany. "You have an electromagnetic force that launches it."

http://snipr.com/kfvsk



Robot Babies
from Smithsonian Magazine

Einstein the robot has enchanting eyes, the color of honey in sunlight. They are fringed with drugstore-variety false eyelashes and framed by matted gray brows made from real human hair.

... David Hanson, Einstein's creator, is visiting from Texas to help scientists here at the University of California at San Diego (UCSD) prepare the robot for an upcoming conference. Hanson switches the robot on--really just a head and neck--and runs it through some of its dozens of expressions.

Its lips purse. Its brow furrows. Its eyes widen as though in horror, then scrunch mirthfully as it flashes a grin. ... Still, the effect is so lifelike that even jaded graduate students have stopped by to stroke the robot's wrinkled cheek ...

http://snipr.com/kfvts

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 22, 2009, 04:54:44 PM
Shit, some of these articles some days sound like something straight out of National Enquirer.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 23, 2009, 02:44:06 AM
http://www.starchild.co.za/what.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Thurnez Isa on June 23, 2009, 03:16:20 AM
roger you missed the best one

http://www.starchildascension.org/starchild/dnachanges.html

:lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 23, 2009, 03:18:31 AM
Quote from: Thurnez Isa on June 23, 2009, 03:16:20 AM
roger you missed the best one

http://www.starchildascension.org/starchild/dnachanges.html

:lulz:

Hahahahahawe'retotallyfuckingdoomedhahahahahaaaaaiiiiiiiieeeeee!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 23, 2009, 03:21:19 AM
Quote from: Thurnez Isa on June 23, 2009, 03:16:20 AM
roger you missed the best one

http://www.starchildascension.org/starchild/dnachanges.html

:lulz:

:lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz:



:lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz:



:lulz: :lulz:
:lulz:





:lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 23, 2009, 03:24:00 AM
QuoteDNA and the Fairy Energy

There's a whole chapter on that. 

TOO MUCH HORROR!  TOO MUCH MIRTH!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 29, 2009, 04:37:41 PM
June 26, 2009



Human History Written in Stone and Blood
from American Scientist

Even by archaeological standards, Blombos Cave is a modestly sized shelter. Yet artifacts recovered from just 13 cubic meters of deposit inside transformed our understanding of when our species developed behavioral attributes we associate with "modern" humans.

From this cramped hole in a sandstone cliff on the Southern Cape coast of South Africa, Christopher Henshilwood and his colleagues unearthed evidence of symbolic expression, in the form of abstract designs (carved ochre bars) and personal ornaments (shell beads) at least 70,000 years old. That is more than 35,000 years before anything comparable emerged in Europe.

... Our modern anatomical features can be traced back almost 200,000 years, based on fossilized remains found in Ethiopia, but the making of the modern mind apparently lagged behind by more than 100,000 years. The remarkable finds at Blombos raised several intriguing questions.

http://snipr.com/kx6ka



H1N1 'Swine' Flu Has Infected 1 Million in U.S.
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

At least 1 million Americans have now contracted the novel H1N1 influenza, according to mathematical models prepared by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, while data from the field indicates that the virus is continuing to spread even though the normal flu season is over and that an increasing proportion of victims are being hospitalized.

Meanwhile, the virus is continuing its rapid spread through the Southern Hemisphere, infecting increasing numbers of people and at least one pig.

Nearly 28,000 laboratory-confirmed U.S. cases of the virus, also known as swine flu, have been reported to the CDC, almost half of the more than 56,000 cases globally reported to the World Health Organization.

http://snipr.com/kx6m6



Giant Glowing Blobs Yield Clues to Galaxy Formation
from ScienceNOW Daily News

A decade ago, astronomers surveying the distant universe discovered giant blobs of shining hydrogen gas bigger than anything ever seen in the cosmos. Since then, researchers have wondered what makes these structures--known as Lyman-alpha blobs (LABs)--glow.

Now, a team of astronomers claims to have found evidence that the blobs are illuminated by radiation and heat from supermassive black holes at their center. The finding supports an emerging idea of how a growing black hole ultimately limits a galaxy's size.

Researchers led by James Geach, an astronomer at the University of Durham in the United Kingdom, used NASA's Chandra X-ray observatory to look at 29 blobs in a patch of sky known as SSA 22. A few hundred thousand light-years across in size, the blobs date back to when the universe was less than a sixth of its current age, or about 2 billion years old.

http://snipr.com/kx6sn



Huge Underground Chamber Found--Early Christian Refuge?
from National Geographic News

A 2,000-year-old underground chamber has been discovered in Israel's Jordan Valley.

The largest human-made cave in Israel, the 1-acre space is thought to have begun as a quarry. In subsequent centuries it may have served as a monastery, hideout for persecuted Christians, or Roman army base, experts say.

Archaeologists working in the valley found the cave this past March when they came across a hole in a rock face. ... The archaeologists peered into a huge hall lined with 22 thick pillars--giving the "impression of a palace," said Adam Zertal, of the University of Haifa in Israel.

http://snipr.com/kx6vh



Evolutionary Origins of Your Right and Left Brain
from Scientific American

The left hemisphere of the human brain controls language, arguably our greatest mental attribute. It also controls the remarkable dexterity of the human right hand. The right hemisphere is dominant in the control of, among other things, our sense of how objects interrelate in space.

Forty years ago the broad scientific consensus held that, in addition to language, right-handedness and the specialization of just one side of the brain for processing spatial relations occur in humans alone. Other animals, it was thought, have no hemispheric specializations of any kind.

... In the past few decades, however, studies of many other animals have shown that their two brain hemispheres also have distinctive roles. Despite those findings, prevailing wisdom continues to hold that people are different.

http://snipr.com/kx6x8



Conformists May Kill Civilizations
from Nature News

The capacity to learn from others is one of the traits that have made humans such a global success story. Relying on it too much, however, could have contributed to the demise of past populations, such as the Maya of southern Mexico in the eighth and ninth centuries and Norse settlers in Greenland 1,000 years ago.

Over-hunting, deforestation and over-population are well-worn routes to societal collapse. Now, Hal Whitehead of Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and Pete Richerson of the University of California, Davis, have modelled how different learning strategies fare in different environments.

They found that conformist social learning -- imitating and emulating what the majority are doing -- may also cause the demise of societies. When environments remain stable for long periods, behaviour can become disconnected from environmental demands, so that when change does come, the effects are catastrophic.

http://snipr.com/kx6z5



Legless Frogs Mystery Solved
from BBC News Online

Scientists think they have resolved one of the most controversial environmental issues of the past decade: the curious case of the missing frogs' legs.

Around the world, frogs are found with missing or misshaped limbs, a striking deformity that many researchers believe is caused by chemical pollution.

However, tests on frogs and toads have revealed a more natural, benign cause. The deformed frogs are actually victims of the predatory habits of dragonfly nymphs, which eat the legs of tadpoles.

http://snipr.com/kx70t



Royal Society Announces Contenders for Science Book Prize
from the Guardian (UK)

The Royal Society has announced the shortlist for its science book prize. It's a strong field of contenders for the £10,000 prize money.

Regular readers of the Guardian and fans of our Science Weekly podcast will already be familiar with the finalists. One of the shortlisted books was recently picked over by our Science Book Club, one of the authors writes a popular weekly column for the Guardian, and two have been guests on the podcast.

Sir Tim Hunt, who chairs the panel of judges, said: "There's clearly a large audience for books that explain science clearly and gracefully, and no shortage of authors. Choosing a final list of six books from the big boxes of books that arrived on our doorsteps - over 120 books were submitted - was a challenging pleasure."

http://snipr.com/kx71s



Famed Montana Dinosaur Hunter Gets Probation
from the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Registration Required)

GREAT FALLS, Mont. (Associated Press) -- Renowned dinosaur hunter Nathan Murphy was sentenced Wednesday to four months in a halfway house and three years probation after pleading guilty to stealing fossils.

Murphy was accused of stealing 13 dinosaur bones from central Montana's Hell Creek badlands in 2006. He pleaded guilty in April to theft of government property.

... The case provided a rare glimpse into the black-market fossil trade while sinking the reputation of the 51-year-old, self-taught paleontologist who rose to fame on his discovery in 2000 of Leonardo, a mummified, 77-million-year-old duck-billed hadrosaur considered the world's best preserved dinosaur.

http://snipr.com/kx73k



Fish in Acidic Waters Grow Bigger Ears
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Listen up! Carbon dioxide being absorbed by the oceans is having a puzzling effect on fish - their ears get bigger. Now, that doesn't mean you're going to reel in the Mr. Spock of the sea.

Fish ears are inside their bodies. But, as in humans, their ears perform a major role in sensing movement and whether the animal is upright - abilities that are important for survival. "It was a surprise," biological oceanographer David M. Checkley of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, said of the discovery.

The ear structure in fish is known as an otolith and is made up of minerals. Checkley and colleagues knew that increasing carbon dioxide in the oceans - absorbed from the atmosphere - is making the sea more acidic, which can dissolve and weaken shells. They wondered if it also would reduce the size of the otoliths.

http://snipr.com/kx74x

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 29, 2009, 04:38:29 PM
June 25, 2009



'Misty Caverns' on Enceladus Moon
from BBC News Online

Nasa's Cassini spacecraft has obtained strong evidence that Saturn's tiny moon Enceladus retains liquid water. The probe has detected sodium salts in the vicinity of the satellite, which appear to spew from its south pole.

Liquid water that is in prolonged contact with rock will leach out sodium - in exactly the same way as Earth's oceans have become salty over time. Scientists tell Nature magazine that the liquid water may reside in caverns just below the surface of the moon.

If confirmed, it is a stunning result. It means the Saturnian satellite may be one of the most promising places in the Solar System to search for signs of extraterrestrial life.

http://snipr.com/kulg3



Combination Device Reduces Heart Failure Deaths
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A combination defibrillator and cardiac resynchronization device reduced deaths by nearly one-third in patients with mild heart failure in a study that was terminated early on Monday because of its success, the device's manufacturer said Tuesday.

The combination device, called a CRT-D, had previously been shown effective in patients with severe heart failure, but this is the first study to investigate its use in those with milder forms of disease, who account for about 70% of the 5.5 million U.S. heart failure patients.

"This is a breakthrough finding," said Dr. Albert Waldo, a cardiologist at University Hospitals Case Medical Center in Cleveland who was not involved in the study.

http://snipr.com/kulhn



Deep in Bedrock, Clean Energy and Quake Fears
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

BASEL, Switzerland -- Markus O. Häring, a former oilman, was a hero in this city of medieval cathedrals and intense environmental passion three years ago, all because he had drilled a hole three miles deep near the corner of Neuhaus Street and Shafer Lane.

He was prospecting for a vast source of clean, renewable energy that seemed straight out of a Jules Verne novel: the heat simmering within the earth's bedrock.

All seemed to be going well -- until Dec. 8, 2006, when the project set off an earthquake, shaking and damaging buildings and terrifying many in a city that, as every schoolchild here learns, had been devastated exactly 650 years before by a quake that sent two steeples of the Münster Cathedral tumbling into the Rhine.

http://snipr.com/kulju



Reverse-Engineering the Quantum Compass of Birds
from Wired

Scientists are coming ever closer to understanding the cellular navigation tools that guide birds in their unerring, globe-spanning migrations.

The latest piece of the puzzle is superoxide, an oxygen molecule that may combine with light-sensitive proteins to form an in-eye compass, allowing birds to see Earth's magnetic field.

... The superoxide theory is proposed by Biophysicist Klaus Schulten of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, lead author of the study and a pioneer in avian magnetoreception. Schulten first hypothesized in 1978 that some sort of biochemical reaction took place in birds' eyes, most likely producing electrons whose spin was affected by subtle magnetic gradients.

http://snipr.com/kulm4



Prehistoric Flute in Germany Is Oldest Known
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

BERLIN (Associated Press) -- A bird-bone flute unearthed in a German cave was carved some 35,000 years ago and is the oldest handcrafted musical instrument yet discovered, archaeologists say, offering the latest evidence that early modern humans in Europe had established a complex and creative culture.

A team led by University of Tuebingen archaeologist Nicholas Conard assembled the flute from 12 pieces of griffon vulture bone scattered in a small plot of the Hohle Fels cave in southern Germany.

Together, the pieces comprise a 8.6-inch instrument with five holes and a notched end. The findings were published online Wednesday by the journal Nature.

http://snipr.com/kuloq



Study: Bad Test Results Often Don't Reach Patients
from the Baltimore Sun

CHICAGO (Associated Press) -- No news isn't necessarily good news for patients waiting for the results of medical tests. The first study of its kind finds doctors failed to inform patients of abnormal cancer screenings and other test results 1 out of 14 times.

The failure rate was higher at some doctors' offices, as high as 26 percent at one office. Few medical practices had explicit methods for how to tell patients, leaving each doctor to come up with a system.

In some offices, patients were told if they didn't hear anything, they could assume their test results were normal. ... The findings are published in Monday's Archives of Internal Medicine.

http://snipr.com/kulqk



Report: New Radiation Detection Machines Not Worth the Money
from the Minneapolis Star Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- The government shouldn't buy more of the new radiation detection machines it's been developing to look for smuggled nuclear materials at ports, a report from the National Research Council says.

The new machines are only marginally better at detecting hidden nuclear material than monitors already at U.S. ports, but would cost more than twice as much, says the report released Wednesday.

It echoes concerns raised by Congress and the Government Accountability Office about the government's next generation radiation detectors.

http://snipr.com/kulsc



Iron-ic Twist Deepens Cosmic Ray Puzzle
from Science News

BLOIS, France -- In the genteel surroundings of the Blois chateau ... a controversial finding about the highest-energy cosmic rays has landed with a thud. If confirmed, a new report could spark a revolution in the way astronomers think about these speedy but rare charged particles, which carry as much oomph as a big league pitcher's fastball.

Scientists have generally assumed that the most energetic cosmic rays are primarily protons. That's true even though heavier nuclei such as iron are more easily accelerated to high energies because of their greater electric charge.

... "Ask anybody what are the highest-energy [cosmic ray] particles, and they'd say 'protons,'" says physics Nobel laureate James W. Cronin of the University of Chicago. But, as he announced June 22 at the Windows on the Universe meeting, the Pierre Auger Observatory in Malargüe, Argentina, has identified an abundance of iron nuclei at some of the highest energies its cosmic ray detectors can record.

http://snipr.com/kulto



Newly Uncovered Enzymes Turn Corn Plant Waste into Biofuel
from Scientific American

"Visualize three tons of moldy bread." It's not the most appealing image, perhaps, but it's a description of the moist mound of growth media tended by bioscientist Cliff Bradley and his partner, chemical engineer Bob Kearns at their biofuel facility in Butte, Mont., that could help cut ethanol costs at the fuel pump.

Selected soil fungi that eat cellulose--the hard-to-digest, structural component of woody plants--thrive on the big pile of putrefaction from which Bradley and Kearns harvest certain powerful enzymes.

The special enzymes allow standard biofuel plants to produce ethanol at lower cost by replacing some of the high-priced corn (starch) they process with cheaper corn stover "waste"--the leaves, stalks, husks and cobs of the maize plant itself.

http://snipr.com/kulw1



Ancient Waves of (Wild) Grain
from ScienceNOW Daily News

We should all give thanks to the first farmers. Had they not begun domesticating plants and animals more than 10,000 years ago, we might still be hunting and gathering and missing out on all the blessings and curses of civilization.

Yet before the agricultural revolution could really take off, people had to find a way to store their produce in between harvests. Archaeologists working in Jordan now claim to have found the remains of several granaries possibly used to store wild barley, the oldest known, and dated nearly 1000 years before the first domesticated cereals.

The earliest definitive traces of domesticated grains, wheat, barley, and oats have been found in the Near East and date back about 10,500 years. Yet much recent research suggests that plant domestication was preceded by a long period--perhaps thousands of years--during which prehistoric peoples cultivated wild plants without visibly changing their appearance or altering their genetic makeup.

http://snipr.com/kum4f

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 29, 2009, 04:39:27 PM
June 24, 2009



Appendicitis Test Under Development for Children
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Researchers have identified a chemical in urine that is closely associated with appendicitis in children and are working to develop a simple test that could be used to diagnose the condition -- a test that would both increase the likelihood of performing surgery before the appendix bursts and prevent unnecessary surgery.

Preliminary results show that the test is highly accurate, producing very few instances in which cases are missed (false negatives) or children are incorrectly diagnosed with the condition (false positives), a team from Children's Hospital Boston reported in the Annals of Emergency Medicine.

Appendicitis is the most common childhood surgical emergency. The lifetime prevalence of appendicitis is 9% for males and 7% for females, but the bulk of the cases occur in childhood or adolescence.

http://snipr.com/ks8gq



The Science of Economic Bubbles and Busts
from Scientific American

... Economists have fought for decades about whether money illusion and, more generally, the influence of irrationality on economic transactions are themselves illusory.

... But the ideas of behavioral economists, who study the role of psychology in making economic decisions, are gaining increasing attention today, as scientists of many stripes struggle to understand why the world economy fell so hard and fast.

And their ideas are bolstered by the brain scientists who make inside-the-skull snapshots of the ventromedial prefrontal cortex and other brain areas.

http://snipr.com/ks8if



Long-Lasting Daddy Longlegs
from Science News

Scientists have unearthed the fossils of two new species of harvestmen, a delicate type of creature better known to many folks as daddy longlegs.

Though there are more than 6,400 known modern-day species of harvestmen -- which aren't spiders but are closely related -- only 26 species have been identified in the fossil record, notes Paul Selden of the University of Kansas in Lawrence.

... The two new species ... were entombed in fine-grained volcanic ash that fell in what is now north central China about 165 million years ago.

http://snipr.com/ks8m0



Carvings From Cherokee Script's Dawn
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The illiterate Cherokee known as Sequoyah watched in awe as white settlers made marks on paper, convinced that these "talking leaves" were the source of white power and success. This inspired the consuming ambition of his life: to create a Cherokee written language.

... Ten years later, despite the ridicule of friends who thought him crazed, he completed the script, in which each of the 85 characters represented a distinct sound in the spoken tongue, and combinations of these syllables spelled words.

... An archaeologist and explorer of caves has now found what he thinks are the earliest known examples of the Sequoyah syllabary. The characters are cut into the wall of a cave in southeastern Kentucky, a place sacred to the Cherokee as the traditional burial site of a revered chief.

http://snipr.com/ks8ne



Mystery Glaciers Growing as Most Others Retreat
from National Geographic News

Two South American glaciers are displaying strange behavior for the times: They're growing.

Most of the 50 massive glaciers draped over the spine of the Patagonian Andes are shrinking in response to a global warming, said Andrés Rivera, a glaciologist at the Center for Scientific Studies in Valdivia, Chile.

But the Perito Moreno glacier in Argentina and Pio XI glacier in Chile are taking on ice, instead of shedding it. "What is happening ... is not well understood," Rivera said.

http://snipr.com/ks8qr



U.S. Eugenics Legacy
from USA Today

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. -- Paul Lombardo hadn't planned on a three-decade detour when he stopped at a greasy-spoon restaurant for breakfast in February, 1980. Lombardo, then a graduate student at the University of Virginia, picked up a newspaper to read as he ate his bacon and eggs.

... For almost 30 years, Lombardo has tried to uncover the full story of the wrongs he read about that day. The article he had stumbled across was about two sisters sterilized in the 1920s by the state of Virginia for being "feeble-minded." The younger sister hadn't even known she'd had a tubal ligation.

She didn't learn until she was in her late 60s that the surgery hadn't been for appendicitis. The older, more famous sister -- Carrie Buck -- was the subject of the now infamous lawsuit over the legality of the operation, Buck v. Bell, that was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.

http://snipr.com/ks8sg



Vatican's Celestial Eye, Seeking Not Angels but Data
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

MOUNT GRAHAM, Ariz. -- Fauré's "Requiem" is playing in the background, followed by the Kronos Quartet. Every so often the music is interrupted by an electromechanical arpeggio -- like a jazz riff on a clarinet -- as the motors guiding the telescope spin up and down. A night of galaxy gazing is about to begin at the Vatican's observatory on Mount Graham.

"Got it. O.K., it's happy," says Christopher J. Corbally, the Jesuit priest who is vice director of the Vatican Observatory Research Group, as he sits in the control room making adjustments.

The idea is not to watch for omens or angels but to do workmanlike astronomy that fights the perception that science and Catholicism necessarily conflict.

http://snipr.com/ks8wr



Hidden Cancer Threat to Wildlife Revealed
from New Scientist

Cancer poses a serious threat to wild animals. That is the message of two pathologists working for the Wildlife Conservation Society, in New York, who have for the first time listed all the animal species that are threatened by cancer.

Conservationists awoke to the problem in the late 1990s when numbers of Tasmanian devils plummeted as a result of the gruesome and disfiguring devil facial tumour disease. The disease causes tumours to form in and around the marsupials' mouth and they eventually die of starvation.

In 2008, the World Conservation Union listed the Tasmanian devil as endangered. Despite this, "cancer really isn't something that's been on anyone's radar in a conservation sense," says Denise McAloose, chief pathologist for the WCS's global health programme.

http://snipr.com/ks927



Catching a Wave, Powering an Electrical Grid?
from Smithsonian Magazine

She was in the water when the epiphany struck. Of course, Annette von Jouanne was always in the water, swimming in lakes and pools as she was growing up around Seattle, and swimming distance freestyle competitively in high-school and college meets.

... But in December 1995 she was bodysurfing in Hawaii over the holidays. She'd just begun working as an assistant professor of electrical engineering at Oregon State University.

... "As the sun set, it hit me: I could ride waves all day and all night, all year long," says von Jouanne. "Wave power is always there. It never stops. I began thinking that there's got to be a way to harness all the energy of an ocean swell, in a practical and efficient way, in a responsible way."

http://snipr.com/ks946



Elusive Forms of Water Found?
from Nature News

Researchers in India and Italy say they have seen two types of liquid water that have long been suspected to exist below water's normal freezing point.

Water is undoubtedly a strange liquid. Unlike most liquids, it becomes less rather than more dense when it freezes -- and it is densest not when it is coldest (at 0 °C, just before it freezes) but at 4 °C.

... This anomalous behaviour stems from the weak chemical bonds, called hydrogen bonds, that stick water molecules together in the liquid. In ice, these bonds hold the molecules 'at arm's length' and so leave plenty of empty space between them.

http://snipr.com/ks96y

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 29, 2009, 04:40:09 PM
June 23, 2009



A Chance for Clues to Brain Injury in Combat Blasts
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

No direct impact caused Paul McQuigg's brain injury in Iraq three years ago. And no wound from the incident visibly explains why Mr. McQuigg, now an office manager at a California Marine base, can get lost in his own neighborhood or arrive at the grocery store having forgotten why he left home.

But his blast injury -- concussive brain trauma caused by an explosion's invisible force waves -- is no less real to him than a missing limb is to other veterans. Just how real could become clearer after he dies, when doctors slice up his brain to examine any damage.

Mr. McQuigg, 32, is one of 20 active and retired members of the military who recently agreed to donate their brain tissue upon death so that the effects of blast injuries -- which, unlike most concussions, do not involve any direct contact with the head -- can be better understood and treated.

http://snipr.com/kpt5o



Martian Lightning
from Science News

Scientists say they have seen the first direct evidence of lightning on Mars, in the form of electrical discharges during a Martian dust storm.

The finding has implications for human travel to the Red Planet and for studying possible origins of life on Mars, the authors say in a paper to appear in Geophysical Research Letters.

It has been thought that lightning might be possible on Mars. Bits of dust rubbing against each other in one of the planet's famous dust devils could charge up the particles the same way that running on a carpet charges up socks. All that charge could then be discharged in a zap, either as lightning or a shock.

http://snipr.com/kpt7y



Indonesian Elephant Fossil Opens Window to Past
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

BANDUNG, Indonesia (Associated Press) -- Indonesian scientists are reconstructing the largest, most complete skeleton of a prehistoric giant elephant ever found in the tropics, a finding that may offer new clues into the largely mysterious origins of its modern Asian cousin.

The prehistoric elephant is believed to have been submerged in quicksand shortly after dying on a riverbed in Java around 200,000 years ago. Its bones -- almost perfectly preserved -- were discovered by chance in March when an old sand quarry collapsed during monsoon rains.

The animal stood four meters (13 feet) tall, five meters (16 feet) long and weighed more than 10 tons - closer in size to the woolly mammoth of the same period than to the great Asian mammals now on Earth.

http://snipr.com/kpt9a



Scientific Flip-Flop: Experts Debate the Roots of GM Opposition
from Seed

On April 22, 1998 the European Union contravened decades of stalwart opposition to genetically engineered crops when it greenlighted the cultivation of "Mon 810," a pest-resistant maize manufactured by Monsanto.

But despite Mon810's official sanction under EU law, several countries ... have imposed national bans on the GE crop. ... At the European level, scientific assessments have found the risks Mon810 poses to the environment to be exceedingly small. ...s]tudy after study after study has concluded that the hazards ... are no greater with GE crops than with conventionally grown ones.

So why the disconnect? Why do many environmentalists trust science when it comes to climate change but not when it comes to genetic engineering? Is the fear really about the technology itself or is it a mistrust of big agribusiness?

http://snipr.com/kptfe



How to Get Drugs Into the Brain
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

With tactics that range from subterfuge to ultrasound beams, scientists are searching for a solution to one of medicine's most intractable problems: how to get drugs into the brain.

Standing in the way is the blood-brain barrier, a formidable defense system that keeps out pathogens and toxins but also bars many potential therapies from reaching the seat of maladies such as brain cancer or Alzheimer's disease.

"The system is supposed to protect us from substances that could be noxious to the brain. Unfortunately, it is also quite efficient in removing various drugs that can actually help in curing certain diseases," said Adam Chodobski, a professor of emergency medicine at the Warren Alpert School of Medicine at Brown University, who studies the blood-brain barrier.

http://snipr.com/kpti5



Science Takes to the Ice
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

NEWARK, Del. -- Melissa Bulanhagui is a highly ranked figure skater, but two years ago her right ankle failed her. She sprained it twice and tore a ligament, each time during one of her favorite jumps, the triple lutz.

Other skaters have suffered similar injuries, and now science is studying why, aiming to help skaters meet the sport's physical challenges without sacrificing their health.

For one study, Ms. Bulanhagui (pronounced BULL-en-hayg-ee), 18, and other skaters tape to their shins devices called tibial accelerometers, which measure the force of the impact when skaters land a jump.

http://snipr.com/kptj2



Following the Money
from Scientific American

Global health hit the philanthropic jackpot in recent years. About four times more aid flowed into developing countries in 2007 than in 1990. But a paper published in The Lancet suggests the nearly $22 billion donated in 2007 missed many of the world's most deserving countries and diseases.

"We know there's a lot of money," says Christopher Murray, director of the University of Washington's Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation and co-author of the study that tracked both the sources and destinations of aid. "But we also know there's huge variation in the amount of money per unit of health need."

Murray lived in Niger as a kid, a country ranked by the World Health Organization (WHO) as the world's 28th most needy country and home to one of the highest childhood death rates. The development funding for Niger, however, is well below that of wealthier countries like Namibia, which receives "10 to 15 times more aid per year of lost life," he says.

http://snipr.com/kptju



Can Wind Power Get Up to Speed?
from Time

Pop quiz: what source of power doesn't come out of the ground, doesn't burn and isn't radioactive? Hint: it contributed the most new electricity generation to the U.S. grid in 2008.

The answer is wind power, the technology that has become synonymous with going green. Companies that started out small ... have become multinational giants selling steel and fiberglass wind turbines; even blue-chippers like General Electric have identified wind power as a major revenue source for the future...

But for all the green talk and growth in wind power ... wind still makes up less than 3% of America's total electricity generation. Even at current rates of growth, that figure is unlikely to change soon. The question is, will wind ever produce enough power to satisfy America's energy needs? A new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences says yes.

http://snipr.com/kptlj



Human Role in Big Kangaroo Demise
from BBC News Online

A fossil study of the extinct giant kangaroo has added weight to the theory that humans were responsible for the demise of "megafauna" 46,000 years ago.

The decline of plants through widespread fire or changes toward an arid climate have also played into the debate about the animals' demise.

But an analysis of kangaroo fossils suggested they ate saltbush, which would have thrived in those conditions. The research is in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/kptmz



Animals That Count: How Numeracy Evolved
from New Scientist

Clever Hans's gift was just too good to be true. The Arabian stallion wowed the crowds in early 20th-century Europe with his apparent ability to stomp out the answers to simple mathematical problems, such as 12 - 3 = 9. He could even add fractions and factorise small numbers. Then in 1907, a German psychologist, Oskar Pfungst, proved that Hans was no animal savant.

In a scientific trial of sorts, Pfungst demonstrated that Hans could do arithmetic only when his owner, a maths teacher, or another questioner provided unconscious body cues hinting that Hans had reached the correct answer. With blinkers on or with the questioner hidden, Hans's abilities vanished. So, too, did the notion that animals could count.

Much has changed, however, in the century since Clever Hans's ignominious exposure. Few now doubt that primates have a sense of number, and even distantly related animals, including salamanders, honeybees and newly hatched chicks, seem to have the knack, with some able to perform basic arithmetic. What's more, the skills of this growing mathematical menagerie resemble our own innate abilities. Could basic mathematics have evolved hundreds of millions of years ago?

http://snipr.com/kptqg

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 29, 2009, 04:41:27 PM
June 22, 2009



Device on Nets May Protect Sea Turtles
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

BOURNE, Mass. (Associated Press) -- Fishery managers trying to protect rare sea turtles from dying in fishing nets have chosen a Cape Cod company to build a device that they think can help balance turtle protection with profitable fishing.

The device is a 7-inch silver cylinder that attaches to fishing nets and records how long they stay underwater. Time is crucial if the nets, dragged behind trawlers, snare a turtle. Federal research indicates that the vast majority of sea turtles survive entanglement, but only if the net is pulled up in less than 50 minutes.

With the logger, regulators can avoid other restrictions on fishermen, like shutting down fishing areas or requiring turtle-saving gear that does not work well in all nets. In fisheries where regulators decide that time limits would work best, they would not have to rely on an honor system for pulling nets up on time.

http://snipr.com/knch5



Evidence Indicates Manioc Was a Major Maya Crop
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Corn was the royalty of Maya food crops, celebrated in religion and cosmology, but archaeologists have long suspected that a different crop, the lowly manioc plant, was the mainstay of Maya life, providing the basic sustenance that allowed their civilization to flourish in densely populated cities.

Now, Colorado researchers have provided the first direct evidence that manioc was indeed intensively cultivated by the Maya -- in quantities that would allow its use for many purposes.

Manioc tubers, also known as cassava, can grow to as much as 3 feet long and as thick as a man's arm. They produce the highest food energy yield of any cultivated crop, about eight to 10 times as much as corn. They can also be grown in infertile soils and require little or no irrigation.

http://snipr.com/knck8



Antipsychotic Drugs for Kids Raise Hope, Worry
from the San Francisco Chronicle

Increasingly powerful antipsychotic drugs available on the market, and growing evidence that starting these medications early can help children with conditions like bipolar disorder, is putting doctors under more pressure than ever to diagnose and treat young people with mental illnesses.

As a result, some doctors say, mental illness, especially bipolar disorder, has been overdiagnosed much the same way attention deficit hyperactivity disorder was in the 1980s.

"ADHD was the diagnosis du jour in the '80s. Now it's become bipolar disorder," said Dr. Andrew Giammona, who heads the psychiatry department at Children's Hospital Oakland. "We're in a quick-fix society, and parents want to believe that if we had this treatment we can get it fixed and move on."

http://snipr.com/knclw



Among Many Peoples, Little Genomic Variety
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

There is a simplicity and all-inclusiveness to the number three -- the triangle, the Holy Trinity, three peas in a pod. So it's perhaps not surprising that the Family of Man is divided that way, too.

All of Earth's people, according to a new analysis of the genomes of 53 populations, fall into just three genetic groups. They are the products of the first and most important journey our species made -- the walk out of Africa about 70,000 years ago by a small fraction of ancestral Homo sapiens.

One group is the African. It contains the descendants of the original humans who emerged in East Africa about 200,000 years ago. The second is the Eurasian, encompassing the natives of Europe, the Middle East and Southwest Asia (east to about Pakistan). The third is the East Asian, the inhabitants of Asia, Japan and Southeast Asia, and -- thanks to the Bering Land Bridge and island-hopping in the South Pacific -- of the Americas and Oceania as well.

http://snipr.com/kncnb



The Plant That Pretends to Be Ill
from BBC News Online

A plant that pretends to be ill has been found growing in the rainforests of Ecuador. The plant feigns sickness to stop it being attacked by insect pests known as mining moths, which would otherwise eat its healthy leaves.

It is the first known example of a plant that mimics being ill, and could also explain a common pattern seen on plant leaves known as variegation. The discovery is published in the journal Evolutionary Ecology.

Variegation is familiar to gardeners and affects many species of plant. Variegated plants have different coloured patterns on the leaf surface, produced by a variety of causes.

http://snipr.com/kncos



Great White Sharks Hunt Like Serial Killers
from Discovery News

Sharks may only kill for food, but they share similar strategies with human serial killers: They lurk out of sight, stalking their victims.

Sharks and human serial killers can both be tracked using geographic profiling, according to a new study that applied this investigative technique to the hunting patterns of great white sharks, the world's largest known predatory fish.

The study, published in the latest Journal of Zoology, marks the first time geographic profiling has ever been used on a marine species.

http://snipr.com/kncuk



Raindrops Keep Falling -- Too Quickly -- On My Head
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The hows and whys of rainfall have been pondered for about as long as human beings have walked upright. Now a research team thinks it has discovered something everyone else missed: Some raindrops fall faster than they should.

Curious though it is, the finding could have consequences far beyond inspiring water cooler talk at the National Weather Service.

According to the researchers at Michigan Technological University and the National University of Mexico, their exhaustive study of how tiny drops of rain behave as they tumble out of the sky, bumping and mixing and breaking apart from their soggy brethren, could ultimately be used to improve weather forecasting.

http://snipr.com/kncvo



Email Patterns Can Predict Impending Doom
from New Scientist

Email logs can provide advance warning of an organisation reaching crisis point. That's the tantalising suggestion to emerge from the pattern of messages exchanged by Enron employees.

After US energy giant Enron collapsed in December 2001, federal investigators obtained records of emails sent by around 150 senior staff during the company's final 18 months. The logs, which record 517,000 emails sent to around 15,000 employees, provide a rare insight into how communication within an organisation changes during stressful times.

Ben Collingsworth and Ronaldo Menezes at the Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne identified key events in Enron's demise, such as the August 2001 resignation of CEO Jeffrey Skilling. They then examined the number of emails sent, and the groups that exchanged the messages, in the period around these events. They did not look at the emails' content.

http://snipr.com/kncx0



Finch Researchers Win Kyoto Prize
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Peter and Rosemary Grant, emeritus professors at Princeton University who were the first to document natural selection in action, have won the 2009 Kyoto Prize in the category of Basic Sciences for their work on evolutionary adaptations in response to environmental flux.

"I can't think of any other scientists who deserve it more," said Kenneth Petren, a former postdoc of Peter Grant and now a professor at the University of Cincinnati in Ohio, citing "their long term commitment to unraveling some very complex problems" in evolutionary biology.

Following in Darwin's footsteps, the Grants have spent 35 years studying the finches he discovered on the Galápagos Islands during his Beagle tour.

http://snipr.com/kncxx



Art Exhibit Links Darwin to Degas
from Seed

Surrealist artists claimed Freud, the cubists looked to Einstein, but Charles Darwin's influence on his 19th century artistic contemporaries has rarely been fully appreciated.

In celebration of his bicentennial birthday this year, Connecticut's Yale Center for British Art (YCBA) and the UK's Fitzwilliam Museum ... have launched ... a traveling exhibit that properly takes stock of the impact Darwin's evolutionary theories had on the visual arts.

It's hard to exaggerate just how widely Darwin's ideas on natural selection and the evolution of human kind traveled in the cultural milieu of his day, even in the age of stagecoaches and month-long journeys across the Atlantic. Artists of all shades reacted to his revolutionary theories, and this exhibit attempts to capture their range of responses in all sorts of mediums, including paintings, photographs, sketches, and sculptures.

http://snipr.com/kncyx

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 29, 2009, 04:42:44 PM
June 29, 2009


Grant System Leads Cancer Researchers to Play It Safe
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Among the recent research grants awarded by the National Cancer Institute is one for a study asking whether people who are especially responsive to good-tasting food have the most difficulty staying on a diet. Another study will assess a Web-based program that encourages families to choose more healthful foods.

Many other grants involve biological research unlikely to break new ground. For example, one project asks whether a laboratory discovery involving colon cancer also applies to breast cancer. But even if it does apply, there is no treatment yet that exploits it.

The cancer institute has spent $105 billion since President Richard M. Nixon declared war on the disease in 1971. The American Cancer Society, the largest private financer of cancer research, has spent about $3.4 billion on research grants since 1946.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/28/health/research/28cancer.html?ref=science



Rising Carbon Dioxide Affects Ear Structure of Fish
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Listen up! Carbon dioxide being absorbed by the oceans is having a puzzling effect on fish -- their ears get bigger.

The ear structure in fish, known as an otolith, is made up of minerals. Scientists knew that increasing carbon dioxide in the oceans -- absorbed from the atmosphere -- is making the sea more acidic, which can dissolve and weaken shells. They wondered if it also would reduce the size of the otoliths.

It turned out to be just the opposite, according to a study published Friday in the journal Science.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-fish-ears27-2009jun27,0,3356298.story


Radar Lets NASA See Beneath Surface of Faults
from the San Francisco Chronicle

California's two most dangerous earthquake faults - the Hayward and the San Andreas - are undergoing a new kind of seismic investigation as NASA scientists probe the faults with radar from the sky.

The new airborne radar is able to see what lies beneath the surface of the faults, providing information that researchers hope will lead to improved quake forecasting, updated building codes, and emergency planning to meet seismic hazards, according to quake forecasters at the U.S. Geological Survey.

Seismic probes aren't the NASA scientists' only goal: They're also seeking signs of danger in the steep East Bay hills where almost imperceptible movements even in dry weather can presage destructive landslides that threaten every year when the rains come and the ground turns soggy.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/06/29/MNUP18BMDE.DTL&type=science



Metrorail Crash May Exemplify Automation Paradox
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Sometime soon, investigators will piece together why one train on Metro's Red Line hurtled into another last Monday, killing nine people and injuring dozens. Early indications suggest a computer system may have malfunctioned, and various accounts have raised questions about whether the driver of the speeding train applied the brakes in time.

The problem, said several experts who have studied such accidents, is that these investigations invariably focus our attention on discrete aspects of machine or human error, whereas the real problem often lies in the relationship between humans and their automated systems.

"It is easy to focus on the last act that may or may not have prevented the collision," said John D. Lee, a professor of industrial and systems engineering at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. "But you can trace the accident back to purchasing decisions, maintenance decisions and track layout. To lay the blame on the end result of when and how quickly someone activated the brake may not help with improving safety."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/28/AR2009062802481.html



Few See Themselves as 'Old,' No Matter What Their Age
from USA Today

If you've been telling yourself you're not old yet, you fit right in.

No matter what their chronological age, most people say that they aren't yet "old" — and that they feel younger than their birthday count, according to a new nationally representative survey of almost 3,000 adults by the Pew Research Center.

The average age considered "old" by respondents was 68 — but there were real differences in perception driven by the respondents' own ages.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-06-29-pew-study-aging-perceptions_N.htm



Electronic Nose Can Pinpoint Where Wine Was Made
from the Telegraph (UK)

Scientists have developed a way of identifying wine so accurately they can even say which barrel it was produced in. It uses an electronic nose to make even the most confident sommelier a little nervous.

The technique exploits the unique and complex mix of thousands of compounds found in each bottle of wine that gives the drink subtly different scents and flavours.

Wine experts use the odour and taste of some of these compounds to identify types and vintages of wines during tasting sessions.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/science/sciencenews/5663798/Electronic-nose-can-pinpoint-where-wine-was-made.html



Forgotten Evolutionist Lives in Darwin's Shadow
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

SANTUBONG, Malaysia (Associated Press) — As he trudges past chest-high ferns and butterflies the size of saucers, George Beccaloni scours a jungle hilltop overlooking the South China Sea for signs of a long-forgotten Victorian-era scientist.

He finds what he's looking for: an abandoned, two-story guest house, its doors missing and ceiling caved in. "Excellent. This is the actual spot," he yells.

It is on this site, in a long-gone thatched hut, that Alfred Russel Wallace is believed to have spent weeks in 1855 writing a seminal paper on the theory of evolution. Yet he is largely unknown outside scientific circles today, overshadowed by Charles Darwin, whom most people credit as the father of a theory that explains the origins of life through how plants and animals evolve.

http://www.ajc.com/news/content/shared-gen/ap/Science/AS_FEA_Malaysia_Forgotten_Evolutionist.html


It's Now Legal to Catch a Raindrop in Colorado
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

DURANGO, Colo. — For the first time since territorial days, rain will be free for the catching here, as more and more thirsty states part ways with one of the most entrenched codes of the West.

Precipitation, every last drop or flake, was assigned ownership from the moment it fell in many Western states, making scofflaws of people who scooped rainfall from their own gutters. In some instances, the rights to that water were assigned a century or more ago.

Now two new laws in Colorado will allow many people to collect rainwater legally. The laws are the latest crack in the rainwater edifice, as other states, driven by population growth, drought, or declining groundwater in their aquifers, have already opened the skies or begun actively encouraging people to collect.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/us/29rain.html?ref=science



No News Can Be Bad News With Medical Test Results
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

"No news is good news" is what most patients assume when they're waiting to receive test results. But "no news" actually meant "bad news" for one out of 14 patients with troubling labs, according to a study published Monday in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

The study, led by Dr. Lawrence P. Casalino of Weill Cornell Medical College in New York City, examined more than 5,000 records of randomly selected middle-aged patients from 23 primary care practices.

The patients had received common blood and screening tests, including mammograms, pap tests, cholesterol tests and red blood cell counts. Almost 35% of the patients had abnormal results that fell well outside the normal range. But in 7.1% of those cases, practices did not inform -- or document that they had informed -- the patients.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-test-results27-2009jun27,0,4193383.story


Extremely Large Telescope Surveys the Past
from the Times (London)

The European Extremely Large Telescope will dwarf all other telescopes. In 1609 Galileo's "Old Discoverer" had a lens an inch in diameter. Now the Keck Observatory on top of a mountain in Hawaii has two mirrors, each of them 10m across, that are so smooth and so perfect that even if they were stretched out to the width of the world their irregularities would still be only inches high. The Extremely Large Telescope — its name so deliberately prosaic that it becomes almost poetic— will, provided that it is completed by 2018, be the diameter of five double-deck buses placed end to end and will be able to see (rather than infer) Earth-like planets revolving around distant stars.

We could, in effect, be looking at ourselves through the looking glass. The Extremely Large Telescope will probably be located in the Canary Islands, but you really can try something like this at home. Look at yourself in the mirror. What do you see? Look very carefully. Obviously your left eye is where your right eye ought to be, but there is more than that, something practically impossible to notice and yet fundamental to making sense of the Universe. Your reflection is no longer you. The difference between you as you are now, and you as the mirror represents you, is measurable. This is what you used to look like, a short time (a few nano seconds) ago. But if the speed of light is finite — something that Galileo realised — then everything you see is history.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article6583353.ece

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 07, 2009, 03:38:23 PM
I just spent an hour formatting links and writing up snarky little comments for this thread, and just before I finished the forum ate my post. So fuck it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on July 07, 2009, 06:51:15 PM
aw :(

(but take this as an opportunity to learn that any post that takes, say, more than 10 minutes to write, write it in Notepad or something similar)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cramulus on July 07, 2009, 08:04:33 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 07, 2009, 03:38:23 PM
I just spent an hour formatting links and writing up snarky little comments for this thread, and just before I finished the forum ate my post. So fuck it.

UGH! That sucks - I know how you feel.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Richter on July 07, 2009, 08:14:33 PM
 :argh!:
I've lost 3 page bullshit masterpieces that way.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 08, 2009, 12:44:52 PM
Quote from: Triple Zero on July 07, 2009, 06:51:15 PM
aw :(

(but take this as an opportunity to learn that any post that takes, say, more than 10 minutes to write, write it in Notepad or something similar)

Yeah, next time I'll do it via text editor.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 08, 2009, 04:08:37 PM
Lets try this again shall we?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/06/AR2009070602076.html National Institute of Health to allow stem cell usage that has been obtained "ethically" (take from that what you will) from non-embryonic tissue.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/07/science/07angier.html?_r=1 Tropical paleontology at the Panama Canal.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-07-07-food-safety-guidelines_N.htm Food and Drug Administration possibly getting visibility and food safety based overhaul.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/07/090706-humans-bats-echolocation.html HUMANS CROSSED WITH BATS RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!1 More seriously, you can use palate clicks to navigate in a similar way that bats do. Very cool. Actually, I want someone to teach me this.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327154.500-eavesdropping-on-the-music-of-the-brain.html Listening to brain scans by assigning areas of activity to different pitches can help determine disorders such as schizophrenia. Also very cool. Whats with all the cool hearing based stuff today?

http://www.economist.com/world/international/displayStory.cfm?story_id=13979392 One of the biggest issues facing taxonomy: more species going extinct every day that we will never know about.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/45214/title/Concerns_over_bisphenol_A_continue_to_grow New study out about bisphenol-A leaching from plastics, prognosis: arrhythmias.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/07/science/07glass.html Glass laminated with polymers to make awesome architecture even more awesome.

http://www.americanscientist.org/science/content1/7069 And one of the ones I screwed up from yesterday, spider decoys built by spiders. Something I've never heard of before, and wish I would hear more about.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 22, 2009, 01:36:02 PM
10 Worst Evolutionary "Designs"

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/17-08/st_best (http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/17-08/st_best)

I actually didn't know the Narwhal tusk was a tooth.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on July 22, 2009, 01:44:23 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 22, 2009, 01:36:02 PM
10 Worst Evolutionary "Designs"

http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/17-08/st_best (http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/magazine/17-08/st_best)

I actually didn't know the Narwhal tusk was a tooth.

Heh, thanks for that find.  A very amusing read and a good way to start the day.

Also, I'm glad I'm not a Hyena. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Richter on July 22, 2009, 01:45:55 PM
Wow, a bit lighter than your usual fare, but awesome nonetheless.  I'm going to be horrormirthing for hours at the idea of an engorged, baby crushing clitoris.

Also:  Walrus Penis Bone:  What the hell do they do if it breaks?  Compound fracture?  :x 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 22, 2009, 02:33:19 PM
Theres more to the Hyena story. It is, for me, the number one argument against a benevolent yet omnipotent and omniscient deity.

The female spotted hyena genetalia is highly masculinized. The labia are fused, and the urogental tract runs straight through the enlarged clitoris. This includes the birth canal. So, not only is sex for spotted hyena's highly awkward, birth is an extremely painful experience. The clitoris expands (spotted hyena females have the highest concentration of relaxin of any organism) to great dialation. A good number of first time mothers die in the experience. On TOP of this, the birth canal isn't straight, it has a 90 degree angle, and the pup often gets stuck.

Hows that for horror?  :x

On a side note, I've actually seen a walrus bacculus before (in a museum bone collection you sick fucks). It looks like a goddamn horse femur.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on July 22, 2009, 02:56:45 PM
coo coo ka choo indeed. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 22, 2009, 03:08:53 PM
fun fact: primates are some of the few mammals that lack a bacculus. Cetcacians are the other group, I think.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Richter on July 22, 2009, 03:16:50 PM
Fucking OW.  That sounds akin to trying to ejaculate a pineapple.

The Inuit refer to the penis bone as "oosik", and have been known to use them as clubs.  I've found a few palces that sell them too  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 22, 2009, 03:19:33 PM
Quote from: Mumia Vending Machine on July 22, 2009, 03:16:50 PM
Fucking OW.  That sounds akin to trying to ejaculate a pineapple.

The Inuit refer to the penis bone as "oosik", and have been known to use them as clubs.  I've found a few palces that sell them too  :lulz:

A documentary on clubbing baby seals with walrus penis bones would be slightly surreal.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Richter on July 22, 2009, 05:00:37 PM
Hell, ANY documentary on penis bones and their useage would be surreal.

http://www.boonetrading.com/Pg26.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Unayko on July 22, 2009, 06:30:09 PM
ODE TO AN OOSIK


Strange things have been done in the Midnight Sun,
   and the story books are full---
But the strangest tale concerns the male,
   magnificent walrus bull!

I know it's rude, quite common and crude,
   Perhaps it is grossly unkind;
But with first glance at least, this bewhiskered beast,
   is as ugly in front as behind.

Look once again, take a second look -- then
   you'll see he's not ugly or vile --
There's a hint of a grin, in that blubbery chin --
   and the eyes have a shy secret smile.

How can this be, this clandestine glee
   that exudes from the walrus like music?
He knows, there inside, beneath blubber and hide
   lies a splendid contrivance -- the Oosik!

"Oosik" you say -- and quite well you may,
    I'll explain if you keep it between us;
In the simplest truth, though rather uncouth
   "Oosik" is, in fact, his penis!

Now the size alone of this walrus bone,
   would indeed arouse envious thinking --
It is also a fact, documented and backed,
   There is never a softening or shrinking!

This, then, is why the smile is so sly,
   the walrus is rightfully proud.
Though the climate is frigid, the walrus is rigid,
   Pray, why, is not man so endowed?

Added to this, is a smile you might miss ---
   Though the bull is entitled to bow --
The one to out-smile our bull by a mile
    is the satisfied walrus cow!

(Anonymous)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 22, 2009, 08:19:27 PM
Quote from: Mumia Vending Machine on July 22, 2009, 05:00:37 PM
Hell, ANY documentary on penis bones and their useage would be surreal.

http://www.boonetrading.com/Pg26.html

I just spent an hour looking at that website. FFS.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Richter on July 22, 2009, 08:34:16 PM
They have good advice on working, caring for and storing ivory / horn / bone.  I found them yesterday when I got bored and decided to try carving some.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on July 22, 2009, 08:37:45 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 22, 2009, 03:19:33 PM
Quote from: Mumia Vending Machine on July 22, 2009, 03:16:50 PM
Fucking OW.  That sounds akin to trying to ejaculate a pineapple.

The Inuit refer to the penis bone as "oosik", and have been known to use them as clubs.  I've found a few palces that sell them too  :lulz:

A documentary on clubbing baby seals with walrus penis bones would be slightly surreal.

The baby seal joke will never be the same for me again. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 22, 2009, 09:57:10 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on July 22, 2009, 08:37:45 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 22, 2009, 03:19:33 PM
Quote from: Mumia Vending Machine on July 22, 2009, 03:16:50 PM
Fucking OW.  That sounds akin to trying to ejaculate a pineapple.

The Inuit refer to the penis bone as "oosik", and have been known to use them as clubs.  I've found a few palces that sell them too  :lulz:

A documentary on clubbing baby seals with walrus penis bones would be slightly surreal.

The baby seal joke will never be the same for me again. 

What, "baby seal walks into a club..."?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Richter on July 23, 2009, 12:17:46 AM
I am sorry, Kai.  For doing this to your thread  :lulz:


Quote from: Unayko on July 22, 2009, 06:30:09 PM
ODE TO AN OOSIK


Strange things have been done in the Midnight Sun,
   and the story books are full---
But the strangest tale concerns the male,
   magnificent walrus bull!

I know it's rude, quite common and crude,
   Perhaps it is grossly unkind;
But with first glance at least, this bewhiskered beast,
   is as ugly in front as behind.

Look once again, take a second look -- then
   you'll see he's not ugly or vile --
There's a hint of a grin, in that blubbery chin --
   and the eyes have a shy secret smile.

How can this be, this clandestine glee
   that exudes from the walrus like music?
He knows, there inside, beneath blubber and hide
   lies a splendid contrivance -- the Oosik!

"Oosik" you say -- and quite well you may,
    I'll explain if you keep it between us;
In the simplest truth, though rather uncouth
   "Oosik" is, in fact, his penis!

Now the size alone of this walrus bone,
   would indeed arouse envious thinking --
It is also a fact, documented and backed,
   There is never a softening or shrinking!

This, then, is why the smile is so sly,
   the walrus is rightfully proud.
Though the climate is frigid, the walrus is rigid,
   Pray, why, is not man so endowed?

Added to this, is a smile you might miss ---
   Though the bull is entitled to bow --
The one to out-smile our bull by a mile
    is the satisfied walrus cow!

(Anonymous)

Good find!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 23, 2009, 01:17:20 PM
this thread is more or less immortal. so it's not really a problem to drift.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: AFK on July 23, 2009, 02:20:20 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 22, 2009, 09:57:10 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on July 22, 2009, 08:37:45 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 22, 2009, 03:19:33 PM
Quote from: Mumia Vending Machine on July 22, 2009, 03:16:50 PM
Fucking OW.  That sounds akin to trying to ejaculate a pineapple.

The Inuit refer to the penis bone as "oosik", and have been known to use them as clubs.  I've found a few palces that sell them too  :lulz:

A documentary on clubbing baby seals with walrus penis bones would be slightly surreal.

The baby seal joke will never be the same for me again. 

What, "baby seal walks into a club..."?


Yes, and when I say it will never be the same, I mean it has been greatly improved, visually. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on July 23, 2009, 02:28:31 PM
Well, now we can add to it.



"A baby seal walks into a club; now it's fucked."
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on July 24, 2009, 06:43:50 AM
Quote from: Kai on July 22, 2009, 03:08:53 PM
fun fact: primates are some of the few mammals that lack a bacculus. Cetcacians are the other group, I think.
I once saw someone suggest that Eve was created not from the rib but from the bacculus. Makes slightly more sense than the original, doesn't it?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 03, 2009, 05:28:25 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/10/science/10aging.html Study by Weindruch of UofA has confounding statistics, but may suggest a low calorie diet lowers the risk for age related diseases in primates. I'm looking at YUO, Dr. Atkins.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=why-do-we-swear HOLY SHIT IN A FUCKBUCKET! Swearing could, just maybe (whowuddathunk) alleviate pain, goddammit.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/45239/title/Climate_change_shrinks_sheep Shorter, sweeter winters shrink sheep on St Kilda Island.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/45269/title/Hornets_suffocate_in_bee_ball You know those Japanese Hornets that get totally pwned by certain honey bee hives? C02 may be as big of a cause of death as heat.

http://www.sciencecentric.com/news/article.php?q=09062929-brittle-table-salt-can-stretch-like-taffy-the-nanoworld Nanowires from salt micro-taffy. Cool!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 03, 2009, 06:04:38 PM
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/45531/title/Erosion,__on_the_down_low Physical rock weathering by symbiotic root fungi observed for the first time.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/45583/title/The__Biofuel_Future Big segment from Science News on alternative biofuels such as grasses and algae. I hope we get over the idea of corn ethanol as a viable future soon.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17543-gorilla-hiv-makes-leap-to-humans.html OhSHIT!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/30/AR2009073002132.html Virginians create a new oyster reef out of old oyster shells, producing a thriving habitat that hasn't been seen in that region since early European settlement. Environmental engineering partnered with ecological understanding FTW.

http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/pavlovs_microorganisms/ Classical conditioning ala pavlov shown in microorganisms.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=stumbling-over-data Regardless of whether you accept global rapid climate change or reject it, mistakes in the data don't help anyone's understanding of the issues at hand.

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2009/729/2 All the fishes in the sea may be more responsible for stirring ocean water than climate. This one I saw twice today, and I'm not sure what to make of it.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-eu-sci-particle-collider,1,4116618.story Large Hadron Collider delayed. AGAIN.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/30/AR2009073002478.html Coming from a background of fisheries management, all I can say to this is DUH. Also, you didn't know that the Orange Roughy was originally called slimehead, did you?

http://www.the-scientist.com/templates/trackable/display/article1.jsp?type=article&o_url=article/display/55774&id=55774 Nice story about possible haddock fishery revival.

http://seedmagazine.com/content/article/supersizing_quantum_behavior/ QUANTUM! But possibly very very cool.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/45958/description/Galaxies_going_green Green galaxies show to be as rare as green stars.

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/sciencemedicine/story/3440B1ED10E3AC1A86257601000BB811?OpenDocument Gulf of Mexico dead zone smaller this year but not indicative of water quality increase. The shit we throw in is still as rotten as ever, folks.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8172739.stm FIRE FIGHTING ROBOTS!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8164060.stm I don't believe this one, myself.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/technology/21distracted.html?_r=1 DUH!

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 05, 2009, 01:05:52 PM
http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/08/03/vitamin.d.children/ There's some confounding variables in this, but the conclusion is the same: get your kids the fuck off their playstations and outside, running around. Also, eat better.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/aug/03/1m3scripps072547-scripps-team-manipulates-skin-cel/?science The fundies are gonna have a field day with this one. mice breeding from skin cells? UNHOLY BLASHPEMY AGAINST GOD AND NATURE~

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/07/090731-green-sahara.html Sahara possibly to return to lush savanna with climate change. Kinda weird or cool, depending on how you think of it.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8182371.stm Domestic dog ancestry may be rooted in Africa.

http://www.latimes.com/features/health/la-he-deaf-children3-2009aug03,0,6159335.story Synthetic Coch....lea. This is actually pretty cool, something I haven't heard of before. The Cochlea is a rather complex organ, to be making synthetic versions of it.

http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/feature/mitochondrial-death-channels/1 A full sized article about programmed cell death in relation to heart attack.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/07/090728-first-animals-evolution-lakes.html A load of interesting speculation on multicellular animal origination.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 06, 2009, 04:12:04 PM
http://www.the-scientist.com/2009/08/1/26/1/ Researchers studying regeneration in amphibians think of possible human implications.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/aug/03/1c3darwin013535-drawn-darwin/?science The effect of On the Origin of Species in relation to the visual arts.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8178703.stm The cause for epilepsy finally shown to be sodium/potassium imbalance and a particular faulty gene. This is all in mice, mind you, but I doubt it's much different for humans.

http://www.startribune.com/nation/52436272.html?elr=KArks:DCiUMEaPc:UiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU Commercial space flights in two years? Not so sure about that.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/04/science/04angier.html?_r=1 Although I knew the spleen played an important role in immunodefense, I didn't know how important. DO NOT FUCK WITH THE HAPPY FUN SPLEEN.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327191.600-dark-energy-may-disguise-shape-of-universe.html DARK ENERGY! I really wish they would come up with better terms for this stuff. Sounds like something straight out of new age.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/8186263.stm HIV-1 genome decoded. Finally. It took long enough, as the article explains, because HIV is an RNA virus, not DNA based.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article6739343.ece Corvids shown once again to be incredibly intelligent birds (to the shattering nonsurprise of everyone).

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on August 06, 2009, 06:19:54 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 06, 2009, 04:12:04 PM
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article6739343.ece Corvids shown once again to be incredibly intelligent birds (to the shattering nonsurprise of everyone).
After us humans finally kill ourselves off crows will be the next sentient species.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on August 06, 2009, 06:25:40 PM
QuoteAn American inventor, Joshua Klein, is trying to harness crows' capabilities for social purposes, specifically clearing up litter. He is developing a crow vending machine that would give a reward in exchange for the litter, which he thinks the birds could learn to use.

this wont have any strange and funny unintended consequences
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 06, 2009, 06:27:21 PM
Quote from: fomenter on August 06, 2009, 06:25:40 PM
QuoteAn American inventor, Joshua Klein, is trying to harness crows' capabilities for social purposes, specifically clearing up litter. He is developing a crow vending machine that would give a reward in exchange for the litter, which he thinks the birds could learn to use.

this wont have any strange and funny unintended consequences

I think the strange and funny consequences are the best part.  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on August 06, 2009, 06:35:07 PM
me to, i support both this experiment and implementing it nation wide quickly before the side effects become apparent, to maximise the fun and spread it as widely as possible...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 07, 2009, 01:15:55 PM
http://scienceblogs.com/zooillogix/2009/08/this_just_in_african_village_d.php Follow up to the dog genetic diversity/origin story.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 09, 2009, 10:29:49 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_GFq12w5WU Totally awesome TED talk on the field of Biomimicry.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 09, 2009, 11:01:29 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOSPNVunyFQ Another TED talk, this one on the evolution of skin pigmentation. I agree with everything except the migration map with arrows pointing from Europe to NA and not from Asia. Maybe I'm just way off on this, but I still haven't heard strong evidence for NA migration from Europe, and as I understand migration from Asia is still the more widely accepted hypothesis.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on August 10, 2009, 01:58:41 AM
Surely that is a mistake. I have NEVER heard anyone suggest that the Native Americans migrated from Europe. I'm pretty sure that there are several genetic studies out there that all but proved that they were more closely related to Russians and Chinese than Europeans.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 10, 2009, 02:42:09 AM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on August 10, 2009, 01:58:41 AM
Surely that is a mistake. I have NEVER heard anyone suggest that the Native Americans migrated from Europe. I'm pretty sure that there are several genetic studies out there that all but proved that they were more closely related to Russians and Chinese than Europeans.

I hope so.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 11, 2009, 03:11:31 PM
http://www.baltimoresun.com/health/chi-grapefruit-juice-05-aug05,0,286430.story I have wondered for a while why people weren't supposed to wash down meds with grapefruit juice, but maybe for cancer drugs it would be best.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-glacier7-2009aug07,0,2419256.story Can't remember if I've talked about this already, but it's been on my mind. Benchmark glaciers receding.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/07/090730-venice-buried-city-altinum.html News about the rediscovery of the first century Roman city Altinum under Italian corn-soy fields.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/06/science/space/06space.html Arg, this again? Look the allure of sending people into space is mostly over. It's costly and dangerous, and people would rather look at awesome space photos sent back by robotics than watch people spacewalking anyway. There's no reason to go to Mars, because we've been there for 5 years. This is the 21st century, this isn't space kindergarten anymore, we have robotics and can interact far better with extraterrestrial environments through them than we could if we went there ourselves. Enough said.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/05/AR2009080500905.html This is exactly what we should be working on. Battery technology is/has been the thing holding us back from so many advances for the longest time now.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-hurricane9-2009aug09,0,4856781.story Although hurricanes destroy cities and endanger lives, they also drop a great deal of water on the droughty southeast and contribute to much of the ocean mixing in the area. It's a trade off, for sure. Me? I'm still going with humans living in houses more suited to the environments they stand on.  There are architectural set ups which minimize damage even in the worst category 5s.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/09/AR2009080902294.html the solution to this, is of course, immigration.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 11, 2009, 03:18:44 PM
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2009/08/10/national/a022331D38.DTL Animals treated with stem cells.

http://features.csmonitor.com/environment/2009/08/07/a-pacific-island-chain-with-real-energy-incentive/ Tuvalu to go 100% renewable by 2020.

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2009/807/2 Wales finally shown to be harmed by surface sonar from Navy ships. Took them long enough.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on August 11, 2009, 03:37:56 PM
Kai, just wanted to say, I enjoy your new "format" for this thread, a summary in your own words, plus a littlebit of opinion.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 11, 2009, 05:07:06 PM
Quote from: Triple Zero on August 11, 2009, 03:37:56 PM
Kai, just wanted to say, I enjoy your new "format" for this thread, a summary in your own words, plus a littlebit of opinion.

Thanks. I like it better too.  :)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 24, 2009, 03:11:48 PM
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090819/full/news.2009.844.html RELATIVITY. Also, speculation about gravity waves.

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2009/819/1 I really wish geneticists would get some standard sensical naming system for genes. SNORKEL1 and SNORKEL2, srsly? Also, drowning rice saved from watery death.

http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/55896/ Oh FOR FUCKS SAKE! Article is about how antioxidants possibly beneficial for preventing cancer may actually accelerate cancerous growth. Course, its The Scientist, how much can I really trust it?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125069735467643373.html SWIIIIIIIIINEEEEEEEEFLUUUUUUUUUUUUUU. Enough said.

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2009/820/1 Makes me see Scooby Doo in a whole other light.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-runner-side21-2009aug21,0,3926576.story NEWSFLASH: SEX AND GENDER NOT SO CLEAR CUT. Some individuals not surprised. More at 10.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2009/08/20/mercury_in_fish_widespread_new_study_shows/ I believe this; coal fire powerplants spew mercury particulate over most of the global surface, AND it occurs naturally. The trick is limiting the type of fish you eat depending on your level of health; eating fish more basal on the food chain is better than eating lots of tuna, because predators have higher concentrations due to biomagnification.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8210645.stm A whole new group of organisms discovered from the deep ocean. This discovery is so new I can't even find any information on where these bioluminecent "bomber worms" might belong phylogenetically. Very very cool.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 24, 2009, 03:40:28 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/21/science/earth/21ancient.html?_r=1&ref=science Damn coastal humans the reason there aren't any awesome giant sloths around today, paper says.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090820-cleaner-fish.html Why cleaner fish don't get eaten.

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1917458,00.html A long time article about the food industry, food economics, and healthy eating

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090819-pterosaur-runway-tracks-dinosaurs.html Fossil footprints of a landing pterosaur found. Very cool. Cue pterodactyl handler.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/16/AR2009081601835.html Wisconsin and Minnesota playing catch with neutrino beams.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090816-killer-spices-sustainable.html We've known this for thousands of years, but it bears repeating.

http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articles/2009/08/17/nanotechnology_coming_soon_to_a_product_you_use/ NANOTECH.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/health/bal-te.hs.sleep18aug18,0,7087025.story Oh great.  :x As if the expectation of glaucoma isn't bad enough.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8205864.stm Methane from the sea bed possibly positive feedback of climate change.

http://technology.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/tech_and_web/article6799723.ece HOLY SHIT. No, srsly, holy. shit.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-comet18-2009aug18,0,7605775.story The more evidence we gather on how common the components of life actually are, the more we realize that life is probably everywhere in the universe it could possibly survive.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/16/magazine/16Bruce-t.html Don't know if you've heard of this guy Cain.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/11/science/11naming.html This pertains directly to my research and Systematics in general. Taxonomy specialists are in decline, but people in general world wide from all cultures have a deep set need to name the living things around them, and there seems to be a pattern to this. Part of the reason our culture is in decline in this respect is the separateness we place between ourselves and the living world I think. Makes me want to go out right now and learn the names of everything.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 24, 2009, 03:41:51 PM
A quote from that final article:

QuoteNo wonder so few of us can really see what is out there. Even when scads of insistent wildlife appear with a flourish right in front of us, and there is such life always — hawks migrating over the parking lot, great colorful moths banging up against the window at night — we barely seem to notice. We are so disconnected from the living world that we can live in the midst of a mass extinction, of the rapid invasion everywhere of new and noxious species, entirely unaware that anything is happening. Happily, changing all this turns out to be easy. Just find an organism, any organism, small, large, gaudy, subtle — anywhere, and they are everywhere — and get a sense of it, its shape, color, size, feel, smell, sound. Give a nod to Professor Franclemont and meditate, luxuriate in its beetle-ness, its daffodility. Then find a name for it. Learn science's name, one of countless folk names, or make up your own. To do so is to change everything, including yourself. Because once you start noticing organisms, once you have a name for particular beasts, birds and flowers, you can't help seeing life and the order in it, just where it has always been, all around you.

Amen.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 26, 2009, 07:14:33 PM
Headlines, The Science

August 26, 2009

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/26/health/26flu.html?_r=1 White House advisory panel shot down by CDCP over the panic inducing numbers in their report on H1N1.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/aug/24/us-sci-multitasking-mayhem-082409/?science&zIndex=154553 Report published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows college students score poorly while multitasking. No surprise there; multitasking should be called fast switching, because its not really doing many things at once but multiple things in rapid succession. People do best when single tasking under great focus.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2009-08-23-dialysis_N.htm Issues with kidney dialysis treatment and data suggesting that more frequent dialysis at home leads to lower mortality overall.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-climate-trial25-2009aug25,0,901567.story More bullshit bureaucratic/corporate nonsense invasion into scientific discussion, this time with climatology.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/25/MN1619D3HH.DTL&type=science#ixzz0PD29LROk American Heart Association publishes on the high refined sugar content of American diets, with tips on how to cut down.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/25/science/25tier.html Study by Kochanska et al published this month in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology investigates the social reasons for the development of guilt, and benefits and detriments thereof.

http://www.boston.com/business/technology/articles/2009/08/24/cambridge_firms_green_energy_source_fuels_speculation/ Joule Biotechnologies with secret living....green goo. Will power cars in the future. Srsly, they say it consumes CO2 and photons and spits out ethanol and they're trying to tell me that the green goo isn't some sort of alga? Possible it could be very tiny vascular plants....theres a duckweed, Wolffia, that looks like a green mass when not viewed up close; happens to be the world's smallest flowering plant, tiny little green beads.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article6808427.ece There's all kinds of reasons for Colony Collapse Disorder in honeybees, there's Veroa Mite, and Small Hive Beetles, and virii, and pesticides. Trying to ascribe it to a single phenomenon is stretching things. Apiaries have been in decline for over 50 years now, this isn't recent or anything.

http://features.csmonitor.com/innovation/2009/08/25/when-the-internet-breaks-who-ya-gonna-call/ Internet security and the like. I really don't understand these issues very well, nor the history behind them. From what I know, the internet isn't this thing but rather a network of computers. Maybe we need to stop talk about "THE Internet" and talk about internets in general, ie networks between computers.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/46658/title/Extrasolar_planets_at_full_tilt Exosolar planets often are seen spinning contrary directions to rotation (like venus does), suggesting interplanetary impacts and crowded star systems. Speculation is that our star system's large planetary impacts occured early on, which allowed for life to continue more or less uninterrupted (the few hiccups include the P-T and K-T extinctions, probably cometary in origin).
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 26, 2009, 07:30:59 PM
Headlines, The Science

Previous Excerpts

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8213884.stm More speculation on the climate change apocalypse.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327220.300-mystery-of-the-missing-minigalaxies.html .....Orrrrrrrrrrrrrr the supermassive black hole at the center of Galaxias is more supermassive than we previously thought. SRsly, do we need to just start making up physics whenever faced with some odd observation?

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/aug/24/us-acid-oceans-alaska-082409/?science&zIndex=154346 Ocean acidification in Alaskan waters. My hypothesis: Chinese coal.

http://www.ajc.com/health/content/shared-auto/healthnews/adhd/630300.html People are abusing ADHD medications; who didn't see this coming? Not I.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/25/science/25fossil.html Dr. Rona of Rutgers University provides evidence that the weird creatures he's finding in the Mid Atlantic ridge vents are Paleodictyon nodosum, the living fossil with the longest static morphology, since Cambrian times (500 mya).

http://www.the-scientist.com/article/display/55850/ On protein folding, and post-translational processing of proteins by enzymes and RNA. Stuff I'm learning about right now, actually.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 26, 2009, 08:42:46 PM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/23/AR2009082302489.html How the Gecko got its Grip, and other not so just so stories. Just had to post it since the researcher is at a university in Upstate SC, which is where I happen to be at the moment. Plus, its just cool.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 28, 2009, 06:36:28 PM
http://www.jsonline.com/features/health/54642152.html Skin cells changed to the same tissue that makes up the retina of your eye. I'm starting to see why fundies hate stem cell research; the future of medicine undermines their need for a personal god whom they can pray to for help.

http://www.startribune.com/nation/55043997.html?elr=KArks:DCiUMEaPc:UiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU Speculation on embryonic transgenics in humans. Thinking this feels a bit too much like eugenics. Mitochondrial eugenics at that.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/46715/title/Vitamin_D_may_be_heart_protective Personally, I think its more that people who spend lots of time outside getting a healthy dose of sunlight also tend to excercise well, have good body weight, and eat reasonably, whereas people who don't get enough sun are probably sitting on their asses all the time and eating shitty food, leading to a shitty body. How could they know anyway? <150 individuals is way too small a sample size to be meaningful.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=depressions-evolutionary Depression as a problem solving adaptation rather than a disease or disorder. I find this interesting. It does seem that people with higher intelligence tend to become depressed more often than their counterparts. First circuit anxiety and fear tends to paralyze and get in the way of this though. Read the article, might be interesting for you.

http://www.economist.com/sciencetechnology/tm/displayStory.cfm?story_id=14299348 The glue of the sandcastle worm, a marine Annelida, to be researched as a bone fracture adhesive for its special properties. THIS IS DAMN COOL. Also, the article mentions caddisfly larvae. :3

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112111657 See, the problem with forensics techniques is that they AREN'T a science. The development of techniques is a science. The primary work into sociology and biology are sciences. Doing forensics work is art, skill and technology, and as always with technology, the expectation is for it to be foolproof. Scientists understand it's not and cannot ever be foolproof. There will be mistakes, which is why there needs to be checking and rechecking. This is no reason to discount forensics, a set of useful tools, just because mistakes won't ever be made.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090826-iridescent-fossil-feather.html Showing once again that amazing detail can be preserved as stone under the right conditions.

http://www.economist.com/sciencetechnology/displayStory.cfm?story_id=14301951 So basically, just more misogyny. Great. It's not sexist if its hormonal! I mean, hormones have absolutely nothing to do with sex. Ever. Also, in this case we need to get some more low testosterone women in the banks, maybe then they'll stop taking STUPID RISKS. FFS.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=gravitational-wave-ligo RELATIVITY. Also, gravity waves.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 28, 2009, 06:39:58 PM
Kai, I am really digging your commentary on these.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 28, 2009, 06:56:40 PM
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SCI_NASA_MOON?SITE=FLPET&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT Good. There's no reason to send people to the moon. All they're gonna do is play golf again.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6811264.ece Cool, but I honestly like real trees better. Just something irresistably natural about them, can't quite put my finger on it. Its almost as if they've been around for 500 million years....

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090826-impossible-planet-wasp-shouldnt-exist.html Want to see an exoplanet fall into a star? We may get to.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/26/AR2009082603549.html Concerns about medical radiation imaging.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8224279.stm New dinosaur species from down under. Sauropods seem like they were pretty diverse in their era, many species, large body size. We really don't have anything group that would compare today.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/27/technology/27compute.html Concern over worldwide control of computers remotely via virus vectors over internet.

http://www3.signonsandiego.com/stories/2009/aug/28/1n28anti002250-scientists-may-have-new-tool-bacter/?science&zIndex=156667 Possible new antibiotic based on inhibition of nicotinate mononucleotide adenyltransferase in bacteria.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:02:00 PM
Quote from: LMNO on August 28, 2009, 06:39:58 PM
Kai, I am really digging your commentary on these.

Thanks. I really like writing them. :)

I hope people start posting articles here with their own commentary too.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:02:19 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 06:56:40 PM

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090826-impossible-planet-wasp-shouldnt-exist.html Want to see an exoplanet fall into a star? We may get to.

Depends.  How many primates are on it?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:13:30 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:02:19 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 06:56:40 PM

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090826-impossible-planet-wasp-shouldnt-exist.html Want to see an exoplanet fall into a star? We may get to.

Depends.  How many primates are on it?

Well, if anything is possible, than there should be some measurable probability that there are say, several billion primates on that planet, and since our lord Jesus Christ makes the improbable happen, then there are DEFINITELY that many primates on that planet. In fact, I bet we can set up some sort of device to capture their screams as the planet tumbles into the star's corona.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 28, 2009, 07:14:35 PM
TURN THE HUBBLE INTO A MICROPHONE!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:19:44 PM
Quote from: LMNO on August 28, 2009, 07:14:35 PM
TURN THE HUBBLE INTO A MICROPHONE!

NASA won't even go up to repair the cameras anymore, and you expect a new device up there?







Fine....we'll send it to committee.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:23:02 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:13:30 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:02:19 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 06:56:40 PM

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090826-impossible-planet-wasp-shouldnt-exist.html Want to see an exoplanet fall into a star? We may get to.

Depends.  How many primates are on it?

Well, if anything is possible, than there should be some measurable probability that there are say, several billion primates on that planet, and since our lord Jesus Christ makes the improbable happen, then there are DEFINITELY that many primates on that planet. In fact, I bet we can set up some sort of device to capture their screams as the planet tumbles into the star's corona.

The congressman from AZ votes to approve funding.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:39:27 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:23:02 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:13:30 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:02:19 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 06:56:40 PM

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090826-impossible-planet-wasp-shouldnt-exist.html Want to see an exoplanet fall into a star? We may get to.

Depends.  How many primates are on it?

Well, if anything is possible, than there should be some measurable probability that there are say, several billion primates on that planet, and since our lord Jesus Christ makes the improbable happen, then there are DEFINITELY that many primates on that planet. In fact, I bet we can set up some sort of device to capture their screams as the planet tumbles into the star's corona.

The congressman from AZ votes to approve funding.

Stellar Microphone: 100 billion dollars

Space Shuttle Flight: 40 billion dollars

Retrofitting the Hubble Telescope: 80 billion dollars

Listening to the Dying Screams of 7 Billion Primates on an Exoplanet Falling into a Star: Priceless.

There are some things money can't by; for everything else there's The National Debt.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 28, 2009, 07:39:48 PM
 :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:42:19 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:39:27 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:23:02 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:13:30 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:02:19 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 06:56:40 PM

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090826-impossible-planet-wasp-shouldnt-exist.html Want to see an exoplanet fall into a star? We may get to.

Depends.  How many primates are on it?

Well, if anything is possible, than there should be some measurable probability that there are say, several billion primates on that planet, and since our lord Jesus Christ makes the improbable happen, then there are DEFINITELY that many primates on that planet. In fact, I bet we can set up some sort of device to capture their screams as the planet tumbles into the star's corona.

The congressman from AZ votes to approve funding.

Stellar Microphone: 100 billion dollars

Space Shuttle Flight: 40 billion dollars

Retrofitting the Hubble Telescope: 80 billion dollars

Listening to the Dying Screams of 7 Billion Primates on an Exoplanet Falling into a Star: Priceless.

There are some things money can't by; for everything else there's The National Debt.

BOARD OVER.  KAI WINS.

SHUT IT DOWN.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:44:15 PM
 :thanks:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on August 29, 2009, 11:29:22 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:23:02 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 07:13:30 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 28, 2009, 07:02:19 PM
Quote from: Kai on August 28, 2009, 06:56:40 PM

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/08/090826-impossible-planet-wasp-shouldnt-exist.html Want to see an exoplanet fall into a star? We may get to.

Depends.  How many primates are on it?

Well, if anything is possible, than there should be some measurable probability that there are say, several billion primates on that planet, and since our lord Jesus Christ makes the improbable happen, then there are DEFINITELY that many primates on that planet. In fact, I bet we can set up some sort of device to capture their screams as the planet tumbles into the star's corona.

The congressman from AZ votes to approve funding.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9mVWN5yy1AY
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 31, 2009, 02:31:31 PM
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/325/5944/1058-a Don't know if I talked about this. Complete genome sequencing of any eukaryote, especially arthropods or vertebrates, is exciting because it's been done so little. Bacterial genome sequences abound, but only a few insects have been sequenced, including the silk moth and the honeybee.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on August 31, 2009, 03:51:57 PM
http://blogs.wnyc.org/radiolab/2009/08/24/after-birth/

Really cool podcast about how babies perceptions after birth differ from our perceptions as we get older.  For example, the lenses in the eyes of newborns have yet to acquired the yellow tint of adults which filters out blue light - so children see a much brighter whiter world.  And why babies tend to be unable to stop staring at interesting things when they're about two months old (its because the control for vision is switching in the brain).
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 01, 2009, 04:07:51 PM
Headlines, The Science

Recent.

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1919420,00.html (http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1919420,00.html) Ice sculptures of children in a Beijing temple leading up to the UN climate summit. Once again it's politics over science. I feel sorry for climatologists.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/46784/title/Girls_have_head_start_on_snake_and_spider_fears This reminds me of the verse in Genesis, about the conflict between Eve and the snake.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=obstacle-exit-pedestrian Yes, keeping people from all rushing a bottleneck at once will keep a bottleneck from happening. In other news, chlorophyll is green.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/30/AR2009083002333.html It's not so much the st Lawrence seaway that was the problem, but rather the canal bypassing niagra falls. Before that, nothing could get in to the upper great lakes from Ontario, which has been connected to the ocean for a long time.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/08/emghandwriting/ Maybe this sort of thing works for people who have neat homogeneous handwriting and need no immediate visual confirmation while writing. I'm not one of those.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/30/us/30ash.html?_r=1&ref=science Coal waste from TN in AL. More of that NIMBY shit.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8230138.stm Neil DeGrass Tyson was talking about this about a year ago.  I don't know if he meant this particular project though.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/30/MNKG15SUJS.DTL&type=science#ixzz0PlX0mvOO On Iceland's geothermal.

http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/55949/ A single transcription factor needed now to change an adult stem cell to an embryonic state. In other news, fundamentalists are lost as to what scientific endeavor to attack next.

http://features.csmonitor.com/environment/2009/08/27/the-next-major-threat-to-the-ozone-layer-nitrous-oxide/ Fearmongering about the ozone holes. Never mind that since CFC's were banned the holes have been getting smaller. This is just a matter of regulating use rather than fixing damage.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 02, 2009, 06:23:02 PM
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090902/full/461027a.html The scientific and public reaction to a paper published two years ago on the effect of Bt corn on stream ecosystems shows how political GM crop research is.

I just got this in my google alert for the word "Trichoptera" 2 minutes ago. Thats speed for you.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: fomenter on September 02, 2009, 06:38:46 PM
Quote from: Kai on September 02, 2009, 06:23:02 PM
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090902/full/461027a.html The scientific and public reaction to a paper published two years ago on the effect of Bt corn on stream ecosystems shows how political GM crop research is.

I just got this in my google alert for the word "Trichoptera" 2 minutes ago. Thats speed for you.

wow... GM do not question!!!!   :x
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on September 02, 2009, 06:59:51 PM
Quote from: Kai on September 02, 2009, 06:23:02 PM
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090902/full/461027a.html The scientific and public reaction to a paper published two years ago on the effect of Bt corn on stream ecosystems shows how political GM crop research is.

I just got this in my google alert for the word "Trichoptera" 2 minutes ago. Thats speed for you.

Ok, from as subjective an impartial stance as I can get....



So, was the experiment flawed, or not? 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 03, 2009, 11:46:26 AM
Quote from: LMNO on September 02, 2009, 06:59:51 PM
Quote from: Kai on September 02, 2009, 06:23:02 PM
http://www.nature.com/news/2009/090902/full/461027a.html The scientific and public reaction to a paper published two years ago on the effect of Bt corn on stream ecosystems shows how political GM crop research is.

I just got this in my google alert for the word "Trichoptera" 2 minutes ago. Thats speed for you.

Ok, from as subjective an impartial stance as I can get....



So, was the experiment flawed, or not? 

Same that I got. I'm of the opinion that more research is better than none. I don't know if the experimental design was flawed or not but the way that many crop geneticists treated it was outrageous. I mean, personal attacks? Are we still in the dark ages or something?

For those of you who don't know, Bt stands for the toxin produced by Bacillus thurengiensis. The toxin is a type of botulism that only targets the guts of insects. Geneticists used a plasmid to insert this gene into the plant genome so it produces the toxin. It has by far been the best pesticide ever produced, as it specifically targets insects that feed on the crops and nothing else.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on September 03, 2009, 01:49:48 PM
Ah, so if that plant material gets into a stream, it might result in non-pest insects eating the toxin, and thus affecting the ecology.  Gotcha.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 03, 2009, 05:02:21 PM
Quote from: LMNO on September 03, 2009, 01:49:48 PM
Ah, so if that plant material gets into a stream, it might result in non-pest insects eating the toxin, and thus affecting the ecology.  Gotcha.

In areas where the primary vegetation is Bt corn, it WILL get in the stream. Whether or not the amount of vegetation in the stream will be potent enough to deliver lethal and/or fitness decreasing doses, whether the insects will feed more on the corn than other carbon sources (such as aquatic macrophytes, invertebrates and algae), and whether agricultural runoff (fertilizer) keeps caddisflies from occupying most crop field streams in the first place is unknown still. We know there will be an impact, we just don't know how much.

Theres also the matter of transportation/laboratory mortality versus field mortality.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 04, 2009, 01:44:25 PM
http://gmopundit.blogspot.com/2009/09/science-versus-politics-in-germany.html More on this issue, from German research this time.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 10, 2009, 03:32:39 PM
Don't have time for the comments right now, so I'm just posting these.

September 1, 2009

At 40, Internet Grows Stodgier
from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

NEW YORK (Associated Press) -- Goofy videos weren't on the minds of Len Kleinrock and his team at UCLA when they began tests 40 years ago on what would become the Internet. Neither was social networking, for that matter, nor were most of the other easy-to-use applications that have drawn more than a billion people online.

Instead, the researchers sought to create an open network for freely exchanging information. That openness ultimately spurred the innovation that would later spawn the likes of YouTube, Facebook and the World Wide Web.

There's still plenty of room for innovation, yet the openness may be eroding. Though the Internet is more widely available and faster than ever, artificial barriers threaten to constrict its growth. Call it a midlife crisis.

http://snipr.com/riq7w




After the Transistor, a Leap Into the Microcosm
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

YORKTOWN HEIGHTS, N.Y. -- Gaze into the electron microscope display in Frances Ross's laboratory here and it is possible to persuade yourself that Dr. Ross, a 21st-century materials scientist, is actually a farmer in some Lilliputian silicon world.

Dr. Ross, an I.B.M. researcher, is growing a crop of mushroom-shaped silicon nanowires that may one day become a basic building block for a new kind of electronics. Nanowires are just one example, although one of the most promising, of a transformation now taking place in the material sciences as researchers push to create the next generation of switching devices smaller, faster and more powerful than today's transistors.

The reason that many computer scientists are pursuing this goal is that the shrinking of the transistor has approached fundamental physical limits.

http://snipr.com/riqen




Glyptodonts Were Savvy Batters
from ScienceNOW Daily News

What do ancient armored mammals have in common with Babe Ruth? They both took advantage of the "sweet spot."

New research suggests that some species of giant mammals called glyptodonts swung their hefty tails like baseball bats, landing powerful blows with the spot on their tails that minimizes potentially harmful vibrations for the slugger.

... Relatives of modern-day armadillos, glyptodonts arose in South America some 20 million years ago and lived until about 10,000 years ago. They sported a turtlelike shell and heavy armor on their heads and tails. The largest species were massive.

http://snipr.com/riqfa




Environmentalists Slow to Adjust in Climate Debate
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

ATHENS, Ohio -- The oil lobby was sponsoring rallies with free lunches, free concerts and speeches warning that a climate-change bill could ravage the U.S. economy. Professional "campaigners" hired by the coal industry were giving away T-shirts praising coal-fired power.

But when environmentalists showed up in this college town--closer than ever to congressional passage of a climate-change bill, in the middle of the green movement's biggest political test in a generation--they provided ... a sedate panel discussion. And they gave away stickers.

Next month, the Senate is expected to take up legislation that would cap greenhouse-gas emissions. ... It seems that environmentalists are struggling in a fight they have spent years setting up.

http://snipr.com/riqg8




'Synthetic Biology' Holds Promise, but Doubts Simmer
from USA Today

"Plastics" may have been the Baby Boomer watchword, but "synthetic" rules today. That's "synthetic" as in synthetic biology, the hottest biomedical buzzword, promising new drugs, new fuel and someday, new life.

"If we can make life, then we understand it," says molecular biologist Steven Benner of the Foundation for Applied Molecular Evolution in Gainesville, Fla. Starting with the building blocks of animal and plant cells, synthetic biologists are reengineering living things today and hope to create synthetic life tomorrow. The ultimate goal, Benner says, is "synthesizing life from scratch."

That makes experts ... hopeful and cautious at the same time about the promise and peril of the field.

http://snipr.com/riqi8




Single Molecule's Stunning Image
from BBC News Online

The detailed chemical structure of a single molecule has been imaged for the first time, say researchers. The physical shape of single carbon nanotubes has been outlined before, using similar techniques--but the new method even shows up chemical bonds.

Understanding structure on this scale could help in the design of many things on the molecular scale, particularly electronics or even drugs. The IBM researchers report their findings in the journal Science.

It is the same group that in July reported the feat of measuring the charge on a single atom. In both cases, a team from IBM Research Zurich used what is known as an atomic force microscope or AFM.

http://snipr.com/riqj3




Scientists Search for Signs of Climate Calamity
from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

MACKENZIE RIVER DELTA, Northwest Territories (Associated Press) -- Only a squawk from a sandhill crane broke the Arctic silence--and a low gurgle of bubbles, a watery whisper of trouble repeated in countless spots around the polar world.

"On a calm day, you can see 20 or more 'seeps' out across this lake," said Canadian researcher Rob Bowen, sidling his small rubber boat up beside one of them. A tossed match would have set it ablaze. "It's essentially pure methane."

Pure methane, gas bubbling up from underwater vents, escaping into northern skies, adds to the global-warming gases accumulating in the atmosphere. And pure methane escaping in the massive amounts known to be locked in the Arctic permafrost and seabed would spell a climate catastrophe. Is such an unlocking under way?

http://snipr.com/riqjl




Ecosystems Not as Fragile as They Look
from the Economist

Conventional wisdom is often a poor guide. For one thing it suggests that human damage to the world's species, habitats and ecosystems is terminal: that when things are lost, they are lost for ever.

But oil spills of the sort that now threaten the Timor Sea, forest fires like those that recently afflicted Greece, and other man-made and man-assisted threats to wildlife are transient. Except in those cases in which a species is driven to extinction, the Earth's ability to shrug such things off is often underestimated.

Alan Weisman shows this in his book, The World Without Us, which illustrates nature's great capacity to recover. Have mankind abducted by aliens or wiped out by some Homo sapiens-specific virus, and nature, Mr. Weisman reckons, would reclaim its territory with surprising speed ...

http://snipr.com/riqk0




Controversial Hemoglobin Substitutes on Life Support
from Scientific American

Efforts to develop blood substitutes that could be used to treat soldiers or trauma victims in remote settings have held great promise as a way to infuse oxygen-carrying liquids into patients, thereby saving their lives when real or safe blood is in short supply.

Biotech companies have even come up with long shelf life replacements that would work for all blood types without the need for refrigeration.

The companies developing these hemoglobin-based blood substitutes, however, are now fighting for their own lives--enduring failures and financial hardships in order to stay in business long enough to see their creations come to market.

http://snipr.com/riqkl




Booming Middle-Class Diet May Stress Asia's Water Needs
from National Geographic News

The beefed-up diets of Asia's expanding middle class could lead to chronic food shortages for the water-stressed region, scientists said at a global water conference in Sweden last week.

Asia's growing economy and appetite for meat will require a radical overhaul of farmland irrigation to feed a population expected to swell to 1.4 billion by 2050, experts warned at Stockholm's World Water Week.

The threat was highlighted in a study by the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) and the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), which estimate that Asian demand for food and livestock fodder will double in 40 years.

http://snipr.com/riql5
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 10, 2009, 04:05:44 PM
September 4, 2009



A Manifesto for the Planet
from Seed

Stewart Brand is a rare breed of environmentalist: in his own words, "an ecologist by training, a futurist by profession, and a hacker (lazy engineer) at heart." In the 60s, Brand campaigned against nuclear power and staged a "Hunger Show" to dramatize the global famine predicted by his mentor, Paul Ehrlich, but he also began printing a decidedly pro-technology handbook for saving the planet.

Whole Earth Catalog, first published in 1968, was premised on the notion that given the right information, tools, and awareness, people could--and would--create a more sustainable world. It was, many have said, the beginning of environmentalism.

Since that time, Brand's own views on core "green issues," from atomic energy to genetic engineering, have shifted under the weight of scientific evidence. Rather than quietly backpedal, Brand has now issued a bold challenge to the very movement he helped create: Can you forsake ideology for the good of the planet? Whole Earth Discipline contains every reason why they should ...

http://snipr.com/rlo92



Many Colleges Reporting Swine Flu
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

More than half of the nation's colleges and universities tracking swine flu cases are reporting infected students, with more than 1,600 cases within the first weeks of classes, a medical group said Wednesday.

The American College Health Association, in the first of what will be weekly reports on swine flu activity, said 55 percent of 165 institutions surveyed counted a total of 1,640 cases as of the week of Aug. 22-28. So far, one student has been hospitalized and no deaths have been reported, the group said. The 165 institutions represent more than 2 million students.

... "Fortunately, it appears that at this early stage the illness remains relatively mild among college students," said James C. Turner, the health association's president and executive director of the Department of Student Health at the University of Virginia.

http://snipr.com/rlobg



Vast Shift in Bird Species Expected from Warming
from the San Francisco Chronicle

Birds of a feather will no longer flock together, and some California species will face extinction as a result of global warming, according to a study released Tuesday by PRBO Conservation Science.

The study, which predicts how birds in California will adapt to changing climatic conditions, says there will be a dramatic change in the pecking order of the avian world over the next 60 years.

In one fell swoop, the changes in bird habitats and behavior between now and 2070 will equal the evolutionary and adaptive shifts that normally occur over tens of thousands of years, according to researchers with PRBO, also known as the Point Reyes Bird Observatory.

http://snipr.com/rlocu



Global Warming Could Forestall Ice Age
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The human-driven buildup of heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere appears to have ended a slide, many millenniums in the making, toward cooler summer temperatures in the Arctic, the authors of a new study report.

Scientists familiar with the work, to be published Friday in the journal Science, said it provided fresh evidence that human activity is not only warming the globe, particularly the Arctic, but could also even fend off what had been presumed to be an inevitable descent into a new ice age over the next few dozen millenniums.

The reversal of the slow cooling trend in the Arctic, recorded in samples of layered lakebed mud, glacial ice and tree rings from Alaska to Siberia, has been swift and pronounced, the team writes.

http://snipr.com/rloed



Scientists Seek Warning Signs for Catastrophic Tipping Points
from Wired

Tipping points are found in ecosystems, economies and even bodies. But they're usually recognized in retrospect, when it's too late for anything but regret. Now a growing body of research suggests there are telltale mathematical signals. If scientists can figure out how to detect them, they may be able to forecast tipping points ahead of time.

... In 1982, physicist Kenneth Wilson won a Nobel Prize for developing equations to describe transitions that don't happen in a linear, easily predictable way, but are sudden and massive, such as fluids becoming turbulent and metals becoming magnetized.

Since then, scientists have noticed similar shifts elsewhere. The theory provides the only models that make sense of the Sahara's sudden flip from fertile grassland to sandy wastes some 5,500 years ago. Exploited fish populations fluctuate wildly. Futures prices on the S&P 500 displayed telltale skewing in the year preceding the 1987 stock market crash. The proposition is by no means certain, but the possibility of being able to predict these sorts of events is tantalizing.

http://snipr.com/rlofd



Reboot for UK's 'Oldest' Computer
from BBC News Online

Britain's oldest original computer, the Harwell, is being sent to the National Museum of Computing at Bletchley where it is to be restored to working order.

The computer, which was designed in 1949, first ran in 1951 and was designed to perform mathematical calculations; it lasted until 1973. When first built the 2.4m x 5m computer was state-of-the-art, although it was superseded by transistor-based systems.

The restoration project is expected to take a year. The system was built and used by staff at the Atomic Energy Research Establishment in Harwell, Oxfordshire.

http://snipr.com/rloga



Royal Society Warns Climate Engineering 'Could Cause Disaster'
from the Times (London)

Giant engineering schemes to reflect sunlight or suck carbon dioxide from the air could be the only way to save the Earth from runaway global warming, according to a group of leading scientists. But they say that these schemes could have their own catastrophic consequences, such as disrupting rainfall patterns, and should be deployed only as a last resort if attempts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions fail.

The Royal Society, a fellowship of 1,400 of the world's most eminent scientists, published a report Tuesday on the feasibility and possible dangers of technologies for cooling down the Earth, known as geoengineering.

The ideas include artificial trees that draw CO2 from the air and mimicking volcanoes by spraying sulphate particles a few miles above the Earth to deflect the Sun's rays. The most far-fetched would would be to launch trillions of small mirrors into space to act as a sunshield.

http://snipr.com/rloh7



Israeli Archaeologists Find Ancient Fortification
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

JERUSALEM (Associated Press) -- Archaeologists digging in Jerusalem have uncovered a 3,700-year-old wall that is the oldest example of massive fortifications ever found in the city, the Israel Antiquities Authority said Wednesday.

The 26-foot-high wall is believed to have been part of a protected passage built by ancient Canaanites from a hilltop fortress to a nearby spring that was the city's only water source and vulnerable to marauders.

The discovery marks the first time archaeologists have found such massive construction from before the time of Herod, the ruler behind numerous monumental projects in the city 2,000 years ago, and shows that Jerusalem of the Middle Bronze Age had a powerful population capable of complex building projects, said Ronny Reich, director of the excavation and an archaeology professor at the University of Haifa.

http://snipr.com/rlohx



When Does Consciousness Arise in Human Babies?
from Scientific American

... How do we know that a newly born and healthy infant is conscious? There is no question that the baby is awake. Its eyes are wide open, it wriggles and grimaces, and, most important, it cries. But all that is not the same as being conscious, of experiencing pain, seeing red or smelling Mom's milk.

It is well recognized that infants have no awareness of their own state, emotions and motivations. Even older children who can speak have very limited insight into their own actions. Anybody who has raised a boy is familiar with the blank look on your teenager's face when you ask him why he did something particularly rash.

... Although a newborn lacks self-awareness, the baby processes complex visual stimuli and attends to sounds and sights in its world, preferentially looking at faces. The infant's visual acuity permits it to see only blobs, but the basic thalamo-cortical circuitry necessary to support simple visual and other conscious percepts is in place. And linguistic capacities in babies are shaped by the environment they grow up in. ... But when does the magical journey of consciousness begin?

http://snipr.com/rlojn



Andromeda Galaxy Is Cosmic Cannibal
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Our nearest major galactic neighbor is a cosmic cannibal. And it's heading this way eventually.

Astronomers have long suspected Andromeda of being a space predator, consuming dwarf galaxies that wander too close. Now, cosmic detectives are doing a massive search of the neighborhood and have found proof of Andromeda's sordid past: They've spotted leftovers in Andromeda's wake.

Early results of a massive telescope scan of Andromeda and its surroundings found about half a dozen remnants of Andromeda's galactic appetite. Stars and dwarf galaxies that got too close to Andromeda were ripped from their usual surroundings. ... The report was published in Thursday's edition of the journal Nature.

http://snipr.com/rlolg
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 10, 2009, 04:15:09 PM
 September 9, 2009

 


Scientists Begin Census of Microbes That Live in or on Us
from the Miami Herald (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Scientists are beginning a large-scale effort to identify and analyze the vast majority of cells in or on your body that aren't of human origin.

Only about 10 percent of the trillions of cells that make up a person are truly human, researchers say. The other 90 percent are bacteria, viruses and other microbes swarming in your gut and on your skin.

... Most of these microbes are harmless, researchers say. Many are necessary to life and health. A troublesome minority, however, can cause everything from teenage acne and obesity to autism and cancer.

http://snipurl.com/rpevv


How Did Economists Get It So Wrong?
from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

It's hard to believe now, but not long ago economists were congratulating themselves over the success of their field. Those successes -- or so they believed -- were both theoretical and practical, leading to a golden era for the profession.

On the theoretical side, they thought that they had resolved their internal disputes. ... And in the real world, economists believed they had things under control: the "central problem of depression-prevention has been solved," declared Robert Lucas of the University of Chicago in his 2003 presidential address to the American Economic Association.

... Last year, everything came apart. Few economists saw our current crisis coming, but this predictive failure was the least of the field's problems. More important was the profession's blindness to the very possibility of catastrophic failures in a market economy.

http://snipurl.com/rpey5


NASA's Goals and Budget Not in the Same Orbit, Report Says
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A special advisory committee on the future of America's manned spaceflight program delivered a report to the White House on Tuesday that could help launch the country on an Apollo-style adventure to Mars, but which also warned that any ambitious program of exploration would require big infusions of cash.

Without a significant boost in NASA's budget, not only will it be impossible to return to the moon by the goal of 2020, but astronauts might not be able to go at all, according to the report by the Human Space Flight Plans Committee. "Under the current budget, you'd never get there," said committee chairman Norman Augustine, a former chief executive at Lockheed Martin.

The panel, made up of former astronauts and space entrepreneurs, was appointed by President Obama this spring to review the Bush administration's Vision for Space Exploration, analyze NASA's agenda and come up with alternatives. The present plan, outlined in 2004, called for a return to the moon by 2020, the establishment of a lunar outpost and, decades later, human travel to Mars.

http://snipurl.com/rpezs


From Three to Four Chambers
from Science News

Lizards and turtles are not warm and cuddly, but they do have hearts -- and interesting ones, at that. One molecular difference in reptile hearts may have divided single ventricles into two, creating four-chambered hearts from three-chambered ones as species evolved, a study published in the Sept. 3 Nature finds.

"The major question has been, what drove the evolution of the four-chambered heart?" comments James Hicks, an evolutionary biologist at the University of California, Irvine. Results from the new study "could lead to a deeper understanding of the fundamental factors involved in heart development," he says.

Amphibians have three-chambered hearts made up of two top chambers, atria, and one bottom chamber, the ventricle. Mammals and birds have two atria and two ventricles, with ventricles separated by a muscular ridge called a septum.

http://snipurl.com/rpf0h


Cow Manure, Other Homegrown Energy Powering U.S. Farms
from National Geographic News

From wind to sun to cow pies, farm-based natural resources are supplying an increasing number of U.S. farmers with homegrown sources of renewable energy.

Farm-based energy can save money and even become a new source of income by powering nearby homes, for instance. Traditional energy sources are expensive: In 2008 fuel and fertilizers--which are largely made from natural gas--accounted for 12.5 percent of all farm expenses.

Homegrown energy may also lessen the impact on the environment by avoiding fossil fuels. Food production--not counting factors such as processing and shipping--accounts for one to 3 percent of U.S. energy consumption and about 7 percent of its direct greenhouse gas emissions, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the nonprofit National Center for Appropriate Technology.

http://snipurl.com/rpf21


Diamonds Are for Softies - Boron Is Harder
from New Scientist

You don't often break a diamond. So when in 2003 Dave Mao cracked a tooth of his diamond anvil, he knew something extraordinary must have happened. Together with his daughter Wendy and other colleagues at the Geophysical Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington DC, he was using the device to test materials at pressures many millions of times higher than those at the Earth's surface - higher even than in our planet's core - by squeezing them between two tiny diamond jaws.

Behind the glitz, diamond is just a form of carbon. It is, however, by common consent the hardest material known. The substance in the Maos' test cell had also begun as pure carbon. It was plain old graphite - the soft, slippery stuff that is used for pencil leads and lubricants. Clearly, something had happened in the anvil cell to make it awesomely hard.

It seemed the Maos might accidentally have succeeded where many before had failed. Had they made the first superhard material that matched or even surpassed diamond? Probably not, as it turned out. Six years and several twists later, though, that feat might at last have been achieved, though not with pure carbon. If the latest reports are right, the hardness crown has changed hands at last.

http://snipurl.com/rpf3b


Can a Computer Be Programmed to Be Cunning Yet Fallible?
from the Economist

If a computer could fool a person into thinking that he were interacting with another person rather than a machine, then it could be classified as having artificial intelligence. That, at least, was the test proposed in 1950 by Alan Turing, a British mathematician. Turing envisaged a typed exchange between machine and person, so that a genuine conversation could happen without the much harder problem of voice emulation having to be addressed.

More recently, the abilities of computers to play games such as chess, go and bridge has been regarded as a form of artificial intelligence. But the latest effort to use machines to emulate the way people interact with one another focuses neither on natural languages nor traditional board and card games. Rather, it concentrates on that icon of modernity, the shoot-'em-up computer game.

At a symposium on computational intelligence and games organised in Milan this week by America's Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, researchers are taking part in a competition called the 2K BotPrize. The aim is to trick human judges into thinking they are playing against other people in such a game.

http://snipurl.com/rpf4p


Hanging on, Bearly
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Unlike some of its ursine cousins, the Andean bear is not one to make a spectacle of itself. It is not particularly big. A male adult rarely gets much heavier than 400 pounds and 6 feet in length, and females are considerably smaller. By comparison, an adult male polar bear typically exceeds 1,000 pounds in weight and 8 feet in length.

Nor do Andean bears necessarily inspire fear or immediate awe. Unlike, say, the grizzly bear, which is too large to escape perceived threats and so tends to defend itself aggressively, Andean bears are extremely capable climbers, preferring to run from danger and hide in treetops.

... Nonetheless, Andean bears (Tremarctos ornatus) are singular creatures. They are the last surviving member of the subfamily Tremarctinae and the only indigenous bear species in South America. But maybe for not much longer.

http://snipurl.com/rpf6o


Implant Gives New Hope to the Blind
from the Philadelphia Inquirer

At first, sitting in church one Sunday, Michael Adler couldn't tell what the whitish glow in front of him was. Adler, 49, had been legally blind since childhood, and his vision eventually deteriorated to pretty much zero.

But now, on the back of the pew in front of him, he saw something. And then he realized: It was the pages of a hymnal. His new "eye" was starting to work.

Two months earlier at Wills Eye Institute, surgeons had implanted a small array of electrodes in the back of Adler's left eye - a speck of metal no bigger than the word eye on this page. In the last few weeks - with the aid of a small video camera in his sunglasses that transmits images to his retinal implant - he has begun to gain some limited vision.

http://snipurl.com/rpf7z


A Clash of Polar Frauds and Those Who Believe
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In September 1909, Dr. Frederick A. Cook and Robert E. Peary each returned from the Arctic with a tale of having reached the North Pole. Neither provided any solid proof or corroborating testimony; both told vague stories with large gaps. They couldn't even convincingly explain how they had plotted their routes across the polar ice.

Yet each explorer's claim immediately attracted its supporters, and no amount of contradictory evidence in the ensuing years would be enough to dissuade the faithful. A century later, the "discovery" of the North Pole may qualify as the most successful fraud in modern science, as well as the longest-running case study of a psychological phenomenon called "motivated reasoning."

The believers who have kept writing books and mounting expeditions to vindicate Cook or Peary resemble the political partisans recently studied by psychologists and sociologists. When the facts get in the way of our beliefs, our brains are marvelously adept at dispensing with the facts.

http://snipurl.com/rpf9f
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 16, 2009, 03:17:18 PM
September 8, 2009


Study Finds Risk to Some Birds Nesting Near Oil Fields in Alaska
from New York Times (Registration Required)

As oil and gas companies press to tap new deposits in remote places, scientists are trying to gauge and limit the ecological impact of pipes and other structures in otherwise wild lands.

Nowhere is that effort more intense than on the Arctic coastal plain of the North Slope of Alaska -- a Maine-size stretch of open lands that is snow-blown and ice sheathed in winter, but a verdant breeding ground for caribou and millions of birds in summer.

Since oil was discovered 40 years ago, 1,000 square miles of the plain have become peppered with wells and laced with pipes. In response to research on caribou, pipelines were elevated 10 feet in hundreds of places so herds could pass unimpeded.

http://snipurl.com/ro15k


Where Did All the Flowers Come From?
from New York Times (Registration Required)

Throughout his life, Charles Darwin surrounded himself with flowers. When he was 10, he wrote down each time a peony bloomed in his father's garden. When he bought a house to raise his own family, he turned the grounds into a botanical field station where he experimented on flowers until his death. But despite his intimate familiarity with flowers, Darwin once wrote that their evolution was "an abominable mystery."

Darwin could see for himself how successful flowering plants had become. They make up the majority of living plant species, and they dominate many of the world's ecosystems, from rain forests to grasslands. They also dominate our farms. Out of flowers come most of the calories humans consume, in the form of foods like corn, rice and wheat. Flowers are also impressive in their sheer diversity of forms and colors, from lush, full-bodied roses to spiderlike orchids to calla lilies shaped like urns.

The fossil record, however, offered Darwin little enlightenment about the early evolution of flowers. At the time, the oldest fossils of flowering plants came from rocks that had formed from 100 million to 66 million years ago during the Cretaceous period. Paleontologists found a diversity of forms, not a few primitive forerunners.

http://snipurl.com/ro2sh


H1N1 Flu Unlikely to Recombine with Seasonal Flu
from Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A new study eases fears that the pandemic H1N1 influenza virus will recombine with seasonal flu to mutate into a more lethal form. The study, reported in the online journal PLoS Currents, shows that the pandemic virus, commonly known as swine flu, grows much faster than seasonal flu viruses and is thus less likely to exchange genetic material with them.

Virologist Daniel Perez of the University of Maryland and his colleagues grew the virus in ferrets, which are considered the best animal model for influenza because their respiratory system is very similar to that of humans. They co-infected the animals with the pandemic H1N1 virus and one of two seasonal flu viruses circulating now (a different H1N1 virus or an H3N2 virus). The animals were sickened by both the viruses, but only the swine flu virus went on to infect other ferrets.

"The H1N1 pandemic virus has a clear biological advantage over the two main seasonal flu strains," Perez said. "I'm not surprised to find that the pandemic virus is more infectious, simply because it is new, so hosts haven't had a chance to build immunity yet."

http://snipurl.com/ro2gj


Women's Weight-loss Surgery May Help Kids
from Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

An overweight woman who has weight-loss surgery before becoming pregnant may help break the cycle of obesity in her family, according to a new study.

Researchers found that children born to women who had weight-loss surgery before pregnancy have improved heart health and a lower risk of obesity compared with their siblings who were born before the mother had surgery. The study was published last week in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism.

Previous research shows a woman's weight and her tendency to develop diabetes and heart disease can influence the long-term health of her fetus, predisposing the child to metabolic problems related to obesity. Obese young women who are planning to have children some day should try to lose weight through weight-loss surgery or behavioral changes, said the lead investigator, Dr. John Kral, a professor of surgery and medicine at the State University of New York, Downstate Medical Center, Brooklyn.

http://snipurl.com/ro2i8


Heart Study Finds Key Gene to Warm-bloodedness
from San Francisco Chronicle

A San Francisco researcher investigating a rare but serious heart defect in newborns has discovered a major genetic factor that makes us the warm-blooded creatures we are.

Finding the genetic factor meant studying the cardiac systems of turtles and lizards, engineering the genes of specially bred mice, and investigating a congenital disorder known as "holes in the heart," or, in medical terms, ventricular septal defect.

The research by Benoit G. Bruneau of the Gladstone Institute for Cardiovascular Disease was published Wednesday in the journal Nature.

http://snipurl.com/ro2j2


Once Worthy of Shakespeare, The Starling Becomes a U.S. Pest
SALT LAKE CITY -- The next time the sky darkens with a flock of noisy, unwelcome starlings, blame Shakespeare -- or, better yet, a few of his strangest fans.

Had the Bard not mentioned the starling in the third scene of "Henry IV," arguably the most hated bird in North America might never have arrived. In the early 1890s, about 100 European starlings were released in New York City's Central Park by a group dedicated to bringing to America every bird ever mentioned by Shakespeare.

Today, it's more like Hitchcock. About 200 million shiny black European starlings crowd North America, from the cool climes of Alaska to the balmy reaches of Mexico's Baja Peninsula. The enormous flocks endanger air travel, mob cattle operations, chase off native songbirds and roost on city blocks, leaving behind corrosive, foul-smelling droppings and hundreds of millions of dollars in damage each year.

http://snipurl.com/ro2ky


Scientists Discover 3 More Genes With Links to Alzheimer's Disease
from The Washington Post (Registration Required)

Two European research teams have identified three genes that affect a person's risk of developing Alzheimer's disease, the most common cause of dementia in the elderly.

The new genes appear to have at least as big a role as four others discovered in the last 15 years that are known to play a role in Alzheimer's.

...The new findings, reported Sunday in the journal Nature Genetics, will have no immediate consequence in either diagnosis or treatment of the disease. However, they will help illuminate a process that goes on for years or even decades before memory loss, the cardinal symptom of the disease, becomes apparent.

http://snipurl.com/ro2mc


Post-wildfire Worries: Floods, Damaged Ecosystem
from Yahoo News

LOS ANGELES (Associated Press) - Southern California's huge wildfire has turned nearly a quarter of the 1,000-square-mile Angeles National Forest into a moonscape of barren mountains looming above thousands of homes that now face the threat of flash floods and mudslides.

Experts are already evaluating the extent of risk to lives and property as well as the impacts of the wildfire on a forest ecosystem that in some areas may not have burned in at least a century.

Sprawled across the San Gabriel Mountains, the Angeles is both a playground for millions in greater Los Angeles and a true wilderness ranging from arid desert to alpine forests and peaks topping 10,000 feet. Skiers dare its steeps in winter; bears wander out of its chaparral cloak in summer for dips in suburban pools.

http://snipurl.com/ro2pi


Vaccine hope after animal leukaemia virus linked to prostate cancer
from The Times (London)

A virus known to cause leukaemia in animals has been linked to human prostate cancer, suggesting that the disease may have a viral origin.

If correct, the finding may lead to more effective screening and vaccination to prevent men from developing the disease.

The main known risk factors for prostate cancer are genetic susceptibility, old age and poor diet. But research suggests that men infected with XMRV, the xenotropic murine leukaemia virus-related virus, may also be more likely to develop the cancer.

http://snipurl.com/ro2qa


Girl Brain, Boy Brain?
from Scientific American

Sex differences in the brain are sexy. As MRI scanning grows ever more sophisticated, neuroscientists keep refining their search for male-female brain differences that will answer the age-old question, "Why can't a woman think like a man?" (and vice-versa).

Social cognition is one realm in which the search for brain sex differences should be especially fruitful. Females of all ages outperform males on tests requiring the recognition of emotion or relationships among other people. Sex differences in empathy emerge in infancy and persist throughout development, though the gap between adult women and men is larger than between girls and boys. The early appearance of any sex difference suggests it is innately programmed--selected for through evolution and fixed into our behavioral development through either prenatal hormone exposure or early gene expression differences. On the other hand, sex differences that grow larger through childhood are likely shaped by social learning, a consequence of the very different lifestyle, culture and training that boys and girls experience in every human society.

At first glance, studies of the brain seem to offer a way out of this age-old nature/nurture dilemma. Any difference in the structure or activation of male and female brains is indisputably biological. However, the assumption that such differences are also innate or "hardwired" is invalid, given all we've learned about the plasticity, or malleability of the brain. Simply put, experiences change our brains.

http://snipurl.com/ro2qx
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 16, 2009, 03:21:11 PM
September 14, 2009




Norman Borlaug, Father of Green Revolution, Dies at 95
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Norman Borlaug, the father of the "Green Revolution" who is widely credited with saving millions of lives by breeding wheat, rice and other crops that brought agricultural self-sufficiency to developing countries around the world, died Saturday in Texas. He was 95.

Borlaug, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 and was hailed by Time magazine in 1999 as one of the 100 most influential minds of the 20th century, died at his home in Dallas from complications of cancer, a Texas A&M University spokeswoman said.

In the 1940s, when the specter of famine was stalking much of the world, Borlaug collected thousands of strains of wheat from around the globe and tediously crossbred them to produce varieties that were much higher yielding and resistant to the diseases that were destroying crops.

http://snipr.com/rtwp3




Better World: Learn to Love Genetic Engineering
from New Scientist

By 2040 there could well be 9 billion people on the planet. The challenge, as oil runs out and climate change kicks in, is not just to grow enough food to feed so many people but to do it without wreaking more havoc on the planet.

It won't be easy. Farming causes more global warming than all the world's cars, trains, ships and planes put together. The worst culprit is a greenhouse gas called nitrous oxide, a breakdown product of nitrogen fertilisers (including organic ones). Next in line is methane from livestock and manure. ...

Genetic engineering could make matters far worse. For instance, Craig Venter's Synthetic Genomics and other companies are trying to develop microbes that turn coal, tar shale and oil into methane. This could greatly increase greenhouse emissions ... Like any technology, however, genetic modification could also be put to positive use.

http://snipr.com/rtwpg




Python "Nightmare": New Giant Species Invading Florida
from National Geographic News

Already squeezed by the invasion of the giant Burmese python, Florida now faces what one scientist calls one of the U.S. state's "worst nightmares."

Africa's largest snake--the ill-tempered, 20-foot-long (6.1-meter long) African rock python--is colonizing the U.S. state, new discoveries suggest. Six African rock pythons have been found in Florida since 2002. More troubling, a pregnant female and two hatchlings have been found, which means the aggressive reptiles have set up house.

More dangerous than even Burmese pythons--which are known to eat alligators--the African pythons are "so mean, they come out of the egg striking," said Kenneth Krysko, senior herpetologist at the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville.

http://snipr.com/rtwqx




Apollo Moon Rocks Lost in Space? No, Lost on Earth
from the San Diego Union-Tribune

AMSTERDAM (Associated Press) -- Attention, countries of the world: Do you know where your moon rocks are?

The discovery of a fake moon rock in the Netherlands' national museum should be a wake-up call for more than 130 countries that received gifts of lunar rubble from both the Apollo 11 flight in 1969 and Apollo 17 three years later.

Nearly 270 rocks scooped up by U.S. astronauts were given to foreign countries by the Nixon administration. But according to experts and research by The Associated Press, the whereabouts of some of the small rocks are unknown.

http://snipr.com/rtwsc




Science Was a Muse to Inspire Romantic Art
from NPR

In a letter dated 1800, the great Romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrote, "I shall attack Chemistry, like a Shark." John Keats' famous 1816 sonnet "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer" celebrated the recent discovery of Uranus--the first new planet to be found in more than a thousand years. In fact, says author Richard Holmes, the scientific discoveries of the Romantic age inspired generations of great artists and their work.

Holmes is the author of the book The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science. He says the book is constructed as a "relay race" of scientific stories that span the years between botanist Joseph Banks' voyage to Tahiti in 1769 and Charles Darwin's journey to the Galapagos in 1831.

"For most people, this period really is the great Romantic period in literature, which we associate with Wordsworth and Coleridge and Shelley and Byron and Keats," Holmes [says]. "But it gradually became clear to me that the scientific breakthroughs in this period had a major effect on how people saw the world and the universe and also how people wrote about it."

http://snipr.com/rtwsl




NASA Chooses Moon Crater for Crash of Rocket
from the San Francisco Chronicle

NASA scientists have chosen a spot inside a small and deeply shadowed crater on the moon for the programmed crash of a spacecraft they hope will reveal quantities of water ice locked in the lunar depths.

Mission scientists at the Ames Research Center in Mountain View announced Friday that they plan to aim a rocket carried by the unmanned spacecraft named LCROSS at a single, flat "sweet spot" inside a 25-mile-wide crater called Cabeus A near the moon's South Pole.

LCROSS is orbiting the moon, carrying the upper-stage Centaur rocket that sent it into space less than four months ago. On Oct. 9 at 4:30 a.m., the Ames team will send that 2-ton rocket crashing precisely into the target to send up a cloud of dust and debris more than 6 miles high.

http://snipr.com/rtwtt




Citation Amnesia: Not Good for Our Health
from Science News

VANCOUVER, B.C. -- Researchers today (September 12) reported uncovering a type of latent epidemic amnesia among certain biomedical scientists.

The at-risk population: researchers testing new therapies on large groups of people. The chief symptom: Affected researchers write up their findings but neglect to put them into context by mentioning earlier human trials on the same topic.

Implications: Studies exhibiting this citation amnesia (a term apparently coined decades ago by Robert Merton of Columbia University) risk diminishing the apparent "weight of evidence" that's already accumulated on how good, bad or limited a therapy is.

http://snipr.com/rtwtw




Xbox Speeds Up Research Results
from BBC News Online

Researchers have harnessed the powerful silicon chips used in the Xbox 360 console to solve scientific conundrums.

Academics at the University of Warwick believe they are the first to use the processors as a cheap way to conduct "parallel processing." Parallel computing is where a number of processors are run in tandem, allowing a system to rapidly crunch data.

Researchers traditionally have to book time on a dedicated "cluster" system or splash out setting up a network of PCs. Instead, the Warwick team harnessed a single Xbox 360 Graphical Processing Unit (GPU). The chip was able to perform parallel processing functions at a fraction of the cost a traditional systems.

http://snipr.com/rtwv0




Surgical Robots Operate With Precision
from Wired

Dread going the doctor? It could be worse. Your next physician could have the bedside manner of a robot. In fact, your next physician could be a robot. Scared yet?

Surgeons and medical engineers have been trying to create machines that can assist in surgery, increase a surgeon's dexterity and support hospital staff. These aren't humanoid robots but computer controlled systems that have been optimized for use in sensitive situations. An exhibition called Sci-fi Surgery: Medical Robots, opening this week at the Hunterian Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, shows a range of robots used in medicine.

"Industrial robots appeared in factories in the early 1960s and robots have become an important part of space exploration," says Sarah Pearson, curator of the exhibition. "But robots have been comparatively slow to be used in medicine because surgeons haven't felt comfortable with them."

http://snipr.com/rtwv9




Wall Street's Math Wizards Forgot a Few Variables
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In the aftermath of the great meltdown of 2008, Wall Street's quants have been cast as the financial engineers of profit-driven innovation run amok. They, after all, invented the exotic securities that proved so troublesome.

But the real failure, according to finance experts and economists, was in the quants' mathematical models of risk that suggested the arcane stuff was safe.

The risk models proved myopic, they say, because they were too simple-minded. They focused mainly on figures like the expected returns and the default risk of financial instruments. What they didn't sufficiently take into account was human behavior, specifically the potential for widespread panic. When lots of investors got too scared to buy or sell, markets seized up and the models failed.

http://snipr.com/rtwvm
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 16, 2009, 03:22:20 PM
 September 11, 2009



Rocket Test in Northern Utah Goes Off Problem-Free
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

PROMONTORY, Utah (Associated Press) -- The first test of NASA's powerful moon rocket went off without a problem Thursday as more than a million pounds of propellant ignited in a split second, sending a towering plume of sand and dust high into the Utah sky.

For more than two minutes, flames roared out the end of the 154-foot Ares I rocket, which was anchored horizontally to the ground on a hill above the Great Salt Lake.

"That was something, wasn't it?" said a grinning Charlie Precourt, a former shuttle astronaut and vice president of Alliant Techsystems Inc.'s space launch systems.

http://snipr.com/rr4lw



One Dose of Swine Flu Vaccine May Be Enough
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

To the surprise of many scientists, preliminary results from a clinical trial of a vaccine for pandemic H1N1 influenza in Australia suggest that one dose of vaccine might be sufficient to provide protective antibodies, a finding that could double the number of available doses and greatly reduce the logistical problems associated with giving two doses.

The results, reported online Thursday by the New England Journal of Medicine, confirm results from a Chinese study of a similar vaccine.

Unlike the Chinese vaccine, however, the Australian one will be used in the United States, accounting for about 20% of the domestic supply.

http://snipr.com/rr4ng



Two Bird Species Sing as One
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Talk about a common tongue. Even though two species of South American antbirds have been evolving independently for more than 3 million years, they sing nearly identical territorial songs. "It's almost the equivalent of humans and chimpanzees using the same language to settle disputes over resources," says Joseph Tobias, an ornithologist at the University of Oxford in the U.K. But rather than causing confusion, the identical songs actually serve a valuable purpose.

One wouldn't expect the two antbirds to have much in common. Although they both live in the southwestern Amazon, one species, the yellow-breasted antbird (Hypocnemis subflava), prefers bamboo patches whereas the other, the Peruvian antbird (H. peruviana), likes tall and dense forests. The birds also look different: H. subflava males sport yellow chests and buff-colored flanks, for example, whereas the males of H. peruviana have white chests and reddish-brown flanks.

Yet the songs the males of each species use to defend their turf are indistinguishable to people: In previous studies, researchers showed that neither human ears listening to the songs nor human eyes studying spectrograms of the songs could identify any notable differences.

http://snipr.com/rr4nn



Can You See Time?
from BBC News Online

Imagine if you could see time laid out in front of you, or surrounding your body. And you could physically point to specific dates in space.

Important dates might stand out--birthdays, anniversaries. And you could scan a visible timeline--to check if you were available--whenever you made plans. No actual diary necessary.

According to Julia Simner, a psychologist from the University of Edinburgh, there is a reasonable chance you can. And that you may use the experience, unconsciously, every day.

http://snipr.com/rr4oa



German Geothermal Project Leads to Second Thoughts After the Earth Rumbles
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

LANDAU IN DER PFALZ, Germany -- Government officials here are reviewing the safety of a geothermal energy project that scientists say set off an earthquake in mid-August, shaking buildings and frightening many residents of this small city.

The geothermal plant, built by Geox, a German energy company, extracts heat by drilling deep into the earth. Advocates of the method say that it could greatly reduce the world's dependence on fossil fuels by providing a vast supply of renewable energy.

But in recent months, two similar projects have stirred concerns about their safety and their propensity to cause earthquakes. In the United States, the Energy Department is scrutinizing a project in Northern California run by AltaRock Energy to determine if it is safe. ... Another project, in Basel, Switzerland, was shut down after it generated earthquakes in 2006 and 2007 and is awaiting the decision of a panel of experts about whether it can resume.

http://snipr.com/rr4ow



Killer Whales Strain to "Talk" Over Ship Noise?
from National Geographic News

Killer whales raise their voices to be heard over boat noise, and the effort may be wearing the whales out as they try to find food amid dwindling numbers of salmon, new research says.

The killer whales of Puget Sound make more calls and clicks while foraging than while traveling, suggesting that such mealtime conservations are key to coordinating hunts, the work reveals.

Several types of vessels, from small whale-watching boats to large cruise ships, also traverse the coastal waters off Washington State and neighboring British Columbia, Canada.

http://snipr.com/rr4pi



Toad "Fraud" May Have Been Ahead of His Time
from Smithsonian Magazine

Before Charles Darwin, there was Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, the French naturalist who proposed that an organism could pass to its offspring characteristics that it acquired during its lifetime. ...

One proponent of Lamarckism in the 1920s was Austrian biologist Paul Kammerer, who undertook a series of experiments on amphibians, including the midwife toad. These toads are special because they copulate on land and then the male keeps the eggs out of the water by carrying them around, on land, stuck to his own legs.

By placing the toads in an arid, hot environment, Kammerer induced the toads to mate in the water. Under these conditions, the toads simply deposited the eggs into the water--the male did not carry them--and only a few hatched into tadpoles. But later generations who grew up under normal conditions preferred to copulate in the water ... Kammerer believed that this was evidence that Larmarckian evolution was real.

http://snipr.com/rr4q0



U.S., Canada Map Edges of Continent on Seafloor
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

A joint American-Canadian cruise exploring the frigid Arctic Ocean has mapped broad swaths of the extended continental shelf for the first time, scientists reported Thursday.

While the researchers divulged few details, saying it will take time to analyze the data, they said they had discovered a massive seamount and what could be an extinct underwater volcano during the 41-day mission.

Debbie Hutchinson, a research geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey still aboard the Canadian Coast Guard's Louis S. St-Laurent, said the group used advanced technology to precisely map unexplored territory.

http://snipr.com/rr4rn



Cannabinoid Controversy
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Switching on a subtype of the receptor that binds cannabis, the active ingredient in marijuana, can suppress inflammation--suggesting a new and particularly promising target to treat autoimmune problems such as multiple sclerosis and the damage caused by immune cells after a stroke.

But hotly contested evidence for whether or not this cannabinoid receptor is expressed on neurons may limit the potential for pursuing that target in the search for new medicines. ...

It's commonly accepted that marijuana's "high" stems from cannabis binding to one type of cannabinoid receptor--called the CB1 receptor--which is widespread on neurons in the brain. Scientists have tied CB1 receptors to a host of health problems, from depression to obesity to cardiovascular disease, as well as therapeutic benefits such as pain and nausea relief.

http://snipr.com/rr4rs



UK Climate Scepticism More Common
from BBC News Online

The British public has become more sceptical about climate change over the last five years, according to a survey.

Twice as many people now agree that "claims that human activities are changing the climate are exaggerated". Four in 10 believe that many leading experts still question the evidence. One in five are "hard-line sceptics."

The survey, by Cardiff University, shows there is still some way to go before the public's perception matches that of their elected leaders.

http://snipr.com/rr4sw
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 16, 2009, 03:23:52 PM
September 10, 2009



After Hubble Repair, New Images From Space
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The cosmic postcards are back. Astronomers on Wednesday unveiled new pictures and observations from the Hubble Space Telescope.

With the exception of a picture last month of the bruise on Jupiter caused by a comet, they were the first data obtained with the telescope since a crew spent 13 days in orbit last May replacing, refurbishing and rebuilding its vital components.

"This is truly Hubble's new beginning," Edward Weiler, the associate administrator for science at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, said at a news conference in Washington. The event ... was a mix of science and celebration of the human spirit and innovation.

http://snipr.com/rqbqk



In Tiny 'Tuk,' They Man Climate's Front Line
from the (Oregon) Mail Tribune

TUKTOYAKTUK, Northwest Territories (Associated Press) -- Caught between rising seas and land melting beneath their mukluk-shod feet, the villagers of Tuktoyaktuk are doing what anyone would do on this windy Arctic coastline.

They're building windmills. That's wind-power turbines, to be exact--a token first try at "getting rid of this fossil fuel we're using," said Mayor Merven Gruben.

It's a token of irony, too: People little to blame, but feeling it most, are doing more to stop global warming than many of "you people in the south," as Gruben calls the rest of us who fill the skies with greenhouse gases.

http://snipr.com/rqbrc



Borderline Personality Disorder Grows as Healthcare Concern
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

They have the thinnest skin, the shortest fuses and take the hardest knocks. In psychiatrists' offices, they have long been viewed as among the most challenging patients to treat. They are the kind of people who drive a friend away for interfering and subsequently berate that friend for abandonment.

But almost 20 years after the designation of borderline personality disorder as a recognized mental health condition, some understanding and hope have surfaced for people with the condition and their families.

Borderline personality disorder was center stage in May at the annual meeting of the American Psychiatric Assn.--with multiple sessions and speakers devoted to the topic. And the message from the meeting was clear: After years during which they threw up their hands, leaders in psychiatry now want to convey a more positive message about the condition and what can be done to help those who have it.

http://snipr.com/rqbrv



Quietest Room in the World Opens Its Doors
from the Telegraph (UK)

The world's "quietest" room opened its doors for the study of nanotechnology in Bristol. The "ultra-low vibration suite," which cost £11 million, allows scientists to manipulate atoms and molecules without the interference of environmental vibrations interrupting their work.

There is virtually no air movement inside the cutting edge laboratory, which is anchored to the rock foundation in the basement of the Nanoscience and Quantum Information Centre in Bristol.

The building's architecture prevents the penetration of echo and sound waves inside the building, despite its location in the Bristol city centre. Meanwhile, its exterior panels are made from 'self-cleaning' glass, that uses nano-particles to break down dirt. The Centre will be used for a range of experiments, from looking for solutions to greener power production to better ways to battle cancer.

http://snipr.com/rqbsd



Liver Cells May Aid Drug-Safety Studies
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Potential new drugs sometimes fail because they damage the liver, but the problem may not turn up until companies have embarked on expensive clinical trials--or until the medicine is on the market. Now, three teams of Boston-area scientists are seeking a faster, safer way to screen out drugs with toxic effects, by modeling the human liver in a lab dish.

Massachusetts General Hospital researchers recently reported a faster way to cultivate liver cells, which they say could potentially reduce the cost and time to screen drugs. MIT researchers are building three-dimensional microscale livers, using cells and a silicon disc the size of a dime.

And a Medford start-up, Hepregen Corp., founded by a different MIT team, is taking yet another approach, engineering "microlivers" that are stable for weeks.

http://snipr.com/rqbtq



How Charities Harness Social Media for a Social Impact
from the Christian Science Monitor

Scott Harrison's new media revolution started by accident. Mr. Harrison is the founder of Charity: Water, a nonprofit dedicated to bringing clean water to impoverished villages in Africa.

In January, he got an e-mail from a British woman who wanted to test Twitter as a fundraising tool. Amanda Rose thought the microblogging site, with its 30 million users, might have some cash power, and if it did, she wanted to put the cash in Harrison's wells.

Ms. Rose organized the first-ever "Twestival," an event whose name blends "Twitter" and "festival." Using this instant-messaging power, Rose organized a series of 200 off-line charity events around the globe ... that raised a combined $250,000 from 10,000 new donors. ... Harrison's nonprofit is one of many using social media in surprising new ways.

http://snipr.com/rqbu6



ADHD Brain Chemistry Clue Found
from BBC News Online

US researchers have pinned down new differences in the brain chemistry of people with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). They found ADHD patients lack key proteins which allow them to experience a sense of reward and motivation.

The Brookhaven National Laboratory study appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association. It is hoped it could help in the design of new ways to combat the condition.

Previous research looking at the brains of people with ADHD had uncovered differences in areas controlling attention and hyperactivity. But this study suggests ADHD has a profound impact elsewhere in the brain too.

http://snipr.com/rqbvr



Hawaii Researchers Explore Previously Unseen Coral
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

HONOLULU (Associated Press) -- Scientists over the past month explored coral reefs in the remote Northwestern Hawaiian Islands that until recently were considered too deep for scuba divers to reach.

Divers swam among previously unseen reefs as deep as 250 feet during a monthlong research trip to the islands by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration vessel Hiialakai. They unexpectedly found nursery grounds for juvenile reef fish like parrotfish and butterflyfish. They also were able to collect specimens that may help them identify new species.

"We were seeing reefs that no human has ever laid eyes on before," Randall Kosaki, the research mission's lead scientist and diver, said Tuesday. "We literally have better maps of the moon than we do of coral reefs in the Hawaiian archipelago."

http://snipr.com/rqbwo



Liposuction Fat Turned Into Stem Cells, Study Says
from National Geographic News

Using leftovers from liposuction patients, scientists have turned human fat into stem cells, a new study says. The new method is much more efficient than a previous practice that used skin cells, researchers say.

The discovery may also help avoid the controversy spawned by the use of stem cells from human embryos. Human fat is "an abundant natural resource and a renewable one," said Stanford University plastic surgeon Michael Longaker, whose liposuction patients donated the fat for the study.

Longaker envisions a future in which doctors will be able to use fat from a patient to grow, in a lab, new tissues and organs for that patient. The opportunity wouldn't be limited to the obese.

http://snipr.com/rqby0



50 Million Chemicals and Counting
from Science News

Bring out the helium balloons, confetti and a noisemaker or two. Today, researchers the world over have reason to raise a toast. This afternoon, the Chemical Abstracts Service--an American Chemical Society subsidiary--identified the 50 millionth compound known.

Arylmethylidene heterocycle--the molecule that qualified for the momentous spot during the long holiday weekend--is a future candidate for reducing neuropathic pain.

Since 1907, the Columbus, Ohio-based Chem Abstracts has maintained a registry of all publicly disclosed chemicals. Over the years, this registry has become the definitive one-stop shopping site for tracking down any and every known compound, including the names for each (as some compounds have as many as 1,000 monikers,) a compound's structure and any general characteristics (such as melting point).

http://snipr.com/rqbz1
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 16, 2009, 03:25:33 PM
September 15, 2009




Researchers Reveal New Weapon in Flu Fight
from the Seattle Times

SAN FRANCISCO (Associated Press) -- Researchers on Sunday delivered a double dose of good news in the fight against flu: successful tests of what could become the first new flu medicine in a decade, and the strongest evidence yet that such drugs save lives, not only shorten illness.

A single intravenous dose of the experimental drug, peramivir (purr-AM-uh-veer), cleared up flu symptoms as well as five days of Tamiflu pills did, a large study in Asia found. An IV treatment is badly needed because many sick people can't swallow pills and because illness hinders the body's ability to absorb oral medicines.

Several other studies, meanwhile, confirmed the value of treatment with Tamiflu. In one study of hundreds of people stricken with bird flu, half of those given Tamiflu survived, while nearly 90 percent of those not given flu medicines died. Other research showed Tamiflu improved survival from seasonal flu, too.

http://snipr.com/rv5pm




Leukemia, Stem Cell Scientists Get Lasker Awards
from USA Today

One of the most prestigious prizes in medicine is being awarded this year to scientists working on stem cells and leukemia--and to New York's mayor for his fight to cut tobacco use.

... The Lasker-DeBakey Clinical Medical Research Award goes to three scientists who turned a fatal cancer, myeloid leukemia, into a manageable condition with their discovery of the drug Gleevec (imatinib mesylate). Brian Druker, 54, of Oregon Health & Science University, Nicholas Lydon, 52, formerly of the Novartis pharmaceutical company, and Charles Sawyers, 50, of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center did the work in the 1990s.

... The Lasker Basic Medical Research Award goes to John Gurdon, 76, of Cambridge University and Shinya Yamanaka, 47, of Kyoto University and San Francisco's Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease. Their work has helped pave the way for the possibility of made-to-order stem cell treatments for individual patients.

http://snipr.com/rv5tu




Is Happiness Catching?
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... By analyzing the Framingham data, social scientists Nicholas Christakis and James Fowler say, they have for the first time found some solid basis for a potentially powerful theory in epidemiology: that good behaviors--like quitting smoking or staying slender or being happy--pass from friend to friend almost as if they were contagious viruses.

The Framingham participants, the data suggested, influenced one another's health just by socializing. And the same was true of bad behaviors--clusters of friends appeared to "infect" each other with obesity, unhappiness and smoking. Staying healthy isn't just a matter of your genes and your diet, it seems.

Good health is also a product, in part, of your sheer proximity to other healthy people. By keeping in close, regular contact with other healthy friends for decades, Eileen and Joseph had quite possibly kept themselves alive and thriving. And by doing precisely the opposite, the lone obese man hadn't.

http://snipr.com/rv5xv




Water Measured From the Sky
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Water management is serious business in the American West, where precipitation is scarce, irrigated agriculture is a major industry, new housing subdivisions spread across arid landscapes and water rights are allocated in a complicated seniority system.

"If you can't measure it, you can't manage it," water officials are fond of saying. ... Now a tool developed by the Idaho Department of Water Resources and the University of Idaho is changing the face of water management and conservation by efficiently offering specific measurements of the water consumed across a large region or single field.

Using surface temperature readings from government satellites, air temperature and a system of algorithms, the new method lets officials measure how much water is "consumed" on a certain piece of land through evapotranspiration.

http://snipr.com/rv5zy




Key Gene 'Controls Disease Fight'
from BBC News Online

A master gene that helps mobilise the immune system to fight disease has been discovered by UK scientists. It causes stem cells in the blood to become disease-fighting "Natural Killer" (NK) immune cells. It is hoped the discovery will lead to new ways to boost the body's production of these frontline cells--potentially creating a new way to kill cancer.

The Nature Immunology study may also help development of new treatments for type 1 diabetes and multiple sclerosis. These conditions are caused by a malfunctioning immune system turning against the body's own tissues, and it is suspected that faulty NK cells play a key role in this process.

The researchers, from Imperial College London, University College London and the Medical Research Council's National Institute for Medical Research have created mice that lack the key gene--E4bp4.

http://snipr.com/rv620




Clean Water Laws Are Neglected, at a Cost in Suffering
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... When Mrs. Hall-Massey and 264 neighbors sued nine nearby coal companies, accusing them of putting dangerous waste into local water supplies, their lawyer did not have to look far for evidence. As required by state law, some of the companies had disclosed in reports to regulators that they were pumping into the ground illegal concentrations of chemicals--the same pollutants that flowed from residents' taps.

But state regulators never fined or punished those companies for breaking those pollution laws. This pattern is not limited to West Virginia. Almost four decades ago, Congress passed the Clean Water Act to force polluters to disclose the toxins they dump into waterways and to give regulators the power to fine or jail offenders.

States have passed pollution statutes of their own. But in recent years, violations of the Clean Water Act have risen steadily across the nation, an extensive review of water pollution records by The New York Times found.

http://snipr.com/rv679




Defogging Titan's Methane Mystery
from Science News

Methane fog hovering above Saturn's moon Titan has cleared away any doubt that the hydrocarbon cycles between the moon's surface and its atmosphere, planetary scientists say.

Titan is the only solar system body other than Earth known to have large quantities of liquid--in this case methane and ethane--on its surface. Scientists have speculated that these liquids may serve as a prebiotic brew, offering a snapshot of the chemistry of the early Earth.

Methane acts on Titan the way water does on Earth, notes Michael Brown of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. On Titan, methane can form clouds and is likely to produce rain. But it's less certain, says Brown, whether methane is truly part of a cycle, in which methane rain "makes it to the surface and pools into ponds or streams that then evaporate back into the atmosphere." The discovery of fog would settle this question.

http://snipr.com/rv6ad




Global Warming Could Cool North America in a Few Decades?
from National Geographic News

Global warming could actually chill down North America within just a few decades, according to a new study that says a sudden cooling event gripped the region about 8,300 years ago.

Analysis of ancient moss from Newfoundland, Canada, links an injection of freshwater from a burst glacial lake to a rapid drop in air temperatures by a few degrees Celsius along North America's East Coast.

This event created a colder year-round climate with a much shorter growing season for about 150 years, from northern Canada to what is now Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. The results suggest that North America's climate is highly sensitive to meltwater flowing into the ocean, said lead study author Tim Daley of Swansea University in the U.K.

http://snipr.com/rv6ds




Waste of Breadth
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

If nothing else, the recent return of scientists from the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a terrific and terrible reminder that we're drowning in the stuff. The patch is roughly the size of Texas, swirling 1,000 miles off the coast of California. For the most part, it's a soupy broth of degraded bits of plastic, with the occasional larger blob of coagulated debris.

The multitudinous bits of microscopic plastic are particularly perplexing. Experts says they outweigh the local surface zooplankton by a factor of 6 to 1 and extend downward 100 feet or more. The exact environmental impact of the plastic--or the patch--is not known, but it's not likely to be good.

A mortality rate study of threatened Laysan albatrosses, whose range includes the garbage patch, found that 90 percent of the albatross chicks that die each year contained plastic. The chicks die by the tens of thousands.

http://snipr.com/rv6gk




The Patuxent's Hidden Treasure
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Aboard a pontoon boat chugging past the marshland of Maryland's upper Patuxent River on a recent Saturday, Ralph Eshelman pointed to the spot where the muddy brown water hides a shipwreck nearly two centuries old, part of the American flotilla that defended the Chesapeake Bay when the British burned Washington during the War of 1812.

Nearly 30 years ago, Eshelman helped direct a team of marine researchers who discovered the wreck, one of the war's most significant artifacts. After a limited, month-long excavation of the site east of Upper Marlboro in 1980, the wreck was reburied under four feet of mud and sediment to protect it from decay.

The hope was that archaeologists with more funding could one day return to excavate the 75-foot vessel, tentatively identified as the Scorpion, flagship of Commodore Joshua Barney's Chesapeake Flotilla. Now, supporters are hoping the time is ripe.

http://snipr.com/rv6jn
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 19, 2009, 08:47:50 PM
http://snipr.com/rwlps - SWIIIIIIINNNNNNNNNE FLUUUUUUUUU. BTW, the vaccines are pretty much ready.

http://snipr.com/rwlqe - steel types and car manufacturing

http://snipr.com/rwlr5 - This one gets two things from me: a huge YES and a huge DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH. This isn't rocket science folks.

http://snipr.com/rwlrg - Lou Gehrig's diseased caused by cyanobacterial toxins? This is an interesting development. Something to follow.

http://snipr.com/rwlst - Centromeric location of Y chromosomes a possible reason for sexual spectrum of conditions in males.

http://snipr.com/rwlue - Te Hokioi a giant New Zealand flightless bird confirmed. It's only natural predator was a giant eagle. Both went extinct over 500 years ago. IOW, humans suck again.  :argh!:

http://snipr.com/rwlv0 - Murray Gell-Mann on Particle physics.

http://snipr.com/rwlvd - Yes, now we must fear with great fear....SHOWERHEADS! No troll, people.

http://snipr.com/rwlvt - animal counting abilities. A quote: "Under certain conditions, monkeys could sometimes outperform college students." Who is surprised by this?  :x

http://snipr.com/rwlw6 - What the hell is a MEMRISTOR? Is this some of that "dictionaries are for the bourgeois" crap?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 19, 2009, 09:05:15 PM
http://snipr.com/ryokb - HELP, I'VE GOT A EARACHE IN MY EYETOOTH! More seriously, this is really cool.

http://snipr.com/ryolr - New awesome distant galaxy searching from the Hubble Space Telescope. THIS is what we should put our space money in, not sending people to the moon to play golf.

http://snipr.com/ryom7 - "Like a locomotive with a mouth full of butcher knives." Probably the coolest movie quote ever about a huge extinct shark, now believed to be the ancestor of modern Great White Sharks.

http://snipr.com/ryoq6 - First images from Plank Telescope. Remember, this one is looking at microwave background radiation.

http://snipr.com/ryoqq Pint sized ancestor of T. rex.

http://snipr.com/ryosm - Anything about "tricorder" developments is super specialawesome. Seriously.

http://snipr.com/ryot0 - Comet having little comet babies. Its a world destroying family!

http://snipr.com/ryotc - But I can do all of this IN MY BRAIN! Okay, I guess it is a little cool.

http://snipr.com/ryotu - trash mark/recapture study. Yes, I know I'm using population dynamics terms for human garbage. 

http://snipr.com/ryoud - I for one AM SHOCKED. Really. No, srsly. SHOCKED, I tell you.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 01, 2009, 07:33:39 PM
Stressed out week. Stressed out month, really.

Here's one article, probably the most important thing published on evolutionary biology in the last 10 years.

http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v461/n7263/full/nature08249.html (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v461/n7263/full/nature08249.html)

If you can't see that due to not being on a campus, here are some quotes:

QuoteAn epistatic ratchet constrains the direction of glucocorticoid receptor evolution

The extent to which evolution is reversible has long fascinated biologists. Most previous work on the reversibility of morphological and life-history evolution has been indecisive, because of uncertainty and bias in the methods used to infer ancestral states for such characters. Further, despite theoretical work on the factors that could contribute to irreversibility there is little empirical evidence on its causes, because sufficient understanding of the mechanistic basis for the evolution of new or ancestral phenotypes is seldom available. By studying the reversibility of evolutionary changes in protein structure and function, these limitations can be overcome. Here we show, using the evolution of hormone specificity in the vertebrate glucocorticoid receptor as a case-study, that the evolutionary path by which this protein acquired its new function soon became inaccessible to reverse exploration. Using ancestral gene reconstruction, protein engineering and X-ray crystallography, we demonstrate that five subsequent 'restrictive' mutations, which optimized the new specificity of the glucocorticoid receptor, also destabilized elements of the protein structure that were required to support the ancestral conformation. Unless these ratchet-like epistatic substitutions are restored to their ancestral states, reversing the key function-switching mutations yields a non-functional protein. Reversing the restrictive substitutions first, however, does nothing to enhance the ancestral function. Our findings indicate that even if selection for the ancestral function were imposed, direct reversal would be extremely unlikely, suggesting an important role for historical contingency in protein evolution.

QuoteWe have examined the sufficiency of selection to drive direct evolutionary reversal. There may be other potentially permissive mutations, of unknown number, that could compensate for the restrictive effect of group W and allow the ancestral conformation to be restored. Reversal by such indirect pathways could be driven by selection, however, only if these other mutations, unlike those we studied, could somehow relieve the steric clashes and restore the lost stabilizing interactions that make the ancestral position of helix 7 intolerable in AncGR2, and also independently restore the ancestral function when helix 7 is in its radically different derived conformation. Whether or not mutations that could achieve these dual ends exist, reversal to the ancestral conformation would require a considerably more complex pathway than was necessary before the ratchet effect of W evolved.

The extent to which our observations concerning the evolutionary reversibility of glucocorticoid recpetors can be generalized to other proteins requires further research. We predict that future investigations, like ours, will support a molecular version of Dollo's law4: as evolution proceeds, shifts in protein structure–function relations become increasingly difficult to reverse whenever those shifts have complex architectures, such as requiring conformational changes or epistatically interacting substitutions. Phenotypes at higher levels of genetic organization may also display ratchet-like modes of evolution if optimization of a derived phenotype involves changes in one gene, regulatory element, morphological structure, or developmental process that epistatically undermine the conditions that enabled the ancestral state at other such 'loci'. In contrast, phenotypic shifts caused by single or additive genetic changes are likely to be readily reversible.

Our observations suggest that history and contingency during glucocorticoid receptor evolution strongly limited the pathways that could be deterministically followed under selection. The 'adaptive peak' represented by the promiscuous AncGR1 is a relatively close neighbour in sequence space to the more specific AncGR2. This peak was occupied in the ancestor of jawed vertebrates—indicating that no intrinsic constraints prevent its realization—but it became far more difficult to access just 40 million years later because of intervening epistatic mutations. Selection is an extraordinarily powerful evolutionary force; nevertheless, our observations suggest that, because of the complexity of glucocorticoid receptor architecture, low-probability permissive substitutions were required to open some mutational trajectories to exploration under selection, whereas restrictive substitutions closed other potential paths. Under selection, some kind of adaptation will always occur, but the specific adaptive forms that are realized depend on the historical trajectory that precedes them. The conditions that once facilitated evolution of the glucocorticoid receptor's ancestors were destroyed during the realization of its present form. The past is difficult to recover because it was built on the foundation of its own history, one irrevocably different from that of the present and its many possible futures.

Emphasis mine. This article is discussing something we've known on a macroscopic level for quite a while now, called Dollo's Law, that as evolution proceeds, reversals to ancestral conditions becomes increasingly difficult. Now we know that proteins for sure are probably a large part of this, not because of the protein itself, but because of the layer of regulating transcription factors that cause a specific what and where aspect. This is like a ratchet: as one part of the network opens a little to change and the other closes a little, theres a directionality that takes place, and its very hard to move those back because you can't change them back one at time, or the function will be lost. Evolution takes place in whats known as adaptive landscapes. Imagine the ratcheting direction as a valley leading down from a mountain. Since the probability "slope" of going back to the previous condition is low, and the valley probability is high, the lineage changes it's phenotype over time directionally, with an extreme unlikelyhood of reversal. It also means we can /predict/ what condition an organism may next evolve towards, since the direction isn't, CAN'T be, largely random without loss of functionality.

Like I said, most important evolution paper in the last 10 years.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Precious Moments Zalgo on October 01, 2009, 10:48:12 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 01, 2009, 07:33:39 PM
QuoteUnless these ratchet-like epistatic substitutions are restored to their ancestral states, reversing the key function-switching mutations yields a non-functional protein. Reversing the restrictive substitutions first, however, does nothing to enhance the ancestral function.

Does that part mean that this experiment (http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jx-BLpv3KK-DizDVnr7QMKh_7vhQ) is doomed to failure?
QuoteHans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at Montreal's McGill University, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared millions of years ago in birds.  Larsson believes by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken embryo's development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told AFP in an interview.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 01, 2009, 11:30:32 PM
Quote from: Pastor-Mullah Zappathruster on October 01, 2009, 10:48:12 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 01, 2009, 07:33:39 PM
QuoteUnless these ratchet-like epistatic substitutions are restored to their ancestral states, reversing the key function-switching mutations yields a non-functional protein. Reversing the restrictive substitutions first, however, does nothing to enhance the ancestral function.

Does that part mean that this experiment (http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jx-BLpv3KK-DizDVnr7QMKh_7vhQ) is doomed to failure?
QuoteHans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at Montreal's McGill University, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared millions of years ago in birds.  Larsson believes by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken embryo's development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told AFP in an interview.

Yes. There are no "genetic levers", or if there are there are very few of them. This person obviously doesn't understand the complexity of transcription factor cascades and networks. He would have to change the genetic state back all at once, and he has no clue what the original state was. He MAY be able to engineer the birds in a forward direction to develop more scales, teeth, etc, and slowly cause convergence so they LOOK similar to dinosaurs, but he'll never reproduce the dinosaur anatomy and more importantly, physiology, as it once was.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Precious Moments Zalgo on October 02, 2009, 02:32:58 AM
Quote from: Kai on October 01, 2009, 11:30:32 PM
Quote from: Pastor-Mullah Zappathruster on October 01, 2009, 10:48:12 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 01, 2009, 07:33:39 PM
QuoteUnless these ratchet-like epistatic substitutions are restored to their ancestral states, reversing the key function-switching mutations yields a non-functional protein. Reversing the restrictive substitutions first, however, does nothing to enhance the ancestral function.

Does that part mean that this experiment (http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jx-BLpv3KK-DizDVnr7QMKh_7vhQ) is doomed to failure?
QuoteHans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at Montreal's McGill University, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared millions of years ago in birds.  Larsson believes by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken embryo's development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told AFP in an interview.

Yes. There are no "genetic levers", or if there are there are very few of them. This person obviously doesn't understand the complexity of transcription factor cascades and networks. He would have to change the genetic state back all at once, and he has no clue what the original state was. He MAY be able to engineer the birds in a forward direction to develop more scales, teeth, etc, and slowly cause convergence so they LOOK similar to dinosaurs, but he'll never reproduce the dinosaur anatomy and more importantly, physiology, as it once was.
Thanks for that.  My simplified pop-science understanding was that organisms have ancestral genes that are "turned off", so it sounded plausible that one could turn simply them back on.  Of course, it's highly likely that the article I cited was a grossly distorted pop-science version of what Larsson is actually planning to do.  

Which is too bad, because I want a rooster with activated dinosaur genes so I can enter it in cock-fights.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 02, 2009, 02:53:08 AM
Quote from: Pastor-Mullah Zappathruster on October 02, 2009, 02:32:58 AM
Quote from: Kai on October 01, 2009, 11:30:32 PM
Quote from: Pastor-Mullah Zappathruster on October 01, 2009, 10:48:12 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 01, 2009, 07:33:39 PM
QuoteUnless these ratchet-like epistatic substitutions are restored to their ancestral states, reversing the key function-switching mutations yields a non-functional protein. Reversing the restrictive substitutions first, however, does nothing to enhance the ancestral function.

Does that part mean that this experiment (http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jx-BLpv3KK-DizDVnr7QMKh_7vhQ) is doomed to failure?
QuoteHans Larsson, the Canada Research Chair in Macro Evolution at Montreal's McGill University, said he aims to develop dinosaur traits that disappeared millions of years ago in birds.  Larsson believes by flipping certain genetic levers during a chicken embryo's development, he can reproduce the dinosaur anatomy, he told AFP in an interview.

Yes. There are no "genetic levers", or if there are there are very few of them. This person obviously doesn't understand the complexity of transcription factor cascades and networks. He would have to change the genetic state back all at once, and he has no clue what the original state was. He MAY be able to engineer the birds in a forward direction to develop more scales, teeth, etc, and slowly cause convergence so they LOOK similar to dinosaurs, but he'll never reproduce the dinosaur anatomy and more importantly, physiology, as it once was.
Thanks for that.  My simplified pop-science understanding was that organisms have ancestral genes that are "turned off", so it sounded plausible that one could turn simply them back on.  Of course, it's highly likely that the article I cited was a grossly distorted pop-science version of what Larsson is actually planning to do.  

Which is too bad, because I want a rooster with activated dinosaur genes so I can enter it in cock-fights.

Okay, a short lesson.

Genes that code for structural proteins tend to be rather conserved. So, keratin is keratin is keratin. Actin is actin is actin. Because the particular structure of that molecule is so important, the gene that codes for the structural part itself doesn't tend to change often.

However, transcription factors, the other genes that determine when and where the gene expresses, are probably the main drivers of evolution. So, there isn't one gene that codes, for example, an insect wing. You've got chitin and melanin and all these other structural proteins, but where and when they are expressed depends on the transcription factors.

Now, transcription factors happen in very intricate networks, but they need to be kick started somehow (see my other thread on transcription factors in Or Kill Me). The kickstarter for the wing patterns in insects are the homeobox or Hox genes Ultrabithorax A and B. When present in the right concentrations (remember, the original start of this comes from the mother), the expression of the second and third thoracic segments leads to the expression of other transcription factors (we'll call this MFG) which pattern the wing.

Now, usually a loss of expression DOES mean some sort of mutation, but in at least one example, the expression of MFG is lost not because it's changed, but because it gets locked up by methylation of chromatin storage of chromosomes. So, in essence for this group (in this case, stick insects) the wing expression gets turned off. Hokay....so, in this rare case, it's believed that MFG (not the real name of the gene but bear with me) was locked up in chromatin storage, and at some point in some lineages MFG became accessable again. So, wings were expressed. HOWEVER, this is not the common case, since loss of expression of a major TF gene in most organisms would mean lowered fitness. In stick insects it was just fine, since flight wasn't necessary for survival.

So yeah. Transfactors change, cause a ratchet effect, and though the enzymatic or structural protein may be easily reversible, all the transcription factors that change with it are not. Thus, Dollo's Law, thus adaptive landscapes. Chickens are never going to be dinosaurs again, although you might get them to LOOK a LITTLE like a dino.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 04, 2009, 09:51:23 PM
 October 1, 2009

E.P.A. Moves to Curtail Greenhouse Gas Emissions - Basically, Obama isn't going to wait for Congress to do anything, so he's having the EPA set standards.

http://snipr.com/s98pl

Chandra's Ten-year Anniversary -Some photographs from the x ray telescope's ten year history, and thats only so far.

http://snipr.com/s98qf

Padang Lives with Quake Stress - On the Sumatran earthquakes and tectonic fault lines.

http://snipr.com/s98rj

Climate-Change Study Cites Role of Ancient Farming - and of course people will think this makes it just peachy to keep turning up the heat. "the indians did it, so why shouldn't we?"

http://snipr.com/s98t6

Stabilizing the Electric Grid with Megawatt-scale Storage - Finally. It's been battery technology thats been holding back energy advancements for a long time now.

http://snipr.com/s98tu

Protein Reveals How Insects Smell - Been hearing a bunch about this particular study. Olfactory reception isn't that different no matter what organism you go to, but this just confirms the particular protein that binds pheromones.

http://snipr.com/s98ux

Excreted Tamiflu Found in Rivers - This is some major horrormirth right here.

http://snipr.com/s98xu

How Will Climate Change Impact World Food Supplies? - Title says it all. I must be in a horrible mood today because I feel the need to tell all the global warming activists they are full of shit, that there's no global warming, and that they should go back to their steak and teevee. Just a sort of rude, assholish trollish mood.

http://snipr.com/s991a

Galaxy Study Hints at Cracks in Dark Matter Theories - Really don't know what to think about "dark matter". So often I hear the words and cringe, because if I understand correctly it's just matter that doesn't radiate light visible to us, but it feels like people are talking about some mysterious force/energy or some stupid shit.

http://snipr.com/s992e

Call for New Nobel Prizes to Honour 'Forgotten' Scientists argument that the nobel prizes should be revamped to include other areas of science.

http://snipr.com/s9945
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 04, 2009, 10:04:49 PM
October 2, 2009

Fossils Radically Alter Ideas About the Look of Man's Earliest Ancestors - This is on all the articles about 'Albi', or Albipithecus, the new hominid fossil uncovered recently.

http://snipr.com/sa1vj

Best of the Ig Nobel Prizes 2009 - Awesome hilarious science. Some of it horrormirth. If you've never heard of the Ig Nobels, check them out.

http://snipr.com/sa1vz

Swine Flu Vaccine Arrives, and the Scramble Begins Basically, everybody's rushing to get the first batch. Watch as I cool my heels.

http://snipr.com/sa1we

Iranian Ministers in Plagiarism Row - Intellectual property stuff.

http://snipr.com/sa1wj

EPA Announces Plan to Review Six Controversial Chemicals - Including Bisphenol A.

http://snipr.com/sa1x7

Endangered Ugandan Gorillas Join Facebook, MySpace - No comment.

http://snipr.com/sa1xd

A Clean Break: Kidney Machines Go Mobile - Mobile dialysis. Cool

http://snipr.com/sa1xy

'Jurassic Treasure Trove' of Eggs Could Reveal Why Dinosaurs Died Out - The site is in southern India. I don't know how exactly they're gonna find out the cause of the K-T extinction from this.

http://snipr.com/sa1y7

Southeast Drought Study Ties Water Shortage to Population, Not Global Warming - The quote below says it all. I've known this since I moved down here. Historical records show the southeast is a dynamic climate landscape, and can handle 'drought' conditions.

"At the root of the water supply problem in the Southeast is a growing population," they wrote.

http://snipr.com/sa1yi

How Earth's Hum Could Help Us Map Mars - Maping mars with the same technology that allowed us to figure out the composition of the earths mantle and core.

http://snipr.com/sa1yx
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on October 05, 2009, 05:56:09 AM
Quote from: Kai on October 04, 2009, 09:51:23 PM
Call for New Nobel Prizes to Honour 'Forgotten' Scientists argument that the nobel prizes should be revamped to include other areas of science.

http://snipr.com/s9945

QuoteThey also suggest either widening the remit of the medicine award to embrace all the life sciences, or creating further prizes in fundamental biology and behavioural science.

Definitely agree with this part. Having a prize just for medicine is too narrow and excludes too many branches of biology. It would be nice to have a Noble Prize for technology too.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 06, 2009, 01:24:39 AM
BREAKING NEWS

Just published today in Oncogene.

http://www.nature.com/onc/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/onc2009259a.html

UK researchers have discovered one of the major genes responsible for tumor suppression. This has been hearalded as one of the most important cancer related discoveries in the last 20 years. Tumor supressors cockblock cancer cells from continuing to divide, but when this gene is damaged it can induce tumorigenesis.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/6261309/Breast-cancer-gene-discovery-most-important-for-20-years.html for a news synopsis more readable than the paper itself.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 12, 2009, 07:09:43 PM
 October 9, 2009



Paper Challenges Ideas About 'Early Bird' Dinosaur
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The "early bird" archaeopteryx may not be a bird, after all.

The first fossil of the raven-size species was an immediate sensation when it was excavated in 1860, in southern Germany. It had feathers and a wishbone, like birds, but teeth and a long, bony tail, like reptiles. Coming the year after publication of The Origin of Species, the discovery swayed many scientists into accepting Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection.

Thomas Henry Huxley, Darwin's staunch ally, recognized the fossil in a limestone slab as a transitional species between dinosaurs and birds. Over time, the 10 known specimens of archaeopteryx became widely regarded as examples of the earliest bird, which lived about 150 million years ago.

http://snipr.com/sextn




Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Linked to 'Cancer Virus'
from New Scientist

Chronic fatigue syndrome, the debilitating condition once dismissed as "yuppie flu," has been linked to a virus that is also common in people with a certain type of prostate cancer.

It's still not clear if the virus, called XMRV, causes chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS), or is just more common in people with the disorder. But the discovery is sure to reignite the debate over whether CFS is fundamentally a psychological condition or a physiological one.

"It's a contentious area that lies somewhere between medicine and psychiatry," says Simon Wessely, a psychiatrist at King's College London who has been vilified by patient groups for his scepticism of cut-and-dried explanations for CFS and his assertion that psychological factors may play an important role.

http://snipr.com/sexu7




Petite Pictures: The 20 Microscopic Photo Competition Prizewinners
from Scientific American

Microscopes have been around for some 400 years, and today they are even accessible via customized cell phones. The act of peering into a microscope of any power can open a whole world of life and beauty that exists right under (or in) our noses. And to capture that rare view for reproduction can also prove to be an art form in itself.

The ability to snap an image seen through an optical microscope--whether it's via fluorescence, polarized-light, dark-field, confocal, deconvolution or other techniques--has brought researchers and novices alike to the intersection of art and science. Since 1974 Nikon has recognized the year's best photomicrographs--pictures taken on a miniscule scale. Here are the top 20 winners of this year's Nikon Small World Photomicrography Competition.

From thousands of entries, four judges ... selected the 20 winners. A popular winner is also chosen via a vote on the contest Web site.

http://snipr.com/sexzf




Spitzer's Cold Look at Space
from American Scientist

In astrophysical observations, more is more--imaging across multiple wavelengths leads to richer information. One electromagnetic band in which most celestial bodies radiate is the infrared: Objects ranging in location from the chilly fringes of our Solar System to the dust-enshrouded nuclei of distant galaxies radiate entirely or predominantly in this band. Thus, astrophysicists require good visualization of these wavelengths.

The problem, however, is that Earth is a very hostile environment for infrared exploration of space, as the atmosphere also emits in the infrared spectrum and additionally absorbs much of the incoming signal. Even heat produced by a telescope itself can degrade its own clarity.

Starting at the end of the 1950s, a number of pioneering groups confronted this challenge and carried out increasingly exciting infrared investigations from ground-based, airborne and balloon-borne observatories. This work continues in parallel with space-based exploration; infrared capabilities form an integral component of current and planned ground-based telescopes with apertures of 10 to 30 meters in diameter.

http://snipr.com/sey05




Monkey Moms Have Madonna Moments
from ScienceNOW Daily News

It's a look that's been painted and photographed untold times: a mother gazing deep into her infant's eyes while the two smile and kiss. Psychologists believe this interplay helps a child's emotional and cognitive development. The behavior was thought to exist only in humans and to a lesser extent in our closest kin, chimpanzees. Now, scientists have discovered similarly intense shared gazing and facial expressions in monkeys. And that means, the researchers say, that this kind of maternal communication dates back at least 30 million years.

Although scientists have studied rhesus macaque monkeys (Macaca mulatta) in the lab and field for more than 50 years, they missed this key behavior. "Previous researchers were looking more at what happens when a mother and infant are separated," says Pier Francesco Ferrari, a neuroscientist at the University of Parma in Italy, not what happens when they're together.

But plenty occurs between the two, as Ferrari and his team observed. In a semi-free-range environment at the Laboratory of Comparative Cognition, part of the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, the scientists filmed 14 mother-and-infant pairs during the first 2 months of the youngsters' lives, beginning when the infants were a few hours old.

http://snipr.com/sey0p




U.S. Companies May Look Abroad to Fight Global Warming
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

U.S. companies could save tens of billions of dollars by investing in efforts to combat deforestation in developing nations instead of cleaning up their own domestic carbon dioxide emissions, according to a report released Wednesday.

The report, compiled by a high-powered bipartisan group, backs the use of "forest offsets" in the global effort to curb pollution that is heating up the atmosphere. It was released in advance of the upcoming Senate debate on climate legislation and an international meeting on the issue set for December in Copenhagen.

The burning of tropical forests and their conversion to cattle farms and soybean fields is responsible for about 17% of the emissions that are causing global warming--more than all the world's cars, trucks, trains and planes combined--scientists say.

http://snipr.com/sey1g




Royal Blood Disorder Identified
from BBC News

DNA analysis has revealed the identity of the "cursed blood" disorder that afflicted the British Royal Family in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Scientists say the disease inherited by Queen Victoria's descendants was probably a severe form of the blood clotting disorder haemophilia B.

The scientists examined DNA samples extracted from the skeletal remains of Russia's Romanov family. The research is published in the journal Science.

http://snipr.com/sey2j




Ice Confirmed on an Asteroid
from Science News

FAJARDO, Puerto Rico -- Space rocks may be dead as doornails but some contain ingredients that could have given life on Earth a foothold.

Planetary scientists reported October 7 that they have, for the first time, confirmed that an asteroid contains frozen water on its surface. Evidence of water-ice, along with organic compounds, on the surface of the asteroid 24 Themis supports the theory that asteroids brought both water and organic compounds to the early Earth, helping lay the foundation for life on the planet.

Humberto Campins of the University of Central Florida in Orlando and his colleagues recorded spectra of the asteroid 24 Themis over a seven-hour period, corresponding to 84 percent of the rotational period of the spinning rock. The spectra, taken with NASA's Infrared Telescope Facility on Hawaii's Mauna Kea, revealed the consistent presence of frozen water as different parts of the asteroid's surface came into view, Campins reported at the annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society's Division for Planetary Sciences.

http://snipr.com/sey32




Giant, Mucus-Like Sea Blobs on the Rise, Pose Danger
from National Geographic News

Beware of the blob--this time, it's for real.

As sea temperatures have risen in recent decades, enormous sheets of a mucus-like material have begun forming more often, oozing into new regions, and lasting longer, a new Mediterranean Sea study says.

And the blobs may be more than just unpleasant. Up to 124 miles (200 kilometers) long, the mucilages appear naturally, usually near Mediterranean coasts in summer. The season's warm weather makes seawater more stable, which facilitates the bonding of the organic matter that makes up the blobs.

http://snipr.com/sey3f




Fossils Suggest an Ancient CO2-Climate Link
from Time

Some of the best evidence linking rising carbon dioxide levels to a warmer world comes from the coldest places on earth. Samples of ancient air extracted from deep inside the Antarctic and Greenland ice caps make it clear that CO2 is scarce in the atmosphere during ice ages and relatively abundant during warmer interglacial periods--like the one we're in now.

The relationship between CO2 and climate is clear going back about 800,000 years. Before that, however, it gets murkier. That's largely because ice and air that old haven't yet been found. So scientists rely instead on indirect measurements--and these have led to a climate mystery: some episodes of past warming, including a planetary heat wave about 15 million years ago and another about 3.5 million years ago, seem to have happened without a rise in CO2. No one quite understands why. Maybe other greenhouse gases were the cause--methane, for example. Or maybe it had to do with changes in ocean circulation.

But according to a new study just published in Science, there may not be any mystery after all. By looking at the chemistry of fossilized foraminifera--tiny sea creatures no bigger than a grain of sand--a team led by Aradhna Tripati, of University of the California, Los Angeles, has detected a significant CO2 bump during both warming episodes.

http://snipr.com/sey4e
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 12, 2009, 07:10:31 PM
October 8, 2009




Russia Plots Return to Venus
from BBC News Online

Densely clouded in acid-laden mist, Venus used to be the Soviet Union's favourite target for planetary exploration.

Now, after a lull of almost three decades, Russia is making plans for a new mission to the "morning star" and has invited Western scientists to participate.

Last week, Moscow-based space research institute IKI hosted an international conference aimed at luring scientists from Europe and possibly other countries such as the US into the ambitious project, officially scheduled for launch in 2016.

http://snipr.com/se97g




You Can Watch NASA Give the Moon a One-Two Punch
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- NASA will throw a one-two punch at the big old moon Friday and the whole world will have ringside seats for the lunar dust-up.

NASA will send a used-up spacecraft slamming into the moon's south pole to kick up a massive plume of lunar dirt and then scour it to see if there's any water or ice spraying up. The idea is to confirm the theory that water--a key resource if people are going to go back to the moon--is hidden below the barren moonscape.

The crashing spaceship was launched in June along with an orbiter that's now mapping the lunar surface. LCROSS--short for Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite and pronounced L-Cross--is on a collision course with the moon, attached to an empty 2.2-ton rocket that helped get the probe off the ground.

http://snipr.com/se97u




Are You Asleep? Exploring the Mind's Twilight Zone
from New Scientist

Earlier this year, a puzzling report appeared in the journal Sleep Medicine. It described two Italian people who never truly slept. They might lie down and close their eyes, but read-outs of brain activity showed none of the normal patterns associated with sleep. Their behaviour was pretty odd, too. Though largely unaware of their surroundings during these rest periods, they would walk around, yell, tremble violently and their hearts would race. The remainder of the time they were conscious and aware but prone to powerful, dream-like hallucinations.

Both had been diagnosed with a neurodegenerative disorder called multiple system atrophy. According to the report's authors, Roberto Vetrugno and colleagues from the University of Bologna, Italy, the disease had damaged the pair's brains to such an extent that they had entered status dissociatus, a kind of twilight zone in which the boundaries between sleep and wakefulness completely break down.

That this can happen contradicts the way we usually think about sleep, but it came as no surprise to Mark Mahowald, medical director of the Minnesota Regional Sleep Disorders Center in Minneapolis, who has long contested the dogma that sleep and wakefulness are discrete and distinct states.

http://snipr.com/se989




An Emotional Response: Using Computers to Analyse Sentiments
from the Economist

The difference between saying what you mean and meaning what you say is obvious to most people. To computers, however, it is trickier. Yet getting them to assess intelligently what people mean from what they say would be useful to companies seeking to identify unhappy customers and intelligence agencies seeking to identify dangerous individuals from comments they post online.

Computers are often inept at understanding the meaning of a word because that meaning depends on the context in which the word is used. For example "killing" is bad and "bacteria" are bad but "killing bacteria" is often good (unless, that is, someone is talking about the healthy bacteria present in live yogurt, in which case, it would be bad).

An attempt to enable computers to assess the emotional meaning of text is being led by Stephen Pulman of the University of Oxford and Karo Moilanen, one of his doctoral students. It uses so-called "sentiment analysis" software to assess text. The pair have developed a classification system that analyses the grammatical structure of a piece of text and assigns emotional labels to the words it contains, by looking them up in a 57,000-word "sentiment lexicon" compiled by people.

http://snipr.com/se99d




Human Variation Revealed
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Scientists have generated the most comprehensive map of the structural variation that exists among normal, healthy humans, according to a study published online today in Nature. Understanding normal variation between individuals is critical to identifying abnormal changes that may contribute to a wide variety of heritable diseases.

"I think it's considered to be a landmark paper," said geneticist Frank Speleman of the Center for Medical Genetics Ghent at Ghent University Hospital in Belgium, who was not involved in the work. "It's quite important in the complete context of genome wide association studies and genetic predisposition."

Using microarrays that contained more than 42 million probes, genome scientist Stephen Scherer of The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto and the University of Toronto and his colleagues searched the genome of 40 healthy individuals for copy number variants (CNVs)--areas of the genome that come in varying quantities as a result of deletions, insertions, or duplications. The researchers identified 11,700 CNVs 443 base pairs or greater in size, with an average of approximately 1,000 CNVs differing between any two individuals.

http://snipr.com/se99t




Baby Bats Imitate Dad's Songs
from ScienceNOW Daily News

A few years ago, researchers discovered that the babies of at least one species of bat make babbling sounds, much like human infants. Now, it turns out those babbling baby bats aren't just mindlessly cooing--they're imitating the songs of the big guys in their colonies: adult males with territories and harems.

Such vocal imitation is rare in the animal kingdom, and it has never been found in nonhuman primates. The discovery should open a new window on the evolution of speech and language, scientists say.

Scientists define complex vocal imitation as the ability to learn a call or song from a tutor--and they regard this talent as a key innovation in the evolution of speech. The rarified list of complex vocal imitators includes birds, elephants, cetaceans, seals, and humans. Researchers had long predicted that bats might also be capable of such imitation because of their extraordinary vocal flexibility; they use echolocation calls to navigate the physical world, for example, and social calls to communicate with their fellow bats.

http://snipr.com/se9ah




Bar Code: Its Origins, Why It's on Google & What's Next
from National Geographic News

The now inescapable bar code celebrates its 57th anniversary Wednesday--a milestone unmissed by Google, which replaced its home page logo with a bar code "doodle" that translates to "Google."

Now used to track just about anything bought and sold in many countries, the standard bar code system was patented in the United States on October 7, 1952, but took about 20 years to go mainstream.

U.S. inventors Norman Woodland and Bernard Silver had devised a way to encode data in a bull's-eye pattern. Their idea didn't immediately take off because the technology to read bar codes wasn't available. That's because at least two required components--lasers and digital-image sensors called charged-coupled devices, or CCDs--hadn't been invented yet.

http://snipr.com/se9b0




Companies Quit U.S. Chamber Over Climate Policy
from National Public Radio

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce bills itself as "the voice of business." But when it comes to climate change, business no longer speaks with one voice.

This week, Apple Inc. announced that it's quitting the chamber in protest of its climate policy. The maker of iPods and Macintosh computers joins a handful of other high-profile chamber defectors.

"Apple supports regulating greenhouse gas emissions, and it's frustrating to find the chamber at odds with us in this effort," Catherine Novelli, Apple's vice president for worldwide government affairs, wrote in a letter to the chamber. "We would prefer that the chamber take a more progressive stance on this critical issue."

http://snipr.com/se9bi




Alligator Swamps Are Lousy With Monogamy
from Wired

Alligators don't seem to be the promiscuous, indiscriminate reptiles scientists once though they were. A new 10-year study of alligator mating habits shows that most female crocodilians prefer to mate over and over with the same male, despite encountering a vast array of eligible alligator bachelors each year.

As the only surviving members of a class of reptiles called archosaurs, which included dinosaurs and the ancient ancestors of birds, alligators are in a unique position to help scientists understand the mating patterns of dinosaurs and birds. For the past 10 years, ecologists have been tracking female alligators at the Rockefeller Wildlife Refuge in Louisiana and recording their mate preferences by looking at the DNA of their young. The data, published today in Molecular Ecology, reveals that up to 70 percent of female alligators choose the same partner year after year.

"Given how incredibly open and dense the alligator population is at RWR, we didn't expect to find fidelity," biologist Stacey Lance of the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory in South Carolina said in a press release.

http://snipr.com/se9ci




Taking Aim at Energy-Sucking TVs
from the Christian Science Monitor

Television's high-definition era has done an impressive job of bringing theaterlike experiences to the not-so-small screen. New tube TVs are hard to come by these days, as stores make room for flat-panel models measuring 50 inches or more.

But it takes a lot of energy to power those millions of pixels--enough that the US Environmental Protection Agency suggested in September that perhaps there is such a thing as a television that's too big.

As picture quality improves, television sets are sucking down an increasing share of home-energy costs. America's TVs consume "4 percent of all households' electricity use," reports the federal energy-efficiency program, Energy Star. "This is enough electricity to power all the homes in the state of New York for an entire year."

http://snipr.com/se9dt
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 12, 2009, 07:11:22 PM
October 7, 2009




Three Win Nobel for Ribosome Research
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Three chemists whose work delves into how the information encoded on strands of DNA is translated by the chemical complexes known as ribosomes into the thousands of proteins that make up living matter will share the 2009 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, the Swedish Academy of Sciences said Wednesday.

The trio are Venkatraman Ramakrishnan of the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, England; Thomas A. Steitz of Yale University; and Ada E. Yonath of the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot, Israel.

Each scientist will get a third of the prize, worth 10 million Swedish kronors in total, or $1.4 million, in a ceremony in Stockholm on Dec. 10.

http://snipr.com/sdkz0




Vaccines for Drug Addiction Show Promise
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Vaccines to help people recover from such addictions as nicotine, cocaine, heroin and methamphetamines now appear scientifically and medically achievable after doctors reported Monday that a vaccine to treat cocaine dependence had produced a large enough antibody response to reduce cocaine use in 38% of addicted individuals.

Those results come on the heels of last week's announcement that the federal government would fund a large clinical trial of a nicotine vaccine based on earlier promising studies.

Neither the nicotine nor the cocaine vaccine prevents addiction the way traditional vaccines prevent diseases, nor do similar vaccines in development.

http://snipr.com/sdkzp




Mystery Solved: The Dark Side of a Moon
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Iapetus has a dirty face, and it's getting dirtier every day. That's the conclusion of astronomers studying Saturn's oddest moon, a sort of yin-yang symbol in space that's almost pitch black on one side and icy bright on the other.

Iapetus's bizarre coloration has been a mystery since Giovanni Cassini discovered it in 1671, but now scientists have fingered the source: a newly discovered gigantic dust ring encircling Saturn--the largest ring in the solar system. Fed by dust from embedded moons, the ring steadily deposits dirt on Iapetus's once-clean façade. "It's nice to finally see a smoking gun that tells us exactly what happened," says ring specialist Joseph Burns of Cornell University.

Planetary scientists announced their discovery today at the Division for Planetary Sciences annual meeting in Fajardo, Puerto Rico. Anne Verbiscer and Michael Skrutskie of the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, and Douglas Hamilton of the University of Maryland, College Park, reported that images taken by the infrared Spitzer satellite orbiting Earth revealed the giant dust ring.

http://snipr.com/sdkzw




Radical Shift Proposed for Funding European Research
from Nature News

Responsibility for managing and allocating funding for European research should be devolved from the European Commission to independent agencies, including the European Research Council (ERC), an advisory board has suggested.

The ERC was set up in 2007 as a pan-European initiative to fund frontier research judged solely on excellence. It allocates €7.5 billion (US$11 billion) out of the €50-billion pot for research in the European Union's (EU's) Seventh Framework Programme, which began in 2007 and runs until 2013.

In a report presented to the commission today, the European Research Area Board (ERAB), which advises the commission, says: "A new governance model for arms-length agencies to deliver research and innovation in Europe is essential for our global position."

http://snipr.com/sdl17




FDA Orders Cleanup of Plane Water
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Bloomberg) -- US airlines must regularly monitor and cleanse aircraft drinking-water systems under new rules prompted by tests five years ago that found some failed to meet quality standards.

The carriers will have two years to meet requirements for things like routine disinfection and flushing, the Environmental Protection Agency said. Airlines in the meantime must honor agreements they made with the EPA after the 2004 failures.

"This rule is a significant step forward in protecting people's health when they travel," said Peter Silva, an EPA assistant administrator.

http://snipr.com/sdl2i




Albatross Cam for Bird's Eye View
from BBC News

Albatrosses associate with killer whales out in the open ocean, tiny cameras attached to the birds reveal.

Unique pictures retrieved from the cameras placed on the albatrosses' backs show the birds feeding alongside the killer whales, also known as orcas.

The birds are thought to feed on food scraps left by the marine mammals. The discovery may explain how black-browed albatrosses find their prey in an apparently featureless open ocean, say the researchers.

http://snipr.com/sdl32




In Rural Africa, a Fertile Market for Mobile Phones
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

BUSHENYI, Uganda -- Laban Rutagumirwa charges his mobile phone with a car battery because his dirt-floor home deep in the remote, banana-covered hills of western Uganda does not have electricity.

When the battery dies, Mr. Rutagumirwa, a 50-year-old farmer, walks just over four miles to charge it so he can maintain his position as communication hub and banana-disease tracker for his rural neighbors.

In an area where electricity is scarce and Internet connections virtually nonexistent, the mobile phone has revolutionized scientists' ability to track this crop disease and communicate the latest scientific advances to remote farmers.

http://snipr.com/sdl4n




Biggest Ever Dinosaur Footprints Found in France
from the Guardian (U.K.)

An "exceptional" collection of the biggest dinosaur footprints ever recorded has been found by two amateur enthusiasts on an expedition near France's Jura mountains, palaeontologists said today.

Imprints measuring up to 2 metres (6ft 6in) in diameter and stretching over a vast area of land have been uncovered near the village of Plagne, 30 miles west of Geneva, according to the National Centre of Scientific Research.

In a statement, the centre said the significance of the prints could not be overestimated. "According to the researchers' initial work, these tracks are the biggest ever seen," it said.

http://snipr.com/sdl55




Find: Stonehenge Could Be Part of Funeral Complex
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LONDON (Associated Press) -- The discovery of a small prehistoric circle of stones near Stonehenge may confirm the theory that the mysterious monument in southwest England was part of a massive funeral complex built around a river, researchers said Tuesday.

The new find shows that the second stone circle--dubbed "Bluehenge" because it was built with bluestones--once stood next to the River Avon about 1.75 miles (2.8 kilometers) from Stonehenge, one of Britain's best loved and least understood landmarks.

The find last month could help prove that the Avon linked a "domain of the dead"--made up of Stonehenge and Bluehenge--with an upstream "domain of the living" known as Durrington Wells, a monument where extensive signs of feasting and other human activity were found, said Professor Julian Thomas, co-director of the Stonehenge Riverside Project.

http://snipr.com/sdl7a




Behind the Scenes, System Sniffs for Biological Attacks
from USA Today

A ringing telephone startled Tom Slezak from a sound sleep. It was 1 a.m. on Oct. 6, 2001. The caller gave Slezak three hours to pack for a chilling, top-secret mission: to protect Washington, D.C., and other U.S. cities from a major bioterror attack.

For all Slezak knew, an attack had begun. Hours earlier, a Florida photo editor named Bob Stevens had died after inhaling anthrax powder sent by mail, jolting a nation that was still reeling from the 9/11 hijackings. At the time, the scope of the anthrax attacks that eventually killed five people and sickened 17 others wasn't clear.

Slezak got the call because he helped pioneer the genetic analysis of biological agents at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. Today, eight years after the anthrax attacks, the system Slezak's research team started, known as BioWatch, is quietly operating in more than 30 cities.

http://snipr.com/sdl7r
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 12, 2009, 07:12:42 PM
October 6, 2009




3 Americans Share 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

STOCKHOLM (Associated Press) -- Three scientists who created the technology behind digital photography and helped link the world through fiber-optic networks shared the 2009 Nobel Prize in physics Tuesday.

Charles K. Kao was cited for his breakthrough involving the transmission of light in fiber optics while Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith were honored for inventing an imaging semiconductor circuit known as the CCD sensor.

The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said all three have American citizenship. Kao also holds British citizenship while Boyle is also Canadian.

http://snipr.com/scud7



Unrevealed Analysis Weakens Claim of AIDS Vaccine "Success"
from Science Insider

When the U.S. Army and its collaborators in Thailand announced at press conferences on 24 September that a large clinical trial of an AIDS vaccine had lowered the rate of new HIV infections by about one-third, researchers were surprised and encouraged. Although it was only a modest reduction, it was the first positive result from any AIDS vaccine trial.

Now some researchers who have seen more of the data in confidential briefings are complaining that a fuller analysis undermines even cautious claims of success, and they are raising questions about the way the results were announced.

The press conference and press releases discussed an analysis that included all 16,000 people who participated in the trial, except for seven who were infected before receiving any doses of the two vaccines that were used in combination. Seventy-four people in the placebo arm of the study became infected with HIV, while the similarly sized vaccinated group only had 51 infections--a 31.2% efficacy. The analysis indicated that there was about a 96% level of confidence that the effect was real and not due to chance--just above the 95% cutoff that is widely used as a measure of statistical significance.

http://snipr.com/scue3



A High-Tech Hunt for Lost Art
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

If you believe, as Maurizio Seracini does, that Leonardo da Vinci's greatest painting is hidden inside a wall in Florence's city hall, then there are two essential techniques for finding it. As usual, Leonardo anticipated both of them.

First, concentrate on scientific gadgetry. After spotting what seemed to be a clue to Leonardo's painting left by another 16th-century artist, Dr. Seracini led an international team of scientists in mapping every millimeter of the wall and surrounding room with lasers, radar, ultraviolet light and infrared cameras. Once they identified the likely hiding place, they developed devices to detect the painting by firing neutrons into the wall.

"Leonardo would love to see how much science is being used to look for his most celebrated masterpiece," Dr. Seracini said, gazing up at the wall where he hopes the painting can be found, and then retrieved intact. "I can imagine him being fascinated with all this high-tech gear we're going to set up."

http://snipr.com/scuev



For the First Time, a Census of Autistic Adults
from Time

Among the many great mysteries of autism is this: Where are all the adults with the disorder? In California, for instance, about 80% of people identified as having an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are 18 or under. Studies by the Centers for Disease Control and Protection indicate that about 1 in 150 children in the U.S. have autism, but despite the fact that autism is by definition a lifelong condition, the agency doesn't have any numbers for adults. Neither has anyone else. Until now.

On Sept. 22, England's National Health Service released the first study of autism in the general adult population. The findings confirm the intuitive assumption: that ASD is just as common in adults as it is in children. Researchers at the University of Leicester, working with the NHS Information Center found that roughly 1 in 100 adults are on the spectrum--the same rate found for children in England, Japan, Canada and, for that matter, New Jersey.

This finding would also appear to contradict the commonplace idea that autism rates have exploded in the two decades. Researchers found no significant differences in autism prevalence among people they surveyed in their 20s, 30s, 40s, right up through their 70s. "This suggests that the factors that lead to developing autism appear to be constant," said Dr. Terry Brugha, professor of psychiatry at the University of Leicester and lead author of the study. "I think what our survey suggests doesn't go with the idea that the prevalence is rising."

http://snipr.com/scug4



Flashy Fungi: Researchers Still in the Dark over Glowing Jungle Mushrooms
from Scientific American

It might sound like the opening to a trippy fairy tale, but there are now 71 known species of bioluminescent mushrooms that glow night and day amidst the leaf litter of tropical jungles across the globe.

Seven new species of these fungi are described in an early online report from the journal Mycologia's March/April 2010 issue, four new to science and three previously described--sans the shimmer. This news was published online today.

It was a surprise to find so many new mushrooms that give off this glow, says lead paper author Dennis Desjardin, a professor of biology at San Francisco State University, given the tens of thousands of fungi species that do not gleam. Hunting for these tiny beacons can be treacherous, too, as researchers tromp out into tropical forests in disorienting darkness. Indeed, "some environments are a little too dangerous to [collect] them in," Desjardin says. In those locations, he notes, mushrooms are gathered in the daylight and taken back to the lab to observe in darkness and test for light with a photometer.

http://snipr.com/scuiu



8-Horned T. Rex Cousin Found--Dinosaur Was "Ballerina"
from National Geographic News

A sleek cousin of Tyrannosaurus rex has been unearthed in Asia's Gobi desert. The discovery reveals that the fearsome "tyrant lizards," or tyrannosaurids, were much more diverse than thought.

"Instead of [its] big bad boy ... relatives, this one is more like a ballerina," said study co-author Stephen Brusatte, a vertebrate paleontologist at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

A well-preserved skull and a near-complete skeleton from the new species of eight-horned, long-snouted carnivore--dubbed Alioramus altai--were unearthed in 2001 in Mongolia.

http://snipr.com/scuj5



Phantom Storms: How Our Weather Leaks Into Space
from New Scientist

Whether it's showering spacecraft with lethal radiation, filling the sky with ghostly light, or causing electrical surges that black-out entire cities, space weather is a force to be reckoned with.

Thankfully, all is calm in space on the day that I speak to Bill Murtagh at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Boulder, Colorado. "Last week we saw a moderate storm, and that was about the most interesting event in months," he reassures me. "It's pretty quiet today."

And Murtagh should know--his job is to forecast space weather, which comprises any disturbance in near-Earth space, including the upper reaches of the Earth's atmosphere where satellites roam. Many of the serious events involve disturbances in the charged portion of the atmosphere, known as the ionosphere, which stretches from 80 to 1000 kilometres above sea level. The finger of blame has always been pointed at the sun, which bombards the Earth with a stream of charged particles in the form of the solar wind. During the last three years, though, the sun's cycle of activity has hit a trough, and as Murtagh observes, space weather is temporarily calm.

http://snipr.com/scukl



How Do Marathons Affect Your Heart?
from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

Last year the European Heart Journal published a study that continues to prompt discussion among researchers who work with marathoner runners and those, many of them the same researchers, who run marathons. In the study, German scientists scanned the hearts of 108 experienced, male distance runners in their fifties, sixties and seventies.

The runners had completed a minimum of five marathons in the prior three years. By standard measures, the group's risk for heart problems was low. But when the researchers studied the runners' scan results, they found that more than a third of the men showed evidence of significant calcification or plaque build-up in their heart arteries. Several also had scarring of some of the tissue in their hearts.

"In our study," the researchers concluded dryly, "regular marathon running seems not to protect runners" from coronary artery disease. "In fact," they continued, "we even cannot exclude the possibility that exercise to this degree has deleterious effects on coronary arteries."

http://snipr.com/sculh



War Injury Leads to Advances at Home
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A world away from the roadside bombs and combat injuries of Iraq and Afghanistan, Americans are suffering the same type of brain injury seen in troops coming home from those war-torn countries. On American roads, at workplaces and on playing fields, more than 11 million have been hurt since the fighting overseas started.

Almost 1 in 5 of these civilians will struggle with lingering, often subtle symptoms--headaches, dizziness, concentration difficulties and personality changes--for a year, and often longer. As their memories falter, their work suffers and their relationships fray, many victims of brain trauma don't realize that their cognitive struggles are related to a blow to the head.

In what has been called a silent epidemic, about 2% of the U.S. population--5.3 million people--cope with long-term disabilities from such accidents.

http://snipr.com/scuod
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 12, 2009, 07:13:24 PM
October 5, 2009




Chromosome Researchers Win Medicine Nobel
from the Wall Street Journal

STOCKHOLM (Associated Press) -- Americans Elizabeth H. Blackburn, Carol W. Greider and Jack W. Szostak won the 2009 Nobel Prize in medicine on Monday for discovering a key mechanism in the genetic operations of cells, an insight that has inspired new lines of research into cancer.

It was the first time two women have been among the winners of the medicine prize.

The trio, working in the late 1970s and 1980s, solved the mystery of how chromosomes, the rod-like structures that carry DNA, protect themselves from degrading when cells divide.

http://snipr.com/sc4vr



Understanding the Anxious Mind
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Jerome Kagan's "Aha!" moment came with Baby 19. It was 1989, and Kagan, a professor of psychology at Harvard, had just begun a major longitudinal study of temperament and its effects. Temperament is a complex, multilayered thing, and for the sake of clarity, Kagan was tracking it along a single dimension: whether babies were easily upset when exposed to new things. ...

He suspected, extrapolating from a study he had just completed on toddlers, that the most edgy infants were more likely to grow up to be inhibited, shy and anxious. Eager to take a peek at the early results, he grabbed the videotapes of the first babies in the study, looking for the irritable behavior he would later call high-reactive.

No high-reactors among the first 18. They gazed calmly at things that were unfamiliar. But the 19th baby was different. She was distressed by novelty--new sounds, new voices, new toys, new smells--and showed it by flailing her legs, arching her back and crying. Here was what Kagan was looking for but was not sure he would find: a baby who essentially fell apart when exposed to anything new.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/04/magazine/04anxiety-t.html?ref=magazine



Herschel Scans Hidden Milky Way
from BBC News Online

A remarkable view of our Galaxy has been obtained by Europe's billion-euro Herschel Space Observatory.

The telescope was put in a special scanning mode to map a patch of sky. The images reveal in exquisite detail the dense, contorted clouds of cold gas that are collapsing in on themselves to form new stars.

Herschel, which has the largest mirror ever put on an orbiting telescope, was launched in May as a flagship mission of the European Space Agency. It is tuned to see far-infrared wavelengths of light and is expected to give astronomers significant insights into some of the fundamental processes that shape the cosmos.

http://snipr.com/sc4wn



Global Study Examines Toll of Preterm Birth
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Around the world, about one in 10 babies are born prematurely each year, and more than one-quarter of the deaths that occur in the month after birth are the consequence of preterm birth.

Those are among the findings of a new study of the burden of preterm birth by the World Health Organization and the March of Dimes.

The global health community is focusing renewed attention on maternal-child illness and mortality. The new study, which will be followed by a country-by-country assessment next year, looks at the specific role of prematurity in the problems of newborns.

http://snipr.com/sc4wx



School Lab Health and Safety Rules 'Could Stop Future Scientists'
from the Times (London)

It is a scientific fact, tested and proven by generations of pupils, that experiments in school laboratories win young people to the cause of science. White coats, goggles and the chance to set fire to things foster a passion for chemistry that even years of examinations do not extinguish.

But government advisers and eminent scientists are warning of a disturbing development that could endanger generations of future scientists: pupils are no longer allowed to experiment.

Health and safety concerns are preventing students--including those taking A levels--from performing vital and exciting investigations into what happens when one sets fire to magnesium ribbon, or drops a small glob of sodium into a dish of water.

http://snipr.com/sc4xr



Science and Art: Fragile Flu, Siliciferous Smallpox
from the Scientist

A virus has a relatively easy time replicating itself. It's just a matter of hijacking a cell to generate the necessary components and in minutes, the capsid shell proteins self-assemble around a coil of viral genome. But for the glassblowers working with British artist Luke Jerram replicating a virus wasn't so easy.

Jerram and his assistants created glass genomes, carefully placing them on tiny pedestals within what would become viral envelopes. Then they closed up the tops before adding final touches of spikes and glycoproteins, which were shaped and melted on while keeping the whole work at roughly the same temperature.

Though the natural process of viral replication is seemingly effortless, some viruses do slip up. Dengue virus, for example, creates one properly assembled particle in every 4,000 tries. In comparison, Jerram's glassblowers were relative experts.

http://snipr.com/sc4yg



Evening Breast Milk Means a Good Sleep
from New Scientist

Mothers who use a breast pump to express milk during the day and then bottle-feed it to their baby at night may be letting themselves in for a sleepless night.

Naturally occurring chemicals called nucleotides that have previously been linked to sleepiness only reach their highest concentrations in human breast milk that is expressed at night.

Nucleotides are the building blocks of DNA, but they also participate in cellular signalling and metabolic processes within cells. Several of them have also been implicated in sleep.

http://snipr.com/sc4zb



Industrial Hemp Supporters Wait on Federal OK to Grow
from the Oregonian (Registration Required)

Supporters had high hopes--sorry--when the 2009 Oregon Legislature legalized industrial hemp, but it appears the crop is growing nowhere fast.

Even though Oregon made it legal to grow and possess industrial hemp and to buy and sell hemp commodities and products, the federal government hasn't yet signed on. The feds still equate hemp with pot, and no one can grow it until they say so.

"It's rolled into the definition of marijuana at the federal level," said state Sen. Floyd Prozanski, D-Eugene, who co-sponsored the bill with Sen. David Nelson, R-Pendleton. That may change. Hemp activists--including the CEO of a Portland company that makes food from the oil-rich hemp seeds--are lobbying Congress this month to legalize the crop.

http://snipr.com/sc50j



Driven to Distraction
from the Economist

The price Americans pay for belonging to the most mobile society in the world is a stubbornly high number of road deaths. On average (when not in recession) 42,000 Americans die in traffic accidents each year. The figure for Britain is 3,200.

Factor in the fivefold difference in population and the United States still comes out with over two-and-a-half times more road deaths. Even allowing for the fact that Americans drive more, and comparing annual deaths per billion vehicle-miles, America still finishes up with one-and-a-half times more fatalities than Britain.

It is difficult, though, to say why. Cultural traditions probably account for part of the difference. Driver training and behaviour are doubtless factors, too. Historical differences in road layout may also contribute. Then there are differences in demographics and disposable income--with American teenagers owning more cars, and driving disproportionately more miles, than their peers elsewhere in the world.

http://snipr.com/sc50q



Religious Experience Linked to Brain's Social Regions
from Wired

Brain scans of people who believe in God have found further evidence that religion involves neurological regions vital for social intelligence.

In other words, whether or not God or Gods exist, religious belief may have been quite useful in shaping the human mind's evolution.

"The main point is that all these brain regions are important for other forms of social cognition and behavior," said Jordan Grafman, a National Institutes of Health cognitive scientist.

http://snipr.com/sc513
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 21, 2009, 07:04:31 PM
October 21, 2009


NASA Puts New Rocket on Launch Pad for Test Flight
from the San Diego Union-Tribune

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Associated Press) -- NASA's lofty new rocket arrived at the launching pad Tuesday for a test flight next week that comes at a time when the future of the country's spaceflight program is up in the air.

It's the first time in 34 years that a rocket other than the space shuttle has stood at Launch Pad 39-B. NASA modified the pad for this rocket, which is supposed to eventually carry astronauts to the moon.

But the White House may scrap those plans. A panel of aerospace experts that provided President Barack Obama with a list of possible exploration options is issuing its final report later this week.

http://snipr.com/smr75




AIDS Vaccine Study Reassures Skeptics
from Science Insider

PARIS--The fog around the largest AIDS vaccine study ever conducted began to lift today, as Thai and U.S. researchers for the first time publicly presented a detailed analysis of their data to over 1000 scientists gathered here at an annual meeting.

The study results, also published online by The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) today, received widespread attention 3 weeks ago, when researchers touted them during press conferences in the United States and Thailand as the first success in a real-world test of an AIDS vaccine. But that pronouncement came under intense scrutiny because of concerns that it omitted negative analyses that challenged the upbeat conclusions.

After seeing a more thorough presentation of the data, even some scientists who were initially skeptical about the trial believe the vaccine does offer modest protection from infection with HIV.

http://snipr.com/smr7l




Defining Line Between Man and Woman
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

What's the difference between a man and a woman? The question seems too silly to be science: Its answer is so obvious that every stand-up comic has a different way of saying it. ...

But the difference is only obvious most of the time. In some unusual cases, resulting from sex-change operations or medical conditions, the usual indicators of male and female can contradict each other in the same body. The best-known recent example is South African runner Caster Semenya, who has been put through "gender verification" amid suspicion about her muscular physique and low voice.

But the same confusion has cropped up in legal battles over who can be married to whom, and when the "M" on a driver's license can be changed to "F." It can also intrude painfully into the lives of ordinary people, when medical diagnoses reveal that their hormones, chromosomes or anatomy don't sit entirely on one side of the line.

http://snipr.com/smr81




People Can Control Their Halle Berry Neurons
from Science News

CHICAGO -- The Halle Berry fan club is expanding one brain cell at a time. By eavesdropping on the activity of single neurons in the human brain, scientists have figured out which brain cells go wild for superstars such as the popular actress. And the newest research shows that people can activate those cells selectively.

"This study is the first demonstration of humans' ability to control the activity of single neurons," the researchers wrote in a summary of their study. The results, presented October 19 at the Society for Neuroscience's annual meeting by Moran Cerf of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, may help researchers understand how each cell in the brain sees and responds to the world.

"This type of work gives us some clues about what's going on in the brain," comments Christoph Weidemann of the University of Pennsylvania, who studies how the brain processes information. "It's quite an amazing feat for the brain to make sense of its input and reliably recognize people and objects."

http://snipr.com/smr8b




The Deadly Mamba as a Lifesaver
from the Wall Street Journal

Mother Nature has provided a rich source of raw materials for a host of important drugs: aspirin comes from willow tree bark; the blood pressure drug captopril from the venom of a pit viper; warfarin, the widely used blood thinner, was derived from moldy sweet clover.

Now researchers think that desperately ill heart failure patients may find relief with the help of the eastern green mamba snake.

That's the hope, at least, of John Burnett, a heart failure expert at Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. He and his colleagues have fashioned an experimental drug based in part on the venom of the snake, a tree-dwelling relative of the cobra that is found in eastern Africa.

http://snipr.com/smr8r




Electric Promise
from BBC News Online

[Chinese Car Maker] BYD says that its new E6 electric car due out before the end of the year will do 250 miles (400km) on a single charge.

This is a very big number. The Tesla electric sports car does almost as much, but has little room for anything else in the car but the battery. The E6 is roomy with space for five passengers and a good-sized boot. The battery tucks under the back seat.

It needs 7-8 hours with a domestic plug to charge the car but BYD--it stands for Build Your Dreams--says a specially developed fast charging point with a lead the diameter of a fire hose will fill up the car in just one hour.

http://snipr.com/smr98




Electric Cars Don't Deserve Halo Yet: Study
from Reuters

NEW YORK -- Electric cars will not be dramatically cleaner than autos powered by fossil fuels until they rely less on electricity produced from conventional coal-fired power plants, scientists said on Monday.

"For electric vehicles to become a major green alternative, the power fuel mix has to move away from coal, or cleaner coal technologies have to be developed," said Jared Cohon, the chair of a National Research Council report released on Monday called "Hidden Costs of Energy: Unpriced Consequences of Energy Production and Use."

About half of U.S. power is generated by burning coal, which emits many times more of traditional pollutants, such as particulates and smog components, than natural gas, and about twice as much of the main greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

http://snipr.com/smr9g




Scientist Arrested on Spy Charges Worked for Department of Defense
from the Huffington Post

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- A scientist credited with helping discover evidence of water on the moon was arrested Monday on charges of attempting to pass along classified information to an FBI agent posing as an Israeli intelligence officer.

Stewart David Nozette, 52, of Chevy Chase, Md., was charged in a criminal complaint with attempting to communicate, deliver and transmit classified information, the Justice Department said.

Nozette was arrested by FBI agents and is expected to make his initial appearance in federal court in Washington on Tuesday. Law enforcement officials said Nozette did not immediately have a lawyer.

http://snipr.com/smrba




Even-More-Gigantic Giant Orb Spider Discovered
from Wired

Scientists have found the world's largest species of golden orb-weaver spider in the tropics of Africa and Madagascar. The discovery marks the first identification of a new Nephila spider since 1879.

Females of the new species, Nephila komaci, measure a whopping 4 to 5 inches in diameter, while the male spiders stay petite at less than a quarter of their mate's size. So far, only a handful of these enormous arachnids have been found in the world.

"We fear the species might be endangered, as its only definite habitat is a sand forest in Tembe Elephant Park in KwaZulu-Natal," ecologist Jonathan Coddington of the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History said in a press release. "Our data suggest that the species is not abundant, its range is restricted, and all known localities lie within two endangered biodiversity hotspots: Maputaland and Madagascar."

http://snipr.com/smrbk




For Decades, Puzzling People With Mathematics
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

For today's mathematical puzzle, assume that in the year 1956 there was a children's magazine in New York named after a giant egg, Humpty Dumpty, who purportedly served as its chief editor.

Mr. Dumpty was assisted by a human editor named Martin Gardner, who prepared "activity features" and wrote a monthly short story about the adventures of the child egg, Humpty Dumpty Jr. Another duty of Mr. Gardner's was to write a monthly poem of moral advice from Humpty Sr. to Humpty Jr.

At that point, Mr. Gardner was 37 and had never taken a math course beyond high school. He had struggled with calculus and considered himself poor at solving basic mathematical puzzles, let alone creating them. But when the publisher of Scientific American asked him if there might be enough material for a monthly column on "recreational mathematics," a term that sounded even more oxymoronic in 1956 than it does today, Mr. Gardner took a gamble.

http://snipr.com/smrci
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on October 21, 2009, 07:44:59 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 21, 2009, 07:04:31 PM
People Can Control Their Halle Berry Neurons
from Science News

CHICAGO -- The Halle Berry fan club is expanding one brain cell at a time. By eavesdropping on the activity of single neurons in the human brain, scientists have figured out which brain cells go wild for superstars such as the popular actress. And the newest research shows that people can activate those cells selectively.

"This study is the first demonstration of humans' ability to control the activity of single neurons," the researchers wrote in a summary of their study. The results, presented October 19 at the Society for Neuroscience's annual meeting by Moran Cerf of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, may help researchers understand how each cell in the brain sees and responds to the world.

"This type of work gives us some clues about what's going on in the brain," comments Christoph Weidemann of the University of Pennsylvania, who studies how the brain processes information. "It's quite an amazing feat for the brain to make sense of its input and reliably recognize people and objects."

http://snipr.com/smr8b

This could get really cool.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 22, 2009, 05:09:48 AM
Quote from: LMNO on October 21, 2009, 07:44:59 PM
Quote from: Kai on October 21, 2009, 07:04:31 PM
People Can Control Their Halle Berry Neurons
from Science News

CHICAGO -- The Halle Berry fan club is expanding one brain cell at a time. By eavesdropping on the activity of single neurons in the human brain, scientists have figured out which brain cells go wild for superstars such as the popular actress. And the newest research shows that people can activate those cells selectively.

"This study is the first demonstration of humans' ability to control the activity of single neurons," the researchers wrote in a summary of their study. The results, presented October 19 at the Society for Neuroscience's annual meeting by Moran Cerf of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, may help researchers understand how each cell in the brain sees and responds to the world.

"This type of work gives us some clues about what's going on in the brain," comments Christoph Weidemann of the University of Pennsylvania, who studies how the brain processes information. "It's quite an amazing feat for the brain to make sense of its input and reliably recognize people and objects."

http://snipr.com/smr8b

This could get really cool.

LMNO, I have a suggestion. Do you know about electronic Table of Contents? I just see how you and other people here are interested in the top new stories in science. Most of those stories are covered in one of two places: Nature Journal, or Science Magazine, both being the most prestigeous and widely read peer reviewed journals in the world.

http://www.nature.com/nams/svc/myaccount/save/ealert?list_id=1

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/alerts/etoc

You can't read the journals unless you have a subscription (and I would actually buy one for myself if it wasn't offered through my university), but you can at least get the titles and abstracts. I'm serious when I say the top science news for the week is in one of those two journals, 9/10 times.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on October 22, 2009, 01:15:57 PM
Good suggestion.  I'll look into it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 13, 2009, 03:37:46 PM
Headlines, The Science - November 12, 2009

Missing Link Dinosaur Discovered
from BBC News Online

Researchers have discovered a fossil skeleton that appears to link the earliest dinosaurs with the large plant-eating sauropods. This could help to bridge an evolutionary gap between the two-legged common ancestors of dinosaurs and the four-legged giants, such as diplodocus.

The remarkably complete skeleton shows that the creature was bipedal but occasionally walked on all four legs. The team reports its discovery in the Royal Society journal Proceedings B.

"What we have is a big, short-footed, barrel-chested, long-necked, small-headed dinosaur," explained Adam Yates, the scientist from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg who led the research.

http://snipr.com/t78kw




Deadliest Lung Cancer Breakthrough
from the Telegraph (UK)

British researchers have found that a drug destroys tumours in a form of inoperable lung cancer that kills more than nine out of 10 sufferers. The treatment works by blocking the growth of the cancer cells and eventually causing them to self destruct.

In more than 50 percent of the trials, the treatment, which appears to have no side effects, killed all traces of the disease. "We are very excited about it," said Professor Michael Seckl, the molecular oncologist who led the study at Imperial College London.

... The researchers behind the new study, published in the journal Cancer Research, have identified a drug that, in half of the mice treated, was able to completely shrink tumours away. It was also able to stop tumours from growing back and it helped other forms of chemotherapy to work more effectively.

http://snipr.com/t78mw




Vatican Looks to Heavens for Signs of Alien Life
from the Tampa Tribune

VATICAN CITY (Associated Press) -- E.T. phone Rome. Four hundred years after it locked up Galileo for challenging the view that the Earth was the center of the universe, the Vatican has called in experts to study the possibility of extraterrestrial alien life and its implication for the Catholic Church.

"The questions of life's origins and of whether life exists elsewhere in the universe are very suitable and deserve serious consideration," said the Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, an astronomer and director of the Vatican Observatory.

Funes, a Jesuit priest, presented the results Tuesday of a five-day conference that gathered astronomers, physicists, biologists and other experts to discuss the budding field of astrobiology--the study of the origin of life and its existence elsewhere in the cosmos.

http://snipr.com/t78no




Medical Marijuana Gets a Boost
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The American Medical Assn. on Tuesday urged the federal government to reconsider its classification of marijuana as a dangerous drug with no accepted medical use, a significant shift that puts the prestigious group behind calls for more research.

The nation's largest physicians organization, with about 250,000 member doctors, the AMA has maintained since 1997 that marijuana should remain a Schedule I controlled substance, the most restrictive category, which also includes heroin and LSD.

In changing its policy, the group said its goal was to clear the way to conduct clinical research, develop cannabis-based medicines and devise alternative ways to deliver the drug.

http://snipr.com/t78qz




High BPA Levels Linked to Male Sexual Problems
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Exposure to high levels of a controversial chemical found in thousands of everyday plastic products appears to cause erectile dysfunction and other sexual problems in men, according to a new study published Wednesday.

The study, funded by the federal government and published in the journal Human Reproduction, is the first to examine the impact of bisphenol A, or BPA, on the reproductive systems of human males. Previous studies have involved mice or rats.

The research comes as government agencies debate the safety of BPA, a compound that is found in thousands of consumer products ranging from dental sealants to canned food linings and that is so ubiquitous it has been detected in the urine of 93 percent of the U.S. population.

http://snipr.com/t78rp




Elephant Seals Sleep While Diving, Study Suggests
from National Geographic News

Migrating northern elephant seals slowly drift downward to rest in the ocean depths, according to a new study of the animals' dive patterns. Moving from their breeding colonies in California to their wintering areas in the mid-Pacific and around Alaska, the seals spend two to eight months at sea without a single pit stop.

There's no land to climb on along the roughly 2,000- to 3,000-mile voyage, and the seabed is often miles below the surface. The marine mammals' grueling trek had many researchers wondering: When and how do elephant seals sleep?

It's long been known that, during the seals' epic migrations, the animals engage in repetitive dives down to depths of 984 feet or more. Now a study of young elephant seals has revealed that during some of these dives, elephant seals roll on their backs and allow themselves to sink.

http://snipr.com/t78sh




Breast Cancer Pain Can Last for Years
from USA Today

Nearly half of breast cancer survivors suffer from persistent pain, even two to three years after surgery, a study shows. Almost 60% of the 3,253 women surveyed experience other symptoms of nerve damage, such as numbness or tenderness, according to a study of all Danish women treated for breast cancer in 2005 and 2006.

Women under 40 and those who have more extensive surgery, such as a mastectomy, and radiation are the most likely to report pain, says the University of Copenhagen's Henrik Kehlet, senior author of the report in today's Journal of the American Medical Association.

Women also have more pain if surgeons remove many of the lymph nodes in their armpits, a common place for breast cancer to spread, the study says. Fortunately, most breast cancer patients can ease their symptoms with over-the-counter pain relievers, says Loretta Loftus of Tampa's H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center, who co-wrote an accompanying editorial.

http://snipr.com/t78to




The Mind Is a Mirror
from Scientific American

The discovery of mirror neurons in the brains of macaques about ten years ago sent shockwaves through the neuroscience community. Mirror neurons are cells that fire both when a monkey performs a certain task and when it observes another individual performing that same task.

With the identification of networks of similarly-behaving cells in humans, there was much speculation over the role such neurons might play in phenomena such as imitation, language acquisition, observational learning, empathy, and theory of mind.

Several research groups have observed the activity of mirror neuron networks indirectly in humans through the use of functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). ... Experiments using fMRI have demonstrated that there is more activation in the human mirror system when people observe movements with which they are familiar. ...

http://snipr.com/t78ug




Afloat in the Ocean, Expanding Islands of Trash
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ABOARD THE ALGUITA, 1,000 miles northeast of Hawaii -- In this remote patch of the Pacific Ocean, hundreds of miles from any national boundary, the detritus of human life is collecting in a swirling current so large that it defies precise measurement.

Light bulbs, bottle caps, toothbrushes, Popsicle sticks and tiny pieces of plastic, each the size of a grain of rice, inhabit the Pacific garbage patch, an area of widely dispersed trash that doubles in size every decade and is now believed to be roughly twice the size of Texas.

But one research organization estimates that the garbage now actually pervades the Pacific, though most of it is caught in what oceanographers call a gyre like this one--an area of heavy currents and slack winds that keep the trash swirling in a giant whirlpool.

http://snipr.com/t78v5




Hub Lab Writing the Book on Face-Reading
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Pity the Boston car salesman who negotiated across the table from Charles A. Nelson III, a Harvard neuroscience professor who runs the nation's top laboratory studying how people learn to decode facial expressions.

As the two men faced off in the showroom last month, the salesman insisted to Nelson that he had just offered the absolute lowest price for the German car in question, declaring, "This is it."

Then the salesman's eyes darted to a vacant corner, his nose and mouth taking on a configuration that shouted "Bluff." The professor ultimately left the dealership smiling, holding a contract to buy the car at a far lower price, a bargain in his estimation. Such is one ancillary benefit of Nelson's exhaustive research, which unfolds every day in his $1.5 million cognitive neuroscience laboratory at Children's Hospital Boston, where he studies just when and how humans learn to read faces.

http://snipr.com/t78vm
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on November 13, 2009, 03:42:42 PM
Quote from: Kai on November 13, 2009, 03:37:46 PM
Missing Link Dinosaur Discovered
from BBC News Online

Researchers have discovered a fossil skeleton that appears to link the earliest dinosaurs with the large plant-eating sauropods. This could help to bridge an evolutionary gap between the two-legged common ancestors of dinosaurs and the four-legged giants, such as diplodocus.

The remarkably complete skeleton shows that the creature was bipedal but occasionally walked on all four legs. The team reports its discovery in the Royal Society journal Proceedings B.

"What we have is a big, short-footed, barrel-chested, long-necked, small-headed dinosaur," explained Adam Yates, the scientist from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg who led the research.

http://snipr.com/t78kw








Vatican Looks to Heavens for Signs of Alien Life
from the Tampa Tribune

VATICAN CITY (Associated Press) -- E.T. phone Rome. Four hundred years after it locked up Galileo for challenging the view that the Earth was the center of the universe, the Vatican has called in experts to study the possibility of extraterrestrial alien life and its implication for the Catholic Church.

"The questions of life's origins and of whether life exists elsewhere in the universe are very suitable and deserve serious consideration," said the Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, an astronomer and director of the Vatican Observatory.

Funes, a Jesuit priest, presented the results Tuesday of a five-day conference that gathered astronomers, physicists, biologists and other experts to discuss the budding field of astrobiology--the study of the origin of life and its existence elsewhere in the cosmos.

http://snipr.com/t78no




I'd suggest the Vatican make a few pronouncements on Terrestrial life, first.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 13, 2009, 07:57:28 PM
Yeah, the winnowing back into previous opinions about evolution is a recent and stupid development.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on November 14, 2009, 02:31:50 AM
Quote from: Kai on November 13, 2009, 03:37:46 PM
Headlines, The Science - November 12, 2009

Missing Link Dinosaur Discovered
from BBC News Online

Researchers have discovered a fossil skeleton that appears to link the earliest dinosaurs with the large plant-eating sauropods. This could help to bridge an evolutionary gap between the two-legged common ancestors of dinosaurs and the four-legged giants, such as diplodocus.

The remarkably complete skeleton shows that the creature was bipedal but occasionally walked on all four legs. The team reports its discovery in the Royal Society journal Proceedings B.

"What we have is a big, short-footed, barrel-chested, long-necked, small-headed dinosaur," explained Adam Yates, the scientist from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg who led the research.

http://snipr.com/t78kw
I SWEAR TO GOD I AM GOING TO GUT THE NEXT JOURNALIST THAT MISUSES THE PHRASE "MISSING LINK"!!!1!!    :argh!:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on November 14, 2009, 02:39:29 AM
Quote from: Kai on November 13, 2009, 07:57:28 PM
Yeah, the winnowing back into previous opinions about evolution is a recent and stupid development.
They are doing better than many of the Protestant denominations.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hf92aHEwYT87J1XPP4JrIusKBT-AD9BSTO1G1
QuoteEarlier this year, the Vatican also sponsored a conference on evolution to mark the 150th anniversary of Charles Darwin's "The Origin of Species."

The event snubbed proponents of alternative theories, like creationism and intelligent design, which see a higher being rather than the undirected process of natural selection behind the evolution of species.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 14, 2009, 12:55:21 PM
Quote from: Iason Ouabache on November 14, 2009, 02:31:50 AM
Quote from: Kai on November 13, 2009, 03:37:46 PM
Headlines, The Science - November 12, 2009

Missing Link Dinosaur Discovered
from BBC News Online

Researchers have discovered a fossil skeleton that appears to link the earliest dinosaurs with the large plant-eating sauropods. This could help to bridge an evolutionary gap between the two-legged common ancestors of dinosaurs and the four-legged giants, such as diplodocus.

The remarkably complete skeleton shows that the creature was bipedal but occasionally walked on all four legs. The team reports its discovery in the Royal Society journal Proceedings B.

"What we have is a big, short-footed, barrel-chested, long-necked, small-headed dinosaur," explained Adam Yates, the scientist from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg who led the research.

http://snipr.com/t78kw
I SWEAR TO GOD I AM GOING TO GUT THE NEXT JOURNALIST THAT MISUSES THE PHRASE "MISSING LINK"!!!1!!    :argh!:

They're ALL intermediate species!  :argh!:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Thurnez Isa on November 20, 2009, 06:18:30 PM
A week ago they finally found water on the moon... sure you could several articles

I for one can't wait to taste some of that delicious moon water
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 20, 2009, 06:23:47 PM
Quote from: Thurnez Isa on November 20, 2009, 06:18:30 PM
A week ago they finally found water on the moon... sure you could several articles

I for one can't wait to taste some of that delicious moon water

It will be bottled, one day.  Trust me.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 20, 2009, 06:34:10 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on November 20, 2009, 06:23:47 PM
Quote from: Thurnez Isa on November 20, 2009, 06:18:30 PM
A week ago they finally found water on the moon... sure you could several articles

I for one can't wait to taste some of that delicious moon water

It will be bottled, one day.  Trust me.

It will be bottled, labeled, and distributed by Pepsi Co to gas stations and drugstores.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on November 20, 2009, 11:53:03 PM
To be totally realistic about it, unless we make a space elevator, there won't be much shipping between Earth and other places.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on November 22, 2009, 10:31:36 PM
since we are talking shipping from the moon to the earth all we need is a space elevatorish contraption on the moon.
factoring the moon's low gravity a strong slingshot would do.
one rocket with a robotminer and a big rubber band.
is not that expensive that sales wont cover the expenses.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 22, 2009, 11:52:02 PM
November 19, 2009






Large Hadron Collider Ready to Restart
from the Telegraph (UK)

Scientists have repaired the world's largest atom smasher and plan by this weekend to restart the fault-ridden Large Hadron Collider. The 'Big Bang' machine was launched with great fanfare last year before its spectacular failure from a bad electrical connection.

This time the European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN, is taking a cautious approach with the super-sophisticated equipment, said James Gillies, a spokesman. It cost about $10 billion, with contributions from many governments and universities around the world.

Scientists expect to send beams of protons around the 17-mile circular tunnel housing the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC, but they have refrained from setting a date. That stands in stark contrast with the hype of the September 10, 2008, launch, when the startup was televised globally.

http://snipr.com/tbf12




Oceans Said to Absorb Fewer Emissions
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The Earth's oceans, which have absorbed carbon dioxide from fuel emissions since the dawn of the industrial era, have recently grown less efficient at sopping it up, new research suggests.

Emissions from the burning of fossil fuels began soaring in the 1950s, and oceans largely kept up, scientists say. But the growth in the intake rate has slowed since the 1980s, and markedly so since 2000, the authors of a study write in a report in Thursday's issue of Nature.

The research suggests that the seas cannot indefinitely be considered a reliable "carbon sink" as humans generate heat-trapping gases linked to global warming. The slowdown in the rise of the absorption rate resulted from a gradual change in the oceans' chemistry, the study found.

http://snipr.com/tbec8




'Temporary' Heart Pumps Could Become Permanent
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Mechanical pumps originally designed to supplement the pumping action of a failing heart and keep the patient alive until a transplant could be found have taken a major step toward becoming a permanent treatment -- a development that could expand their use to tens of thousands of patients in the United States alone.

Results presented Tuesday at the Orlando, Fla., meeting of the American Heart Assn. showed that a new type of device more than doubled the two-year survival rate among heart failure patients. The key was the development of a smaller, quieter, more reliable pump that is less likely to break down and need replacement, an outcome that requires the patient to undergo a second major surgery.

The pumps are called left ventricular assist devices, or LVADs. They are not meant to replace the entire heart, only to assist in the pumping of the left ventricle, which pushes blood out through the aorta to the body.

http://snipr.com/tbecz




In Battle to Save Hemlocks, Hope Rests on a Beetle
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Armed with a Wiffle Ball bat and a canvas sheet, entomologist David Mausel is scouring forests across New England for an ally. That ally - a small jet-black beetle - feasts on the even tinier but voracious hemlock woolly adelgid, which is ravaging the region's hemlocks. The adelgids latch onto twigs, feeding on the trees until their needles yellow and fall and the trees die.

Mausel has been in cahoots with these beetles since 2007, when he began collecting a small army of them in Idaho and brought them back East to release at specific study sites.

Now, he is beginning to revisit those plots to determine whether the beetles have begun to establish themselves - and to begin to answer the bigger question of whether they are reducing the adelgid population and saving hemlocks. Mausel, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, calls it "finding a beetle in a haystack."

http://snipr.com/tbedd




A Glut of Mercury Raises Fears
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Over the past decade, environmental groups have pressured U.S. chlorine plants to stop spewing mercury, the toxic heavy metal that settles in water and makes its way into the food chain by contaminating fish and shellfish.

In the past four years, five such plants converted to mercury-free technology, cutting the industry's mercury emissions by 88 percent, according to the Environmental Protection Agency.

But this success has created a new environmental problem. Hundreds of tons of mercury acquired for use by the plants may be on the global market, where it could ultimately be used in small-scale unregulated "artisanal" gold mining. Such activity might create environmental and health hazards in developing countries.

http://snipr.com/tbedn




Bristlecone's Growth May Reflect Global Warming
from the San Francisco Chronicle

Bristlecone pines, those ancient and iconic trees on many of California's mountaintops, reflect the impact of global warming in a curious way - not by dying off like coral reefs in the world's oceans, but by growing faster than at any time in the past thousands of years, scientists have discovered.

Anyone who has hiked and climbed high in the White Mountains along the Nevada border has seen and marveled at the bristlecones - some still verdant after countless centuries, but many wind-battered, twisted and nearly naked with stunted trunks lying almost flat against the barren ground - but still alive.

Now these stubborn trees that cling to life at elevations above 12,000 feet are a clear symbol of climate change, according to seven years of field research by Matthew Salzer of the University of Arizona and his colleagues.

http://snipr.com/tbedy




Tiny Chip Could Diagnose Disease
from BBC News Online

Researchers have demonstrated a tiny chip based on silicon that could be used to diagnose dozens of diseases. A tiny drop of blood is drawn through the chip, where disease markers are caught and show up under light.

The device uses the tendency of a fluid to travel through small channels under its own force, instead of using pumps. The design is simpler, requires less blood be taken, and works more quickly than existing "lab on a chip" designs, the team report in Lab on a Chip. It has a flexible design so that it could be used for a wide range of diagnostics.

Much research in recent years has focused on the chemical and medical possibilities of so-called microfluidic devices at the heart of lab-on-a-chip designs. These microfluidics contain between dozens and thousands of tiny channels through which fluids can flow, and as micro-manufacturing methods have advanced, so has the potential complexity of microfluidics.

http://snipr.com/tbee7




"Shangri-La" Caves Yield Treasures, Skeletons
from National Geographic News

A treasure trove of Tibetan art and manuscripts uncovered in "sky high" Himalayan caves could be linked to the storybook paradise of Shangri-La, says the team that made the discovery. The 15th-century religious texts and wall paintings were found in caves carved into sheer cliffs in the ancient kingdom of Mustang--today part of Nepal.

Few have been able to explore the mysterious caves, since Upper Mustang is a restricted area of Nepal that was long closed to outsiders. Today only a thousand foreigners a year are allowed into the region.

In 2007 a team co-led by U.S. researcher and Himalaya expert Broughton Coburn and veteran mountaineer Pete Athans scaled the crumbling cliffs on a mission to explore the human-made caves.

http://snipr.com/tbeej




Surprising Gamma-Ray Source
from Science News

Some 30,000 light-years from Earth, a tiny gravitational monster is tearing material from a companion star, blasting X-rays into space and sporadically hurling out jets of radio-wave-emitting blobs at close to the speed of light.

Known as Cygnus X-3, this mercurial star system -- thought to be either a small black hole or a neutron star orbiting an ordinary partner -- has fascinated astronomers for more than four decades with its surprisingly bright X-ray emissions.

Now, two teams of researchers have made the first definitive detection of high-energy gamma rays, the most powerful type of electromagnetic radiation, from this small but nearby stellar system. The findings may provide a new window on how this beast accelerates charged particles to enormous energies ....

http://snipr.com/tbefj




10 Bioscapes Photo Contest Winners Revealed
from Scientific American

We are approaching the millennial anniversary of the first meaningful written description of how lenses and light could be used to magnify objects. It was in 1011 that Arab scientist Ibn al-Haytham (Alhazen) began writing the Book of Optics, which described the properties of a magnifying glass, principles that later led to the invention of the microscope.

The entrants in the 2009 Olympus BioScapes Digital Imaging Competition provide fitting tribute to nearly 1,000 years of making the invisible visible.

Optical microscopy, energized by generation after generation of technological advance, continues to furnish dazzling proof that beyond the resolution of the human eye resides a sweepingly large world of small things, both around and within us.

http://snipr.com/tbefw
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 22, 2009, 11:53:12 PM
November 20, 2009




Guidelines Push Back Age for Cervical Cancer Tests
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

New guidelines for cervical cancer screening say women should delay their first Pap test until age 21, and be screened less often than recommended in the past.

The advice, from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, is meant to decrease unnecessary testing and potentially harmful treatment, particularly in teenagers and young women. The group's previous guidelines had recommended yearly testing for young women, starting within three years of their first sexual intercourse, but no later than age 21.

Arriving on the heels of hotly disputed guidelines calling for less use of mammography, the new recommendations might seem like part of a larger plan to slash cancer screening for women. But the timing was coincidental, said Dr. Cheryl B. Iglesia, the chairwoman of a panel in the obstetricians' group that developed the Pap smear guidelines.

http://snipr.com/tbw46




Five "Oddball" Crocs Discovered, Including Dinosaur-Eater
from National Geographic News

A "saber-toothed cat in armor" and a pancake-shaped predator are among the strange crocodile cousins whose bones have been found beneath the windswept dunes of the Sahara, archaeologists say.

The diverse menagerie of reptiles ruled Gondwana--a landmass that later broke up into the southern continents--about a hundred million years ago, during the Cretaceous period.

"There's an entire croc world brewing in Africa that we really had only an inkling about before," said Paul Sereno, a paleontologist at the University of Chicago and leader of a new study. "We knew about SuperCroc, the titan of all crocs, but we didn't have quite an idea of what existed in the shadows of the Cretaceous...."

http://snipr.com/tbw4n




Maize Genome Mapped
from Nature News

Plant biologists have something special to be thankful for this US Thanksgiving Day. The genome of maize (corn)--a staple crop first introduced by Native Americans to the European settlers centuries ago--has finally been sequenced.

The genetic secrets of maize, one of the world's most widely grown grains, should accelerate efforts to develop improved crop varieties to meet the world's growing hunger for food, animal feed and fuel.

The genome "is really a tremendous resource," says John Doebley, a maize geneticist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who was not involved in the project. "It gives us a tool for mapping genes that we didn't have before."

http://snipr.com/tbw4t




IBM Reveals the Biggest Artificial Brain of All Time
from Popular Mechanics

San Jose, Calif. -- Scientists at IBM's Almaden research center have built the biggest artificial brain ever--a cell-by-cell simulation of the human visual cortex: 1.6 billion virtual neurons connected by 9 trillion synapses. This computer simulation, as large as a cat's brain, blows away the previous record--a simulated rat's brain with 55 million neurons--built by the same team two years ago.

"This is a Hubble Telescope of the mind, a linear accelerator of the brain," says Dharmendra Modha, the Almaden computer scientist who will announce the feat at the Supercomputing 2009 conference in Portland, Ore. In other words, in the realm of computer science, the team's undertaking is grand.

... Modha hopes the simulation, assembled using neuroscience data from rats, cats, monkeys and humans, will help scientists better understand how the brain works--and, in particular, how the cortical microcolumn manages to perform such a wide range of tasks.

http://snipr.com/tbw4z




Scientists Zero in on Reason for Mammoths' Demise
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

About 15,000 years ago, North America was home to an astonishing number of large plant-eating mammals--giant sloths, mastodons, mammoths. A thousand years later, they were all gone, wiped from the face of the Earth with sudden finality.

Scientists have floated a variety of possible explanations for this mass die-off, from climate change to a cataclysmic asteroid impact. But now a team of American researchers may be closing in on the answer, hidden in the thousands-year-old muck of an Indiana lake.

... The research focused on the amounts of the fungus Sporormiella present in the sediments, according to Jacquelyn Gill, a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin, Madison and a co-author of the paper appearing in today's issue of the journal Science.

http://snipr.com/tbw5h




The Secrets Within Cosmic Dust
from Smithsonian Magazine

At the threshold of a sterile lab at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, I pull on a white clean-room suit, a surgical cap and mask, booties and latex gloves. My host, a mineralogist named Mike Zolensky, swabs my digital voice recorder with alcohol to remove flakes of skin and pocket lint. He doesn't want any detritus to contaminate the precious dust in the room.

Once inside, Zolensky retrieves a palm-size glass box from a cabinet. The box holds a rectangular chunk, less than two inches across, of eerily translucent material. I lean in and squint at it but can't quite focus on anything. Zolensky turns off the lights and hands me a laser pointer. The red beam reveals thin streaks in the chunk that start at its surface and penetrate fractions of an inch, like the traces of tiny bullets. "Those are the comet impacts," he says. "It's beautiful to look at."

The tracks were made during the world's first--and only--attempt to chase a comet and bring a bit of it home. The NASA mission, called Stardust, sent a spacecraft to Comet Wild 2 (pronounced "VILT-too") on a seven-year journey that ended in 2006. It brought back the only material--other than moon rocks--taken directly from an extraterrestrial body.

http://snipr.com/tbw5s




Why Web Widgets Will Invade Your TV
from the Christian Science Monitor

The Internet revolution may finally be televised. Innocuous little software applications, popularly known as "widgets," may turn out to be the back door to your TV screen that Internet companies have been waiting for.

For more than a decade, businesses have been trying to make the Internet available on the largest screen in most homes. In 1996, Time Warner offered WebTV, which failed to find an audience and folded. Even today, projects like Hewlett Packard's MediaSmart (2006) and Apple TV (2007) have yet to win over large numbers of viewers, hampered by complicated setups or limited programming choices.

Widgets promise to bring the perks of the Internet to TV screens, using a familiar remote control instead of a computer mouse. All indications are that widgets are going to "move very quickly to a great many of the TVs being sold in the next few years--if not all of them," says Kurt Scherf, vice president and principal analyst at Parks Associates, a market research firm in Dallas that specializes in emerging consumer technologies.

http://snipr.com/tbw69




"Study Ethics, NIH!"
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

The government agency tasked with funding crucial life science research needs to focus more attention on ethical quandaries and nefarious business practices that often obscure the path from discovery to public benefit, says a strongly worded letter to Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), signed by more than 100 biomedical researchers, journal editors, and health care administrators in the US.

"...we ask that you acknowledge the research gap on the effect of conflicts of interest and commercial influence on medical decision making," the letter reads, "and set in motion a process that leads to recognition of the importance of funding studies on research ethics, the beliefs and behaviors of researchers and clinicians, and the effects of industry-academic relationships on the generation and dissemination of medical knowledge."

"It would be great to raise [the NIH's] awareness, and maybe have them actually do an RFA [request for applications] on this," said Adriane Fugh-Berman, director of PharmedOut, a group seeking to educate physicians on how the pharmaceutical industry influences prescribing practices, which spearheaded the writing and dissemination of the letter.

http://snipr.com/tbw74




Scuba Diving to the Depths of Human History
from New Scientist

Kitted out with the latest scuba gear, Garry Momber peers through the murky water to the seabed below. It's dark--Momber is 11 metres below the water's surface and the black peat of the seabed absorbs what little light reaches the bottom. Then the tide turns, and as clearer water flows in from the open seas, the decaying remains of an ancient forest emerge from the gloom.

Working quickly, he records details of the exposed material before the strengthening current forces him away from the site. This is all in a day's work for Momber, who is director of the Hampshire and Wight Trust for Maritime Archaeology in Southampton, UK.

His job is to search for clues to a prehistoric world lost beneath the waves in the channel that separates the Isle of Wight from the south coast of England .... Momber's work is just part of a growing trend for searching the deep for clues to our distant past.

http://snipr.com/tbw7g




Mystery of HIV Carriers Who Don't Contract AIDS
from Scientific American

More than half a million people in the U.S. have died from HIV infection, and more than a million currently live with the virus, but a relative handful of people infected with HIV never get treatment for it and never get sick from it. The immune systems of this small population--perhaps 50,000 Americans--somehow control the virus for long periods of time.

Of course, there is typically a bell curve of response to any disease, but figuring out how these people control the virus is one of the most vexing mysteries of the AIDS pandemic. Solving it might unlock new ways to prevent and treat HIV infection, and now several research teams are going after the answer.

... "Long-term nonprogressors" is a category of persons whose disease progresses less rapidly than average. Researchers originally used the term broadly but now they have been able to tease out two subsets of patients within a hierarchy...

http://snipr.com/tbw8q
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 22, 2009, 11:58:38 PM
 November 18, 2009




Breaching a Barrier to Fight Brain Cancer
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Dr. Howard Riina threaded a slender tube through a maze of arteries in Dennis Sugrue's brain, watching X-ray images on a monitor to track his progress. At the site where a previous operation had removed a malignant tumor, he infused a drug called mannitol and unleashed a flood of the cancer drug Avastin.

... It was an experiment. Mr. Sugrue, 50, who works for a hedge fund and has two teenage children, was in a study for people with glioblastoma--the same type of brain tumor that killed Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts in August--and was only the second person ever to have Avastin sprayed directly into his brain.

Getting drugs into the brain has always been a major challenge in treating tumors and other neurological diseases, because the blood-brain barrier, a natural defense system, keeps many drugs out.

http://snipr.com/taltj




Uninsured Trauma Patients Are Much More Likely to Die
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Patients who lack health insurance are more likely to die from car accidents and other traumatic injuries than people who belong to a health plan--even though emergency rooms are required to care for all comers regardless of ability to pay, according to a study published today.

An analysis of 687,091 patients who visited trauma centers nationwide from 2002 to 2006 found that the odds of dying from injuries were almost twice as high for the uninsured than for patients with private insurance, researchers reported in Archives of Surgery.

Trauma physicians said they were surprised by the findings, even though a slew of studies had previously documented the ill effects of going without health coverage.

http://snipr.com/taluv




Birth of New Species Witnessed by Scientists
from Wired

On one of the Galapagos islands whose finches shaped the theories of a young Charles Darwin, biologists have witnessed that elusive moment when a single species splits in two.

In many ways, the split followed predictable patterns, requiring a hybrid newcomer who'd already taken baby steps down a new evolutionary path. But playing an unexpected part was chance, and the newcomer singing his own special song.

This miniature evolutionary saga is described in a paper published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. It's authored by Peter and Rosemary Grant, a husband-and-wife team who have spent much of the last 36 years studying a group of bird species known collectively as Darwin's finches.

http://snipr.com/talvp




Ketamine Drug Use 'Harms Memory'
from BBC News Online

Frequent use of ketamine--a drug popular with clubbers--is being linked with memory problems, researchers say. The University College London team carried out a range of memory and psychological tests on 120 people.

They found frequent users performed poorly on skills such as recalling names, conversations and patterns. Previous studies said the drug might cause kidney and bladder damage. The London team and charity Drugscope said users should be aware of the risks.

Ketamine--or Special K as it has been dubbed--acts as a stimulant and induces hallucinations. It has been increasing in popularity, particularly as an alternative to ecstasy among clubbers, as the price has fallen over recent years.

http://snipr.com/talx6




Could Jupiter Moon Harbor Fish-Size Life?
from National Geographic News

In the oceans of a moon hundreds of millions of miles from the sun, something fishy may be alive--right now. Below its icy crust Jupiter's moon Europa is believed to host a global ocean up to a hundred miles deep, with no land to speak of at the surface.

And the extraterrestrial ocean is currently being fed more than a hundred times more oxygen than previous models had suggested, according to provocative new research.

That amount of oxygen would be enough to support more than just microscopic life-forms: At least three million tons of fishlike creatures could theoretically live and breathe on Europa, said study author Richard Greenberg of the University of Arizona in Tucson.

http://snipr.com/talxv




Family Versus Science
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

The pressures of family obligations and child-rearing are pushing young female researchers out of science, according to a new study released this month by the Center for American Progress (CAP), a think tank based in Washington, DC.

The report provides a contrast to an earlier report by the National Academies of Sciences that focused on dissecting the subtle biases against women in science.

CAP, together with the Berkeley Center on Health, Economic & Family Security at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law surveyed some 25,000 University of California postdocs and graduate students for the report. They found that married women with children were 35% less likely to get a tenure-track position than married men with children and 33% less likely to do so than single women without children.

http://snipr.com/talyw




4 Percent of U.S. Children Have Food Allergies
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The number of children who have food allergies is not only increasing, it now encompasses 4% of all kids in the United States, according to an analysis of four large, national surveys published Monday in the journal Pediatrics.

The study--the first to make a broad estimate about the prevalence of food allergies among U.S. children--supports previous studies suggesting that allergy rates are rising rapidly, for reasons that are unclear.

Government researchers found that self-reported food allergies increased 18% between 1997 and 2007. Healthcare visits for food allergies in children nearly tripled between two time periods studied: 1992 through 1997 and 2003 through 2006. In the later period, U.S. children had an average of 317,000 visits to healthcare settings per year for food allergies.

http://snipr.com/talzm




Vaccines on Horizon for AIDS, Alzheimer's, Herpes
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

MARIETTA, Pa. (Associated Press) -- Malaria. Tuberculosis. Alzheimer's disease. AIDS. Pandemic flu. Genital herpes. Urinary tract infections. Grass allergies. Traveler's diarrhea. You name it, the pharmaceutical industry is working on a vaccine to prevent it.

Many could be on the market in five years or less. Contrast that with five years ago, when so many companies had abandoned the vaccine business that half the U.S. supply of flu shots was lost because of contamination at one of the two manufacturers left.

Vaccines are no longer a sleepy, low-profit niche in a booming drug industry. Today, they're starting to give ailing pharmaceutical makers a shot in the arm.

http://snipr.com/tam04




Ancients 'Had Heart Disease Too'
from BBC News Online

Hardening of the arteries has been found in Egyptian mummies--suggesting that the risk factors for heart disease may be ancient, researchers say. A team of US and Egyptian scientists carried out medical scans on 22 mummies from Cairo's Museum of Antiquities.

They found evidence of hardened arteries in three of them and possible heart disease in three more. All the mummies were of high socio-economic status and would have had a rich diet.

Details of the study by the University of California, the Mid America Heart Institute, Wisconsin Heart Hospital and Al Azhar Medical School in Cairo appear in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

http://snipr.com/tam0p




A Silent Killer in Bangladesh Wells
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Every day, millions of people in Bangladesh drink poisoned water. Wells all over the country tap into shallow aquifers with high concentrations of arsenic. Now researchers report that they've figured out the cause of this contamination.

About 30 years ago, international aid agencies and the government of Bangladesh started installing wells throughout the country. For good reason: The ponds and rivers where people used to get their water also contained sewage--and deadly pathogens.

But in the mid-1990s, other health problems started appearing. Those who drink the well water year after year develop lumps on their hands and feet and greatly increase their risk of cancer, especially lung cancer; epidemiologists say that drinking arsenic-contaminated well water is as bad as smoking.

http://snipr.com/tam2s
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Iason Ouabache on November 24, 2009, 01:51:42 AM
Quote from: Kai on November 22, 2009, 11:52:02 PM
Large Hadron Collider Ready to Restart
from the Telegraph (UK)

Scientists have repaired the world's largest atom smasher and plan by this weekend to restart the fault-ridden Large Hadron Collider. The 'Big Bang' machine was launched with great fanfare last year before its spectacular failure from a bad electrical connection.

This time the European Organization for Nuclear Research, known as CERN, is taking a cautious approach with the super-sophisticated equipment, said James Gillies, a spokesman. It cost about $10 billion, with contributions from many governments and universities around the world.

Scientists expect to send beams of protons around the 17-mile circular tunnel housing the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC, but they have refrained from setting a date. That stands in stark contrast with the hype of the September 10, 2008, launch, when the startup was televised globally.

http://snipr.com/tbf12

:jebus: I can't wait for them to start reporting their results.

Quote from: Kai on November 22, 2009, 11:53:12 PM
Guidelines Push Back Age for Cervical Cancer Tests
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

New guidelines for cervical cancer screening say women should delay their first Pap test until age 21, and be screened less often than recommended in the past.

The advice, from the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, is meant to decrease unnecessary testing and potentially harmful treatment, particularly in teenagers and young women. The group's previous guidelines had recommended yearly testing for young women, starting within three years of their first sexual intercourse, but no later than age 21.

Arriving on the heels of hotly disputed guidelines calling for less use of mammography, the new recommendations might seem like part of a larger plan to slash cancer screening for women. But the timing was coincidental, said Dr. Cheryl B. Iglesia, the chairwoman of a panel in the obstetricians' group that developed the Pap smear guidelines.

http://snipr.com/tbw46

The breast cancer guideline story sure was a touchy topic. It definitely brought out all of the crazies. Who knew breast cancer could be such a touchy topic?  Anyways, Orac and Rebbecca Watson both did very good jobs on covering it:

http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/11/really_rethinking_breast_cancer_screenin.php
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2009/11/obamas_makin_death_panels_for_your_mama.php
http://skepchick.org/blog/2009/11/no-ladies-the-new-breast-cancer-guidelines-arent-patronizing/

If you don't want to read all of those links the short version is: Screening for breast cancer in asymptomatic women in their 40s is more harmful than helpful because of false positives and unnecessary biopsies. No, this isn't patronizing or misogenistic. No, this has absolutely nothing with Obama. Yes, these guidelines are similar to what Europe and Canada has been recommending for years.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Thurnez Isa on November 24, 2009, 02:16:18 AM
That's what you think.
Truth is Obama's Muslim charm actually causes breast cancer.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 28, 2009, 09:28:19 PM
November 23, 2009




Hacked E-Mail Is New Fodder for Climate Dispute
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Hundreds of private e-mail messages and documents hacked from a computer server at a British university are causing a stir among global warming skeptics, who say they show that climate scientists conspired to overstate the case for a human influence on climate change.

The e-mail messages, attributed to prominent American and British climate researchers, include discussions of scientific data and whether it should be released, exchanges about how best to combat the arguments of skeptics, and casual comments--in some cases derisive--about specific people known for their skeptical views. Drafts of scientific papers and a photo collage that portrays climate skeptics on an ice floe were also among the hacked data, some of which dates back 13 years.

In one e-mail exchange, a scientist writes of using a statistical "trick" in a chart illustrating a recent sharp warming trend. In another, a scientist refers to climate skeptics as "idiots."

http://snipr.com/tdwwb




Large Hadron Collider is Back Online
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Geneva (Associated Press) -- Scientists are preparing the world's largest atom smasher to explore the depths of matter after successfully restarting the $10-billion machine following more than a year of repairs.

When the Large Hadron Collider is fully operational, its magnets will control the beams of protons and send them in opposite directions through two parallel tubes the diameter of fire hoses.

In rooms as large as cathedrals, 300 feet under the Swiss-French border, the magnets will force the protons into huge detectors to record the reactions.

http://snipr.com/tdwwl




Crawling Around With Baltimore Street Rats
from Smithsonian

A trio of tiny rat statuettes stands sentinel in the center of Gregory Glass's desk. The shelves above are stuffed with rat necropsy records and block-by-block population analyses. Huge, humming freezers in the lab across the hall are chockfull of rodent odds and ends.

Now Glass, a professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, leads me out of his building and into the streets of Baltimore for a bit of impromptu fieldwork. He asks that I leave my jewelry and purse behind; after all these years of tramping the alleys in the rougher parts of town, the disease ecologist still gets nervous around sunset. Yet mostly he enjoys observing the "urban ecosystem," which, he says, is just as worthy of study as wilder areas, and maybe even more so: as savannas and rainforests shrink, cities grow, becoming a dominant habitat.

"This is what the natural environment looks like for most people," Glass says, as we enter a narrow passage behind a block of row houses. Some backyards are orderly and clean, others are heaped with garbage. I promptly step in something mushy. Glass frowns down at my flimsy shoes.

http://snipr.com/tdwzo




First Test for Record Solar Plane
from BBC News Online

The prototype of a solar-powered plane destined for a record round-the-world journey has made its first trip across a runway.

On Thursday, the plane covered at least 2km at speeds of up to five knots on the landing strip in Switzerland.

This week saw the Solar Impulse plane outside its hangar for the first time, with tests of its engines and computer. As wide as a jumbo jet but weighing just 1,500 kg, it will be piloted by Swiss adventurer Bertrand Piccard.

http://snipr.com/tdx00




Classic View of Leaf-Cutter Ants Overlooked Nitrogen-Fixing Partner
from Science News

No pigs or chickens yet. But the vast farms where leaf-cutter ants raise their fungal crops may harbor a crew of previously overlooked farmhands--nitrogen-fixing bacteria.

At least eight species of leaf-cutter ants typically live with bacteria that capture nitrogen from the air and turn it into a form that living organisms can use, says microbial ecologist Adrián Pinto-Tomás of the University of Costa Rica in San José. He and his colleagues propose that these bacterial helpers might explain how the ants feed up to 8 million workers in a single colony just by harvesting bits of nitrogen-poor leaves and letting a fungus grow on them.

Neither the fungus nor the ants, nor any other multicellular organisms, can use the atmosphere's abundant nitrogen directly. Pinto-Tomás and his colleagues tracked the path of nitrogen through ant nests and tested inhabitants for genes active in capturing the nutrient from the air. Live-in bacteria, particularly in the genus Klebsiella, could provide an estimated 45 to 60 percent of the nitrogen in the ants' food, the researchers report in the Nov. 20 Science.

http://snipr.com/tdx06




Who Knew I Was Not the Father?
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

It was in July 2007 when Mike L. asked the Pennsylvania courts to declare that he was no longer the father of his daughter. For four years, Mike had known that the girl he had rocked to sleep and danced with across the living-room floor was not, as they say, "his."

The revelation from a DNA test was devastating and prompted him to leave his wife--but he had not renounced their child. He continued to feel that in all the ways that mattered, she was still his daughter, and he faithfully paid her child support. It was only when he learned that his ex-wife was about to marry the man who she said actually was the girl's biological father that Mike flipped. Supporting another man's child suddenly became unbearable. ...

Mike's conundrum is increasingly playing out in courts across the country, a result of political, social and technological shifts. Stricter federal rules have pressed states to chase down fathers and hold them responsible for children born outside of marriage, a category that includes 40 percent of all births. At the same time, DNA tests have become easier, cheaper and more reliable. Swiping a few cheek cells and paying a couple hundred dollars can answer the question that has plagued men since the dawn of time: Am I really the father?

http://snipr.com/tdx0g




Thousands of Strange Creatures Found Deep in Ocean
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

NEW ORLEANS (Associated Press) -- The creatures living in the depths of the ocean are as weird and outlandish as the creations in a Dr. Seuss book: tentacled transparent sea cucumbers, primitive "dumbos" that flap ear-like fins, and tubeworms that feed on oil deposits.

A report released Sunday recorded 17,650 species living below 656 feet, the point where sunlight ceases. The findings were the latest update on a 10-year census of marine life. ...

Thousands of marine species eke out an existence in the ocean's pitch-black depths by feeding on the snowlike decaying matter that cascades down--even sunken whale bones. Oil and methane also are an energy source for the bottom--dwellers, the report said.

http://snipr.com/tdx0r




Greening America's Asphalt Jungle
from the Guardian (U.K.)

In the 40 years since Joni Mitchell sang about paving paradise, putting up parking lots remains an American obsession. Scientists estimate that up to 10% of land in U.S. cities is now devoted to car parks, causing environmental damage whether they are used by Humvees or hybrids.

Stormwater run-off from roads, drains and parking dumps the equivalent of more than a dozen Exxon Valdez tankers of oil directly into U.S. rivers each year, in addition to dangerous levels of heavy metals, pesticides, bacteria and industrial pollutants. Traditional car parks also encourage sprawl, contribute to urban heat islands and offer little biodiversity.

Now the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has decided that it's time to turn grey car parks green. It has begun road-testing alternative paving materials that allow water to slowly filter back into the ground rather than rush down the drain.

http://snipr.com/tdx25




Into the Uncanny Valley
from Seed

A dead body appears in almost every way to be a normal human. But the pallid skin and empty eyes signal that the person-shaped form we are looking at is, in a way we can't even fully grasp, strange and disturbing.

We feel a similar eeriness when interacting with robots and models that look almost human but fall short of convincing us because of subtle peculiarities in their features. Poor box office returns on computer-animated films like "The Polar Express" and "Beowulf" were blamed on moviegoers finding the not quite true-to-life characters unsettling.

Disturbing experiences that feel both familiar and strange are instances of the "uncanny," an intuitive concept, yet one that has defied simple explanation for more than a century. Interest in the particular occurrences of the uncanny, in which humans are bothered by interaction with human-like models, began as a psychological curiosity. But as our ability to design artificial life has increased--along with our dependence on it--getting to the heart of why people respond negatively to realistic models of themselves has taken on a new importance.

http://snipr.com/tdx2k




Lava Cave Minerals Actually Microbe Poop
from National Geographic News

Colorful cave deposits long thought to be ordinary minerals are actually mats of waste excreted by previously unknown types of microbes, scientists say.

The discovery could offer clues in the search for life on Mars and beyond, researchers said in October at a meeting of the Geological Society of America.

"We're finding that you need to look at things you might write off as not being biological--they might be biological," said Penelope Boston, a cave scientist at the New Mexico Institute of Mining and Technology in Socorro.

http://snipr.com/tdx42
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 28, 2009, 09:42:13 PM
 November 24, 2009




Can Climate Change Cause Conflict? Recent History Suggests So
from Scientific American

Some experts call the genocide in Darfur the world's first conflict caused by climate change. After all, the crisis was sparked, at least in part, by a decline in rainfall over the past 30 years just as the region's population doubled, pitting wandering pastoralists against settled farmers for newly scarce resources, such as arable land.

"Is Darfur the first climate change war?" asked economist and Scientific American columnist Jeffrey Sachs at an event at Columbia University in 2007. "Don't doubt for a moment that places like Darfur are ecological disasters first and political disasters second."

But new research would suggest the answer to Sachs's question is no, at least regarding the novelty of Darfur. Agricultural economist Marshall Burke of the University of California, Berkeley and his colleagues have analyzed the history of conflict in sub-Saharan Africa between 1980 and 2002 in a new paper in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/tegh1




fMRI Evidence Used in Murder Sentencing
from Science Insider

For what may be the first time, fMRI scans of brain activity have been used as evidence in the sentencing phase of a murder trial. Defense lawyers for an Illinois man convicted of raping and killing a 10-year-old girl used the scans to argue that their client should be spared the death penalty because he has a brain disorder.

The defendant, Brian Dugan, pleaded guilty in July to killing Jeanine Nicarico after kidnapping her from her home in 1983. (Prior to that, the Nicarico case had taken more turns than a hangman's knot, detailed in a 1998 book Victims of Justice). Dugan was already serving life sentences for two other murders, but prosecutors sought the death penalty for Nicarico's murder.

"Nobody thought we had any chance at all going in," says Steve Greenberg, the lead attorney for the defense. But the defense tried an unusual strategy: They argued that Dugan was born with a mental illness--psychopathy--that should be considered a mitigating factor because it impaired his ability to control his behavior.

http://snipr.com/teghv




Skin Color Is in the Eye of the Beholder
from ScienceNOW Daily News

A new study suggests that we mentally alter politicians' skin tones to match how we feel about them. When presented with three photos of President Barack Obama and asked to choose which was most representative of him, liberals tended to pick a shot in which his skin had been digitally lightened, whereas conservatives tended to choose a darkened version.

Previous studies indicate that people tend to view lighter skin more favorably than they do darker skin. Darker skin tones are associated with more negative stereotypes, says Eugene Caruso, a social psychologist at the University of Chicago in Illinois and co-author of the new study. Clearly, skin tone affects how we perceive an individual. But can our perception of an individual affect how we see their skin tone?

To find out, Caruso and his colleagues quizzed undergraduate students--about 90% were white and 10% were black--on their political views and then presented them with three photos of Obama. The researchers had doctored two of the photos. In one, they digitally lightened Obama's skin tone slightly, and in the other they darkened his skin tone. The researchers then asked the students to choose the photo that best captured the candidate's "true essence."

http://snipr.com/tegj6




In Snails and Snakes, Features to Delight Darwin
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Charles Darwin seems to have had a boundless interest in the many forms life takes on earth. He could find something about any animal or plant that piqued his insatiable curiosity, and masses of such observations fueled his prodigious output of books and scientific papers.

Darwin was particularly intrigued by what he referred to as "contrivances," the various biological devices through which creatures make their livings or disperse their young.

Even the most pedestrian species seized his imagination. Take the Roman land snail Helix pomatia, for instance. If one is not a lover of escargot, this common European snail would inspire little attention. But not so for Darwin. He was gripped, and troubled, by the mere existence of land snails.

http://snipr.com/tegmm




Shedding Light on How the Brain Works
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

More than two centuries ago, the Italian scientist Luigi Galvani found that electricity could make a dead frog's leg kick, as if it were alive. Today, using the same basic principle but new tools, scientists are employing light to trigger brain cells--looking not for a kick, but for the origins of emotions, behaviors, and diseases in the brain.

Advanced imaging technologies have given neuroscientists new ways to peer into the working mind, but a precise understanding of how 100 billion brain cells create everything from memories to mental illness has remained elusive.

Now, by using gene therapy to insert light-sensitive proteins from algae and other organisms into brain cells, scientists are able to control specific brain circuits with light, and then watch what happens.

http://snipr.com/tegn5




Sunken Alaskan Sternwheeler is an Underwater Time Capsule
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Underwater archaeologists said Monday they have found a virtual time capsule of life during Canada's Klondike Gold Rush: a sunken Yukon River sternwheeler so well-preserved that researchers can document the last minutes of the five-man crew as well as their life aboard the primitive cargo-hauler.

The door of the steam boiler on the A. J. Goddard was open, and slightly charred wood found inside suggested the crew were trying to build up a head of steam, perhaps to break loose from an ice jam.

An axe remained on the deck after one crew member hefted it to chop the rope used to tow a barge, a sign of their frantic attempts to escape the ice floe.

http://snipr.com/tegnh




First Programmable Quantum Computer Created
from Science News

Using a few ultracold ions, intense lasers and some electrodes, researchers have built the first programmable quantum computer. The new system, described in a paper to be published in Nature Physics, flexed its versatility by performing 160 randomly chosen processing routines.

Earlier versions of quantum computers have been largely restricted to a narrow window of specific tasks. To be more generally useful, a quantum computer should be programmable, in the same way that a classical computer must be able to run many different programs on a single piece of machinery.

The new study is "a powerful demonstration of the technological advances towards producing a real-world quantum computer," says quantum physicist Winfried Hensinger of the University of Sussex in Brighton, England.

http://snipr.com/tegnq




Building a Better Alien-Calling Code
from Wired

Alien-seeking researchers have designed a new, simple code for sending messages into space. To a reasonably clever alien with math skills and a bit of astronomical training, the messages should be easy to decipher.

As of now, Earthlings spend much more time searching for alien radio messages than broadcasting news of ourselves. We know how to do it, but relatively little attention has been paid to "ensuring that a transmitted message will be understandable to an alien listener," wrote California Institute of Technology geoscientist Michael Busch and Rachel Reddick, a Stanford University physicist, in a study filed online Friday on arXiv.

According to Busch and Reddick, neither the Arecibo message, beamed at star cluster M13 in 1974, nor the Cosmic Calls sent in 1999 and 2003 were tested for decipherability. So the pair devised their own alien-friendly messaging system: Busch invented the code, and Reddick role-played the part of an alien trying to decode it.

http://snipr.com/tego3




Friendly Bacteria Keep Your Skin's Defences in Check
from New Scientist

Being caked in germs sounds unpleasant, but "friendly" bacteria living on our skin may have the vital role of keeping in check inflammation triggered by injury and unwanted bacteria.

The discovery extends the list of bacteria that the human body relies on to function. It also suggests that antibacterial hand gels and soaps might exacerbate skin conditions characterised by excessive inflammation.

The most common family of bacteria found on the skin is Staphylococcus, the member of which are harmless, unless they get into wounds. To see if they might actually be useful to humans, Richard Gallo at the University of California, San Diego, and his colleagues added molecules released by Staphylococcus to cells found in human skin.

http://snipr.com/tegoa




Nasa Cassini Spacecraft Sends Pictures of Saturn's Moon
from BBC News Online

Nasa has released the latest raw images of Saturn's moon Enceladus, from the Cassini spacecraft's extended mission to the planet and its satellites. The images show the moon's rippling terrain in remarkable clarity.

Cassini started transmitting uncalibrated temperature data and images during a flyby on 21 November. The data will help scientists create a highly detailed mosaic image of the southern part of the moon's Saturn-facing hemisphere, and a thermal map.

This thermal map will help researchers to study the long fractures in the south polar region of the moon's surface, which have been dubbed "tiger stripes" and are warmer than the rest of the surface.

http://snipr.com/tegou
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 28, 2009, 09:48:21 PM
November 25, 2009

Could Cannibalism Hold the Key to Alzheimer's?
from BBC News Online

It's a remarkable example of Darwinian natural selection at work in humans.

Villagers suffering from a major epidemic of Kuru, a fatal CJD-like brain disease, seem to have developed a strong genetic resistance to the condition.

The infection, which is associated with mortuary feasts, where mainly women and children consume the remains of respected relatives, devastated populations in the remote eastern highlands of Papua New Guinea. Things got so bad that in some villages there were no women of child-bearing age left alive and the practice was banned in the late 1950's and quickly died out.

http://snipr.com/texg1



Intersex Fish in Potomac Remains Mystery
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

KEARNEYSVILLE, W.VA. -- What's the problem with the Potomac River--and could whatever it is spell problems for those of us who drink its water?

In 2003, scientists discovered something startling in the Potomac, from which at least 3 million Washington area residents get their drinking water: Male fish were growing eggs. But six years later, a government-led research effort still hasn't answered those two questions. Scientists say they still aren't sure which pollutants are altering the fish, or whether the discovery poses any threat to people's health.

The job is not easy: Scientists are looking for wisps of hormone-mimicking pollutants in the Potomac's vast, moving soup. But the effort has also been held back, according to environmentalists and a federal researcher, by sparse funding and a lack of government focus.

http://snipr.com/texgj



How Do People Cope With 'Locked-in' Syndrome?
from BBC News Online

The case of Rom Houben, thought to have been in a coma for 23 years, but apparently conscious all the time, raises a horrifying prospect: how can you cope being trapped in your body, aware of everything but unable to communicate with the outside world?

Mike Cubiss can vividly remember the tiles on the kitchen floor and how cold they felt. He was waiting for the ambulance, afraid he might die, but unable to move or say goodbye to his wife. On an ordinary day in 2002, as he prepared to take his three sons to school, and his wife got ready for work, Mike collapsed. The aftermath was locked-in syndrome.

Public awareness of the condition today is largely a result of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly, a book by French magazine editor Jean-Dominique Bauby, later turned into a film.

http://snipr.com/texgq



Green Redemption
from the Economist

Depending on how you view it, climate change is either the biggest problem mankind faces or its greatest financial opportunity. For example, McKinsey has become known as a climate-change consultant, thanks to its greenhouse gas "cost abatement curve." This clever little chart shows the relative opportunity costs of different abatement activities. McKinsey's curve and expertise on climate change have opened the doors and pockets of ministries and industries around the globe.

What is striking about the global cost-abatement curve is what a bargain it seems to be to lower emissions by protecting rainforests. There is plenty of argument about whether it really will be as cheap as the curve suggests.

For example, Simon Counsell, director of the Rainforest Foundation, in Britain, queries whether the opportunity costs of reducing slash-and-burn farming are as low as they are presented. Subsistence farming may, indeed, yield only $200-300 per hectare but paying that sum to the locals will not give them shops in which to buy food.

http://snipr.com/texh0



The Universe's Past, in Close-Up
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

If there were a Guinness world record for making telescope mirrors, Dean Ketelsen would likely win it. Colleagues boast that the onetime Iowa farm boy has ground and polished more square footage of optics than any human being alive.

"It used to be a mysterious thing that hunch-backed people in white coats did," the 55-year-old technician said while taking a break at the University of Arizona's Steward Observatory Mirror Lab. "Now we use machines to grind the glass. They've taken a lot of the black arts out of it."

Maybe so. But Ketelsen can't help being as proud as a soccer parent of his latest achievement. Resting behind him in the laboratory under the university's football stadium was the first of seven huge mirrors being made for the Giant Magellan Telescope.

http://snipr.com/texha



The Future of Trains
from Scientific American

Although so-called bullet trains in France can travel at speeds approaching 575 kilometers per hour, their adoption in the U.S. has been more local than express. Now, 140 years after the transcontinental railroad's nearly 2,900 kilometers of track first connected both U.S. coasts, a number of states are hoping for a second golden age of rail, this time fueled by the Obama administration's pledge of billions of stimulus dollars for high-speed railway development.

California is developing perhaps the most ambitious high-speed rail plans, a project that would include a mixture of shorter lines connecting Los Angeles to Anaheim and San Francisco to San Jose as well as a longer line traversing the nearly 1,300 kilometers between San Francisco and San Diego (with a branch through Sacramento).

The $10-billion price tag to get these projects on track is equally ambitious--California is looking for $4.7 billion of this to come from the $8 billion in stimulus money the federal government is making available for high-speed rail projects under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

http://snipr.com/texhg



A Vision Faces an Environmental Test
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

MICHES, Dominican Republic -- From a development perspective, this town has a few problems.

It is 60 miles from the nearest airport, a three-hour drive on roads so bad the trip can be nauseating. Electricity is erratic, drinking water is contaminated, the beach in town is littered with trash and nearby rivers are either clogged with an invasive weed or plagued by silty agricultural runoff that threatens the fish on offshore reefs.

But to a team of conservation biologists and other researchers from Columbia University who began working here in 2007, Miches has great potential. They see tourists camping in platform tents, like those in St. John, in the Virgin Islands. They see hikers in its lush green hills, people riding horseback on pristine beaches outside of town and others heading out to sea to watch whales, dolphins or manatees. They imagine the town's half-derelict waterfront plaza lined with locally owned restaurants serving locally caught fish.

http://snipr.com/texhx



Scientists Seek New Ways To Produce Flu Vaccine
from National Public Radio

As the shortage of vaccinations against the new H1N1 swine flu begins to lessen, researchers are working to find ways to prevent flu vaccine shortages from occurring again.

They're looking for new ways to make flu vaccines. The old way, in use for more than 50 years, involves growing inside of chicken eggs a modified form of whatever flu virus is in circulation. The viruses replicate and can be harvested from the eggs. The process of vaccine development and production takes about five months.

According to Bill Hall, a spokesman for the Department of Health and Human Services, the government has spent nearly $2 billion in the past five years on developing quicker, eggless systems.

http://snipr.com/texie



Wind Turbines Take a Lesson From Lance Armstrong
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Arranging wind turbines like a school of fish could reduce the amount of land they take up by 100-fold while maintaining their electrical output, say researchers. Wind farms based on the approach might also be considerably safer for migrating birds.

Whether it's Lance Armstrong bicycling behind his teammates in the Tour de France or a storm of fish slicing their way through the ocean, animals benefit from drafting. The leader breaks through the calm air or water, while the followers enjoy the reduced resistance in the leader's wake.

The same doesn't hold true for horizontal-axis wind turbines (HAWTs), the most common kind of windmill. Placing one HAWT in another's draft drastically reduces the efficiency of the trailing windmill. That's because the turbulent breeze created by the leading turbine's blades can't propel the trailing blades as well as an unobstructed airflow. So engineers spread the giant fans across hundreds of hectares of land--a practice that has created a backlash from people who find the turbines unsightly.

http://snipr.com/texiq



Ethiopia's Exotic Monkeys
from Smithsonian

Geladas are isolated, oddball monkeys that science has largely overlooked. They live in large herds in the towering Simien Mountains of northern Ethiopia. A few researchers studied the primates in the 1970s, but famine and political turmoil in the region made further investigations impossible. ...

Yet--if you don't mind heights--geladas (Theropithecus gelada) make intriguing research subjects. With their falsetto cries, explosive barks and soft grunts, geladas have one of the most varied vocal repertoires of all the primates. The noisy herds are relatively easy to follow. Unlike most monkeys, geladas graze primarily on grass. They are usually observable---except at night, when they disappear over the edges of cliffs to sleep on tiny ledges, safe from leopards and hyenas.

Geladas are visually striking, with burning eyes and leathery complexions. Males have vampiric canines, which they frequently bare at each other, and their golden manes are the stuff of shampoo commercials. "They cry out to be photographed," says Fiona Rogers. She and her partner, Anup Shah, visited Beehner's camp in Simien Mountain National Park for a month to photograph the animals.

http://snipr.com/texiv
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on December 01, 2009, 01:53:27 PM
 November 30, 2009




Kenyans Draw Weapons Over Shrinking Resources
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Isiolo, Kenya -- Have the climate wars of Africa begun? Tales of conflict emerging from this remote, arid region of Kenya have disturbing echoes of the lethal building blocks that turned Darfur into a killing ground in western Sudan.

Tribes that lived side by side for decades say they've been pushed to warfare by competition for disappearing water and pasture. The government is accused of exacerbating tensions by taking sides and arming combatants who once used spears and arrows.

The aim, all sides say, is no longer just to steal land or cattle, but to drive the enemy away forever.

http://snipr.com/thl5i



Americans' Eating Habits More Wasteful Than Ever
from ScienceNOW Daily News

After their biggest meal of the year, Americans might reflect on the fate of those moldering Thanksgiving leftovers. Nearly 40% of the food supply in the United States goes to waste, according to a new study, and the problem has been getting worse. "The numbers are pretty shocking," says Kevin Hall, a quantitative physiologist at the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) in Bethesda, Maryland.

Food waste is usually estimated through consumer interviews or garbage inspections. The former method is inaccurate, and the latter isn't geographically comprehensive. Hall and his colleagues tried another approach: modeling human metabolism.

They analyzed average body weight in the United States from 1974 to 2003 and figured out how much food people were eating during this period. Hall and Chow assumed that levels of physical activity haven't changed; some researchers think that activity has decreased, but Hall and Chow say their assumption is conservative. Then they compared that amount with estimates of the food available for U.S. consumers, as reported by the U.S. government to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

http://snipr.com/thl5p



Europe's Post-Soviet Greening: Gains and Failures
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Dniprodzerzhynsk, Ukraine (Associated Press) -- Twenty years ago, when the Iron Curtain came down, the world gagged in horror as it witnessed firsthand the ravages inflicted on nature by the Soviet industrial machine.

Throughout the crumbling communist empire, sewage and chemicals clogged rivers; industrial smog choked cities; radiation seeped through the soil; open pit mines scarred green valleys. It was hard to measure how bad it was and still is: The focus was more on production quotas than environmental data.

Today, Europe has two easts--one that has been largely cleaned up with the help of a massive infusion of Western funds and the prospect of membership in the prosperous European Union; another that still looks as though the commissars never left.

http://snipr.com/thl5z



Benign by Design
from Seed

More than 40 years ago, Rachel Carson warned of a "silent spring." Twenty years later, Bill McKibben wrote of the human alteration of every aspect of the natural world. Nature has not ended, but signs of severe and subtle disturbance are everywhere.

Scientists are now watching natural systems that have evolved over millennia begin to falter in response to chemical wrenches we've introduced into the global environment. The manufactured materials we've used for the past century have served us well in many ways. But it is now clear we can no longer afford--if we ever could--to proceed with designs that serve but one generation. ...

Yet as John Warner, one of the leading proponents of green chemistry, says, there is no reason a molecule must be hazardous to perform a particular task. For example, there are nontoxic alternatives to the chemicals that make products lightweight, shatterproof, and moldable. And as Paul Anastas--who with Warner is considered a founder of green chemistry--says, hazard adds nothing to performance and ultimately adds unwanted production costs.

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Climate Change Bill Faces Delays in Senate
from National Public Radio

In early December, world leaders will gather in Copenhagen to begin talks on a new treaty to curb greenhouse gases and global warming. President Obama will attend the summit.

In urging action on climate change, the president says it's essential "that all countries do what is necessary to reach a strong operational agreement that will confront the threat of climate change while serving as a stepping stone to a legally binding treaty."

White House officials say the U.S. will propose targets for reducing greenhouse gases in line with what Congress is considering. But while the House narrowly passed a climate change bill last summer, no action by the Senate is expected until next spring.

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Industrial Thanksgiving: Science Takes Mom's Recipes to the Assembly Line
from Wired

Thanksgiving is about eating, and though local, organic food might be what the cool kids are eating, most people are still eating products of the industrial food system.

Whether you're talking turkey, cranberries or potatoes, industrial-scale processes have been developed to drive down food costs, drive up corporate profits and feed America's incredible hunger for novel food items.

But most consumers of these manufactured meals have little or no knowledge of the machines and methods used to freeze turkeys, turn potatoes into fake potatoes, and cranberries into TV-dinner cranberry sauce. It's not always pretty, but food scientists' epic battle to scale up your mom's recipes without making them taste nasty is worth examining, if not giving thanks for.

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The Final Push to End Polio in India
from the Guardian (U.K.)

In a school courtyard in Lucknow on a dusty Sunday afternoon, the final push in a heroic campaign to drive a crippling disease from the planet is under way. Among scores of wide-eyed children, four-year-old Mohamed Yusuf is brought to the big wooden table under the yellow banners by his mother Afsar Jahan. Uncomprehending but compliant, he tilts his head back and opens his mouth to receive two drops of polio vaccine.

His less fortunate sister Saba Banu, 12, comes across the open space to join them, strikingly beautiful in her bright blue sari, swinging her deformed limb this way and that on her crutches. Saba's right leg is stunted from polio, which she contracted when she was two.

This campaign in the most densely populated state of India is intended to stop polio blighting other lives as it has Saba's. Nobody knows how long it will last, how much more effort will be required or whether, in the end, we will get there at all.

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Martian "Lake Michigan" Filled Crater, Minerals Hint
from National Geographic News

Mars may have once hosted a body of water roughly the size of Lake Michigan, say researchers who have found a telltale "bathtub ring" of minerals inside an ancient Martian impact crater.

The find means that Columbus crater, in Mars's southern hemisphere, is the best place yet to study the chemistry of so-called fossil lakes on the red planet, the scientists say.

Hundreds of Martian craters have been identified as possible fossil lakes, based on the presence of now dry channels or sediments deposited at former deltas, said lead study author James Wray of Cornell University.

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The Royal Society Puts Historic Papers Online
from BBC News Online

One of the world's oldest scientific institutions is marking the start of its 350th year by putting 60 of its most memorable research papers online.

The Royal Society, founded in London in 1660, is making public manuscripts by figures like Sir Isaac Newton. Benjamin Franklin's account of his infamous kite-flying experiment is also available on the Trailblazing website.

Society president Lord Rees said the papers documented some of the most "thrilling moments" in science history.

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People Hear with Their Skin, As Well As Their Ears
from Scientific American

The act of hearing is a group effort for the human body's organs, involving the ears, the eyes and also, according to the results of a new study, the skin.

In 1976 scientists discovered the importance of the eyes to our sense of hearing by demonstrating that the eyes could fool the ears in a peculiar phenomenon named the McGurk effect. When participants watched a video in which a person was saying "ga" but the audio was playing "ba," people thought they heard a completely different sound--"da." Now, by mixing audio with the tactile sense of airflow, researchers have found that our perception of certain sounds relies, in part, on being able to feel these sounds. The study was published November 26 in Nature.

Normally when we say words with the letters "p," "t" and "k," we produce a puff of air. This puff helps the listener distinguish words with these letters from those with the similar sounding "b," "d" and "g," respectively, even though the puff is so subtle that most of us do not even notice feeling it.

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Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 07:16:06 PM
 December 1, 2009




Naked Black Hole Builds Future Galactic Dream Home
from Wired

Astronomers have spied a distant black hole in the act of creating the galaxy that will eventually become its home.

By sending a jet of gas and highly energetic particles into a neighboring galaxy, the black hole has touched off star formation at a rate 100 times the galactic average.

"Our study suggests that supermassive black holes can trigger the formation of stars, thus 'building' their own host galaxies," David Elbaz, lead author of a paper on the work in the journal Astronomy and Astrophysics, said in a press release. "This link could also explain why galaxies hosting larger black holes have more stars."

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Stolen E-Mails and the IPCC
from BBC News Online

The content of stolen e-mails from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia has prompted much discussion about the way peer-reviewed science is conducted. But it is also raising questions among some scientists about the workings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

The IPCC, steered by governments and drawing on the work of thousands of scientists and other experts, is the world's biggest peer-review body. It was formed because politicians needed definitive advice about the effects of greenhouse gases.

Most policymakers rely in large part on the IPCC's summary reports--so the summaries involve a battle of wills and opinions in the distillation of thousands of studies into climate change. ... The CRU holds one of the key global data sets on temperature, so its data has helped underpin the IPCC's conclusions.

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'Simple' Bacterium Shows Surprising Complexity
from New Scientist

The inner workings of a supposedly simple bacterial cell have turned out to be much more sophisticated than expected.

An in-depth "blueprint" of an apparently minimalist species has revealed details that challenge preconceptions about how genes operate. It also brings closer the day when it may be possible to create artificial life.

Mycoplasma pneumoniae, which causes a form of pneumonia in people, has just 689 genes, compared with 25,000 in humans and 4000 or more in most other bacteria. Now a study of its inner workings has revealed that the bacterium has uncanny flexibility and sophistication, allowing it to react fast to changes in its diet and environment.

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A Lost European Culture, Pulled From Obscurity
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Before the glory that was Greece and Rome, even before the first cities of Mesopotamia or temples along the Nile, there lived in the Lower Danube Valley and the Balkan foothills people who were ahead of their time in art, technology and long-distance trade.

For 1,500 years, starting earlier than 5000 B.C., they farmed and built sizable towns, a few with as many as 2,000 dwellings. They mastered large-scale copper smelting, the new technology of the age. Their graves held an impressive array of exquisite headdresses and necklaces and, in one cemetery, the earliest major assemblage of gold artifacts to be found anywhere in the world.

The striking designs of their pottery speak of the refinement of the culture's visual language. Until recent discoveries, the most intriguing artifacts were the ubiquitous terracotta "goddess" figurines, originally interpreted as evidence of the spiritual and political power of women in society.

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Do Titan's Lakes Migrate South for the Winter?
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Imagine if all of the water in the Great Lakes evaporated, moved to the Southern Hemisphere, and rained down to form new lakes in Argentina. Then thousands of years later, the process repeated and the water returned north.

That's what researchers say could be happening on Saturn's largest moon, Titan. Understanding the process could shed light on how long-term climate cycles operate on other worlds.

Titan's lakes aren't anything like those on Earth. Although some are as large and deep as our own Great Lakes--one, called Ontario Lacus, is about the size of Lake Ontario--they contain mostly methane, which becomes liquid at temperatures below -180°C. Even stranger, of the hundreds of lakes spotted so far, almost all are in Titan's far northern latitudes, and there seem to be no lakes at all near the moon's equator.

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Debate Over Artificial Legs in Sports
from LiveScience

In an ironic twist, Oscar Pistorius' disability has now been shown to be an unfair advantage. The South African sprinter, who races with two prosthetic lower legs, has been the subject of a see-saw legal battle trying to determine if his carbon fiber, crescent-shaped manufactured legs give him an unfair advantage.

Now, two sports scientists have published new research showing that the legs, known as "Cheetahs," make him 15-20 percent faster, equal to 10 seconds over a 400 meter race, then he otherwise would be with natural legs.

In 2008, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) overturned a competition ban placed on Pistorius from the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), track and field's governing body. Seven scientists produced research that refuted the IAAF's contentions and Pistorius was cleared in time to try for a spot on the Beijing Olympic squad.

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H.M. Recollected: Famous Amnesic Launches Bold New Brain Project
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

As best he could remember, Henry Gustav Molaison never visited San Diego, spending his entire life on the East Coast. When he died late last year at the age of 82, Molaison was a man almost entirely unknown except by his initials H.M. and the fact that experimental brain surgery had erased his ability to form new memories.

He forgot names, places, events and faces almost immediately. Half an hour after lunch, he couldn't recall what he had eaten, or that he had eaten at all. His face in the mirror was a constant surprise because he remembered only what he looked like as a young man. Every question was new, even those asked just minutes before.

Yet Molaison bore this strange and unimaginable burden with grace and stoicism, allowing scores of scientists to study, probe and ponder his condition for decades, each seeking to better understand the mysteries of the human brain, memory and personal identity.

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Solar Panel Costs 'Set to Fall'
from BBC News Online

The cost of installing and owning solar panels will fall even faster than expected according to new research.

Tests show that 90% of existing solar panels last for 30 years, instead of the predicted 20 years. According to the independent EU Energy Institute, this brings down the lifetime cost. The institute says the panels are such a good long-term investment that banks should offer mortgages on them like they do on homes.

At a conference, the institute forecast that solar panels would be cost-competitive with energy from the grid for half the homes in Europe by 2020--without a subsidy.

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Vultures Should Be Allowed to Return as 'Nature's Waste Managers' in Spain
from the Guardian (U.K.)

Europe's carrion-guzzling vultures should be allowed to return to their old jobs as nature's waste managers, according to scientists who say the birds are suffering as they increasingly depend on being fed by people.

Stringent regulations brought in because of mad cow disease in 2002 meant the carcasses of dead cows, as well as sheep, goats and other livestock, could not be left in the open. Carrion was crucial part of the vultures' diet, but the birds now do much of their feeding at managed carrion centres set up by authorities.

The change means a gradual, decades-old revival of vulture populations around Europe is grinding to a halt. Vultures fed by humans find it harder to reproduce and farmers complain some have taken to attacking live animals.

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Narcolepsy Research Triggers Myriad Brain Studies
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Research into an unusual sleep disorder is unraveling what goes awry in the brains of people who fall prey to daytime sleep attacks--and shedding light on everything from addiction to appetite.

Work that began in sleepy dogs and mice has led to a significant advance in understanding narcolepsy, providing new insight into the ways in which sleep and wakefulness, eating, and addictive behaviors are linked. The work is pointing to potential therapies not only for people who are chronically sleepy, but also for the much larger numbers who have trouble sleeping at all.

At the root of this work is a fundamental brain chemical called orexin. Research over the past decade has shown that narcolepsy is caused by the loss of a type of brain cell that produces orexin. Scientists have found that the chemical also helps determine when we are asleep and awake and plays a role in regulating appetite and addiction.

http://snipr.com/ti6ex
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 07:19:07 PM
December 2, 2009




Fuelling Fears: Uranium Shortage Could Derail Plans to Go Nuclear
from the Economist

There is an awesome amount of energy tied up in an atom of uranium. Because of that, projections of the price of nuclear power tend to focus on the cost of building the plant rather than that of fuelling it. But proponents of nuclear energy--who argue, correctly, that such plants emit little carbon dioxide--would do well to remember that, like coal and oil, uranium is a finite resource.

Some 60% of the 66,500 tonnes of uranium needed to fuel the world's existing nuclear power plants is dug fresh from the ground each year. The remaining 40% comes from so-called secondary sources, in the form of recycled fuel or redundant nuclear warheads.

The International Atomic Energy Agency, which is a United Nations body, and the Nuclear Energy Agency, which was formed by the rich countries that are members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, both reckon that, at present rates, these secondary sources will be exhausted within the next decade or so.

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Treating Toddlers for Autism Boosts IQ Later
from New Scientist

Toddlers with symptoms of autism can show dramatic improvement if they are given early, intensive therapy. The finding, from the first randomised controlled trial in such young children, should settle the question of whether early screening and treatment of autism are worthwhile.

Sally Rogers, a psychologist at the Mind Institute of the University of California, Davis, and colleagues randomly assigned autistic toddlers aged 18 to 30 months to receive either conventional care or an intensive programme of behavioural therapy known as the Early Start Denver Model. This emphasises fun, child-directed activities rather than the repetitive exercises used in conventional autism therapies, which are less suitable for very young children.

"Being able to follow children's leads and build fun into their interactions is an important teaching tool. That may sound like common sense, but with autism nothing is common sense," says Rogers.

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China's OK on GMO Rice, Corn to Boost Yields
from Yahoo News

BEIJING (AFP) -- China has approved genetically modified strains of rice and corn in a move experts say could dramatically boost crop yields and help the world's most populous nation avoid food shortages.

The Ministry of Agriculture said it had issued initial production licences for genetically modified rice and corn, paving the way for commercial cultivation of high-yielding and pest-resistant grain and cereal crops.

In a fax to AFP this week, the ministry said the decision was "an important outcome of China's research on genetic engineering technology".

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Climate Research Chief Stands Down Pending Inquiry into Leaked Emails
from the Guardian (U.K.)

The head of the climate research unit that had its emails hacked and posted online will step down from his post while an inquiry into the affair is carried out.

Messages between scientists at the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit (CRU) were posted on the web last week, and climate-change deniers seized on them as alleged evidence that scientists have been hiding and manipulating data to support the idea that the world is warming up.

Professor Phil Jones, the director of the CRU, said he stood by the science produced by his researchers and suggestions of a conspiracy to alter evidence to support a theory of man-made global warming were "complete rubbish". But he said today that he would stand aside as director of the unit until an independent review into the hacked emails had been completed.

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The Moral Call of the Wild
from Scientific American

I love spending time outside. From wild places like the backcountry of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, to the mundane nature in my back yard, I find comfort in my natural experiences. These places are restful. Peaceful. ...

The benefits of spending time in nature have been well-documented. Psychological research has shown that natural experiences help to reduce stress, improve mood, and promote an overall increase in physical and psychological well-being. There is even evidence that hospital patients with a view of nature recover faster than do hospital patients without such a view. This line of research provides clear evidence that people are drawn to nature with good reason. It has restorative properties.

But a recent article by researchers at the University of Rochester shows that experiences with nature can affect more than our mood. In a series of studies, Netta Weinstein, Andrew Przybylski, and Richard Ryan, University of Rochester, show that exposure to nature can affect our priorities and alter what we think is important in life. In short, we become less self-focused and more other-focused. Our value priorities shift from personal gain, to a broader focus on community and connection with others.

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American Indians Stand to Gain in Health Overhaul
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The meeting last month was a watershed: the leaders of 564 American Indian tribes were invited to Washington to talk with cabinet members and President Obama, who called it "the largest and most widely attended gathering of tribal leaders in our history." Topping the list of their needs was better health care.

"Native Americans die of illnesses like tuberculosis, alcoholism, diabetes, pneumonia and influenza at far higher rates," Mr. Obama said. "We're going to have to do more to address disparities in health care delivery."

The health care overhaul now being debated in Congress appears poised to bring the most significant improvements to the Indian health system in decades. After months of negotiations, provisions under consideration could, over time, direct streams of money to the Indian health care system and give Indians more treatment options.

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China's Climate Target: Is It Achievable?
from Nature News

Climate analysts are praising China's promise to slash the country's emissions--even as they wonder if the target is achievable or ambitious enough.

Last week, China's State Council announced that the country will cut its carbon intensity--carbon emissions per unit of gross domestic product (GDP)--by 40-45% from 2005 levels by 2020. "It is a very welcome decision," says Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency in Paris. "If the target is met, it would have significant implications for China and the rest of the world."

Yet some think that the target is not far-reaching enough given China's booming economy and its track record of improving energy efficiency. The country reduced its energy intensity--energy consumption per unit of GDP--by 47% between 1990 and 2005, and looks likely to cut it by another 20% from 2005 levels by the end of next year. Carbon intensity can drop faster than energy intensity if clean-energy sources are brought into the mix.

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Loneliness Is Contagious, Study Suggests
from Science News

Staying socially connected may be just as important for public health as washing your hands and covering your cough. A new study suggests that feelings of loneliness can spread through social networks like the common cold.

"People on the edge of the network spread their loneliness to others and then cut their ties," says Nicholas Christakis of Harvard Medical School in Boston, a coauthor of the new study in the December Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. "It's like the edge of a sweater: You start pulling at it and it unravels the network."

This study is the latest in a series that Christakis and James Fowler of the University of California, San Diego have conducted to see how habits and feelings move through social networks. Their earlier studies suggested that obesity, smoking and happiness are contagious.

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The End of Hypoallergenic Cats?
from the Scientist

A controversial company that claimed to develop hypoallergenic cats and dogs will bow out of the companion animal business and launch a new venture focused on veterinary diagnostic services starting next year, according to a statement sent out in their corporate newsletter this Sunday (29th November).

"Following our recent acquisition, the business will be taking a new direction from 2010, specifically, fine-tuning and launching our proprietary veterinary genetic molecular diagnostic products," reads a statement from the company, called Allerca Lifestyle Pets.

The statement did not indicate which company had acquired it, but noted that this information, as well as details on its new business model, will be announced publicly early next year. Allerca said that it will stop taking new orders for its two breeds of hypoallergenic cats and one dog breed as of December 31, 2010, but will continue filling already-placed orders through 2010 and early 2011.

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Venting at the Office Helps Hearts
from the Wall Street Journal

Men who didn't confront colleagues or bosses who treated them unfairly doubled their risk of heart attack, according to a study in Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.

Researchers asked 2,755 men how they typically responded to unfair treatment at work. Those who said they would most often "Go away" or "Let things pass without saying anything" had significantly more heart attacks during the following 10 years, even after researchers controlled for variables such as education level and job strain. The authors hypothesized that the stress resulting from unexpressed anger led to higher blood pressure, a risk factor for heart disease.

Caveat: The researchers didn't ask respondents how often they faced unfair treatment at work. The authors also interviewed women for the study, but too few of them had heart attacks to conduct a meaningful analysis.

http://snipr.com/titn8
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 07:20:09 PM
December 3, 2009




New Stem Cell Lines Open to Research
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The National Institutes of Health said Wednesday that it had approved 13 new human embryonic stem cell lines for use by federally financed researchers, with 96 more under review.

The action followed President Obama's decision in March to expand the number of such cell lines beyond those available under a policy set by President George W. Bush, which permitted research to begin only with lines already available on Aug. 9, 2001.

Since that date, biomedical researchers supported by the N.I.H. have had to raise private money to derive the cells, which are obtained from the fertilized embryos left over from in vitro fertility clinics.

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Bhopal Marks 25 Years Since Gas Leak Devastation
from BBC News Online

People in the Indian city of Bhopal have been marking 25 years since a leak at a gas plant killed thousands and left many more seriously ill.

Activists and survivors marched through the city, chanting slogans against the government and Union Carbide - the US firm that owned the plant at the time.

The incident was the worst industrial disaster in history. Forty tonnes of a toxin called methyl isocyanate leaked from the factory and settled over slums on 3 December 1984.

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Cellphones and Cancer: Interphone Can't End the Debate
from New Scientist

Do cellphones cause cancer? That question is about to be revived with the publication of a long-awaited study called Interphone. Given the public health implications, we can expect it to get a lot of media attention. But you should treat what you read and hear with caution.

A decade ago, when the study was being set up, there were great expectations that it would produce a definitive answer. It is now clear that it cannot.

Interphone was coordinated by the International Agency for Research on Cancer and established on the recommendation of the IARC's parent body, the World Health Organization. It comprises 16 studies in 13 countries that sought to determine whether cellphone use is associated with tumours of the brain (glioma), meninges (meningioma), acoustic nerve (acoustic neuroma) or salivary glands.

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Rising Obesity Rates Imperil Health Gains
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Americans have increased their life expectancy by cutting back on cigarettes, but the pounds they're packing on means that, ultimately, they could lose ground.

A New England Journal of Medicine study published Wednesday looked at previous national health surveys to forecast life expectancy and quality of life for a typical 18-year-old from 2005 through 2020. Declines in smoking over the last 15 years would give that 18-year-old an increased life expectancy of 0.31 years.

However, growing body mass index rates would also mean that that teen would have a reduced life expectancy of 1.02 years, giving a net life expectancy reduction of 0.71 years.

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Acidic Oceans May Be a Boon for Some Marine Dwellers
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Researchers fret that many species of invertebrates will disappear as the oceans acidify due to increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2). But a new study concludes that some of these species may benefit from ocean acidification, growing bigger shells or skeletons that provide more protection. The work suggests that the effects of increased CO2 on marine environments will be more complex than previously thought.

Bottom-dwelling marine critters such as lobsters and corals encase themselves in shells or exoskeletons made from calcium carbonate. Previous studies predict that rising ocean acidity will result in the loss or weakening of these exoskeletons or shells and increase their owner's vulnerability to disease, predators, and environmental stress.

But marine scientist Justin Ries of the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, hypothesized that not all ocean organisms would respond the same way to acidity because they use different forms of calcium carbonate for their shells.

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The Mystery of Bosnia's Ancient Pyramids
from Smithsonian

Sam Osmanagich kneels down next to a low wall, part of a 6-by-10-foot rectangle of fieldstone with an earthen floor. If I'd come upon it in a farmer's backyard here on the edge of Visoko--in Bosnia and Herzegovina, 15 miles northwest of Sarajevo--I would have assumed it to be the foundation of a shed or cottage abandoned by some 19th-century peasant.

Osmanagich, a blond, 49-year-old Bosnian who has lived for 16 years in Houston, Texas, has a more colorful explanation. "Maybe it's a burial site, and maybe it's an entrance, but I think it's some type of ornament, because this is where the western and northern sides meet," he says, gesturing toward the summit of Pljesevica Hill, 350 feet above us. "You find evidence of the stone structure everywhere. Consequently, you can conclude that the whole thing is a pyramid."

Not just any pyramid, but what Osmanagich calls the Pyramid of the Moon, the world's largest--and oldest--step pyramid. Looming above the opposite side of town is the so-called Pyramid of the Sun--also known as Visocica Hill--which, at 720 feet, also dwarfs the Great Pyramids of Egypt. A third pyramid, he says, is in the nearby hills. All of them, he says, are some 12,000 years old. During that time much of Europe was under a mile-thick sheet of ice and most of humanity had yet to invent agriculture. As a group, Osmanagich says, these structures are part of "the greatest pyramidal complex ever built on the face of the earth."

http://snipr.com/tjg5r




Rolling Out the Changes: Fuel-Efficient Tyres
from the Economist

John Dunlop had a son who complained that his bicycle was bumpy to ride. So he invented the pneumatic tyre in 1888. Various improvements have been made since then. In particular, Pirelli, an Italian tyremaker, introduced steel-belted radial tyres in 1973. These reduced the fuel consumption of cars fitted with them. Now manufacturers are trying to develop tyres that reduce that consumption still further.

Tyres account for about a fifth of the energy required to power a car. They provide friction, so that the vehicle can grip the road, but some of the power supplied to the tyres is then lost as heat. Indeed, Michelin, a French tyremaker, estimates that this "rolling resistance" accounts for 4% of the world's carbon-dioxide emissions.

Tyre designers have therefore sought to improve fuel economy by reducing rolling resistance. However, this not only reduces a tyre's ability to grip, making drivers take corners sideways, it also wears out the tyres more rapidly.

http://snipr.com/tjg5w




Confessions of a Gall Hunter
from Natural History

Back in 1969, while I was working as a naturalist for the East Bay Regional Park District in Oakland, California, my boss, Chris Nelson, dropped a bunch of purple spiny things on my desk. "What are they?" he wanted to know. ... [W]ith his simple (and innocent) action, Nelson had sparked my curiosity about something small and wonderful, helping to define the course of my life.

The search for a better understanding of those natural "plant urchins" quickly led me to the late Sara S. Rosenthal, then a young wasp biologist from the University of California's Essig Museum of Entomology at Berkeley. Together we visited an old blue oak in Briones Regional Park, in the hills above Martinez, California. In the space of an hour or so, she pointed out twenty-one structures of every imaginable shape and color on the leaves and stems of that single tree.

They were galls, casings built by the tree in response to the manipulation of insects--in this instance, all species of wasps belonging to the family Cynipidae. Each cynipid species had made a distinct gall (you can identify the species of wasp by the shape, size, and color of the gall). ... In all the time I had spent in woodland and forest habitat, how could I not have noticed them before?

http://snipr.com/tjg62




Amino Acid Recipe Could Be Right for Long Life
from Science News

Long life may stem from a proper imbalance of dietary nutrients. A new study in fruit flies suggests that the life-extending properties of caloric restriction may be due not only to fewer calories in the diet, but also to just the right mix of protein building blocks, called amino acids. The study, published online December 2 in Nature, may help explain some of the health benefits of restricted-calorie diets.

Coupled with other data, the new study should prompt researchers to reevaluate whether it is calorie count or the nutrient composition of a diet that is most important for regulating lifespan and health, comments Luigi Fontana of Washington University in St. Louis.

Caloric restriction--a diet that contains a minimal amount of calories while maintaining healthy levels of nutrients--has been proven to extend lifespan in fruit flies, worms, mice, dogs, baboons and other organisms. Nutritious, low-cal diets also improve health in people, but scientists don't yet know whether such diets can extend maximal lifespan in humans.

http://snipr.com/tjg6a




Man Can Control Robotic Hand with Thoughts
from Time

ROME (Associated Press) -- An Italian who lost his left forearm in a car crash was successfully linked to a robotic hand, allowing him to feel sensations in the artificial limb and control it with his thoughts, scientists said Wednesday.

During a one-month experiment conducted last year, 26-year-old Pierpaolo Petruzziello felt like his lost arm had grown back again, although he was only controlling a robotic hand that was not even attached to his body. "It's a matter of mind, of concentration," Petruzziello said. "When you think of it as your hand and forearm, it all becomes easier."

Though similar experiments have been successful before, the European scientists who led the project say this was the first time a patient has been able to make such complex movements using his mind to control a biomechanic hand connected to his nervous system.

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California's Sinking Delta
from the Christian Science Monitor

Dennis Baldocchi often drives past the ruins of his grandmother's house on Sherman Island, in northern California's Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta. Flooding gutted the house when the island's levee broke 40 years ago. Today, grass grows through the floors and chickens wander through.

To Dr. Baldocchi, the slanting hulk whispers an unsettling truth: The land that his family farmed for three generations is sinking farther below sea level each year.

Immigrants began arriving at the Sacramento River Delta 150 years ago. They drained 450,000 acres of marshy lands so that they could farm asparagus, corn, and sugar beets.

http://snipr.com/tjg70
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 09:46:52 PM
December 4, 2009




Copenhagen Climate Change Talks Must Fail, Says Top Scientist
from the Guardian

The scientist who convinced the world to take notice of the looming danger of global warming says it would be better for the planet and for future generations if next week's Copenhagen climate change summit ended in collapse.

"I would rather it not happen if people accept that as being the right track because it's a disaster track," said [James] Hansen, who heads the Nasa Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York.

"The whole approach is so fundamentally wrong that it is better to reassess the situation. If it is going to be the Kyoto-type thing then [people] will spend years trying to determine exactly what that means." He was speaking as progress towards a deal in Copenhagen received a boost today, with India revealing a target to curb its carbon emissions. All four of the major emitters--the US, China, EU and India--have now tabled offers on emissions, although the equally vexed issue of funding for developing nations to deal with global warming remains deadlocked.

http://snipr.com/tk2w1




After Delays, Vaccine to Counter Bad Beef Tested
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

HOLYOKE, Colo. -- Jason Timmerman coaxed a balky calf into a chute on his feedlot one recent afternoon and jabbed a needle into its neck. He was injecting the animal with a new vaccine to make it immune to a dangerous form of the E. coli bacteria.

The calf and thousands of others are part of a large-scale test to see whether animal vaccines are an answer to one of the nation's most persistent food-safety problems.

The test has been a long time coming. Bureaucratic delays in Washington stalled the arrival of the vaccines for years, even as people continued to become sick and die from eating tainted beef. And now, even if the vaccines prove successful in the ambitious tests that are just getting under way, they face an uncertain future as farmers and feedlot owners worry about who will pick up the extra cost.

http://snipr.com/tk2wi




Feeding Birds Could Create New Species
from Wired

Central European blackcap warblers that spend the winter in the birdfeeder-rich United Kingdom are on a different evolutionary trajectory than those that migrate to Spain. The population hasn't yet split into two species, but it's headed in that direction.

"This is reproductive isolation, the first step of speciation," said Martin Schaefer, a University of Freiburg evolutionary biologist.

Blackcap migration routes are genetically determined, and the population studied by Schaefer has historically wintered in Spain. Those that flew north couldn't find food in barren winter landscapes, and perished. But during the last half-century, people in the U.K. put so much food out for birds that north-flying blackcaps could survive.

http://snipr.com/tk2yt




Shark Fins Traced to Home Waters Using DNA--A First
from National Geographic News

Many of the hammerhead sharks that are butchered to feed Asian demand for shark-fin soup start their lives in American waters, a new forensic study shows.

For the first time, scientists have used DNA from shark fins to determine where they came from. The researchers traced finds from the scalloped hammerhead shark species--collected at the world's biggest fin market in Hong Kong--back to rare populations in the Atlantic and Indo-Pacific oceans.

The trade in shark fins supplies Asian markets with the key ingredient in the luxury dish shark-fin soup. The practice claims up to 73 million sharks annually, including up to 3 million hammerheads. The finless fish are usually tossed back into the ocean to die.

http://snipr.com/tk2yy




Obama Science Advisers Grilled Over Hacked E-Mails
from the San Diego Union-Tribune

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- House Republicans pointed to controversial e-mails leaked from climate scientists and said it was evidence of corruption. Top administration scientists looking at the same thing found no such sign, saying it doesn't change the fact that the world is warming.

The e-mails from a British university's climate center were obtained by computer hackers and posted online about two weeks ago. Climate change skeptics contend the messages reveal that researchers manipulated and suppressed data and stifled dissent, and conservative bloggers are dubbing it "Climategate."

In the first Capitol Hill airing of the issue, House Republicans Wednesday read excerpts from at least eight of the e-mails, saying they showed the world needs to re-examine experts' claims that the science on warming is settled. One e-mail from 2003 was by John Holdren, then of Harvard University and now the president's science adviser.

http://snipr.com/tk2z9




Contested Signs of Mass Cannibalism
from Science News

At a settlement in what is now southern Germany, the menu turned gruesome 7,000 years ago. Over a period of perhaps a few decades, hundreds of people were butchered and eaten before parts of their bodies were thrown into oval pits, a new study suggests.

Cannibalism at the village, now called Herxheim, may have occurred during ceremonies in which people from near and far brought slaves, war prisoners or other dependents for ritual sacrifice, propose anthropologist Bruno Boulestin of the University of Bordeaux 1 in France and his colleagues. A social and political crisis in central Europe at that time triggered various forms of violence, the researchers suspect.

"Human sacrifice at Herxheim is a hypothesis that's difficult to prove right now, but we have evidence that several hundred people were eaten over a brief period," Boulestin says. Skeletal markings indicate that human bodies were butchered in the same way as animals.

http://snipr.com/tk2zh




Tests Find More Than 200 Chemicals in Newborn Umbilical Cord Blood
from Scientific American

U.S. minority infants are born carrying hundreds of chemicals in their bodies, according to a report released today by an environmental group.

The Environmental Working Group's study commissioned five laboratories to examine the umbilical cord blood of 10 babies of African-American, Hispanic and Asian heritage and found more than 200 chemicals in each newborn.

"We know the developing fetus is one of the most vulnerable populations, if not the most vulnerable, to environmental exposure," said Anila Jacobs, EWG senior scientist. "Their organ systems aren't mature and their detox methods are not in place, so cord blood gives us a good picture of exposure during this most vulnerable time of life."

http://snipr.com/tk2zo




Antarctica Was Climate Refuge During Great Extinction
from New Scientist

The cool climate of Antarctica was a refuge for animals fleeing climate change during the biggest mass extinction in Earth's history, suggests a new fossil study. The discovery may have implications for how modern animals will adapt to global warming.

Around 250 million years ago, at the end of the Permian period, about 90 per cent of land species were wiped out as global temperatures soared. A cat-sized distant relative of mammals, Kombuisia antarctica, seems to have survived the extinction by fleeing south to Antarctica.

Jörg Fröbisch, a geologist at the Field Museum in Chicago, and colleagues rediscovered fossils of K. antarctica dating from the end of the Permian among specimens collected from Antarctica over 30 years ago. The fossil hoard had been assembled for the American Museum of Natural History as evidence of the existence of the ancient supercontinent Pangaea, in which all today's continents were locked together in one land mass.

http://snipr.com/tk2zz




Cool Find in Hunt for Exoplanets
from BBC News Online

Astronomers have published an image of the coolest planet outside our solar system that has been pictured directly. The new find is more similar to our own Solar System than prior pictured exoplanets, in terms of the parent star's type and the planet's size.

However, the surface temperature is a scorching 280-370C, and could still prove to be a brown dwarf star.

The results, published in Astrophysical Journal, were obtained by a new camera on the Subaru telescope in Hawaii.

http://snipr.com/tk30i




Your Own Fat, Relocated
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The latest kind of recycling has nothing to do with soda bottles. It entails liposuctioning fat from, say, thighs or buttocks and injecting it into breasts to augment them. After being condemned in the early '90s, this procedure is generating newfound excitement among the handful of doctors nationwide who offer it and patients keen to enlarge their breasts without resorting to implants.

Almost 20 years ago, the association now known as the American Society of Plastic Surgeons issued a warning to its member doctors to not inject suctioned fat into patients' breasts, for fear that mammograms would be misread. Since some injected fat dies and calcifies, the thinking was that radiologists would not be able to distinguish between those calcifications (or calcium deposits) and suspicious ones that may indicate breast cancer.

A second concern was that too little injected fat survived being transplanted, because techniques for harvesting, refining and placing fat were not advanced enough. Even today, the success of fat grafting to the breast, as the procedure is also known, depends on the physician.

http://snipr.com/tk30s
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:10:17 PM
December 22, 2009




Herschel Space Observatory Sees Stars Being Born
from Science News

Peering into the heart of a dust-covered stellar nursery, a new infrared observatory has spied some 700 stars in the making. At the moment, the soon-to-be stars are just clumps of dust and gas. But about 100 of the clumps are protostars, embryonic bodies about to initiate nuclear fusion at their cores and become bona fide stars. The other 600 objects are less mature but will ultimately develop into new stars.

The European Space Agency's Herschel Space Observatory discovered the dust-obscured bodies by recording emissions of long-wavelength infrared radiation, which unlike visible light, penetrates through the embryos' dusty cocoons.

No other infrared satellite has been able to see into this dark, cold region, which lies 1,000 light-years from Earth in the Eagle constellation.

http://snipr.com/tsrxn



Building a Search Engine of the Brain
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

SAN DIEGO -- On a gray Wednesday afternoon here in early December, scientists huddled around what appeared to be a two-gallon carton of frozen yogurt, its exposed top swirling with dry-ice fumes.

As the square container, fixed to a moving platform, inched toward a steel blade mounted level with its surface, the group held its collective breath. The blade peeled off the top layer, rolling it up in slow motion like a slice of pale prosciutto. "Almost there," someone said.

Off came another layer, another, and another. And then there it was: a pink spot at first, now a smudge, now growing with every slice like spilled rosé on a cream carpet--a human brain. Not just any brain, either, but the one that had belonged to Henry Molaison, known worldwide as H. M., an amnesiac who collaborated on hundreds of studies of memory and died last year at age 82.

http://snipr.com/tsry8



One Dose of H1N1 Vaccine May Be Enough for Children
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Australian researchers have shown that a single dose of vaccine against pandemic H1N1 influenza can provide effective immunity against the swine flu virus in infants and children, a finding that, if corroborated, could help damp the spread of the virus by reducing the logistical complications associated with the currently recommended regimen of two doses.

Immunizing children plays a crucial role in preventing widespread outbreaks of flu and other infectious diseases because schools and camps provide a fertile breeding ground for viruses, which then spread into the community. Early swine flu outbreaks, in New York for example, were triggered by infections in the school system.

But immunizing a large proportion of schoolchildren is a daunting task, and making sure they receive the recommended two doses is doubly difficult.

http://snipr.com/tsryy



Widening the Search for Extraterrestrial Life
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

HAT CREEK, CALIF. -- The wide dishes, 20 feet across and raised high on their pedestals, creaked and groaned as the winds from an approaching snowstorm pushed into this highland valley. Forty-two in all, the radio telescopes laid out in view of some of California's tallest mountains look otherworldly, and now their sounds conjured up visions of deep-space denizens as well.

The instruments, the initial phase of the planned 350-dish Allen Telescope Array, are designed to systematically scan the skies for radio signals sent by advanced civilizations from distant star systems and planets.

Fifty years after it began--and 18 years since Congress voted to strip taxpayer money from the effort--the nation's search for extraterrestrial intelligence is alive and growing.

http://snipr.com/tsrzc



Old Discovery Could Bring New Cancer Therapies
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

An 80-year-old discovery about the way cancer cells generate energy is fueling a new wave of research into how cancers proliferate--and how to stop them.

In the 1920s, the German scientist Otto Warburg first observed that cancer cells burn sugar differently than normal cells do. Today, doctors exploit the phenomenon to capture images of tumors using PET-CT scans, which identify areas of the body that are metabolically active.

Still, the reason for cancer cells' peculiar metabolism--and the question of whether it plays a key role in driving cancer--remained largely mysterious to scientists. Over the past few years, however, biochemistry research has led to a resurgence of interest in cancer cell metabolism--the ways in which cancer cells generate energy to function and grow.

http://snipr.com/tsrzn



'Bumper Year' for Botanical Finds
from BBC News Online

Giant rainforest trees, tiny fungi and wild coffee plants are among almost 300 species that have been described by UK botanists for the first time in 2009.

The finds were recorded by researchers from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, who carried out surveys involving teams in 100 countries around the world.

The discoveries showed how little of the world's plant species had been documented, the researchers said. They warned that nearly a third of the finds were in danger of extinction.

http://snipr.com/tss09



First Jesus-Era House Discovered in Nazareth
from the Seattle Times

NAZARETH, Israel (Associated Press) -- Just in time for Christmas, archaeologists on Monday unveiled what may have been the home of one of Jesus' childhood neighbors. The humble dwelling is the first dating to the era of Jesus to be discovered in Nazareth, then a hamlet of around 50 impoverished Jewish families where Jesus spent his boyhood.

Archaeologists and present-day residents of Nazareth imagined Jesus as a youngster, playing with other children in the isolated village, not far from the spot where the Archangel Gabriel revealed to Mary that she would give birth to the boy.

Today the ornate Basilica of the Annunciation marks that spot, and Nazareth is the largest Arab city in northern Israel, with about 65,000 residents. Muslims now outnumber Christians two to one in the noisy, crowded city.

http://snipr.com/tss0k



In Oak and Iron, New Pipe Organ Sounds Echo of Age of Bach
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ROCHESTER -- The ceremonial pipe organ of the 18th century was the Formula One racer of its time, a masterpiece of human ingenuity so elegant in its outward appearance that a casual observer could only guess at the complexity that lay within.

Each organ was designed to fit its intended space, ranging in size from local churches where townspeople could worship to vast cathedrals fit for royalty. The builders were precision craftsmen celebrated for their skill in hand-making thousands of moving parts and in shaping and tuning metal and wooden pipes to mimic the sounds of each instrument in an orchestra.

... Modern instruments take advantage of technologies that have given organ-makers generations of new tools and materials, like air compressors, composites and the electric circuit. But before all that, the builders did it another way.

http://snipr.com/tss22



The Truth About Lions
from Smithsonian Magazine

Craig Packer was behind the wheel when we came across the massive cat slumped in the shade beneath a spiny tree. It was a dark-maned male, elaborately sprawled, as if it had fallen from a great height. Its sides heaved with shallow pants.

Packer, a University of Minnesota ecologist and the world's leading lion expert, spun the wheel of the Land Rover and drove straight toward the animal. He pointed out the lion's scraped elbow and a nasty puncture wound on its side. Its mane was full of leaves. From a distance it looked like a deposed lord, grand and pitiable.

... Packer, 59, is tall, skinny and sharply angular, like a Serengeti thorn tree. He has spent a good chunk of his life at the park's Lion House, a concrete, fortress-like structure that includes an office, kitchen and three bedrooms. ... Packer has been running the Serengeti Lion Project for 31 of its 43 years. It is the most extensive carnivore study ever conducted.

http://snipr.com/tss2c



Bird-Like Dinosaur Used Venom to Subdue Prey
from Scientific American

A fierce, feathered raptor might have been terrifying enough to small dinosaurs, lizards, birds and mammals living 128 million years ago, but add venom to its arsenal and the threat would be paralyzing--literally.

First described a decade ago, Sinornithosaurus had peculiar dental and facial features--including some long, grooved teeth and indentations in its face--that initially escaped explanation.

But a new paper, published online Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, proposes that this Lower Cretaceous raptor used those adaptations to deliver prey-stunning poison that aided in killing.

http://snipr.com/tss2p
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:11:04 PM
 December 18, 2009



At a Mine's Bottom, Hints of Dark Matter
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

An international team of physicists working in the bottom of an old iron mine in Minnesota said Thursday that they might have registered the first faint hints of a ghostly sea of subatomic particles known as dark matter long thought to permeate the cosmos.

The particles showed as two tiny pulses of heat deposited over the course of two years in chunks of germanium and silicon that had been cooled to a temperature near absolute zero. But, the scientists said, there was more than a 20 percent chance that the pulses were caused by fluctuations in the background radioactivity of their cavern, so the results were tantalizing, but not definitive.

Gordon Kane, a physicist from the University of Michigan, called the results "inconclusive, sadly," adding, "It seems likely it is dark matter detection, but no proof."

http://snipr.com/tqu2r



On Environment, Obama and Scientists Take Hit in Poll
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

As President Obama arrives in Copenhagen hoping to seal an elusive deal on climate change, his approval rating on dealing with global warming has crumbled at home and there is broad opposition to spending taxpayer money to encourage developing nations to curtail their energy use, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.

There's also rising public doubt and growing political polarization about what scientists have to say on the environment, and a widespread perception that there is a lot of disagreement among scientists about whether global warming is happening.

But for all the challenges American policymakers have to overcome, nearly two-thirds of people surveyed say the federal government should regulate the release of greenhouse gases from sources like power plants, cars and factories in an effort to curb global warming.

http://snipr.com/tqu4n



Human-Like Fossil Find Is Breakthrough of the Year
from BBC News Online

The discovery of a fossilised skeleton that has become a "central character in the story of human evolution" has been named the science breakthrough of 2009.

The 4.4 million year old creature, that may be a human ancestor, was first described in a series of papers in the journal Science in October. It has now been recognised by the journal's editors as the most important scientific accomplishment of this year. It is part of a scientific top 10 that ranges from space science to genetics.

The first fossils of the species, Ardipithecus ramidus, were unearthed in 1994. Scientists recognised their importance immediately. But the very poor condition of the ancient bones meant that it took researchers 15 years to excavate and analyse them.

http://snipr.com/tqu55



Murals Depict Everyday Life of the Maya
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Newly discovered Mayan murals, uncovered during an excavation at Calakmul, Mexico, offer a glimpse of the life of ordinary people instead of the more common depictions of the concerns and lives of Mayan ruling elites, according to the researchers who found the artworks.

The wall murals, which probably date from the 7th century, were preserved by a layer of clay when new buildings were constructed over the original one. They show groups of men, women and children doing such ordinary things as preparing food and tobacco, drinking maize gruel, serving and eating maize-bread tamales, wearing tall decorated hats and carrying large rope-tied bundles.

Hieroglyphic captions, including some using symbols that researchers hadn't encountered before, accompany some of the murals.

http://snipr.com/tqu6q



Shroud of Turin Not Jesus', Tomb Discovery Suggests
from National Geographic News

From a long-sealed cave tomb, archaeologists have excavated the only known Jesus-era burial shroud in Jerusalem, a new study says.

The discovery adds to evidence that the controversial Shroud of Turin did not wrap the body of Christ, researchers say. What's more, the remains of the man wrapped in the shroud are said to hold DNA evidence of leprosy--the earliest known case of the disease.

"In all of the approximately 1,000 tombs from the first century A.D. which have been excavated around Jerusalem, not one fragment of a shroud had been found" until now, said archaeologist Shimon Gibson, who excavated the site for the Israel Antiquities Authority. "We really hit the jackpot."

http://snipr.com/tqu6w



'Reconditioned' Lungs Transplanted
from the Times (London)

A British patient has undergone a pioneering lung transplant involving damaged donor lungs that were "resuscitated" in a laboratory to make them suitable for use.

James Finlayson, a sufferer of advanced cystic fibrosis, has become the first Briton to undergo the operation, which has been described by scientists as having the potential to address Britain's severe shortage of donor organs.

Mr Finlayson, 24, was discharged from hospital at the end of last month after receiving the lungs from a team in Newcastle. The organs were unuseable when donated but were repaired with a perfusion technique, where an oxygenated solution is pumped over them.

http://snipr.com/tqu72



Scientists Watch Deep-Sea Volcano for First Time
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

SAN FRANCISCO (Associated Press) -- Scientists have witnessed the eruption of a deep-sea volcano for the first time ever, capturing on video the fiery bubbles of molten lava as they exploded 4,000 feet beneath the surface of the Pacific Ocean in what researchers are calling a major geological discovery.

A submersible robot witnessed the eruption during an underwater expedition in May near Samoa, and the high-definition videos were presented Thursday at a geophysics conference in San Francisco.

Scientists hope the images, data and samples obtained during the mission will shed new light on how the ocean's crust was formed and how the earth behaves when tectonic plates ram into each other.

http://snipr.com/tqu7c



Artificial Platelets Catalyze Clotting
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Platelets can quickly stanch the bleeding from a cut in your finger, but the hemorrhaging caused by a car crash or a battlefield injury might overwhelm the blood-clotting abilities of these cell fragments. Now, researchers report that they have designed a potential helper for such situations, a synthetic platelet that they show can curtail blood loss in animals.

After an injury, platelets stick to the walls of damaged vessels, to each other, and to clotting proteins, forming a plug. Platelet transfusions can boost clotting in trauma patients, wounded soldiers, and people with low platelet counts because of disease or cancer treatment.

But platelets obtained from donated blood have several drawbacks, including a shelf life of only 5 days--versus 6 weeks for red blood cells--and a risk of bacterial infections.

http://snipr.com/tqu7p



Gene Variant May Help Against Emphysema, Asthma
from Science News

People who carry a variant form of a gene that encodes a protein called MMP-12 are in luck. This uncommon form of the gene appears to provide some protection against emphysema and asthma, researchers report online December 16 in the New England Journal of Medicine.

In the study, an international team of researchers analyzed data on lung function and genetics from seven studies that included more than 5,000 people and found that 7 to 13 percent of people harbored the beneficial variant of MMP-12.

In four of the studies, the scientists found that tobacco smokers carrying the helpful form of the protein were one-third less likely to develop chronic obstructive pulmonary disease than other smokers. COPD includes emphysema and chronic obstructive bronchitis and is the fourth leading cause of death in the United States after heart disease, cancer and stroke.

http://snipr.com/tqu81



Earth-Like Planets May Be Made of Carbon
from Scientific American

Astronomy is the science of the exotic, but the thing that astronomers most want to find is the familiar: another planet like Earth, a hospitable face in a hostile cosmos. The Kepler spacecraft, which was launched last March, is their best instrument yet for discovering Earth-like planets around sunlike stars, as opposed to the giant planets that have been planet finders' main harvest so far.

Many predict that 2010 will be the year of exo-Earths. But if the giant planets, which looked nothing like what astronomers had expected, are any indication, those Earths may not be so reassuringly familiar either.

It has dawned on theorists in recent years that other Earth-mass planets may be enormous water droplets, balls of nitrogen or lumps of iron. Name your favorite element or compound, and someone has imagined a planet made of it. The spectrum of possibilities depends largely on the ratio of carbon to oxygen.

http://snipr.com/tqu8f

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:11:59 PM
December 17, 2009



Scientists Crack 'Entire Genetic Code' of Cancer
from BBC News Online

Scientists have unlocked the entire genetic code of two of the most common cancers--skin and lung--a move they say could revolutionise cancer care.

Not only will the cancer maps pave the way for blood tests to spot tumours far earlier, they will also yield new drug targets, say the Wellcome Trust team.

Scientists around the globe are now working to catalogue all the genes that go wrong in many types of human cancer. The UK is looking at breast cancer, Japan at liver and India at mouth. China is studying stomach cancer, and the US is looking at cancers of the brain, ovary and pancreas.

http://snipr.com/tqbap



That Tap Water Is Legal but May Be Unhealthy
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The 35-year-old federal law regulating tap water is so out of date that the water Americans drink can pose what scientists say are serious health risks--and still be legal.

Only 91 contaminants are regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act, yet more than 60,000 chemicals are used within the United States, according to Environmental Protection Agency estimates. Government and independent scientists have scrutinized thousands of those chemicals in recent decades, and identified hundreds associated with a risk of cancer and other diseases at small concentrations in drinking water, according to an analysis of government records by The New York Times.

But not one chemical has been added to the list of those regulated by the Safe Drinking Water Act since 2000. Other recent studies have found that even some chemicals regulated by that law pose risks at much smaller concentrations than previously known.

http://snipr.com/tqbaw



Microbes That Keep Us Healthy Are Disappearing
from Scientific American

Bacteria, viruses and fungi have been primarily cast as the villains in the battle for better human health. But a growing community of researchers is sounding the warning that many of these microscopic guests are really ancient allies.

Having evolved along with the human species, most of the miniscule beasties that live in and on us are actually helping to keep us healthy, just as our well-being promotes theirs. In fact, some researchers think of our bodies as superorganisms, rather than one organism teeming with hordes of subordinate invertebrates.

The human body has some 10 trillion human cells--but 10 times that number of microbial cells. So what happens when such an important part of our bodies goes missing? With rapid changes in sanitation, medicine and lifestyle in the past century, some of these indigenous species are facing decline, displacement and possibly even extinction.

http://snipr.com/tqbey



Creating Citizen Scientists
from Seed

... You might think astronomy would be one field where amateurs can't contribute much to the state of knowledge. The most advanced telescopes cost hundreds of millions of dollars and have long waiting lists of eager professionals anxious to put them to use.

How could an amateur scientist possibly help? While it is true an amateur isn't likely to get time on a cutting-edge telescope, that doesn't mean he or she can't help analyze the torrents of data those telescopes produce.

The newly-launched site Zooniverse consolidates several massive projects, each of which engages the assistance of hundreds of thousands of volunteers worldwide. I logged in to one of its oldest projects, Galaxy Zoo, to give it a try.

http://snipr.com/tqbfi



All Mammals March to the Same Beat
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Many animals test their legs and totter forth only hours after they are born, but humans need a year before they take their first, hesitant steps. Is something fundamentally different going on in human babies?

Maybe not. A new study shows that the time it takes for humans and all other mammals to start walking fits closely with the size of their brains.

In past studies to develop a new animal model for the brain events that support motor development, neurophysiologist Martin Garwicz of Lund University in Sweden and his colleagues discovered that the schedules by which ferrets and rats acquire various motor skills, such as crawling and walking, are strikingly similar to each other; the progress simply happens faster for rats. That made them wonder how similar the timing of motor development might be among mammals in general.

http://snipr.com/tqbfz



A Sultry World Is Found Circling a Distant Star
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Call it Sauna World. Astronomers said Wednesday that they had discovered a planet composed mostly of water.

You would not want to live there. In addition to the heat--400 degrees Fahrenheit on the ocean surface--the planet is probably cloaked in a crushingly dank and dark fog of superheated steam and other gases. But its discovery has encouraged a growing feeling among astronomers that they are on the verge of a breakthrough and getting closer to finding a planet something could live on.

"This probably is not habitable, but it didn't miss the habitable zone by that much," said David Charbonneau of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, who led the team that discovered the new planet and will reports its findings on Thursday in the journal Nature.

http://snipr.com/tqbge



Airman Injured in Afghanistan Gets a Remote Pancreas Fix
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Six days before Thanksgiving, Air Force Senior Airman Tre Francesco Porfirio was pulling duty in Afghanistan when three high-velocity bullets tore through his pancreas--the fist-size organ that produces insulin and enzymes needed to extract fuel from food.

With an injury like that, Porfirio's prognosis was difficult: If he could survive long enough to get to a specialized transplant center, he could perhaps get a transplant of islet cells from a deceased donor and take anti-rejection drugs for the rest of his life. Or doctors could remove his pancreas, leaving him completely dependent on insulin. Either way, an early death from complications of Type 1 diabetes was highly likely.

Instead, doctors improvised a way to help the serviceman and made Porfirio, 21, a pioneer in the technique of islet-cell transplantation.

http://snipr.com/tqbh2



Deep-Sea Glider
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

She was at sea for 221 days. She was alone, often in dangerous places, and usually out of touch. Her predecessor had disappeared on a similar trip, probably killed by a shark. Yet she was always able to do what was asked, to head in a different direction on a moment's notice and report back without complaint.

So is it any surprise tears were shed when people could finally wrap their arms around her steel torso once more?

"She was a hero," said Rutgers University oceanographer Scott Glenn last week after retrieving an aquatic glider called the Scarlet Knight from the stormy Atlantic off western Spain. The 7-foot-9-inch submersible device, shaped like a large-winged torpedo, had just become the first robot to cross an ocean.

http://snipr.com/tqbi2



How to Slow Climate Change for Just $15 Billion
from Wired

Weaning humanity from its fossil fuel habit will take decades, and it will take decades more for global warming to stop. But one simple measure could slow warming in some of Earth's most sensitive regions, effective immediately--and it would cost just $15 billion.

That's a rough price tag for providing clean stoves to the 500 million households that use open fires, fed by wood and animal dung and coal, to heat their homes and cook. Those fires produce one-quarter of all so-called "black carbon," a sooty pollutant that's adding to the planetary heat burden.

"We know how to cook without smoke," said Veerabhadran Ramanathan, a University of California, San Diego climatographer. "A clean stove costs $30. Multiply that by 500 million households, and it's only $15 billion. This is a solvable problem." After floating to the atmosphere, black carbon mixes with dust to form a solar heat-absorbing particulate layer. Raindrops form around the particles, trapping even more heat. Soot deposited by the rain heats up, too.

http://snipr.com/tqbib



Alice's Adventures in Algebra: Wonderland Solved
from New Scientist

What would Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland be without the Cheshire Cat, the trial, the Duchess's baby or the Mad Hatter's tea party? Look at the original story that the author told Alice Liddell and her two sisters one day during a boat trip near Oxford, though, and you'll find that these famous characters and scenes are missing from the text.

As I embarked on my DPhil investigating Victorian literature, I wanted to know what inspired these later additions. The critical literature focused mainly on Freudian interpretations of the book as a wild descent into the dark world of the subconscious.

There was no detailed analysis of the added scenes, but from the mass of literary papers, one stood out: in 1984 Helena Pycior of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee had linked the trial of the Knave of Hearts with a Victorian book on algebra.

http://snipr.com/tqbip
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:12:38 PM
December 16, 2009



Alzheimer's Risk Linked to Appetite Hormone
from BBC News Online

High levels of a hormone that controls appetite appear to be linked to a reduced risk of developing Alzheimer's disease, US research suggests.

The 12-year-study of 200 volunteers found those with the lowest levels of leptin were more likely to develop the disease than those with the highest.

The JAMA study builds on work that links low leptin levels to the brain plaques found in Alzheimer's patients. The hope is leptin could eventually be used as both a marker and a treatment.

http://snipr.com/tpt1x



For Bicyclists Needing a Boost, This Wheel May Help
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

It is not easy to reinvent the wheel, but researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are giving it their best shot.

The Senseable City Laboratory at M.I.T. has designed a wheel that captures the kinetic energy released when a rider brakes and saves it for when the rider needs a boost. While technically sound, the wheel's true challenge may be in winning over cyclists. For centuries, bikes have been beloved for their simplicity, not their bells and whistles.

... The new wheel uses a kinetic energy recovery system, the same technology used by hybrid cars, like the Toyota Prius, to harvest otherwise wasted energy when a cyclist brakes or speeds down a hill. With that energy, it charges up a battery inside the wheel's hub.

http://snipr.com/tpt2a



New NIH Forms Raise Concerns
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

The new, shortened National Institutes of Health grant applications, designed to make the process easier on applicants and reviewers, may have an unintended downside, some researchers say.

Specifically, some critics say the new, shorter forms--down from 25 to 12 pages for R01 grants--will favor better writers, making it more difficult for younger investigators to compete for NIH funding.

"[The new grant applications] are going to focus people's words, and I do think it will favor better writers," said Robert Kalb, a University of Pennsylvania neurologist who is also the chair of the NIH's cellular and molecular biology of neurodegeneration study section. Plus, "it frees the experienced investigator to not provide as much feasibility and preliminary data because they can just cite their previous publications."

http://snipr.com/tpt2m



Teen Drug Use Survey Seen as 'Warning Sign'
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The federal government's annual report of kids' alcohol and drug abuse seems reassuring: Compared with earlier in the decade, use of hallucinogens was down in 2008, marijuana use was way down, and use of methamphetamines was way, way down.

But the researchers and public officials who crunch those numbers warned that some of the statistics gleaned from an annual survey of 46,000 American eighth-, 10th- and 12th-graders were worrisome.

Though drug and alcohol use seems to be declining or holding steady, there has been slippage in teen disapproval of such practices and perception of the risks, officials warned.

http://snipr.com/tpt30



A Deluge of Data Shapes a New Era in Computing
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In a speech given just a few weeks before he was lost at sea off the California coast in January 2007, Jim Gray, a database software pioneer and a Microsoft researcher, sketched out an argument that computing was fundamentally transforming the practice of science.

Dr. Gray called the shift a "fourth paradigm." The first three paradigms were experimental, theoretical and, more recently, computational science. He explained this paradigm as an evolving era in which an "exaflood" of observational data was threatening to overwhelm scientists.

The only way to cope with it, he argued, was a new generation of scientific computing tools to manage, visualize and analyze the data flood.

http://snipr.com/tpt38



Climate Change Talks Enter 'Important Moment'
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

COPENHAGEN -- Global warming talks entered what the top United Nations climate official described as "a very distinct and important moment in the process" Tuesday, as top ministers searched for a way to ensure the commitments nations made here would stand up over time.

Yvo de Boer, the executive secretary of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, told reporters both large and small countries will have to make concessions in the coming days because "there is still an enormous amount of ground to be covered if this conference is to deliver what people around the world expect it to deliver."

The United States and other industrialized nations are still pressing for a way to verify that China, India and other emerging economies will make the greenhouse gas emissions cuts they've promised to make in the context of a new agreement, while developing countries argue these rich nations have not provided the financing and ambitious climate targets that would be commensurate with their historic responsibility for global warming.

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Can a Lull in Solar Activity Head Off Climate Change?
from the Boston Globe(Registration Required)

CAMBRIDGE -- Old Sol these days is showing a strikingly bland face, one nearly unmarred by the usual wild magnetic storms, whipsawing coronal loops, and fiery plasma ejections.

"The sun is in the pits of the deepest solar minimum in almost 100 years," said Madhulika Guhathakurta, lead program scientist for NASA's Living With A Star program, whose focus is solar variability and its effects on the earth.

From the earth's perspective, scientists say, the periodic lull in the sun's activity means cosmic rays reaching our section of the solar system are way up, the planet's ionosphere is way down, and the minimum may be producing some small but still important counteraction to climate change--though that is controversial.

http://snipr.com/tpt3b



Distance Vision Is All a Blur to More of Us
from the Baltimore Sun

For an increasing number of Americans, life's a blur. That's according to a population-based study published Monday showing that rates of myopia--difficulty seeing distant objects--are soaring.

The trend is matched in many other countries, causing eye doctors to wonder what could be causing the decline in human vision. Some suspect both an increase in our close-up work time (think computer use) and a decrease in time spent outdoors.

Researchers at the National Eye Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health, found that rates of myopia--also called nearsightedness--in people ages 12 to 54 increased from 25% in 1971-72 to 41.6% in 1999-2004. The study included people with a range of myopia, from mild to severe.

http://snipr.com/tpt3f



Yellowstone Magma Pocket 20% Larger Than Thought
from National Geographic News

The huge column of molten rock that feeds Yellowstone's "supervolcano" dives deeper and fills a magma chamber 20 percent bigger than previous estimates, scientists say.

The finding, based on the most detailed model yet of the region's geologic plumbing, suggests that Yellowstone's magma chamber contains even more fuel for a future "supereruption" than anyone had suspected.

The model shows that a 45-mile-wide plume of hot, molten rock rises to feed the supervolcano from at least 410 miles beneath Earth's surface.

http://snipr.com/tpt3r



Irrigation Draining California Groundwater
from Science News

SAN FRANCISCO -- In the past six years, the irrigation of crops in California's Central Valley has pulled groundwater from aquifers there at rates that are unsustainable if current trends continue, scientists say.

The Central Valley, which covers about 52,000 square kilometers, is one of the world's most productive agricultural regions, says Jay Famiglietti, director of the University of California Center for Hydrologic Modeling in Irvine.

... But the productivity of those fertile fields is increasingly at risk: Satellite data suggest that more than 20 cubic kilometers of groundwater has been pumped from the valley's aquifers since October 2003, Famiglietti reported December 14 at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union. That's roughly 4 percent the volume of Lake Erie.

http://snipr.com/tpt41
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:13:49 PM
 December 15, 2009



Radiation From CT Scans Linked to Cancers
from USA Today

CT scans deliver far more radiation than previously believed and may contribute to 29,000 new cancers each year, along with 14,500 deaths, suggest two studies in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

One study, led by the National Cancer Institute's Amy Berrington de Gonzalez, used existing exposure data to estimate how many cancers might be caused by CT scans.

Another study in the journal suggests the problem may even be worse. In that study, researchers found that people may be exposed to up to four times as much radiation as estimated by earlier studies.

http://snipr.com/tp8hk



Half a Lifetime Spent in Pursuit of Waterbirds
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Twenty years ago, Theodore Cross traveled 16 time zones, from New York to Moscow, Irkutsk and Yakutsk, and finally to the tundra of the Kolyma Delta, in northeastern Siberia, to catch a coveted glimpse of an Arctic bird, the Ross's gull.

Mr. Cross did spot one gull, but its nest was overtaken by a parasitic jaeger before he could return with his blind and his long telephoto lens. The trip was a failure. Two weeks later, the unexpected happened: a Ross's gull showed up in Baltimore. Thousands of birders converged on the spot for the rare sighting.

"They call it the bird that launched 20,000 binoculars," Mr. Cross said. His 344-page volume, Waterbirds (W. W. Norton & Company), is part visual encyclopedia, part memoir of a nearly half-century pursuit of birds.

http://snipr.com/tp8i4



NASA Launches New Mapping Spacecraft
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

NASA's newest mapping mission, designed to sniff out the dimmest residents of our neighborhood in space, launched successfully Monday morning from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

... Over the next 10 months, the spacecraft will photograph the entire night sky in the infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum, finding objects too dim and cool to appear in ordinary light, much as night goggles reveal the faint signatures of warm-blooded creatures that would otherwise be hidden by vegetation or darkness.

The craft should greatly expand the catalogue of the known universe. In our solar neighborhood alone, it is expected to find thousands of never-seen asteroids between Mars and Jupiter ....

http://snipr.com/tp8j0



Plan to Rev Up Clean Technology in Poor Nations
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

COPENHAGEN -- Energy Secretary Steven Chu on Monday announced a five-year, $350 million international plan to deploy clean technology in developing countries.

The effort includes such things as putting solar lanterns in poor households and promoting advanced energy-efficient appliances worldwide, administration officials said.

The Climate Renewables and Efficiency Deployment Initiative is an attempt by the United States and other industrialized nations to help curb energy consumption in countries that will help determine whether global greenhouse emissions keep rising or level off.

http://snipr.com/tp9p7



Octopus Snatches Coconut and Runs
from BBC News Online

An octopus and its coconut-carrying antics have surprised scientists. Underwater footage reveals that the creatures scoop up halved coconut shells before scampering away with them so they can later use them as shelters.

Writing in the journal Current Biology, the team says it is the first example of tool use in octopuses.

One of the researchers, Dr Julian Finn from Australia's Museum Victoria, told BBC News: "I almost drowned laughing when I saw this the first time."

http://snipr.com/tp8r8



Did Mammoths Vanish Before and After Humans Arrived?
from Scientific American

Before humans arrived, the Americas were home to woolly mammoths, saber-toothed cats, giant ground sloths and other behemoths, an array of megafauna more impressive than even Africa boasts today.

Researchers have advanced several theories to explain what did them in and when the event occurred. A series of discoveries announced in the past four weeks, at first glance apparently contradictory, adds fresh details to the mystery of this mass extinction.

One prominent theory pegs humans as the cause of the demise, often pointing to the Clovis people, who left the earliest clear signs of humans entering the New World roughly 13,500 years ago. ... Another hypothesis supposes that climate was the culprit ....

http://snipr.com/tp8rn



Trusting Nature as the Climate Referee
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Imagine there's no Copenhagen. Imagine a planet in which global warming was averted without the periodic need for thousands of people to fly around the world to promise to stop burning fossil fuels.

Imagine no international conferences wrangling over the details of climate policy. Imagine entrusting the tough questions to a referee: Mother Earth.

That is the intriguing suggestion of Ross McKitrick, an economist at the University of Guelph in Ontario who ... is virtuously restricting his carbon footprint by staying away from Copenhagen this week.

http://snipr.com/tp8uw



Higgs in Space: Orbiting Telescope Could Beat the LHC
from New Scientist

Evidence for the Higgs boson could be pouring down upon us from deep space. If so, an orbiting space telescope could upstage the Large Hadron Collider in the search for the elusive particle.

NASA's FERMI satellite was launched last year to detect gamma rays. One expected source of gamma rays is the mutual annihilation of dark matter particles in our galaxy.

While the nature of dark matter--which makes up 90 per cent of the matter in the universe--is unknown, physicists think it is made of weakly interacting massive particles, or WIMPs.

http://snipr.com/tp8xx



A Cheap Way to Chop up Nitrogen
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Nitrogen atoms are needed to make many important chemicals from drugs to fertilizers. But getting those atoms into chemicals is challenging, because nitrogen molecules are tough nuts to crack.

They consist of two atoms sharing a stubborn triple bond, which chemists can break up only by scorching them with temperatures of up to 500°C. And that results in the simple chemical ammonia, which needs further processing to produce more complicated compounds.

Now chemists have bypassed the energy-intensive reaction and devised a new one that splits molecular nitrogen at room temperature and synthesizes a common fertilizer.

http://snipr.com/tp8y9



UK's Vista Telescope Takes Stunning Images
from BBC News Online

The first images have been revealed from a telescope that can map the sky much faster and deeper than any other.

The Vista (Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy) is dedicated to mapping the sky in infrared light.

Spectacular images, including some of the centre of our Milky Way, show, astronomers say, that the UK-designed telescope is working "extremely well." It is based at the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) Paranal Observatory in Chile.

http://snipr.com/tp8yo
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:14:25 PM
December 14, 2009



Mammogram Math
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In his inaugural address, Barack Obama promised to restore science to its "rightful place." This has partly occurred, as evidenced by this month's release of 13 new human embryonic stem-cell lines.

The recent brouhaha over the guidelines put forth by the government task force on breast-cancer screening, however, illustrates how tricky it can be to deliver on this promise. One big reason is that people may not like or even understand what scientists say, especially when what they say is complex, counterintuitive or ambiguous.

As we now know, the panel of scientists advised that routine screening for asymptomatic women in their 40s was not warranted and that mammograms for women 50 or over should be given biennially rather than annually. The response was furious. Fortunately, both the panel's concerns and the public's reaction to its recommendations may be better understood by delving into the murky area between mathematics and psychology.

http://snipr.com/tojva



Genome Reveals Panda's Carnivorous Side
from Nature News

The complete genetic sequence of the giant panda has revealed that the iconic Chinese bear has all the genes required to digest meat--but not its staple food, bamboo.

The international team sequenced a three-year-old female panda called Jingjing, who was also a mascot of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, and found that she lacks any recognizable genes for cellulases--enzymes that break down the plant material cellulose. "The panda's bamboo diet may be dictated by its gut bacteria rather than by its own genetic composition," says Wang Jun, deputy director of the Beijing Genomics Institute in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, who led the sequencing project.

The researchers also discovered that the T1R1 gene, which encodes a key receptor for the savoury or 'umami' flavour of meat, has become an inactive 'pseudogene' due to two mutations. "This may explain why the panda diet is primarily herbivorous even though it is classified as a carnivore," says Wang.

http://snipr.com/tojvm



AP Impact: Science Not Faked, But Not Pretty
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LONDON (Associated Press) -- E-mails stolen from climate scientists show they stonewalled skeptics and discussed hiding data--but the messages don't support claims that the science of global warming was faked, according to an exhaustive review by The Associated Press.

The 1,073 e-mails examined by the AP show that scientists harbored private doubts, however slight and fleeting, even as they told the world they were certain about climate change. However, the exchanges don't undercut the vast body of evidence showing the world is warming because of man-made greenhouse gas emissions.

The scientists were keenly aware of how their work would be viewed and used, and, just like politicians, went to great pains to shape their message. Sometimes, they sounded more like schoolyard taunts than scientific tenets.

http://snipr.com/tojvw



Butterflies Versus Beetles
from the Christian Science Monitor

Sierra Chincua, Mexico -- The butterflies flitting in the sky above seem ablaze, as sunlight filters down into the Sierra Chincua forest in Mexico's Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve. Millions of the orange-and-black insects are just arriving, as part of their annual 2,800-mile journey from Canada and the United States.

But this year, because of the worst drought in nearly 70 years, an infestation of bark beetles has hit this 138,000-acre reserve, where tourists from around the world come to view part of a migration pattern considered one of the globe's most extraordinary.

Authorities have already identified more than 7,500 beetle-infested fir trees--three times the normal amount in any given year--and have raced to cut them down. "We can expect to find more infected trees," says Rosendo Caro, director of the reserve.

http://snipr.com/tojw0



Poor Nations Threaten Climate Deal Showdown at Copenhagen Summit
from the Guardian

The Copenhagen climate talks hit trouble tonight as a number of African countries indicated their leaders would refuse to take part in the final summit unless significant progress was made in the next three days.

The showdown between rich and poor countries came as ministers began arriving in Copenhagen to take over negotiations. However, negotiators failed to reach agreement in key areas such as emission cuts, long-term finance and when poor countries should start to reduce emissions.

More than 110 heads of state, mainly from developing countries, are due to begin arriving on Thursday for an intense 24 hours of final negotiations.

http://snipr.com/tojw5



Genetic 'Map' of Asia's Diversity
from

from BBC News Online

An international scientific effort has revealed the genetics behind Asia's diversity. The Human Genome Organisation's (HUGO) Pan-Asian SNP Consortium carried out a study of almost 2,000 people across the continent.

Their findings support the hypothesis that Asia was populated primarily through a single migration event from the south. The researchers described their findings in the journal Science.

They found genetic similarities between populations throughout Asia and an increase in genetic diversity from northern to southern latitudes.

http://snipr.com/tol6q



New Google Innovation to Help Scientists Monitor Deforestation
from Spiegel Online

A new program from Google is helping environmentalists see the forest for the trees. Literally.

In Copenhagen on Thursday, the Internet giant launched a new technology that will allow governments, environmentalists and others to observe and measure on a global scale how the Earth's forests are changing. Google worked with the Carnegie Institution for Science and with Imazon, a non-profit research institution dedicated to sustainable development in the Amazon, to bring the project to life.

Using the "Google Cloud," the company's system of networked computers and computing power, the technology will be able to analyze deforestation and detect illegal logging in seconds, the company says. Indeed, in addition to helping scientists, it could also be a potential boon to local law enforcement. It will also lower the cost for nations to monitor and thereby protect their forests by providing an online platform to access and analyze the data collected. Google points out that Google Earth already allows people to view deforestation, but up until now there has been no way to measure the destructive activity.

http://snipr.com/tol6q



Turtles Act Like Chameleons
from LiveScience

Freshwater turtles' skin and shells often match the color of their habitat's substrate, which may help them deceive predators and prey alike. But what happens if turtles change abodes, from a black swamp, say, to a sandy-bottomed pond?

John W. Rowe, of Alma College in Michigan, and three colleagues collected gravid female midland painted turtles and red-eared sliders from the wild, brought them to the lab, and injected them with oxytocin, a hormone that induces egg laying.

They assigned the hatchlings to two control groups, which they kept for 160 days on either a white or a black substrate, and to two "reversal" groups, which they kept for 80 days on white or black and then switched to a substrate of the opposite color for another 80 days. The researchers periodically used a spectrometer to measure the color intensity of spots on each turtle's carapace and head.

http://snipr.com/tojx2



How Global Warming Could Change the Winemaking Map
from Time

Many Bordeaux winemakers are declaring 2009 the best vintage in 60 years, but Yvon Minvielle of Château Lagarette isn't celebrating. Like many vintners across France, Minvielle is feeling uneasy after another unusually warm summer and early grape harvest. "They say everything is going great in Bordeaux, but take a closer look," he says. Heat-stressed vines ripened at unequal rates this year, and only skillful picking spread over a full month allowed Minvielle to gather a mature crop.

Such seasonal headaches are becoming more commonplace in France, and many vintners are placing the blame on global warming. In the past 30 years, harvest dates have moved up an average of 16 days because of unusually warm growing seasons. Grapes are reaching their sugar ripeness before their aromas fully develop, alcohol levels are soaring and acid levels are dropping--forcing some winemakers to resort to chemistry in their cellars to produce a quaffable cuvée.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts that the earth's temperatures could rise by as much as 6 degrees Celsius by 2100 if nothing is done to combat climate change. "While 2 to 3 degrees [Celsius] may be manageable, if temperatures rise 4 to 5 degrees ... the vineyard map will never be the same again," says Bernard Seguin, head of the Climate Change and Greenhouse Effect Unit at the National Institute for Agricultural Research in Avignon.

http://snipr.com/tojx6



Asian Mutation Protects Against Malaria
from ScienceNOW Daily News

A mutation common in Southeast Asia that causes anemia also provides some protection against malaria, according to a new study. The mutation doesn't shield carriers from the best-known and most severe cause of the disease, but from a more benign parasite that has been studied far less.

Scientists already know that humans' long battle with malaria has shaped our genome. One-third of sub-Saharan Africans, for example, carry a mutation that causes sickle cell anemia but that also protects against malaria: The deformed red blood cells prevent the malaria parasite from entering. Researchers have identified other mutations as well, but almost all protect against Plasmodium falciparum, a parasite transmitted by Anopheles mosquitoes that kills more than a million people annually.

In the current study, geneticist Anavaj Sakuntabhai of the Pasteur Institute in Paris and colleagues examined a mutation in the gene encoding glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G6PD), an enzyme that helps protect cells from damage by oxidizing molecules. Mutations in G6PD can cause jaundice in newborns, anemia after infection with certain pathogens, and other problems.

http://snipr.com/tojxe
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:14:52 PM
 December 11, 2009




Ancient Amazon Civilisation Laid Bare by Felled Forest
from New Scientist

Signs of what could be a previously unknown ancient civilisation are emerging from beneath the felled trees of the Amazon. Some 260 giant avenues, ditches and enclosures have been spotted from the air in a region straddling Brazil's border with Bolivia.

The traditional view is that before the arrival of the Spanish and Portuguese in the 15th century there were no complex societies in the Amazon basin--in contrast to the Andes further west where the Incas built their cities. Now deforestation, increased air travel and satellite imagery are telling a different story.

"It's never-ending," says Denise Schaan of the Federal University of Pará in Belém, Brazil, who made many of the new discoveries from planes or by examining Google Earth images. "Every week we find new structures." Some of them are square or rectangular, while others form concentric circles or complex geometric figures such as hexagons and octagons connected by avenues or roads. The researchers describe them all as geoglyphs.

http://snipr.com/tne8o



War Games: Military Use of Consumer Technology
from the Economist

Video games have become increasingly realistic, especially those involving armed combat. America's armed forces have even used video games as recruitment and training tools.

But the desire to play games is not the reason why the United States Air Force recently issued a procurement request for 2,200 Sony PlayStation 3 (PS3) video-game consoles. It intends to link them up to build a supercomputer that will run Linux, a free, open-source operating system. It will be used for research, including the development of high-definition imaging systems for radar, and will cost around one-tenth as much as a conventional supercomputer. The air force has already built a smaller computer from a cluster of 336 PS3s.

This is merely the latest example of an unusual trend. There is a long tradition of technology developed for military use filtering through to consumer markets: satellite-navigation systems designed to guide missiles can also help hikers find their way, and head-up displays have moved from jet fighters to family cars. But technology is increasingly moving in the other direction, too, as consumer products are appropriated for military use.

http://snipr.com/tnea8



Dino Discovery Supports Migration Theory
from the San Francisco Chronicle

Dinosaur hunters digging in a New Mexico quarry have unearthed the fossil bones of an early meat-eating beast whose remains tell a remarkable story of evolution that started more than 200 million years ago when the whole world was one supercontinent known as Pangaea.

The bones boost theories that the first dinosaurs originated in what is now South America and some migrated north into the present day United States as the giant landmass began breaking into pieces.

A team of five paleontologists, including two who began their studies at UC Berkeley, reported the discovery of the small, carnivorous beast in the journal Science today.

http://snipr.com/tnebd



Our Atmosphere Came From Space Gases, Study Says
from National Geographic News

The gases that make up Earth's atmosphere came from a swarm of comets, not from bubbling volcanoes as long thought, a new study says.

The new theory came about after scientists discovered that pristine samples of the elements krypton and xenon, recently collected from deep within the Earth, have the same chemical makeup as ancient meteorites. The discovery has squelched the volcano theory, said project leader Chris Ballentine of the U.K.'s University of Manchester.

Most of the gases in the air we breathe originated in the solar nebula, the cloud of gas and dust that formed the sun and planets, the study says.

http://snipr.com/tnedr



Erasing Scary Memories Is a Matter of Timing
from ScienceNOW Daily News

We often think of memories like Polaroid snapshots, images frozen in time. But they're more like the fluid, melting pocket watches of Salvador Dali's painting The Persistence of Memory. Now scientists have developed a method that takes advantage of memory's malleability to block specific fear memories, which could someday lead to new therapies for anxiety disorders and phobias.

Each time you recall the ice cream cake and clown from your fifth birthday party, the memory is subject to change. Information about the color of the clown's polka-dotted suit, for example, becomes "unfrozen" and could change from red to blue. This process is called reconsolidation, and scientists have blocked scary memories in rats--such as the association between a specific tone and a painful shock--during reconsolidation with drugs. Unfortunately, these drugs stop protein synthesis in the brain, which would lead to terrible side effects in people.

A different approach to diminishing fear is called extinction training. In experiments with rats, scientists keep playing the ominous tone without a shock, and over time, the animals stop getting scared by the tone. Therapists use a similar method called exposure therapy to help people overcome debilitating fears, such as claustrophobia. But these methods aren't as long-lasting as the dangerous drugs.

http://snipr.com/tnefc



Ancient Maya King Shows His Foreign Roots
from Science News

A man's skeleton found atop a stone slab at Copán, which was the capital of an ancient Maya state, contains clues to a colonial expansion that occurred more than 1,000 years before Spanish explorers reached the Americas.

The bones come from K'inich Yax K'uk' Mo', or KYKM for short, the researchers report in an upcoming Journal of Anthropological Archaeology. KYKM was the first of 16 kings who ruled Copán and surrounding highlands of what is today northern Honduras for about 400 years, from 426 to 820, say archaeologist T. Douglas Price of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and his colleagues. KYKM's bone chemistry indicates that he grew up in the central Maya lowlands, which are several hundred kilometers northwest of Copán.

Along with inscriptions at Copán, the new evidence suggests that the site's first king was born into a ruling family at Caracol, a powerful lowland kingdom in Belize. KYKM probably spent his young adult years as a member of the royal court at Tikal, a Maya kingdom in the central lowlands of Guatemala, before being sent to Copán to found a new dynasty at the settlement there, Price's team proposes.

http://snipr.com/tnefq



Geeky Math Equation Creates Beautiful 3-D World
from Wired

The quest by a group of math geeks to create a three-dimensional analogue for the mesmerizing Mandelbrot fractal has ended in success.

They call it the Mandelbulb. The 3-D renderings were generated by applying an iterative algorithm to a sphere. The same calculation is applied over and over to the sphere's points in three dimensions. In spirit, that's similar to how the original 2-D Mandelbrot set generates its infinite and self-repeating complexity.

If you were ever mesmerized by the Mandelbrot screen saver, the following images are worth a look. Each photo is a zoom on one of these Mandelbulbs.

http://snipr.com/tnegc



One Gene Keeps Ovaries Female
from the Scientist

Knocking down a single gene in an adult mouse makes ovaries develop the characteristics of a male gonad and produce testosterone, according to a study published today (December 10th) in Cell. The study suggests that the signal is required to maintain the female phenotype throughout adulthood, and may provide clues to female infertility.

"I think this is a very important finding" identifying a key regulator of the genes involved in sex development, said Blanche Capel from Duke University Medical Center, who was not involved in the research.

Mathias Treier from the European Molecular Biology Laboratory, lead author of the study, and his colleagues cloned the Foxl2 gene, a transcription factor located on non-sex chromosomes, several years ago. When they knocked out the gene in mice, females began to form ovaries, but later in development, the ovaries degenerated. Since the gene is expressed throughout the lifespan, the researchers wondered whether it would behave the same way in adult females.

http://snipr.com/tnegw



Another Fatal Blow to Asian Vultures
from Scientific American

As if it weren't bad enough that 99.9 percent of Asian vultures have been killed off in the past 20 years, now comes news that yet another potential man-made disaster waits in the wings.

Millions of Asian vultures, particularly those in India, have died off over the last two decades after being poisoned by the veterinary drug diclofenac. The vultures eat dead cattle and other livestock treated with the drug, then go into renal failure.

Now scientists have discovered that another veterinary drug, ketoprofen, is also fatal to the birds. Vultures which feed on the carcasses of livestock recently treated with ketoprofen suffer acute kidney failure and die within days of exposure.

http://snipr.com/tnehq



Battery Made of Paper Charges Up
from BBC News Online

Batteries made from plain copier paper could make for future energy storage that is truly paper thin. The approach relies on the use of carbon nanotubes--tiny cylinders of carbon--to collect electric charge.

While small-scale nanotube batteries have been demonstrated before, the plain paper approach lends itself to making larger devices more cheaply.

The work, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, could lead to "paintable" energy storage.

http://snipr.com/tnei1
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:15:39 PM
 December 10, 2009



Virgin Galactic Unveils First Tourist Spaceship
from National Geographic News

Aspiring space tourists got a first look at their future ride late Monday, when Virgin Galactic unveiled the first of its long-awaited SpaceShipTwo planes.

After years of teases, the world's only commercial spacecraft rolled out onto the tarmac at the Mojave Air and Space Port in California. There, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson christened the Virgin Galactic craft with the customary smashing of champagne bottles.

Virgin Galactic leader Sir Richard Branson's daughter, Holly, announced the first SpaceShipTwo plane's name: V.S.S. Enterprise, short for Virgin Space Ship Enterprise, said Virgin Galactic President Will Whitehorn.

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Kettleman City Asks: Why So Many Birth Defects?
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Kettleman City, Calif. -- When environmental activists began a survey of birth defects in this small migrant farming town halfway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, the results were alarming.

Approximately 20 babies were born here during the 14 months beginning in September 2007. Three of them died; each had been born with oral deformities known as clefts. Two others born with the defect during that period are undergoing medical treatment.

The 1,500 primarily Spanish-speaking residents of this impoverished enclave just off Interstate 5 want to know what is causing these health problems. Some blame them on a nearby hazardous waste facility--the largest landfill of its kind west of Louisiana and the only one in California licensed to accept carcinogenic PCBs.

http://snipr.com/tmwvk



The Big Spill: Flood Could Have Filled Mediterranean in Less Than Two Years
from Science News

A cataclysmic flood could have filled the Mediterranean Sea--which millions of years ago was a dry basin--like a bathtub in the space of less than two years. A new model suggests that at the flood's peak water poured from the Atlantic into the Mediterranean basin at a rate one thousand times the flow of the Amazon River, according to calculations published in the Dec. 10 Nature.

"In an instantaneous flash, the dry Mediterranean became a normal Mediterranean like we see it today," says lead author Daniel Garcia-Castellanos of Spain's Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC) in Barcelona.

He and his colleagues calculate that at the height of the flood, water levels rose more than 10 meters and more than 40 centimeters of rock eroded away per day. The model also shows that 100 million cubic meters of water flowed through the channel per second, with water gushing at speeds of 100 kilometers an hour. Rather than a Niagara Falls-esque cascade from the Atlantic into the Mediterranean, the team's results imply a torrent several kilometers wide at a fairly gradual slope.

http://snipr.com/tmwvp



Dirty Babies Get Healthier Hearts
from New Scientist

Affluent, modern babies live in a sanitised world. This has already been blamed for a high incidence of asthma and allergies, but might also up the risk of developing a host of other conditions common in rich countries, such as stroke and heart disease.

According to the "hygiene hypothesis", our immune system evolved to handle a germ-laden world. If we don't encounter many pathogens during infancy, it doesn't learn to keep itself in check, and turns on inflammation--normally a response to infection--in inappropriate situations. This reaction, the hypothesis goes, is responsible for the recent increase in asthma and allergies, both associated with inflammation.

Recently, it has emerged that chronic inflammation may also increase the risk of diabetes, stroke and heart diseases. So might the hygiene hypothesis be implicated here too?

http://snipr.com/tmwvz



In Some Bird Species, Even Females Are Pretty
from LiveScience

In many bird species, the males get all the glory with elaborate, colorful plumes, while females' drab appearance keeps them under the radar. This is thought to be the case when females are choosy and males must compete against each other for mates.

That is true in many species. But now scientists have found that when birds live in families, and not every individual gets to breed, females must compete just as hard as males and thus have just as lavish plumage.

The original theory of sexual selection was outlined by Charles Darwin to explain why many species have dull females and flamboyant males. This tends to occur whenever reproduction is shared more equally among females than among males. In this case, the males must strut their stuff and perfect their ornamentation to be noticed, while even the plainest female will still be sought out as a mate, so there is no incentive for her to accessorize.

http://snipr.com/tmwwf



Should Wild Animals Become Pets to Ward Off Extinction?
from Time

In February 2009, Australia's Environment Minister Peter Garrett made a depressing announcement. The Christmas Island pipistrelle bat--an inch-long winged creature no heavier than five grams--was about to go extinct. Articles about its imminent demise were accompanied by photos of the bat's minuscule body, barely big enough to embrace the full diameter of a human finger. In February, there were estimated to be just 20 bats left. One was seen fluttering around the island in August, but there have been no sightings since.

If the Christmas Island pipistrelle is truly gone, it will be the 23rd Australian mammal species to have become extinct in the past 200 years. ... The accumulation of tragedies like these has given Australia the shameful distinction of having the worst mammal-extinction record in the world. Half of the mammals that have vanished from the planet in the past two centuries have been in Australia. ...

Mike Archer, a professor at the School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of New South Wales (UNSW), has long been a proponent of domesticating Australia's unique wildlife to keep it from disappearing. ... While he concedes that not all native animals make great pets (wombats and koalas come to mind), others do, and Archer is hoping that the government will start to legalize ownership of more native pets.

http://snipr.com/tmwwn



Evidence of Water in Sand Mars Rover's Stuck In
from the San Francisco Chronicle

Spirit, the Mars rover with one wheel stuck fast in the planet's soft sand since April, has uncovered some of the best evidence yet that water once existed on the planet, apparently after a time of intense volcanic activity billions of years ago.

The evidence came from sand the rover dug up as its stuck wheel spun, broke through a thin rocky crust and created a tiny crater about 5 feet wide and less than 10 inches deep.

The sand, clearly visible to scientists in photographs taken with the rover's own camera, is filled with sulfates--chemicals that had formed in water.

http://snipr.com/tmwxe



Developing Countries Split Over Climate Measures
from BBC News Online

A major split between developing countries has emerged at the UN climate talks in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Small island states and poor African nations vulnerable to climate impacts laid out demands for a legally-binding deal tougher than the Kyoto Protocol. This was opposed by richer developing states such as China, which fear tougher action would curb their growth.

... The split within the developing country bloc is highly unusual, as it tends to speak with a united voice.

http://snipr.com/tmwxo



Hubble Sees to Edge of Universe
from Scientific American

Astronomers have used the Hubble space telescope to discover the faintest and most distant galaxies ever seen. A new camera fitted to the orbiting observatory in May by shuttle astronauts has captured dim red "star cities" that formed only 600-900 million years after the Big Bang.

The universe is thought to be around 14 billion years old and this new glimpse of them is a look back in time more than 13 billion years. Two teams from the universities of Oxford and Edinburgh picked out the candidates for most remote galaxies in images taken in infrared light by Hubble's new Wide Field Camera 3.

It is an incredible photograph, covering a square patch of sky just a 15th the width of the full moon. Yet that tiny bit of the heavens alone is crammed with thousands of whirls and blurs--each one a collection of many millions or billions of stars.

http://snipr.com/tmwxw



Rare Words 'Author's Fingerprint'
from BBC News Online

Analyses of classic authors' works provide a way to "linguistically fingerprint" them, researchers say.

The relationship between the number of words an author uses only once and the length of a work forms an identifier for them, they argue.

Analyses of works by Herman Melville, Thomas Hardy, and DH Lawrence showed these "unique word" charts are specific to each author. The work is published in the New Journal of Physics.

http://snipr.com/tmwy1
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:16:57 PM
December 9, 2009





Drugs Change Personality in Depressed, Study Finds
from the Chicago Tribune

Antidepressant drugs taken by some 7 percent of American adults effect profound personality changes in many patients with depression--making them more optimistic, self-confident and outgoing.

The drugs, which increase levels of the chemical serotonin in the brain, reduced neuroticism and increased extroversion, two of the five traits thought to define personality and shape a person's day-to-day thoughts and behavior, according to a study published Monday.

The personality changes were observed for a substantial portion of depressed subjects. The drugs seem, in effect, to relieve depression by reducing the supply of negative thoughts that feed the mental disorder, said Northwestern University psychologist Tony Tang, the lead author of the study.

http://snipr.com/tmfib



UN: 2000-2009 Could Be Earth's Warmest Decade Ever
from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

COPENHAGEN -- A leaked Danish document at the U.N. climate conference provoked angry criticism Tuesday from developing countries and activists who feared it would shift more of the burden to curb greenhouse gases on poorer countries.

Negotiators, meanwhile, displayed charts of data that said the current decade is on track to be the hottest on record for planet Earth.

At the heart of Tuesday's clash--stemming from draft texts attributed to Denmark and China--is the determination by the more impoverished states to bear a lesser burden than wealthy, more industrialized countries in the effort to slow global warming.

http://snipr.com/tmfij



Study: Eating Soy Is Safe for Breast-Cancer Survivors
from Time

If you are among the thousands of American women who have survived breast cancer, you probably find yourself thinking twice about everything you do--what you eat, how much you exercise--to ensure that you don't increase your risk of developing another tumor. It's a natural response to a difficult diagnosis, but it can be challenging, especially when it comes to diet: most breast tumors are driven by the hormone estrogen, but estrogen is frequently found in many popular foods, from some types of milk and yogurt to breakfast bars to tofu and those addictive edamame beans.

The common culprit is soy, a plant that contains chemicals with estrogen-like and anti-estrogenic properties--making it a nutritional minefield for breast-cancer survivors. ...Studies on the effect of soy on breast-cancer recurrence and mortality have been conflicting, with some showing that it can reduce risk, while others show an elevated rate of recurrent disease among frequent consumers of soy.

Now the largest study to date on soy's effect on breast cancer suggests that eating soy, even in large amounts, may not be harmful after all, and may even reduce recurrence and death from the disease. But while the findings are intriguing, not all doctors are ready to tout the benefits of tofu.

http://snipr.com/tmfin



Hungry Amoebas Spawn Biggest Viruses Ever
from Wired

Made from a hodgepodge of genetic bits and pieces, the newly discovered Marseillevirus is the world's largest virus.

But fame is fleeting: It's almost sure to be supplanted by another, even bigger virus. What's really special about Marseillevirus is where it comes from. Like other giant viruses, it was found inside amoebas--lowly, single-celled organisms that devour anything they can absorb. Their voracious appetites make them incubators of genetic remixing among their prey, and may hint at processes that spawned complex life.

"What we find is that inside the amoeba, a virus can meet bacteria, archaea and prokaryotes. A whole new repertoire of an organism can be composed," said Didier Raoult, a microbiologist at the University of the Mediterranean in Marseille, France.

http://snipr.com/tmfiy



It's Natural to Behave Irrationally
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

To a psychologist, climate change looks as if it was designed to be ignored.

It is a global problem, with no obvious villains and no one-step solutions, whose worst effects seem as if they'll befall somebody else at some other time. In short, if someone set out to draw up a problem that people would not care about, one expert on human behavior said, it would look exactly like climate change.

That's the upshot of a spate of new research that tries to explain stalled U.S. efforts to combat greenhouse-gas emissions by putting the country on the couch.

http://snipr.com/tmfjf



I'm Too Sexy for My Species
from ScienceNOW Daily News

It's hard out there for a sexy female fruit fly. All she wants is a nice meal and a little sperm to fertilize her eggs, but male fruit flies harass her so much, according to a new study, that she lays fewer eggs than normal. And that, researchers say, could be bad for the evolution of the entire species.

When it comes to choosing a mating partner, females are usually the more picky sex. Female peacocks like the boys with the most colorful feathers, for example, and female deer go for big antlers. In the fruit fly world, however, males are the choosy ones. They prefer fatter females--they dance around them and constantly try to mate with them--probably because these females lay more eggs.

Evolutionary biologist Tristan Long of the University of California, Santa Barbara, and colleagues wondered if all of this attention was bad for the females. The team sorted female fruit flies by knocking them out with carbon dioxide and sifting them through a series of sieves, each with holes a little smaller than the level above. In some experiments, males were given a choice between large-bodied females and randomly chosen females...

http://snipr.com/tmfjw



Exoplanet Claim Bites the Dust
from Nature News

Strike one planet from the list of 400-odd found around stars in other solar systems: a proposed planet near a star some 6 parsecs from Earth may not exist after all.

The finding is also a strike against a planet-seeking strategy called astrometry, which measures the side-to-side motion of a star on the sky to see whether any unseen bodies might be orbiting it. Ground-based astrometry has been used for more than a century, but none of the extrasolar planets it has detected has been verified in subsequent studies.

In May, Steven Pravdo of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, and his colleagues raised fresh hopes for the technique when they announced an exoplanet, six times more massive than Jupiter, orbiting VB10, a star about one-thirteenth the mass of the Sun, using a telescope at the Palomar Observatory in southern California. But now a group led by Jacob Bean at the Georg-August University in Gottingen, Germany, has used a different approach, and found nothing. "The planet is not there," says Bean.

http://snipr.com/tmfk7



Testosterone Link to Aggression 'All in the Mind'
from BBC News Online

Giving women more of the male hormone testosterone can turn them into fairer and more amiable game players, according to tests.

A single dose of testosterone was enough to have this effect, European scientists found, but only if the woman was oblivious to the treatment. If she realised she had received the hormone and not a dummy drug, she turned to greed and selfishness.

The work in Nature magazine suggests the mind can win over hormones. Testosterone induces anti-social behaviour in humans, but only because of our own prejudices about its effect rather than its biological activity, suggest the authors.

http://snipr.com/tmfkb



Russia Reigns Over its Weather
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Moscow -- In the snow-hushed woods on Moscow's northern edge, scientists are decades deep into research on bending the weather to their will. They've been at it since Soviet dictator Josef Stalin paused long enough in the throes of World War II to found an observatory dedicated to tampering with climatic inconveniences.

Since then, they've melted away fog, dissipated the radioactive fallout from Chernobyl and called down rains fierce enough to drown unborn locusts threatening the distant northeastern grasslands.

Now they're poised to battle the most inevitable and emblematic force of Russian winter: the snow.

http://snipr.com/tmfkt



The Circular Logic of the Universe
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Circling my way not long ago through the Vasily Kandinsky show now on display in the suitably spiral setting of the Guggenheim Museum, I came to one of the Russian master's most illustrious, if misleadingly named, paintings: "Several Circles."

Those "several" circles, I saw, were more like three dozen, and every one of them seemed to be rising from the canvas, buoyed by the shrewdly exuberant juxtapositioning of their different colors, sizes and apparent translucencies. I learned that, at around the time Kandinsky painted the work, in 1926, he had begun collecting scientific encyclopedias and journals; and as I stared at the canvas, a big, stupid smile plastered on my face, I thought of yeast cells budding, or a haloed blue sun and its candied satellite crew, or life itself escaping the careless primordial stew.

I also learned of Kandinsky's growing love affair with the circle. The circle, he wrote, is "the most modest form, but asserts itself unconditionally." It is "simultaneously stable and unstable," "loud and soft," "a single tension that carries countless tensions within it." Kandinsky loved the circle so much that it finally supplanted in his visual imagination the primacy long claimed by an emblem of his Russian boyhood, the horse.

http://snipr.com/tmfl0
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:42:57 PM
December 23, 2009

Happy Holidays! Science in the News will resume on January 4.



Tennessee Coal-Ash Spill Only One EPA Hurdle
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

When the dam broke-- ayear ago Tuesday, a little after midnight--Sandy Gupton thought she was hearing two trains colliding. It wasn't until morning that she saw what had really happened near Kingston, Tenn. It looked, Gupton said, "like a volcano had erupted."

An earth-and-ash dam holding back 1 billion gallons of waterlogged ash from a nearby power plant had failed, and the slurry flowed out to choke the Emery River and cover 85 acres of land.

One year later, most of the ash on the land is still there. And the problem of similar coal-ash ponds still sits on the long and fast-expanding to-do list of President Obama's Environmental Protection Agency. Now--after a year in which a climate-change summit in Copenhagen fell short of most expectations, and with a climate bill stalled in the U.S. Senate--the EPA might shoulder more of the burden for an administration with historic environmental ambitions.

http://snipr.com/ttfl7



Whatever Doesn't Kill Some Animals Can Make Them Deadly
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Have you ever tried to think up the worst meal you could imagine? How about blue-ringed octopus, floral egg crab, basket shell snails and puffer fish.

Sure, some people may think these are delicacies, and puffer fish is certainly treated as such in parts of Asia. But each dish has something more important in common: they are all deadly. Each of these animals is chock full of a powerful neurotoxin called tetrodotoxin.

First isolated from the puffer fish, tetrodotoxin is among the most potent toxins known. It is 100 times as toxic by weight as potassium cyanide--two milligrams can kill an adult human--and it is not destroyed by cooking. Just half an ounce of the fish liver, known as fugu kimo in Japan and eaten by daring connoisseurs, can be lethal. When ingested, the toxin paralyzes nerves and muscles, which leads to respiratory failure and, in some cases each year, death.

http://snipr.com/ttfq9



Study: With Cardiac Rehab, More Is Better
from USA Today

Cardiac rehabilitation sessions for elderly people with heart disease can lower their risk of heart attack and help them live longer, new research finds, but fewer than one in five eligible patients bothers to go.

Researchers looked at medical records of more than 30,000 Medicare patients aged 65 and older who attended at least one cardiac rehabilitation session from 2000 to 2005. The findings: More sessions are better.

"We were not surprised that patients who attended more rehabilitation had better outcomes," study author Bradley G. Hammill said in a statement. "We need to encourage physicians to recommend cardiac rehabilitation to eligible patients, and we need to encourage those patients to attend and stay with it."

http://snipr.com/ttfrw



Jurupa Hills Oak May Be California's Oldest Plant
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Nestled between two boulders on a low rise in the Jurupa Hills of Riverside County, a good 30 miles from its nearest living relative, lies the ultimate survivor--an oak bush that researchers believe is 13,000 years old.

That's 1,000 years older than a previously identified Palm Springs creosote bush that was thought to be the oldest plant in California, 8,000 years older than bristlecone pines and 10,000 years older than the redwoods.

While it is one of the world's oldest living plants, it is probably not the oldest. That distinction may belong to a quaking aspen in Utah that is thought to be as old as 80,000 years or a holly in Tasmania that may be 43,000 years old.

http://snipr.com/ttft3



Taking Mental Snapshots to Plumb Our Inner Selves
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Psychologists have many ways to get inside our heads: they can give us questionnaires, track our eyes, time how long we take to respond to cues and measure the blood flow to our brains. But how close can these methods get to the texture of our inner lives?

Russell T. Hurlburt a psychologist at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, has spent decades refining another way to study the mind. Dr. Hurlburt, a former aeronautical engineer, took up the study of psychology while playing trumpet at military funerals during the Vietnam War.

Frustrated by the lack of attention to everyday experiences in the field of psychology, he arrived at the university in 1976 with an unconventional plan to investigate the mental lives of his subjects: ask them for descriptions.

http://snipr.com/ttfug



Science News Highlights of 2009
from BBC News Online

It was the year we learned of a spectacular smash-up in space, and scientists working on the world's biggest physics experiment delighted at collisions of an entirely different sort.

There were shockwaves, too, in Copenhagen, as the summit failed to reach a consensus on tackling climate change, instead merely noting a deal struck by major powers including the US and China.

The BBC's science reporter Paul Rincon looks back at the twists and turns of a year in science and the environment.

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Stem Cell Eye Treatment Restores Sight
from the Times (London)

A man who was partially blinded after intervening in a fight has had his vision restored by a new stem-cell therapy.

Russell Turnbull, 38, lost most of the sight from his right eye in 1994 when he was sprayed in the face with ammonia while trying to break up an altercation on a bus in Newcastle upon Tyne. The chemical burnt his cornea, leaving him with cloudy vision, pain on every blink and extreme sensitivity to light.

He has now become one of the first people to benefit from a treatment developed at the North East England Stem Cell Institute in Newcastle, in which stem cells from his good eye were used to repair his damaged one.

http://snipr.com/ttfvh



First Case of Swine Flu in Dog Confirmed
from the Seattle Times

(LA Times and Associated Press) -- Veterinarians in White Plains, N.Y., have identified the first known case of pandemic H1N1 influenza in a dog--a 13-year-old mixed-breed male who is now recovering. The dog was tested because his owner previously had swine flu.

The virus has been found before in other pets, including at least three ferrets, several cats and pigs, and a cheetah named Gijima at a wildlife preserve in Santa Rosa, Calif.

A couple of the cats died, but most of the animals recovered. In each case, the virus is thought to have been transmitted to the animal by its owner or handler, and there is no evidence of the virus being passed back to a human.

http://snipr.com/ttfw6



When Fire Approaches, Chimps Keep Their Cool
from ScienceNOW Daily News

When primatologist Jill Pruetz found herself threatened by wildfires in the savannas of Fongoli, Senegal, in 2006 she had two options: stay with the chimpanzees she was studying, or run.

She chose the chimps. The primates were calm, and--with her in tow--they carefully made their way around the blaze. "I was very surprised at how good they were at judging the threat and predicting the behavior of fire," says Pruetz.

The chimps' actions, she would later report, set them apart from other nonhuman animals--and they may reveal the evolutionary origins of how we came to master fire.

http://snipr.com/ttfwr



Hormones in Concert
from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Multiple hormones act in concert to regulate blood sugar and food intake. The idea has already led to a new diabetes therapy; will it also yield new strategies for obesity?

... In the clinical setting, it was not uncommon for doctors to advise their patients to try harder and be more disciplined. After all, with adequate willpower and meticulous tracking of blood sugars and ingested calories, there had to be a way to do better.

From a scientific perspective, however, it was quite evident that the root of the problem was far more complex.

http://snipr.com/ttfx9
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:45:21 PM
 January 4, 2010




Assessing Risks From Bisphenol A
from American Scientist

The industrialized world produces an immense amount of plastic, more than 45 billion kilograms annually in the United States alone. But what is it made of, and is it all safe?

Some reusable water bottles sold in Wal-Mart and other retail stores in the United States now display stickers proudly marketing themselves as "BPA-free." The labeling results from consumer concern over scientific evidence that bisphenol A (BPA), a common ingredient in many hard plastics, may be harmful to the human reproductive system because it interferes with hormones.

The plastics industry and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration say BPA is not dangerous at the levels people are currently exposed to. In contrast, in September of 2008, the U.S. National Toxicology Program concluded that there is "some concern" for adverse effects on the "brain, behavior and prostate gland in fetuses, infants, and children." This concern prompted members of Congress to pressure the FDA to take another look, a process that is now underway.

http://snipr.com/tyom6




Cell Phone Safety Studied
from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK -- John Bucher, a reserved scientist who will play a key role in the public debate over the health risks posed by cell phones, doesn't like to discuss his own calling habits.

His reticence is understandable: The 5-year, $25 million health study is meant to settle the question of whether long-term exposure to radiation from cell phones can cause cancers. The study overseen by Bucher, associate director of the National Toxicology Program in Research Triangle Park, is the U.S. government's response to rising concerns about the ubiquitous phones.

Some scientists and public health advocates are calling for restrictions on cell phone use. ... More than 100 studies have been devoted to the subject of cell phone safety worldwide, but the results have been "all over the map," Bucher said.

http://snipr.com/tyomj




Tasmanian Devil Facial Cancer Origins 'Identified'
from BBC News Online

Researchers believe they have identified the source of fatal tumours that threaten to wipe out the wild population of Tasmanian devils.

Writing in Science, an international team of scientists suggest cells that protect nerves are the likely origin of devil facial tumour disease (DFTD).

The disease is a transmissible cancer that is spread by physical contact, and quickly kills the animals. DFTD has caused the devil population to collapse by 60% in the past decade.

http://snipr.com/tyomn




Scientists Start a Genomic Catalog of Earth's Abundant Microbes
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

If you want to appreciate the diversity of life on earth, you will need a microscope.

There are about 5,400 species of mammals on the planet, but just a spoonful of soil may contain twice as many species of microbes. They can dwell in habitats where so-called higher life forms like us would quickly die, including acid-drenched mines and Antarctic deserts. By one rough estimate, there may be, all told, 150 million species of microbes.

"Microbes represent the vast majority of organisms on earth," said Hans-Peter Klenk, a microbiologist for the German Collection of Micro-organisms and Cell Cultures, a government microbiology research center.

http://snipr.com/tyon3




Hushing the Intruders in Her Brain
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

It was a little more than a year ago that January Schofield, at age 6, began to drift from reality. Suicidal, violent and plagued by hallucinations of rats and cats who conversed and played with her, she began the first of seven psychiatric hospitalizations.

As of today, Jani, 7, has been out of the hospital for 56 days, the longest period in 15 months. Together with her parents, Michael and Susan, and brother, Bodhi, 2, Jani is living a fragile existence--haunted by delusions that sometimes tell her to hurt herself or others, even the people she loves.

But despite the family's dire financial and emotional circumstances, that existence is not completely devoid of hope.

http://snipr.com/tyon7




H1N1 Pandemic Tops List of Health Stories
from USA Today

Global health experts worried that if the virus began spreading from person to person, it could spark a human chain of infection and death worse than anything seen since 1918. They ramped up flu surveillance and bolstered vaccine production. No one predicted that the next pandemic would be launched by an entirely different flu virus in Mexico.

Unlike avian flu, the new virus, H1N1, came from pigs. H1N1 also had an "extraordinary capability to spread explosively from person to person," says Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Fortunately, it is far less lethal to humans.

The first wave began in the spring, targeting unusual risk groups: young people, children with neuromuscular diseases, pregnant women and the obese. A summer lull in the Northern Hemisphere was balanced by a wave of cases in the south. When schools reopened, the virus came roaring back.

http://snipr.com/tyonc




Dog Genes May Hold Secrets to Human Disease
from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Scientists scouring the genome to better understand complex human diseases are looking to an unlikely ally for guidance: our pets.

Dogs have been an integral part of human life for centuries. It is precisely because of that intertwined history that dogs are a potentially powerful tool for researchers seeking the genetic roots of everything from psychiatric disorders to cancer--just two of the ailments that are similar in both humans and dogs.

Last month, scientists studying Doberman pinschers with a compulsive behavior disorder similar to human obsessive-compulsive disorder found a gene associated with the condition. The genetic hit is now being followed by other researchers, who are studying the same gene in human patients with OCD, in hopes the clue from man's best friend may help explain the disease in people.

http://snipr.com/tyonj




North Magnetic Pole Moving East Due to Core Flux
from National Geographic News

Earth's north magnetic pole is racing toward Russia at almost 40 miles (64 kilometers) a year due to magnetic changes in the planet's core, new research says.

Now, newly analyzed data suggest that there's a region of rapidly changing magnetism on the core's surface, possibly being created by a mysterious "plume" of magnetism arising from deeper in the core.

And it's this region that could be pulling the magnetic pole away from its long-time location in northern Canada, said Arnaud Chulliat, a geophysicist at the Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris in France.

http://snipr.com/tyons




Warming Has Already Boosted Insect Breeding
from Science News

Summertime and the insect breeding is easy.

That old song rings especially true for 44 species of moths and butterflies in Central Europe, according to an analysis by ecologist Florian Altermatt of the University of California, Davis. As the region has warmed since the 1980s, some of these species have added an extra generation during the summer for the first time on record in that location.

Among the 263 species already known to have a second or third generation there during toasty times, 190 have grown more likely to do so since 1980, Altermatt reports online December 22 in Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

http://snipr.com/tyonx




The Top 10 ScienceNOWs of 2009
from ScienceNOW Daily News

Every year, ScienceNOW publishes hundreds of breaking science news stories, from the discovery of Earth-like planets to new insights into how the brain works. Picking our Top 10 is never an easy task, so we've relied on you to help us out. Most of the stories below were our most popular of 2009, as judged by reader clicks. And we've thrown in some of our staff favorites as well.

10) Closer Look at Einstein's Brain. Ever wondered what made Albert Einstein so smart--and such a good violin player to boot? The answers may lie in a new analysis of the famed physicist's brain, which is unusual in several ways.

9) Ancient Virus Gave Wasps Their Sting. A virus that infected wasps millions of years ago has given the insect the ability to paralyze caterpillars and turn them into nests for their young. Experts say the discovery could improve gene therapy techniques for humans.

http://snipr.com/tyoop
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:49:08 PM
And, after that huge dump, some articles from Science and Nature about the happenings in 2009.

QuoteThe Breakthroughs of 2009
Bruce Alberts

Bruce Alberts is Editor-in-Chief of Science.

Every December, the editors of Science face the challenge of reviewing what Science has accomplished around the world in the past 12 months, so as to select our "breakthroughs of the year." The task is an invigorating one, providing a powerful reminder of both the enormous scope and the continual advance of science. For this year's selections, the range is staggering. From the discovery of pulsars created by neutron stars that are many thousands of light-years distant, to the production of a new single-atom–thick material such as graphene, the same natural laws and logic have generated new understandings over a more than 1030-fold difference in scale. And there is usually special excitement when an advance directly concerns humans, as in the discovery of an ancient ancestor or a successful application of gene therapy to cure disease.

This year's selection for the Breakthrough of the Year is the reconstruction of the 4.4-million-year-old Ardipithecus ramidus skeleton and her environs, published in Science as a major series of 11 articles in October. This choice does not come easily, given the distaste of our editors for self-promotion. But this work changes the way we think about early human evolution, and it represents the culmination of 15 years of highly collaborative research. Remarkably, 47 scientists of diverse expertise from nine nations joined in a painstaking analysis of the 150,000 specimens of fossilized animals and plants [see Science 326, 62 (2009) for photos and locations of each author].

The 11 Ardipithecus papers, requiring 89 pages of text plus 295 pages of supporting online material, provide an enormous amount of data for scientists around the world to reexamine. As described on p. 1598 in the current issue, some of those scientists are certain to challenge some of the findings, as further advances are built on those already published. With time, we will come to understand much more, and some current conclusions will probably be modified. This is both to be expected and hoped for: Science can only advance as a highly collaborative global endeavor, through which new knowledge improves on old knowledge based on logic and confirmable evidence.

Our Runner-Up Breakthrough of the Year is "opening up the gamma-ray sky," as represented by the discovery of gamma-ray pulsars with the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope. Astrophysicist Michael Turner, a member of our Senior Editorial Board, emphasizes the telescope's astounding capability to scan the entire sky in less than 3 hours, with a sensitivity orders of magnitude better than its predecessors, superior angular resolution and energy coverage, and time coverage ranging from milliseconds to months. The Fermi Telescope has thereby revealed, with unprecedented detail, a very restless high-energy universe, and it is solving old mysteries while making new, unexpected discoveries.

A glance at the remaining eight breakthroughs on our list similarly reveals a heavy dependence of new science on remarkable engineering feats. Most obvious are the Hubble Telescope repair and the giant x-ray laser created at the Stanford Linear Accelerator. But it would be hard to overestimate the benefits to modern science from the development of sophisticated new technologies in essentially every discipline. Indeed, new understandings of the natural world derived from science are constantly being used to generate new techniques and instruments that greatly speed the next scientific discoveries, helping to explain the accelerating pace at which science advances.

To take an example from my field of biology, advances in the techniques for sequencing DNA will soon have moved us from a $3 billion human genome to a $3000 human genome in less than 20 years—a reduction in cost of a million-fold, attributable to collaborations of scientists with engineers.

Today, more than ever, scientists and engineers across the globe need each other if we are to continue to achieve the remarkable advances in human understanding that we celebrate in Science's final issue every year: the kind of breakthroughs that the world will always require to improve the welfare of human beings.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 05, 2010, 10:53:55 PM
And, Rapidshare link to News 2009 from Nature:

http://rapidshare.com/files/330915139/462962a.pdf.html (http://rapidshare.com/files/330915139/462962a.pdf.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on January 06, 2010, 12:13:29 PM
QuoteTrusting Nature as the Climate Referee
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Imagine there's no Copenhagen. Imagine a planet in which global warming was averted without the periodic need for thousands of people to fly around the world to promise to stop burning fossil fuels.

Imagine no international conferences wrangling over the details of climate policy. Imagine entrusting the tough questions to a referee: Mother Earth.

That is the intriguing suggestion of Ross McKitrick, an economist at the University of Guelph in Ontario who ... is virtuously restricting his carbon footprint by staying away from Copenhagen this week.

http://snipr.com/tp8uw

reading this article ... is this a good idea? it sounds like a good idea, but maybe I'm missing the catch here.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 06, 2010, 12:20:01 PM
January 5, 2010

Use of Potentially Harmful Chemicals Kept Secret Under Law
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Of the 84,000 chemicals in commercial use in the United States--from flame retardants in furniture to household cleaners--nearly 20 percent are secret, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, their names and physical properties guarded from consumers and virtually all public officials under a little-known federal provision.

The policy was designed 33 years ago to protect trade secrets in a highly competitive industry. But critics--including the Obama administration--say the secrecy has grown out of control, making it impossible for regulators to control potential dangers or for consumers to know which toxic substances they might be exposed to.

At a time of increasing public demand for more information about chemical exposure, pressure is building on lawmakers to make it more difficult for manufacturers to cloak their products in secrecy. Congress is set to rewrite chemical regulations this year for the first time in a generation.

http://snipurl.com/tz01p



C.I.A. Is Sharing Data With Climate Scientists
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The nation's top scientists and spies are collaborating on an effort to use the federal government's intelligence assets — including spy satellites and other classified sensors — to assess the hidden complexities of environmental change. They seek insights from natural phenomena like clouds and glaciers, deserts and tropical forests.

The collaboration restarts an effort the Bush administration shut down and has the strong backing of the director of the Central Intelligence Agency. In the last year, as part of the effort, the collaborators have scrutinized images of Arctic sea ice from reconnaissance satellites in an effort to distinguish things like summer melts from climate trends, and they have had images of the ice pack declassified to speed the scientific analysis.

The trove of images is "really useful," said Norbert Untersteiner, a professor at the University of Washington who specializes in polar ice and is a member of the team of spies and scientists behind the effort.

http://snipurl.com/tz05o



NASA's Kepler Planet-Hunter Detects Five Worlds
from BBC News Online

NASA's Kepler Space Telescope has detected its first five exoplanets, or planets beyond our Solar System.

The observatory, which was launched last year to find other Earths, made the discoveries in its first few weeks of science operations. Although the new worlds are all bigger than our Neptune, the US space agency says the haul shows the telescope is working well and is very sensitive.

The exoplanets have been given the names Kepler 4b, 5b, 6b, 7b and 8b. They were announced at an American Astronomical Society meeting in Washington DC. The planets range in size from an object that has a radius four times that of Earth, to worlds much bigger than even our Jupiter.

http://snipurl.com/tz06q



Study Bolsters Concerns that Disinfectants Create Superbugs
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Disinfectants, be they hand sanitizers or industrial-strength cleaners, present a hospital's first blockade against bacterial infection. But this same weapon may be helping create stronger microbial enemies: superbugs that are resistant to disinfectants and commonly used antibiotics, scientists report in the January issue of the journal Microbiology.

Researchers from the National University of Ireland in Galway studied lab cultures of Pseudomonas aeruginosa, which lives in soil and water. The bacterium, which can colonize catheters and other medical equipment, accounts for 8% of infections acquired in hospitals, according to a 2008 report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Though it does not seriously hurt healthy people (it's been implicated in such quaintly named afflictions as "hot tub itch" and "swimmer's ear"), the bacterium can infect the lungs, joints, burn wounds, urinary tracts and blood of people whose defenses have been weakened by conditions such as chemotherapy, diabetes, cystic fibrosis or AIDS.

http://snipurl.com/tz071 - A note about this one. Soap, all by itself, is antibacterial and antimicrobial. It's a sulfactant, and it destroys cell membranes, killing 99% of all microorganisms it comes into contact with. There is no reason to add antibacterials to soap, since it is in base already antibacterial. Molecular biologists use soap to cut up cells to extract nucleic acids. So, just use soap, all by itself, it's more than good enough.



Melting Glaciers Nourishing Oceans With Ancient Carbon
from National Geographic News

Alaska's marine animals have an unexpected nutrient in their diets: ancient carbon from glacier melt, a new study says. Glaciers that naturally melt each summer along the Gulf of Alaska flush out huge amounts of organic material, made up mostly of dead microbes.

Those microbes had feasted on ancient carbon from boggy forests, which lined the Alaska coast between 2,500 to 7,000 years ago and were later trapped under glaciers.

Once released via glacial melt, the dead microbes provide a tasty treat for living microbes, which are at the base of the marine food web, researchers say.

http://snipurl.com/tz09f



Going Smoke-Free May Raise Diabetes Risk
from the Baltimore Sun

No one doubts that quitting smoking is one of the best ways to improve your health. But a new study by Johns Hopkins researchers suggests that, in the short term, tossing the cigarettes might actually increase the risk of developing diabetes.

People who quit smoking tend to gain weight, and those extra pounds can put a person at increased diabetes risk. In fact, the diabetes risk was higher for people who gave up cigarettes than for those who continued to smoke--but only within the first couple of years of quitting, according to the research appearing in today's Annals of Internal Medicine.

After that, the diabetes risk decreased and almost disappeared after 10 years, researchers found.

http://snipurl.com/tz09x



Are Engines the Future of Solar Power?
from Scientific American

Nearly 200 years after their invention, and decades after first being proposed as a method of harnessing solar energy, 60 sun-powered Stirling engines are about to begin generating electricity outside Phoenix, Ariz., for the first time. Such engines, which harness heat to expand a gas and drive pistons, are not used widely today other than in pacemakers and long-distance robotic spacecraft.

The 1.5 megawatt (MW) demonstration site, known as Maricopa Solar, is set to begin operations early January 2010, with units provided by the Arizona-based Stirling Energy Systems (SES). While 1.5 MW is only a fraction of the power that may be generated at sites SES has contracted to develop in California and Texas, spokesperson Janette Coates says this is a necessary first step in the technology's commercialization.

"It's important for our industry to see—and our partners and investors—that we can take a small-scale plant and get it operational before we break ground on larger ones," she says.

http://snipurl.com/tz0ab



New-Found Galaxies May Be Farthest Back in Time Yet
from Science News

By pushing the refurbished Hubble Space Telescope to its very limits as a cosmic time machine, astronomers have identified three galaxies that may hail from an era only a few hundred million years after the Big Bang. The faint galaxies may be the most distant starlit bodies known, each lying some 13.2 billion light-years from Earth.

Detecting galaxies at such a distance is at the very edge of what current technology can accomplish, comments Richard Ellis of Caltech, who was not part of the new study. It's uncharted territory, he says.

If the researchers are correct in the preliminary determination, then Hubble is seeing light that reveals the galaxies as they first appeared just 480 million years after the birth of the universe.

http://snipurl.com/tz0bd



In New Way to Edit DNA, Hope for Treating Disease
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Only one man seems to have ever been cured of AIDS, a patient who also had leukemia. To treat the leukemia, he received a bone marrow transplant in Berlin from a donor who, as luck would have it, was naturally immune to the AIDS virus.

If that natural mutation could be mimicked in human blood cells, patients could be endowed with immunity to the deadly virus. But there is no effective way of making precise alterations in human DNA.

That may be about to change, if a powerful new technique for editing the genetic text proves to be safe and effective. At the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Carl June and colleagues have used the technique to disrupt a gene in patients' T cells, the type attacked by the AIDS virus. They have then infused those cells back into the body. A clinical trial is now under way to see if the treated cells will reconstitute a patient's immune system and defeat the virus.

http://snipurl.com/tz0dy - Did I predict cure for prostate cancer? Wait, I meant cure for AIDS.



The Call of the Panama Bats
from Smithsonian Magazine

...Since 2000, [Elisabeth] Kalko, who is jointly appointed as the head of the experimental ecology department at the University of Ulm in Germany and a staff scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, has been making two trips a year, usually for a month each time, to Panama's Barro Colorado Island (BCI).

...The bats are what draw Kalko. Around 120 bat species—a tenth of the species found worldwide—live in Panama, and of those, 74 can be found on BCI. Kalko has worked closely with a quarter of them and estimates she has observed about 60 in an effort to better understand the various behaviors that have allowed so many species to coexist.

...The greater bulldog bat, as it's more commonly known, is the only bat on the island with fish as its primary diet. Using echolocation to locate swimming fish making ripples in the water's surface, it swoops down over the water, drags its long talons and snatches its prey. In flight, it curls its head down to grab the fish, then chews it and fills its cheek pouches like a hamster.

http://snipurl.com/tz0eu - fish hunting bats are cool.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 06, 2010, 12:22:28 PM
Quote from: Triple Zero on January 06, 2010, 12:13:29 PM
QuoteTrusting Nature as the Climate Referee
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Imagine there's no Copenhagen. Imagine a planet in which global warming was averted without the periodic need for thousands of people to fly around the world to promise to stop burning fossil fuels.

Imagine no international conferences wrangling over the details of climate policy. Imagine entrusting the tough questions to a referee: Mother Earth.

That is the intriguing suggestion of Ross McKitrick, an economist at the University of Guelph in Ontario who ... is virtuously restricting his carbon footprint by staying away from Copenhagen this week.

http://snipr.com/tp8uw

reading this article ... is this a good idea? it sounds like a good idea, but maybe I'm missing the catch here.

The catch is it's all talk.

Plus, we should be setting carbon limits anyway, regardless of climate change. Pollution control doesn't need a reason like climate change to make sense.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 06, 2010, 08:33:50 PM
January 6, 2010

Why Atom-Size Gadgets Must Shape Up
from the Christian Science Monitor

For engineers who measure their gizmos in atom-size dimensions, getting size and shape just right is the key to success. A few nanometers (billionths of a meter) off that right size or a misplaced wrinkle can ruin an exquisitely designed nano "tool." Mastering these poorly understood design principles will have big practical payoffs.

For example, food scientist Yuan Yao at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind., has found a way to reshape nanoparticles derived from sweet corn that transforms them into a powerful food preservative. Meanwhile, chemist Scott Anderson at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City has shown that size directly affects the electrical properties of metal nanoparticles used as catalysts to make certain chemical reactions happen. "People had speculated this should be happening but no one has ever seen it [before]," he says.

If that sounds like something only a chemist would whoop about, consider this. Because chemists don't really know how to design a catalyst, they use expensive metals like gold or platinum that they know from experience will work. Think of a car's catalytic converter. Yet as Dr. Anderson notes, 90 percent of the particles in a gold catalyst are too big to be active. Only nanoparticles with about 10 atoms each seem to do the work. "If you could make a catalyst with only the right size particles, you could save 90 percent of the cost or more," he says.

http://snipr.com/tzbti




Should Baby Screenings Include More Rare Gene Diseases?
from USA Today

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- At his first birthday, John Klor couldn't sit up on his own. A few months later, he was cruising like any healthy toddler -- thanks to a special diet that's treating the North Carolina boy's mysterious disease.

What doctors initially called cerebral palsy instead was a rare metabolic disorder assaulting his brain and muscles, yet one that's treatable if caught in time.

Urged by John's family, Duke University researchers are working on a way to test newborns for this disease, called GAMT deficiency. It's part of a growing movement to add some of the rarest of rare illnesses -- with such names as bubble-boy disease, Pompe disease, Krabbe disease -- to the battery of screenings given to U.S. babies hours after birth.

http://snipr.com/tzbtr




Time Marches on, Measured in Billionths of a Second
from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

When you're having the time of your life, time doesn't matter. So when the big ball in Times Square hit bottom on New Year's Eve, you probably didn't much care if it was precisely midnight, especially if you were engaged in the annual ritual epic smooch.

The rest of your life, however, depends on timekeeping that is almost unimaginably exact. Telecommunications systems, such as your cellphone service, need timing signals that are correct to within a millionth of a second per day. Ditto for the devices that synchronize all the sources feeding the nation's electric power grid. Global Positioning System signals, as readers of this column know, have to be accurate to within a billionth of a second per day, and some kinds of research demand time scales a million times finer. Or more.

As a result, civilization now tracks the passage of time with an accuracy of three or four parts in 10 million billion, equivalent to gaining or losing no more than one second in 100 million years or so. That's pretty good. But not close enough for government work--or for a host of urgent purposes from fundamental physics to neuroscience and defense applications.

http://snipr.com/tzbtx - cause we all have connections to atomic clocks in our back pockets, essentially.




Future Uncertain for Stuck Mars Rover
from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

LOS ANGELES (Associated Press) -- Spirit has always been the unluckier of NASA's twin Mars rovers. Just weeks after landing in a Martian crater in 2004, it went haywire and transmitted gibberish to Earth. Engineers eventually nursed it back to health.

As if the near-death experience wasn't enough, Spirit was upstaged early on by its twin Opportunity, which landed in a geologic gold mine and was the first to determine that the frigid, dusty planet possessed a wetter past.

Bad luck has fallen again on Spirit. As the workhorse rover marks its sixth year on the red planet on Sunday, it finds itself stuck in a sand trap, perhaps forever. The six-wheel robot geologist has been in jams before, but this is the worst predicament yet.

http://snipr.com/tzbuc - Awww. Well, it was nice while it lasted. At least we still have Opportunity, and we've been on Mars for 6 years now.




Down on the Farm, an Endless Cycle of Waste
from the New York Times (Registration Required)

GUSTINE, Tex. -- Day and night, a huge contraption prowls the grounds at Frank Volleman's dairy in Central Texas. It has a 3,000-gallon tank, a heavy-duty vacuum pump and hoses and, underneath, adjustable blades that scrape the surface as it passes along.

In function it is something like a Zamboni, but one that has crossed over to the dark side. This is no hockey rink, and it's not loose ice being scraped up. It's cow manure. ... Proper handling of this material is one of the most important tasks faced by a dairy operator, or by a cattle feedlot owner, hog producer or other farmer with large numbers of livestock.

... But as the increasing incidence of environmental and health problems linked to agriculture makes clear, when manure is mismanaged the nutrients in it can foul streams, lakes and aquifers; the pathogens in it can contaminate food products; and the gases it produces, including ammonia, methane and bad-smelling volatile compounds, can upset neighbors and pollute the atmosphere.

http://snipr.com/tzbun




Biological Cells Reveal Brain Chemistry Secrets
from BBC News Online

Scientists have developed biological cells that can give insight into the chemistry of the brain. The cells, which change colour when exposed to specific chemicals, have been used to show how a class of schizophrenia drug works.

The researchers hope they will also help shed light on how many other drugs work on the brain. The study, by the University of California - San Diego, is published in Nature Neuroscience.

Schizophrenia is most commonly associated with symptoms such as delusions and hallucinations. But people with the illness also struggle to sustain attention or recall information. A class of drugs called atypical neuroleptics has become commonly prescribed, in part because they seem to improve these problems. However, the way they altered brain chemistry was uncertain.

http://snipr.com/tzbus




Evidence Lacking for Special Diets in Autism
from the Seattle Times

CHICAGO (Associated Press) -- An expert panel says there's no rigorous evidence that digestive problems are more common in children with autism compared to other children, or that special diets work, contrary to claims by celebrities and vaccine naysayers.

The report's lead author, Dr. Timothy Buie of Harvard Medical School, said pain or discomfort because of bloating or stomach cramps can set off problem behavior, further complicating diagnosis, especially if the child has trouble communicating--as is the case for children with autism.

Autism is a spectrum of disorders affecting a person's ability to communicate and interact with others. Children with autism may make poor eye contact or exhibit repetitive movements such as rocking or hand-flapping. About 1 in 110 U.S. children has autism, according to a recent government estimate.

http://snipr.com/tzbvj




Giant Carbon "Vault" Proposed Near New York City
from National Geographic News

Several new underwater "vaults" that could stash the potent greenhouse gas carbon dioxide have been found--and one of them is right outside New York City, a new study says.

Such close-in vaults would be convenient, but could pose an earthquake risk, experts say.

Some of Earth's largest ancient lava flows lie below the Atlantic Ocean seafloor not far from the Big Apple. The vault regions include rubble-filled, fractured, and otherwise porous volcanic layers in which massive amounts of liquid CO2 could be safely stored, the research found.

http://snipr.com/tzbvz - Interesting.




Music Therapy 'May Help Cut Tinnitus Noise Levels'
from BBC News Online

Individually designed music therapy may help reduce the noise levels experienced by people who suffer from tinnitus, say German researchers.

They altered participants' favourite music to remove notes which matched the frequency of the ringing in their ears. After a year of listening to the modified music, individuals reported a drop in the loudness of their tinnitus.

The researchers said the "inexpensive" treatment could be used alongside other techniques to relieve the condition.

http://snipr.com/tzbwb - Also interesting.




The Curious Thing About Alan Alda
from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

For a new three-part PBS special called "The Human Spark," actor and science lover Alan Alda visits a number of far-flung places--Germany, a Caribbean island, the home of the Lascaux cave paintings--in pursuit of just what it is that makes us different from the Earth's other creatures.

...Jared Ipworth, executive producer for "The Human Spark," which airs tonight and the next two Wednesdays, calls Alda a perfect fit for the show's approach. "His immense curiosity about science and his ability to get scientists to speak about the ways their field relates to others" was crucial to making it work.

Most of the issues in the program--the diversion of humans from chimpanzees 6 million years ago, the gradual replacement of Neanderthals by modern humans, development of young children--had been covered in other places, Ipworth said, but not brought together properly.

http://snipr.com/tzbwp - I'd really like to see this show, but I don't have a television. :/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on January 06, 2010, 08:54:24 PM
we(humans) produce about a mountain of carbondioxide every year. (if it were made liquid/solid)
how much space did they say there was?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 06, 2010, 10:09:51 PM
Quote from: Regret on January 06, 2010, 08:54:24 PM
we(humans) produce about a mountain of carbondioxide every year. (if it were made liquid/solid)
how much space did they say there was?

I just thought it was interesting that such an option was being considered. I have no idea if there is enough room or if it would even work.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 07, 2010, 08:59:35 PM
January 7, 2010


Fossil Tracks Record 'Oldest Land-Walkers'

from BBC News Online

The oldest evidence of four-legged animals walking on land has been discovered in southeast Poland. Rocks from a disused quarry record the "footprints" of unknown creatures that lived about 397 million years ago.

Scientists tell the journal Nature that the fossil trackways even retain the impressions left by the "toes" on the animals' feet. The team says the find means that land vertebrates appeared millions of years earlier than previously supposed.

"This place has yielded what I consider to be some of the most exciting fossils I've ever encountered in my career as a paleontologist," said team member Per Ahlberg from Uppsala University, Sweden. "[They are] fossils of footprints that give us the earliest record of how our very distant ancestors moved out of the water and moved on to the land and took their first steps."

http://snipr.com/tzqxi - Pretty cool. But Poland? I don't usually think Poland when it comes to cool fossils.


White House Announces $250M Effort for Science and Math Teachers

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The White House announced a $250 million public-private effort Wednesday to improve science and mathematics instruction, aiming to help the nation compete in key fields with global economic rivals.

With funding from high-tech businesses, universities and foundations, the initiative seeks to prepare more than 10,000 new math and science schoolteachers over five years and provide on-the-job training for an additional 100,000 in science, technology, engineering and math.

...The initiative effectively doubles, to more than $500 million, a philanthropic campaign for so-called STEM education that Obama launched in November. Separately, the government spends about $700 million a year on elementary and secondary education in the STEM fields through agencies such as NASA, the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Education Department. But it's unclear how much federal spending can grow in a time of rising budget deficits.

http://snipr.com/tzqxx - Good. And bad. And whatever.


North America's Cooling Due to Natural Causes in 2008?

from National Geographic News

Average temperatures across North America dropped in 2008--which may seem to contradict global warming theory. Not so, scientists say. The cooling, caused by natural changes in global air circulation, temporarily masked the effects of global warming, which is getting worse, a new study says.

New computer-model simulations suggest that the continent-wide dip resulted from an unusually long cooling of the Pacific Ocean, driven by the La Niña phenomenon. During a La Niña, event, the sea-surface temperature in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean drops, sometimes as much as 7 degrees Fahrenheit below normal.

La Niña conditions recur every few years and typically last about one year. The one that began in 2007, however, lasted about two years, said study leader Judith Perlwitz of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The two-year La Niña affected the patterns of jet streams and so-called storm tracks across North America.

http://snipr.com/tzqy5 - Yes. Climatologists know what they are talking about, so lay off.


Medication of Little Help for Mild, Moderate Depression

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Antidepressant medications probably provide little or no benefit to people with mild or moderate depression, a new study has found. Rather, the mere act of seeing a doctor, discussing symptoms and learning about depression probably triggers the improvements many patients experience while on medication.

Only people with very severe depression receive additional benefits from drugs, said the senior author of the study, Robert J. DeRubeis, a University of Pennsylvania psychology professor. The research was released online Tuesday and will be published today in the Journal of the American Medical Assn.

Hundreds of studies have attested to the benefits of antidepressants over placebos, DeRubeis said. But many studies involve only participants with severe depression. Confusion arises, he said, "because there is a tendency to generalize the findings to mean that all depressed people benefit from medications."

http://snipr.com/tzqyk - of course, this doesn't take into account anxiety.


For F.D.R. Sleuths, New Focus on an Odd Spot

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

When President Franklin D. Roosevelt died unexpectedly on April 12, 1945, in Warm Springs, Ga., the White House lost no time announcing a cause of death. The 63-year-old president, the shocked and grieving nation was told, had died of cerebral hemorrhage.

... That Roosevelt died of a stroke is undisputed. But what caused it is a medical mystery that has persisted to this day, a mystery heightened by the secrecy in which he, his aides and his doctors always insisted on shrouding his health. Now a new book -- "F.D.R.'s Deadly Secret," by a neurologist, Dr. Steven Lomazow, and a journalist, Eric Fettmann (PublicAffairs) -- revives an intriguing theory.

Look closely at Roosevelt's portraits over his 12-year presidency. In his first two terms, there is a dark spot over his left eyebrow. It seems to grow and then mysteriously vanishes sometime around 1940, leaving a small scar. Was the spot a harmless mole? Or a cancerous melanoma that spread to contribute to, or even cause, his death?

http://snipr.com/tzqys


No More Power Lines?

from the Christian Science Monitor

Abundant solar and wind power lies across America's vast plains and deserts, but getting that distant renewable energy to cities without wrecking vistas and raising lawsuits over transmission lines is a sizable hurdle for green-leaning utility companies. Thousands of miles of towering electrical lines will be needed before big alternative-energy projects can take hold. Yet such power lines portend years of legal snarls over the not-in-my-backyard problem.

Into this fray come Phil Harris and his pioneering plan to use underground superconducting cables that will be both hidden from view and more efficient than traditional lines. Mr. Harris wants to build a virtually invisible network that would create a national renewable-energy hub located in the Southwest.

Today, the nation's power grid is in three disconnected pieces - Eastern, Western, and Texas. Harris's project, called Tres Amigas, would use superconducting cable to provide the first large-scale commercial trading link between those big grids - opening up new markets for renewable wind and solar power in the American East and West.

http://snipr.com/tzqyx


Even Without DNA, Prions Can Evolve Like Organisms

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Although they are believed to be "lifeless," the infectious agents known as prions that cause a variety of fatal brain diseases in people and animals, including chronic wasting disease in deer, are capable of evolving like living organisms, according to a new study.

The research, which has implications for eventual treatments for such diseases, is one of the first studies to suggest that something devoid of DNA or other genetic material can evolve in a Darwinian manner. ... The new paper, which was published online in the journal Science Express, adds another complicated twist to the prion concept ...

Prions are abnormal versions of proteins made in the brain. Although they are believed to contain no genetic material, they are able to replicate in the brain by causing normal prion protein to misfold. That misfolding can turn the normally harmless prion protein into infectious prions that cause incurable, fatal brain disorders ...

http://snipr.com/tzqze - PRIONS. Also, there is no such thing as a normal prion. You know what they call normal prion proteins? Proteins


A Step Beyond Anthropology

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Most people see sustainability as pertaining to the physical environment, and the need to preserve it for coming generations. But in academe, sustainability can have as much to do with social science as science science.

Goucher College, the liberal arts college in Baltimore, is extending the concept: to preserving the traditional values, as well as the arts, dress, customs and cuisines, of communities threatened by globalization and modernization, whether inner-city neighborhoods or third-world villages.

Goucher calls it cultural sustainability, and is offering a Master of Arts. ... Though students are required to attend Goucher for two one-week residencies, most of the curriculum, drawn from ethnography, anthropology and social entrepreneurship, is online.

http://snipr.com/tzqzh - Interesting.


The Top Four Sites to Land on Mars

from Popular Mechanics

Call it the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's version of the Final Four. Scientists at the Pasadena, Calif.-based NASA research center will decide within the next two years where to send the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover after it launches in the fall of 2011. MSL's mission is to scour the Red Planet for environments that may once have harbored, or may still harbor, microbial organisms. Such an environment would have to contain the basic ingredients of life--including water, organic carbon and a source of energy to sustain the microbes' metabolism.

After several years of painstaking research and debate, NASA scientists whittled down their initial list of over 50 sites to four-- Eberswalde Crater, Holden Crater, Mawrth Vallis, and Gale Crater.

When it arrives on Mars in 2012, the MSL will bring one of NASA's most sophisticated toolkits, including high-resolution imagers that will beam back data about the planet's rock and soil textures and a suite of instrumentation to carry out in situ sample analysis.

http://snipr.com/tzqzm - Hey, at least they aren't talking about sending people.


Obama to Honor S.F. State Science Professor

from the San Francisco Chronicle

In 1992, Frank Bayliss was teaching biology at San Francisco State University when he realized that none of the minority science students were going on to graduate school.

Bayliss realized that many of them were underprivileged and had no time for essential laboratory work because they had to hustle jobs to stay in school. So he founded San Francisco State's Student Enrichment Opportunities Office and began raising funds to make it easier for students with less means to do the time-consuming lab work their science courses demanded. Today, the project provides mentoring and enough money to send 20 to 25 "underrepresented minorities" a year on to doctoral programs.

At a White House reception in Washington yesterday, President Obama presented Bayliss with a special award for "Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring." It's a national award that recognizes teachers who have made distinguished efforts to bring underprivileged college students into the mainstream of the advanced sciences.

http://snipr.com/tzqzt
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 13, 2010, 04:33:16 PM
January 8, 2010
Stricter New Smog Limit Would Hit Rural Areas, Too

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Hundreds of communities far from congested highways and belching smokestacks could soon join big cities and industrial corridors in violation of stricter limits on lung-damaging smog proposed Thursday by the Obama administration.

Costs of compliance could be in the tens of billions of dollars, but the government said the rules would save other billions--as well as lives--in the long run.

More than 300 counties--mainly in southern California, the Northeast and Gulf Coast--already violate the current, looser requirements adopted two years ago by the Bush administration and will find it even harder to reduce smog-forming pollution enough to comply with the law. The new limits being considered by the Environmental Protection Agency could more than double the number of counties in violation and reach places like California's wine country in Napa Valley and rural Trego County, Kan., and its 3,000 residents.

http://snipr.com/u0hke


Warp-Speed Algebra

from Scientific American

Quantum computers can do wondrous things: too bad they do not exist yet. That has not stopped physicists from devising new algorithms for the devices, which can calculate a lot faster than ordinary computers--in fact, exponentially faster, in quite a literal sense. Once quantum computers do become available, the algorithms could become a key part of applications that require number crunching, from engineering to video games.

The latest quantum algorithm is generating excitement among physicists. It tackles linear equations: expressions such as 3x + 2y = 7 and typically written with unknowns on one side and constants on the other.

Many high schoolers learn the trite mechanics of solving systems of such equations by eliminating one unknown at a time. Speed becomes crucial when systems contain billions of variables and billions of equations, which are not unusual in modern applications such as simulations of weather and other physical phenomena.

http://snipr.com/u0hl6 - QUANTUM!


Bornavirus Genes Found in Human DNA

from Science News

People may not be quite the humans they think they are. Or so suggests new research showing that the human genome is part bornavirus.

Bornaviruses, a type of RNA virus that causes disease in horses and sheep, can insert their genetic material into human DNA and first did so at least 40 million years ago, the study shows.

The findings, published January 7 in Nature, provide the first evidence that RNA viruses other than retroviruses (such as HIV) can stably integrate genes into host DNA. The new work may help reveal more about the evolution of RNA viruses as well as their mammalian hosts.

http://snipr.com/u0hlr - My body is a chimera of ancestors, making the tree of life more like a twisted bank of roots.


Climate Change: No Hiding Place?

from the Economist

It may seem implausible at the moment, as northern Europe, Asia and parts of America shiver in the snow, but 2010 may well turn out as the hottest year on record.

Those who doubt that greenhouse gases are quite the problem they have been cracked up to be by most of the world's climatologists have taken comfort from the fact that the Hadley Centre, part of Britain's Meteorological Office, reckons the warmest year since records began was 1998.

Twelve years without a new record would, the sceptics reckon, be rather a large lull in what is supposed to be a rising trend. Computer modelling by the Met Office, though, gives odds-on chances of the lull being broken.

http://snipr.com/u0hlx


Yearlong Star Eclipse May Help Solve Space Mystery

from National Geographic News

While relatively few people were looking, an unusual eclipse darkened New Year's Day.

On January 1 a giant space object blotted out our view of Epsilon Aurigae, a yellow supergiant star about 2,000 light-years from Earth. Based on studies of Epsilon Aurigae's previous eclipses, astronomers expect the star won't fully regain its bright shine until early 2011.

Normally the star is so bright it can be seen with the naked eye even by city dwellers. For all but the most rural star-gazers, though, the mystery object that eclipses the star causes it to vanish for about 18 months every 27.1 years. Ever since the star's periodic eclipses were first recorded in 1821, astronomers have been puzzling over how Epsilon Aurigae pulls off its lengthy disappearing act.

http://snipr.com/u0hm3


Pi Calculated to 'Record Number' of Digits

from BBC News Online

A computer scientist claims to have computed the mathematical constant pi to nearly 2.7 trillion digits, some 123 billion more than the previous record.

Fabrice Bellard used a desktop computer to perform the calculation, taking a total of 131 days to complete and check the result. This version of pi takes over a terabyte of hard disk space to store.

Previous records were established using supercomputers, but Mr. Bellard claims his method is 20 times more efficient. The prior record of about 2.6 trillion digits, set in August 2009 by Daisuke Takahashi at the University of Tsukuba in Japan, took just 29 hours. However, that work employed a supercomputer 2,000 times faster and thousands of times more expensive than the desktop Mr. Bellard employed.

http://snipr.com/u0hmc


Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Attacked Again

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Here we go again. Late last year, scientists seemed to be homing in on the cause of chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS)--excessive tiredness and other symptoms that have no known biological cause--by finding a supposed viral link. But a new paper challenges that link, a development that may plunge the field back into the same confusion and acrimony that has characterized it for years.

Many CFS patients report that their symptoms began after an acute viral infection. Yet scientists have been unable to pin CFS on common viruses such as the Epstein-Barr virus. As a result, patients have faced skepticism for years that CFS might not be a real disease, or that it is perhaps a psychiatric disorder.

A team of American researchers thought it finally struck pay dirt last October when it reported in Science that it found DNA traces of a virus in the blood cells of two-thirds of 101 patients with CFS, compared with 4% of 218 healthy controls. XMRV is a rodent retrovirus also implicated in an aggressive prostate cancer, though why it might cause or be associated with CFS remains unclear.

http://snipr.com/u0hmm


Engineering Class Shows Girls Male-Dominated Field

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

While students at an all-girls school in Montgomery County were laboring one day last month to build bridges out of popsicle sticks, their teachers were trying to build bridges for them into the male-dominated field of engineering.

The popsicle-stick bridges shattered under 60 pounds of pressure. Teachers at the Holton-Arms School in Bethesda hope their seemingly unique engineering course will make girls' interest in the field last longer.

"It's about taking risks and getting them over the anxiety of always having to be right all the time," said physics teacher Chris Lee, who designed the course four years ago and wears a tie-dyed lab coat and goatee. The students, who range from sophomores to seniors, study such new technologies as artificial limbs; they research bridge disasters, something Lee guarantees will annoy parents when the teens spout dire predictions during the next family road trip; and they also build bridges and robots.

http://snipr.com/u0hn3


Using a Virus's Knack for Mutating to Wipe It Out

from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Evolution is a virus's secret weapon. The virus can rapidly slip on new disguises to evade our immune systems, and it can become resistant to antiviral drugs.

But some scientists are turning the virus's secret weapon against it. They hope to cure infections by forcing viruses to evolve their way to extinction.

Viruses can evolve because of the mistakes they make when they replicate. All living things can mutate, but viruses are especially prone to these genetic errors. In fact, some species of viruses mutate hundreds of thousands of times faster than we do.

http://snipr.com/u0hnh


Professors Search for Cures in Polar Regions

from the Tampa Tribune

TAMPA -- From the waters of a melting Antarctic glacier, a University of South Florida researcher has found an organism with the potential to fight malaria and other diseases that plague people in the tropics.

It's one of several minute creatures that Bill Baker, a professor in the USF Department of Chemistry, has gathered from the freezing water and brought to the university for study.

He discovered the malaria-fighting compound with Dennis Kyle, of USF's Department of Global Health. Their findings were recently published in the Journal of Natural Products. Baker doesn't see great commercial application in the compound, found in a bright red sponge. It doesn't improve on existing tropical disease drugs. But he said its discovery has strengthened his belief that the Antarctic waters are filled with potential cures for a variety of ailments.

http://snipr.com/u0hnu
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 13, 2010, 04:39:34 PM
January 11, 2010
The Americanization of Mental Illness

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Americans, particularly if they are of a certain leftward-leaning, college-educated type, worry about our country's blunders into other cultures. In some circles, it is easy to make friends with a rousing rant about the McDonald's near Tiananmen Square, the Nike factory in Malaysia or the latest blowback from our political or military interventions abroad.

For all our self-recrimination, however, we may have yet to face one of the most remarkable effects of American-led globalization. We have for many years been busily engaged in a grand project of Americanizing the world's understanding of mental health and illness. We may indeed be far along in homogenizing the way the world goes mad.

This unnerving possibility springs from recent research by a loose group of anthropologists and cross-cultural psychiatrists. Swimming against the biomedical currents of the time, they have argued that mental illnesses are not discrete entities like the polio virus with their own natural histories. These researchers have amassed an impressive body of evidence suggesting that mental illnesses have never been the same the world over (either in prevalence or in form) but are inevitably sparked and shaped by the ethos of particular times and places.

http://snipr.com/u1ny0 - Cf. the thread posted about this.


Experts Urge Officials to End Mountaintop Mining

from National Public Radio

A team of scientists says the environmental damage from mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia is so widespread, the mining technique should be stopped.

The scientific review of research on the effects of the practice, which dumps coarse rock down the mountainsides into nearby valleys, states that harmful chemicals such as sulfate and selenium are pervasive in streams below.

Mountaintop removal is a pretty efficient and cheap way to mine coal. But when the rock or "overburden" above coal seams is blasted away and pushed over the side of the mountain, says Margaret Palmer of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, "you expose material that, when it rains and water percolates through that, it dissolves a lot of chemicals, and those are very persistent in the streams below valley fill sites."

http://snipr.com/u1nyh


Grant Money Could Speed Stem Cell Cures

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Dr. Karen Aboody estimates that she has cured several hundred mice of a cancer of the central nervous system called neuroblastoma.

First she injected them with specialized neural stem cells that naturally zero in on the tumors and surround them. Then she administered an anti-cancer agent that the cells converted into a highly toxic drug. In her tests, 90% of the animals were rid of their tumors while healthy brain tissue remained undamaged.

To hear Aboody tell it, that was the easy part. "People are curing mice right and left," said the City of Hope neuroscientist. The real challenge is convincing the Food and Drug Administration to let her try this on people with brain tumors.

http://snipr.com/u1nzb


The Ultimate Eco-Friendly Ride

from Spiegel

Carbon fiber and aluminum are so 2009. This year's best bicycling model is made out of bamboo and hemp. A new generation of manufacturers is coming up with some of the most environmentally friendly transport yet. Lighter, stronger, more comfortable and these bikes have also got a much smaller carbon footprint.

Craig Calfee is known as the Zen master of bamboo-bike builders. In his workshop on the Californian coast, only a hundred meters from the tumultuous waves of the Pacific Ocean, the frame designer builds breathtaking bikes out of the fast-growing plant, the largest member of the grass family.

But the American, who has become well known for making bikes out of plant materials, has some competition. The number of experts who are making bicycles out of renewable raw materials is growing. Among them are Brano Meres, an engineer from Slovakia and professional cyclist Nick Frey also from California. German engineer Nicolas Meyer is also working along this line, but not with bamboo. Instead he has built a triathlon bike out of hemp.

http://snipr.com/u1nzi


Egyptian Eyeliner May Have Warded Off Disease

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Clearly, ancient Egyptians didn't get the memo about lead poisoning. Their eye makeup was full of the stuff. Although today we know that lead can cause brain damage and miscarriages, the Egyptians believed that lead-based cosmetics protected against eye diseases. Now, new research suggests that they may have been on to something.

Previous work indicates that the Egyptians added lead to their cosmetics on purpose. When analytical chemist Philippe Walter and colleagues at CNRS and the Louvre Museum in Paris analyzed the composition of several samples of the Egyptians' famous bold, black eyeliner in the Louvre's collection, they identified two types of lead salt not found in nature. That means that ancient Egyptians must have synthesized them. But making lead salt is a tricky, delicate process that requires tending for weeks--and unlike other common makeup components, the salts are not glossy. So why did they bother?

Ancient manuscripts gave the scientists a clue. It turns out that in those days, people made lead salts and used them as treatments for eye ailments, scars, and discolorations. When Walter told analytical chemist Christian Amatore of the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris about the findings, Amatore says he was intrigued because lead is now known to have so many toxic effects.

http://snipr.com/u1nzn


Sea Slug Steals Genes for Greens, Makes Chlorophyll Like a Plant

from Science News

SEATTLE -- It's easy being green for a sea slug that has stolen enough genes to become the first animal shown to make chlorophyll like a plant.

Shaped like a leaf itself, the slug Elysia chlorotica already has a reputation for kidnapping the photosynthesizing organelles and some genes from algae. Now it turns out that the slug has acquired enough stolen goods to make an entire plant chemical-making pathway work inside an animal body, says Sidney K. Pierce of the University of South Florida in Tampa.

The slugs can manufacture the most common form of chlorophyll, the green pigment in plants that captures energy from sunlight, Pierce reported January 7 at the annual meeting of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology. Pierce used a radioactive tracer to show that the slugs were making the pigment, called chlorophyll a, themselves and not simply relying on chlorophyll reserves stolen from the algae the slugs dine on.

http://snipr.com/u1nzx -- HOLY SHIT. No really, HO-LY SHIT.


Rude Awakening: Media Frenzy Haunts Doctors

from Newsweek

Late last year, the world was captivated by the story of Rom Houben, a Belgian man who suffered a traumatic brain injury and was misdiagnosed for 23 years as being in a vegetative state. In fact, media outlets reported breathlessly, Houben had been conscious the whole time, trapped inside his motionless body, until a heroic doctor used cutting-edge scans to find normal brain activity. What's more, that doctor discovered a way for Houben to communicate, allowing the "locked-in" man to tell his harrowing tale to visiting reporters...

It was a fantastic story that ruled the headlines for a few days, but unfortunately, it was only partly true, and the resulting media circus distorted the work of Houben's doctor, Steven Laureys. In reality, Laureys didn't need advanced technology to diagnose Houben, who doesn't meet the definition of a locked-in patient.

Laureys actually can't verify that the patient was fully conscious for all those 23 years. Nor did Laureys acquaint Houben with "facilitated communication," a controversial aided-speech method that has Houben reliant on the hand of a therapist to peck out letters on a keyboard. ...

http://snipr.com/u1o04


Chernobyl Nuclear Accident: Figures for Deaths and Cancers Still in Dispute

from the Guardian (U.K.)

At the children's cancer hospital in Minsk, Belarus, and at the Vilne hospital for radiological protection in the east of Ukraine, specialist doctors are in no doubt they are seeing highly unusual rates of cancers, mutations and blood diseases linked to the Chernobyl nuclear accident 24 years ago.

But proving that infant mortality hundreds of miles from the stricken nuclear plant has increased 20-30% in 20 years, or that the many young people suffering from genetic disorders, internal organ deformities and thyroid cancers are the victims of the world's greatest release of radioactivity, is impossible.

The UN's World Health Organisation and the International Atomic Energy Agency claim that only 56 people have died as a direct result of the radiation released at Chernobyl and that about 4,000 will die from it eventually.

http://snipr.com/u1o0c


Neanderthal 'Make-Up' Containers Discovered

from BBC News Online

Scientists claim to have the first persuasive evidence that Neanderthals wore "body paint" 50,000 years ago. The team report in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) that shells containing pigment residues were Neanderthal make-up containers.

Scientists unearthed the shells at two archaeological sites in the Murcia province of southern Spain.

The team says its find buries "the view of Neanderthals as half-wits" and shows they were capable of symbolic thinking.

http://snipr.com/u1o0h - not sure I believe this, considering the stuff that's been allowed publication recently in PNAS. Hybridogenesis, anyone?


Male Fish Punish Unruly Females--and Benefit, Study Says

from National Geographic News

Cheaters may not prosper--but punishers do, according to a new study. Male cleaner fish will chase and pester female fish if they interfere with the male's mealtime--the first evidence of a species benefiting from third-party punishment.

If you're a cleaner fish, it's bad table manners to nibble on the mucous layer of "client" fish, which are generally bigger than the cleaners. Clients stop by multifish cleaning "stations" to get rid of their parasites, which become food for the cleaners.

But biting off a chunk of tasty mucous means the larger fish may flee--so one mischievous cleaner can deprive another from a meal.

http://snipr.com/u1o0p - $10 on some radio statio believing you can apply this to humans.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 13, 2010, 04:47:53 PM
January 12, 2010
At Las Vegas Electronics Show, the Web and Cars Meet

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

LAS VEGAS -- What happens in Vegas could soon hit the open road. Even as policymakers and safety advocates worry that the use of gizmos in cars is driving people to distraction, companies including Ford Motor showcased dashboard innovations at the Consumer Electronics Show.

The topic was so prominent, in fact, that hundreds of booths dedicated to computers and cars gave the industry event a Detroit Auto Show feeling. Ford, for example, has a lineup of cars decked out with Internet dashboards that allow people to use Twitter and Facebook and stream Internet radio from behind the wheel.

Alan Mulally, Ford's chief executive, described the firm's "in-car connectivity strategy" as core to its corporate turnaround. ... But as the use of technology accelerates, policymakers are proceeding with caution. Distracted driving is deadly, they say.

http://snipr.com/u22c9


Climate Expert in the Eye of an Integrity Storm

from the Philadelphia Inquirer

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. -- Michael Mann switched from physics to climate science back in graduate school because he thought climate offered a better chance to work "on a frontier."

He got his wish, and now, as the director of Pennsylvania State University's Earth System Science Center, he has experienced an aspect of frontier life more like the Wild West--a bounty on his head. After dozens of Mann's personal e-mails were hacked in November, the tenured professor has been called a fraud, a clown, and worse by columnists and bloggers.

Irate citizens complained to a Pennsylvania state senator, who demanded that the university conduct a probe into Mann's scientific integrity. That inquiry is ongoing. This is hardly Mann's first review. His work has been the subject of at least two major investigations by outside experts.

http://snipr.com/u22cx


Deciphering the Chatter of Monkeys

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Walking through the Tai forest of Ivory Coast, Klaus Zuberbühler could hear the calls of the Diana monkeys, but the babble held no meaning for him.

That was in 1990. Today, after nearly 20 years of studying animal communication, he can translate the forest's sounds. This call means a Diana monkey has seen a leopard. That one means it has sighted another predator, the crowned eagle.

"In our experience time and again, it's a humbling experience to realize there is so much more information being passed in ways which hadn't been noticed before," said Dr. Zuberbühler, a psychologist at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.

http://snipr.com/u22dm - cool.


Trio of NASA Craft Will Boost Climate Data

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

NASA heads into 2010 with the bittersweet assignment of retiring the space shuttle after nearly three decades. But the agency also plans to launch three new satellites aimed at better understanding the sun and Earth's climate and oceans.

Two satellites will examine Earth--specifically, the concentration of salt in the world's oceans and the presence of aerosols, or minute particles, such as dust or ash, in the atmosphere. A third satellite mission will study the sun and its effect on space weather, including solar flares that can disrupt communication on Earth.

All three come at a critical time for NASA. Data will probably influence global-warming research, and the launches could serve as bright spots in a year otherwise dominated by debate over the future of the manned space program.

http://snipr.com/u22dw - This, to me, is so much more interesting than manned spacecraft.


What the EPA's "Chemicals of Concern" Plans Really Mean

from Scientific American

In an unusual exercise of its authority under the Toxic Substances Control Act (TSCA), the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced on December 30 the establishment of a "chemicals of concern" list and action plans that could prompt restrictions on four types of synthetic chemicals used widely in manufacturing and consumer products, including phthalates used to make flexible plastics, often for toys, household products and medical equipment.

Of the compounds covered in the action plans--which also include polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), long-chain perfluorinated chemicals (PFCs) and short-chain chlorinated paraffins (SCCPs)--phthalates and PBDEs will be listed as "chemicals of concern." The PFCs and paraffins will be addressed under other TSCA provisions that could also result in restrictions.

These four types of chemicals, the EPA said, raise "serious environmental or health concerns" and in some cases "may present an unreasonable risk of injury to health and the environment."

http://snipr.com/u22e6


Ancient Hominids May Have Been Seafarers

from Science News

ANAHEIM, Calif. -- Human ancestors that left Africa hundreds of thousands of years ago to see the rest of the world were no landlubbers. Stone hand axes unearthed on the Mediterranean island of Crete indicate that an ancient Homo species--perhaps Homo erectus--had used rafts or other seagoing vessels to cross from northern Africa to Europe via at least some of the larger islands in between, says archaeologist Thomas Strasser of Providence College in Rhode Island.

Several hundred double-edged cutting implements discovered at nine sites in southwestern Crete date to at least 130,000 years ago and probably much earlier, Strasser reported January 7 at the annual meeting of the American Institute of Archaeology.

Many of these finds closely resemble hand axes fashioned in Africa about 800,000 years ago by H. erectus, he says. It was around that time that H. erectus spread from Africa to parts of Asia and Europe.

http://snipr.com/u22pi - Interesting, but the above seems a bit sensational.


Carpe Diem? Maybe Tomorrow

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

For once, social scientists have discovered a flaw in the human psyche that will not be tedious to correct. You may not even need a support group. You could try on your own by starting with this simple New Year's resolution: Have fun ... now!

Then you just need the strength to cash in your gift certificates, drink that special bottle of wine, redeem your frequent flier miles and take that vacation you always promised yourself. If your resolve weakens, do not succumb to guilt or shame. Acknowledge what you are: a recovering procrastinator of pleasure.

It sounds odd, but this is actually a widespread form of procrastination .... But it has taken awhile for psychologists and behavioral economists to analyze this condition. Now they have begun to explore the strange impulse to put off until tomorrow what could be enjoyed today.

http://snipr.com/u22pv - yes, guilt is pretty powerful. I have this very problem.


Why Light Intensifies the Pain of a Migraine

from the Telegraph (UK)

Scientists have discovered why light intensifies the pain of migraine even among the blind, potentially offering hope to millions. Many sufferers of the debilitating head pain can find that light is a trigger and doctors often recommend lying in a dark room until an attack passes.

Researchers found that light rays trigger activity in specific brain cells within seconds of hitting the optic nerve, at the back of the eye. They believe these cells are responsible for causing the debilitating pain light can trigger in migraine sufferers.

Even when light was removed the cells remained active until up to half an hour later, animal tests show. The scientists, from the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Centre, in Boston, now hope that drugs can be developed to block the signal to the brain cells, removing the pain.

http://snipr.com/u22q8 - Interesting.


Sailing into Antiquity

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

The archeological digs at Egypt's Wadi Gawasis have yielded neither mummies nor grand monuments. But Boston University archeologist Kathryn Bard and her colleagues are uncovering the oldest remnants of seagoing ships and other relics linked to exotic trade with a mysterious Red Sea realm called Punt.

"They were the space launches of their time," Bard said of the epic missions to procure wondrous wares. Although Nile River craft are well-known, the ability of ancient Egyptian mariners to ply hundreds of miles of open seas in cargo craft was not so fully documented.

Then the team led by Bard and an Italian archeologist, Rodolfo Fattovich, started uncovering maritime storerooms in 2004, putting hard timber and rugged rigging to the notion of pharaonic deepwater prowess. In the most recent discovery, on Dec. 29, they located the eighth in a series of lost chambers at Wadi Gawasis after shoveling through cubic meters of rock rubble and wind-blown sand.

http://snipr.com/u22qf


Arctic Tern's Epic Journey Mapped

from BBC News Online

The Arctic tern's extraordinary pole-to-pole migration has been detailed by an international team of scientists. The researchers fitted the birds with tiny tracking devices to see precisely which routes the animals took on their 70,000km (43,000 miles) round trip.

The study reveals they fly down either the African or Brazilian coasts but then return in an "S"-shaped path up the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The long-distance adventure is described in the US journal PNAS.

"From ringing, we knew where the Arctic tern travelled," said Carsten Egevang of the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources. "The new thing is that we've now been able to track the bird during a full year of migration, all the way from the breeding grounds to the wintering grounds and back again."

http://snipr.com/u22xd - Very cool.


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 18, 2010, 11:57:35 PM
January 13, 2010
The Madness of Crowds and an Internet Delusion

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

When does the wisdom of crowds give way to the meanness of mobs?

In the 1990s, Jaron Lanier was one of the digital pioneers hailing the wonderful possibilities that would be realized once the Internet allowed musicians, artists, scientists and engineers around the world to instantly share their work. Now, like a lot of us, he is having second thoughts.

Mr. Lanier, a musician and avant-garde computer scientist--he popularized the term "virtual reality"--wonders if the Web's structure and ideology are fostering nasty group dynamics and mediocre collaborations. His new book, "You Are Not a Gadget," is a manifesto against "hive thinking" and "digital Maoism," by which he means the glorification of open-source software, free information and collective work at the expense of individual creativity.

http://snipr.com/u2gqw - Sounds like someone who's butthurt about not having any ideas. That aside, something to check out, if only for the line about "nasty group dynamics and mediocre collaborations".


Watching TV Shortens Life Span, Study Finds

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Watching television for hour upon hour obviously isn't the best way to spend leisure time--inactivity has been linked to obesity and heart disease. But a new study quantifies TV viewing's effect on risk of death.

Researchers found that each hour a day spent watching TV was linked with an 18% greater risk of dying from cardiovascular disease, an 11% greater risk of all causes of death, and a 9% increased risk of death from cancer.

The study, released Monday in Circulation, a journal of the American Heart Assn., looked at health data among 8,800 men and women older than 25 who were part of the Australian Diabetes, Obesity and Lifestyle Study. Participants recorded their television viewing hours for a week, and researchers separated the results by amount of viewing: those who watched less than two hours of TV a day, those who watched two to four hours a day, and those who watched more than four hours a day.

http://snipr.com/u2grb - KILL YOUR FUCKING TELEVISION. NOW.


Astronomers Confident They'll Find Another Planet Like Earth

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

It seems increasingly likely that, as they stare at the heavens, astronomers are going to find an Earth out there, or at least something that they can plausibly claim is a rocky planet where water could splash at the surface and--who knows?--harbor some kind of life. But it's also clear that, when they make their big discovery, the astronomers might want to hire movie director James Cameron to help with the special effects.

The roughly 400 planets that astronomers have found outside our solar system have not been Earthlike by any stretch of the imagination. Most are hot Jupiters, which is to say they're gas giants in scorching orbits.

They've also been pretty much invisible, their presence inferred from fluctuations in starlight. The planet emerges from the data. Astronomers will announce a new planet find with a graph, typically with a nice curving line that represents the periodic changes in starlight associated with the orbiting body. There are no pictures. Which is fine for scientists.

http://snipr.com/u2grj


Benefit of Immobilizing Trauma Victims Questioned

from the Baltimore Sun

Shooting and stabbing victims immobilized to protect their spines might be twice as likely to die because of the delay in transporting them to the hospital, Johns Hopkins researchers conclude in a new study that could trigger a review of treatment protocols used by Maryland paramedics.

Immobilization is standard procedure for paramedics in Maryland and many communities across the country, and the study could have particular significance in Baltimore, where 218 people were fatally shot or stabbed last year.

Immobilization "shouldn't be applied to every single patient who is shot or stabbed because it uses up precious time and doesn't necessarily benefit the patient," said Dr. Elliott R. Haut, lead author of the study published Tuesday in the Journal of Trauma.

http://snipr.com/u2gs1 - This is one of those "It depends on the jurisdiction" things.


Solar Cells Made Through Oil-and-Water 'Self-Assembly'

from BBC News Online

Researchers have demonstrated a simple, cheap way to create self-assembling electronic devices using a property crucial to salad dressings.

It uses the fact that oil- and water-based liquids do not mix, forming devices from components that align along the boundary between the two. The idea joins a raft of approaches toward self-assembly, but lends itself particularly well to small components.

The work is reported in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Crucially, it could allow the large-scale assembly of high-quality electronic components on materials of just about any type, in contrast to "inkjet printed" electronics or some previous self-assembly techniques.

http://snipr.com/u2gs8 - Excellent.


New Sex Hormone Found--May Lead to Male Birth Control?

from National Geographic News

A new human sex hormone has been found, a new study says. The naturally occurring substance could lead to the long-sought male birth control pill, researchers cautiously speculate.

Gonadotropin-inhibitory hormone (GnIH)--first identified in birds about a decade ago--was recently discovered in the hypothalamus of the human brain. The hypothalamus produces hormones that regulate sleep, sex drive, body temperature, and more.

GnIH suppresses another hormone--gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH)--which spurs the release of additional hormones, which get the body for sex and reproduction. So scientists cautiously suggest that contraceptives based on the newfound hormone could someday be possible.

http://snipr.com/u2gse - It would have just been enough to report on GnIH but they had to throw the speculation in....*sigh*


Hydrothermal Vent Environments Not Unchanging

from Science News

In stable neighborhoods, there's often very little turnover of residents. But a new study surprisingly suggests that around hydrothermal vents, considered to be some of the most stable environments on Earth, microbial communities in some parts of a hydrothermal system can undergo dramatic demographic changes over time.

Environmental conditions on the deep ocean floor rarely change: No sunlight reaches the sediment there, and water temperatures typically hover near freezing. In such an environment, hydrothermal vents--which spew immense amounts of warm, often nutrient-rich water--offer an oasis for microbes and the creatures that consume them.

Even within these systems, however, conditions, such as the mineralogy of the hydrothermal chimneys and the chemical composition of vent fluids as those oases age, can change.

http://snipr.com/u2gsx - UNIVERSE NOT STATIC. MORE AT TEN.


Should Evolutionary Theory Evolve?

from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Evolution, by its very nature, is a dynamic process. But just as fluid are humankind's efforts to understand, describe, and conceptualize that process. Out went Lamarck, in came Darwin. Mendel's insights set the rules for genetic inheritance, then certain exceptions to Mendel's rules materialized. So forth and so on.

The most recent, broadly recognized codification of evolutionary theory is known as the Modern Synthesis. After nearly 3 decades of theorizing, experimentation, and writing by paragons of evolutionary thought--Ronald Fisher, J.B.S. Haldane, and Sewall Wright, to name but a few--British biologist Julian Huxley cemented the term in 1942 with the publication of his book Evolution: The Modern Synthesis.

The theoretical framework brought Darwin's ideas into the 20th century and married them to the gene's-eye-view of biology that was emerging at the start of the century, with the rediscovery of Gregor Mendel's inheritance research. But since the 1940s, science's concept of evolutionary dynamics has, well, evolved. Indeed, these days, calling the Modern Synthesis "modern" might be a stretch.

http://snipr.com/u2gtm - My advisor specifically said that I should read this story. This is certainly the first time I've heard the term "evolvability", which is "the ability of a population or species to produce inheritable variation". I'm not sure how one would QUANTIFY that, or even qualify, because for the most part we can only actively watch transmutation in those species with short generation times, and we are severely limited in time and space to view the production of variation at all. In other words, it seems like speculation to me, and not science. Like string theory, the Extended Synthesis as they are calling it is largely composed of "theoretical concepts", by which they mean hypotheses that have no evidence as of yet. Speculation. The only thing here that DOES strike me as a good criticism is the need to include epigenetics in the Modern Synthesis. I will be reading the book mentioned in this article, if only to understand better the arguments.


New Cricket Species Filmed Pollinating Orchids

from BBC News Online

A new species of cricket has been caught on camera--and its bizarre behaviour has surprised scientists. Far from living up to the cricket's plant-destroying reputation, this species lends a helping hand to flora by acting as a pollinator. Scientists say this is the first time a cricket has been spotted pollinating a flower--in this case, an orchid.

A study of the nocturnal insect, which was found on the island of Reunion, has been published in the Annals of Botany. The creature has yet to be given a scientific name, but it belongs to the Glomeremus genus of crickets, which are also known as raspy crickets.

The insect was spotted by researchers who were attempting to find out how a species of orchid called Angraecum cadetii was being pollinated. This green-white flower is closely related to the comet orchid, which is found in Madagascar.

http://snipr.com/u2guj - This is way cool. I would call the species Glomeremus angraecumi, after the genus of orchid it polinates.


Bifocals Slow Progression of Myopia in Children

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

For children diagnosed with worsening myopia, bifocals might be a better choice than standard lenses for nearsightedness; researchers have found that the condition doesn't seem to progress as rapidly among bifocal-wearing children. Those findings, released Monday, raise the intriguing question of whether there is a better way to treat myopia early in its course, slowing its typical progression.

The condition, in which near vision is clear but distance vision is blurry, is usually identified in childhood and worsens until late adolescence. Myopia is increasing worldwide, with researchers at the National Eye Institute reporting last month that rates in Americans ages 12 to 54 rose 66% in the last 30 years.

Some research had suggested that treating children with bifocals could reduce the ultimate severity of the condition. Bifocals are glasses that use two corrective powers in each lens; traditional glasses simply correct vision for one distance.

http://snipr.com/u2gv1 - Interesting.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 19, 2010, 12:13:24 AM
January 14, 2010
Tectonics, Poor Construction Create Devastation in Haiti

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The catastrophic quake that struck Haiti on Tuesday involved a collision of lethal circumstances: a massive, shallow eruption below a densely populated city with few, if any, building codes.

The magnitude 7.0 quake occurred near the boundary between two major tectonic plates, the Caribbean and North American plates. Most of the movement along these plates is what is known as left-lateral strike-slip motion, according to the U.S. Geological Survey, with the Caribbean plate moving eastward in relation to the North America plate.

Kate Hutton, a seismologist at Caltech, said the quake was similar to those seen along the San Andreas fault: It was shallow, a fact that enhances the intensity and makes it more localized to the region right along the fault.

http://snipr.com/u2whm


Study Supports Connection Between BPA and Heart Disease

from Science News

A previously reported link between exposure to the plastics chemical bisphenol A and heart disease stands, reports a new study published online January 12 in PLoS ONE.

Added to previous work, the finding provides a third prong of evidence implicating the chemical in cardiovascular and metabolic problems, notes Richard Stahlhut of the Center for Reproductive Epidemiology at the University of Rochester in New York. "It's becoming a coherent picture that really does fit together," says Stahlhut, who was not involved in the research. "If these all connect, we really do have a problem."

Researchers analyzed data from the 2005-2006 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, or NHANES, conducted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. NHANES uses physical examinations, clinical and lab tests, and personal interviews to get a snapshot of the health and nutritional status of the U.S. population. The new analysis of 2005-2006 data reveals an association between concentrations of bisphenol A in urine and risk of cardiovascular disease, a link also detected in the 2003-2004 NHANES data.

http://snipr.com/u2wix


The Fickle Y Chromosome

from Nature News

The male sex chromosome, long dismissed as the underachieving runt of the genome, has now been fully sequenced in a common chimpanzee. And comparison with its human counterpart--the only other Y chromosome to have been sequenced in such detail--reveals a rate of change that puts the rest of the genome to shame.

The common chimp (Pan troglodytes) and human Y chromosomes are "horrendously different from each other", says David Page of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts, who led the work. "It looks like there's been a dramatic renovation or reinvention of the Y chromosome in the chimpanzee and human lineages."

Sex chromosomes evolved some 200 million-300 million years ago, but the chimpanzee and human lineages diverged only 6 million-7 million years ago. Comparisons of the chimp and human genomes suggested that not much has changed between the species since.

http://snipr.com/u2wjg - Whenever a paper mentions the human Y chromosome, it always seems to lead to some sort of sensationalization.


Homo Erectus Invented "Modern" Living?

from National Geographic News

It's long been thought that so-called modern human behavior first arose during the middle Stone Age, in "modern" humans--Homo sapiens. But a new study suggests modern living may have originated roughly 500,000 years earlier--courtesy of one of our hairy, heavy-browed ancestor species.

At the prehistoric Gesher Benot Ya'aqov site in northern Israel, researchers have found the earliest known evidence of social organization, communication, and divided living and working spaces--all considered hallmarks of modern human behavior.

The former hunter-gatherer encampment dates back as far as 750,000 years ago, and must have been built by Homo erectus or another ancestral human species, archaeologists say. Homo sapiens--our own species--emerged only about a couple hundred thousand years ago, fossil record suggest. At the site, researchers found artifacts including hand axes, chopping tools, scrapers, hammers and awls, animal bones, and botanical remains buried in distinct areas.

http://snipr.com/u2wjv - Not sure I believe the dating on this one, just from the article.


Gene Found that Cuts Chance of Dementia

from the Telegraph (U.K.)

Hope of a new treatment for Alzheimer's was raised after scientists discovered a 'longevity gene' that protects against the disease. Researchers found that people with two copies of this gene had a 70 per cent reduced risk of developing the disease compared to those without it.

Scientists at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University in New York city, America, found that the gene helped to slow age related decline in brain function.

The findings, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, could lead to new treatments for the condition. Drugs that act in a similar way are now in development.

http://snipr.com/u2wkg - Dementia /is/ a terminal disease, I've said as much before.


Groups Ask U.S. to Regulate Shipping of Bumblebees

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Conservation groups said four species of native bumblebees are close to extinction and called on the federal government Tuesday to begin regulating the shipping of bees raised commercially as crop pollinators.

Researchers believe the precipitous declines in the species are being caused by diseases linked to the cultivation of a species of native bumblebee sold to farmers. The bees are used to increase fruit yield in a number of crops, including hothouse tomatoes and field-grown raspberries and blueberries.

During the past decade, wild bee species "went from being--some of them--very common to species that are now going extinct," said Scott Hoffman Black, executive director of the Xerces Society.

http://snipr.com/u2wkt - This is HONESTLY more important than colony collapse disorder.


Shar-pei Wrinkles Explained by Dog Geneticists

from BBC News Online

Just how did the Shar-pei get its famous wrinkled appearance? Scientists who have analysed the genetics of 10 pedigree dog breeds believe they now have the answer.

Their research identifies 155 distinct locations in the animals' genetic code that could play a role in giving breeds their distinctive appearances. In the Shar-pei, the team found differences in a gene known as HAS2 which makes an enzyme known to be important in the production of skin.

"There was probably a mutation that arose in that gene that led to a really wrinkly puppy and a breeder said, 'Hey, that looks interesting, I'm going to try to selectively breed this trait and make more of these dogs'," explained Joshua Akey from the Department of Genome Sciences at the University of Washington, Seattle, US.

http://snipr.com/u2wl1 - cute. Now, can we cure cancer please?


For Olympic Games, London Dreams of a Cloud Castle

from the Christian Science Monitor

A group of architects, artists, and other big thinkers are certain that they don't have their heads in a cloud as they plan what could be the most startling structure to emerge from the London Olympic Games of 2012.

Called simply "the Cloud," the monument would consist of two slender towers rising hundreds of feet into the air. Atop the twin spires float digital displays and viewing platforms for the public, who would climb up by foot or bicycle using spiral ramps wrapped around one of the towers. The summit would also feature giant inflated plastic spheres, some of which visitors could enter. Real-time information about the Games and the surroundings would be displayed by Google.

In an emerging century with more and more online experience, the Cloud aims to form a connection from the virtual world to the real world, "from the world of bits to the physical world, the world of atoms," says Carlo Ratti, head of the SENSEable Cities Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass., and a member of the international team working on the project.

http://snipr.com/u2wl9 - Cain, can you comment on this please?


Popular Blood Therapy May Not Work

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... It is a new procedure, based on an idea that once seemed revolutionary: Inject people with their own blood, concentrated so it is mostly platelets, the tiny colorless bodies that release substances that help repair tissues.

Soon the treatment, platelet-rich plasma, or P.R.P., was extended to so many uses--treating muscle sprains and tendon pulls and tears, arthritis, bone fractures and surgical wounds--that Dr. Bruce Reider, editor of The American Journal of Sports Medicine, said in a recent editorial that perhaps it should be called "platelet-rich panacea."

... Now, though, the first rigorous study asking whether the platelet injections actually work finds they are no more effective than saltwater. The study, reported in the Jan. 13 issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association, involved people with injured Achilles' tendons, fibrous tissue that connects the calf to the heel bone.

http://snipr.com/u2wlu - again, I really HATE science reporting for the way they make overly simplistic conclusions out of complex papers.


Scientists Make New Molecules That Look and Act Like Others

from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Since ancient times, alchemists have strived to turn base metals into gold, without success. But a Penn State University physicist and his team of researchers are logging achievements along those lines of which alchemists could only dream.

A team led by A. Welford Castleman Jr., the Eberly Distinguished Chair in Science and Evan Pugh Professor in the departments of chemistry and physics, has "squished together" cheaper base elements into molecules known as superatoms that have "the electronic signatures" of more expensive, or more exotic, atoms or elements.

Superatoms they've created with metals, oxygen and carbon closely mimic such elements as nickel, platinum and palladium. A Penn State news release says these superatoms could be used in such widespread applications as "new sources of energy, methods of pollution abatement and catalysts on which industrial nations depend heavily for chemical processing."

http://snipr.com/u2wmp - QUANTUM?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 19, 2010, 12:25:11 AM
January 15, 2010
Haiti Earthquake Disaster Little Surprise to Some Seismologists

from Scientific American

The devastating magnitude 7.0 quake that ripped through Haiti Tuesday, reportedly killing thousands, did not catch everyone by surprise.

In an interview last week for an unrelated story, Robert Yeats, a professor emeritus in geoscience at Oregon State University in Corvallis and co-author of a June 1989 article for Scientific American "Hidden Earthquakes," said that an imminent big west coast earthquake concerned him far less than a "big one" that might occur in Haiti, due to the large fault near the capital city of Port-au-Prince--and the poverty-driven low level of earthquake-preparedness there.

"If they have an earthquake on this fault that runs through Port-au-Prince," the death toll would be tremendous, he said January 6. The fault, called the Enriquillo-Plaintain Garden Fault, runs some 16 kilometers from Port-au-Prince and is at the intersection of the North American and Caribbean tectonic plates, which are slowly sliding past one another.

http://snipr.com/u3c6d - Yeah, it was pretty clear this was going to happen eventually.


Endangered Birds and Quirky Lists

from the Philadelphia Inquirer

Like most birds, the cerulean warbler is a fussy sort. The tiny creature, just inches long, nests only in the tops of deciduous trees, those that lose their leaves in winter. With males a vivid sky blue, it's a "gorgeous bird," says ornithologist Jeffrey Wells.

It's also in trouble. In three decades, its numbers have declined by about 80 percent. It is one of the fastest-declining forest birds in the United States. So how do we protect the warbler and other creatures in similar decline? Recent research by Wells and others has cast doubt on whether the current methods are working as well as they could.

Indeed, their flaws "could have profound negative consequences" for many species, the authors concluded in a study published last week in the scientific journal PLoS ONE. In the last few decades, a cornerstone of publicly funded wildlife conservation has been lists.

http://snipr.com/u3c7p - Lists are good, but more important is overall ecosystem conservation.


Morphine Shows Promise Against PTSD

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Early administration of morphine to military personnel wounded on the front lines during Operation Iraqi Freedom appears to have done more than relieve excruciating pain.

Scientists believe it also prevented hundreds of cases of post-traumatic stress disorder, the debilitating condition that plagues 15 percent of those who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

That conclusion is based on findings published Thursday in the New England Journal of Medicine. They suggest that a simple treatment can stop a single horrifying event from escalating into a chronic, incapacitating illness.

http://snipr.com/u3cf8 - Interesting.


U.S. Obesity Rate Leveling Off

from USA Today

Americans may be tightening their belts. Or at least not expanding them.

The percentage of adults who are obese hasn't increased much over the past 10 years after several decades of skyrocketing growth, an indication that America's obesity epidemic is finally starting to level off, according to a landmark government analysis released Wednesday.

About 34 percent of U.S. adults--almost 73 million people--were obese (roughly 30 or more pounds over a healthy weight) in 2008, up from 31 percent in 1999.

http://snipr.com/u3cfm - Probably because Texas has hit it's carrying capacity.


Report Links Vehicle Exhaust to Health Problems

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Exhaust from cars and trucks exacerbates asthma in children and may cause new cases as well as other respiratory illnesses and heart problems resulting in deaths, an independent institute that focuses on vehicle-related air pollution has concluded.

The report, issued on Wednesday by the nonprofit Health Effects Institute, analyzed 700 peer-reviewed studies conducted around the world on varying aspects of motor vehicle emissions and health. It found "evidence of a causal relationship," but not proof of one, between pollution from vehicles and impaired lung function and accelerated hardening of the arteries.

It said there was "strong evidence" that exposure to traffic helped cause variations in heart rate and other heart ailments that result in deaths. But among the many studies that evaluated death from heart problems, some did not separate stress and noise from air pollution as a cause, it said.

http://snipr.com/u3cg0  - Well, DUH.


New FDA Deputy to Lead Food-Safety Mandate

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

A year ago, Michael Taylor was sitting in his office at George Washington University, considering a basic mission of the federal government: making sure food is safe. He'd devoted his career to food safety, working in and out of government, and he was finally in academia where he could think deeply about what was wrong and how to fix it.

And then the call came. The Obama administration wanted Taylor to implement the solutions he had been designing. A string of food poisoning outbreaks nationally had sickened thousands and killed dozens. Both parties in Congress were calling for tough new laws. The president promised the public that he would strengthen food safety.

In July, Taylor became an adviser to Margaret Hamburg, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, and Wednesday he was named deputy commissioner for foods, a new position that elevates food in an agency long criticized for placing greater emphasis on drugs and medical devices.

http://snipr.com/u3cgh


Mysterious Jamestown Tablet an American Rosetta Stone?

from National Geographic News

With the help of enhanced imagery and an expert in Elizabethan script, archaeologists are beginning to unravel the meaning of mysterious text and images etched into a rare 400-year-old slate tablet discovered this past summer at Jamestown, Virginia, the first permanent English settlement in America.

Digitally enhanced images of the slate are helping to isolate inscriptions and illuminate fine details on the slate--the first with extensive inscriptions discovered at any early American colonial site, said William Kelso, director of research and interpretation at the 17th-century Historic Jamestowne site.

The enhancements have helped researchers identify a 16th-century writing style used on the slate and discern new symbols, researchers announced last week. The characters may be from an obscure Algonquian Indian alphabet created by an English scientist to help explorers pronounce the language spoken by the Virginia Indians.

http://snipr.com/u3cgy - Also interesting.


Soybean Genome Turns Out to Be Soysoybeanbean

from Science News

Scientists finally do know beans about soybeans, thanks to a newly unveiled genome sequence.

The plant's DNA contains a surprising amount of duplication, says geneticist Scott Jackson of Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind. Having the soybean's genetic blueprint, he says, should help scientists both improve crop varieties and study the evolutionarily important process of genome doubling.

Soybean's set of chromosomes has copied itself at least twice, approximately 59 million years ago the first time and then again about 13 million years ago, Jackson and his colleagues report in the Jan. 14 Nature. Redundant genes often retool or vanish, but soybean plants still have multiple copies of almost three-quarters of their genes, the researchers say.

http://snipr.com/u3chk - polysomy is pretty common in plants, so this isn't surprising.


Biomedical Bust

from the Scientist (Registration Required)

It's not just the growth rate of biomedical funding that's slowing; the total number of dollars seems to be decreasing as well, says a study in this week's Journal of the American Medical Association.

To make matters worse, the funding downturn also corresponds to one of the biomedical industry's most stagnant periods in productivity, measured by the number of new drugs approved by the US Food and Drug Administration, the report notes.

E. Ray Dorsey, a neurologist at the University of Rochester Medical Center, New York, and colleagues analyzed biomedical funding records from federal, state and local governments, foundations, and industry. All values were adjusted to 2008 dollar levels using the biomedical research and development price index (BRDPI). They then compared their results to a similar 2005 study they did on biomedical funding from 1994 to 2003.

http://snipr.com/u3chx - Well, it's probably due to the huge economic recession we've been having. Just a thought.


Catching Up on Lost Sleep a Dangerous Illusion

from USA Today

People who are chronically sleep-deprived may think they're caught up after a 10-hour night of sleep, but new research shows that although they're near-normal when they awake, their ability to function deteriorates markedly as night falls.

Some studies show that almost 30% of Americans get less than six hours of sleep at night. The research indicates that the body's daily circadian rhythm hides the effects of chronic sleep loss and gives such people a second wind between about 3 p.m. and 7 p.m., when the circadian rhythm is pushing them to be awake. But then they fall off a cliff in terms of attention.

Staying up for 24 hours straight is bad enough, but the study shows that if you do that on top of having gotten less than six hours of sleep a night for two to three weeks, your reaction times and abilities are 10 times worse than they would have been just pulling an all-nighter, says Daniel Cohen, a neurologist at Harvard Medical School and lead author of the study in Wednesday's Science Translational Medicine journal.

http://snipr.com/u3cij - Okay, I'm gonna take this seriously. This is a real problem for graduate students and people in academia in general. I don't want to process stuff at one tenth my capacity. So, at least 7 hours a night, that will be my goal from now on.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 25, 2010, 08:21:21 PM
January 22, 2010
The Venus Flytrap's Lethal Allure

from Smithsonian Magazine

As I slogged through black swamp water, the mud made obscene smooching noises each time I wrenched a foot free. "Be careful where you put your hands," said James Luken, walking just ahead of me. "This is South Carolina"--home to multitudinous vipers, canoe-length alligators and spiders with legs as thick as pipe cleaners.

... Our destination, not far from the headwaters of the Socastee Swamp, was a cellphone tower on higher ground. Luken had spotted a healthy patch of Venus flytraps there on an earlier expedition. To reach them, we were following a power-line corridor that cut through oval-shaped bogs called Carolina bays.

... Luken, a botanist at Coastal Carolina University, is one of the few scientists to study flytraps in the wild, and I was starting to understand why he had so little competition.

http://snipr.com/u5kk4 - I really should go see this before I leave this state. And you all should read this. Carnivorous plants are way cool.

UN Climate Report Riddled With Errors on Glaciers

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Five glaring errors were discovered in one paragraph of the world's most authoritative report on global warming, forcing the Nobel Prize-winning panel of climate scientists who wrote it to apologize and promise to be more careful.

The errors are in a 2007 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a U.N.-affiliated body. All the mistakes appear in a subsection that suggests glaciers in the Himalayas could melt away by the year 2035--hundreds of years earlier than the data actually indicates. The year 2350 apparently was transposed as 2035.

The climate panel and even the scientist who publicized the errors said they are not significant in comparison to the entire report, nor were they intentional. And they do not negate the fact that worldwide, glaciers are melting faster than ever. But the mistakes open the door for more attacks from climate change skeptics.

http://snipr.com/u5kl9 - Yes, yes they do, and it just means that scientists need to be more careful than ever at informing the public. Charles Darwin understood the delicacy of scientific information made public, and what care was needed to do it right.

Humans Might Have Faced Extinction 1 Million Years Ago

from Scientific American

New genetic findings suggest that early humans living about one million years ago were extremely close to extinction.

The genetic evidence suggests that the effective population--an indicator of genetic diversity--of early human species back then, including Homo erectus, H. ergaster and archaic H. sapiens, was about 18,500 individuals (it is thought that modern humans evolved from H. erectus), says Lynn Jorde, a human geneticist at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. That figure translates into a total population of 55,500 individuals, tops.

One might assume that hominin numbers were expanding at that time as fossil evidence shows that members of our Homo genus were spreading across Africa, Asia and Europe, Jorde says. But the current study by Jorde and his colleagues suggests instead that the population and, thus its genetic diversity, faced a major setback about one million years ago. The finding is detailed in the January 18 issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/u5km9 - GENETIC BOTTLENECK! HA! But again, this is PNAS. Can we really trust that journal right now?

Breakup Doesn't Keep Hydrogel Down

from Science News

Pulling yourself back together after a breakup can be tough to do. But a new hydrogel has no trouble. Using little more than water, clay and a new, designer compound, scientists have created a moldable gel that is both strong and can heal itself in seconds when split in two. The gel may advance efforts in tissue engineering and environmentally friendly chemistry.

The new hydrogel is more than 50 times stronger than comparable squishy self-healing materials, researchers led by Takuzo Aida of the University of Tokyo report in the Jan. 21 Nature. Such substances are well suited for the body; they are 95 percent water. Hydrogels may one day serve as scaffolding for growing new tissue, as matrices for keeping drugs in their targeted area or as replacements for damaged cartilage. The new gel, unlike similar materials, is quick and relatively simple to make.

The work adds to a "growing field of materials with exceptional properties that really could not be imagined" before, comments chemical engineer J. Zach Hilt of the University of Kentucky in Lexington.

http://snipr.com/u5koh - very cool.

Seven Essentials for Longer Life Spans

from the Seattle Times

DALLAS (Associated Press) -- Here are the seven secrets to a long life: Stay away from cigarettes. Keep a slender physique. Get some exercise. Eat a healthful diet and keep your cholesterol, blood pressure and blood sugar in check.

Research shows that most 50-year-olds who do that can live an additional 40 years free of stroke and heart disease, two of the most common killers, said Dr. Clyde Yancy, president of the American Heart Association. The heart association published the advice online Wednesday in the journal Circulation.

The group also introduced an online quiz to help people gauge how close they are to the ideal. Tips are offered for those who fall short.

http://snipr.com/u5koq - Hm....looks like I've got most of those in the bag.

Mammals "Rafted" to Madagascar, Climate Model Suggests

from National Geographic News

Only in the movies could a lion, a zebra, a giraffe, and a hippo wash ashore on Madagascar to start a new life. But a new computer model suggests there may be a grain of truth in the animated fiction: The ancestors of ring-tailed lemurs, flying foxes, and other mammals that live on the Indian Ocean island got there aboard natural rafts.

The model supports a 70-year-old theory that mainland mammals from southeastern Africa "rafted" to the island on large logs or floating carpets of vegetation after being swept out to sea during storms.

The ancient refugees were carried to Madagascar by ocean currents, drifting on the open seas for several weeks before finally coming ashore, the model says. Based on genetic and ecosystem evidence, this theory makes more sense than the alternative, which holds that Madagascar's mammals arrived via a land bridge that was later destroyed by shifting continents.

http://snipr.com/u5kow - Hollywood imitating life.

Magnetic Activity in Brain 'Diagnoses Stress Disorder'

from BBC News Online

A one-minute test appears to diagnose post-traumatic stress disorder with an accuracy of 90%. The test measures the tiny magnetic fluctuations that occur as groups of neurons fire in synchrony, even when subjects are not thinking of anything.

These "synchronous neural interactions" have already been shown to distinguish signals from subjects with a range of disorders including Alzheimer's. The latest work is reported in the Journal of Neural Engineering.

The brain's signals are effectively a symphony of electrical impulses, which in turn drive tiny magnetic fields. Researchers have measured and mapped these fields, in a pursuit known as magnetoencephalography, since the late 1960s. It has already been used to diagnose tinnitus, and can even predict when people will make mistakes.

http://snipr.com/u5kp0 - Hey, this is pretty cool!

Big Benefits Are Seen From Eating Less Salt

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In a report that may bolster public policy efforts to get Americans to reduce the amount of salt in their diets, scientists writing in The New England Journal of Medicine conclude that lowering the amount of salt people eat by even a small amount could reduce cases of heart disease, stroke and heart attacks as much as reductions in smoking, obesity and cholesterol levels.

If everyone consumed half a teaspoon less salt per day, there would be between 54,000 and 99,000 fewer heart attacks each year and between 44,000 and 92,000 fewer deaths, according to the study, which was conducted by scientists at University of California San Francisco, Stanford University Medical Center and Columbia University Medical Center.

The report comes as health authorities at federal, state and municipal levels are considering policies that would have the effect of pressuring food companies to reduce salt in processed foods, which are considered to be the source of much of the salt Americans eat.

http://snipr.com/u5kp8 - Depends on who you are, of course. I actually add salt, because otherwise I don't get enough.

Study: Hacking Passwords Easy As 123456

from PC World

If you are using "123456" as your password it is past time to stop. Same if you are using the always popular "Password" to protect your account. Those easy-to-hack passwords were the top and fourth most-popular from among 32 million hacked from RockU.com, a new study finds.

Imperva studied the breached passwords and has published an interesting study that talks about them. While "Consumer Password Worst Practices" isn't about us supposedly savvy business users, as an occasional system administrator I've run into both 123456 and Password on many occasions.

... "To quantify the issue, the combination of poor passwords and automated attacks means that in just 110 attempts, a hacker will typically gain access to one new account on every second or a mere 17 minutes to break into 1000 accounts," Imperva said in its report.

http://snipr.com/u5kph - "That's the code for my luggage!"

MS Pills Show Promise and Risk, Studies Say

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

ATLANTA (Associated Press) -- Tests of the first two oral drugs developed for treating multiple sclerosis show that both cut the frequency of relapses and may slow progression of the disease, but with side effects that could pose a tough decision for patients.

Two experts not involved in the studies said the drugs appear effective but with potentially dangerous side effects. It's too soon to know if the pills will be approved by the government or widely adopted by physicians, they said.

About 2.5 million people around the world have multiple sclerosis, a neurological disease that can cause muscle tremors, paralysis and problems with speech, memory and concentration. The studies involve the most common form of the disease, in which people are well for a while and then suffer periodic relapses. Current treatments can reduce the duration and severity of symptoms but require daily or regular shots or infusions.

http://snipr.com/u5kq0 - One of my favorite scientists has MS. I'm hoping this works.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nast on January 25, 2010, 09:14:59 PM
Quote from: Kai on January 25, 2010, 08:21:21 PM


http://snipr.com/u5kk4 - I really should go see this before I leave this state. And you all should read this. Carnivorous plants are way cool.

They sure are. The Southeastern conifer forests (or, what little's left of them) sound very fascinating. Thanks for the article!

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 29, 2010, 12:08:29 AM
January 25, 2010
Strongest Hurricanes May Triple in Frequency, Study Says

from National Geographic News

The U.S. Southeast, Mexico, and the Caribbean will be pounded by more very intense hurricanes in the coming decades due to global warming, a new computer model suggests.

Warmer sea surface temperatures--which fuel hurricanes--and shifting wind patterns are expected to strengthen the storms, the study says. At the same time, rising temperatures should result in fewer weak or middling hurricanes in the western Atlantic.

The study considered what would happen if people kept emitting more greenhouse gases until about 2050 and then started cutting emissions.

http://snipr.com/u6op7 - PARTY ON THE GULF COAST!  :banana:


Absolutely: The Psychology of Power

from the Economist

Reports of politicians who have extramarital affairs while complaining about the death of family values, or who use public funding for private gain despite condemning government waste, have become so common in recent years that they hardly seem surprising anymore. Anecdotally, at least, the connection between power and hypocrisy looks obvious.

Anecdote is not science, though. And, more subtly, even if anecdote is correct, it does not answer the question of whether power tends to corrupt, as Lord Acton's dictum has it, or whether it merely attracts the corruptible.

To investigate this question Joris Lammers at Tilburg University, in the Netherlands, and Adam Galinsky at Northwestern University, in Illinois, have conducted a series of experiments which attempted to elicit states of powerfulness and powerlessness in the minds of volunteers. Having done so, as they report in Psychological Science, they tested those volunteers' moral pliability. Lord Acton, they found, was right.

http://snipr.com/u6oq6 -ATTN Cain...Actually, attention EVERYFUCKINGBODY. Read this!


Prions 'May Keep Nerves Healthy'

from BBC News Online

Experiments on mice may help scientists understand the workings of the prion protein linked to brain disease vCJD.

Swiss researchers say there is evidence that prions play a vital role in the maintenance of the sheath surrounding our nerves. They say it is possible that an absence of prions causes diseases of the peripheral nervous system.

One expert said there was growing evidence that the prion had a number of important roles in the body. As well as the latest research in the journal Nature Neuroscience, other studies have indicated prions may protect us from Alzheimer's disease or even play a role in our sense of smell.

http://snipr.com/u6oqm - O.o okay, as far as I knew previously, prions are pathogenic proteins that turn your brain into swiss cheese.


The Origin of Darwin (Q&A)

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Randal Keynes, 62, is the great-great-grandson of Charles Darwin. He is also the author of the book Darwin, His Daughter, and Human Evolution, inspiration for the new film Creation, starring Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly.

The film, which opened Friday and gets a wider release Jan. 29, is a heartbreaking biopic that explores Darwin's life and loves and portrays him as more than a bit tortured by an irony in his family: Darwin (Bettany) was poised to go public on the origins of all life, including that of human beings, and his wife, Emma (Connelly), was a devout Christian who believed the only way to heaven was to trust in God.

Darwin struggled over whether to reveal his theories and how it would affect his family. His oldest daughter, Annie, who died at age 10, becomes his conscience in the film--an apparition that helps and haunts him.

http://snipr.com/u6or4 - I will be seeing this eventually, but not now. Too happy with my good interpretation of Darwin from his actual writings and the writings of his son to poison that with Hollywood ATM.


New Rule Allows Use of Partial DNA Matches

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ALBANY -- New York has become the latest of a handful of jurisdictions to permit a controversial use of DNA evidence that gives law enforcement authorities a sophisticated means to track down criminals.

Under a state rule approved in December, DNA found at a crime scene that does not exactly match that of someone in the state's DNA database can still be used to pursue suspects if the DNA closely resembles that of someone on file.

Since family members share genetic traits, a partial DNA match allows investigators to narrow searches to relatives of people whose DNA is already in the state database, forensic experts say.

http://snipr.com/u6orm - This is a huge slope, and it's very SLIPPERY.


Slime Mold Is Master Network Engineer

from Science News

Talented and dedicated engineers spent countless hours designing Japan's rail system to be one of the world's most efficient. Could have just asked a slime mold.

When presented with oat flakes arranged in the pattern of Japanese cities around Tokyo, brainless, single-celled slime molds construct networks of nutrient-channeling tubes that are strikingly similar to the layout of the Japanese rail system, researchers from Japan and England report January 22 in Science. A new model based on the simple rules of the slime mold's behavior may lead to the design of more efficient, adaptable networks, the team contends.

Every day, the rail network around Tokyo has to meet the demands of mass transport, ferrying millions of people between distant points quickly and reliably, notes study coauthor Mark Fricker of the University of Oxford. "In contrast, the slime mold has no central brain or indeed any awareness of the overall problem it is trying to solve, but manages to produce a structure with similar properties to the real rail network."

http://snipr.com/u6ors - Acellular slime molds are probably one of the coolest organisms around. Besides caddisflies, of course.


Newlyweds Chased From Their Home by Mold, Bacteria

from the Philadelphia Inquirer

After a honeymoon in Mexico, Danielle and David Beety returned to their dream home, a $407,000 yellow stucco on a cul-de-sac in Gloucester County. Their future seemed golden.

"We were on cloud nine," said Danielle Beety, a first-grade teacher who also coached high school field hockey. "Everything was going completely great," added David Beety, a mortgage loan originator.

That lasted two weeks. Suddenly, Danielle Beety was stricken with severe throat pain and developed flulike symptoms. Her baffled doctors ordered myriad tests. Three times they admitted her to Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia. She required two operations to remove a 5-centimeter abscess inside her neck.

http://snipr.com/u6osb - Okay, this is honestly just gross. How can people not notice these issues immediately?


Cold War Split Birds, Too

from SciencNOW Daily News

The Cold War divided the people of Europe for nearly half a century, and it turns out humans weren't the only ones stuck behind the Iron Curtain. Trade blockades led to vastly different numbers and types of invasive birds in Western and Eastern Europe, new research reveals. The findings, say experts, highlight the dramatic impact human activity can have on the success of alien species.

After World War II, political divisions split Western Europe and the United States from communist Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Democratic Western Europe became closely linked to North America and Africa, while Eastern Europe was largely isolated from global trade and suffered economically under communism.

This disparity, researchers argue in the February issue of Biological Conservation, had a profound effect on invasive bird species. The data come from more than 150 years of bird-introduction records--including government reports, scientific papers, and observations by local experts--which were collected and analyzed as part of a European program called Delivering Alien Invasive Species Inventories for Europe.

http://snipr.com/u6osq - Interesting.


Are Algae Worse than Corn for Biofuels?

from Scientific American

Growing algae for use in biofuels has a greater environmental impact than sources such as corn, switch grass and canola, researchers found in the first life-cycle assessment of algae growth.

Interest in algae-based biofuels has blossomed in the past year, sparking major investments from Exxon Mobil Corp. and Dow Chemical Co., and it has gained steam on Capitol Hill, as well. But the nascent industry has major environmental hurdles to overcome before ramping up production, according to research published this week in Environmental Science and Technology.

"What we found was sort of surprising," said Andres Clarens, a civil and environmental engineering professor at the University of Virginia and lead author of the paper. "We started doing this with as much optimism as everybody else."

http://snipr.com/u6otd - And this is why its time for PANIC, ehem, I mean Panicum.


Economic Growth 'Cannot Continue'

from BBC News Online

Continuing global economic growth "is not possible" if nations are to tackle climate change, a report by an environmental think-thank has warned.

The New Economics Foundation (Nef) said "unprecedented and probably impossible" carbon reductions would be needed to hold temperature rises below 2C (3.6F). Scientists say exceeding this limit could lead to dangerous global warming.

"We urgently need to change our economy to live within its environmental budget," said Nef's policy director.

http://snipr.com/u6otl - Well DUH.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 29, 2010, 12:30:43 AM
January 27, 2010
Surgical Procedure Urged for Atrial Fibrillation

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

People with atrial fibrillation, a common type of irregular heartbeat, should be referred for a surgical treatment called catheter ablation if an oral medication is not effective, said the authors of a study released Tuesday.

In a head-to-head comparison of the two forms of treatment, catheter ablation was so superior in resolving the disorder and helping patients to feel better that the study was halted early. The results will be published today in the Journal of the American Medical Assn.

Atrial fibrillation, which affects more than 2 million Americans, occurs when the heart's two small upper chambers quiver instead of beating effectively. It can cause blood to pool and clot, raising the risk of a stroke. The condition can go undetected indefinitely, though many people have symptoms such as palpitations, dizziness, chest pain, fatigue and shortness of breath.

http://snipr.com/u7f0r


China Spends Billions to Study Dinosaur Fossils

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

ZHUCHENG, CHINA -- What killed the dinosaurs? Scientist Wang Haijun thinks the answer may be buried inside a 980-foot-long ravine in the Chinese countryside 415 miles southeast of Beijing where hundreds of the creatures may have huddled in the final moments before their extinction.

The fossils here--more than 15,000 fractured, mangled and blackened bones from about 65 million years ago in the late Cretaceous period right before they went extinct--support theories of a catastrophe. Global fires. Explosions. Climate change.

"This find is very important for understanding the very end of the age of dinosaurs," said James M. Clark, a paleontologist at George Washington University who has examined some of the fossils. The excavation here, believed to be the largest dinosaur fossil site in the world, is one of a number of groundbreaking research projects in a country that once shunned science because it was associated with the elites.

http://snipr.com/u7f1r - THURNEZ, PACK YOUR BAGS WE'RE GOING TO BEJING!


A Deadly Quake in a Seismic Hot Zone

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

To scientists who study seismic hazards in the Caribbean, there was no surprise in the magnitude 7 earthquake that devastated the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, two weeks ago. Except, perhaps, in where on the island of Hispaniola it occurred.

"If I had had to make a bet, I would have bet that the first earthquake would have taken place in the northern Dominican Republic, not Haiti," said Eric Calais, a geophysicist at Purdue University who has conducted research in the area for years.

The fault that ruptured violently on Jan. 12 had been building up strain since the last major earthquake in Port-au-Prince, 240 years ago. Dr. Calais and others had warned in 2008 that a quake could occur along that segment, part of what is called the Enriquillo-Plantain Garden fault zone, although they could not predict when.

http://snipr.com/u7f26 - Just like you can't predict when the 500 year flood will come to a floodplain, might be 500 years or more, might be tomorrow. However, it WILL happen. So watch your ass.


The MRSA Bacteria Mutates Quickly As It Spreads

from Science News

An antibiotic-resistant strain of staph bacteria began its globetrotting adventures in Europe and can mutate quickly as it spreads, a new study suggests. Scientists acting as molecular historians used a new technology to decode the bacteria's genome and follow its movements, an approach that could one day help health care workers pinpoint the origins of outbreaks and prevent further infections.

The marauding bacterium, known as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus or MRSA, changes its genetic makeup faster than previously thought by altering at least one letter in its genetic handbook about every six weeks, a new study in the Jan. 22 Science shows.

More of those mutations fall in genes involved in antibiotic resistance than would be expected if the changes had occurred randomly, "illustrating that there is an immense selective pressure from antibiotic use worldwide," says Simon Harris, a bacterial phylogeneticist at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Hinxton, England. Bacteria that get mutations creating resistance to antibiotics are more likely to survive than are bacteria that remain sensitive to drugs.

http://snipr.com/u7f58 - Staph infections freak me out.


High-Tech Energy "Oasis" to Bloom in the Desert?

from National Geographic News

A renewable-energy "oasis" slated to be built in 2010 may serve as a proving ground for new technologies designed to bring green living to the desert.

The planned research center is part of the Sahara Forest Project--but that doesn't mean it'll be built in Africa. Sahara means "desert" in Arabic, and the center is meant to be a small-scale version of massive green complexes that project managers hope to build in deserts around the globe.

Experts are now examining arid sites in Australia, the U.S., the Middle East, and Africa that could support the test facility. "The Sahara Forest Project is a holistic approach for creation of local jobs, food, water, and energy, utilizing relatively simple solutions mimicking design and principles from nature," said Frederic Hauge, founder and president of the Norwegian environmental nonprofit the Bellona Foundation.

http://snipr.com/u7f5j - The deserts were the last places to escape from humanity. No longer.


Genetic Tests Give Consumers Hints About Disease Risk

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Last fall, Sgt. Timothy Gall, an Army medic stationed at Fort Belvoir, sought clues to the multiple sclerosis and heart disease that ran in his family by looking into his DNA. All it took was some spit and about a thousand bucks.

He didn't go to a doctor. Instead, Gall, 30, joined the growing number of consumers ordering scans of their DNA directly from private companies. A handful of companies such as 23andMe, Navigenics and Decode Genetics offer customers a personal peek at their genetic code, finding variations linked to certain traits, diseases and drug sensitivities--a process known as genotyping. As the cost of genetic scanning has dropped and the pace of genetic discovery quickened, these companies began springing up about three years ago. Now, as they're attracting more and more customers, they're also drawing more scrutiny.

Once Gall decided to try it, he persuaded his father to be genotyped, too. As a quality check, both men mailed saliva samples to two testing firms: 23andMe, based in California's Silicon Valley, and Decode, of Reykjavik, Iceland. "I figured I'd only pay attention to the results where both companies agreed," Gall said.

http://snipr.com/u7f6w  - I bet no one can guess the potential for misuse on this.


Scientist: Alien Life Could Already Be on Earth

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

LONDON (Associated Press) -- For the past 50 years, scientists have scoured the skies for radio signals from beyond our planet, hoping for some sign of extraterrestrial life. But one physicist says there's no reason alien life couldn't already be lurking among us--or maybe even in us.

Paul Davies, an award-winning Arizona State University physicist known for his popular science writing, said Tuesday that life may have developed on Earth not once but several times. Davies said the variant life forms--most likely tiny microbes--could still be hanging around "right under our noses--or even in our noses."

"How do we know all life on Earth descended from a single origin?" he told a conference at London's prestigious Royal Society, which serves as Britain's academy of sciences. "We've just scratched the surface of the microbial world."

http://snipr.com/u7f7a - Why oh WHY do theroretical physicists have to talk like they actually understand biology?


Mars Rover Will Rove No More

from MSNBC

Nine months after the Spirit rover sank into a Martian sand trap, NASA says the troubled traveler will have to remain stationary in order to survive the Red Planet's winter. Now the challenge is to improve Spirit's tilt so that it soaks up as much solar energy as it can.

Doug McCuistion, director of NASA's Mars Exploration Program, said that Spirit ran up against "a golfer's worst nightmare" and that the rover's "driving days are likely over."

"Right now the worry is about getting through the winter," he told journalists Tuesday during a teleconference. After the winter, scientists plan to conduct stationary experiments to characterize the Red Planet's core--is it solid, or still somewhat molten? They'll also look into the interaction between the Martian soil and atmosphere, as well as the characteristics of the intriguing soil around the rover.

http://snipr.com/u7f7l - Poor little rover.


Female Teachers May Pass on Math Anxiety to Girls

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Girls have long embraced the stereotype that they're not supposed to be good at math. It seems they may be getting the idea from a surprising source--their female elementary school teachers.

First- and second-graders whose teachers were anxious about mathematics were more likely to believe that boys are hard-wired for math and that girls are better at reading, a new study has found. What's more, the girls who bought into that notion scored significantly lower on math tests than their peers who didn't.

The gap in test scores was not apparent in the fall when the kids were first tested, but emerged after spending a school year in the classrooms of teachers with math anxiety. That detail convinced researchers that the teachers--all of them women--were the culprits.

http://snipr.com/u7f7q - I personally think they do math better. And sexier.


Physicists' Dreams in Era of the Big Collider

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A few dozen scientists got together in Los Angeles for the weekend recently to talk about their craziest hopes and dreams for the universe. At least that was the idea.

"I want to set out the questions for the next nine decades," Maria Spiropulu said on the eve of the conference, called the Physics of the Universe Summit. She was hoping that the meeting, organized with the help of Joseph D. Lykken of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory and Gordon Kane of the University of Michigan, would replicate the success of a speech by the mathematician David Hilbert, who in 1900 laid out an agenda of 23 math questions to be solved in the 20th century.

Dr. Spiropulu is a professor at the California Institute of Technology and a senior scientist at CERN, outside Geneva. Next month, CERN's Large Hadron Collider, the most powerful particle accelerator ever built, will begin colliding protons and generating sparks of primordial fire in an effort to recreate conditions that ruled the universe in the first trillionth of a second of time.

http://snipr.com/u7f7y  - You know, I don't care for anything but that last line above. Its just a fucking cool line.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on January 29, 2010, 12:51:53 AM
More on the prion story: http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100124/full/news.2010.29.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on February 01, 2010, 12:30:50 PM
QuoteCold War Split Birds, Too

from SciencNOW Daily News

The Cold War divided the people of Europe for nearly half a century, and it turns out humans weren't the only ones stuck behind the Iron Curtain. Trade blockades led to vastly different numbers and types of invasive birds in Western and Eastern Europe, new research reveals. The findings, say experts, highlight the dramatic impact human activity can have on the success of alien species.

After World War II, political divisions split Western Europe and the United States from communist Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Democratic Western Europe became closely linked to North America and Africa, while Eastern Europe was largely isolated from global trade and suffered economically under communism.

This disparity, researchers argue in the February issue of Biological Conservation, had a profound effect on invasive bird species. The data come from more than 150 years of bird-introduction records--including government reports, scientific papers, and observations by local experts--which were collected and analyzed as part of a European program called Delivering Alien Invasive Species Inventories for Europe.

http://snipr.com/u6osq - Interesting.



awwwww that means this beautiful song is wrong :(

Harry Jekkers & het Klein Orkest - Over de muur (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MesVrkdjHSk)

translation and explanation of the lyrics: http://everything2.com/title/Over+de+muur

it's beautiful

if you have ever seen the movie "Goodbye Lenin", you get the idea. otherwise, REALLY go see that movie, it is a wonderfully tragicomic story surrounding the fall of the Berlin wall.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Chairman Risus on February 04, 2010, 08:46:10 PM
Just wanted to say to keep up the good work, Kai.
Fun thread.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on February 05, 2010, 02:11:35 AM
This thread is one of my favorite PDcom threads to date.

:mittens:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 06, 2010, 04:48:02 PM
I have to go through my email and update today, a whole bunch. Look for it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 12, 2010, 01:15:30 AM
February 1, 2010
The Great Uranium Stampede

from the Times (London)

It's an odd place for a group of Frenchmen to pitch a tent city. Bakouma is one of the deepest, darkest corners of African jungle. From Bangui, the capital of the land-locked Central African Republic, it takes days to navigate the 800km of dirt track to this patch of virgin forest in the middle of the continent. Usually they go by light aircraft to a nearby landing strip.

Most of the 160 or so jungle dwellers are scientists but they are not there to count butterflies. They are drawing up plans for a uranium mine. Areva, France's state-owned nuclear giant, is behind the project. It hopes to begin clearing forest next year after the government approves its plan.

Bakouma is not an isolated case. It's just one example of a silent landgrab unfolding around the globe. After decades as a forgotten commodity, uranium, the radioactive element used as the primary fuel for nuclear power, is hot property again. Agents for companies, many of them government-controlled, are fanning out across the globe to gain access to the powdery, radioactive ore.

http://snipr.com/u8qrj

2011 NASA Budget Eliminates Funds for Manned Lunar Missions

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

NASA's grand plan to return to the moon, built on President George W. Bush's vision of an ambitious new chapter in space exploration, is about to vanish with hardly a whimper. With the release Monday of President Obama's budget request, NASA will finally get the new administration's marching orders, and there won't be anything in there about flying to the moon.

The budget numbers will show that the administration effectively plans to kill the Constellation program that called for a return to the moon by 2020. The budget, expected to increase slightly over the current $18.7 billion, is also a death knell for the Ares 1 rocket, NASA's planned successor to the space shuttle. The agency has spent billions developing the rocket, which is still years from its first scheduled crew flight.

It remains to be seen whether Congress will accede to Obama's change in direction. Industry insiders expect a brutal fight in Congress. The early reaction to media reports about the budget request has been filled with howls of protest from lawmakers in districts that would be most affected by a sharp change in strategy.

http://snipr.com/u8qrx

Genetically Modified Forest Planned for U.S. Southeast

from Scientific American

Genetic engineering is coming to the forests. While the practice of splicing foreign DNA into food crops has become common in corn and soy, few companies or researchers have dared to apply genetic engineering to plants that provide an essential strut of the U.S. economy, trees.

But that will soon change. Two industry giants, International Paper Co. and MeadWestvaco Corp., are planning to transform plantation forests of the southeastern United States by replacing native pine with genetically engineered eucalyptus, a rapidly growing Australian tree that in its conventional strains now dominates the tropical timber industry.

The companies' push into genetically modified trees, led by their joint biotech venture, ArborGen LLC, looks to overcome several hurdles for the first time. Most prominently, they are banking on a controversial gene splice that restricts trees' ability to reproduce, meant to allay fears of bioengineered eucalyptus turning invasive and overtaking native forests.

http://snipr.com/u8qs2

Is There an Ecological Unconscious?

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

About eight years ago, Glenn Albrecht began receiving frantic calls from residents of the Upper Hunter Valley, a 6,000-square-mile region in southeastern Australia. ... Residents were distraught over the spread of coal mining in the Upper Hunter. Coal was discovered in eastern Australia more than 200 years ago, but only in the last two decades did the industry begin its exponential rise.

Today, more than 100 million tons of black coal are extracted from the valley each year, primarily by open-pit mining, which uses chemical explosives to blast away soil, sediment and rock. The blasts occur several times a day, sending plumes of gray dust over ridges to settle thickly onto roofs, crops and the hides of livestock. Klieg lights provide a constant illumination. Trucks, draglines and idling coal trains emit a constant low-frequency rumble. Rivers and streams have been polluted.

Albrecht, a dark, ebullient man with a crooked aquiline nose, was known locally for his activism. He participated in blockades of ships entering Newcastle (near the Upper Hunter), the largest coal-exporting port in the world, and published opinion articles excoriating the Australian fossil-fuel industries. But Albrecht didn't see what he could offer besides a sympathetic ear and some tactical advice. Then, in late 2002, he decided to see the transformation of the Upper Hunter firsthand.

http://snipr.com/u8qs9

The Intellectual Property Fight That Could Kill Millions

from Discover

Ngurah Rai International Airport in Bali is best known as a tourist hub, the bustling port of entry to a volcanic paradise. But when Indonesian authorities learned that a Mexican swine flu had gone global, that hub became a surreal microcosm of flu politics.

Each arriving passenger was scanned for fever. ... The controversial head of the Indonesian Health Ministry, physician Siti Supari, quarantined sick foreigners at warp speed. Already embroiled in a battle royal with the world's superpowers over another flu virus--the ultra-lethal bird flu--Supari did not have time to deal with a new enemy. She would do everything possible, she told her fellow citizens, to protect them from the new pathogen spawned by a pig.

The recent frenzy in Bali stood in notable contrast to the research paralysis that has gripped this tropical archipelago since late 2006, when Supari declared that flu viruses circulating in Indonesia belonged to her government alone. It was a bizarre, 21st-century twist on an age-old intellectual property argument. Developing nations had long fought passionately over plant and native human genes, but no one had ever before staked claim to microbes that birds could carry anywhere.

http://snipr.com/u8qsh

On Financial Decisions, Older Isn't Always Wiser

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Contrary to the popular notion that young people are reckless, while older people avoid risks, new research shows that in an investment task that involves balancing risk to make the most money, older people make more mistakes than their younger counterparts.

That does not mean older adults are bad investors who should not be entrusted with financial decisions. But the research--in which participants were placed in a brain scanner while they chose stocks and bonds--found that as age increases, so do the mistakes people make. The scans also showed that in older adults, there was more "noise" in a brain region thought to be involved in computing value.

"Older adults aren't terrible at this, it's just that they sometimes make more mistakes, especially when they were choosing the risky assets," said Gregory R. Samanez-Larkin, a psychology graduate student at Stanford University and lead author of the study, published last week in the Journal of Neuroscience.

http://snipr.com/u8qsr

Scientists Test Model Dinosaur Wings

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The long-dead bones of a four-winged dinosaur, the cat-sized Microraptor gui, have inspired lively argument among present-day paleontologists. How, they ask, did such an animal coast through the skies?

For a study published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers took an unusual approach to test the 125-million-year-old dinosaur's flight capability--they built a life-size model microraptor from a beautifully preserved fossil skeleton found in China.

Little is known about how this microraptor lived, but some scientists believe it probably glided from tree to tree in the subtropical forests, eating insects and smaller animals.

http://snipr.com/u8qsu

Climate Deadline Passes--But Does It Really Matter?

from BBC News Online

Arguably, it's a deadline that isn't a deadline for an accord that isn't an accord. "It" is--or was--the 31 January target date by which governments were supposed to tell the UN climate convention (UNFCCC) secretariat what pledges they are prepared to make on curbing greenhouse gas emissions.

The date stems from the Copenhagen Accord--the agreement cobbled together at the end of December's UN climate summit in the Danish capital.

It received less than universal support at the summit, and since then UNFCCC executive secretary Yvo de Boer has indicated that 31 January isn't a deadline anyway. So does who sends in what really matter?

http://snipr.com/u8qsw

Henrietta Lacks' 'Immortal' Cells (Q&A)

from Smithsonian

Medical researchers use laboratory-grown human cells to learn the intricacies of how cells work and test theories about the causes and treatment of diseases. The cell lines they need are "immortal"--they can grow indefinitely, be frozen for decades, divided into different batches and shared among scientists.

In 1951, a scientist at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, created the first immortal human cell line with a tissue sample taken from a young black woman with cervical cancer. Those cells, called HeLa cells, quickly became invaluable to medical research--though their donor remained a mystery for decades.

In her new book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, journalist Rebecca Skloot tracks down the story of the source of the amazing HeLa cells, Henrietta Lacks, and documents the cell line's impact on both modern medicine and the Lacks family.

http://snipr.com/u8qt2

The Bedbug Decider

from the New Yorker

"Dear Carolyn, I am super paranoid that I have bedbugs. No bites, just crazy paranoia. This is all the evidence I have. [Sample] C looks like a cockroach, but I don't know about the others. Please give me a careful and thoughtful definitive answer. Thank you! Jody..."

Carolyn Klass, who for the past thirty-eight years has been Cornell University's diagnostician for insect pests, gets this kind of mail every day. A petite woman with mussed graying blond hair and wire-rimmed glasses, Klass is paid to examine other people's bedbugs, or what they think might be bedbugs. Half are. "The other half are odd things with that general shape," Klass said the other day, sitting in her laboratory in Comstock Hall, in Ithaca.

Often, the item in question is not even an insect. Pills of fabric, cereal, and skin particles or scabs frequent her microscope slides. "People send me pillowcases and bedcovers. Sometimes you see other things, too," she said, blushing. "A sock, or even worse." She'll advise on most everything, except skin debris. In such cases, she tells clients to consult a dermatologist.

http://snipr.com/u8qta
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 12, 2010, 01:17:55 AM
February 2, 2010
Extra Money for Science in Obama's Budget

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Calming fears that scientific research would be hurt by the Obama administration, the budget request for the Department of Health and Human Services was $81.3 billion, up from $79.6 billion a year ago. And the National Institutes of Health saw its budget request rise by $1 billion, to $32 billion, more than was requested last year.

The proposed budget, announced on Monday, now includes $6 billion for cancer research, intended to allow the agency to start 30 new drug trials and double the number of drugs and vaccines in clinical trials by 2016.

... In other science-related budget requests, the National Science Foundation would get $7.4 billion, a nearly 8 percent increase from the budget last year.

http://snipr.com/u92lc


Antidepressants May Help Victims of Stroke

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Widely used antidepressants may help patients recover cognitive functions, such as memory skills, that are damaged following a stroke, according to research released Monday.

Escitalopram, a type of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor, or SSRI, was linked to improved cognitive functioning in a group of stroke patients who did not have symptoms of depression, scientists found.

Previous research showed antidepressants were associated with improved cognitive functioning in stroke patients who were given the drug because they were depressed. The new study ... assessed the effect of cognitive functioning in 129 stroke patients who were not depressed.

http://snipr.com/u92lp


Focus on Abstinence Can Delay Sexual Activity

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Sex education classes that focus on encouraging children to remain abstinent can convince a significant proportion to delay sexual activity, researchers reported Monday in a landmark study that could have major implications for the nation's embattled efforts to protect young people against unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases.

In the first carefully designed study to evaluate the controversial approach to sex ed, researchers found that only about a third of 6th and 7th graders who went through sessions focused on abstinence started having sex in the next two years.

In contrast, nearly half of students who got other classes, including those that included information about contraception, became sexually active.

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Rotting Fish Yield Fossil Clues

from BBC News Online

By watching fish as they rot, scientists have discovered "patterns" that could help interpret some of the oldest and most important fossils. The "very smelly" study revealed how primitive marine creatures changed as they decayed.

The researchers identified particular patterns of deterioration that should help scientists more accurately identify very early marine fossils. They published their findings in the journal Nature.

Dr Rob Sansom from the University of Leicester, UK, who led the study, said that examining fossils was very similar to forensic analysis--putting together a scientific reconstruction of something that happened in the past.

http://snipr.com/u92m1


Westerner's Skeleton Found in Ancient Mongolian Tomb

from Science News

Dead men can indeed tell tales, but they speak in a whispered double helix.

Consider an older gentleman whose skeleton lay in one of more than 200 tombs recently excavated at a 2,000-year-old cemetery in eastern Mongolia, near China's northern border. DNA extracted from this man's bones pegs him as a descendant of Europeans or western Asians.

Yet he still assumed a prominent position in ancient Mongolia's Xiongnu Empire, say geneticist Kyung-Yong Kim of Chung-Ang University in Seoul, South Korea, and his colleagues. On the basis of previous excavations and descriptions in ancient Chinese texts, researchers suspect that the Xiongnu Empire ... included ethnically and linguistically diverse nomadic tribes.

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In Vitro Meat's Evolution

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

In 1932, Winston Churchill, appalled by the leftover bones and gristle crowding his dinner plate, predicted that in 50 years "we shall escape the absurdity of growing a whole chicken in order to eat the breast or wing by growing these parts separately under a suitable medium."

It's taken longer than that, but at the dawn of the 21st century we're finally closing in on tasty and eerily healthy meat grown by scientists instead of Old MacDonald.

"It's been a thought problem for scientists for decades," says Jason Matheny, director of New Harvest, a nonprofit organization devoted to global efforts to produce cultured meat. With meat consumption in heavily populated countries like China and India multiplying every decade, the environmental complications resulting from industrial meat production have reached critical mass.

http://snipr.com/u92mi


Best Fluid Motion Pictures Named

from National Geographic News

Ripples in soap film mimic the flow of air from a hand-held fan in an award-winning image from the American Physical Society's (APS) most recent Gallery of Fluid Motion.

To create the image, a team at the Technical University of Denmark flapped a rigid foil over soap film, creating a breeze that made the film flow into a "beautiful butterfly shape," according to the scientists.

Each year the APS Division of Fluid Dynamics sets up the Gallery of Fluid Motion exhibit at its annual meeting. The exhibit displays "stunning graphics and videos from computational or experimental studies showing flow phenomena," according to the APS Web site.

http://snipr.com/u92mr


Digital Doomsday: The End of Knowledge

from New Scientist

"In month XI, 15th day, Venus in the west disappeared, 3 days in the sky it stayed away. In month XI, 18th day, Venus in the east became visible."

What's remarkable about these observations of Venus is that they were made about 3500 years ago, by Babylonian astrologers. We know about them because a clay tablet bearing a record of these ancient observations, called the Venus Tablet of Ammisaduqa, was made 1000 years later and has survived largely intact. Today, it can be viewed at the British Museum in London.

We, of course, have knowledge undreamt of by the Babylonians. ... Yet even as we are acquiring ever more extraordinary knowledge, we are storing it in ever more fragile and ephemeral forms. If our civilisation runs into trouble, like all others before it, how much would survive?

http://snipr.com/u92mx


Foster Care for Chimps

from ScienceNOW Daily News

When Victor's mother died from anthrax, Fredy came along and adopted him. He shared his home with Victor every night, carried him on his back, and even gave him some of his precious food. Such altruistic behavior is one of the noblest attributes of our species. But Fredy and Victor aren't humans--they're chimps.

A new study of these primates in the wild suggests that they are far more selfless than scientists have given them credit for, though some researchers have their doubts.

Researchers have seen evidence of altruistic-type behavior in several species, including marmosets, rats, and even ants. But it's unclear whether these behaviors fit the scientific definition of altruism: spontaneously helping others with no expectation of a reward.

http://snipr.com/u92nf


Up in the Air, and Down, With a Twist

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

PARK CITY, Utah -- The first time you watch skiers hurtle off a curved ramp at 30 miles per hour, soaring six stories in the air while doing three back flips and up to five body twists, you can't help but think: These people are crazy.

Keep watching and you will quickly have second--and third--thoughts. You begin to notice how the skiers adjust their starting point on the inrun to reach the proper takeoff speed, how they practice odd arm movements, like giant Barbie dolls whose limbs are being manipulated by unseen hands.

Freestyle aerialists, as these athletes are known, are not actually throwing caution, along with themselves, to the winds. It is not fate that plops them down at the end of their jumps, more or less upright and safe, in a cloud of powdery snow. It is physics, and plenty of preparation.

http://snipr.com/u92ns
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 12, 2010, 01:18:58 AM
February 3, 2010
Journal Retracts 1998 Paper Linking Autism to Vaccines

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A prominent British medical journal on Tuesday retracted a 1998 research paper that set off a sharp decline in vaccinations in Britain after the paper's lead author suggested that vaccines could cause autism.

The retraction by The Lancet is part of a reassessment that has lasted for years of the scientific methods and financial conflicts of Dr. Andrew Wakefield, who contended that his research showed that the combined measles, mumps and rubella vaccine may be unsafe.

But the retraction may do little to tarnish Dr. Wakefield's reputation among parents' groups in the United States. Despite a wealth of scientific studies that have failed to find any link between vaccines and autism, the parents fervently believe that their children's mental problems resulted from vaccinations.

http://snipr.com/u9g7e


Leaks Imperil Nuclear Industry

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

VERNON, Vt. -- The nuclear industry, once an environmental pariah, is recasting itself as green as it attempts to extend the life of many power plants and build new ones. But a leak of radioactive water at Vermont Yankee, along with similar incidents at more than 20 other US nuclear plants in recent years, has kindled doubts about the reliability, durability, and maintenance of the nation's aging nuclear installations.

Vermont health officials say the leak, while deeply worrisome, is not a threat to drinking water supplies or the Connecticut River, which flows beside the 38-year-old plant, nor is it endangering public health. But the controversy is threatening to derail the nuclear plant's bid, now at a critical juncture, for state approvals to extend its operating life by 20 years when its license expires in two years.

... The timing couldn't be worse for the nuclear industry, coming as it attempts a broad rebirth as a green energy source in the battle against global warming; the reactors do not emit greenhouse gases that cause the atmosphere to warm.

http://snipr.com/u9gah


Could Museum's Gold Be From Ancient Troy?

from the Philadelphia Inquirer

The scientist had traveled from Germany to examine the ancient items that lay before him on the University of Pennsylvania laboratory table, and he was dazzled. Earrings with cascades of golden leaves. Brooches adorned with tightly coiled spirals. A necklace strung with hundreds of gold ringlets and beads.

The jewelry bore a striking resemblance to objects from one of the world's great collections--a controversial treasure unearthed long ago from the fabled city of Troy. Were the objects on the lab table also from the city that inspired Homer's epic poem of war?

Ernst Pernicka suspected they were, but he could not be sure. ... Pernicka, one of the world's foremost experts on ancient metals, had come to Penn's archaeology museum last February to rub off microscopic samples from the purported Trojan gold. He would then take them back to Germany for a high-tech analysis.

http://snipr.com/u9gjo


Study: Babies' Low Serotonin Levels Cause SIDS

from USA Today

Researchers may have solved the mystery of what makes some babies vulnerable to sudden infant death syndrome, or SIDS, which kills more than 2,300 babies a year.

Infants who died of SIDS had low levels of serotonin, a brain chemical that helps the brainstem regulate breathing, temperature, sleeping, waking and other automatic functions, according to an autopsy study in today's Journal of the American Medical Association.

Serotonin normally helps babies respond to high carbon-dioxide levels during sleep by helping them wake up and shift their head position to get fresh air, says senior author Hannah Kinney of Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston. When babies are placed face down, their exhaled carbon dioxide may pool in loose bedding, where it can be breathed back in, Kinney says.

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Climate Scientist 'Hid' Data Flaws

from the Guardian (UK)

Phil Jones, the beleaguered British climate scientist at the centre of the leaked emails controversy, is facing fresh claims that he sought to hide problems in key temperature data on which some of his work was based.

A Guardian investigation of thousands of emails and documents apparently hacked from the University of East Anglia's climatic research unit has found evidence that a series of measurements from Chinese weather stations were seriously flawed and that documents relating to them could not be produced.

Jones and a collaborator have been accused by a climate change sceptic and researcher of scientific fraud for attempting to suppress data that could cast doubt on a key 1990 study on the effect of cities on warming--a hotly contested issue. On Monday, the Guardian reveals how Jones withheld the information requested under freedom of information laws.

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The Great Electric Car Race of 2010

from the Christian Science Monitor

For Jason Hendler and more than 50,000 others who put their names on an Internet "want list" in hopes of one day owning the Chevrolet Volt plug-in car, the wait is almost over. After more than two years of online debating, wailing, and waiting with each other, Mr. Hendler and his fellow Volt-ophiles could actually have the long-promised hybrid electric-drive vehicle sitting in their driveways this fall--at least in theory.

It may be a long shot to actually get one, he acknowledges, at least this year. Only 7,000 to 10,000 Volts are supposed to be made available this fall. Just a few thousand more competing electric-drive cars will be available for sale this year--such as the Nissan Leaf, BYD e6, and Fisker Karma.

Yet for Hendler and the nation, 2010 is when the rubber hits the road and the electrified next generation of vehicles gets a reality check. Real buyers will be kicking real tires, forking over a slice of their life savings, and gliding off dealer lots in glorious all-electric silence.

http://snipr.com/u9gme


A Push to Find New Ways Into Space

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The ambitious space initiative that President Obama unveiled for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration on Monday calls for sweeping changes in mission and priorities for the 52-year-old agency, yet it omits two major details: where the agency will send its astronauts and a timetable for getting them there.

If Mr. Obama's proposed budget is implemented, NASA a few years from now would be fundamentally different from NASA today. The space agency would no longer operate its own spacecraft, but essentially buy tickets for its astronauts on commercially launched rockets.

It would end its program to return to the moon and would pursue future missions to deep space by drawing more cooperation and financing from other nations.

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Can a Brain Scan Predict a Broken Promise?

from Scientific American

Last time you told someone "I'll call you," did you mean it? We all make promises in our daily interactions with others. On the one hand, promises such as "I'll return your book next week" or "I won't tell anyone" are not heavily binding, except maybe in a moral sense.

On the other hand, some of the promises we make bind us legally and financially. ... But imagine making a promise when in fact, you know you would benefit from not keeping it. Would you keep it anyway? Could we somehow tell in advance whether you're going to keep it or break it? And finally, could we predict your decision by looking at what happens in your brain?

All these questions are addressed in an exciting new study performed in Switzerland and led by Thomas Baumgartner and Urs Fischbacher. While their findings, published in Neuron, are brand new and thus need to be confirmed by further research, they suggest that it may indeed be possible to detect whether a person is about to break a promise based on brain activity, well before the promise is actually broken.

http://snipr.com/u9gmw


Many Minds, One Story

from Seed

Virginia Woolf's To The Lighthouse opens in opposition, with a fragment of conversation already in progress: "Yes, of course, if it's fine tomorrow," says Mrs. Ramsay to her son James. "But," contradicts his father two paragraphs later, "it won't be fine."

The novel is unbalanced from its first line. Within four paragraphs, points of view shift among mother, son, and father; then an omniscient voice reveals the thoughts of all three members of the Ramsay family, "hat great clan which cannot keep this feeling separate from that."

... In her diaries, Woolf regularly described a recurrent "madness," referring to the disruptive mood swings that plagued her career and ultimately led to her suicide. As a doctor who has studied neurological disorders for 35 years, I recognize such periodic and cyclical fluctuations as manic-depressive illness, or bipolar affective disorder.

http://snipr.com/u9gnb


Astronomers Spot Aftermath of Asteroid Collision

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

An object imaged last week by the Hubble Space Telescope looks at first glance to be a comet, but a closer examination indicates it is something researchers have never seen before--the immediate aftermath of two asteroids colliding.

The scattered debris that looks like a comet's tail is actually the result of two asteroids colliding nearly head-on at more than 11,000 miles per hour, scattering pieces in all directions, NASA announced Tuesday.

The asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, where the collision occurred, contains the remains of many such events from the distant past, but this is first time that researchers have observed such debris so soon after a collision.

http://snipr.com/u9gnp
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 05:36:23 PM
Mud Volcano Was Man-Made, New Evidence Confirms

from Wired

A new analysis shows that a deadly mud volcano in Indonesia may not have been a natural disaster after all. The research lends weight to the controversial theory that the volcano was caused by humans.

Villagers near Sidoarjo noticed a mud volcano beginning to erupt at 5 a.m. local time May 29, 2006. It was about 500 feet from a local gas-exploration well. Every day since then, the Lusi mud volcano has pumped out 100,000 tons of mud, or enough to fill 60 Olympic-size swimming pools. It has now covered an area of almost 3 square miles to a depth of 65 feet. Thirty thousand people have been displaced, and scientific evidence is mounting that the company drilling the well caused the volcano.

"The disaster was caused by pulling the drill string and drill bit out of the hole while the hole was unstable," said Richard Davies, director of the Durham Energy Institute and co-author of a new paper in the journal Marine and Petroleum Geology, in a press release. "This triggered a very large 'kick' in the well, where there is a large influx of water and gas from surrounding rock formations that could not be controlled."

http://snipr.com/udgka


What Doesn't Kill Microbes, Makes Them Stronger

from ScienceNOW Daily News

If you are taking antibiotics, your doctor will admonish you not to skip any pills and to continue the treatment even after you start to feel better. That's because failure to kill the bugs making you sick can cause some of them to become resistant to the antibiotics.

Now, a new study explains how nonlethal antibiotic concentrations can lead to resistance. The drugs trigger the release of so-called reactive oxygen species (ROS) inside bacteria, which in turn cause mutations in the bugs' DNA--including some that happen to cause resistance.

Traditionally, the development of antibiotic resistance--a big and growing problem in medicine--has been seen as a passive phenomenon. Haphazard mutations occur in bacterial genomes, and bacteria randomly swap genetic elements. Every now and then, a mutation or a bit of newly acquired DNA enables the microbes to detoxify antibiotics, pump them out of the cells, or render them harmless in another way. When these microbes are exposed to antibiotics, natural selection will allow them to outcompete the ones that aren't resistant.

http://snipr.com/udglb


The Ultimate Mouthful: Lunge Feeding in Rorqual Whales

from American Scientist

A hungry fin whale dives deep into the ocean to perform a series of rapid accelerations with mouth agape into a dense prey patch. On each of these bouts, or lunges, the whale engulfs about ten kilograms of krill contained within some 70,000 liters of water--a volume heavier than its own weight--in a few seconds.

During a lunge, the whale oscillates its tail and fluke to accelerate the body to high speed and opens its mouth to about 90 degrees. The drag that is generated forces the water into its oral cavity, which has pleats that expand up to four times their resting size. After the whale's jaws close, the sheer size of the engulfed water mass is evident as the body takes on a "bloated tadpole" shape. In less than a minute, all of the engulfed water is filtered out of the distended throat pouch as it slowly deflates, leaving the prey inside the mouth. Over several hours of continuous foraging, a whale can ingest more than a ton of krill, enough to give it sufficient energy for an entire day.

Years ago, Paul Brodie of the Bedford Institute of Oceanography described the feeding method of fin whales as the "greatest biomechanical action in the animal kingdom." This extreme lunge-feeding strategy is exhibited exclusively by rorquals, a family of baleen whales that includes species such as humpback, fin and blue whales. Like all baleen whales, rorquals are suspension filter feeders that separate small crustaceans and fish from engulfed water using plates of keratin--the same protein that forms hair, fingernails and turtle shells--that hang down from the top of their mouths.

http://snipr.com/udglm


Primordial Giant: The Star That Time Forgot

from New Scientist

At first, there didn't seem anything earth-shattering about the tiny point of light that pricked the southern Californian sky on a mild night in early April 2007. Only the robotic eyes of the Nearby Supernova Factory, a project designed to spy out distant stellar explosions, spotted it from the Palomar Observatory, high in the hills between Los Angeles and San Diego.

The project's computers automatically forwarded the images to a data server to await analysis. The same routine kicks in scores of times each year when a far-off star in its death throes explodes onto the night sky, before fading back to obscurity once more.

But this one did not fade away. It got brighter. And brighter. That's when human eyes became alert.

http://snipr.com/udgm0


Adoptees Offer Clues on Skills of Language

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

As Andy Ross learned to speak English, he progressed from simple word combinations like "Andy shoe" to the more complex "my red shoe," just like any toddler.

But Andy was older when he began to learn English, after being adopted from Russia, and his chatter--taped in weekly sessions--has provided scientists important clues about how language develops.

Harvard psychologists are finding that preschool-age children adopted from foreign countries learn English in the same sequence as babies: starting with single words and progressing to word combinations and complex grammar. That means it is not the maturity of the brain but the nature of language itself that dictates how it is learned, the Harvard scientists say.

http://snipr.com/udgmd


Climate Data 'Not Well Organised'

from BBC News Online

Phil Jones, the professor behind the "Climategate" affair, has admitted some of his decades-old weather data was not well enough organised.

He said this contributed to his refusal to share raw data with critics--a decision he says he regretted. But Professor Jones said he had not cheated over the data, or unfairly influenced the scientific process. He said he stood by the view that recent climate warming was most likely predominantly man-made.

But he agreed that two periods in recent times had experienced similar warming. And he agreed that the debate had not been settled over whether the Medieval Warm Period was warmer than the current period.

http://snipr.com/udgml


World Wide Wait

from the Economist

Ever noticed how long it takes for web pages to load these days? You click on a link and wait and wait, and then wait some more, for the content to trickle in. If nothing has happened after ten seconds or so, your impatient correspondent hits the browser's stop button followed by the reload key.

In desperation, he sometimes loads the link into a second or even a third browser tab as well, and bombards the website's server with multiple requests for the page. If that fails, he gives up in disgust and reads a newspaper instead.

Back in the early days of the internet, when most web users relied on dial-up connections, browsers were crude and web graphics were clumsy GIF files, eight seconds was considered the maximum people would stick around for a page to load. To increase "stickiness," web designers pared their HTML code to the bone, collated their style-sheet data and JavaScripts into single files for more efficient caching elsewhere on the web, used fewer graphics and embraced the PNG and JPEG picture formats, with their smaller file sizes, as soon as they became available. Compared with text, pictures really were the equivalent of 1,000 words, at least when it came to the time taken to transmit them.

http://snipr.com/udgmx


Becoming Vegetarian 'Can Harm the Environment'

from the Guardian

It has often been claimed that avoiding red meat is beneficial to the environment, because it lowers emissions and less land is used to produce alternatives.

But a study by Cranfield University, commissioned by WWF, the environmental group, found a substantial number of meat substitutes--such as soy, chickpeas and lentils--were more harmful to the environment because they were imported into Britain from overseas.

The study concluded: "A switch from beef and milk to highly refined livestock product analogues such as tofu could actually increase the quantity of arable land needed to supply the UK."

http://snipr.com/udgn5


Was Haiti's Ecosystem Disrupted by Quake?

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

It's a small solace, but the terrifying 7.0-magnitude earthquake seems not to have caused any major, immediate damage to Haiti's ecosystem. According to Asif Zaidi, operations manager of the U.N. Environmental Program's Post-Conflict and Disaster Management Branch, there has been one small spill near a coastal oil terminal, some minor warehouse fires and a few small landslides close to Port-au-Prince, but nothing that requires a significant emergency response.

As the situation stabilizes, clearing away the waste and debris will become an urgent priority. It's too early to estimate just how much rubble must be moved, but considering that 80 to 100 percent of the structures in some areas were destroyed, Zaidi says it's likely to be "a staggering amount." Some of the demolition material, such as steel and iron bars, can be salvaged and recycled; the rest can be crushed and used for rebuilding roads. (Ideally, debris management will also provide employment for many local workers.)

The growing amount of medical waste, particularly from makeshift tent hospitals, is also a concern: At the moment, it's unclear whether there are any safe disposal options for this hazardous material. Public-health experts are also worried about all the human waste generated in survivor camps.

http://snipr.com/udgtx


Measuring Climate Change in Mediterranean Caves

from Spiegel

The underside of the Spanish island of Mallorca is as perforated as Swiss cheese. The rising and falling ocean has worn hollow caves into a soft layer of calcium, and stalactites and stalagmites in these caves bear evidence of prehistoric sea levels. Now a team of scientists around the geochemist Jeffrey Dorale, from the University of Iowa, claims the Mediterranean some 81,000 years ago stood a full meter higher than it does today.

The results were published in the journal Science on Friday. Dorale and his team won't speculate why sea levels were so high back then--or why, in fact, they seemed to surge all of a sudden--but they believe their findings have "major implications for future concerns with sea-level change," according to the Science Web site.

Mallorca is a good place to study these changes because the island barely moves, the scientists say. It's tectonically stable, and the buildup or melting of glaciers hasn't raised or lowered the island. The stalactites and stalagmites, moreover, have collected deposits of calcite from the ocean, and these deposits give up secrets like rings in a tree. Dorale's team dated the deposits by measuring the radioactive decay of uranium traces. "We've reconstructed sea levels with a high degree of precision," Dorale told Spiegel Online.

http://snipr.com/udgnm
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 05:42:16 PM
Hot and Heavy Matter Runs a 4 Trillion Degree Fever

from Science News

WASHINGTON -- Talk about hot and heavy. Scientists have taken the temperature of a minuscule glob of dense, hot matter formed in the grisly aftermath of collisions between gold atoms traveling near the speed of light. The material reaches an estimated 4 trillion degrees Celsius, about 250,000 times hotter than the sun's interior, and higher than any temperature ever reached in a laboratory, researchers reported February 15 at a meeting of the American Physical Society.

The measurements, which will be published in an upcoming Physical Review Letters, provide a more detailed description of the superhot, superdense soup of matter called quark-gluon plasma, which may mimic the conditions of the infant universe, the researchers say. Other studies of the soup hint that discrete pockets of the matter break special kinds of symmetry.

In the new study, gold ions were smashed inside an underground 2.4-mile-circumference track at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island. The messy collisions were so energetic that they caused protons and neutrons to melt, sending their constituent particles, known as quarks and gluons, into the fray.

http://snipr.com/udwex


Hormone Oxytocin Found to Help People with Autism

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

A nasal spray containing a hormone that is known to make women more maternal and men less shy apparently can help those with autism make eye contact and interact better with others, according to a provocative study released Monday.

The study, involving 13 adults with either a high-functioning form of autism or Asperger syndrome, a mild form of the disorder, found that when the subjects inhaled the hormone oxytocin, they scored significantly better on a test that involved recognizing faces and performed much better in a game that involved tossing a ball with others.

Although more research is needed to confirm and explore the findings, the results are the latest in a growing body of evidence indicating that the hormone could lead to ways to help people with the often devastating brain disorder function better.

http://snipr.com/udwf9


A Good Night's Sleep Study for People Over 65

from USA Today

A good night's sleep is important at any age. But what constitutes a good night's sleep for people over 65?

Some researchers now say the answer may be surprisingly reassuring: Healthy older people may need less sleep than younger people to feel alert during the day.

The idea is not proven, and some experts are skeptical. But it would come as good news to a lot of people, since it's undisputed that older people typically sleep fewer hours, with more awakenings and fewer minutes of deep sleep. And, at a time when many older folks still hold jobs, do volunteer work, care for children and drive cars, it matters.

http://snipr.com/udwfq


Space Rock Contains Organic Molecular Feast

from BBC News Online

Scientists say that a meteorite that crashed into Earth 40 years ago contains millions of different carbon-containing, or organic, molecules. Although they are not a sign of life, such organic compounds are life's building blocks, and are a sign of conditions in the early Solar System.

It is thought the Murchison meteorite could even be older than the Sun. The results of the meteorite study are published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

"We are really excited. When I first studied it and saw the complexity I was so amazed," said Philippe Schmitt-Kopplin, lead researcher on the study from the Institute for Ecological Chemistry in Neuherberg, Germany. "Having this information means you can tell what was happening during the birth of the Solar System," Dr Schmitt-Kopplin told BBC News.

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Regulator Waffles on Bisphenol A

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Eight days after chemical industry lobbyists met with Obama administration officials, federal regulators delayed action on including bisphenol A in a new effort to better regulate dangerous chemicals.

The move is drawing suspicion, considering how the head of the Environmental Protection Agency had been talking tough in one speech after another last fall about the need to protect the public from such chemicals, particularly BPA.

But when the agency's list came out Dec. 30, identifying four chemicals that would face stricter labeling and reporting requirements, BPA was not among them. While other agencies and governmental bodies are moving to restrict BPA's use because of concerns about its links to health problems, including cancer, the EPA now says it won't develop a tougher regulatory plan for the chemical for at least two years.

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A Tantalizing Hint, but Not Proof, of Elusive Dark Matter

from the Cleveland Plain Dealer

On the night of Aug. 5, 2007, in an abandoned Minnesota iron mine converted into a kind of cosmic burglar alarm center, something whizzed through half a mile of rock and set off a detector. Eleven weeks later, just after lunchtime, it happened again. An invisible particle breached the underground lab's shielding and tripped another sensor.

When researchers analyzing the experiment's data two years later confirmed the twin intrusions, the news lit up physicists' BlackBerries worldwide. Were the tiny pings finally proof of dark matter, the mysterious, long-sought stuff that scientists believe holds galaxies together and makes up most of the matter in the universe?

The answer is a disappointing "maybe," the search team that includes scientists from Case Western Reserve University reported Thursday. While the two impacts bear the hallmarks of stealthy dark matter particles arriving from space, statistics can't eliminate a less exotic explanation, such as cosmic rays or background radiation in the underground cavern.

http://snipr.com/udwhr


Giant Redwoods May Dry Out; Warming to Blame?

from National Geographic News

Declining fog cover on California's coast could leave the state's famous redwoods high and dry, a new study says. Among the tallest and longest-lived trees on Earth, redwoods depend on summertime's moisture-rich fog to replenish their water reserves.

But climate change may be reducing this crucial fog cover. Though still poorly understood, climate change may be contributing to a decline in a high-pressure climatic system that usually "pinches itself" against the coast, creating fog, said study co-author James Johnstone, an environmental scientist at the University of California, Berkeley.

For the new study, scientists measured the cloud ceiling--the height of the lowest level of Earth's cloud layer--at two area airports, as well as examined a long-term record of daily maximum temperatures in the region. The research revealed that fog was 33 percent more common a century ago than it is today.

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Do-It-Yourself Genetic Engineering

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

It all started with a brawny, tattooed building contractor with a passion for exotic animals. He was taking biology classes at City College of San Francisco, a two-year community college, and when students started meeting informally early last year to think up a project for a coming science competition, he told them that he thought it would be cool if they re-engineered cells from electric eels into a source of alternative energy.

Eventually the students scaled down that idea into something more feasible, though you would be forgiven if it still sounded like science fiction to you: they would build an electrical battery powered by bacteria. This also entailed building the bacteria itself--redesigning a living organism, using the tools of a radical new realm of genetic engineering called synthetic biology.

A City College team worked on the project all summer. Then in October, five students flew to Cambridge, Mass., to present it at M.I.T. and compete against more than 1,000 other students from 100 schools, including many top-flight institutions like Stanford and Harvard.

http://snipr.com/udwk7


Olympic Team Studies Sled Forces in High-Tech Simulator

from Scientific American

In the sport of skeleton, where athletes called "sliders" hurtle face first atop a sled the size of a seat cushion down an iced-over concrete track at speeds upwards of 110 kilometers per hour, the smallest details separate success and failure. Any aspect of a skeleton run that is not completely in sync--including the slider's outfit, helmet, body position or the sled's orientation--can cost hundredths of a second, an eternity in this sport.

The U.S. Olympic skeleton team, which hits the track this week at the Vancouver games, has their approach down to a science, thanks to some high-tech help from researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) in Troy, N.Y. Engineering professor Timothy Wei and his team built a custom-made skeleton simulator to study a slider's greatest opponent--wind resistance.

... This simulator mimicked the dimensions of an actual skeleton track, which is about a half of a meter deep and a little over one meter wide. The sled, which can be as wide as 20 centimeters and as long as 120 centimeters, rested on pads equipped with load cells used to measure force exerted downward by the slider, who could also see feeds from two cameras ... on a monitor viewable through a hole cut into the bottom of the track (sliders lie facedown on their sleds).

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Israel Discovers Large Ancient Wine Press

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

JERUSALEM (Associated Press) -- Israeli archaeologists said Monday that they've discovered an unusually shaped 1,400-year-old wine press that was exceptionally large and advanced for its time.

The octagonal press measures 21 feet by 54 feet and was discovered in southern Israel, about 40 kilometers south of both Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

"What we have here seems to be an industrial and crafts area of a settlement from the sixth- to seventh century, which was situated in the middle of an agricultural region," said excavation director Uzi Ad of the Israel Antiquities Authority. During this period, the whole area was part of the Byzantine Empire--the eastern half of the old Roman Empire.

http://snipr.com/udwl8
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 05:43:43 PM
U.S. Is Backing New Nuclear Reactors

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- President Obama told an enthusiastic audience of union officials on Tuesday that the Energy Department has approved a loan guarantee intended to underwrite construction of two nuclear reactors in Georgia, with taxpayers picking up much of the financial risk.

If the project goes forward, it would be the first nuclear reactor built in the United States since the 1970s. In a speech in Lanham, Md., Mr. Obama announced government approval of an $8.3 billion loan guarantee to help the Southern Company build two reactors in Burke County, Georgia, near Augusta.

The new aid for the nuclear power industry serves many of the Obama administration's objectives, helping broaden support for its energy policy proposals that face obstacles in Congress, helping control emissions of greenhouse gases, and to some extent bolstering employment and domestic energy production.

http://snipr.com/ue9hw


Study Sheds Light on 'Teenage Night Owl Syndrome'

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Riding in school buses in the early morning darkness and sitting in poorly lighted classrooms are the main reasons students have trouble getting to sleep at night, according to new research.

Teenagers, just like everyone else, need bright lights in the morning, particularly in the blue wavelengths, to synchronize their circadian rhythms with nature's cycles of day and night. If they are deprived of the light, they go to sleep an average of six minutes later each night, until their bodies are completely out of synch with the school day, researchers from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute reported Tuesday in the journal Neuroendocrinology Letters.

"These morning-light-deprived teenagers are going to bed later, getting less sleep and possibly under-performing on standardized tests," said lead author Mariana G. Figueiro, a sleep researcher at RPI's Lighting Research Center. "We are starting to call this the teenage night owl syndrome."

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Food Safety Rules to Emerge From Fight Over Catfish

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The whiskered, bottom-feeding catfish is one of the lowliest creatures on Earth. But for months, catfish have been at the center of an intense Washington lobbying effort pitting domestic producers against importers.

At issue is how catfish will be regulated and whether Vietnamese imports pose a health risk to American consumers. U.S. catfish producers used a multimillion-dollar lobbying effort to persuade Congress in 2008 to tighten regulation of the single species of fish, a program expected to incur $5 million to $16 million in start-up costs with its launch next year.

The battle has sparked threats of a trade war from Vietnam, which wants its fish excluded from the regulations. The Vietnamese ambassador to the United States, Le Cong Phung, has called Congress hypocritical for changing the rules on catfish to give an advantage to domestic producers.

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Malaria Most Likely Killed King Tut

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

King Tutankhamun, the boy pharaoh, was frail, crippled and suffered "multiple disorders" when he died at age 19 in about 1324 B.C., but scientists have now determined the most likely agents of death: a severe bout of malaria combined with a degenerative bone condition.

The researchers said that to their knowledge "this is the oldest genetic proof of malaria in precisely dated mummies." Several other mummies in the study also showed DNA evidence for the presence of the malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum, perhaps not surprising in a place like the Nile Valley.

The application of advanced radiological and genetic techniques to royal Egyptian mummies marks a new step in the ever deepening reach of historical inquiry through science. The study, reported Tuesday, turned up no evidence of foul play, as had been suspected by some historians and popular writers familiar with palace intrigues in ancient Egypt.

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Use Chocolate to Measure the Speed of Light

from Wired

If you're a long-time reader, you may remember the great leftover Easter Peeps microwave experiment. Well, today we're going to be nuking leftover Valentine's Day chocolate to demonstrate one of the constants of physics, the speed of light.

... The demonstration works because microwave ovens produce standing waves--waves that move "up" and "down" in place, instead of rolling forward like waves in the ocean. Microwave radiation falls into the radio section of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Most ovens produce waves with a frequency of 2,450 megahertz (millions of cycles per second). The oven is designed to be just the right size to cause the microwaves to reflect off the walls so that the peaks and valleys line up perfectly, creating "hot spots" (actually, lines of heat).

http://snipr.com/ue9jq


Fossils 'Record Past Sea Changes'

from BBC News Online

Fossilised coral reefs in the Great Barrier Reef could help scientists understand how sea levels have changed over the past 20,000 years. An international team of researchers will spend 45 days at sea, gathering core samples from about 40 sites.

Described as the "trees of the sea," coral have growth rings that show seasonal variations. Researchers say the samples will also shed light on past sea temperatures, as well as other changes to the reef.

Alan Stevenson, team leader of marine geology at the British Geological Survey (BGS), which is involved in the project, said the fossilised corals' annual growth rings provided an insight to conditions under waves.

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Astronauts Install 'Room with a View' on ISS

from the Christian Science Monitor

A new countdown has begun on the International Space Station: It's T-minus two days and counting--give or take a few hours--for some of the most stunning views astronauts have ever had of Earth.

By late Wednesday or Thursday, astronauts on the station should be able to open the shutters of a $27-million, seven-windowed cupola, now snugly bolted to its proper spot on a new space-station segment astronauts installed during the past week. Both were delivered by the space shuttle Endeavour and its six-member crew during the shuttle's current mission, now at its halfway point.

The cupola in essence is the station's version of a seven-pane bay window. In its workaday role, it provides a place where crew members inside can provide an extra set of eyes to help colleagues on spacewalks. It also hosts a second set of controls the crew can use to operate the station's robotic arm.

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Bioengineering to Crop Up When AAAS Meets

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

If the titans of agribusiness are right, the world is on the verge of a major breakthrough in the way food is grown. But if history is any indication, genetically modified crops will need to overcome a lot of skepticism to spark a consumer revolution.

That uncertainty is fueled by the mixed record of current bioengineered crops--mainly soybeans, corn, canola--in meeting lofty targets set by backers of high-tech seeds. Vitamin-enhanced foods remain out of reach, it's unclear how much biotechnology has boosted plant production, and a recent study said genetically engineered plants have increased usage of herbicides.

One of biotechnology's leading advocates will hold a presentation at the 176th annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, which will start Thursday at the San Diego Convention Center and other venues. About 8,000 people from more than 50 countries are expected for the five-day affair, making it the largest general-science conference in the nation.

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Migraines, Memory Loss: Was It All in His Head?

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Karen Hammerman could see that her son was upset, and when he told her why, she was unnerved. Adam Hammerman, then a 16-year-old sophomore at Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School in Montgomery County, had missed a week of school because of a virus and telephoned several classmates to see what assignments he'd missed.

"Something's wrong," he told his mother last May. "All my friends are mad at me. They say I've called them five times already and they're not going to tell me again." But Adam had no memory of making the calls.

The incident, Karen Hammerman soon discovered, was not isolated. One morning as Adam prepared to take a shower, he screamed after seeing himself in the mirror: He said he did not remember getting a haircut the previous day. He called his mother from school to ask what time she was picking him up, then called again five minutes later to ask the same thing. "Basically it was like living with a 16-year-old Alzheimer's patient," Karen Hammerman recalled.

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Stonehenge "Hedge" Found, Shielded Secret Rituals?

from National Geographic News

Stonehenge may have been surrounded by a "Stonehedge" that blocked onlookers from seeing secret rituals, according to a new study. Evidence for two encircling hedge--possibly thorn bushes--planted some 3,600 years ago was uncovered during a survey of the site by English Heritage, the government agency responsible for maintaining the monument in southern England.

The idea that Stonehedge was a shield against prying eyes isn't yet firmly rooted, but it's archaeologists' leading theory. For instance the newfound banks are too low and unsubstantial to have had a defensive role.

"The best [theory] we can come up with is some sort of hedge bank," said English Heritage archaeologist David Field, whose team discovered the two landscape features in April 2009. "We think they served as some sort of screen to filter access to the center [of Stonehenge]."

http://snipr.com/ue9mj
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 05:57:32 PM
The Writing on the Cave Wall

from New Scientist

The first intrepid explorers to brave the 7-metre crawl through a perilously narrow tunnel leading to the Chauvet caves in southern France were rewarded with magnificent artwork to rival any modern composition. Stretching a full 3 metres in height, the paintings depict a troupe of majestic horses in deep colours, above a pair of boisterous rhinos in the midst of a fight.

... When faced with such spectacular beauty, who could blame the visiting anthropologists for largely ignoring the modest semicircles, lines and zigzags also marked on the walls? Yet dismissing them has proved to be something of a mistake.

The latest research has shown that, far from being doodles, the marks are in fact highly symbolic, forming a written "code" that was familiar to all of the prehistoric tribes around France and possibly beyond.

http://snipr.com/uepqn


New Source of an Isotope in Medicine Is Found

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- Just as the worldwide shortage of a radioactive isotope used in millions of medical procedures is about to get worse, officials say a new source for the substance has emerged: a nuclear reactor in Poland.

The isotope, technetium 99, is used to measure blood flow in the heart and to help diagnose bone and breast cancers. Almost two-thirds of the world's supply comes from two reactors; one, in Ontario, has been shut for repairs for nine months and is not expected to reopen before April, and the other, in the Netherlands, will close for six months starting Friday.

Radiologists say that as a result of the shortage, their treatment of some patients has had to revert to inferior materials and techniques they stopped using 20 years ago.

http://snipr.com/uepr5


Have Olympic Athletes Done All They Can?

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

It merited only a few paragraphs inside newspaper sports sections. Crystal Cox, a member of the gold-medal-winning U.S. women's 1,600-meter relay team in the 2004 Athens Olympics, had admitted to using a performance-enhancing drug. Cox would lose her medal and be banned from competition for four years.

On the surface, the announcement last month seemed just another episode of sports doping and its sad consequences. But to many sports scientists, the news was evidence of a broader trend. They believe that human athletic performance has peaked, and only cheating or technological advances will result in a rash of new world records.

A French researcher who analyzed a century's worth of world records concluded in a recent paper that the peak of athletic achievement was reached in 1988. Eleven world records were broken that year in track and field. Seven of them still stand.

http://snipr.com/ueprg


War Game Reveals U.S. Lacks Cyber-Crisis Skills

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Scene: The White House Situation Room. Event: A massive cyber attack has turned the cellphones and computers of tens of millions of Americans into weapons to shut down the Internet. A cascading series of events then knocks out power for most of the East Coast amid hurricanes and a heat wave.

Is the assault on cellphones an armed attack? In a crisis, what power does the government have to order phone and Internet carriers to allow monitoring of their networks? What level of privacy can Americans expect?

A war game, sponsored by a nonprofit group and attended by former top-ranking national security officials, laid bare Tuesday that the U.S. government lacks answers to such key questions.

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Report Compares Health County-by-County

from USA Today

For the first time, a new report reveals how counties across America stack up when it comes to health.

Today, whether you live in Malibu or Atlanta, you can learn if your community is holding its own in health. "County Health Rankings: Mobilizing Action Toward Community Health," a health report card for almost every one of the nation's more than 3,000 counties, is being released by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Wisconsin's Population Health Institute.

"This is a complicated story about what makes a community healthy and another not so healthy," says report author Pat Remington, the associate dean for public health at the University of Wisconsin.

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Aspirin May Reduce Breast Cancer Death Risk

from ABC News

A provocative new study suggests that aspirin reduces the odds of death in breast cancer survivors, although doctors caution it is too soon to know if women should start taking the drug as soon as they are diagnosed.

The research, part of the long-running Nurses' Health Study, followed 4,164 female nurses who had been diagnosed with early stage breast cancer. Harvard investigators found that nurses who took aspirin--usually to protect against heart disease--were 50 percent less likely to have their cancer spread and 50 percent less likely to die from breast cancer.

"This is a very interesting and exciting study that suggests aspirin may reduce the recurrence of breast cancer," said Dr. Richard Besser, senior health and medical editor for ABC News. "However, the design of the study does not allow for definitive conclusions. Hopefully, there will be randomized trials of aspirin use to answer this question."

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Archbishop Desmond Tutu in Genome Health Study

from BBC News Online

Scientists have analysed the genomes of five southern Africans, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu, to study their genetic diversity and health. The research, published in the journal Nature, compared genes of the Archbishop with San people.

"I am excited by the results," Archbishop Tutu told BBC News. "Without these tests, I would not have known my bloodline... I am related to the San people, the first people to inhabit Southern Africa," he explained.

... The team of researchers from Africa, America and Australia hope that the study will help redress the geographic imbalance in disease susceptibility studies based on genetics. Southern Africans have often been poorly represented in drug trials and it will now be possible to include them in genome based studies on disease.

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Primitive Humans Conquered Sea, Surprising Finds Suggest

from National Geographic News

It wasn't supposed to happen like this. Two years ago a team of U.S. and Greek archaeologists were combing a gorge on the island of Crete in Greece, hoping to find tiny stone tools employed by seafaring people who had plied nearby waters some 11,000 years ago.

Instead, Boston University archaeologist and stone-tool expert Curtis Runnels came across a whopping surprise--a sturdy 5-inch-long hand ax. ... The discovery of the hand ax suggests that someone besides technologically modern humans--perhaps Neanderthals, Homo heidelbergensis, Homo erectus, or primitive Homo sapiens--island-hopped across the Mediterranean for tens of millennia.

It's been thought that the early humans of this time period were not capable of devising boats or even simple rafts--technology considered an expression of modern behavior.

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Is the Recovery Act Stimulating Science and the Economy?

from Scientific American

Most of the National Science Foundation's $3 billion from the stimulus package has been distributed, but hardly any of it has been spent.

So far, $9.3 million for researchers building robotic bees, $1.3 million to hunt for viruses that infect single-celled organisms, and $845,000 to study past climate change in Russia has been doled out.

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has been able to fund thousands of new research projects with money from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA), aka the economic stimulus package, which was passed a year ago today. But has this money been as much of a boon to the economy has it has been to science?

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Engineering Cellular Synchrony

from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Scientists have engineered bacteria that can communicate with each other in a synchronized manner, lighting up in waves of fluorescent green, according to report in this week's Nature. The advance paves the way for developing environmental sensors and drug delivery systems that can time the release of medicines in periodic bursts.

"I think [the study] represents the state of the art of our ability to create synthetic gene networks," said James Collins of Boston University. "It was really brilliant that they were able to pull it off."

Jeff Hasty and colleagues at the University of California, San Diego, engineered a very simple positive feedback loop using just two genes, plus the green fluorescent protein gene as a reporter. "The beauty of this thing is its simplicity," said Hasty.

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Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 06:02:53 PM
February 4, 2010
Haiti Debates Moving Its Capital

from Spiegel

Haiti's official seismologist, who predicted the recent earthquake, has warned that an even stronger one is likely to hit Port-au-Prince within the next 20 years. Now the Haitian government is debating how and if the capital should be rebuilt--or if it should be moved elsewhere.

Claude Prépetit had seen it coming in his figures. He had done the calculations, in millimeters and in centuries, he had calculated the pressure that was building up beneath his feet, and he had estimated the energy that would eventually be discharged. And when the earth finally did shake, and falling concrete ceilings, stone walls and wooden beams killed at least 170,000 people within the space of 40 seconds, that was when Prépetit thought to himself: "This is it--this has to be a seven."

He had predicted an earthquake with a magnitude of about 7.2 points on the Richter scale, and the actual quake measured 7.0. For years, he had taken precise measurements and performed careful calculations, and he had done his job exceedingly well. When the earthquake struck, he was sitting at home in front of his computer.

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Sea Level Rise May Sink Island Nations

from Discovery News

Sea level rise from anthropogenic global warming could erase some island states from the face of the Earth--but those nations could survive even without land, say researchers.

Governments and people of lost islands could survive "in exile," build structures to mark their submerged territory, retain their status in the eyes of other states and await the day when their islands emerge again when global cooling drops sea levels.

The trouble is current international agreements, including the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, don't address the issue, said international law professor Rosemary Rayfuse of the University of New South Wales in Australia. Just what to do about the possibility of nations being lost, and how to do it, is very much on the frontiers of the legal thinking.

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Researcher on Climate Is Cleared in Inquiry

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- An academic board of inquiry has largely cleared a noted Pennsylvania State University climatologist of scientific misconduct, but a second panel will convene to determine whether his behavior undermined public faith in the science of climate change, the university said Wednesday.

The scientist, Dr. Michael E. Mann, has been at the center of a dispute arising from the unauthorized release of more than 1,000 e-mail messages from the servers of the University of East Anglia in England, home to one of the world's premier climate research units.

While the Pennsylvania State inquiry, conducted by three senior faculty members and administrators, absolved Dr. Mann of the most serious charges against him, it is not likely to silence the controversy over climate science. New questions about the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, to which Dr. Mann was a significant contributor, have arisen since the hacked e-mail messages surfaced last November.

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Study Finds Cognition in Vegetative Patients

from the Wall Street Journal

In a new study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, four of 23 patients diagnosed as being in a vegetative state showed signs of consciousness on brain-imaging tests.

Even more significantly, one patient was able to answer yes and no questions using the researchers' technique--indicating the potential for communication with people previously considered unresponsive.

Researchers at two centers, in England and Belgium, used functional magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) tests on 54 patients with severe brain injury. Of these patients, 31 were diagnosed as being in a minimally conscious state, meaning they showed intermittent signs of awareness such as laughing or crying. The other 23 were diagnosed as being in a vegetative state, meaning they were considered unresponsive and unaware of their surroundings.

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Smart Power Grid Promises Efficiency, Consumer Options

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Imagine an electrical power network that talks to customers--and listens to them.

Or one that practically heals itself, that can sense when a fallen tree has severed a power line and reroute power so the fewest number of customers possible lose electricity.

Or one that gives customers control of their own energy use through the Internet, remotely turning off appliances or running the washing machine at night, when demand is low. Those are the promises power companies and the state are exploring in new technologies known collectively as the "smart grid."

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Plants' Quantum Secret to Boost Photosynthesis

from Scientific American

In less than one billionth of a second, plants from algae to redwoods transform 95 percent of the sunlight that falls on them--1017 joules per second bathe the planet--into energy stored chemically as carbohydrates. The quantum key to doing that lies in a phenomenon known to physicists as quantum coherence, according to new research published in Nature on February 4.

Quantum coherence describes how more than one molecule interacts with the same energy from one incoming photon at the same time. In essence, rather than the energy from a particular photon choosing one route to pass through the photosynthetic system, it travels through multiple channels simultaneously, allowing it to pick the quickest route.

"The energy of the absorbed light is finding more than one pathway to move along at any one time," explains physical chemist Greg Scholes of the University of Toronto, leader of the research group that highlighted the effect. "We can't pinpoint the energy of that light. It's shared in a very special way."

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China Set for Global Lead in Scientific Research

from Financial Times (Registration Required)

China has experienced the strongest growth in scientific research over the past three decades of any country, according to figures compiled for the Financial Times, and the pace shows no sign of slowing.

Jonathan Adams, research evaluation director at Thomson Reuters, said China's "awe-inspiring" growth meant it was now the second-largest producer of scientific knowledge and was on course to overtake the US by 2020 if it continued on its trajectory.

Thomson Reuters, which indexes scientific papers from 10,500 journals, analysed the performance of four emerging markets countries--Brazil, Russia, India and China--over the past 30 years. China far outperformed every other nation, with a 64-fold increase in peer-reviewed scientific papers since 1981, with particular strength in chemistry and materials science.

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Reaching for Answers

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

For two years, Pamela Hottenstein swallowed her pride and left collection jars in restaurants and stores around Beloit, her hometown. She held fund-raising car washes on rainy days and sent letters to churches. She watched her husband's roofing co-workers labor 10 hours on their day off just so they could donate all their earnings to the cause.

Late in 2009, she took the $32,300 raised and wired every penny to a company in China that arranged for her teenage daughter to be injected with stem cells.

The procedure, an attempt to treat the daughter's severe developmental disorder, is unproven, and American scientists were skeptical it would make any difference. The company offering it is one of dozens overseas that have sidestepped Western standards of medicine by selling treatments before they have been vetted in clinical trials and respected scientific journals. Despite all of the fund raising, the stem cell injections would leave Pamela and James Hottenstein $7,000 in debt.

http://snipr.com/u9rkq


Lost Roman Codex Fragments Found in Book Binding

from National Geographic News

Fragments of a lost ancient Roman law text have been rediscovered in the scrap paper used to bind other books. The Codex Gregorianus, or Gregorian Code, was compiled by an otherwise unknown man named Gregorius at the end of the third century A.D. It started a centuries-long tradition of collecting Roman emperors' laws in a single manuscript.

The Codex Gregorianus covered the laws of Hadrian, who ruled from A.D. 117 to 138, to those of Diocletian, ruler from A.D. 284 to 305.

Later codices excerpted the laws that were still relevant and added new ones, so only parts of the first codex survived as passages in other editions. All copies of the original collection of laws were thought to have been lost. Luckily, in the 16th century it was common to use scraps of paper to reinforce the bindings of new books.

http://snipr.com/u9rky


Leaf Veins Loopy for a Reason

from Science News

Tree branches have inspired efficient transit networks, but a new study finds inspiration in leaves. The curvy, connected leaf veins found in some plants are an efficient way to circumvent damaged areas and channel nutrients, report researchers led by Eleni Katifori of the Rockefeller University in New York City.

"It's obvious that if you look at leaves, they have a lot of loops," Katifori says. To find out how the looped networks may be beneficial for the plants, the researchers created a computer model to compare how efficiently different branching patterns could do the job of leaf veins, which move water and nutrients around. "The question we're asking is, what's the best network we can build?" Katifori says.

In the simulations, the looped network performed better than nonlooped ones in several important ways, the team reported January 29 in Physical Review Letters. Damage from hungry insects, cold weather or parasites can interrupt leaves' normal venation patterns. Connected circular veins allowed the flow of water and minerals to circumvent areas where veins were destroyed, the team shows.

http://snipr.com/u9rl8


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 06:04:46 PM
February 5, 2010
Collider to Operate Again, Though at Half Power

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The world's biggest and most expensive physics experiment will finally be going into regular operation later this month, but it is going to operate at only half power for the next two years, CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, said Thursday.

CERN's Large Hadron Collider was built over 15 years and at a cost of $10 billion to accelerate protons to energies of 7 trillion electron volts apiece and then bang them together in a search for primordial forces and new laws of physics. But the machine has been plagued with problems.

In the fall of 2008, after the collider was first turned on, an electrical splice between two of the superconducting magnets that guide the proton beams exploded during a test, casting doubt on the integrity of thousands of such splices in the collider, which is 18 miles around.

http://snipr.com/ua2mx


Pluto Images Show a Dynamic World

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Newly computer-processed images of Pluto taken by the Hubble Space Telescope show that it is not simply a ball of ice and rock, but a dynamic world that undergoes dramatic atmospheric changes produced by its seasons, NASA said Thursday.

The images show an icy and dark molasses-colored world that is highly mottled and whose northern hemisphere is now getting brighter.

The images show that the body--once considered the ninth and most distant planet but now reduced to the status of dwarf planet--also turned noticeably redder in the two years after the turn of the millennium for reasons that are not clear, and that its equator features a large bright spot whose origin remains a mystery.

http://snipr.com/ua2nk


The Counterfeiter

from the Scientist (Registration Required)

... Drugs can pass through a dozen or more hands on the way to the pharmacy and a consumer's medicine cabinet. The patchiness of the drug distribution network and the absence of a proper paper trail ... has allowed unscrupulous middlemen to launder counterfeit medications within the legitimate supply chain that leads to a local pharmacy. Foreign-produced drugs are also illegally "diverted" into the domestic supply chain.

In the last 10 years, counterfeit pharmaceuticals have become big business. According to the World Health Organization, counterfeit drugs are any medication that is deliberately and fraudulently mislabeled with respect to its true identity or source.

For instance, counterfeits may have packaging that matches a brand-name drug but were produced under appalling sanitary conditions, and may contain no active ingredient or a completely different ingredient. By some estimates, 15-25% of malaria drugs in sub-Saharan Africa are counterfeit or substandard.

http://snipr.com/ua2w4


Giant Meteorites Slammed Earth Around A.D. 500?

from National Geographic News

Pieces of a giant asteroid or comet that broke apart over Earth may have crashed off Australia about 1,500 years ago, says a scientist who has found evidence of the possible impact craters.

Satellite measurements of the Gulf of Carpentaria revealed tiny changes in sea level that are signs of impact craters on the seabed below, according to new research by marine geophysicist Dallas Abbott. Based on the satellite data, one crater should be about 11 miles wide, while the other should be 7.4 miles wide.

For years Abbott, of Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, has argued that V-shaped sand dunes along the gulf coast are evidence of a tsunami triggered by an impact.

http://snipr.com/ua2nv


Florida's Big Chill May Have Hammered Corals

from Science News

Rough weather is slowing efforts to survey the extent of Florida's first cold-weather coral bleaching event in 33 years. But reports so far find heavy damage in parts of reefs near shore.

A cold snap in January stressed corals in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary so much that many lost their colorful, live-in algal partners and turned bleached white, according to reports from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Corals sometimes recover, but divers are already reporting dead patches from the event.

Cold bleachings in this region are very unusual, says Billy Causey, Southeast regional director of NOAA's marine sanctuary office. "It's a benchmark event for us."

http://snipr.com/ua2nz


Exoplanet Gas Spotted from Earth

from BBC News Online

Astronomers have used a new ground-based technique to study the atmosphere of a planet outside our Solar System.

The work could assist the search for Earth-like planets with traces of organic, or carbon-rich, molecules. Gases have previously been discerned on exoplanets before, but only by using space-based telescopes.

Astronomers reporting in Nature say their method of spotting methane gas on exoplanets could be extended to many other, ground-based telescopes. Methane was first spotted on an exoplanet named HD 189733b in 2008 by a group led by Mark Swain of Nasa's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in the US.

http://snipr.com/ua2o6


Strict Ban on Medical Ghostwriting Proposed

from Scientific American

When students pawn someone else's work off as their own, they get expelled. But when some professors do the same thing, they get a "pat on the back," and maybe even a few extra bucks. Scientists credited for research articles that were secretly penned by ghostwriters from pharmaceutical companies often are not reprimanded for their misrepresentations; rather, their ranks and career trajectories often improve.

Although this practice of undisclosed authors (with undisclosed commercial interests) writing articles under the pretense of unbiased scientific inquiry raises serious concerns about academic integrity, few institutions have policies to discourage it. The authors of a new study published in PLoS One hope to make medical ghostwriting a faux pas on par with plagiarism and data falsification.

After the results from their survey on ghostwriting prohibition policies revealed that 37 of the top 50 academic medical centers in the U.S. have none, Jeffrey Lacasse of Arizona State University's School of Social Work and Jonathan Leo of Lincoln Memorial University in Harrogate, Tenn., took the opportunity to propose an unambiguous policy on the matter in their article.

http://snipr.com/ua2o7


How Sleepy Are Sloths?

from Smithsonian Magazine

Hoots, chirps and the guttural wails of howler monkeys fill the humid, earthy air as we trek deeper. From floor to canopy, the tropical forest is crawling with creatures, and my guide, Robert Horan, keeps a running commentary. Spider monkeys flounce in the tree branches. Two bats cling to the inside of a hollow tree. Stingless bees swarm around a honey-like goop oozing from a freshly cut log.

... With all the wildlife vying for my attention, I just about pass the 130-foot radio tower, when Horan calls it out. I tilt my hat back, wipe the sweat from my brow and look up. The tower, like the soaring trees surrounding it, is the first evidence of the island being wired.

An aerial view of the six-square-mile research island in the Panama Canal would reveal six other towers poking through the treetops--all part of a cutting-edge animal surveillance system scientists call the Automated Radio Telemetry System, or ARTS. Atop each tower is an array of antennas that, every few minutes, receives signals from up to 20 radio-tagged animals roaming the forest. The towers then communicate real-time information on the locations and activity levels of the animals to an on-site laboratory.

http://snipr.com/ua2oj


The Strangest Liquid: Why Water Is So Weird

from New Scientist

We are confronted by many mysteries, from the nature of dark matter and the origin of the universe to the quest for a theory of everything. These are all puzzles on the grand scale, but you can observe another enduring mystery of the physical world--equally perplexing, if not quite so grand--from the comfort of your kitchen. Simply fill a tall glass with chilled water, throw in an ice cube and leave it to stand.

The fact that the ice cube floats is the first oddity. And the mystery deepens if you take a thermometer and measure the temperature of the water at various depths. At the top, near the ice cube, you'll find it to be around 0°C, but at the bottom it should be about 4°C. That's because water is denser at 4°C than it is at any other temperature--another strange trait that sets it apart from other liquids.

Water's odd properties don't stop there, and some are vital to life. Because ice is less dense than water, and water is less dense at its freezing point than when it is slightly warmer, it freezes from the top down rather than the bottom up. So even during the ice ages, life continued to thrive on lake floors and in the deep ocean. Water also has an extraordinary capacity to mop up heat, and this helps smooth out climatic changes that could otherwise devastate ecosystems.

http://snipr.com/ua2os


Psychiatric Diagnosis: That Way, Madness Lies

from the Economist

On February 10th the world of psychiatry will be asked, metaphorically, to lie on the couch and answer questions about the state it thinks it is in. For that is the day the American Psychiatric Association (APA) plans to release a draft of the fifth version of its Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V).

Mental illness carrying the stigma that it does, and the brain being as little-understood as it is, revising the DSM is always a controversial undertaking. This time, however, some of the questions asked of the process are likely to be particularly probing.

The DSM, the first version of which was published in 1952, lists recognised psychological disorders and the symptoms used to diagnose them. In the United States, what is in it influences whether someone will be diagnosed with an illness at all, how he will be treated if he is so diagnosed, and whether his insurance company will pay for that treatment.

http://snipr.com/ua2oz
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 06:07:08 PM
Study: Eastern Trees in the Midst of a Growth Spurt

from Time

Basic biology suggests that plants might grow faster in a world with more carbon dioxide, and field experiments bear that out: when you pump extra CO2 into a field or a forest, trees and other vegetation tend to get bigger.

There are plenty of caveats attached: without other nutrients, the size and health of CO2-enriched plants can be compromised, and in some cases noxious weeds like poison ivy do better than the greenery you might prefer. But perhaps the biggest question of all is how closely such artificial situations translate in the real world.

That question is a long way from being answered, but a study published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences takes a small step in that direction. A team of researchers used 22 years' worth of carefully accumulated measurements of hardwood forests in and near the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, in Edgewater, Md., to show that their growth has accelerated significantly. On average, the stands were expanding at a rate of two extra tons of mass per acre per year, by the end of the study--the equivalent of a single two-foot-diameter tree, if you could grow a tree that big in a year.

http://snipr.com/uay51


Evidence Builds on Color of Dinosaurs

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Until last week, paleontologists could offer no clear-cut evidence for the color of dinosaurs. Then researchers provided evidence that a dinosaur called Sinosauropteryx had a white-and-ginger striped tail. And now a team of paleontologists has published a full-body portrait of another dinosaur, in striking plumage that would have delighted that great painter of birds John James Audubon.

"This is actual science, not Avatar," said Richard O. Prum, an evolutionary biologist at Yale and co-author of the new study, published in Science.

Dr. Prum and his colleagues took advantage of the fact that feathers contain pigment-loaded sacs called melanosomes. In 2009, they demonstrated that melanosomes survived for millions of years in fossil bird feathers. The shape and arrangement of melanosomes help produce the color of feathers, so the scientists were able to get clues about the color of fossil feathers from their melanosomes alone.

http://snipr.com/uay5c


Is It Time to Throw Out 'Primordial Soup' Theory?

from National Public Radio

Is the "primordial soup" theory--the idea that life emerged from a prebiotic broth--past its expiration date? Biochemist Nick Lane thinks so. The University College London writer and his colleagues argue that the 81-year-old notion just doesn't hold water.

Lane [says] there's another possible explanation for the emergence of life. But before we get to that, why toss out the soup theory? Lane says the idea of a primordial soup goes back to 1929, and great biologists like J.B.S. Haldane.

"He proposed that the Earth's early atmosphere was composed of simple gases like methane and ammonia. And they would react together under the influence of ultraviolet rays or lightning to produce a thin 'soup'--which became thicker over time--of organic molecules," Lane says.

http://snipr.com/uay6a


Protein Clumps Like a Prion, But Proves Crucial For Long-term Memory

from Science News

Sea slugs make memories with a twist. Screwing a normal nerve cell protein into a distorted shape helps slugs, and possibly people, lock in memories, new research shows.

Notably, the shape change also brings a shift in the protein's behavior, leading it to form clumps. That kind of behavior is the sort seen in prions, the misshapen, infectious proteins that cause mad cow disease, scrapie and other disorders. But the new study, published February 5 in Cell, shows a possible normal function for the shape-shifting, suggesting that twists and clumps don't necessarily make prions monsters.

In one sense, prions are machines of "molecular memory," says Yury Chernoff, a biologist at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta and editor in chief of the journal Prion. The proteins remember what happened to them--changing shapes--and then transmit that change to other proteins. "But the notion of these machines being used for cellular, and therefore organismal, memory is truly amazing," he says.

http://snipr.com/uay6y


Is Climate Change Hiding the Decline of Maple Syrup?

from Nature News

The burning of fossil fuels such as coal and oil releases carbon dioxide that alters the balance of carbon isotopes naturally found in the environment--an effect that is now being found in food, reveals a US study.

Modern methods for tracking the origins of processed foods use isotopes--atoms of the same element that have different numbers of neutrons. Of the most common naturally occurring isotopes of carbon ... the heavier carbon-13 isotope is rarer.

... As part of an undergraduate project intended to show how isotope analysis works, geochemist William Peck at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, got his students to analyse maple syrup from different parts of the northeastern United States. "Our intent was really just to see if isotope values varied by geography or if anyone was putting in sweeteners," says Peck.

http://snipr.com/uay7i


Challenges Posed by Bt Brinjal

from the Times of India

The cutting-edge technology of Bt brinjal [eggplant] has had an unintended consequence. The public outrage that followed the regulatory clearance of the first ever GM food crop has forced environment minister Jairam Ramesh to adopt an innovation in public administration.

No minister has ever before crisscrossed the country to hold a series of public consultations, that too on a policy matter already approved by a statutory regulator. Ramesh has announced that he would present his findings to the prime minister shortly following the last of the seven consultation meetings due in Bangalore on February 6.

Ramesh came up with the device of public consultations on October 15, 2009, just a day after the regulator in his ministry, the Genetic Engineering Approval Committee (GEAC), had given its go-ahead to the commercial cultivation of Bt brinjal. The series of consultation meetings chaired by him, starting in Kolkata on January 13, have turned out to be as dramatic, given the manner in which pro and anti-GM lobbies sought to demonstrate not only the strength of their arguments but also their lung power.

http://snipr.com/uay8y


Flying Through the Water: America's Cup Technology

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

The basic physics of sailing seem obvious: A sail catches the wind. The energy is transferred to the hull. The boat is pushed forward.

Of course, any sailor worth his salt knows it's not that simple, and sailing the boats of this year's America's Cup, scheduled to begin today off the coast of Valencia, Spain, may be something akin to rocket science.

By all reports, both vessels in this year's 33rd staging of the America's Cup (racing began in 1851, making it the world's oldest active sports trophy) are capable of sailing two to three times faster than the wind, so fast in fact that "they make their own wind," said Bryon Anderson, a physicist at Kent State University and a longtime sailor.

http://snipr.com/uay9a


Even If You're Careful, Drugs Can End Up in Water

from the News and Observer (Raleigh, NC)

PORTLAND, Maine (Associated Press) -- The federal government advises throwing most unused or expired medications into the trash instead of down the drain, but they can end up in the water anyway, a study from Maine suggests.

Tiny amounts of discarded drugs have been found in water at three landfills in the state, confirming suspicions that pharmaceuticals thrown into household trash are ending up in water that drains through waste, according to a survey by the state's environmental agency that's one of only a handful to have looked at the presence of drugs in landfills.

That landfill water--known as leachate--eventually ends up in rivers. Most of Maine doesn't draw its drinking water from rivers where the leachate ends up, but in other states that do, water supplies that come from rivers could potentially be contaminated.

http://snipr.com/uay9m


Insects Migrate in Wind Highways

from BBC News Online

Migrating insects use highways in the sky to speed their journey, according to a study published in Science magazine.

Researchers say moths and butterflies use sophisticated methods to find winds that will take them in certain directions for thousands of kilometres. The little creatures travel on winds of up to 100km (60 miles) per hour.

They use internal compasses to find these fast moving winds to carry them to their journey's end.

http://snipr.com/uay9u


Living Fast? Scientists Show Lifespan Is Linked to DNA

from the Guardian (U.K.)

Scientists have isolated a gene sequence that appears to determine how fast our bodies age, the first time a link between DNA and human lifespan has been found.

The discovery could have a profound impact on public health and raises the best hope yet for drugs that prevent the biological wear and tear behind common age-related conditions such as heart disease and certain cancers.

The work is expected to pave the way for screening programmes to spot people who are likely to age fast and be more susceptible to heart problems and other conditions early in life. People who test positive for the gene variant in their 20s could be put on cholesterol-lowering statin drugs and encouraged to exercise, eat healthily and avoid smoking.

http://snipr.com/uaya4
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 06:09:15 PM
February 10, 2010
'Third-Hand Smoke' Could Damage Health

from BBC News Online

Lingering residue from tobacco smoke which clings to upholstery, clothing and the skin releases cancer-causing agents, work in PNAS journal shows. Berkeley scientists in the US ran lab tests and found "substantial levels" of toxins on smoke-exposed material.

They say while banishing smokers to outdoors cuts second-hand smoke, residues will follow them back inside and this "third-hand smoke" may harm. Opponents called it a laughable term designed to frighten people unduly.

The scientists say nicotine stains on clothing, furniture and wallpaper can react with a common indoor pollutant to generate dangerous chemicals called tobacco-specific nitrosamines or TSNAs. In the tests, contaminated surface exposed to "high but reasonable" amounts of the pollutant nitrous acid--emitted by unvented gas appliances and in car exhaust--boosted levels of newly formed TSNAs 10-fold.

http://snipr.com/ubtcy


Will You Be E-Mailing This Column? It's Awesome

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Sociologists have developed elaborate theories of who spreads gossip and news ... but they've had less success measuring what kind of information travels fastest. Do people prefer to spread good news or bad news? Would we rather scandalize or enlighten? Which stories do social creatures want to share, and why?

Now some answers are emerging thanks to a rich new source of data: you, Dear Reader. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania have intensively studied the New York Times list of most-e-mailed articles, checking it every 15 minutes for more than six months, analyzing the content of thousands of articles and controlling for factors like the placement in the paper or on the Web home page.

... People preferred e-mailing articles with positive rather than negative themes, and they liked to send long articles on intellectually challenging topics. ... In general, they found, 20 percent of articles that appeared on the Times home page made the list, but the rate rose to 30 percent for science articles ...

http://snipr.com/ubtf1


FDA Aims to Rein in Radiation-Based Medical Scans

from ABC News

(Associated Press) -- The Food and Drug Administration said Tuesday it will work with doctors and manufacturers to reduce unnecessary radiation exposure from medical scans, a problem that has been growing for decades.

The agency says it will require manufacturers of CT scanners and other imaging machines to include safety controls that prevent patients from receiving excessive radiation doses. A public meeting to discuss the requirements is scheduled for late March.

Regulators are also developing best-practice measures that hospitals and imaging centers will have to meet to retain their scanning accreditation. The proposal is part of a multipronged effort to rein in excessive radiation-based medical scanning, which has mushroomed in recent years.

http://snipr.com/ubtfk


"Super Earth" May Really Be New Planet Type

from National Geographic News

Oceans of lava might bubble on its surface. Hot pebbles may rain down from the sky. But the extrasolar planet CoRoT-7b is considered to be the most Earthlike world yet found outside our solar system.

A recent study, however, suggests that Earth might not be the best basis for comparison. Instead, the authors argue, CoRoT-7b is the first in a new class of exoplanets: a super-Io.

Like Jupiter's moon Io, CoRoT-7b could easily be in the right kind of orbit to experience what's known as tidal heating, according to study co-author Rory Barnes of the University of Washington in Seattle.

http://snipr.com/ubtfq


Revising the Book on Mental Illness

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

After years of research, professional infighting and maneuvering from various interest groups, the nation's psychiatrists Tuesday unveiled proposed changes to the manual used to diagnose and treat mental disorders around the world.

The draft document, released by the American Psychiatric Assn., for the first time calls for binge-eating and gambling to be considered disorders, opening the way for insurance coverage of these problems. But it refrains from suggesting a formal diagnosis for obesity, Internet addiction or sex addiction, as some professionals had proposed.

The document also recommends a single category for autism spectrum disorders, unifying what has been a multifaceted and complicated diagnostic scale. The fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders will be published in 2013.

http://snipr.com/ubtft


The Advantages of Being Helpless

from Scientific American

At every stage of early development, human babies lag behind infants from other species. A kitten can amble across a room within moments of birth and catch its first mouse within weeks, while its wide-eyed human counterpart takes ... years to learn even simple tasks ....

... In a recent article in Current Directions in Psychological Science, Sharon Thompson-Schill, Michael Ramscar and Evangelia Chrysikou make the case that this very helplessness is what allows human babies to advance far beyond other animals.

They propose that our delayed cortical development is precisely what enables us to acquire the cultural building blocks, such as language, that make up the foundations of human achievement.

http://snipr.com/ubtg1


Testing Time for Stem Cells

from Nature News

The drug industry is keener on stem-cell technologies than ever before--and not just as a source of new treatments. A wave of new partnerships aims to use stem cells as a way to screen other potential drug candidates.

In the latest such example, Roche last week announced a deal worth some US$20 million with Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston. Roche, based in Basel, Switzerland, will use cell lines and protocols developed by academic researchers to screen for drugs to treat cardiovascular disease and other conditions.

Because relevant human cell types are often unavailable, current screens tend to use cells from rodents or human tissues other than the ones researchers want to target. The hope is that stem cells could provide exactly the type of cells relevant for an assay.

http://snipr.com/ubtgb


Have Gray Wolves Found a Home in Colorado?

from High Country News

Last April, in a narrow mountain valley in northwestern Colorado, Cristina Eisenberg was searching for scat. The diminutive, dark-haired biologist and two members of her field crew had set up a kilometer-long transect through elk habitat, and the trio was walking slowly along the line.

... Then, on the edge of an aspen grove, one of the biologists saw something unusual: a scat roughly as long and wide as a banana, tapered at the ends, perhaps two months old. When Eisenberg examined it, she saw that it contained hair from deer or elk and shards of bone, some almost as long as a fingernail.

... In the course of her research, Eisenberg had seen and handled thousands of scats just like this one, but not here, not in Colorado. Everything about it--the size, the shape, the smell, the contents--indicated a creature that had been extirpated from the state more than 70 years ago. Everything about it said wolf.

http://snipr.com/ubtgm


Scientists Try to Measure Love

from the Baltimore Sun

Leave it to science to take all the fun out of something as cosmically pure as love. Theories about love's purpose range from the biologically practical to the biologically complicated. Anthropologists have said it helps ensure reproduction of the species; attachment theorists maintain it's a byproduct of our relationship with our childhood caregivers.

And now researchers are exploring what happens physiologically as a romantic relationship progresses. The more we understand it, they say, the better our chances of making love last and of harnessing its potential to improve our emotional and physical well-being.

... Arthur Aron, a social psychologist at Stony Brook University in New York, has done brain scans on people newly in love and found that after that first magical meeting or perfect first date, a complex system in the brain is activated that is essentially "the same thing that happens when a person takes cocaine."

http://snipr.com/ubtgw


$78.5 Million Effort to Keep Carp Out of Great Lakes

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

CHICAGO -- Federal authorities on Monday presented a $78.5 million plan intended to block Asian carp, a hungry, huge, nonnative fish, from invading the Great Lakes.

The threat has grown increasingly tense throughout the region in recent months as genetic material from the fish was found near and even in Lake Michigan.

In a meeting in Washington with leaders of some Great Lakes states, officials from the Army Corps of Engineers, the Environmental Protection Agency and other agencies laid out an "Asian Carp Control Strategy Framework" to ensure that the fish, known to take over entire ecosystems, do not establish themselves in the lakes.

http://snipr.com/ubth8
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 06:10:01 PM
February 9, 2010
U.N. Climate Panel and Chief Face Credibility Siege

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Just over two years ago, Rajendra K. Pachauri seemed destined for a scientist's version of sainthood: A vegetarian economist-engineer who leads the United Nations' climate change panel, he accepted the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize on behalf of the panel, sharing the honor with former Vice President Al Gore.

But Dr. Pachauri and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are now under intense scrutiny, facing accusations of scientific sloppiness and potential financial conflicts of interest from climate skeptics, right-leaning politicians and even some mainstream scientists. Senator John Barrasso, a Wyoming Republican, called for Dr. Pachauri's resignation last week.

Critics, writing in Britain's Sunday Telegraph and elsewhere, have accused Dr. Pachauri of profiting from his work as an adviser to businesses, including Deutsche Bank and Pegasus Capital Advisors, a New York investment firm--a claim he denies.

http://snipr.com/ubdsl


First Results From Large Hadron Collider Published

from BBC News Online

The results from the highest-energy particle experiments carried out at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in December have begun to yield their secrets.

Scientists from the LHC's Compact Muon Solenoid detector has now totted up all of the resulting particle interactions.

They wrote in the Journal of High Energy Physics that the run created more particles than theory predicted. However, the glut of particles should not affect results as the experiment runs to even higher energies this year.

http://snipr.com/ubdsz


Study Links Mother's Age to Child's Risk of Autism

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Women who give birth after age 40 are nearly twice as likely to have a child with autism as those under 25, but it is unlikely that delayed parenthood plays a big role in the current autism epidemic, California researchers reported Monday.

The findings were expected to draw widespread attention because of the intense public interest in autism, but their true impact was expected to be simply in suggesting further avenues of research.

Surprisingly, the age of the father plays little role unless the mother is younger than 30 and the father is over 40, according to the analysis of all births in California in the 1990s.

http://snipr.com/ubdwr


U.S. Proposes New Climate Service

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Obama administration proposed a new climate service on Monday that would provide Americans with predictions on how global warming will affect everything from drought to sea levels.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Climate Service, modeled loosely on the 140-year-old National Weather Service, would provide forecasts to farmers, regional water managers and businesses affected by changing climate conditions.

The move is essentially a reorganization of NOAA, and would bring the agency's climate research arm together with its more consumer-oriented services. It would not come with a boost in funding. A Web portal launched Monday at www.climate.gov provides a single entry point to NOAA's climate information, data, products and services.

http://snipr.com/ubdtc


New Methods Aim to Keep E. coli in Beef Lower

from USA Today

The dead of winter may not be the time when most people's thoughts turn toward the allure of a hamburger on the grill. But from a food safety standpoint, it's probably the safest time there is to eat ground beef.

"The theory is that animals are carrying higher levels of E. coli during the summer months, and sometimes they may overwhelm the systems in place to control pathogen contamination in (processing) plants," says James Marsden, a professor of food safety and security at Kansas State University.

... So industry and researchers are turning their sights to new technologies being deployed on the farm, the feedlot and at the slaughterhouse to knock E. coli O157:H7 down to winter levels all year round.

http://snipr.com/ubdtt


Soft Drinks Could Boost Pancreatic Cancer Risk

from BusinessWeek

People who down two or more soft drinks a week may have double the risk of developing deadly pancreatic cancer, compared to non-soda drinkers, new research suggests.

But the overall number of people developing the malignancy remains low, with the U.S. National Cancer Institute (NCI) estimating 42,470 new cases last year.

"Soft drinks are linked with a higher risk of pancreatic cancer," said Noel Mueller, lead author of a study appearing in the February issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention. "We can't speculate too much on the mechanism because this is an observational study, but the increased risk may be working through effects of the hormone insulin."

http://snipr.com/ubdu6


Saving Tiny Toads Without a Home

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

This is a story about a waterfall, the World Bank and 4,000 homeless toads. Maybe the story will have a happy ending, and the bright-golden spray toads, each so small it could easily sit on a dime, will return to the African gorge where they once lived, in the spray of a waterfall on the Kihansi River in Tanzania.

The river is dammed now, courtesy of the bank. The waterfall is 10 percent of what it was. And the toads are now extinct in the wild. But 4,000 of them live in the Bronx and Toledo, Ohio, where scientists at the Wildlife Conservation Society and the Toledo Zoo are keeping them alive in hopes, somehow, of returning them to the wild. This month, the Bronx Zoo will formally open a small exhibit displaying the toads in its Reptile House.

Meanwhile, though, the toads embody the larger conflicts between conservation and economic development and the complexity of trying to preserve and restore endangered species to the wild. Their story also raises questions about how much effort should go to save any one species.

http://snipr.com/ubduh


Turkeys: So Good People Tamed Them Twice

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Americans love turkeys, so it's surprising how little researchers know about the birds' early relationship to humans.

Many archaeologists credited Mesoamericans--who lived in the area extending from present-day Mexico to Honduras--with bringing domesticated turkeys to North America sometime between 200 B.C.E. and 500 C.E., much like they brought maize, beans, and squash.

But a new study shows that Native Americans in what is now the southwestern United States likely tamed turkeys on their own.

http://snipr.com/ubduw


Oldest Land-Walker Tracks Found

from National Geographic News

The first vertebrates to walk the Earth emerged from the sea almost 20 million years earlier than previously thought, say scientists who have discovered footprints from an 8-foot-long prehistoric creature.

Dozens of the 395-million-year-old fossil footprints were recently discovered on a former marine tidal flat or lagoon in southeastern Poland.

The prints were made by tetrapods--animals with backbones and four limbs--and could rewrite the history of when, where, and why fish evolved limbs and first walked onto land, the study says.

http://snipr.com/ubdv2


City Dwellers Drive Deforestation in 21st Century

from Scientific American

Globally, roughly 13 million hectares of forest fall to the blade or fire each year. Such deforestation has long been driven by farmers eking out a slash-and-burn living or loggers using new roads to cut inroads into pristine forest.

But now new data appears to show that, at least for the first five years of the 21st century, big block clearings that reflect industrial deforestation have come to dominate, rather than smaller-scale efforts that leave behind long, narrow swaths of cleared land.

Geographer Ruth DeFries of Columbia University and her colleagues used satellite images from Landsat, along with the MODIS instrument on Aqua to analyze tree-clearing in countries ringing the tropics, representing 98 percent of all remaining tropical forest.

http://snipr.com/ubdvb
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 06:18:20 PM
February 12, 2010
Denmark's Case for Antibiotic-Free Animals

from CBS News

They call it the "Danish Experiment"--a source of pride for the country's 17,000 farmers. CBS Evening News Anchor Katie Couric reports how unlike industrial farms in the U.S., which use antibiotics to promote growth and prevent disease, farmers in Denmark use antibiotics sparingly, only when animals are sick.

The experiment to stop widespread use of antibiotics was launched 12 years ago, when European studies showed a link between animals who were consuming antibiotic feed everyday and people developing antibiotic resistant infections from handling or eating that meat.

"We don't want to use more medicine than needed, and a lot of the medicine that is given is not needed," said Soren Helmer. Helmer is a second-generation pig farmer whose sows produce more than 30,000 pigs a year. When the ban started, he and his father thought the industry would suffer. "We thought we could not produce pigs as efficient as we did before," Helmer said. "But that was proven wrong."

http://snipr.com/uchk6


Child Obesity Risks Death at Early Age, Study Finds

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A rare study that tracked thousands of children through adulthood found the heaviest youngsters were more than twice as likely as the thinnest to die prematurely, before age 55, of illness or a self-inflicted injury.

Youngsters with a condition called pre-diabetes were at almost double the risk of dying before 55, and those with high blood pressure were at some increased risk. But obesity was the factor most closely associated with an early death, researchers said.

The study, published Thursday in The New England Journal of Medicine, analyzed data gathered from Pima and Tohono O'odham Indians, whose rates of obesity and Type 2 diabetes soared decades before weight problems became widespread among other Americans. It is one of the largest studies to have tracked children for several decades after detailed information on weight and risk factors like high cholesterol were gathered.

http://snipr.com/uchkv


Pompadours in the Palms

from Natural History

A full-grown chapil palm tree can reach 110 feet tall, its corona of forty-foot fronds stretching skyward above the surrounding canopy. Competition for space and light can be intense among rain forest trees, and every mature, fruit-producing chapil that towers overhead had countless less-fortunate siblings that perished during the long journey from seed to adult.

But what determines the winners and losers in that lottery? In the case of the chapil, part of the answer may lie in the social behavior of a curious endangered species known as the long-wattled umbrellabird.

The chapil (Oenocarpus bataua) is widely distributed--and widely consumed--throughout the South American tropics. ... But on the other side of the Andes from the Amazon Basin the chapil palm serves the long-wattled umbrellabird--perhaps its most unusual avian patron--and benefits in return.

http://snipr.com/uchl6


Errors in Climate Report Prompt a Push for Reform

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Washington -- A steady drip of unsettling errors is exposing what scientists are calling "the weaker link" in the Nobel Peace Prize-winning series of international reports on global warming.

The flaws--and the erosion they've caused in public confidence--have some scientists calling for drastic changes in how future United Nations climate reports are done. A push for reform is being published in Thursday's issue of the scientific journal Nature. The work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is often portrayed as one massive tome. But it is four separate reports on different aspects of global warming, written months apart by distinct groups of scientists.

No errors have surfaced in the first and most well-known of the reports, which said the physics of a warming atmosphere and rising seas are man-made and incontrovertible. Four mistakes have been discovered in the second report, which attempts to explain how global warming might affect daily life around the world.

http://snipr.com/uchn9


Bouncing Sands Explain Mars' Rippled Surface

from Science News

Once Martian sand grains hop, they don't stop. That's the conclusion of a new study that finds sand can move on Mars without much windy encouragement. Mars' sandy surface has clearly been shaped by wind.

Its characteristic dunes and ripples are the kind formed by sand particles taking short wind-borne hops, a process called saltation. But atmospheric simulations and landers' direct measurements of wind speed have found that the Martian wind hardly ever blows hard enough to kick sand grains off the ground in the first place.

The new paper, to appear in an upcoming Physical Review Letters, suggests a solution to this paradox: a kind of billiard-ball effect in which one sand particle knocks the next one into motion.

http://snipr.com/uchnh


Unearthing Anthrax's Dirty Secret

from Scientific American

NEW YORK -- Using a pipette as a makeshift rolling pin, Raymond Schuch spent some of his lab time last summer pressing the guts out of earthworms that he had collected, fresh from Manhattan soil. For his efforts, The Rockefeller University microbiologist extracted what looked like just a small pile of dirt, but was actually a microcosm teeming with phages--viruses that infect bacteria.

Schuch was on the hunt for phages that could kill anthrax and become anti-anthrax therapies, but what he discovered were viruses that enable this deadly bacteria to grow and survive when the going gets tough.

Scientists have suspected for decades that some phages have a hand at helping the growth of anthrax, Bacillus anthracis, and its less deadly cousins in the Bacillus genus. Then, four years ago, Schuch, along with Vincent Fischetti, a professor of bacteriology at Rockefeller, found a direct link--a type of phage that made anthrax resistant to an antibiotic commonly produced by other bacteria in soil, such as Streptomyces.

http://snipr.com/uchnq


Solar Observatory Launches From Cape Canaveral

from BBC News Online

The US space agency (Nasa) has launched its Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) from Cape Canaveral in Florida. It was the second lift-off attempt for the mission after Wednesday's effort was postponed due to high winds.

The observatory is designed to acquire detailed images of our star to explain variation in its activity. An active Sun can disrupt satellite, communication, and power systems at Earth--especially when it billows charged particles in our direction. Scientists want to see if they can forecast this "space weather" better.

... The Solar Dynamics Observatory will investigate the physics at work inside, on the surface and in the atmosphere of the Sun. "SDO is the solar variability mission," said Lika Guhathakurta, the SDO programme scientist at Nasa Headquarters. "It is going to revolutionise our view of the Sun and it will reveal how solar activity affects our planet, and help us anticipate what lies ahead. It will observe the Sun faster, deeper and in greater detail than any previous observations, breaking barriers of time, scale and clarity that have long blocked progress in solar physics."

http://snipr.com/ucho9


Holy Surgical Side Effect

from ScienceNOW Daily News

People of many religious faiths share the belief that there is a reality that transcends their personal experience. Now, a study with brain cancer patients hints at brain regions that may regulate this aspect of spiritual thinking. The researchers found that some patients who had surgery to remove part of the parietal cortex became more prone to "self transcendence."

Scientists have grown increasingly interested in the origins and neural underpinnings of religious faith. Yet, contrary to some overenthusiastic media reports, brain scans of people of various faiths asked to ponder their relationship with God have so far failed to turn up a "God spot," suggesting instead that many regions of the brain are involved.

In the new study, psychologist Cosimo Urgesi of the University of Udine in Italy and colleagues took a different approach, asking 88 brain cancer patients to fill out a widely used personality questionnaire before and after surgery to remove their tumors. One section of the test measures "self transcendence." It asks respondents, for example, about their tendency to become so absorbed in an activity that they lose track of time and place and whether they feel a strong spiritual connection with other people or with nature.

http://snipr.com/uchp2


Swedish Environmental Lessons

from the Christian Science Monitor

Falls Church, Va. -- Gathered around a dining room table in a typical home in this suburban Virginia community, four people are talking about the lifestyle changes they've made in order to live more sustainably.

"I don't think we've had beef since July 1," says Nolan Stokes, a financial planner. In addition, "we all eat smaller portions of meat." Angela Ulsh, a teacher, chimes in: "You don't miss it."

"We got a digital thermostat and cut our electricity use in half because of it," says Isaiah Akin, a Senate staffer, as his wife, Mya, a teacher, nods and adds, "The changes don't have to be a burden." A woman wearing a purple suit and stylish glasses listens to this recitation of changes undertaken to benefit the environment and smiles. ... She's Maud Olofsson, Sweden's deputy prime minister. During a November visit to the United States she visited the group, whose members are part of a Swedish-sponsored environmental initiative that teaches people how to reduce their carbon footprints.

http://snipr.com/uchpf


Hives Stayin' Alive

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

SAN DIEGO -- Scientists have spent decades studying waggling bees, individuals in every colony that dance and vibrate to tell others where food can be found.

As it turns out, the bees butting heads with the wagglers to make them stop dancing may be just as important. The interruption is a "stop signal"--a warning to steer clear of a place with predators or competing bees. Why is this significant?

Studies of bee waggling have led to profound discoveries about the complex communication patterns of some highly social insects, helped beekeepers improve their operations and earned an Austrian zoologist a 1973 Nobel Prize. The anti-waggling discovery, by UCSD professor James Nieh, also may be historic: It's only the second known example of a sophisticated insect society using "negative feedback"--signals that tell others to stop a behavior.

http://snipr.com/uchpk


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 20, 2010, 06:19:59 PM
February 11, 2010
Animal Antibiotic Overuse Hurting Humans?

from CBS News

Two years ago, 46-year-old Bill Reeves, who worked at a poultry processing plant in Batesville, Arkansas, developed a lump under his right eye. "It went from about the size of a mosquito bite to about the size of a grapefruit," he said.

CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric reports doctors tried several drugs that usually work on this potentially deadly infection: methicillin resistant staph or MRSA--before one saved his life.

... This is not an isolated incident and chickens aren't the only concern. A University of Iowa study last year found a new strain of MRSA in nearly three-quarters of hogs (70 percent), and nearly two-thirds of the workers (64 percent) on several farms in Iowa and Western Illinois. All of them use antibiotics, routinely. On antibiotic-free farms no MRSA was found.

http://snipr.com/uc5bl


Climate-Change Debate Is Heating Up in Deep Freeze

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- As millions of people along the East Coast hole up in their snowbound homes, the two sides in the climate-change debate are seizing on the mounting drifts to bolster their arguments.

Skeptics of global warming are using the record-setting snows to mock those who warn of dangerous human-driven climate change--this looks more like global cooling, they taunt.

Most climate scientists respond that the ferocious storms are consistent with forecasts that a heating planet will produce more frequent and more intense weather events. But some independent climate experts say the blizzards in the Northeast no more prove that the planet is cooling than the lack of snow in Vancouver or the downpours in Southern California prove that it is warming.

http://snipr.com/uc5bw


Being Bored Could Be Bad for Your Health

from USA Today

LONDON (Associated Press) -- Can you really be bored to death? In a commentary to be published in the International Journal of Epidemiology in April, experts say there's a possibility that the more bored you are, the more likely you are to die early.

Annie Britton and Martin Shipley of University College London caution that boredom alone isn't likely to kill you--but it could be a symptom of other risky behavior like drinking, smoking, taking drugs or having a psychological problem.

The researchers analyzed questionnaires completed between 1985 and 1988 by more than 7,500 London civil servants ages 35 to 55. The civil servants were asked if they had felt bored at work during the previous month.

http://snipr.com/uc5cc


Genes Linked to Stuttering Identified

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Government researchers have discovered the first genes linked to stuttering--a complex of three mutated genes that may be responsible for one in every 11 stuttering cases, especially in people of Asian descent.

Studies of stuttering in both families and twins had long suggested that stuttering has a significant genetic component. But until now, scientists had not been able to identify specific genes that might cause the disorder.

The finding is important, experts said, because it shows that stuttering, which affects as many as 1% of all adults worldwide, is biological in origin and not the result of poor parenting, emotional distress or other nebulous factors that many physicians have cited as causes.

http://snipr.com/uc5cq


Feds Pass on Surest Solution to Asian Carp Advance

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. (Associated Press) -- With marauding Asian carp on the Great Lakes' doorstep, the federal government has crafted a $78.5 million battle plan that offers no assurance of thwarting an invasion and doesn't use the most promising weapon available to fight it off.

The surest way to prevent the huge, hungry carp from gaining a foothold in the lakes and threatening their $7 billion fishing industry is to sever the link between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi River basin, created by engineers in Chicago more than a century ago.

The strategy released by the Obama administration this week agrees only to conduct a long-range study of that idea, which could take years. The government also refuses to shut down two navigational locks on Chicago waterways that could provide an easy pathway for the carp into the lakes, although it promises to consider opening them less often.

http://snipr.com/uc5hc


A New VISTA on Stellar Birthplace

from Science News

Using its infrared eyes to peer into the dusty center of the Milky Way's Orion star-forming region, the world's largest panoramic telescope has produced a revealing new portrait of this familiar stellar nursery. The image was taken at the Paranal Observatory in northern Chile by the new 4.1-meter VISTA (for Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy) telescope, which records large sections of sky in a single exposure.

Orion lies about 1,350 light-years from Earth. Like previous images taken of the region in visible light, the center of the new picture shows the four hot, young stars known as the Trapezium, which blast ultraviolet light into surrounding space and set the Orion region aglow.

But VISTA's view also shows many other newborn stars, which in visible light are hidden by dust. Because infrared light penetrates dust, VISTA was able to record these youngsters and the high-speed streams of gas they eject.

http://snipr.com/uc5iq


Whole Genome of Ancient Human Is Decoded

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The genome of a man who lived on the western coast of Greenland some 4,000 years ago has been decoded, thanks to the surprisingly good preservation of DNA in a swatch of his hair so thick it was originally thought to be from a bear.

This is the first time the whole genome of an ancient human has been analyzed, and it joins the list of just eight whole genomes of living people that been have been decoded so far. It also sheds new light on the settlement of North America by showing there was a hitherto unsuspected migration of people across the continent, from Siberia to Greenland, some 5,500 years ago.

The Greenlander belonged to a Paleo-Eskimo culture called the Saqqaq by archaeologists. On the basis of his genome, the Saqqaq man's closest living relatives are the Chukchis, people who live at the easternmost tip of Siberia.

http://snipr.com/uc5j5


Are You Too Smart to Have a Heart Attack?

from ABC News

How well a person does on a standardized intelligence test--in other words, their IQ score--may be related to his or her risk for having a heart attack, according to a team of researchers who have been investigating the potential link between the brain and the heart.

In a study of more than 1,100 middle-aged Scottish men and women who were followed for 20 years, a low score on an IQ test was a better predictor of death from heart disease than traditional risk factors such as systolic blood pressure--the first number in a blood pressure reading--income, and lack of exercise.

Only smoking topped low IQ as a predictor of death, according to G. David Batty, a researcher at the University of Glasgow. Batty and his colleagues ... found a similar link when they studied Vietnam veterans.

http://snipr.com/uc5ji


Universe 20 Million Years Older Than Thought

from National Geographic News

If you want to celebrate the universe's birthday, you might need to add a few more candles to the cake. That's because our universe is about 20 million years older than thought, according to the most accurate measurement yet made of the universe's age.

The data are the latest from the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP), a satellite launched in 2001 that has been mapping what's known as the cosmic microwave background radiation. This "afterglow of creation" is believed to be radiation emitted as matter began to cool 400,000 years after the big bang created the universe.

The faint, almost uniform radiation is coming from every direction in the sky, and it can be picked up from billions of light-years away. By mapping the cosmic microwave background, WMAP is literally creating a picture of the early years of the cosmos.

http://snipr.com/uc5k1


First Video of Clouded Leopard

from BBC News Online

The Sundaland clouded leopard, a recently described new species of big cat, has been caught on camera. The film, the first footage of the cat in the wild to be made public, has been released by scientists working in the Dermakot Forest Reserve in Malaysia.

The Sundaland clouded leopard, only discovered to be a distinct species three years ago, is one of the least known and elusive of all cat species. Two more rare cats, the flat-headed cat and bay cat, were also photographed.

Details of the discoveries are published in the latest issue of Cat News, the newsletter of the Cat Specialist Group of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

http://snipr.com/uc5kc
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on February 26, 2010, 11:45:23 PM
It really cheers me up to think that low IQ can be deadly in itself.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 27, 2010, 01:53:07 AM
Quote from: Sigmatic on February 26, 2010, 11:45:23 PM
It really cheers me up to think that low IQ can be deadly in itself.

I was just thinking something along those lines, only the opposite.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on February 27, 2010, 04:07:04 AM
Quote from: Calamity Nigel on February 27, 2010, 01:53:07 AM
Quote from: Sigmatic on February 26, 2010, 11:45:23 PM
It really cheers me up to think that low IQ can be deadly in itself.

I was just thinking something along those lines, only the opposite.

Why's that?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 27, 2010, 04:27:27 AM
Quote from: Sigmatic on February 27, 2010, 04:07:04 AM
Quote from: Calamity Nigel on February 27, 2010, 01:53:07 AM
Quote from: Sigmatic on February 26, 2010, 11:45:23 PM
It really cheers me up to think that low IQ can be deadly in itself.

I was just thinking something along those lines, only the opposite.

Why's that?

Because I have hypertension and arrhythmia, and it cheers me up to think I might not actually be at higher risk of dying of a heart attack.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on February 27, 2010, 06:31:32 AM
More good news.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 04, 2010, 03:10:55 PM
February 22, 2010

U.S. Urges Glaxo to Pull Avandia on Heart Risks

from the Wall Street Journal

WASHINGTON -- Confidential studies by Food and Drug Administration officials recommend that GlaxoSmithKline's Avandia, a diabetes medicine, get pulled from the market because it is linked to heart attacks.

The studies, released as part of a report on Avandia by staff of Senate Finance Committee members Chuck Grassley (R., Iowa) and Max Baucus (D., Mont.), also say any head-to-head trial where patients get Avandia and Takeda Pharmaceutical Co.'s diabetes medicine Actos would be "unethical and exploitative." GlaxoSmithKline is currently sponsoring a study, called TIDE, where patients get either Avandia, Actos or other medicines.

GlaxoSmithKline said in a prepared statement that it has extensively studied Avandia in more than 52,000 patients and none of its reports shows a statistically significant association between Avandia and heart attacks. The company said the TIDE study was mandated by the FDA and "has been approved by an independent review board and appropriate safety boards that are responsible for assessing the safety of conducting the trial."

http://snipr.com/ugsrg


A Base for War Training, and Species Preservation

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

FORT STEWART, Ga. -- Under crystalline winter skies, a light infantry unit headed for Iraq was practicing precision long-range shooting through a pall of smoke. But the fire generating the haze had nothing to do with the training exercise.

Staff members at the Army post had set the blaze on behalf of the red-cockaded woodpecker, an imperiled eight-inch-long bird that requires frequent conflagrations to preserve its pine habitat.

Even as it conducts round-the-clock exercises to support two wars, Fort Stewart spends as much as $3 million a year on wildlife management, diligently grooming its 279,000 acres to accommodate five endangered species that live here. Last year, the wildlife staff even built about 100 artificial cavities and installed them 25 feet high in large pines so the woodpeckers did not have to toil for six months carving the nests themselves.

http://snipr.com/ugssg


Battle of Bosworth Location Finally Uncovered

from the Times (London)

On the morning of August 22, 1485, the last medieval king of England gambled his throne and his life on one desperate cavalry charge.

It must have made for a magnificent spectacle as Richard III hurtled through the smoke and din of the Battle of Bosworth on a mission to kill his upstart rival, Henry Tudor. He nearly reached him but was held up a few yards short of his quarry and then driven back into a marsh, where he and his heavily armoured knights were picked off by Welshmen with halberds and daggers.

In those few frenzied moments the future of England--and by extension much of the world--changed course. Bosworth became the bridge that links the Middle Ages to modern Britain and ushered in the dynasty of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. If Richard had killed Henry there might have been no English Reformation, no Church of England and no Elizabethan golden age to inspire artists, explorers and empire builders.

http://snipr.com/ugsss


Peru Poison Frog Reveals Secret of Monogamy

from BBC News Online

The first monogamous amphibian has been discovered living in the rainforest of South America. Genetic tests have revealed that male and females of one species of Peruvian poison frog remain utterly faithful.

More surprising is the discovery that just one thing--the size of the pools of water in which they lay their tadpoles--prevents the frogs straying.

That constitutes the best evidence yet documented that monogamy can have a single cause, say scientists. Details of the frog's sex life is to be published in the journal The American Naturalist.

http://snipr.com/ugssu


U.S. Turns to Sweden as Model in Nuclear Waste Storage

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

If the United States is at a loss over what to do about nuclear waste, it may be time to check out the Swedish model. A symposium at the annual meeting of the American Assn. for the Advancement of Science in San Diego last week highlighted the Swedish power industry in gaining public support for a geological repository for high-level radioactive waste.

The Scandinavian success comes in stark contrast to efforts in the U.S., where spent nuclear fuel rods have remained for decades in temporary storage at power plants around the country. Meanwhile, Congress has debated where to bury them, decided on a repository under Yucca Mountain in Nevada, and then changed its mind.

The Obama administration, mindful of the fierce resistance of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), has opposed Yucca and, in the 2011 budget, slashed all funding for the project, which is led by the Department of Energy. Also, President Obama has called for "a new generation of safe, clean nuclear plants" and has budgeted $36 billion in loan guarantees for nuclear power.

http://snipr.com/ugst6


Head Case: Can Psychiatry Be a Science?

from the New Yorker

You arrive for work and someone informs you that you have until five o'clock to clean out your office. You have been laid off. ... After a week, you have a hard time getting out of bed in the morning. After two weeks, you have a hard time getting out of the house. You go see a doctor. The doctor hears your story and prescribes an antidepressant. Do you take it?

However you go about making this decision, do not read the psychiatric literature. Everything in it, from the science (do the meds really work?) to the metaphysics (is depression really a disease?), will confuse you. There is little agreement about what causes depression and no consensus about what cures it. ... There is suspicion that the pharmaceutical industry is cooking the studies that prove that antidepressant drugs are safe and effective, and that the industry's direct-to-consumer advertising is encouraging people to demand pills to cure conditions that are not diseases. ...

These complaints are not coming just from sociologists, English professors, and other troublemakers; they are being made by people within the field of psychiatry itself. As a branch of medicine, depression seems to be a mess. Business, however, is extremely good. Between 1988, the year after Prozac was approved by the F.D.A., and 2000, adult use of antidepressants almost tripled. By 2005, one out of every ten Americans had a prescription for an antidepressant. ... As a depressed person might ask, What does it all mean?

http://snipr.com/ugstj


IVF May Raise Risk of Diabetes, Hypertension and Cancer in Later Life

from the Guardian (U.K)

People conceived through IVF treatment should be monitored for the early onset of high blood pressure, diabetes and certain cancers before the age of 50, according to a fertility specialist.

While IVF is generally considered to produce healthy babies, doctors have identified subtle genetic changes that may raise the risk of particular medical conditions in later life.

Since the birth of the first test tube baby, Louise Brown, on 25 July 1978, more than three million babies have been born through fertility treatment around the world. The vast majority are still under the age of 30.

http://snipr.com/ugstt


Is a Dolphin a Person?

from ScienceNOW Daily News

SAN DIEGO -- Are dolphins as smart as people? And if so, shouldn't we be treating them a bit better than we do now? Those were the topics of discussion at a session on the ethical and policy implications of dolphin intelligence here today at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (which publishes ScienceNOW).

First up, just how smart are dolphins? Researchers have been exploring the question for three decades, and the answer, it turns out, is pretty darn smart. In fact, according to panelist Lori Marino, an expert on cetacean neuroanatomy at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, they may be Earth's second smartest creature (next to humans, of course).

Marino bases her argument on studies of the dolphin brain. Bottlenose dolphins have bigger brains than humans (1600 grams versus 1300 grams), and they have a brain-to-body-weight ratio greater than great apes do (but lower than humans). "They are the second most encephalized beings on the planet," says Marino.

http://snipr.com/ugsu4


Best Science Pictures Announced

from National Geographic News

Fibers cradle a planet-like ball in an award-winning image meant to convey that Earth's future is in our collective hands.

Harvard University's Sung Hoon Kang submerged tiny plastic fibers--each only 1/500 as big as a human hair--in an evaporating liquid, where they spontaneously and cooperatively supported the small green ball.

...The shot was selected as best photograph in the 2009 International Science and Engineering Visualization Challenge. The annual contest, sponsored by the National Science Foundation and the journal Science, awards outstanding artistic efforts to visualize complex scientific concepts.

http://snipr.com/ugsue


Reality Bites: Despite Battles Won, the War Against Malaria Rages On

from the San Diego Union-Tribune

Over the years, medical science has claimed victory, however incomplete, over some of the nastiest, deadliest, infectious diseases to afflict mankind. Bubonic plague, for example, once wiped out an estimated quarter of the Earth's population in a single year--1400. Treated promptly with modern antibiotics, plague patients now usually recover completely. Smallpox annually killed tens of millions of people until global vaccination programs took effect in the 19th and 20th centuries. In 1979, the viral disease was declared officially eradicated.

But other infectious scourges endure. They persist and resist. And none, it could be argued, is more problematic than malaria, a parasitical disease that continues to kill more than 1 million people each year--primarily children and pregnant women--while infecting another 300 million to 500 million. The World Health Organization estimates a child dies of the disease every 30 seconds.

In the United States, malaria is perceived as an exotic disease, an unfamiliar affliction of distant, tropical lands. And this is true, to a degree.

http://snipr.com/ugtcf
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 04, 2010, 03:12:33 PM
February 19, 2010

Cancer's Genetic Fingerprint Allows New Blood Test

from the Guardian (UK)

A personalised blood test that monitors cancer in the body and spots when it has returned after treatment has been developed by scientists.

Researchers believe the test will give doctors a way to tailor cancer treatments to individual patients by monitoring how well their tumour has responded to surgery or therapy and picking up the early signs of a recurrence.

In principle, the test could be used to keep watch over any kind of cancer that scientists can collect cells from. Scientists developed the test after deciphering the full genomes of tumour tissue taken from six patients. Most cancers contain large-scale rearrangements of genetic material that aren't seen in healthy tissue, so they can be used as a genetic "fingerprint" for the tumour.

http://snipr.com/uf9q2


Study Raises Questions About Supernova Origins

from Science News

New X-ray findings appear to have blown a hole in the leading model for the origin of stellar explosions called type 1a supernovas. Astronomers routinely use these bright supernovas to measure dark energy, a baffling entity thought to rev up the rate of expansion of the universe.

Although the new study, published in the Feb. 18 Nature, is unlikely to change the interpretation of previous dark energy studies, a new understanding of how type 1a supernovas form may be critical for future, more precise dark energy measurements, says study coauthor Marat Gilfanov of the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics in Garching, Germany.

Because 1a supernovas are all similarly luminous and can be seen from afar, the explosions serve as ideal cosmic mileposts for measuring the universe's expansion and deducing the presence of dark energy, which accelerates that expansion.

http://snipr.com/uf9sd


Protect Your Business from Kneber-Style Botnets

from PC World

A report from security research firm NetWitness about a malicious botnet dubbed Kneber has been the focus of a fair amount of media attention, but mostly sensationalism that misses the real point.

Yes, the Kneber botnet consists of nearly 75,000 computers. Yes, systems at roughly 2,500 different companies around the world have been infiltrated. Yes, government agencies have had data compromised. Sadly, that is just "a day in the life." There is nothing spectacular about those figures.

Some media reports are even comparing the Kneber botnet to the massive threat of last year's Conficker worm and the associated Downadup botnet. There really is no comparison--Kneber is a drop in the bucket compared to Conficker.

http://snipr.com/uf9t6


Climate Pact Appears Increasingly Fragile

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Just two months after patching together a climate deal in Copenhagen, the world's biggest emitters of greenhouse gases are trying to figure out how to keep the fragile accord together, while the United Nations, which has played a central part in 15 rounds of climate talks, seems destined for a smaller role in the future.

Nearly 100 nations, including the United States, South Africa and Brazil, have endorsed the Copenhagen Accord. But China and India have yet to formally sign off on it, and sources close to Chinese officials say they are balking at sensitive points dealing with transparency and monitoring, even as they vow to press ahead with limits on the growth of their emissions in the next decade.

Meanwhile, a domestic political stalemate in the United States could make it challenging for the Obama administration to deliver on pledges to cut emissions 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020.

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Technology, Medical Tests 'Changing the Face of Health Care'

from USA Today

A boom in medical technology over the past decade or two has led to a surge in certain medical tests and increased prescription drug use, say authors of a report that provides a snapshot of Americans' health today.

Imaging, assisted reproductive technologies, prescription drugs and knee replacements have all seen a dramatic rise since the early '90s, says Amy Bernstein, the report's lead author, a health scientist for the National Center for Health Statistics. The center, part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, released the 33rd annual Report on the Nation's Health Wednesday. It includes a special section on health technology.

"There are newer and better technologies all the time, and they're changing the face of health care and practice patterns," Bernstein says. She points to report findings that show the use of statin drugs, which lower cholesterol, increased almost tenfold from 1994 to 2006 in adults over age 45.

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Remarkable Creatues: Imitators That Hide in Plain Sight

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

In the summer of 1859, an Englishman named Henry Walter Bates returned home after 11 years of roaming the vast Amazon jungle with specimens of more than 14,000 species he had collected.

His timing was uncanny. Just as Bates set about organizing and describing his vast collection, Darwin's "On the Origin of Species" was published, which gave Bates an entirely new way of thinking about all that he had seen in the jungle.

He was able to provide some fresh and very timely evidence in support of natural selection because it explained a phenomenon he had closely observed, one that intrigued him and continues to hold the attention of naturalists today: the close resemblance of some animals to living or inanimate objects.

http://snipr.com/uf9uu


NASA Rides 'Bucking Bronco' to Mars

from BBC News Online

It weighs almost a tonne, has cost more than $2bn and, in 2013, it will be lowered on to the surface of Mars with a landing system that has never been tried before.

The Mars Science Laboratory will "revolutionise investigations in science on other planets," says Doug McCuistion, director of Nasa's Mars exploration programme. It will, he says, lay the foundations for future missions that will eventually bring pieces of the Red Planet back home to Earth.

"The ability to put a metric tonne on the surface ... gives us the capability to undertake sample collection," says Dr McCuistion. "To collect and launch samples back into orbit will require that size of a vehicle." But it has been a rather bumpy road to revolution.

http://snipr.com/uf9vi


New Role for Robot Warriors

from the Christian Science Monitor

Science fiction sometimes depicts robot soldiers as killing machines without conscience or remorse. But at least one robotics expert today says that someday machines may make the best and most humane decisions on the battlefield.

Guided by virtual emotions, robots could not only make better decisions about their own actions but also act as ethical advisers to human soldiers or even as observers who report back on the battlefield conduct of humans and whether they followed international law.

As militaries around the world invest billions in robotic weapons, no fundamental barriers lie ahead to building machines that "can outperform human soldiers in the battlefield from an ethical perspective," says Ronald Arkin, associate dean at the School of Interactive Computing at Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. The result would be a reduction in casualties both for soldiers and civilians, he says.

http://snipr.com/uf9vt


Testing Curbs Some Genetic Diseases

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

(Associated Press) -- Some of mankind's most devastating inherited diseases appear to be declining, and a few have nearly disappeared, because more people are using genetic testing to decide whether to have children.

Births of babies with cystic fibrosis, Tay-Sachs and other less familiar disorders seem to have dropped since testing came into wider use, The Associated Press found from interviews with numerous geneticists and other experts and a review of the limited research available.

Many of these diseases are little known and few statistics are kept. But their effects--ranging from blood disorders to muscle decline--can be disabling and often fatal during childhood. Now, more women are being tested as part of routine prenatal care, and many end pregnancies when diseases are found. One study in California found that prenatal screening reduced by half the number of babies born with the severest form of cystic fibrosis because many parents chose abortion.

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Ancient Filter Feeders Found Lurking in Museums

from Nature News

The first large filter feeders swam in the oceans for much longer than previously thought.

In a study published today in Science, Matt Friedman, a palaeobiologist at the University of Oxford, UK, and his colleagues identify filter feeders in fossils spanning more than 100 million years and originating in Asia, Europe and North America. The discovery is a result of examining fossils from museums around the world that had either not been studied or had been misinterpreted.

"Given how widespread they were and how long they appear in the geological records, I think it's an important finding that's really going to force us to think about what role these bony fish had," said Nick Pyenson, a fossil marine vertebrate expert at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History in Washington DC.

http://snipr.com/uf9wu


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 04, 2010, 03:13:31 PM
February 23, 2010

Panel Sounds Alarm on National Hypertension 'Emergency'

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A federal panel has a familiar prescription for the American people to reduce hypertension, a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke: Eat less salt and more fruit and vegetables, lose some weight and be more active physically.

The incidence of high blood pressure in this country has reached "emergency" proportions, said Dr. David W. Fleming, the health officer for Seattle & King County in Washington and chairman of an Institute of Medicine panel that released a new report on the problem Monday.

Hypertension "is easy to prevent, simple to diagnose and inexpensive to treat," he said at a news conference. "Yet nearly one in three Americans have hypertension and one in six deaths are caused by hypertension."

http://snipr.com/uh93n


When It Comes to Salt, No Rights or Wrongs. Yet.

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Suppose, as some experts advise, that the new national dietary guidelines due this spring will lower the recommended level of salt. Suppose further that public health officials in New York and Washington succeed in forcing food companies to use less salt. What would be the effect?

A) More than 44,000 deaths would be prevented annually (as estimated recently in The New England Journal of Medicine). B) About 150,000 deaths per year would be prevented annually (as estimated by the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene). C) Hundreds of millions of people would be subjected to an experiment with unpredictable and possibly adverse effects (as argued recently in The Journal of the American Medical Association). D) Not much one way or the other. E) Americans would get even fatter than they are today.

Don't worry, there's no wrong answer, at least not yet. That's the beauty of the salt debate: there's so little reliable evidence that you can imagine just about any outcome.

http://snipr.com/uh93v


Cal Physicist Helps Confirm Einstein Theory

from the San Francisco Chronicle

A UC Berkeley physicist and a Nobel prize-winning colleague now in President Obama's Cabinet report they have confirmed one of Albert Einstein's most revolutionary theories 10,000 times more accurately than ever before.

Einstein's theory of general relativity has already been tested and confirmed to a degree as a true picture of reality by scores of experimenters, ever since he proposed it to the world nearly a century ago.

... One basic prediction from Einstein's theory is that the tug of gravity makes clocks slow down. Now Holger Müller, a physicist at UC Berkeley, together with Steven Chu, former director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and now Obama's energy secretary, as well as Achim Peters of Humboldt University in Berlin, report they have developed what is by far the best confirmation yet of Einstein's monumental achievement.

http://snipr.com/uh955


The Sound of Science

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

PROVIDENCE -- Seth Horowitz has super hearing. As a toddler, chicken pox invaded his ears, bursting both eardrums. When they healed, his hearing range had shifted higher. Today, he can hear a computer monitor humming three rooms away. He can hear bats chattering.

He also is an insomniac; any slight noise can jolt him awake. This might explain why Horowitz, an assistant research professor of neuroscience at Brown University, has spent years in search of a sound that can put people to sleep.

He thinks he's found it, along with a sound that makes you nervous, a sound that makes you concentrate, and a sound that makes you sick to your stomach. Now he and a partner, composer Lance Massey, are trying to market sounds as a way to combat insomnia and other maladies. They are developing CDs with sounds they believe can hijack the auditory system and use it to stimulate different parts of the brain.

http://snipr.com/uh95u


Pediatricians Call for a Choke-Proof Hot Dog

from USA Today

Nutritionists have long warned of the perils of hot dogs: fat, sodium and preservatives to name a few.

Now, the American Academy of Pediatrics wants foods like hot dogs to come with a warning label--not because of their nutritional risks but because they pose a choking hazard to babies and children.

Better yet, the academy would like to see foods such as hot dogs "redesigned" so their size, shape and texture make them less likely to lodge in a youngster's throat. More than 10,000 children under 14 go to the emergency room each year after choking on food, and up to 77 die, says the new policy statement, published online today in Pediatrics. About 17% of food-related asphyxiations are caused by hot dogs.

http://snipr.com/uh96g


Anti-Retrovirals Could Halt Aids Spread in Five Years

from BBC News Online

Anti-retroviral treatments (ARVs) and universal testing could stop the spread of Aids in South Africa within five years, a top scientist says.

Dr Brian Williams says the cost of giving the drugs to almost six million HIV-positive patients in the country would be $2-3bn per year. Only about 30% get the life-saving drugs, he said, but early detection and treatment would prevent transmission.

This, he said, should be complementary to the search for an Aids vaccine. An effective vaccine, he said, was still a long way away. Dr Williams, a leading figure in the field of HIV research, is based at the South African Centre for Epidemiological Modelling and Analysis in Stellenbosch.

http://snipr.com/uh976


Naps Clear Brain's Inbox, Improve Learning

from National Geographic News

If your brain is an email account, sleep--and more specifically, naps--is how you clear out your inbox. That's the conclusion of a new study that may explain why people spend so many of their sleeping hours in a pre-dreaming state known as stage 2 non-rapid eye movement, or REM, sleep.

For years sleep studies have hinted that shut-eye improves our ability to store and consolidate memories, reinforcing the notion that a good night's sleep--and power naps--is much more conducive to learning than an overnight cram session.

Now scientists may have figured out how, in part, this happens: During sleep, information locked in the short-term storage of the hippocampus--the part of the brain responsible for memories--migrates into the longer-term database of the cortex. This action not only helps the brain process new information, it also clears out space for the brain to take in new experiences.

http://snipr.com/uh97m


Brain at the Breaking Point

from Science News

SAN DIEGO -- Rigid pathways in brain cell connections buckle and break when stretched, scientists report, a finding that could aid in the understanding of exactly what happens when traumatic brain injuries occur.

Up to 20 percent of combat soldiers and an estimated 1.4 million U.S. civilians sustain traumatic brain injuries each year. But the mechanics behind these injuries have remained mysterious.

New research ... suggests exactly how a blow to the brain disrupts this complex organ. The brain "is not like the heart. If you lose a certain percentage of your heart muscle, then you'll have a certain cardiac output," says Geoffrey Manley, a neurologist at the University of California, San Francisco. Rather, the brain is an organ of connections. Car crashes, bomb blasts and falls can damage these intricate links, and even destroying a small number of them can cause devastating damage.

http://snipr.com/uh98b


Environmental Advocates Are Cooling on Obama

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- There has been no more reliable cheerleader for President Obama's energy and climate change policies than Daniel J. Weiss of the left-leaning Center for American Progress. But Mr. Obama's recent enthusiasm for nuclear power, including his budget proposal to triple federal loan guarantees for new nuclear reactors to $54 billion, was too much for Mr. Weiss.

The president's embrace of nuclear power was disappointing, and the wrong way to go about winning Republican votes, he said, adding that Mr. Obama should not be endorsing such a costly and potentially catastrophic energy alternative "as bait just to get talks started with pro-nuke senators."

The early optimism of environmental advocates that the policies of former President George W. Bush would be quickly swept away and replaced by a bright green future under Mr. Obama is for many environmentalists giving way to resignation, and in some cases, anger.

http://snipr.com/uh98p


NOAA's New Fisheries Director Faces Familiar Challenges

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Eric Schwaab, the new head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Marine Fisheries Service, will face skeptical fishermen, impatient environmentalists and a host of other cranky constituencies in the job he started Tuesday. It's familiar territory.

Schwaab has spent the bulk of his career at the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, where he began as a Natural Resources Police officer 27 years ago. He rose through the ranks to direct three of the department's branches--the Forest Service; the Forest, Wildlife and Heritage Service; and the Fisheries Service. Throughout, he dealt with warring factions on such contentious questions as how to manage the area's blue crab and striped bass fisheries.

In a telephone call with reporters Tuesday, Schwaab said he hopes to "promote management that builds sustainable fisheries and vibrant coastal communities. However, as you look around the country, there are significant challenges in that regard."

http://snipr.com/uh99m
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 04, 2010, 03:14:45 PM
February 25, 2010

For updates on Science in the News and American Scientist, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!
Bloom Energy Unveils 'Power Plant in a Box'

from the San Francisco Chronicle

Bloom Energy Corp., one of Silicon Valley's most secretive startups, unveiled on Wednesday its long-awaited "power plant in a box," a collection of fuel cells that the company says can provide clean electricity to homes, office buildings--even whole villages in the developing world.

The Bloom Energy Server, a smooth metal box the size of a pickup truck, can generate electricity from multiple fuels while producing relatively few greenhouse gas emissions. With government subsidies factored in, power from the server costs less than power from the grid.

Unlike other fuel cells, Bloom's is made mostly of sand, with no platinum or other precious metals thrown in as catalysts. And unlike solar panels and wind turbines, each server can produce the same amount of energy day and night for years on end, according to the company. The process is twice as efficient as burning natural gas.

http://snipr.com/uiedq


DNA's Dirty Little Secret

from Washington Monthly

... Over the past quarter century, DNA evidence has transformed criminal justice, freeing hundreds of innocent people and helping unravel countless crimes that might otherwise have gone unsolved.

It has also captivated the public imagination: the plots of popular TV crime shows often hinge on the power of DNA to crack impossible cases, which has helped to give this forensic tool an air of infallibility--a phenomenon known in criminal justice circles as "the CSI effect."

... But increasingly DNA is being used for a new purpose: to target the culprits in cold cases .... In these instances, where the DNA is often incomplete or degraded and there are few other clues to go on, the reliability of DNA evidence plummets--a fact that jurors weighing such cases are almost never told. As a result, DNA, a tool renowned for exonerating the innocent, may actually be putting a growing number of them behind bars.

http://snipr.com/uieem


LHC Restarts This Week--Half Power But Full of Potential

from National Geographic News

The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is slated to be reawakened Thursday, at the earliest, LHC directors say. The reboot comes after a run at the highest energies yet for any particle accelerator--or atom smasher--and a scheduled winter break.

The Large Hadron Collider will be run at only half power, because equipment upgrades are needed before full-power operation is advisable, LHC scientists decided. But the LHC should still be capable of some stunning discoveries, experts say--perhaps even the detection of extra dimensions or evidence of the Higgs boson, or "God particle."

Particle accelerators use electric fields to channel particles into extremely narrow, fast-moving beams. By colliding some of these beams, the physicists at the Large Hadron Collider hope to recreate the intense conditions just after the big bang and to solve other scientific riddles, such as the nature of dark matter, the invisible material that scientists think makes up most of the universe's mass.

http://snipr.com/uief0


Alternatives to BPA Containers Not Easy to Find

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Major U.S. foodmakers are quietly investigating how to rid their containers of Bisphenol A, a chemical under scrutiny by federal regulators concerned about links to a range of health problems, including reproductive disorders and cancer.

But they are discovering how complicated it is to remove the chemical, which is in the epoxy linings of nearly every metal can on supermarket shelves and leaches into foods such as soup, liquid baby formula and soda. It is a goal that is taking years to reach, costing millions and proving surprisingly elusive.

Randy Hartnell, whose company, Vital Choice, sells products aimed at health-conscious consumers, switched last year to can linings made without BPA. It was a costly move that he figured would resonate in the niche market that buys his canned wild salmon and low-mercury tuna.

http://snipr.com/uiefj


Target Cancer: A Roller Coaster Chase for a Cure

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

PHILADELPHIA -- His patient, a spunky Italian-American woman in her 60s, was waiting in an exam room down the hall for the answer: Was the experimental drug stopping her deadly skin cancer?

... Dozens of such "targeted" drugs are emerging from the laboratory, rooted in decades of research and backed by unprecedented investment by pharmaceutical companies, which stand to profit from drugs that prolong life even by weeks. But putting them to their truest test falls to a small band of doctors committed to running experimental drug trials for patients they have no other way to heal.

At a time when cancer still kills one in four Americans, it is a job that requires as much hubris as heart. To chronicle the trial of the drug known as PLX4032 is to ride a roller coaster of breakthroughs and setbacks at what many oncologists see as a watershed moment in understanding the genetic changes that cause cancer.

http://snipr.com/uiegu


Giant Shark Fossil Unearthed in Kansas

from BBC News Online

The fossilised remains of a gigantic 10m-long predatory shark have been unearthed in Kansas, US. Scientists dug up a gigantic jawbone, teeth and scales belonging to the shark which lived 89 million years ago. The bottom-dwelling predator had huge tooth plates, which it likely used to crush large shelled animals such as giant clams.

Palaeontologists already knew about the shark, but the new specimen suggests it was far bigger than previously thought. The scientists who made the discovery, published in the journal Cretaceous Research, last week also released details of other newly discovered giant plankton-eating fish that swam in prehistoric seas for more than 100 million years.

But this new fish, called Ptychodus mortoni, is both bigger and more fierce, having a taste for flesh rather than plankton. It may even have been the largest shellfish-eating animal ever to have roamed the Earth.

http://snipr.com/uieh5


Should Bone Marrow Donors Be Paid?

from USA Today

Should people be paid to donate bone marrow? About 20,000 bone marrow transplants are performed annually in the USA to treat blood disorders such as leukemia and anemia, and in up to 30% of cases, the donor is a relative, usually a sibling.

The remaining transplants use marrow from volunteer donors, who are strangers to the recipients. Worldwide, 14 million potential donors have signed up with bone marrow registries, including 8 million Americans.

Although millions have registered to donate bone marrow, a lawsuit filed in federal court in California argues that too many patients are dying for want of a match. To encourage more prospective donors to sign up, the plaintiffs propose compensating bone marrow donors, a violation of the National Organ Transplant Act, which bans buying donor organs, including bone marrow. Violating the law carries a penalty of up to five years in prison and a $50,000 fine.

http://snipr.com/uiehy


UN Weather Meeting Agrees to Refine Climate Data

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

GENEVA (Associated Press) -- World weather agencies have agreed to collect more precise temperature data to improve climate change science, officials said Wednesday, as U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged environment ministers to reject efforts by skeptics to derail a global climate deal.

Britain's Met Office proposed that climate scientists around the world undertake the "grand challenge" of measuring land surface temperatures as often as several times a day, and allow independent scrutiny of the data--a move that would go some way toward answering demands by skeptics for access to the raw figures used to predict climate change.

... The proposal was approved in principle by some 150 delegates meeting under the auspices of the World Meteorological Organization this week in Antalya, Turkey.

http://snipr.com/uieif


'Miracle' Second Baby for Ovarian Transplant Woman

from the Telegraph (UK)

A woman has hailed her 'miracle' after giving birth to her second child following an ovarian transplant in a world first. Mrs Stinne Holm Bergholdt, from Denmark, gave birth after fertility treatment in 2007 but then conceived again naturally the following year. She had gone through the menopause early at age 27 following treatment for cancer.

The breakthrough is important as it was not known how long ovarian transplants would continue to work and if women could have a family normally afterwards. The new procedure could allow women to put off the menopause indefinitely and conceive children 'naturally' much later in life.

Doctors said the ovarian tissue could remain viable in the freezer for 40 years with women coming back to 'top-up' their ovarian function periodically. The technique, which is still considered experimental, offers hope for women born without functioning ovaries or those who have normal fertility which may be destroyed through medical treatments for life threatening diseases.

http://snipr.com/uieip


Evidence That Little Touches Do Mean So Much

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Psychologists have long studied the grunts and winks of nonverbal communication, the vocal tones and facial expressions that carry emotion. A warm tone of voice, a hostile stare--both have the same meaning in Terre Haute or Timbuktu, and are among dozens of signals that form a universal human vocabulary.

But in recent years some researchers have begun to focus on a different, often more subtle kind of wordless communication: physical contact. Momentary touches, they say--whether an exuberant high five, a warm hand on the shoulder, or a creepy touch to the arm--can communicate an even wider range of emotion than gestures or expressions, and sometimes do so more quickly and accurately than words.

"It is the first language we learn," said Dacher Keltner, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of "Born to Be Good: The Science of a Meaningful Life" (Norton, 2009), and remains, he said, "our richest means of emotional expression" throughout life.

http://snipr.com/uieja
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 04, 2010, 03:16:44 PM
February 26, 2010

For updates on Science in the News and American Scientist, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!
Little Lizard Inspires a New Adhesive Tape

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Keep your eye on the shelves of your local hardware store, where in the next few years you may be able to find new tape from an unlikely source: the gecko.

"Geckos have millions of microscopic hairs on their toes, each with hundreds of tips that adhere to surfaces, with no residue left behind," said Kellar Autumn, a biology professor at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Ore. "Their hairs can stay attached indefinitely."

Mr. Autumn and scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, were responsible for the research that enabled Mark Cutkosky, a professor of mechanical engineering at Stanford, to develop a prototype for a tape based on gecko adhesion.

http://snipr.com/uizcq


Huge New Dinosaur Found Via Skulls

from National Geographic News

Four skulls of a giant new species of plant-eating dinosaur may give scientists a head start on understanding the biggest animals ever to have walked the Earth, a new study says.

The 105-million-year-old skulls of Abydosaurus mcintoshi were discovered between the late 1990s and 2003 in a sandstone quarry in eastern Utah's Dinosaur National Monument. Although the site is known as for fossil bonanzas, the newfound skulls are extremely rare, paleontologists say.

That's because the new species--part of a group of ancient four-legged lumberers called sauropods--had long necks capped with tiny, delicate heads, which disintegrated quickly after death.

http://snipr.com/uize4


Inflaming the Dangers of a Fat-Laden Meal

from Science News

In the heavyweight division, immune cells embedded in fat pack some extra disease-causing punches, a new study shows.

Those punches involve potentially dangerous proteins linked to inflammation, heart disease and diabetes. Something in the adipose tissue, or fat, of overweight people primes immune cells called macrophages nestled within the tissue to release the proteins when the cells sense high levels of fat in the bloodstream, researchers report in the Feb. 24 Science Translational Medicine.

The discovery may lead to treatments that could block disease formation in overweight or obese people. Blood levels of free fatty acids, such as triglycerides, rise after a high-fat meal and, in obese people, are often constantly elevated to levels two to three times higher than normal ...

http://snipr.com/uizf0


How Google's Algorithm Rules the Web

from Wired

Want to know how Google is about to change your life? Stop by the Ouagadougou conference room on a Thursday morning. It is here, at the Mountain View, California, headquarters of the world's most powerful Internet company, that a room filled with three dozen engineers, product managers, and executives figure out how to make their search engine even smarter.

This year, Google will introduce 550 or so improvements to its fabled algorithm, and each will be determined at a gathering just like this one. ... You might think that after a solid decade of search-market dominance, Google could relax.

After all, it holds a commanding 65 percent market share and is still the only company whose name is synonymous with the verb search. But just as Google isn't ready to rest on its laurels, its competitors aren't ready to concede defeat.

http://snipr.com/uizfg


Do Ocean-Bottom Bacteria Make Their Own Power Grids?

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Deep on the ocean floor, colonies of bacteria appear to have connected themselves via microscopic power grids that would be the envy of any small town. Much remains unknown about the process, but if confirmed the findings could revolutionize scientists' understanding of how the world's smallest ecosystems operate.

Oxygen-breathing bacteria that live on the ocean bottom have a problem. Those sitting atop the sediment have ready access to oxygen in the water but not to the precious mineral nutrients that lie out of reach a centimeter or so below the ground.

Meanwhile, those microbes that live in the sediment can access the nutrients, but they lack oxygen. How do both groups survive? Microbial ecologist Lars Peter Nielsen of Aarhus University in Denmark figured the surface and subsurface bacteria were somehow exchanging oxygen and nutrients with one another.

http://snipr.com/uizfx


Plastic Rubbish Blights Atlantic Ocean

from BBC News Online

Scientists have discovered an area of the North Atlantic Ocean where plastic debris accumulates. The region is said to compare with the well-documented "great Pacific garbage patch."

Kara Lavender Law of the Sea Education Association (SEA) told the BBC that the issue of plastics had been "largely ignored" in the Atlantic. She announced the findings of a two-decade-long study at the Ocean Sciences Meeting in Portland, US.

The work is the conclusion of the longest and most extensive record of plastic marine debris in any ocean basin. Scientists and students from the SEA collected plastic and marine debris in fine mesh nets that were towed behind a research vessel.

http://snipr.com/uizgg


FDA Creates Partnership to Boost Regulatory Science

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Washington - The Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health on Wednesday announced a plan to help the FDA make swifter decisions about the safety and effectiveness of new products and procedures that flow from advanced research.

The new partnership will promote the development of testing and other tools that FDA regulators need in order to assess drugs and other products coming from fields such as genomics, nanotechnology and stem cell therapy.

Officials from both agencies said laboratory science leading to treatments had vastly outdistanced regulatory science, which develops the methods to evaluate the safety and quality of those treatments.

http://snipr.com/uizhl


Experts: Lactose Intolerance Misunderstood

from USA Today

Many Americans avoid dairy products, an important source of calcium, vitamin D and other nutrients, because they mistakenly think they're lactose intolerant, a panel of experts concluded Wednesday at a National Institutes of Health conference.

Solid estimates of the prevalence of lactose intolerance are lacking, because medical studies have different interpretations of the condition, the experts write in their concluding statement, which is published at consensus.nih.gov.

"I think that there are huge gaps in knowledge," panel chairman Frederick Suchy, a pediatric liver specialist at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, said at a news briefing after the 2½-day conference in Bethesda, Md.

http://snipr.com/uizhq


Two Huge Icebergs Let Loose Off Antarctica's Coast

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

SYDNEY (Associated Press) -- An iceberg about the size of Luxembourg that struck a glacier off Antarctica and dislodged another massive block of ice could lower the levels of oxygen in the world's oceans, Australian and French scientists said Friday.

The two icebergs are now drifting together about 62 to 93 miles (100 to 150 kilometers) off Antarctica following the collision on Feb. 12 or 13, said Australian Antarctic Division glaciologist Neal Young.

... The new iceberg is 48 miles (78 kilometers) long and about 24 miles (39 kilometers) wide and holds roughly the equivalent of a fifth of the world's annual total water usage, Young told The Associated Press. Experts are concerned about the effect of the massive displacement of ice on the ice-free water next to the glacier, which is important for ocean currents.

http://snipr.com/uizi5


Younger People Suffering Strokes

from the San Antonio Express-News

Long considered an old person's disease, a new study finds younger people are suffering from strokes--a trend that's likely related to growing rates of diabetes in the young, a researcher says.

The study, which looked at patients from Ohio and Kentucky, also found fewer older people suffering strokes as the average age of stroke patients dropped by three years over about a decade.

And since stroke patients often suffer impairments that limit their ability to work, such a trend toward younger stroke patients could have big social and economic consequences, said Dr. Brett Kissela, lead author of the study and associate professor of neurology at the University of Cincinnati.

http://snipr.com/uizil
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 04, 2010, 03:17:42 PM
March 1, 2010

For updates on Science in the News and American Scientist, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!
Chile Quake in 'Elite Class' Like 2004 Asian Quake

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LOS ANGELES -- The huge earthquake that struck off the coast of Chile belongs to an "elite class" of mega earthquakes, experts said, and is similar to the 2004 Indian Ocean temblor that triggered deadly tsunami waves.

The magnitude-8.8 quake was a type called a "megathrust," considered the most powerful earthquake on the planet. Megathrusts occur when one tectonic plate dives beneath another. Saturday's tremor unleashed about 50 gigatons of energy and broke about 340 miles of the fault zone, according to the U.S. Geological Survey's National Earthquake Information Center.

The quake's epicenter was offshore and occurred about 140 miles north of the largest earthquake ever recorded--a magnitude-9.5 that killed about 1,600 people in Chile and scores of others in the Pacific in 1960.

http://snipr.com/ukwz4


Rulings Restrict Clean Water Act, Foiling E.P.A.

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Thousands of the nation's largest water polluters are outside the Clean Water Act's reach because the Supreme Court has left uncertain which waterways are protected by that law, according to interviews with regulators.

As a result, some businesses are declaring that the law no longer applies to them. And pollution rates are rising.

Companies that have spilled oil, carcinogens and dangerous bacteria into lakes, rivers and other waters are not being prosecuted, according to Environmental Protection Agency regulators working on those cases, who estimate that more than 1,500 major pollution investigations have been discontinued or shelved in the last four years.

http://snipr.com/ukx05


Playing Along With the Mozart Effect

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Five months after we are conceived, music begins to capture our attention and wire our brains for a lifetime of aural experience. At the other end of life, musical memories can be imprinted on the brain so indelibly that they can be retrieved, perfectly intact, from the depths of a mind ravaged by Alzheimer's disease.

In between, music can puncture stress, dissipate anger and comfort us in sadness.

As if all that weren't enough, for years parents have been seduced by even loftier promises from an industry hawking the recorded music of Mozart and other classical composers as a means to ensure brilliant babies.

http://snipr.com/ukx0t


Forum: How the Hidden Brain Controls Our Lives

from PRI's The World Science

We like to think of ourselves as conscious, rational beings. But human behavior is largely driven by unconscious attitudes. These attitudes reside in the deep recesses of the brain, and we ignore them at our own peril. So says Washington Post journalist Shankar Vedantam.

Vedantam is the author of a new book, The Hidden Brain: How Our Unconscious Minds Elect Presidents, Control Markets, Wage Wars, and Save Our Lives. Vedantam explores how the workings of the unconscious mind explain everything from genocide and injustice to the rise of suicide bombers.

The World's science reporter Rhitu Chatterjee spoke with Vedantam about the role of the hidden brain in our lives and actions.

http://snipr.com/ukx1k


Taking Root: The Spread of GM Crops

from the Economist

A decade ago, after European activists whipped up lots of negative coverage about the perils of toying with nature, the future of genetically modified (GM) crops seemed uncertain. The technology was adopted by farmers in the rich world outside Europe, but poor countries seemed likely to be left behind.

However, according to a report released on February 23rd by the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA), a non-profit outfit that monitors the use of GM crops, the sector is blossoming, especially in the developing world, where poor and unproductive farmers have the most to gain from such advances.

Despite the decline in food prices and the global economic downturn last year, the use of GM technology increased by about 7%, according to ISAAA. More than three-quarters of the soyabeans grown around the world are now genetically modified, as is roughly half the cotton and over a quarter of the maize (corn). Crucially, developing countries now account for nearly half of the world's 134m hectares of transgenic crops, with Brazil, Argentina, India and China in the vanguard. Of the 14m or so farmers now benefiting from the technology, perhaps 90% live in poor countries.

http://snipr.com/ukx1y


Sex Addiction Divides Mental Health Experts

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Tiger Woods, who recently admitted to multiple extramarital affairs, said he is receiving treatment. David Duchovny, who plays a sex-obsessed professor on the TV show "Californication," underwent rehab in 2008. Dr. Drew Pinsky has launched a reality series dealing with the subject.

Sex addiction talk seems to be everywhere. But mental health experts are split on what underlies such behavior.

The American Psychiatric Assn. has proposed that out-of-control sexual appetites be included as a diagnosis in the next edition of the psychiatrists' bible, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, to be published in 2013.

http://snipr.com/ukx2d


Ants Are First Animal Known to Navigate by Stereo Smell

from BBC News Online

Desert ants in Tunisia smell in stereo, sensing odours from two different directions at the same time. By sniffing the air with each antenna, the ants form a mental 'odour map' of their surroundings. They then use this map to find their way home, say scientists who report the discovery in the journal Animal Behaviour.

Pigeons, rats and even people may also smell in stereo, but ants are the first animal known to use it for navigation.

Dr Markus Knaden and colleagues Dr Kathrin Steck and Professor Bill Hansson of the Max-Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology in Jena, Germany investigated how the desert ant Cataglyphis fortis navigates around its surroundings.

http://snipr.com/ukx2s


Are Pesticides from Plants Dangerous to Humans?

from Scientific American

Chemicals derived from flowers may sound harmless, but new research raises concerns about compounds synthesized from chrysanthemums that are used in virtually every household pesticide.

For at least a decade, pyrethroids have been the insecticide of choice for consumers, replacing organophosphate pesticides, which are far more toxic to people and wildlife. But evidence is mounting that the switch to less-toxic pyrethroids has brought its own set of new ecological and human health risks.

About 70 percent of people in the United States have been exposed to pyrethroids, with children facing the highest exposure, according to a study published this month. Although the human health threats are unknown, animal studies have found evidence of damage to neurological, immune and reproductive systems.

http://snipr.com/ukx3b


Electric Avenue: Riding the Electromagnetic Wave of the Future

from Spiegel

Christian Förg devoted his student thesis to solving the distance problem in driving electric cars. At the same time he developed a whole new concept for freeways. The project, called "Speedway," earned him a top grade from his polytechnic university. But there's lots of work to be done.

... Förg wanted to remove the problem of [the distance an electric car can travel], but for him it was also important to let drivers of old-fashioned cars share the road with his new-fangled vehicles. "My approach will persuade drivers that (the future) is not about confrontation," he says.

"Speedway," as he calls the project, is simple. In city and local traffic, his cars will move under their own power, propelled by electric motors built for lower speeds. On one charge these vehicles could travel 200 kilometers--more than enough for a short trip. For longer trips Förg envisions a system of highways outfitted with so-called linear induction motors, where his electric cars can link up quietly with an electromagnetic field, cruise for long distances, then exit again under their own power.

http://snipr.com/ukx43


Study: Are Liberals Smarter Than Conservatives?

from Time

The notion that liberals are smarter than conservatives is familiar to anyone who has spent time on a college campus. The College Democrats are said to be ugly, smug and intellectual; the College Republicans, pretty, belligerent and dumb. There's enough truth in both stereotypes that the vast majority of college students opt not to join either club.

But are liberals actually smarter? A libertarian (and, as such, nonpartisan) researcher, Satoshi Kanazawa of the London School of Economics and Political Science, has just written a paper that is set to be published in March by the journal Social Psychology Quarterly. The paper investigates not only whether conservatives are dumber than liberals but also why that might be so.

The short answer: Kanazawa's paper shows that more-intelligent people are more likely to say they are liberal. They are also less likely to say they go to religious services. ... What's new in Kanazawa's paper is a provocative theory about why intelligence might correlate with liberalism. He argues that smarter people are more willing to espouse "evolutionarily novel" values--that is, values that did not exist in our ancestral environment, including weird ideas about, say, helping genetically unrelated strangers (liberalism, as Kanazawa defines it), which never would have occurred to us back when we had to hunt to feed our own clan and our only real technology was fire.

http://snipr.com/ukx50
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 04, 2010, 03:18:43 PM
Today's Headlines - March 2, 2010

For updates on Science in the News and American Scientist, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!
Chile Earthquake Tsunamis Smaller Than Expected--But Why?

from National Geographic News

The giant earthquake in Chile that struck Friday--one of the most powerful ever recorded--killed more than 700 people and leveled cities. Yet the tsunamis spawned by the earthquake were smaller than expected, leaving experts speculating as to why.

Tsunamis reached only 4 feet in Japan and 6.5 feet in the South Pacific island of Tonga, according to scientists. Tsunamis can often become monster waves of more than 100 feet. Furthermore, despite a massive evacuation of Hawaii, tsunamis in Hawaii measured only about three feet, too small to do any damage.

But this doesn't mean the tsunamis in Hawaii fizzled, said Costas Synolakis, director of the Tsunami Research Center at the University of Southern California. Rather, he said, the tsunamis were only slightly smaller than the 4-foot waves predicted by computer models. "The main story here, I think, is that the full evacuation of Hawaii was unnecessary," Syolakis told National Geographic News by email.

http://snipr.com/ulkhm


Studies Examine Electrocardiograms for Young Athletes

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Two studies published yesterday are expected to reignite an emotionally charged debate about whether young athletes should be screened with a heart test to reduce the small risk of sudden death from an undiagnosed heart problem.

In the first, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard University added an electrocardiogram, known as an ECG, to a routine physical for students. This strategy doubled the number of students with heart disease who were detected, compared with those who did not receive an ECG with their physical.

... In the second study, scientists at Stanford University School of Medicine concluded that adding an ECG to the traditional sports physical would tack on roughly $89 per athlete, a cost that is considered feasible compared with other routine medical interventions. Both studies were published in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

http://snipr.com/ulki1


Ice Deposits Found at Moon's Pole

from BBC News Online

A radar experiment aboard India's Chandrayaan-1 lunar spacecraft has identified thick deposits of water-ice near the Moon's north pole. The US space agency's (Nasa) Mini-Sar experiment found more than 40 small craters containing water-ice.

But other compounds--such as hydrocarbons--are mixed up in lunar ice, according to new results from another Moon mission called LCROSS. The findings were presented at a major planetary science conference in Texas.

The craters with ice range from 2km to 15km (one to nine miles) in diameter; how much there is depends on its thickness in each crater. But Nasa says the ice must be at least a couple of metres thick to give the signature seen by Chandrayaan-1.

http://snipr.com/ulkif


Stroke Study Puts Two Procedures on Equal Footing

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

For patients with a hardening of the neck arteries that can lead to a stroke, balloon angioplasty and stenting are virtually as effective and safe as the long-used gold standard of surgical removal of the plaque, according to the largest comparison of the two procedures ever conducted.

Results from the CREST trial on more than 2,500 patients in the United States and Canada, reported Friday at the International Stroke Conference in San Antonio, suggest that either procedure is a good way to limit the risks of having a stroke and that the choice between the two could be more a matter of patient preference than scientific certainty.

Stroke was "a bit more common" in patients who underwent stenting, and heart attacks were a bit more common in those who had surgery, said lead investigator Dr. Thomas G. Brott of the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Fla. "Unfortunately, there is not a lot of scientifically valid information that tells us which is more important to the patient."

http://snipr.com/ulkim


A Closer Look at Evolutionary Faces

from Smithsonian Magazine

To recreate the faces of our early ancestors, some of whom have been extinct for millions of years, sculptor John Gurche dissected the heads of modern humans and apes, mapping patterns of soft tissue and bone. He used this information to fill out the features of the fossils. Each sculpture starts with the cast of a fossilized skull; Gurche then adds layers of clay muscle, fat and skin.

Seven of his finished hominid busts will be featured at the National Museum of Natural History's David H. Koch Hall of Human Origins, which opens March 17. They are perhaps the best-researched renderings of their kind.

Gurche, a "paleo-artist," even molds the hominids' eyes out of acrylic plastic, eschewing pre-fabricated versions. "If you want the eyes to be the window to the soul," Gurche says, "you have to make them with some depth."

http://snipr.com/ulkj2


Scientists Observe Protein Folding in Living Cells

from Scientific American

Even in sleep, the human body is rarely still--and within it, there is the constant motion of the contents of our cells and the proteins within.

Until now, scientists have had to estimate the speed of complex but common actions such as protein folding (which turns an unorganized polypeptide strand into a complex and useful three-dimensional protein). They could watch the action unfold, so to speak, in a test tube but weren't sure how close the pace conformed to real life.

A group of researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, however, have developed a system to move the observation out of in vitro and into in vivo. "This is the first experiment that allows us to observe the dynamics of a protein folding in a live cell," Martin Gruebele, a chemist at Illinois and co-author of the study, said in a prepared statement. "Now we have the capability of looking at how fast biological processes occur as a function of time."

http://snipr.com/ulkjk


Depression's Upside

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... The mystery of depression is not that it exists--the mind, like the flesh, is prone to malfunction. Instead, the paradox of depression has long been its prevalence. While most mental illnesses are extremely rare ... depression is everywhere, as inescapable as the common cold.

... The persistence of this affliction--and the fact that it seemed to be heritable--posed a serious challenge to Darwin's evolutionary theory. If depression was a disorder, then evolution had made a tragic mistake, allowing an illness that impedes reproduction--it leads people to stop having sex and consider suicide--to spread throughout the population. For some unknown reason, the modern human mind is tilted toward sadness and, as we've now come to think, needs drugs to rescue itself.

The alternative, of course, is that depression has a secret purpose and our medical interventions are making a bad situation even worse. Like a fever that helps the immune system fight off infection ... depression might be an unpleasant yet adaptive response to affliction. Maybe Darwin was right. We suffer--we suffer terribly--but we don't suffer in vain.

http://snipr.com/ulkjs


Study: Herbicide Upsetting Some Animals' Hormone Systems

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

A new study shows that male frogs exposed to the herbicide atrazine--commonly found in U.S. rivers and streams--can make a startling developmental U-turn, turning female so completely that they can mate with other males and lay viable eggs.

The study will focus new attention on concerns about atrazine, which is applied to an estimated 75 percent of American cornfields. Its manufacturer, the Swiss agricultural giant Syngenta, says the product is safe for wildlife, and for the people who are exposed to small amounts of it in drinking water. In recent years, however, some studies have seemed to show that atrazine can drive natural hormone systems haywire in fish, birds, rats and frogs. In some cases, male animals exposed to the chemical developed female characteristics.

The study led by Tyrone Hayes, a professor at the University of California, was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. It showed an even starker transformation: Among a group of male African clawed frogs raised in water tainted with atrazine, he said, a fraction grew up to look and act like females.

http://snipr.com/ulkkh


How the Men Reacted as the Titanic and Lusitania Went Under

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Records from two nearly 100-year-old shipwrecks, the Titanic and the Lusitania, have given researchers new insight into human selfishness--and altruism.

On one boat, it seems, the men thought only of themselves; on the other, they were more likely to help women and children. This occurred for one key reason, researchers said: time. The Lusitania sank in about 18 minutes, while the Titanic took nearly three hours. Women and children fared much better on the Titanic.

"When you have to react very, very fast, human instincts are much faster than internalized social norms," said Benno Torgler, an economics professor at Queensland University of Technology in Brisbane, Australia, and one of the authors of the study, published in the current issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/ulkkv


Vaccine Advice Outweighs Autism Fear, Study Finds

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Chicago (Associated Press) -- One in 4 U.S. parents thinks some vaccines cause autism in healthy children, but even many of those worried about vaccine risks think their children should be vaccinated.

Most parents continue to follow the advice of their children's doctors, according to a study based on a survey of 1,552 parents. Extensive research has found no connection between autism and vaccines.

"Nine out of 10 parents believe that vaccination is a good way to prevent diseases for their children," said lead author Dr. Gary Freed of the University of Michigan. "Luckily, their concerns don't outweigh their decision to get vaccines so their children can be protected from life-threatening illnesses."

http://snipr.com/ulknd
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 04, 2010, 03:21:10 PM
March 3, 2010

For updates on Science in the News and American Scientist, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!
USA Pays Price for Food-Borne Illness: $152B a Year

from USA Today

Food-borne illnesses cost the United States $152 billion a year, a tab that works out to an average cost of $1,850 each time someone gets sick from food, a report by a former Food and Drug Administration economist says.

"A lot of people don't realize how expensive food-borne illnesses are," says Robert Scharff, a former FDA regulatory economist and now a professor of consumer science at Ohio State University. "It's important for the public to understand the size of this problem."

Scharff worked with government estimates that there are 76 million food-related illnesses a year, 325,000 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths. The costs include medical services, deaths, lost work and disability. They are based on data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the FDA.

http://snipr.com/um30n


Scientists Strive to Map the Shape-Shifting Net

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

SAN FRANCISCO -- In a dimly lit chamber festooned with wires and hidden in one of California's largest data centers, Tim Pozar is changing the shape of the Internet.

He is using what Internet engineers refer to as a "meet-me room." The room itself is enclosed in a building full of computers and routers. What Mr. Pozar does there is to informally wire together the networks of different businesses that want to freely share their Internet traffic.

The practice is known as peering, and it goes back to the earliest days of the Internet, when organizations would directly connect their networks instead of paying yet another company to route data traffic. Originally, the companies that owned the backbone of the Internet shared traffic. In recent years, however, the practice has increased to the point where some researchers who study the way global networks are put together believe that peering is changing the fundamental shape of the Internet ....

http://snipr.com/um33p


Chile Earthquake Altered Earth Axis, Shortened Day

from National Geographic News

Saturday's Chile earthquake was so powerful that it likely shifted an Earth axis and shortened the length of a day, NASA announced Monday.

By speeding up Earth's rotation, the magnitude 8.8 earthquake--the fifth strongest ever recorded, according to the USGS--should have shortened an Earth day by 1.26 millionths of a second, according to new computer-model calculations by geophysicist Richard Gross of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.

For comparison, the same model estimated that the magnitude 9 Sumatra earthquake in December 2004 shortened the length of a day by 6.8 millionths of a second. Gross also estimates that the Chile earthquake shifted Earth's figure axis by about three inches.

http://snipr.com/um34c


Early Polar Bear Discovered in Arctic Tundra

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Digging in the frozen tundra of Norway's Svalbard archipelago, scientists have uncovered the remains of the most ancient polar bear ever found. DNA analyses reveal that the bear--a mature male--lived about 120,000 years ago, at a time when wooly mammoths were also roaming the land. The work also shows that this bear represents something very rare in the fossil record: an evolutionary snapshot of one species turning into another.

"This is the most exciting new development in polar bear research in recent years," says biologist and polar bear expert Ian Stirling of the University of Alberta in Edmonton.

The discovery of the fossil is a major breakthrough. Polar bears, which can weigh nearly 700 kilograms, spend most of their lives in the open ocean above the Arctic Circle, hiding atop ice floes and waiting for an unfortunate seal to take a break from swimming. When they die, polar bears are either torn apart by their comrades for food or sink to the sea bottom, where marine animals and microbes quickly dispose of their remains.

http://snipr.com/um35q


Hydrothermal Vents Sometimes Colonized From Afar

from Science News

PORTLAND, Ore. -- Field studies at a hydrothermal vent system where all life was snuffed out by a massive undersea volcanic eruption reveal that these habitats can be repopulated in a matter of months by larvae from distant vents.

In late 2005 and early 2006, a swarm of earthquakes rocked a 15-kilometer-long portion of the East Pacific Rise, a deep submarine ridge south-southwest of Acapulco, Mexico. That portion of the rise, which in turn is part of a network of mid-ocean ridges that encircle the globe, hosts hydrothermal vent systems that many researchers have long studied.

When scientists returned to the area four months after the quakes, cameras sent to the seafloor revealed that a volcanic eruption had smothered spots as far as two kilometers from the ridge with lava. "All of the organisms in the region were eradicated," said Lauren Mullineaux, a biological oceanographer at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. That devastation provided a natural laboratory to see how long it would take for organisms to recolonize the vent systems....

http://snipr.com/um378


Woolly Mammoths Resurfacing in Siberia

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The beasts had long lain extinct and forgotten, embedded deep in the frozen turf, bodies swaddled in Earth's layers for thousands of years before Christ.

Now, the Russian permafrost is offering up the bones and tusks of the woolly mammoths that once lumbered over the tundra. They are shaped into picture frames, chess sets, pendants. They are gathered and piled, carved and whittled, bought and sold on the Internet.

The once-obscure scientists who specialize in the wastelands of Siberia have opened lucrative sidelines as bone hunters, spending the summer months trawling the northern river banks and working networks of locals to gather stockpiles of bones. They speak of their work proudly, and a little mystically.

http://snipr.com/um38x


Etched Ostrich Eggs Illustrate Human Sophistication

from BBC News Online

Inscribed ostrich shell fragments found in South Africa are among the earliest examples of the use of symbolism by modern humans, scientists say.

The etched shells from Diepkloof Rock Shelter in Western Cape have been dated to about 60,000 years ago. Details are reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The researchers, who have investigated the material since 1999, argue that the markings are almost certainly a form of messaging--of graphic communication. "The motif is two parallel lines, which we suppose were circular, but we do not have a complete refit of the eggs," explained Dr Pierre-Jean Texier from the University of Bordeaux, Talence, France.

http://snipr.com/um39f


He's Had Work: Preserving the Face of a Revolution

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

It's an old Soviet joke. Three Russians are in the gulag. The first one says, "What are you in for?" The second one replies, "I called Zbarsky a revolutionary." "That's funny," the first one says. "I called Zbarsky a counterrevolutionary." "That's funny," the third one says. "I'm Zbarsky."

Vern Thiessen's new play, "Lenin's Embalmers," which starts on Wednesday at the Ensemble Studio Theater in Clinton, opens with the ghost of Lenin telling this joke as a parable of the mordant doom pervading the Communist state he created.

In real life the joke wasn't specifically about Zbarsky. You could insert any of Stalin's thousands of lackeys turned victims. Certainly Zbarsky would do. Boris Zbarsky was a real person, one of the two biochemists who, after Lenin died in 1924, were ordered by the Kremlin to devise a way of preserving his body forever.

http://snipr.com/um3aq


Fossil of Dinosaur-Eating Snake Found

from the Guardian (UK)

Even dinosaurs may have been afraid of snakes, a discovery suggests. Scientists have unearthed the almost complete fossil skeleton of a prehistoric snake that preyed on baby dinosaurs. The creature, which was three metres long, was "caught in the act" of pursuing a meal 67m years ago.

Its body was found in a dinosaur nest coiled around a hatched and crushed egg, and next to it was a 50cm fossil hatchling titanosaur--a small version of a plant-eating giant that as an adult weighed up to 100 tonnes. The remains of two other snakes were also found paired with eggs at the same site in Gujarat, western India.

The snake, named Sanajeh indicus, lacked the wide-open jaws of modern snakes such as pythons and boa constrictors and would not have been able to swallow a whole dinosaur egg. But baby dinosaurs would have been just the right size, according to researchers.

http://snipr.com/um3cs


Fat Rats Skew Research Results

from Nature News

Failure to recognize that many laboratory animals live unhealthy lives may be leading researchers to misinterpret their findings, potentially misdirecting efforts to develop theraputic drugs.

The problem, reports a group at the US National Institute on Aging in Bethesda, Maryland, is that many rats and mice used in experiments are so overweight that they are glucose intolerant and heading for an early death. As a result, data from the animals--about, for example, the effects of an anti-cancer drug--may not apply to normal-weight animals.

"The vast majority of investigators who use rats and mice don't recognize that their normal conditions are relatively unhealthy," says Mark Mattson, chief of the National Institute on Aging's Laboratory of Neurosciences and a co-author on the paper. "The most logical way to extrapolate is to say any data we obtain in the animal model would be more relevant to overweight, sedentary humans than normal-weight, active individuals."

http://snipr.com/um3ee
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on March 17, 2010, 11:44:34 AM
An amphipod was video recorded 600 feet down in an Antarctic ice bore hole, 12.5 miles from open water, by NASA scientists.

http://dailypostal.com/2010/03/16/lyssianasid-amphipod-nasa-video-shrimp-under-antarctic-ice/

Sympagic environments are rather cool. By sympagic, I mean ecological regions which are mostly solid ice, usually associated with the polar ice caps and what Russians call the polynya, the region of open water between ice caps and sea ice. The organisms in these regions must be specifically adapted so that their proteins and cell membranes function at such low temperatures and all have some form of antifreeze. Most are planktonic feeders, or algal scrapers on the underside of the ice.

Discovery of an amphipod that far from the polynya indicates there may be a whole ecosystem underneath the ice, yet undiscovered.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on March 30, 2010, 11:57:19 PM
Who needs nanobots when you can control a swarm of bacteria to do your bidding? I for one welcome our new nano-Illuminati Overlords.

http://technoccult.net/archives/2010/03/29/computer-controlled-swarm-of-bacteria-builds-tiny-pyramid/

(http://technoccult.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/bacteria-build-pyramid.png)

    Researchers at the NanoRobotics Laboratory of the École Polytechnique de Montréal, in Canada, are putting swarms of bacteria to work, using them to perform micro-manipulations and even propel microrobots.

    Led by Professor Sylvain Martel, the researchers want to use flagellated bacteria to carry drugs into tumors, act as sensing agents for detecting pathogens, and operate micro-factories that could perform pharmacological and genetic tests.

    They also want to use the bacteria as micro-workers for building things. Things like a tiny step pyramid. [...]

    The bacteria, of a type known as magnetotactic, contain structures called magnetosomes, which function as a compass. In the presence of a magnetic field, the magnetosomes induce a torque on the bacteria, making them swim according to the direction of the field. Place a magnetic field pointing right and the bacteria will move right. Switch the field to point left and the bacteria will follow suit.

http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/medical-robots/032510-swarm-of-bacteria-builds-tiny-pyramid
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 02, 2010, 02:19:48 PM
April 1, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Obama to Open Offshore Areas to Oil Drilling

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration is proposing to open vast expanses of water along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling, much of it for the first time, officials said Tuesday.

The proposal--a compromise that will please oil companies and domestic drilling advocates but anger some residents of affected states and many environmental organizations--would end a longstanding moratorium on oil exploration along the East Coast from the northern tip of Delaware to the central coast of Florida, covering 167 million acres of ocean.

Under the plan, the coastline from New Jersey northward would remain closed to all oil and gas activity. So would the Pacific Coast, from Mexico to the Canadian border.

http://snipr.com/v70vn - Drill baby, DRILL!

Drought and Flooding Led to Collapse of Angkor

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

A prolonged drought punctuated by intense monsoons that partially destroyed the city's water-preservation infrastructure led to the 15th century collapse of the ancient city of Angkor, capital of the Khmer Empire, U.S. and Asian researchers reported.

Researchers had suspected that water scarcity played a role in the city's demise, and the first tree-ring chronology in Asia provides strong support for that speculation. It shows that the drought persisted for decades, which would have severely strained the city's ability to survive.

Monsoons then inundated Angkor's extensive canal system with mud and other debris--which other researchers had previously discovered--impairing its ability to provide adequate water for the nearly 1 million residents sprawled over an area similar to that of modern-day Los Angeles, the team reported this week in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/v70vs - Sounds like the story of the Anasazi

To Scientists, Laughter Is No Joke

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- So a scientist walks into a shopping mall to watch people laugh. There's no punchline. Laughter is a serious scientific subject, one that researchers are still trying to figure out.

Laughing is primal, our first way of communicating. Apes laugh. So do dogs and rats. Babies laugh long before they speak. No one teaches you how to laugh. You just do. And often you laugh involuntarily, in a specific rhythm and in certain spots in conversation.

You may laugh at a prank on April Fools' Day. But surprisingly, only 10 to 15 percent of laughter is the result of someone making a joke, said Baltimore neuroscientist Robert Provine, who has studied laughter for decades. Laughter is mostly about social responses rather than reaction to a joke. "Laughter above all else is a social thing," Provine said. "The requirement for laughter is another person."

http://snipr.com/v70vz - This is cool, read it.

FDA Pressured to Combat Rising 'Food Fraud'

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The expensive "sheep's milk" cheese in a Manhattan market was really made from cow's milk. And a jar of "Sturgeon caviar" was, in fact, Mississippi paddlefish. Some honey makers dilute their honey with sugar beets or corn syrup, their competitors say, but still market it as 100 percent pure at a premium price.

And last year, a Fairfax man was convicted of selling 10 million pounds of cheap, frozen catfish fillets from Vietnam as much more expensive grouper, red snapper and flounder. The fish was bought by national chain retailers, wholesalers and food service companies, and ended up on dinner plates across the country.

"Food fraud" has been documented in fruit juice, olive oil, spices, vinegar, wine, spirits and maple syrup, and appears to pose a significant problem in the seafood industry. Victims range from the shopper at the local supermarket to multimillion companies, including E&J Gallo and Heinz USA. Such deception has been happening since Roman times, but it is getting new attention as more products are imported and a tight economy heightens competition. And the U.S. food industry says federal regulators are not doing enough to combat it.

http://snipr.com/v70w8 - But COI mitocondrial DNA can be used to detect food fraud now, the tequila bottle and fish market experiment of late show this pretty clearly.

Study: Chocolate May Reduce Heart Risk

from USA Today

LONDON (Associated Press) -- The Easter Bunny might lower your chances of having a heart problem. According to a new study, small doses of chocolate every day could decrease your risk of having a heart attack or stroke by nearly 40%. German researchers followed nearly 20,000 people over eight years, sending them several questionnaires about their diet and exercise habits.

They found people who had an average of six grams of chocolate per day--or about one square of a chocolate bar--had a 39% lower risk of either a heart attack or stroke. The study is scheduled to be published Wednesday in the European Heart Journal.

Previous studies have suggested dark chocolate in small amounts could be good for you, but this is the first study to track its effects over such a long period of time. Experts think the flavonols contained in chocolate are responsible.

http://snipr.com/v70wg - I hope that these food stories go die a slow and painful death. Maybe it's because these people are overall healthier in general?

Bulging Mutant Trout Created

from National Geographic News

Scientists have created hundreds of mutant fish with "six-pack abs" and bulging "shoulders" by beefing them up with new genes. While the fish aren't going to win any beauty contests, the genetically engineered rainbow trout could hold some appeal at market, because they each provide 15 to 20 percent more flesh than standard trout, researchers say.

Developed with fish farming in mind, the genetically modified trout is the result of ten years of experimentation by a team led by Terry Bradley of the University of Rhode Island's Department of Fisheries, Animal, and Veterinary Sciences.

The team injected 20,000 rainbow trout eggs with different types of DNA from other species, making them transgenic. The added DNA was intended to suppress a protein called myostatin, and it apparently worked in about 300 of the eggs, turning them into the muscle-bound superfish.

http://snipr.com/v70wp - Ugh. Sounds like those muscle cows.

Gene Flaw Found in Induced Stem Cells

from Nature News

Stem-cell researchers have puzzled over why reprogrammed cells taken from adult tissues are often slower to divide and much less robust than their embryo-derived counterparts.

Now, a team has discovered the key genetic difference between embryonic and adult-derived stem cells in mice. If confirmed in humans, the finding could help clinicians to select only the heartiest stem cells for therapeutic applications and disease modelling.

Induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells are created by reprogramming adult cells, and outwardly seem indistinguishable from embryonic stem (ES) cells. Both cell types are pluripotent--they can form any tissue in the body. Yet subtle distinctions abound.

http://snipr.com/v70xf

The Bigger Menace: Asteroid Impact or Climate Change?

from Scientific American

If you ask the average person whether in the long run it is climate change or an asteroid/comet impact that's expected to kill more people annually, you'll undoubtedly get some confused replies. Those asteroid movies are scary, but there are no verified instances of an asteroid strike killing any humans, are there? Meanwhile, the science of climate change is currently being overshadowed by a media-driven public debate, mainly in the U.S.

In fact, the expected annual fatality rate due to climate change is estimated to be far higher than that due to an asteroid or comet impact--150,000 versus 91, per the World Health Organization (WHO) and Alan Harris of the Space Science Institute, respectively.

You won't, however, see that 150,000 figure in the main body of the Washington, D.C.-based National Research Council report on near-Earth object (NEO) surveys and mitigation strategies. (The report was written by a total of 42 scientists.)

http://snipr.com/v70y9 - And yet another article about catastrophe.

First Songbird Genome Arrives With Spring

from Science News

Zebra finches have something to tweet about. The little songbirds' genetic instruction book has just been deciphered.

An international team of scientists announced the accomplishment in the April 1 Nature. Zebra finches are the first songbirds and the second bird, after the chicken, with a completely decoded genetic blueprint. Contained within the finch's DNA could be clues to how songbirds learn vocal information and use songs in social situations, a model for human language and communication.

Whales, dolphins, some bats and several other species of birds also learn vocally, but the mouse-sized zebra finch has become a model system for studying the process in the laboratory. Male zebra finches memorize their fathers' songs and practice singing the song for a month or two. Once learned, a male's song is his signature. Unlike other songbirds that can change their songs, he sings his for life.

http://snipr.com/v70ys - Now that 3rd generation sequencing technology has cut the time for genome sequencing and the cost significantly, we'll be seeing a lot more of this sort of thing. However, it's important to remember that this sort of sequence doesn't work on all the DNA, only the portions that are open to copying, it doesn't tell us where and when genes are expressed and it doesn't tell us the interactions between genes. Thats why there are things like transcriptomics, interactomics, proteomics, etc.

Climate Science Must Be More Open, Say MPs

from BBC News Online

MPs investigating the climate change row at the UK's University of East Anglia (UEA) have demanded greater transparency from climate scientists. The Commons Science and Technology Committee criticised UEA authorities for failing to respond to requests for data from climate change sceptics.

But it found no evidence Professor Phil Jones, whose e-mails were hacked and published online, had manipulated data. It said his reputation, and that of his climate research unit, remained intact. The e-mails were hacked from the university's computer network and were published on the internet just before the Copenhagen climate conference in December 2009.

Climate sceptics claimed that the e-mails provided evidence that scientists at the university's Climatic Research Unit (CRU) were hiding data and falsifying scientific evidence on global warming. The committee said much of the data that critics claimed Prof Jones had hidden, was in fact already publicly available. But they said Prof Jones had aroused understandable suspicion by blocking requests for data.

http://snipr.com/v70z9 - We're all fucked, lets just go with that. Works regardless.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Shibboleet The Annihilator on April 02, 2010, 03:30:19 PM
Awesome thread is awesome.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on April 02, 2010, 06:02:25 PM
Quote"The requirement for laughter is another person."

This worries me.  I probably laugh at least half as much when I'm alone.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 06, 2010, 06:56:14 PM
April 2, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Happy 20th, Hubble

from Science News

When NASA announced in 2004 that it was canceling a final mission to repair the then-ailing Hubble Space Telescope--effectively a death sentence--the agency received a letter from a 9-year-old girl who wanted to donate her lunch money to save Hubble. That letter, among countless others, exemplifies the public's love affair with the observatory, which turns 20 years old this month.

Since its launch on April 24, 1990, Hubble has repeatedly risen from the ashes to produce pictures of unparalleled clarity and beauty. The observatory has recorded nearly a million images and spectra in about 110,000 trips around the Earth.

Among its cosmic postcards--some of the best in the pages to follow--Hubble has caught bruises left on Jupiter by fragments of a comet, elderly stars gift-wrapped in shells of glowing gas, the slender arms of spiral galaxies and nebulae ablaze with the light of newborn stars.

http://snipr.com/v7r8g


Human Genome at 10

from National Geographic News

In June 2000 scientists joined U.S. President Bill Clinton at the White House to unveil the Human Genome Project's "working draft" of the human genome--the full set of DNA that makes us human.

As the tenth anniversary of that achievement approaches, scientists weigh in on the scientific discoveries the Human Genome Project enabled, as well as some hopes and predictions for future advances that could be made using the project's data.

National Geographic looks at five breakthroughs powered by the Human Genome Project and five predictions for the next 10 years.

http://snipr.com/v7r8k


On the Hunt of What Makes All of Us Recoil

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

The pungent sting of wasabi, the searing pain of tear gas, and the watery eyes we get from chopping an onion are all triggered by an ancient chemical sensor that is found in everything from humans to mollusks and may hold the key to developing new kinds of insect repellents and pain medications.

Research by Brandeis University scientists finds that the ability to detect noxious compounds comes from a biological pathway older than our sense of smell, emerging far in the evolutionary past, about half a billion years ago.

"This chemical sense, as far as we can tell, appears to have been essentially unchanged," said Paul Garrity, a biology professor at Brandeis and senior author of a paper published in the journal Nature this month. The sensor's ubiquity and stability suggested it does something essential for the survival of animals, but what?

http://snipr.com/v7r8s


Next Big Thing in English: Knowing They Know That You Know

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

... This layered process of figuring out what someone else is thinking--of mind reading--is both a common literary device and an essential survival skill. Why human beings are equipped with this capacity and what particular brain functions enable them to do it are questions that have occupied primarily cognitive psychologists.

Now English professors and graduate students are asking them too. They say they're convinced science not only offers unexpected insights into individual texts, but that it may help to answer fundamental questions about literature's very existence: Why do we read fiction? Why do we care so passionately about nonexistent characters? What underlying mental processes are activated when we read?

... Jonathan Gottschall, who has written extensively about using evolutionary theory to explain fiction, said "it's a new moment of hope" in an era when everyone is talking about "the death of the humanities." To Mr. Gottschall a scientific approach can rescue literature departments from the malaise that has embraced them over the last decade and a half. ... Since then a new generation of scholars have been casting about for The Next Big Thing. ... The brain may be it.

http://snipr.com/v7r8w


Prostate Drug May Work as a Preventive

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Men at an above-normal risk of prostate cancer may be able to reduce their risk of developing the disease by taking a drug already on the market.

In research reported Wednesday, the drug dutasteride, currently used to shrink enlarged prostates, was found to reduce the risk of prostate cancer by about a quarter in high-risk men. The medication, sold under the brand name Avodart, apparently caused small tumors to stop growing or even to shrink, researchers reported in the New England Journal of Medicine.

A previous study found that a similar drug, finasteride, could also lower the risk of prostate tumors, but the new research--conducted at 250 sites in 42 countries--suggests that dutasteride is slightly more effective.

http://snipr.com/v7r8y


White House Mandates New Fuel Efficiency Standards

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Obama administration finalized the first national rules curbing greenhouse gas emissions Thursday, mandating that the U.S. car and light-truck fleet reach an average fuel efficiency of 35.5 miles per gallon by 2016.

The new fuel efficiency standards ... represent a peaceful end to a contentious legal battle over how to regulate tailpipe emissions. At a time when it remains unclear whether Congress can pass climate legislation this year, the new rules also mark the White House's most significant achievement yet in addressing global warming.

In a speech Wednesday, President Obama said the standards "will reduce our dependence on oil while helping folks spend a little less at the pump." He estimated that tougher Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) requirements will save 1.8 billion barrels of oil over the life of vehicles sold under the program covering the 2012-16 model years. He said this would be the equivalent of taking 58 million cars off the road for a year. Environmentalists hailed the move, saying it will transform the American auto market in the years to come.

http://snipr.com/v7r93


Industry Wary of New Rules on Fishing

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

The federal government finalized the most fundamental changes in New England fishing rules in more than a generation Wednesday, over the strenuous objections of many fishermen who say they will be put out of business.

The new rules, which take effect May 1, come after years of effort by the federal government and environmental groups to stop overfishing of the region's fabled cod, flounder, and other bottom-dwelling species that once were said to be so plentiful that colonists caught them simply by lowering baskets into the sea.

The rules encourage boat owners to organize into groups that will be allocated a share of the annual quota for each species, and already fishermen who account for the vast majority of the catch in New England have voluntarily formed groups, called sectors. The system is designed to give fishermen more financial incentive to be good stewards of the sea and more flexibility in deciding who fishes and when, such as allowing fishermen to avoid bad weather.

http://snipr.com/v7r9f


Science Writer Simon Singh Wins Libel Appeal

from BBC News Online

A science writer has won the right to rely on the defence of fair comment in a libel action, in a landmark ruling at the Court of Appeal. Simon Singh was accused of libel by the British Chiropractic Association over an article in the Guardian in 2008.

Dr Singh questioned the claims of some chiropractors over the treatment of certain childhood conditions. The High Court had said the words were fact not opinion--meaning Dr Singh could not use the fair comment defence.

However, the Lord Chief Justice Lord Judge, Master of the Rolls Lord Neuberger and Lord Justice Sedley ruled High Court judge Mr Justice Eady had "erred in his approach" last May, and allowed Dr Singh's appeal. BBC News science correspondent Pallab Ghosh says that, had Justice Eady's ruling stood, it would have made it difficult for any scientist or science journalist to question claims made by companies or organisations without opening themselves up to a libel action that would be hard to win.

http://snipr.com/v7r9m


Advance Directives for End-of-Life Care Work

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

Advance directives work. That's the conclusion of one of the largest studies on the effectiveness of documents specifying what medical treatments are desired, or not desired, at the end of life. Further, Americans are increasingly making use of the tool.

In a study of 3,746 deaths, researchers found that 42.5% of patients had faced treatment decisions near the end of their lives but that more than 70% of those people had lacked the ability to make choices because of their mental or physical health. Among that group, however, the majority--67.6%--had advance directives.

Moreover, the instructions left in the advance directives were almost always carried out by surrogate decision-makers. The will of the patient, said the lead author of the study, prevailed.

http://snipr.com/v7r9u


Study Suggests Toads Can Detect Coming Earthquakes

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

LONDON (Associated Press) -- When it comes to predicting earthquakes, toads--warts and all--may be an asset. British researchers said Wednesday that they observed a mass exodus of toads from a breeding site in Italy five days before a major tremor struck, suggesting the amphibians may be able to sense environmental changes, imperceptible to humans, that foretell a coming quake.

Since ancient times, anecdotes and folklore have linked unusual animal behavior to cataclysmic events like earthquakes, but hard evidence has been scarce. A new study by researchers from the Open University is one of the first to document animal behavior before, during and after an earthquake.

The scientists were studying the common toad--bufo bufo--at a breeding colony in central Italy when they noticed a sharp decline in the number of animals at the site. Days later, a 6.3-magnitude earthquake hit, killing hundreds of people and badly damaging the town of L'Aquila.

http://snipr.com/v7ra0
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 06, 2010, 06:57:24 PM
March 31, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


US Judge Strikes Down Patent on Cancer Genes

from the Miami Herald (Registration Required)

NEW YORK (Associated Press) -- In a ruling with potentially far-reaching implications for the patenting of human genes, a judge on Monday struck down a company's patents on two genes linked to an increased risk of breast and ovarian cancer.

The decision by U.S. District Judge Robert Sweet challenging whether anyone can hold patents on human genes was expected to have broad implications for the biotechnology industry and genetics-based medical research.

Sweet said he invalidated the patents because DNA's existence in an isolated form does not alter the fundamental quality of DNA as it exists in the body nor the information it encodes. He rejected arguments that it was acceptable to grant patents on DNA sequences as long as they are claimed in the form of "isolated DNA."

http://snipr.com/v6ce8


Heading Off the Next Financial Crisis

from the New York Times Magazine (Registration Required)

...To reduce the odds of a future crisis, the Obama plan would take three basic steps. First, regulators would receive more authority to monitor everything from mortgages to complex securities. This is meant to keep future financial time bombs, like the no-documentation loans and collateralized debt obligations of the past decade, from becoming rife.

Second--and most important--financial firms would be forced to reduce the debt they take on and to hold more capital in reserve. This is the equivalent of requiring home buyers to make larger down payments: more capital will give firms a bigger cushion when investments start to go bad.

Finally, if that cushion proves insufficient, the government would be allowed to seize a collapsing financial firm, much as it can already do with a traditional bank. Regulators would then keep the firm operating long enough to prevent a panic and slowly sell off its pieces.

http://snipr.com/v6bkm


How to Classify a Million Galaxies in Three Weeks

from Time

... Among the most ambitious and successful online "citizen science" projects to date, Galaxy Zoo asks its participants to help classify galaxies by studying images of them online and answering a standard set of questions about their features. For instance: Is the galaxy smooth or bulging? Is it elliptical or spiral? If it's spiral, how many arms does it have, and are they tightly wound or thrown open wide?

Galaxy Zoo was first launched in 2007 by astronomers and astrophysicists from the U.S. and U.K. The goal was to get the public to identify the shapes of 1 million galaxies in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), which were photographed between 2000 and 2008 by a telescope at the Apache Point Observatory in New Mexico.

Because every feature of each galaxy had to be categorized by at least 20 people--having multiple classifications of the same object is important because it helps scientists assess how reliable each one is--astronomers estimated it would take three to five years to categorize all million galaxies. It took three weeks.

http://snipr.com/v6bkw


Folk Medicine Poses Global Threat to Primates

from BBC News Online

Traditional folk medicine poses a significant and ongoing threat to the future of primates around the world. According to a major scientific survey at least 101 primate species are still used in traditional folk practices and in magic or religious rituals.

For example, spider monkeys are eaten to treat rheumatism, while gorilla parts are given to pregnant women. Such practises are accelerating the declines of many already vulnerable species, say the survey's authors.

Details of the survey are published in Mammal Review, the journal of the UK Mammal Society. Of 390 species studied, 101, or more than a quarter, are regularly killed for their body parts, with 47 species being used for their supposed medicinal properties, 34 for use in magical or religious practices, and 20 for both purposes.

http://snipr.com/v6bl7


Amphibious Caterpillars Discovered in Hawaii

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Moths of the Hawaiian genus Hyposmocoma are an oddball crowd: One of the species' caterpillars attacks and eats tree snails. Now researchers have described at least a dozen different species that live underwater for several weeks at a time.

"I couldn't believe it," said study coauthor Daniel Rubinoff, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Hawaii at Honolulu, of the first time he spotted a submerged caterpillar. "I assumed initially they were terrestrial caterpillars . . . how were they holding their breath?"

Each of the 12 species lives in and along streams running down the mountains on several different islands of Hawaii, said Rubinoff, who has studied Hyposmocoma, a group of more than 350 moth species, for more than seven years. They usually eat algae or lichen, and build silk cases -- which one species even adorns with bird feathers -- for shelter and camouflage. They spin silk drag lines to withstand the high pressure of fast floodwaters.

http://snipr.com/v6cfv


Whooping Cranes Tracked With GPS to Study Their Habits

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

WOOD RIVER, NEB. -- Each dawn and dusk, numberless birds stopping here to feed on their migration north take to the air. Against the steel-colored sky they look like iron filings wheeling and milling to an invisible magnet.

Most are sandhill cranes, whose beauty and marionette-like dance draw bird-watchers from across the country each spring. Some are snow geese, dabbing the dun fields with their white bodies. Teal, pintail, mallard--and dozens of other species of waterfowl--pass through in thousands. On the avian interstate known as the Central Flyway, Nebraska straddles the middle lane.

Somewhere among the flocks over the next few weeks will be a small number of whooping cranes. Huge white birds with red crowns and black legs, they will be flying in twos and threes, with rarely more than a dozen congregating on the brief sojourn here en route from Texas to Alberta. At five feet, they are the tallest birds in North America and also among the rarest.

http://snipr.com/v6blj


Among Weathercasters, Doubt on Warming

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The debate over global warming has created predictable adversaries, pitting environmentalists against industry and coal-state Democrats against coastal liberals. But it has also created tensions between two groups that might be expected to agree on the issue: climate scientists and meteorologists, especially those who serve as television weather forecasters.

Climatologists, who study weather patterns over time, almost universally endorse the view that the earth is warming and that humans have contributed to climate change. There is less of a consensus among meteorologists, who predict short-term weather patterns.

Joe Bastardi, for example, a senior forecaster and meteorologist with AccuWeather, maintains that it is more likely that the planet is cooling, and he distrusts the data put forward by climate scientists as evidence for rising global temperatures.

http://snipr.com/v6bm1


Lead "Burrito" Sarcophagus Found Near Rome

from National Geographic News

A 1,700-year-old sarcophagus found in an abandoned city near Rome could contain the body of a gladiator or a Christian dignitary, say archaeologists who are preparing to examine the coffin in the lab.

Found in a cement-capped pit in the ancient metropolis of Gabii, the coffin is unusual because it's made of lead--only a few hundred such Roman burials are known.

Even odder, the 800 pounds (362 kilograms) of lead fold over the corpse like a burrito, said Roman archaeologist Jeffrey Becker. Most lead sarcophagi look like "old-fashioned cracker boxes," molded into a rectangular shape with a lid, he said. The coffin, which has been in storage since last year, is about to be moved to the American Academy in Rome for further testing.

http://snipr.com/v6bm4


Bar Codes Could Be Next to Check Out

from Science News

Lines at the grocery store might become as obsolete as milkmen, if a new tag that seeks to replace bar codes becomes commonplace.

Researchers from Sunchon National University in Suncheon, South Korea, and Rice University in Houston have built a radio frequency identification tag that can be printed directly onto cereal boxes and potato chip bags. The tag uses ink laced with carbon nanotubes to print electronics on paper or plastic that could instantly transmit information about a cart full of groceries.

"You could run your cart by a detector and it tells you instantly what's in the cart," says James M. Tour of Rice University, whose research group invented the ink. "No more lines, you just walk out with your stuff."

http://snipr.com/v6bmf


Agile 'Roadrunner' Dinosaur Discovered in China

from BBC News Online

One the most agile dinosaurs so far discovered has been unearthed in China. The tiny dinosaur, dubbed a "roadrunner" by the scientists who found it, is also one of the smallest dinosaurs known.

Measuring just half a metre long, the fleet-footed theropod named Xixianykus zhangi was likely to have used a huge claw to dig for termites and ants. It then used its speed to efficiently move between ant mounds and avoid the attentions of larger predators. Details of the discovery are published in the journal Zootaxa.

"The limb proportions of Xixianykus are among the most extreme ever recorded for a theropod dinosaur," says Dr Corwin Sullivan, a Canadian palaeontologist based at the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing and one of the authors of the study.

http://snipr.com/v6bmt
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 06, 2010, 06:58:44 PM
April 5, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Obama Oil Drilling Plan Draws Critics

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- President Obama's proposal to open vast expanses of American coastlines to oil and natural gas drilling drew criticism from both sides in the drilling debate. The plan ... would end a longstanding moratorium on exploration from the northern tip of Delaware to the central coast of Florida, covering 167 million acres of ocean.

"Drilling our coasts will do nothing to lower gas prices or create energy independence," Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club, said in a statement. "It will only jeopardize beaches, marine life, and coastal tourist economies, all so the oil industry can make a short-term profit."

On the other hand, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell called Mr. Obama's proposal "a step in the right direction, but a small one that leaves enormous amounts of American energy off limits."

http://snipr.com/v9tyl


Environmental Regulations to Curtail Mountaintop Mining

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The Obama administration on Thursday imposed strict new environmental guidelines that are expected to sharply curtail "mountaintop" coal mining, a controversial practice that has enriched Appalachia's economy while rearranging its topography.

The announcement by the Environmental Protection Agency ended months of bureaucratic limbo on the issue. It was hailed by environmentalists but condemned by coal industry officials, who said it would render a technique that generates about 10 percent of U.S. coal largely impractical.

At "mountaintop removal" mines, which are unique to Appalachian states, miners blast the peaks off mountains to reach coal seams inside and then pile vast quantities of rubble in surrounding valleys. On Thursday, EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said those "valley fills" will be curtailed. She cited new scientific evidence showing that when rainwater is filtered through the jumbles of rock, it emerges imbued with toxins, poisoning small mountain streams.

http://snipr.com/v9tyq


"Roaming" Magnetic Fields Found

from National Geographic News

Weak magnetic fields are "roaming" across the universe, according to a new study that may have solved the mystery of where the huge magnetic fields around galaxies come from. Galaxies such as our Milky Way have their own large-scale magnetic fields. Although these fields are weak compared to planetary fields, scientists think the galactic versions help establish rates of star formation, guide cosmic rays, and regulate the dynamics of interstellar gas.

Most scientists believe the stronger magnetic fields of today's adult galaxies grew from weaker "seed" fields. But it's unclear where these older fields originated.

The two leading theories: The seed fields were created by the movement of charged gas in protogalaxies, or they were produced outside of galaxies by some unseen processes in the early universe. New observations made with NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope support the idea that the seeds were there all along, even before galaxies themselves.

http://snipr.com/v9tz5


New Written Language of Ancient Scotland Discovered

from Discovery News

The ancestors of modern Scottish people left behind mysterious, carved stones that new research has just determined contain the written language of the Picts, an Iron Age society that existed in Scotland from 300 to 843.

The highly stylized rock engravings, found on what are known as the Pictish Stones, had once been thought to be rock art or tied to heraldry. The new study, published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A, instead concludes that the engravings represent the long lost language of the Picts, a confederation of Celtic tribes that lived in modern-day eastern and northern Scotland.

"We know that the Picts had a spoken language to complement the writing of the symbols, as Bede (a monk and historian who died in 735) writes that there are four languages in Britain in this time: British, Pictish, Scottish and English," lead author Rob Lee told Discovery News.

http://snipr.com/v9tzi


UK Sets Up Chagos Islands Marine Reserve

from BBC News Online

The UK government has created the world's largest marine reserve around the Chagos Islands.

The reserve would cover a 545,000-sq-km area around the Indian Ocean archipelago, regarded as one of the world's richest marine ecosystems. This will include an area where commercial fishing will be banned.

But islanders, who were evicted to make way for the US air base on the island of Diego Garcia, say a reserve would effectively bar them from returning. UK Foreign Secretary David Miliband said establishing the reserve would "double the global coverage of the world's oceans under protection."

http://snipr.com/v9tzr


Mapping Effort Hopes to Save Dozens of Native Plants

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

American colonists once watched for the spring bloom of the Nantucket shadbush, a sign that it was warm enough to bury the winter's dead.

Today, that shadbush and dozens of other flora native to the New York region face extinction, a result of urban development and the encroachment of invasive plants from foreign lands, scientists from the Brooklyn Botanic Garden report.

Hoping to revive the plants, the scientists recently completed a 20-year project mapping species in every county within a 50-mile radius of New York, providing detailed information on the health of more than 15,000 native and nonnative species.

http://snipr.com/v9tzz


Meet the Periodic Table's Newest Resident: Copernicium

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

There's a new element officially in town and its name is copernicium, after the 16th-century Polish scientist Nicholas Copernicus. It is element 112 and its symbol is Cn.

Copernicium, a heavier relative of zinc, cadmium and mercury, was first seen in 1996 by researchers at the Society for Heavy Ions Research in Darmstadt, Germany, after they bombarded a lead target with zinc ions.

It took the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry, which regulates nomenclature, nearly 14 years to resolve disputes between the Germans and American researchers over who was first to produce the new element, but the agency reported in the March issue of the journal Pure and Applied Chemistry that the Germans had priority and are thus entitled to propose a name.

http://snipr.com/v9u0a


Inventors Hall of Fame Inducts 16

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The thing that is obvious if your profession is, say, NBA basketball, but less obvious if your profession is, say, adhesives and laminates, is that every field has its own hotshot studs. "Oh, I get maybe six or seven autograph requests" a week, Arthur Fry is saying modestly.

"Now, do you respond to those?" his collaborator Spencer Silver asks. He's always afraid that if he gives out autographs, someone could use his signature for identity theft. "Oh, yes."

Fry and Silver were surrounded by a small cluster of people in the National Press Building. They were there to be announced as two of 2010's 16 inductees to the National Inventors Hall of Fame, a tradition that began in 1973 ... Fry and Silver invented Post-its. They are the studs.

http://snipr.com/v9u0s


Traumatized Vets Say Service Dogs Help Them to Live

from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON -- Weeks after Chris Goehner, 25, an Iraq war veteran, got a dog, he was able to cut in half the dose of anxiety and sleep medications he took for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The night terrors and suicidal thoughts that kept him awake for days on end ceased.

Aaron Ellis, 29, another Iraq veteran with the stress disorder, scrapped his medications entirely soon after getting a dog--and set foot in a grocery store for the first time in three years. The dogs to whom they credit their improved health are not just pets. They are psychiatric service dogs trained to help traumatized veterans leave the battlefield behind as they reintegrate into society.

Because of stories like these, the federal government, not usually at the forefront of alternative medical treatments, is spending several million dollars to study whether research supports anecdotal reports the dogs might speed recovery from the psychological wounds of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

http://snipr.com/v9u0z


Air Force to Launch Robotic Winged Space Plane

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

LOS ANGELES (Associated Press) -- After a decade of development, the Air Force this month plans to launch a robotic spacecraft resembling a small space shuttle to conduct technology tests in orbit and then glide home to a California runway.

The ultimate purpose of the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle and details about the craft, which has been passed between several government agencies, however, remain a mystery as it is prepared for launch April 19 from Cape Canaveral, Fla.

... The quietly scheduled launch culminates the project's long and expensive journey from NASA to the Pentagon's research and development arm and then to a secretive Air Force unit. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on the X-37 program, but the current total has not been released.

http://snipr.com/v9u1b
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 06, 2010, 10:25:14 PM
April 6, 2010


Peering Into the Future of Science in U.S.

from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

Dr. Neal Lane is a specialist in the area where science and policy collide. The molecular physicist served as National Science Foundation director in 1993 and as President Bill Clinton's science adviser in 1998.

He'll be the keynote speaker Saturday at N.C. State's Scope Academy 2010, an exploration of science and math topics including climate change and the statistics of bank failure. Lane will discuss the future of science in America and what upcoming challenges and opportunities will mean for the country.

In an interview, the News and Observer asked him if he thought there's been a change in the influence of science on public policy decisions and what the country can do to inspire students to seek careers in science and engineering.

http://snipr.com/vafdq


A Race to Reap Energy From the Ocean Breezes

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

As New Englanders await a decision in Massachusetts on a bitterly contested proposal to build the nation's first offshore wind farm, the State of Rhode Island is forging ahead with its own project in the hope of outpacing--and upstaging--its neighbor.

Crucial to its strategy is dispelling worries that economics will trump the environment, or the broader public good.

Instead of having a private developer dominate the research on potential sites, as Massachusetts has, Rhode Island embarked on a three-year scientific study, to be completed in August, of all waters within 30 miles of its coast. It has spent more than $8 million on research into bird migration patterns, wildlife habitats, fish distribution, fishermen's needs and areas that might be of cultural importance to Indian tribes.

http://snipr.com/vafei


Climate Change Computer Models Under Attack

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

... The computer models used to predict climate change are far more sophisticated than the ones that forecast the weather, elections or sporting results. They are multilayered programs in which scientists try to replicate the physics behind things such as rainfall, ocean currents and the melting of sea ice. Then, they try to estimate how emissions from smokestacks and auto tailpipes might alter those patterns in the future, as the effects of warmer temperatures echo through these complex and interrelated systems.

To check these programs' accuracy, scientists plug in data from previous years to see if the model's predictions match what really happened. But these models still have the same caveat as other computer-generated futures. They are man-made, so their results are shaped by human judgment.

This year, critics have harped on that fact, attacking models of climate change that have been used to illustrate what will happen if the United States and other countries do nothing to limit greenhouse gas emissions. Climate scientists have responded that their models are imperfect, but still provide invaluable glimpses of change to come.

http://snipr.com/vafet


New Studies Eat Into Diet Math

from the Wall Street Journal

How many calories must a dieter cut to lose a pound? The answer most dietitians have long provided is 3,500. But recent studies indicate that calories can't be converted into weight through a simple formula.

The result is that the 3,500-calorie rule of thumb gets things very wrong over the long term, and has led health analysts astray. Much bigger dietary changes are needed to gain or shed pounds than the formula suggests. Consider the chocolate-chip-cookie fan who adds one 60-calorie cookie to his daily diet. By the old math, that cookie would add up to six pounds in a year, 60 pounds in a decade and hundreds of pounds in a lifetime.

But new research--based on studies of volunteers whose calorie consumption is observed in laboratory settings, rather than often-unreliable food diaries--suggests that the body's self-regulatory mechanisms tamp down the effects of changes in diet or behavior. If the new nutritional science is applied, the cookie fiend probably will see his weight gain approach six pounds, and then level off ...

http://snipr.com/vaff2


Weak Economy Fuels Assault on California Climate Law

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

SACRAMENTO (Associated Press) -- Four years ago, California earned accolades for adopting a law that would slash its greenhouse gas emissions and serve as a model for national climate change legislation.

With the state mired in a crippling recession, the law that once looked like a landmark achievement is coming under assault. The regulatory effort Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger set in motion is facing a political backlash and could come to an abrupt halt in the months ahead.

A coalition of businesses, financed largely by three Texas oil companies, is funding a ballot petition that would delay the law until California's current unemployment rate is cut by more than half. The leading Republican gubernatorial candidate, Meg Whitman, has vowed she would suspend the law on her first day in office, which she would have the authority to do.

http://snipr.com/vafh7


Study: Breast-Feeding Would Save Lives, Money

from USA Today

CHICAGO (Associated Press) -- The lives of nearly 900 babies would be saved each year, along with billions of dollars, if 90% of U.S. women breast-fed their babies for the first six months of life, a cost analysis says.

Those startling results, published online Monday in the journal Pediatrics, are only an estimate. But several experts who reviewed the analysis said the methods and conclusions seem sound. "The health care system has got to be aware that breast-feeding makes a profound difference," said Dr. Ruth Lawrence, who heads the American Academy of Pediatrics' breast-feeding section.

The findings suggest that there are hundreds of deaths and many more costly illnesses each year from health problems that breast-feeding may help prevent. These include stomach viruses, ear infections, asthma, juvenile diabetes, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome and even childhood leukemia.

http://snipr.com/vafhn


Rare "Supertaskers" Can Juggle Driving, Cell Phones

from National Geographic News

People with superhuman powers walk among us--or at least drive among us, scientists say. Numerous studies have shown that the vast majority of people can't drive well while distracted, such as when talking on a cell phone.

A new study supports those findings, but it also uncovered a rare group of people who perform as well or better when multitasking. About 1 in 40 people are "supertaskers," the study found. The discovery may open the door to a slew of new research into how the brain handles multiple streams of information.

The existence of supertaskers "does seem to violate traditional cognitive theory," which says that the human brain can actively pay attention to just one task at a time, said study co-author Jason Watson, a University of Utah psychologist.

http://snipr.com/vafig


Insulin-Producing Cells Can Renegerate in Diabetic Mice

from Science News

Replacements for some diabetics' missing insulin-producing cells might be found in the patients' own pancreases, a new study in mice suggests.

Alpha cells in the pancreas can spontaneously transform into insulin-producing beta cells, researchers from the University of Geneva in Switzerland report online in Nature April 4. The study, done in mice, is the first to reveal the pancreas's ability to regenerate missing cells.

Scientists were surprised to find that new beta cells arose from alpha cells in the pancreas, rather than stem cells. If the discovery translates to people, scientists may one day be able to coax type 1 diabetics' own alpha cells into replacing insulin-producing cells. Type 1 diabetes, also known as juvenile diabetes, results when the immune system destroys beta cells in the pancreas.

http://snipr.com/vafip


Explosive Silicon Gas Casts Shadow on Solar Power

from Scientific American

In 2007, outside Bangalore, India, an explosion decapitated an industrial worker, hurling his body through a brick wall. In 2005 a routine procedure at a manufacturing plant in Taiwan caused a spontaneous explosion that killed a worker and ignited a blaze that ripped through the factory, shutting down production for three months.

Both incidents shared a common cause--silane, a gas made up of silicon and hydrogen that explodes on contact with air. And both incidents occurred in the same industry--solar power.

Among other environmental black marks, the process of manufacturing photovoltaic (PV) cells from silicon relies on this dangerous pyrophoric gas. As the industry gears up to meet growing demand--6.4 gigawatts of new photovoltaic installations were built worldwide in 2009 according to the European Photovoltaic Industry Association, the bulk of it silicon solar cells--what are the human health and environmental concerns related to solar power?

http://snipr.com/vafiy


NSF Study Looks at Who Does Interdisciplinary Research

from ScienceNOW Daily News

U.S. graduate students in the agricultural sciences are more likely than those in other fields to carry out interdisciplinary research, according to a first-ever analysis of the issue by the National Science Foundation. And the Massachusetts Institute of Technology leads the nation in the percentage of its doctoral students whose dissertations involve more than one discipline.

But beyond that, it's not clear what the data say about this important subject. It's an article of faith among science policymakers that interdisciplinary research is essential to address society's most pressing technological challenges, from energy independence to improved health care. But don't ask them to measure it.

The National Academies' upcoming assessment of doctoral research programs, for example, asked departments what percentage of their faculty members were associated with other programs. But the data "aren't very satisfactory," says Charlotte Kuh, study director. Part of the problem is the fuzzy definition of an interdisciplinary program, she adds.

http://snipr.com/vafjb
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on April 06, 2010, 10:47:38 PM
oh, gawd....
i hope the term 'supertasker' isn't bandied about by the media much, 'cause that's the kind of bzz word that would catch.
every asshole with a blackberry would then consider themselves a 'supertasker' once there's a label the grab onto...  :x

also, just another thanks for providing this service, Kai!  :D
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on April 07, 2010, 12:18:32 PM
Hey Kai, please ignore this if it's too much trouble. But could you perhaps make the titles of the articles bold again (in future posts) like you sometimes used to? I love reading these links, but having bolded titles would allow me to scan for items of interest much quicker.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 07, 2010, 12:23:13 PM
I have been more or less copypasting these recently, because I haven't had the time to really edit them the way I should.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Triple Zero on April 07, 2010, 12:44:17 PM
Fair enough :) hey, I got an editor with regular expressions, which would make adding [ b ] tags a simple search/replace action, with your permission I could do an edit.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 07, 2010, 01:10:15 PM
Permission granted.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on April 11, 2010, 01:20:55 AM
http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/04/10/0519202/The-Fruit-Fly-Drosophila-Gets-a-New-Name
G3ckoG33k writes: "The name of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster will change to Sophophora melangaster. The reason is that scientists have by now discovered some 2,000 species of the genus and it is becoming unmanageably large. Unfortunately, the 'type species' (the reference point of the genus), Drosophila funebris is rather unrelated to the D. melanogaster, and ends up in a distant part of the relationship tree. However, geneticists have, according to Google Scholar, more than 300,000 scientific articles describing innumerable aspects of the species, and will have to learn the new name as well as remembering the old. As expected, the name change has created an emotional (and practical) stir all over media. While name changes are frequent in science, as they describe new knowledge about relationships between species, these changes rarely hit economically relevant species, and when they do, people get upset."


http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/04/09/232219/Completely-Farm-Bred-Unagi-a-World-First
JoshuaInNippon writes: "Japanese scientists at the National Research Institute of Aquaculture, Fisheries Research Agency have reported that they successfully completed an artificial cultivation cycle for unagi, or eel — a world first. Unagi is a traditional delicacy in Japan, and can commonly be found in baked form at sushi restaurants. The fish has long been caught either matured, or still young and then fattened on farms. Sadly, as a result, natural stocks of unagi have plummeted in recent years. However, the research news indicates a future method to completely farm breed the tasty creature in mass quantity. Good news for sushi lovers, Japanese businesses, and wild eel alike."


http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/04/08/2111236/Wake-Forest-Researchers-Swap-Skin-Grafts-For-Cell-Spraying
TigerWolf2 writes with this excerpt from a Reuters story carried by Yahoo: "Inspired by a standard office inkjet printer, US researchers have rigged up a device that can spray skin cells directly onto burn victims, quickly protecting and healing their wounds as an alternative to skin grafts. ... Tests on mice showed the spray system, called bioprinting, could heal wounds quickly and safely, the researchers reported at the Translational Regenerative Medicine Forum."


http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/10/04/10/1440243/Underwater-Robot-Powered-By-Oceans-Thermal-Energy
separsons writes: "A team of scientists recently created the world's first underwater robotic vehicle powered entirely by renewable, ocean thermal energy. Researchers from NASA, the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the US Navy developed Sounding Oceanographic Lagrangrian Observer Thermal RECharging (SOLO-TREC), an autonomous robot that runs on a thermal recharging engine. The engine derives power from the natural temperature differences found at varying ocean depths. SOLO-TREC produces about 1.7 watts of power each dive, enough to juice the robot's science instruments, GPS receiver, communication device and buoyancy control pump. SOLO-TREC is poised to revolutionize ocean monitoring; previous robots could only spend a limited amount of time underwater because of depleting power sources. SOLO-TREC can stay beneath the surface of the waves for indefinite amounts of time. Based on SOLO-TREC's success, NASA and the US Navy plan to incorporate thermal recharging engines in next-generation submersibles."
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on April 13, 2010, 08:09:56 AM
http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/04/12/1944254/Crowdsourcing-the-Department-of-Public-Works
blackbearnh writes: "Usually, Gov 2.0 deals mainly with outward transparency of government to the citizens. But SeeClickFix is trying to drive data in the other direction, letting citizens report and track neighborhood problems as mundane as potholes, and as serious as drug dealers. In a recent interview, co-founder Jeff Blasius talked about how cities such as New Haven and Tucson are using SeeClickFix to involve their citizens in identifying and fixing problems with city infrastructure. 'We have thousands of potholes fixed across the country, thousands of pieces of graffiti repaired, streetlights turned on, catch basins cleared, all of that basic, broken-windows kind of stuff. We've seen neighborhood groups form based around issues reported on the site. We've seen people get new streetlights for their neighborhood, pedestrian improvements in many different cities, and all-terrain vehicles taken off of city streets. There was also one case of an arrest. The New Haven Police Department attributed initial reports on SeeClickFix to a sting operation that led to an arrest of two drug dealers selling heroin in front of a grammar school.'"


http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/04/12/158232/Woman-Creates-3-D-Erotic-Book-For-the-Blind
Lisa J. Murphy has written an erotic book with tactile images for that special visually impaired porn connoisseur in your life. Tactile Mind contains explicit softcore raised images, along with Braille text and photos. From the article: "A photographer with a certificate in Tactile Graphics from the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, Murphy learned to create touchable images of animals for books for visually impaired children. Then she realized that there was a lack of such books for adults only. 'There are no books of tactile pictures of nudes for adults, at least the last time I looked around,' says Murphy. 'We're breaking new ground. Playboy has [an edition with] Braille wording, but there are no pictures.' She says that while we live in a culture saturated with sexual images, the blind have been 'left out.'"


http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/10/04/11/0031221/VisLab-Sponsors-Milan-to-Shanghai-Driverless-Trek
incuso writes: "VisLab announced the most advanced challenge so far ever organized for autonomous vehicles. Two driverless electric cars will perform a trip from Italy to China to demonstrate the feasibility of autonomous driving in real traffic conditions. Each vehicle will be equipped with five laser scanners, seven cameras, GPS, inertial measurement unit, three Linux PCs, and an x-by-wire driving system. The mission will start on July 10 in Milan, Italy, and will reach Shanghai, China, on October 10 (10/10/10) on a 13,000 km route though Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Romania, Ukraine, Russia, Kazakhstan, and finally China."


http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/04/11/0012244/Scientists-Turn-T-Shirts-Into-Body-Armor
separsons writes: "Scientists at the University of South Carolina recently transformed ordinary T-shirts into bulletproof armor. By splicing cotton with boron, the third hardest material on the planet, scientists created a shirt that was super elastic but also strong enough to deflect bullets. Xiaodong Li, lead researcher on the project, says the same tech may eventually be used to create lightweight, fuel-efficient cars and aircrafts."
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on April 13, 2010, 06:35:42 PM
Quote from: Telarus on April 11, 2010, 01:20:55 AM
http://science.slashdot.org/story/10/04/10/0519202/The-Fruit-Fly-Drosophila-Gets-a-New-Name
G3ckoG33k writes: "The name of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster will change to Sophophora melangaster. The reason is that scientists have by now discovered some 2,000 species of the genus and it is becoming unmanageably large. Unfortunately, the 'type species' (the reference point of the genus), Drosophila funebris is rather unrelated to the D. melanogaster, and ends up in a distant part of the relationship tree. However, geneticists have, according to Google Scholar, more than 300,000 scientific articles describing innumerable aspects of the species, and will have to learn the new name as well as remembering the old. As expected, the name change has created an emotional (and practical) stir all over media. While name changes are frequent in science, as they describe new knowledge about relationships between species, these changes rarely hit economically relevant species, and when they do, people get upset."

This is actually a HUGE story. Let me explain.

When one of the ranks covered by the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) is named, a type species has to be fixed to that rank. So, for superfamily, family, subfamily, tribe, genus and subgenus (I think I got them all?), a species must be fixed to that name upon it's original description. That name is now fixed to that species; if  reclassification demands a changing of combinations at any of those levels, the type species MUST stay with it's original groupings.

In that sense, when the Subgenus Drosophila (Genus Drosophila) was first described, it was fixed to the type D. funebris. That means that if species are added or removed from Genus Drosophila due to new phylogenetic evidence, or if the ranks of subgenus are raised to genus level, /it must stay with Drosophila.

However, the model species D. melanogaster isn't in the subgenus Drosophila. It's in the subgenus Sophophora, though not fixed to it.

And the International Council of Zoological Nomenclature decided against unfixing D. funebris as the type, for various reasons.

So, the options:

1. Keep the Genus Drosophila at an unimaginably unmanagable size of 2000+ species.
2. Elevate the subgenera to genus level, changing D. melanogaster to S. melanogaster. It will upset a whole bunch of molecular biologists, but it will be far more stable within systematics (a whole bunch of name changes and confusion) and keep monophyletic, natural  groupings of species.
3. Say to hell with the ICZN, lets do whatever we want.
4. Or worse, screw the ICZN all together, and use Phylocode.

This is the first time, as far as I know, when the Council had any real political implications in its decisions. This could get interesting.

On the other hand, it's as weird as the uproar of Pluto not being a planet.  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on April 14, 2010, 12:11:29 AM
I knew you'd have some insight on that. Thanks Kai.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 02, 2010, 06:08:14 PM
(http://www.smbc-comics.com/comics/20100502.gif)

The red queen hypothesis is that you have to be constantly running in order to stay where you are, evolutionarily, since everything else is doing the same.

Sex is better explained by the benefit of recombination versus the detriment of mutation in fission reproduction. The more complex the systems of an organism, the more likely a single mutation will throw things to bits. Recombination leads to less likelyhood of lethal mutations, since one of the copies is likely not to have that mutation.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Jasper on May 02, 2010, 07:08:54 PM
I love the DNAs.  I love how monomaniacally pragmatic they are. 

Thanks for keeping WSH alive, Kai!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 02, 2010, 08:34:27 PM
I'm probably going to dump some this week. Have a whole lot of email to go through.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Remington on May 03, 2010, 05:35:13 AM
Hubble's gotchu covered, man!

http://www.latenightwithjimmyfallon.com/video/hubble-gotchu-42610/1222742/ (http://www.latenightwithjimmyfallon.com/video/hubble-gotchu-42610/1222742/)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 05, 2010, 12:15:39 AM
Today's Headlines - April 7, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Building a Better Mouse

from the Scientist (Registration Required)

...Most of the time, in order to test a cancer therapy, researchers simply transplant human cancer tissue into a mouse. But those experiments rarely predict how a human will respond to the same treatment.

In a new trial, however, principal investigator Pier Paolo Pandolfi and others have engineered the mice to develop cancers that carry mutations similar to those seen in cancer patients--mutations scientists suspect may explain why some patients respond to a particular treatment and some don't.

All of this, in the end, is for one purpose: to find a better mouse model for cancer, one that can successfully predict how a human cancer will progress and respond to treatment before the drug is ever tried in humans.

http://snipr.com/vb0mn


Cooling the Planet With Geoengineering

from Public Radio International

The current guest for PRI's Science Forum is economist Scott Barrett of Columbia University's Earth Institute. Chat online with Barrett about the science and politics of geoengineering, the emerging field of science aimed at cooling the planet.

Barrett is an expert on international environmental agreements. He is currently studying the politics and economics of geoengineering. He says countries are more likely to geoengineer climate than reduce their carbon emissions.

Barrett is the author of Environment and Statecraft: The Strategy of Environmental Treaty-Making. He also blogs for Yale Global Online. He's in the forum through April 19.

http://snipr.com/vb0n5


In Syria, a Prologue for Cities

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Archaeologists have embarked on excavations in northern Syria expected to widen and deepen understanding of a prehistoric culture in Mesopotamia that set the stage for the rise of the world's first cities and states and the invention of writing.

In two seasons of preliminary surveying and digging at the site known as Tell Zeidan, American and Syrian investigators have already uncovered a tantalizing sampling of artifacts from what had been a robust pre-urban settlement on the upper Euphrates River. People occupied the site for two millenniums, until 4000 B.C.--a little-known but fateful period of human cultural evolution.

Scholars of antiquity say that Zeidan should reveal insights into life in a time called the Ubaid period, 5500 to 4000 B.C. In those poorly studied centuries, irrigation agriculture became widespread, long-distance trade grew in influence socially and economically, powerful political leaders came to the fore and communities gradually divided into social classes of wealthy elites and poorer commoners.

http://snipr.com/vb0ns


95-Million-Year-Old Bugs Found in African Amber

from Wired

Newly discovered pieces of amber have given scientists a peek into the Africa of 95 million years ago, when flowering plants blossomed across Earth and the animal world scrambled to adapt.

Suspended in the stream of time were ancestors of modern spiders, wasps and ferns, but the prize is a wingless ant that challenges current notions about the origins of that globe-spanning insect family.

"Most specimens represent a unique fossil record of their group from Africa, and some are among the oldest records in the world," wrote researchers in a paper April 5 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

http://snipr.com/vb0o4


An Hour of Exercise a Day Fights 'Fatso' Gene in Teens

from USA Today

CHICAGO (Associated Press) -- One hour of moderate to vigorous exercise a day can help teens beat the effects of a common obesity-related gene with the nickname "fatso," according to a new European study. The message for adolescents is to get moving, said lead author Jonatan Ruiz of the Karolinska Institute in Sweden.

"Be active in your way," Ruiz said. "Activities such as playing sports are just fine and enough." The study, released Monday, appears in the April edition of Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.

The research supports U.S. guidelines that tell children and teenagers to get an hour or more of physical activity daily, most of it aerobic activity such as running, jumping rope, swimming, dancing and bicycling. Scientists are finding evidence that both lifestyle and genes cause obesity and they're just learning how much diet and exercise can offset the inherited risk.

http://snipr.com/vb0of


Rare Frogs Find a Military Home

from the Charlotte Observer

Amid a daily percussion of artillery fire and munitions explosions, a rare amphibian migration began at Fort Bragg in early March. Carolina gopher frogs emerged from their underground burrows and hopped a mile or so to seasonal ponds.

Their instinct to breed was sparked by several days of rainfall and warm nights. About 100 to 150 Carolina gopher frogs live in Fort Bragg's artillery impact zones, where soldiers train. North Carolina lists the frogs as "threatened."

N.C. State University biologist Nick Haddad studies the frogs, which live in intact sandhill and longleaf pine ecosystems that require periodic burning. With the widespread loss of this habitat--only 5 percent remains, compared with its historic range--the frogs have developed a curious dependency upon military lands such as Fort Bragg.

http://snipr.com/vb0p2


"Sound Bullets" to Zap Off Tumors?

from National Geographic News

A new machine inspired by a common office toy could one day allow doctors to zap cancerous tumors using "sound bullets," scientists say. Dubbed an acoustic lens, the device could also be used to create near photo-quality images of internal organs that surpass the resolution of modern ultrasounds.

The design is based on the Newton's cradle, which features several identically sized metal balls suspended so that the balls barely touch each other. Due to Newton's laws of motion, when an end ball is pulled back and released, the ball at the other end swings outward with the same speed, even though none of the middle balls move.

The toy inspired study co-author Chiara Daraio to invent the acoustic lens, which uses 0.95-centimeter stainless steel spheres aligned in parallel chains. But instead of channeling motion, the new machine manipulates sound.

http://snipr.com/vb0rb


Alaskan Peatlands Expanded Rapidly as Ice Age Waned

from Science News

A rapid expansion of Alaskan peatlands at the end of the ice age was fueled by highly seasonal climate conditions, a new analysis suggests. The finding raises the possibility that future warming could decrease or reverse carbon storage in peatlands and thereby further aggravate climate change.

The study, published online the week of April 5 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, shows that most of Alaska's peatlands formed at a time when the region experienced warmer summers and colder winters than today.

Paleoecologists Zicheng Yu and Miriam Jones of Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa., analyzed core samples from peatlands, as well as data collected by other teams, to trace the expansion of peatlands in Alaska since the peak of the most recent ice age.

http://snipr.com/vb0rr


Animals Thrive Without Oxygen at Sea Bottom

from Nature News

Living exclusively oxygen-free was thought to be a lifestyle open only to viruses and single-celled microorganisms. A group of Italian and Danish researchers has now found three species of multicellular animal, or metazoan, that apparently spend their entire lives in oxygen-starved waters in a basin at the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea.

The discovery "opens a whole new realm to metazoans that we thought was off limits", says Lisa Levin, a biological oceanographer at Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California.

Roberto Danovaro from the Polytechnic University of Marche in Ancona, Italy, and his colleagues pulled up the animals during three research cruises off the south coast of Greece.

http://snipr.com/vb0s5


Scientists Discover Heavy New Element

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A team of Russian and American scientists has discovered a new element that has long stood as a missing link among the heaviest bits of atomic matter ever produced. The element, still nameless, appears to point the way toward a brew of still more massive elements with chemical properties no one can predict.

The team produced six atoms of the element by smashing together isotopes of calcium and a radioactive element called berkelium in a particle accelerator about 75 miles north of Moscow on the Volga River, according to a paper that has been accepted for publication at the journal Physical Review Letters.

Data collected by the team seem to support what theorists have long suspected: that as newly created elements become heavier and heavier they will eventually become much more stable and longer-lived than the fleeting bits of artificially produced matter seen so far.

http://snipr.com/vb0sg
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 05, 2010, 12:43:22 AM
Today's Headlines - April 8, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Chile's Seismic Lessons for U.S. Pacific Coast

from the San Francisco Chronicle

(Associated Press) -- As the Easter earthquake shook Southern California, the state's disaster management chief was thousands of miles away in Chile, examining what experts say is the best case study yet for how a truly catastrophic earthquake could impact the United States.

Chile and the U.S. Pacific Coast have more in common than their geology; they share advanced construction codes, bustling coastal cities, modern skyscrapers and veteran emergency services.

These were all put to the test in Chile, which despite its extensive planning lost 432 lives in the 8.8-magnitude earthquake and resulting tsunami--lessons that California, Oregon and Washington have yet to learn fully.

http://snipr.com/vbqmw


Controlling Risks From Methane in Mines

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Coal mines will always have methane, often in explosive concentrations, geologists and engineers say. The only question is how diligently miners and mining companies will work to avoid explosions.

Though there is no definitive proof that it was a methane explosion that killed 25 miners in West Virginia on Monday, miners have said the gas has been a constant problem, leading to several evacuations in recent months and a history of violations.

The gas, like coal, is a molecule made of hydrogen and carbon, and it is produced from the same raw material as coal, ancient piles of biological material, by the same processes. Much of the natural gas sold in the United States is drawn from coal seams.

http://snipr.com/vbqo6


Giant Lizard Discovered in the Philippines

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

MANILA, Philippines (Associated Press) -- Researchers have concluded that a giant, golden-spotted monitor lizard discovered in the forested mountains of the Philippines six years ago is a new species, according to a study released Wednesday.

The 6.5-foot (2-meter) -long lizard was first spotted in 2004 in the Sierra Madre mountains on the main island of Luzon when local researchers saw local Agta tribesmen carrying one of the dead reptiles.

But it took until last year to determine it was a new species. After capturing an adult, researchers from the University of Kansas and the National Museum of the Philippines obtained DNA samples that helped confirm the lizard was new to science.

http://snipr.com/vbqrp


Superheavy Element 117 Makes Debut

from Science News

Physicists have reported synthesizing element 117, the latest achievement in their quest to create "superheavy" elements in the laboratory. A paper describing the discovery has been accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters.

A team led by Yuri Oganessian of the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, reports smashing together calcium-48--an isotope with 20 protons and 28 neutrons--and berkelium-249, which has 97 protons and 152 neutrons.

The collisions spit out either three or four neutrons, creating two different isotopes of an element with 117 protons. Sigurd Hofmann, a nuclear physicist at the GSI research center in Darmstadt, Germany, calls the new work on element 117 "convincing."

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New Earth Epoch Has Begun, Scientists Say

from National Geographic News

The older you get, the faster the time goes. Our 4.57-billion-year-old planet may know the feeling. After all, some scientists are suggesting Earth has already entered a new age--several million years earlier than it should have.

Earth's geologic epochs--time periods defined by evidence in rock layers--typically last more than three million years. We're barely 11,500 years into the current epoch, the Holocene. But a new paper argues that we've already entered a new one--the Anthropocene, or "new man," epoch.

The name isn't brand-new. Nobel Prize-winner Paul Crutzen, a co-author of the paper, coined it in 2002 to reflect the unprecedented changes humans have wrought in the roughly 200 years since the industrial revolution. The report, however, is part of new push to formalize the Anthropocene epoch.

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Forests Growing Back in U.S. Face Man-Made Tests

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

PINEY GROVE, VA. -- Here, in a forest of woodpecker-holed pine trees, is one of the rarest things in the American environment. A second chance. The United States can now hit "reset" on one of its greatest environmental mistakes: the destruction of the enormous woodland that once canopied the continent from Maine to east Texas.

By the late 1800s, much of it--including this tract of woods southeast of Richmond--had been cut down for agriculture and timber. Then, farms were abandoned. Old seeds sprouted. Unlike many other environmental mistakes, this one began to fix itself: The forest grew back, though burdened with too many deer, too little fire, and armies of invasive bugs.

Now, new forests like this one in Piney Grove are a test, a practical exam for American environmentalism 40 years into the Earth Day era. In some places, scientists are trying to fix man-made flaws that could eventually destroy forest ecosystems.

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Even Among Animals: Leaders, Followers and Schmoozers

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

I recently tried taking a couple of online personality tests, and I must say I was disappointed by the exercise. I was asked bland amorphisms like whether I was "someone who tends to find fault" with people (duh), is generally "friendly and agreeable" (see previous response), and always "does a thorough job" (can I just skip this question?).

Nowhere were there any real challenges like the following: Let's say you are very hungry, and you go over to your favorite food dish. Inside you see, in addition to the standard blend of peanuts and insect parts, a bright pink plastic frog.

How long before you work up the nerve to eat your dinner anyway? Or: You have just been ushered into a room that is in every way familiar, except that somebody has put a scrap of old, brown carpet in the middle of the floor. Do you keep your distance from the novelty item, or do you rush over and start pecking at it?

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Lake Union Lab Suddenly a Force

from the Seattle Times

Seattle is home to well-known scientific powerhouses such as the University of Washington and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. But most locals would be hard-pressed to name the upstart that bested all U.S. research labs in a recent ranking of scientific clout: the Institute for Systems Biology (ISB).

"For an institution that's only 10 years old, this is nothing short of remarkable," said Dr. Leroy Hood, the maverick biologist and entrepreneur who split from the UW to form ISB. Hood's ambitious goal is nothing short of a revolution in medicine.

At the institute's complex on the north side of Lake Union, biologists, engineers and computer wizards are working to unravel the intricate web of genes, proteins and biochemical signals underlying human disease.

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Solar Plane Prototype in First Test Flight

from BBC News Online

A prototype solar-powered plane has made its first full test flight--coming closer to the goal of using solar energy to fly around the world. The Solar Impulse, with a wingspan similar to that of a super-jumbo jet but weighing the same as a saloon car, took off from a Swiss airfield.

The plane's wings are covered by solar cells which power four electric motors. Its designers hope a slightly larger production model will circumnavigate the globe in two years' time.

The test flight was intended to verify that the plane's behaviour tallied with simulations. "With such a large and light plane never having flown before, the aircraft's flight behaviour remains unexplored," the flight team said in a statement.

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How Science Could Spark a Second Green Revolution

from the Christian Science Monitor

Jonathan Lynch wants to get at the roots of the problem of producing enough food for humanity. Literally.

In projects around the world, the professor of plant nutrition at Pennsylvania State University and his colleagues are trying to develop crops whose root systems can resist drought and take up fertilizer from the soil more efficiently.

With world population expected to grow by nearly 50 percent to more than 9 billion people by midcentury, farmland is going to need to be much more productive. Even today, nearly 1 out of every 6 people in the world--more than 1 billion--are going hungry, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization.

http://snipr.com/vbr2p

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 05, 2010, 12:56:48 AM
Today's Headlines - April 9, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


New Hominid Species Discovered in South Africa

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

CRADLE OF HUMANKIND, South Africa -- Nine-year-old Matthew Berger dashed after his dog Tau into the high grass here one sunny morning, tripped over a log and stumbled onto a major archeological discovery. Scientists announced Thursday that he had found the bones of a new hominid species that lived almost two million years ago during the fateful, still mysterious period spanning the emergence of the human family.

"Dad, I found a fossil!" Matthew said he cried out to his father, Lee R. Berger, an American paleoanthropologist, who had been searching for hominid bones just a hill-and-a-half away for almost two decades. Fossil hunters have profitably scoured these rolling grasslands north of Johannesburg since the 1930s.

Matthew held in his hands the ancient remains of a 4-foot-2 boy who had been just a few years older than Matthew himself. Dr. Berger, with the Institute for Human Evolution at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, and his fellow researchers have since found much more of the boy's skeleton, including his extraordinarily well-preserved skull, and three other individuals. South Africa's children will compete to name the boy.

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These Horses Are Two of a Kind

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The chestnut stallion was the love of Zarela Olsen's life. A majestic hall-of-fame horse with personality and a copper coat bright as a new penny, Capuchino often greeted his fawning owner with kisses, nuzzling her neck and licking the back of her ears.

"When he died, he took my heart with him," said Olsen, 46, of the Paso Fino horse who died in Ocala, Fla., last year. "I could not stop crying and crying."

But Olsen had planned ahead, investing $160,000 in the replicating services of a biotech company specializing in the controversial practice of animal cloning. Her champion's genetic duplicate, Capuchino Forever, was born in May. His birth--and the increasing number of horses cloned in the U.S.--has spawned debate and wonder among breeders and owners in the equine world, including here in Marion County, the self-proclaimed "Horse Capital of the World."

http://snipr.com/vclox


Test Would Warn Smokers of Lung Cancer Danger

from USA Today

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Scientists may have found a way to tell which smokers are at highest risk of developing lung cancer: measuring a telltale genetic change inside their windpipes. A test based on the research is being developed in hopes of detecting this deadly cancer earlier, when it's more treatable.

And if the work pans out, the next big question is: Might it even be possible to reverse this genetic chain reaction before it ends in full-blown cancer? The researchers found a tantalizing early hint among a handful of people given an experimental drug.

"They're heading toward lung cancer, and we can identify them with this genomic test," said Dr. Avrum Spira of Boston University School of Medicine, who led the research published Wednesday in the journal Science Translational Medicine.

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Eating Fruits and Vegetables Has Little Impact on Cancer

from BBC News Online

Eating more fruit and vegetables has only a modest effect on protecting against cancer, a study into the link between diet and disease has found.

The study of 500,000 Europeans joins a growing body of evidence undermining the high hopes that pushing "five-a-day" might slash Western cancer rates. The international team of researchers estimates only around 2.5% of cancers could be averted by increasing intake.

But experts stress eating fruit and vegetables is still key to good health. In 1990, the World Health Organization recommended that everyone consume at least five portions of fruit and vegetables a day to prevent cancer and other chronic diseases.

http://snipr.com/vclpu


Mystery Eclipse Caught in the Act

from Sky and Telescope

... Astronomers have struggled for decades to understand what's going on with the binary star Epsilon Aurigae. It was discovered in 1821 to be an eclipsing double-star system with a period of 27.1 years. In other eclipsing binaries, it usually takes only hours or at most days for one star to cross in front of the other. But Epsilon Aurigae's events take two years to complete--and the most recent one began last August.

... Epsilon Aurigae's central star is a F-type supergiant pumping out 130,000 times the Sun's brightness. This much now seems clear. But there are at least five candidate explanations for the eclipsing component: (1) a huge, nearly spherical nebula that's somewhat opaque; (2) a massive, dark disk of gas and dust; (3) a black hole cocooned inside a disk; (4) a thin, tipped disk with a binary star at its center; and (5) a large, slightly tilted disk surrounding a single hot B star.

As S&T editor-in-chief Bob Naeye described a few months ago, this last scenario has gained favor recently. New observations of Epsilon Aurigae, just announced in the April 8th issue of Nature, show that the Answer Number 5 is likely correct.

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Cancer Vaccines May Be on the Verge of Wider Use

from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

One of the persistent frustrations in cancer treatment has been the way that tumors can evade our immune systems as they grow and multiply inside our bodies. Even though cancer cells have special surface markers, known as antigens, the body often doesn't seem to be able to mount a full-fledged attack against the tumors, and the longer they last, the more they seem to suppress the immune response.

Yet it doesn't have to be that way, says a dedicated band of scientists in universities and companies around the globe. In fact, they say, we may be on the verge of being able to vaccinate people against cancer in the same way we do with infectious diseases.

"I think we really are on the cusp of a revolution in cancer immunology," said Andres Salazar, CEO of Oncovir, a Washington, D.C., company that makes an immune system booster for cancer vaccines. "We hope to make patients allergic to their cancers." The first commercial cancer vaccine out of the gate is likely to be sipuleucel-T, a vaccine against advanced prostate cancer being made by Dendreon Corp. of Seattle, Wash.

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Scientists Unlock Mystery of Animal Color Patterns

from the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

In the lab that summer morning, Thomas Werner's heart pounded. The University of Wisconsin-Madison postdoctoral researcher had to sit down and take deep breaths before continuing the crucial experiment. Werner, who had grown up in East Germany hoping to study butterflies, had instead devoted more than three years to a species of the North American fruit fly, Drosophila guttifera.

Focusing on this species of fruit fly, he and the other researchers in the lab of molecular biologist Sean B. Carroll, had made a prolonged assault on one of the key questions in evolutionary biology: how nature endows creatures with their colorful patterns, from a leopard's dark spots to a butterfly's bold swirls. In different species the patterns serve to attract mates, provide camouflage or provide other advantages in the struggle to survive.

But what causes the colors to fall so precisely into place? Werner's hands shook as he removed the fruit fly pupa's wing and placed it under the microscope in the darkroom. Three years of work now came down to a single image. He needed to see green fluorescent light in the places where black spots would one day appear on the wing of the adult fruit fly. That would mean he had discovered the secret of the fly's spots.

http://snipr.com/vclsu


Launch Success for ESA's Cryosat-2 Ice Mission

from BBC News Online

Europe's Cryosat-2 spacecraft has launched from Baikonur in Kazakhstan on a mission to map the Earth's ice cover. ... Cryosat's data should help scientists understand better how melting polar ice could affect ocean circulation patterns, sea level and global climate. It is a copy of a spacecraft that was destroyed on launch in 2005.

... Cryosat-2 will measure very precisely the rates of change of sea and land ice in the Arctic and the Antarctic. A key quest for the satellite will be to assess the volume of sea ice in the Arctic--something that has been hard to do from space.

Satellites have long been used to track ice extent (area), but calculating the thickness of the marine floes requires the overflying spacecraft to gauge the difference between the top of the ice surface and the top of the water--a relatively simple calculation then gives the overall volume.

http://snipr.com/vcltw


Lung Function Still Impaired by Dust From World Trade Center

from Science News

Many rescue workers who responded to the 2001 attack on the World Trade Center in New York continue to show breathing difficulties that haven't improved in the years since the dust cleared, researchers report in the April 8 New England Journal of Medicine.

The effects go beyond what was first dubbed "World Trade Center cough," although that symptom has lingered in some emergency workers, says study coauthor Thomas Aldrich, a pulmonologist at Montefiore Medical Center and Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University in New York City.

Inhalation of the thick dust has caused bronchitis, asthma and symptoms of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease such as being short of breath, he says. Passersby have also shown increased asthma rates.

http://snipr.com/vclus


Slowing the Losses

from the Economist

For the first time since the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) started making decade-by-decade surveys of the world's forests, it says it has evidence that efforts to slow the world's rate of deforestation are working.

The total area of forest on the planet is about 4 billion hectares (10 billion acres). In the "key findings" of its Global Forest Resources Assessment 2010 (the full report is not out for a few months) the FAO estimates that, during each of the past ten years, an average of roughly 13m hectares of forest (an area twice the size of Latvia) were either converted to other uses or lost through natural causes such as drought and fire. In the 1990s the figure was 16m hectares.

Reduced rates of deforestation in Brazil and Indonesia form a large part of the story, but the reduction was more broadly based. It was seen on all continents apart from Oceania and forest-free Antarctica--and the increased loss of forest in Oceania was caused largely by drought and fire, rather than by extra logging.

http://snipr.com/vclv7

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 05, 2010, 06:40:40 PM
April 12, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Hallucinogens Have Doctors Tuning In Again

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

As a retired clinical psychologist, Clark Martin was well acquainted with traditional treatments for depression, but his own case seemed untreatable as he struggled through chemotherapy and other grueling regimens for kidney cancer. Counseling seemed futile to him. So did the antidepressant pills he tried.

Nothing had any lasting effect until, at the age of 65, he had his first psychedelic experience. He left his home in Vancouver, Wash., to take part in an experiment at Johns Hopkins medical school involving psilocybin, the psychoactive ingredient found in certain mushrooms.

Scientists are taking a new look at hallucinogens, which became taboo among regulators after enthusiasts like Timothy Leary promoted them in the 1960s with the slogan "Turn on, tune in, drop out." Now, using rigorous protocols and safeguards, scientists have won permission to study once again the drugs' potential for treating mental problems and illuminating the nature of consciousness.

http://snipr.com/vfisg


Does Our Universe Live Inside a Wormhole?

from ScienceNOW Daily News

A long time ago, in a universe much larger than our own, a giant star collapsed. Its implosion crammed so much mass and energy together that it created a wormhole to another universe. And inside this wormhole, our own universe was born. It may seem fantastic, but a theoretical physicist claims that such a scenario could help answer some of the most perplexing questions in cosmology.

A number of facets about our universe don't make sense. One is gravity. Scientists can't construct a mathematical formula that unites gravity with the three other basic forces of nature: the strong and weak nuclear forces and electromagnetism. Another problem is dark energy, the mysterious phenomenon that seems to be expanding our universe at an accelerating rate, even though gravity should be contracting it or at least slowing the expansion.

These conundrums may be a result of stopping the search for the riddle of the cosmos at the big bang, says Nikodem Poplawski of Indiana University in Bloomington. The big bang theory holds that our universe began as a single point--or singularity--about 13.7 billion years ago that has been expanding outward ever since. Perhaps, Poplawski argues, we need to consider that something existed before the big bang that gave rise to it.

http://snipr.com/vfito


World's Deepest Undersea Vents Discovered In Caribbean

from BBC News Online

What are believed to be the world's deepest undersea volcanic vents have been discovered in the Caribbean. The vents, known as black smokers, were located 5,000m (3.1 miles) down in the Cayman Trough. The volcanic chimneys, which spew out water hot enough to melt lead, were caught on film by a British-led team.

Marine biologist Dr Jon Copley said: "Seeing the world's deepest black-smoker vents looming out of the darkness was awe-inspiring." He added: "Super-heated water was gushing out of their two-storey-high mineral spires, more than three miles beneath the waves."

Expedition leader Doug Connelly said: "We hope our discovery will yield new insights into biogeochemically important elements in one of the most extreme naturally occurring environments on our planet."

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Protein Folding: The Dark Side of Proteins

from Nature News

Of all the ways that proteins can go bad, becoming an amyloid is surely one of the worst. In this state, sticky elements within proteins emerge and seed the growth of sometimes deadly fibrils. Amyloids riddle the brain in Alzheimer's disease and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. But until recently it has seemed that this corrupt state could threaten only a tiny fraction of proteins.

Research is now hinting at a more unsettling picture. In work reported in February, a team led by David Eisenberg at the University of California, Los Angeles, sifted through tens of thousands of proteins looking for segments with the peculiar stickiness needed to form amyloid. They found, says Eisenberg, that "effectively all complex proteins have these short segments that, if exposed and flexible enough, are capable of triggering amyloid formation."

Not all proteins form amyloids, however. The "amylome," as Eisenberg calls it, is restricted because most proteins hide these sticky segments out of harm's way or otherwise keep their stickiness under control. His results and other work suggest that evolution treats amyloids as a fundamental threat. Amyloids have been found in some of the most common age-related diseases, and there is evidence that ageing itself makes some amyloid accumulation inevitable. It now seems as though the human body is perched precariously above an amyloidal abyss.

http://snipr.com/vfiup


China and West Virginia: A Tale of Two Mine Disasters

from Time

Just as West Virginia families were hit with word of a deadly mine disaster on April 5, relatives of miners missing after a flood in China's coal belt welcomed some unexpected news. After eight days trapped underground, 115 coal miners in Shanxi province were dramatically rescued. In China, where mine disasters are grimly commonplace, the rescue was trumpeted as a miracle. And in the U.S., where mine safety is sometimes seen as a question that was resolved decades ago, the death of at least 25 men is a painful reminder of the risks they face.

The explosion at the Massey Energy company's Upper Big Branch mine was the deadliest U.S. mining disaster in 26 years. The U.S. is one of the safest places for the profession; last year the country recorded 34 fatalities, an all-time low, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.

China, one of the world's deadliest places for mining, has seen improvements in the safety of its mines, albeit from the high numbers of accidents in past years. In 2009, 2,631 people died in Chinese mines, down from a peak of 6,995 in 2002.

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Drug Giants Tackle 'Neglected' Effort

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

Scientists at the La Jolla laboratories of Novartis are taking part in an unusual assignment for the pharmaceutical industry--finding drugs for some diseases with little or no moneymaking potential.

Using powerful genetic-analysis tools more commonly targeted to cancer and other diseases prevalent in industrialized nations, researchers are studying patterns that underlie malaria and tuberculosis in developing countries and more obscure conditions such as leishmaniasis and Chagas' disease.

It's part of an increased effort by the pharmaceutical industry to pursue treatments for "neglected" diseases for which drugs either don't exist or don't work well. It also includes diseases, such as HIV/AIDS, for which large numbers of people in developing countries are not being treated.

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Swirling Dust Shocks Physicists

from Nature News

Scientists have explained how lightning can occur even in the driest deserts. A new theory describes how neutral dust can gain an electrical life of its own.

For centuries, researchers have known that clouds of neutral particles can sometimes gain a net charge. This can cause even the driest sand to generate lightning, and sugar refineries and coal-processing plants can experience unexpected explosions. Most researchers have ascribed such events to static build-up, but Troy Shinbrot, a physicist at Rutgers University in Piscataway, New Jersey, was unconvinced. Under normal conditions, sand and dust don't conduct electricity, he says, so how could they generate fields strong enough to spark massive lightning bolts? ...

Shinbrot sat up at night for months thinking about it, and eventually he developed a theory. He began by visualizing the sand particles as party balloons. In an electric field, he thought, the balloons would polarize: In other words, each balloon would develop a positive and negative hemisphere.

http://snipr.com/vfix0


Laser Nuclear Technology Might Pose Security Risk

from National Public Radio

World leaders have gathered in Washington to talk about how to limit the spread of nuclear weapons. The discussions are mainly about keeping actual weapons, and weapons-grade material, under strict control.

Some researchers are also concerned about the spread of a new technology that could make it much easier to secretly refine uranium for bombs.

Right now, the technology to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons is big and cumbersome. Typically, countries build enormous centrifuge plants. And Francis Slakey, a physicist at Georgetown University, says it's relatively easy to catch wind of a project like that.

http://snipr.com/vfixd


Tipping Point Not Likely for Arctic Sea Ice

from Wired

A late-winter expansion of Arctic sea ice is a good example of ice-forming dynamics that could keep the Arctic from hitting a "tipping point" in the near future.

Some scientists have predicted that rising temperatures could create a runaway feedback loop in the Arctic. Sunlight-reflecting ice sheets would give way to sunlight-absorbing water, driving up temperatures and melting even more ice. The Arctic climate would change so dramatically that winter ice couldn't form again, producing planet-wide ripples in weather patterns.

But some research suggests that other, previously underappreciated forces may stabilize the melt before it's complete. The Arctic will soon be ice-free in summer, and winter ice will decline, but it won't suddenly become permanently ice-free.

http://snipr.com/vfixt


Building a Green Economy

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

If you listen to climate scientists ... it is long past time to do something about emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. If we continue with business as usual, they say, we are facing a rise in global temperatures that will be little short of apocalyptic. And to avoid that apocalypse, we have to wean our economy from the use of fossil fuels, coal above all.

But is it possible to make drastic cuts in greenhouse-gas emissions without destroying our economy?

Like the debate over climate change itself, the debate over climate economics looks very different from the inside than it often does in popular media. The casual reader might have the impression that there are real doubts about whether emissions can be reduced without inflicting severe damage on the economy. In fact, once you filter out the noise generated by special-interest groups, you discover that there is widespread agreement among environmental economists that a market-based program to deal with the threat of climate change ... can achieve large results at modest, though not trivial, cost.

http://snipr.com/vfiyb
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 14, 2010, 12:41:15 AM
Today's Headlines - April 13, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Studying Sea Life for a Glue That Mends People

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

SALT LAKE CITY -- Along one wall of Russell J. Stewart's laboratory at the University of Utah sits a saltwater tank containing a strange object: a rock-hard lump the size of a soccer ball, riddled with hundreds of small holes. ... It's a home of sorts, occupied by a colony of Phragmatopoma californica, otherwise known as the sandcastle worm.

... P. californica is a master mason, fashioning its tube, a shelter that it never leaves, from grains of sand and tiny bits of scavenged shell. ... Using a specialized organ on its head, it produces a microscopic dab or two of glue that it places, just so, on the existing structure. Then it wiggles a new grain into place and lets it set. What is most remarkable ... is that it does all this underwater.

... Dr. Stewart is one of a handful of researchers around the country who are developing adhesives that work in wet conditions, with worms, mussels, barnacles and other marine creatures as their guide. While there are many possible applications ... the biggest goal is to make glues for use in the ultimate wet environment: the human body.

http://snipr.com/vgf30


China Research Hurt by Plagiarism, Faked Results

from the San Francisco Chronicle

(Associated Press) -- When professors in China need to author research papers to get promoted, many turn to people like Lu Keqian. Working on his laptop in a cramped spare bedroom, the former schoolteacher ghostwrites for professors, students, government offices--anyone willing to pay his fee, typically about 300 yuan ($45).

"My opinion is that writing papers for someone else is not wrong," he said. "There will always be a time when one needs help from others. Even our great leaders Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping needed help writing."

Ghostwriting, plagiarizing or faking results is so rampant in Chinese academia that some experts worry it could hinder China's efforts to become a leader in science. The communist government views science as critical to China's modernization, and the latest calls for government spending on science and technology to grow by 8 percent to 163 billion yuan ($24 billion) this year.

http://snipr.com/vgf59


New Atlas Aims to Show State of World's Ecosystems

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

What does it take to determine which of the world's 9,800 bird species depend on fresh water for survival? Try devoting two months' worth of evenings and weekends to reading the descriptions of every known avian species, which is what Timothy Boucher did.

"Being a fanatic birder, I decided this could be really fun," recalled Boucher, a senior conservation geographer at the Nature Conservancy who has personally seen and identified 4,257 species of birds in his life. So his "life list," as birders say, covers 43 percent of the bird species that exist. The result of Boucher's work--a map showing the wetlands and rivers on which 828 freshwater bird species depend--is part of the Atlas of Global Conservation, a new publication that shows how nature is faring across the globe.

Environmental researchers evaluate the state of nature in a number of ways--by listing the most imperiled species, focusing on particular habitats or detailing the pace of human activities that transform the planet. But mapmaking, which provides a visual account of how different ecological regions are faring, provides one of the most easily accessible ways of depicting of the global environment.

http://snipr.com/vgf67


Aerospace Business Has Its Doubts About Plans to Revamp NASA

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Boeing and Lockheed Martin, the aerospace giants with decades of experience working on America's space program, will happily sell rockets to carry astronauts into space, but the companies are leery about taking a leading role in President Obama's vision for a revamped National Aeronautics and Space Administration.

The prospect of NASA relying on smaller companies--unproven upstarts in the view of critics--could create yet another hurdle in convincing an already skeptical Congress of the idea of relying on commercial companies to provide taxi transportation to the International Space Station.

"I don't think there is a business case for us," John Karas, vice president and general manager of human spaceflight at Lockheed Martin, said about space taxis.

http://snipr.com/vgf9q


Ancient City Yielding New Clues in Michoacan, Mexico

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Colorado researchers have discovered and partially mapped a major urban center once occupied by the Purépecha of Mexico, a little-known people who fought the Aztecs to a standstill and who controlled much of western Mexico until diseases brought by the Spanish decimated them.

The "proto-urban center," which researchers have not yet named, sat on volcanic rock on the shores of Lake Pátzcuaro in the central Mexican state of Michoacan, now a tourist destination. It supported as many as 40,000 people until the consolidation of the Purépecha empire about AD 1350 led most of its inhabitants to relocate to the new capital of Tzintzuntzan, six miles away.

"What's really interesting about the site is that it gives us a window into the pre-state period when social complexity was increasing and people were congregating together and starting to modify the landscape," said archaeologist Christopher Fisher of Colorado State University, who will present the findings this week at a St. Louis meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

http://snipr.com/vgfa6


A Whale-Watch of Vital Significance

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

OFF THE COAST OF PROVINCETOWN -- Charles "Stormy" Mayo descends from a long line of men who have made their living on the sea, but with one big difference. His forebears sometimes hunted the whales that appear off the shores of Cape Cod each spring. He is trying to save them.

Mayo leads a small crew of scientists who are studying the North Atlantic right whale to learn more about the habitat and habits of one of the most endangered animal species on the planet, to better understand and protect the rare leviathans. And here on the research vessel Shearwater, about 5 miles southwest of Herring Cove Beach in Provincetown, is one of the best places in the world to do it.

Some 25 to 40 of the great marine mammals, which can grow 55 feet long and weigh more than 70 tons, have come here to feed, and yesterday the tiny animals that draw them to these waters were teeming on the surface in billowing pink clouds. About a dozen of the giants glided just feet from the Shearwater's busy deck, skimming zooplankton from the water with the great baleen filters that line their mouths instead of teeth.

http://snipr.com/vgfak


Is It Fair to Patent Genes?

from USA Today

For Lisbeth Ceriani, news that a judge had invalidated the patent on the gene that almost killed her was a victory. Gene patents, she says, are "turning our bodies into commerce." Ceriani, of Newton, Mass., developed an aggressive form of cancer in both breasts at age 42. She wanted to be tested for mutations in the BRCA gene, which would tell her whether she was also at high risk for ovarian cancer.

But it took an agonizing year and a half, because the company that makes the tests and owns the patent on the gene had chosen not to contract with her insurance provider, MassHealth, a form of Medicaid, because the rate of reimbursement wasn't high enough. Only when the company, Myriad Genetics of Salt Lake City, donated 200 tests to the state was she able to be tested, she says.

"I didn't want to just go ahead and have my ovaries removed if I didn't necessarily have to," Ceriani says. The results showed she had the mutation. Ceriani had her ovaries removed prophylactically in December. In the interim, her cancer went into remission, and she joined a lawsuit to overturn Myriad's patent.

http://snipr.com/vgfc1


'Life As We Don't Know It' in the Universe?

from the Christian Science Monitor

Scientists studying the Saturn's largest moon, Titan, are beginning to challenge perhaps the most commonly repeated five words in the search for life in the universe. "Life as we know it."

From the dun plains of Meridiani on Mars to the "cool Jupiter" exoplanet CoRoT-9b circling a distant star in the constellation Serpens, scientists have put a premium on finding worlds that have the potential for liquid water, which enables life on Earth.

But in Titan, scientists have found a world that, some suggest, could point to an exception to the rule. Might life exist without liquid water? Increasingly, Titan is becoming the focus of a movement to consider the possible existence of "life as we don't know it."

http://snipr.com/vgfcx


Mapping the Fruit Fly Brain

from Science News

WASHINGTON -- A new computer-based technique is exploring uncharted territory in the fruit fly brain with cell-by-cell detail that can be built into networks for a detailed look at how neurons work together. The research may ultimately lead to a complete master plan of the entire fly brain.

Mapping the estimated 100,000 neurons in a fly brain, and seeing how they interact to control behavior, will be a powerful tool for figuring out how the billions of neurons in the human brain work.

The program has already found some new features of the fruit fly brain, said study coauthor Hanchuan Peng of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Janelia Farm Research Campus in Ashburn, Va. "We can see very beautiful and very complicated patterns," said Peng, who presented the results April 9 at the 51st Annual Drosophila Research Conference. "If you look at neurons at a better resolution, or look at regions you've never looked at before, you'll find something new."

http://snipr.com/vgfdi


Near-Death Experiences Explained?

from National Geographic News (Registration Required)

Near-death experiences are tricks of the mind triggered by an overload of carbon dioxide in the bloodstream, a new study suggests.

Many people who have recovered from life-threatening injuries have said they experienced their lives flashing before their eyes, saw bright lights, left their bodies, or encountered angels or dead loved ones.

In the new study, researchers investigated whether different levels of oxygen and carbon dioxide--the main blood gases--play a role in the mysterious phenomenon. The team studied 52 heart attack patients who had been admitted to three major hospitals and were eventually resuscitated. Eleven of the patients reported near-death experiences.

http://snipr.com/vgfel
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 14, 2010, 12:42:12 AM
Today's Headlines - April 14, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Maternal Deaths Decline Sharply Across the Globe

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

For the first time in decades, researchers are reporting a significant drop worldwide in the number of women dying each year from pregnancy and childbirth, to about 342,900 in 2008 from 526,300 in 1980.

The findings, published in the medical journal The Lancet, challenge the prevailing view of maternal mortality as an intractable problem that has defied every effort to solve it. "The overall message, for the first time in a generation, is one of persistent and welcome progress," the journal's editor, Dr. Richard Horton, wrote in a comment accompanying the article, published online on Monday.

The study cited a number of reasons for the improvement: lower pregnancy rates in some countries; higher income, which improves nutrition and access to health care; more education for women; and the increasing availability of "skilled attendants"--people with some medical training--to help women give birth. Improvements in large countries like India and China helped to drive down the overall death rates.

http://snipr.com/vh8q8


Distant Planets Rattle Theories With Their Orbit

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Some highly unusual planets orbiting other stars are calling into question current theories about how solar systems are formed and suggesting that more complex theories must be developed.

European researchers reported Tuesday that some of the recently observed extrasolar planets are revolving around their stars in the opposite direction from the stars' spin. That finding is inconsistent with the view that planets are formed by the condensation of dust from a disk surrounding a newly formed star.

Some other planets were found to have highly tilted orbits that are also at odds with conventional theory. The findings also suggest that planets with such eccentric orbits would destroy any smaller, rocky planets, eliminating the chance that an Earth-like planet could be orbiting around that same star.

http://snipr.com/vh8rx


Ancient Human-Like Creature's Skull Probed

from BBC News Online

X-rays show in stunning detail the interior of the skull of a new human-like creature found in South Africa. The hominid Australopithecus sediba was presented to the world last week. The X-ray images reveal information about the ancient animal's brain and tantalising evidence of the insects that may have fed on the dead body.

Its discoverers say it fills a key gap between older creatures and the group of more modern species known as Homo, which includes our own kind. The work was conducted at the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble, France, which has developed expertise in the non-destructive study of fossils.

Probing such artefacts with a brilliant light source is the only way to see inside the specimens without actually breaking them apart. South African researchers took the skull of the juvenile, 1.9-million-year-old creature, and many other parts of its skeleton, to the European facility for a two-week investigation.

http://snipr.com/vh8sh


Obama Revives Capsule From Canceled Moon Program

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- President Barack Obama is reviving the NASA crew capsule concept that he had canceled with the rest of the moon program earlier this year, in a move that will mean more jobs and less reliance on the Russians, officials said Tuesday.

The space capsule, called Orion, still won't go to the moon. It will go unmanned to the International Space Station to stand by as an emergency vehicle to return astronauts home, officials said.

Administration officials also said NASA will speed up development of a massive rocket. It would have the power to blast crew and cargo far from Earth, although no destination has been chosen yet. The rocket would be ready to launch several years earlier than under the old moon plan. The two moves are being announced before a Thursday visit to Cape Canaveral, Fla., by Obama. They are designed to counter criticism of the Obama administration's space plans as being low on detail, physical hardware and local jobs.

http://snipr.com/vh8td


Panel to Take Broad View of Bioethics

from Nature News

US President Barack Obama last week announced the full membership of his bioethics advisory council, unveiling a more diverse body and one that is likely to have a greater impact on policy than its predecessor.

In the past decade, ethical questions in science have made headlines on issues such as the patenting of human genes, financial conflicts of interest in biomedical research and risk assessments related to environmental exposure to chemicals. These issues were largely ignored by the bioethics commission established by former president George W. Bush, which maintained a relatively narrow focus on stem cells, cloning and abortion.

But all fall within the remit of the new Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues, as outlined by the executive order which established it in November 2009. Obama had already broken with the past by not appointing a bioethicist to chair the commission, instead selecting Amy Gutmann, a political scientist at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

http://snipr.com/vh8uc


New Force Behind Agency of Wonder

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

ARLINGTON, Va. -- The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is different from other federal agencies. For one thing, the agency, known as Darpa, created the Internet (really). For another, it is probably the only agency ever to offer a $40,000 prize for a balloon hunt, a contest that was inspired by Regina Dugan, a 47-year-old expert in mine detection, who took over last summer as its director.

Dr. Dugan, who has a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the California Institute of Technology, is the first woman to be the director of Darpa, and those who know her say she has a knack for inspiring, and indeed insisting on, creative thinking.

Last December's balloon hunt, otherwise known as the Darpa Network Challenge, is a good example. In marking the 40th anniversary of the connecting of the first four nodes of the Internet in 1969, the agency offered a $40,000 prize to the first team of volunteers able to locate 10 large red balloons hidden around the country. The task only sounds frivolous. It was actually something that experts agreed was impossible using traditional intelligence techniques. The challenge was designed to test new methods, involving the use of social networks.

http://snipr.com/vh8v8


Earth-Like Planets May Abound in the Milky Way

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Maybe Frank Drake was right. Nearly half a century ago, the American astronomer postulated that, based on pure statistical probability, the Milky Way could be teeming with Earth-like planets.

Now observations of formerly sunlike stars called white dwarfs suggest that the overwhelming majority of them once harbored at least one rocky world. And because sunlike stars could account for up to half of the Milky Way's population of several hundred billion suns, that means hundreds or even thousands of civilizations might inhabit our galaxy.

The question of how many rocky worlds exist in the galaxy has perplexed astronomers for the better part of a century. Even now, technology hampers the search. Astronomers are years away from being able to image another Earth directly.

http://snipr.com/vh8vp


A Fresh Look at Mount St. Helens

from Science News

Just a stone's throw north of Mount St. Helens, the oddly hummocky terrain is covered with a patchwork of vegetation and small ponds. Sediment-rich rivers thread through and meander across floodplains once hidden beneath lush, tall forests. Although harshly pruned in the recent past, the region's tree of life is beginning to sprout with vigor.

It has been nearly 30 years since the largest volcanic eruption ever observed in the lower 48 states pulverized the top of Mount St. Helens into a roiling cloud of rock and ash. A 550-square-kilometer swath of the Pacific Northwest--an area about three times the size of the District of Columbia--was almost immediately transformed from vibrant ecosystem to denuded wasteland.

In the decades since, the region has been a natural laboratory for studying the processes that bring life back in the aftermath of devastation. Ecological recovery has proceeded more quickly than many scientists thought possible, but has nevertheless been a slow and halting affair.

http://snipr.com/vh8w5


Does Stress Feed Cancer?

from Scientific American

A little stress can do us good--it pushes us to compete and innovate. But chronic stress can increase the risk of diseases such as depression, heart disease and even cancer. Studies have shown that stress might promote cancer indirectly by weakening the immune system's anti-tumor defense or by encouraging new tumor-feeding blood vessels to form.

But a new study published April 12 in The Journal of Clinical Investigation shows that stress hormones, such as adrenaline, can directly support tumor growth and spread. For normal cells to thrive in the body, "they need to be attached to their neighbors and their surroundings," says the study's lead author Anil Sood from The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

Cells that detach from their environment undergo a form of programmed cell death called anoikis. "But cancer cells have come up with way to bypass this effect--they avoid anoikis," Sood says. ... So Sood wondered: Could stress affect anoikis? "It surprised us that this biology hadn't been studied before," he notes. "Stress influences so many normal physiological processes. Why wouldn't it be involved in tumor progression?"

http://snipr.com/vh8zn


Rethinking Internal Combustion Engines

from New Scientist

It may seem dirty and outdated compared with the batteries that power electric vehicles, but the internal combustion engine is set for a makeover that could halve its greenhouse gas emissions.

Today's engines are pretty inefficient, converting only around a quarter of the energy contained in fuel into motion; the remaining three-quarters is lost as heat. So efforts are under way to recover some of this lost energy in the hope of reducing fuel consumption and emissions.

Up to 40 percent of an engine's potential output is lost in its exhaust, says Guy Morris, engineering director at Controlled Power Technologies based in Laindon, UK. The company plans to recover some of this energy by fitting a turbine inside the tailpipe: the fast-moving exhaust gases coming straight from the engine drive the turbine, generating electricity.

http://snipr.com/vh90b
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 14, 2010, 12:55:36 AM
oday's Headlines - April 15, 2010

For more updates, follow @AmSciMag on Twitter!


Research Offers Promise for Diabetics

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Boston researchers have made a major step toward the development of an artificial pancreas that overcomes the bugaboo of most previous such attempts--dangerously low blood sugar caused by injection of too much insulin.

Their experimental device secretes two hormones normally produced by the pancreas--insulin and its counterbalancing hormone, called glucagon--and has been shown to control blood sugar levels in about a dozen people for at least 24 hours, they reported Wednesday. The team is now planning longer trials as they gear up for what they hope will be approval by the Food and Drug Administration in as little as seven years.

"This is a very important proof-of-concept study," said Dr. Irl B. Hirsch, an endocrinologist at the University of Washington School of Medicine, who was not involved in the research. "It was becoming obvious that if we were ever going to get [an artificial pancreas], we would have to use both hormones. ... The fact that they have been able to do so successfully is very big and very exciting news."

http://snipr.com/vi38t


Bill Seeks to Overhaul U.S. Chemical Laws

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

After a year of working with environmental groups, government regulators and the chemical industry, a leading advocate for chemical regulation has devised a plan to remake the nation's chemical laws--a 34-year-old set of regulations that all players agree is outmoded and ineffective.

The plan, contained in legislation that Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) is set to file Thursday, would require manufacturers to prove the safety of chemicals before they enter the marketplace. That would be a significant departure from current laws, which allow chemicals to be used unless the federal government can prove they cause harm to health or the environment.

"We're saying those who make the chemicals--and there are 700 new ones that come to market each year--ought to be responsible for testing them first before they're released to the public, instead of having the EPA play detective to search and try to find problems," Lautenberg said. The bill would also mandate that manufacturers submit health and safety data to the EPA for 84,000 chemicals in use. The agency would review the information to determine whether the chemicals are safe enough to remain on the market.

http://snipr.com/vi3fk


"Biggest" Comet Measured

from National Geographic News

The Great Comet of 2007 made an even bigger impression on the solar system than anyone realized, according to a new study that measured the size of the comet's wake.

In January 2007 people around the world watched comet McNaught streak across the sky. It was the brightest comet seen since 1965 and, in some places, was visible to the naked eye in broad daylight. The visible tail was about 35 degrees long, or roughly the same apparent size as 70 full moons lined up in the night sky.

By chance, the European Space Agency's Ulysses spacecraft plowed through the width of the comet's tail in February 2007. Designed to study the sun's atmosphere, the probe was able to record information on how the comet's passage affected the solar wind, which is actually charged particles constantly streaming from the sun.

http://snipr.com/vi3gi


Physicists Untangle the Geometry of Rope

from Science News

Researchers have unraveled the mathematics that keeps ropes from unwinding. The trick lies in the number of times each strand in a rope is twisted, say Jakob Bohr and Kasper Olsen, physicists at the Technical University of Denmark in Lyngby. Their paper was posted online April 6 at arXiv.org.

In a traditional rope, each individual strand is twisted as much as possible in one direction. The twisted strands are then wound together in a spiral shape called a helix, which itself rotates in the opposite direction. The interlocking of these twists and countertwists gives the rope strength so that when yanked, it does not unwind.

By plotting a rope's length against the number of twistings in each strand, Bohr and Olsen discovered that there is a maximum number of times each strand can be twisted--resulting in what they call the "zero-twist point" for the overall rope. A good rope is always in the zero-twist configuration.

http://snipr.com/vi3hc


The Cost of Scientific Misconduct

from Seed

... How does the research community respond to a retraction? Janet Stemwedel, an ethicist at San Jose State University, discusses one such study at her blog, Adventures in Ethics and Science. A team led by Anne Victoria Neale examined 102 cases where published research articles involved fraud or misconduct.

Their study was published in the journal Science and Engineering Ethics in 2007. While nearly every article was either retracted or corrected, Neale's team wanted to know if the articles had an influence on other research. They found that an astonishing 5,393 articles cited those reports!

Stemwedel points out that Neale and her fellow researchers didn't analyze those articles for context: It could be that citations of the fraudulent or unethical work were made in order to show that the research couldn't be replicated.

http://snipr.com/vi3i6


Researchers ID Alzheimer's Risk Gene

from the Miami Herald (Registration Required)

University of Miami researchers have identified a gene that appears to double a person's risk of developing late-onset Alzheimer's disease. They called the finding a small step toward understanding and fighting the debilitating disease, which affects five million Americans.

"I hope that in the next five to 10 years we can see major improvements--a combination of therapies and prevention through exercise, both physical and mental, diet and other things," said Margaret Pericak-Vance. She is director of the John P. Hussman Institute for Human Genomics at the UM Medical School and principal investigator in the study.

The study was presented Tuesday at the 62nd Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Neurology in Toronto. Finding the gene "will help us better understand how this disease develops and potentially serve as a marker for people who may be at increased risk," said Adam Naj, an author of the report, who also works at the Hussman Institute.

http://snipr.com/vi3j5


Newfound Neighbor to Solar System Is a Cool Slacker

from Science News

The solar system is surrounded by a bunch of abject failures, a new discovery suggests. Astronomers have found the nearest known brown dwarf, or failed star, residing about 9 light-years from Earth.

That places this brown dwarf among the 10 closest stellar or substellar systems to the solar system, researchers report in an article posted online April 5. Its temperature, about baking temp in a home oven, makes it the coolest brown dwarf known.

... Astronomers calculate, based on the percentage of stars that fail to develop in young star clusters, that brown dwarfs should be at least as common in the Milky Way as stars. The new finding, combined with recent discoveries of other nearby brown dwarfs, suggests that the solar neighborhood is rife with these dim, hard-to-detect bodies.

http://snipr.com/vi3jy


Panel Clears Researchers in 'Climategate' Controversy

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Climate change researchers accused of manipulating or hiding data in last year's "Climategate" affair were guilty of sloppy record-keeping but not bad science, an independent panel in Britain concluded Wednesday.

Allegations that the researchers deliberately misrepresented data to promote the idea of human-caused global warming rocked the scientific community in November, just as world leaders were preparing for an international environmental summit.

The allegations, by skeptics of climate change, were based on e-mails hacked from the University of East Anglia in eastern England, including one in which a scientist wrote of using a "trick" to mask an apparent decline in recent global temperatures. But a panel of experts tasked with examining the underlying science said it "saw no evidence of any deliberate scientific malpractice in any of the work" by the university's Climatic Research Unit.

http://snipr.com/vi3kh


'Very Little Progress' Made Against Hospital Infections

from USA Today

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- The nation's hospitals are failing to protect patients from potentially fatal infections despite years of prevention campaigns, the government said Tuesday.

The Health and Human Services department's 2009 quality report to Congress found "very little progress" on eliminating hospital-acquired infections and called for "urgent attention" to address the shortcomings--first brought to light a decade ago.

Of five major types of serious hospital-related infections, rates of illnesses increased for three, one showed no progress, and one showed a decline. As many as 98,000 people a year die from medical errors, and preventable infections--along with medication mixups--are a significant part of the problem.

http://snipr.com/vi3la


Japanese Whale Meat 'Being Sold in US and Korea'

from BBC News Online

Scientists say they have found clear proof that meat from whales captured under Japan's whaling programme is being sold in US and Korean eateries. The researchers say they used genetic fingerprinting to identify meat taken from a Los Angeles restaurant as coming from a sei whale sold in Japan.

They say the discovery proves that an illegal trade in protected species still exists. Whale meat was also allegedly found at an unnamed Seoul sushi restaurant. Commercial whaling has been frozen by an international moratorium since 1986.

But a controversial exemption allows Japan to kill several hundred whales each year for what is termed scientific research. The meat from these whales is then sold to the public in shops and restaurants in that country.

http://snipr.com/vi3mk

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: NotPublished on May 14, 2010, 04:19:59 AM
Thank you soo much for that Kai!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 14, 2010, 04:22:45 AM
Sorting email backlogs takes time. You're welcome.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 20, 2010, 09:02:26 PM
Gulf Oil Now in Powerful Loop Current

from BBC News Online

The first oil from the Gulf of Mexico spill has entered an ocean current that could take it to Florida and up the east coast of the US, scientists say. The European Space Agency said satellite images suggested oil could reach the coral reefs of the Florida Keys within six days.

"We have visible proof that at least oil from the surface... has reached the current," said Dr Bertrand Chapron.

Meanwhile, the US said it was having talks with Cuba over the spill. Observers say the talks demonstrate a concern that the oil may be carried by currents far from the site of the Deep Horizon disaster.

http://ow.ly/1NBsx

House GOP Stops Major Science, Technology Bill

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- It was strike two for a major science funding bill Wednesday as House Republicans again united to derail legislation they said was too expensive.

Going down to defeat was the COMPETES Act, which would have committed more than $40 billion over three years to boost funding for the National Science Foundation and other federal agencies involved in basic and applied science, provided loan guarantees to small businesses developing new technologies and promoted science and math education.

Congress enacted a first version of the legislation in 2007 with a large majority in the House and a unanimous vote in the Senate. But in this election year, with Republicans out to show their anti-spending credentials and intent on disrupting the Democratic agenda, things are different.

http://ow.ly/1NBt7

Argonauts Use Shells as Flotation Devices

from Science News

After centuries of speculation, biologists have documented one way a strange group of octopuslike creatures use their seashell-shaped cases.

Female argonauts, a group of four species that are close cousins of octopuses, grow delicate white shell-like cases. Biologists have found argonauts with air bubbles in their cases, and now it turns out the animals use the trapped air to float at a comfortable depth, says Julian Finn of Museum Victoria in Melbourne, Australia.

In the first reports from scuba observations of wild argonauts, Finn maneuvered Argonauta argo females so air escaped from their cases. The animals flailed as if struggling to maintain their orientation and quickly jetted to the water surface.

http://ow.ly/1NBvO

Neglected Diseases: Teach or Treat?

from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Scientists are taking the debate over how to address neglected tropical diseases to the pages of [the journal] PLoS Medicine, with one camp arguing in favor of more drug development, and another pushing for more funding and research on public health strategies such as sanitation and education.

In 2005, researchers coined the term "neglected tropical diseases" to refer to thirteen diseases primarily occurring in rural, poor areas that have been largely ignored by policymakers and public health officials. These diseases, including sleeping sickness, river blindness, hookworm infection and more, traditionally fall second in attention and funding to "the big three"--HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis.

In the last five years, however, neglected tropical diseases have experienced a hike in funding from private and government sources, including a recent boost from the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama. But there is disagreement about how that money should be used.

http://ow.ly/1NBym

Scientists Urge Carbon Tax or Cap-and-Trade

from the Chicago Tribune

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Ditching its past cautious tone, the nation's top scientists urged the government Wednesday to take drastic action to raise the cost of using coal and oil to slow global warming.

The National Academy of Sciences specifically called for a carbon tax on fossil fuels or a cap-and-trade system for curbing greenhouse gas emissions, calling global warming an urgent threat.

The academy, which advises the government on scientific matters, said the nation needs to cut the pollution that causes global warming by about 57 percent to 83 percent by 2050. That's close to President Barack Obama's goal.

http://ow.ly/1NBAo

The Expanding Mind

from Seed

Scarcely a decade has passed since scientists painstakingly sequenced the first bacterial genome, yet today automated human genome sequencing is becoming routine, heralding a new era of medicine. Replacement tissues and even organs can now be grown from a patient's own cells and used without risk of immune rejection. Genetic therapies for a plethora of debilitating conditions are on the horizon; brain and body imaging technologies allow early discovery of potentially harmful pathologies.

But as these developments have unfolded, another area of research has simultaneously matured to rival them in its dramatic potential to help people. It's called neuroengineering.

My colleagues and I have expected these events for years, but we are still awed by the results; some things are so powerful that, even if you know they are coming, they remain breathtaking when they actually arrive. Watching a person move a robotic limb or control the functions of a computer, through thought alone, we have little choice but to stare in amazement. These breakthroughs were made possible by prototype brain-computer interfaces (BCIs), which allow direct communication between the brain and external devices.

http://ow.ly/1NBCx

Female Damselflies Prefer Hot Males

from BBC News Online

Female damselflies prefer hot males, scientists have revealed.

Male damselflies perform elaborate courtship displays, attracting females with high-speed flying manoeuvres. Now a new imaging study reveals that males that warm their bodies by flying in the sun are indeed 'hot stuff' and attract more females.

Hot-bodied males may benefit females by having access to the warmest territories, which in turn are optimal sites to lay eggs, the scientists say.

http://ow.ly/1NBFJ

Malaria May Not Rise as World Warms

from Nature News

Of the many climate-change catastrophes facing humankind, the anticipated spread of infectious tropical diseases is one of the most frequently cited--and most alarming. But a paper in this week's Nature adds to the growing voice of dissent from epidemiologists who challenge the prediction that global warming will fuel a worldwide increase in malaria.

On the surface, the connection between malaria and climate change is intuitive: higher temperatures are known to boost mosquito populations and the frequency with which they bite. And more mosquito bites mean more malaria.

Yet when epidemiologists Peter Gething and Simon Hay of the Malaria Atlas Project at the University of Oxford, UK, and their colleagues compiled data on the incidence of malaria in 1900 and 2007, they found the opposite: despite rising temperatures during the twentieth century, malaria has lost ground.

http://ow.ly/1NBIM

Exploding Stars May Be New Type of Supernova

from ScienceNOW Daily News

There's more than one way to blow up a star--in fact, scientists know of two. But could there be a third? A team of astronomers has identified two supernovae that don't seem to fit into established categories, though another team claims that there's not much new about them. If the first team is right, it could solve a longstanding mystery about the origins of one of the basic elements needed for life.

The first type of supernova occurs when one star in a binary pair explodes. A white dwarf star, roughly the mass of our sun, keeps snatching excess gas from its close-orbiting stellar companion. At a certain point, the extra gas renders the consuming star unstable, like a balloon filling with too much air, and the accumulated gas triggers a thermonuclear explosion so powerful that the star blows itself completely out of existence.

This class of supernovae include what are called Type Ia, the brightness and duration of which are so precise that astronomers use them to gauge distances to other galaxies and to track the rate of acceleration of the universe.

http://ow.ly/1NBLD

Wine's Anti-Aging Ingredient: Can It Spawn New Drugs?

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

For years, Sirtris Pharmaceuticals grabbed headlines for its scientific success in pursuit of a tantalizing goal: drugs that could fight aging itself.

The Cambridge company, built on the discovery that an ingredient found in red wine had life-lengthening effects in yeast, sparked the public imagination and became a biotech success story. In 2008, it was purchased by GlaxoSmithKline for $720 million.

But even as Sirtris and others have published results showing the promise of the ingredient, resveratrol, against diseases of aging, several groups of researchers have questioned whether the original findings that led the company to create a new class of pharmaceuticals really explain why the drugs work.

http://ow.ly/1NBMV
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 20, 2010, 09:27:47 PM
May 19, 2010
Fishing Ban Is Expanded as Spill's Impact Becomes More Evident

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration greatly expanded the fishing ban in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday in response to spreading oil from the BP well blowout. The prohibited area now covers 19 percent of the gulf, nearly double what it was, according to the agency.

Officials are already seeing some impact on fish and wildlife in the region. Rowan W. Gould, the acting director of the Fish and Wildlife Service, said 156 sea turtle fatalities had been recorded in the gulf since April 30, about 100 more than usual at this time of year.

Mr. Gould also said that a small number of oily birds, 35, had been recovered, including 23 dead birds directly linked to the spill.

http://ow.ly/1N3o9


Oldest Mesoamerican Pyramid Tomb Found in Mexico

from the San Francisco Chronicle

MEXICO CITY (Associated Press) -- Archaeologists in southern Mexico announced Monday they have discovered a 2,700-year-old tomb of a dignitary inside a pyramid that may be the oldest such burial documented in Mesoamerica.

The tomb held a man aged around 50, who was buried with jade collars, pyrite and obsidian artifacts and ceramic vessels. Archaeologist Emiliano Gallaga said the tomb dates to between 500 and 700 B.C.

Based on the layers in which it was found and the tomb's unusual wooden construction, "we think this is one of the earliest discoveries of the use of a pyramid as a tomb, not only as a religious site or temple," Gallaga said.

http://ow.ly/1N3pk


NASA Wants Mission to Bring Martian Rocks to Earth

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

MONROVIA, Calif. (Associated Press) -- If NASA's exploration of Mars were summed up in a bumper sticker, it would read: "Follow the water." Well, we've found the water--ice was discovered by the Phoenix lander in 2008. Now what?

It's time to search again for signs of life, scientists say, something they haven't done since 1976. This time, they want to bring Martian rock and soil samples back to Earth. Here, they could be analyzed for fossilized traces of alien bacteria, or chemical or biological clues that could only be explained by something that was alive.

Such a venture as now outlined would be a three-part act, cost as much as $10 billion and take several years to complete. NASA can't afford it on its own so it recently joined the European Space Agency to map out a shared project.

http://ow.ly/1N3sq


Creatures of Cambrian May Have Lived On

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Ever since their discovery in 1909, the spectacular Burgess Shale outcrops in the Canadian Rockies have presented scientists with a cornucopia of evidence for the "explosion" of complex, multicellular life beginning some 550 million years ago.

The fossils, all new to science, were at first seen as little more than amazing curiosities from a time when life, except for bacteria and algae, was confined to the sea--and what is now Canada was just south of the Equator. In the last half century, however, paleontologists recognized that the Burgess Shale exemplified the radiation of diverse life forms unlike anything in earlier time. Here was evolution in action, organisms over time responding to changing fortunes through natural experimentation in new body forms and different ecological niches.

But the fossil record then goes dark: the Cambrian-period innovations in life appeared to have few clear descendants. Many scientists thought that the likely explanation for this mysterious disappearance was that a major extinction had wiped out much of the distinctive Cambrian life. It seemed that the complex organisms emerging in the Cambrian had come to an abrupt demise, disappearing with few traces in the later fossil record.

http://ow.ly/1N3tU


Postpartum Depression Strikes New Fathers Too

from Time

Postpartum depression is a familiar rite of new parenthood. Feelings of emptiness, sadness and anxiety settle in after the birth of a child, and in severe cases last for months. It turns out that this common condition, once considered the province of the mother, may affect many new fathers too.

Researchers at Eastern Virginia Medical School, publishing an analysis of 43 past studies in the Journal of the American Medical Association on Tuesday, report that up to 10% of fathers may experience postpartum depression (PPD) after the birth of a child.

That figure comes as a surprise, even to the authors, who had been studying paternal PPD for several years, especially because it doubles the average risk of depression found in the male population in general--which is only about 5%. "It is surprising and novel that the rate is much higher than most people would guess or expect," says study author James Paulson. "This is a condition that is not recognized by many folks. Postpartum in men is an alien concept to most people."

http://ow.ly/1N3x8


Scientists Question Safety Of New Airport Scanners

from NPR

After the "underwear bomber" incident on Christmas Day, President Obama accelerated the deployment of new airport scanners that look beneath travelers' clothes to spot any weapons or explosives.

Fifty-two of these state-of-the-art machines are already scanning passengers at 23 U.S. airports. By the end of 2011, there will be 1,000 machines and two out of every three passengers will be asked to step into one of the new machines for a six-second head-to-toe scan before boarding.

About half of these machines will be so-called X-ray back-scatter scanners. They use low-energy X-rays to peer beneath passengers' clothing. That has some scientists worried.

http://ow.ly/1N3zW


Russian Module Added to Station

from BBC News Online

Astronauts have succeeded in attaching a new Russian module to the International Space Station (ISS). The 7m-long unit known as Rassvet was put in place in a delicate manoeuvre by the platform's robotic arm.

The module, brought up by the Atlantis shuttle, is a docking and storage facility.

As well as being packed with over a tonne of stores, it carries equipment for a Russian science lab which will join the ISS in 2012.

http://ow.ly/1N3BI


Behavioral Therapy Can Help Kids With Tourette Disorder

from Science News

An intensive course of behavioral therapy can limit the verbal and physical tics that plague some children with Tourette disorder, a new study finds. This form of therapy, in which a child learns simple ways to derail tics, led to improvement in more than half of children treated, scientists report in the May 19 Journal of the American Medical Association.

"I think this is groundbreaking," says clinical psychologist Martin Franklin of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, who didn't participate in the trial. "Clinically, we now have pretty powerful evidence of the efficacy of a behavioral treatment in this disorder."

Tourette disorder is characterized by short, rapid physical or vocal tics that can take the form of jerking motions, blinking, grimacing, blurting out words or throat clearing. These tics are brought on by urges. And much as a cigarette satisfies a smoker's need for nicotine, the tics seem to resolve these urges, but at a cost. People with Tourette disorder, which starts in childhood and affects about six in 1,000, can face isolation and social stigmatization.

http://ow.ly/1N3Eg


Study Links Coral Growth to Sound

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Coral larvae, tiny hair-covered sacs of cells, can "hear" reefs and actually swim toward them, researchers report. The finding suggests that sound is far more important in underwater ecosystem development than previously thought.

Further, marine biologists say, human noise pollution has the potential to block the larvae's ability to seek out nearby reefs and settle there, ultimately harming other marine life.

Coral are tiny sea creatures that build the rocky, often colorful structures associated with them; these structures ring islands and can span thousands of miles. In doing so, they provide an important ecological backbone for the world's marine life.

http://ow.ly/1N3Gz


The Climategate Chronicle

from Spiegel

To what extent is climate change actually occuring? Late last year, climate researchers were accused of exaggerating study results. SPIEGEL ONLINE has since analyzed the hacked "Climategate" e-mails and provided insights into one of the most unprecedented spats in recent scientific history.

Is our planet warming up by 1 degree Celsius, 2 degrees, or more? Is climate change entirely man made? And what can be done to counteract it? There are myriad possible answers to these questions, as well as scientific studies, measurements, debates and plans of action. Even most skeptics now concede that mankind--with its factories, heating systems and cars--contributes to the warming up of our atmosphere.

But the consequences of climate change are still hotly contested. It was therefore something of a political bombshell when unknown hackers stole more than 1,000 e-mails written by British climate researchers, and published some of them on the Internet. A scandal of gigantic proportions seemed about to break, and the media dubbed the affair "Climategate" in reference to the Watergate scandal that led to the resignation of US President Richard Nixon. Critics claimed the e-mails would show that climate change predictions were based on unsound calculations.

http://ow.ly/1N3HK
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 22, 2010, 11:15:59 PM
May 21, 2010
Genome From a Bottle

from Science News

Using a made-from-scratch genome, scientists have breathed a new kind of life into a bacterium. The feat, published May 21 in Science, holds great promise for creating designer organisms that might do things like produce vaccines, synthesize biofuels, purify water or eat spilled oil.

In the new study, researchers from the J. Craig Venter Institute carefully stitched together the entire genome of the bacteria Mycoplasma mycoides and put it into a different kind of bacteria, Mycoplasma capricolum. This unprecedented wholesale genome swap caused the M. capricolum cell to switch species. The newly converted cell was nearly identical to the natural M. mycoides.

"This was a proof of concept experiment showing that we could take the sequence out of a computer, build it and boot it up to make a synthetic cell," says study leader Daniel Gibson of the Venter Institute's campus in Rockville, Md.

http://ow.ly/1O7pT

Studies Link Infertility Treatments to Autism

from Time

Every parent of a child with autism wonders what might have caused the disorder. Does it secretly run in the family? Was there a toxic exposure during pregnancy? An infection in early infancy? Was the mother or father too old?

Amy Sawelson Landes of Tarzana, California, has asked herself all of these questions, plus one more: Could the fact that she had taken an infertility drug to get pregnant have contributed to her son Ted's autism? "It was one of the first things I wondered about," says Landes, who was 37 when Ted was born 18 years ago.

A study presented Wednesday at the International Meeting for Autism Research in Philadelphia provides some of strongest evidence to date that Landes might be onto something. The study, conducted by a team at the Harvard School of Public Health, found that autism was nearly twice as common among the children of women who were treated with the ovulation-inducing drug Clomid and other similar drugs than women who did not suffer from infertility, and the link persisted even after researchers accounted for the women's age.

http://ow.ly/1O7s7

EPA Demands a Less Toxic Dispersant in Gulf Spill

from the Miami Herald

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- The Environmental Protection Agency directed BP PLC on Thursday to use a less toxic form of chemical dispersants to break up the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, one of several steps the government took to crack down on the oil giant.

The moves come amid a growing sense of frustration with the company's failure to stop the spill and allow independent reviews of its work.

The Obama administration asked BP to make public all detailed information about the Gulf spill--including all measurements of the growing leak. A live video feed that shows oil gushing from the blown-out well was put online.

http://ow.ly/1O7t1

Vibrating Frogs Are Ready to Fight

from ScienceNOW Daily News

How do frogs demonstrate their bravery? By quivering like a coward. New research reveals that male red-eyed treefrogs (Agalychnis callidryas) shake a branch with their hind legs to signal a willingness to brawl with a rival. It's the first time researchers have seen this form of communication in tree-dwelling animals, and they say birds, lizards, and other creatures may similarly send signals through the branches.

Late at night in the wet jungles of Central America, red-eyed treefrog males sit on the branches of thin saplings and produce a sound called a "chack" to attract females. But when a rival homes in on a calling site, the two males pose aggressively and sometimes engage in fearsome wrestling matches. The fights can last hours, and, in some cases, both males end up locked in a grueling embrace, dangling by their hind legs from a branch.

During one of these fights, behavioral ecologist Michael Caldwell of Boston University observed an odd performance: the frogs briskly wiggling their butts up and down. Using a small accelerometer set on a tree branch, he and colleagues found that the victors in wrestling contests had vibrated more often and for longer than losers during the battle, and they were more likely to produce the final vibration....

http://ow.ly/1O8K2

One Day Your Pants May Power Up Your iPod

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Need juice for a dying iPod? You may soon be able to plug the gadget into a shirt, dance the electric slide and be good to go.

Researchers at UC Berkeley are perfecting microscopic fibers that can produce electricity from simple body motions such as bending, stretching and twisting. The filaments, which resemble tiny fishing lines, may soon be woven into clothing and sold as the ultimate portable generators.

It could take three years or more before it hits the store shelves, but the technology is already being hailed as a breakthrough. The so-called nanofibers "will have very significant implications," said Mihail Roco, senior advisor for nanotechnology with the National Science Foundation, which recently gave a $350,000 grant to the project.

http://ow.ly/1O7yI

Can a Black Hole Have an 'Aurora'?

from Discovery News

As our telescopes become more powerful, we are able to see more exotic cosmic objects. Eventually, we may even be able to take a snapshot of the supermassive black hole living in the center of our galaxy, but what will we see? According to two Japanese researchers, we might be able to spot a black hole 'aurora.'

But this isn't your average aurora. When the solar wind slams into the Earth's atmosphere, the solar plasma (made up mainly of high-energy protons) hits air molecules, kicking off some light. When you have a lot of these collisions in the upper atmosphere, the sky will light up as an aurora.

However, a black hole doesn't have an atmosphere like ours, so how can an aurora be generated?

http://ow.ly/1O7BL

Homeland Security Wants to Turn Your Cell Phone into a Smell Phone

from the Christian Science Monitor

Who needs a bloodhound--or even a nose? The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is hoping that soon your cell phone will sniff out poisonous gases. It's funding three companies to create a small chip--about the size of a dime--that would sit inside of cell phones and alert users to potentially deadly smells.

Michael Sailor, whose research team at the University of California, San Diego works for Rhevision Technology, Inc. to create the chip, says the chips are most useful for first responders or other emergency workers. Firefighters and police could track the location of, say, a noxious cloud in a subway, by monitoring GPS signals from the passengers' cell phones. They could then use the information to better coordinate a response.

...The technology is similar to that of a computer chip. Scientists start with a silicon wafer, which they fill with billions of nano-sized holes that reflect different colors depending on their size. If poisonous gas molecule such as sarin enters the hole, it displaces the air inside it, and causes the color that the hole reflects to change.

http://ow.ly/1O7Ei

Arctic Drilling Proposal Advanced Amid Concern

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A proposal to drill for oil in the Arctic Ocean as early as this summer received initial permits from the Minerals Management Service office in Alaska at the same time federal auditors were questioning the office about its environmental review process.

The approvals also came after many of the agency's most experienced scientists had left, frustrated that their concerns over environmental threats from drilling had been ignored.

Minerals Management has faced intense scrutiny in the weeks since the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. An article in The New York Times reported that it failed to get some environmental permits to approve drilling in the gulf and ignored objections from scientists to keep those projects on schedule.

http://ow.ly/1O7GX

Quantum Crack in Cryptographic Armour

from Nature News

Quantum cryptography isn't as invincible as many researchers thought: a commercial quantum key has been fully hacked for the first time.

In theory, quantum cryptography--the use of quantum systems to encrypt information securely--is perfectly secure. It exploits the fact that it is impossible to make measurements of a quantum system without disturbing it in some way. So, if two people--Alice and Bob, say--produce a shared quantum key to encode their messages, they can be safe in the knowledge that no third party can eavesdrop without introducing errors that will show up when they compare their keys, setting off warning bells.

In practice, however, no quantum cryptographic system is perfect and errors will creep in owing to mundane environmental noise. Quantum physicists have calculated that as long as the mismatch between Alice's and Bob's keys is below a threshold of 20%, then security has not been breached. Now, however, quantum physicist Hoi-Kwong Lo and his colleagues at the University of Toronto in Ontario, Canada, have hacked a commercial system released by ID Quantique (IDQ) in Geneva, Switzerland, while remaining below the 20% threshold.

http://ow.ly/1O7JO

Turtle 'Super Tongue' Discovered

from BBC News Online

One type of turtle possesses an extraordinary organ that allows it to breathe underwater and stay submerged for many months.

The common musk turtle has a tiny tongue lined with specialised buds, scientists have discovered. Rather than use this tongue for eating, the turtles use it to exchange oxygen, solving a mystery of how these reptiles can remain submerged for so long.

Details are published in journal The Anatomical Record.

http://ow.ly/1O7LU  THIS IS FUCKING AWESOME.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 22, 2010, 11:39:51 PM
May 18, 2010
Oil Piped to Surface May Be Refined

from the New Orleans Times-Picayune

A mile-long tube inserted into a broken pipe spewing oil into the Gulf of Mexico is capturing about 1,000 barrels of oil daily, or about 20 percent of the oil leaking from the site, a BP official said Monday.

The tube began transferring leaking oil and natural gas onto a waiting ship Sunday. The gas that is being collected is being burned in a process called flaring. BP is testing the oil to determine if it can be refined or if it should be discarded, chief operating officer Doug Suttles said.

It is BP's first successful attempt at containing oil, which is leaking both from a pipe called a riser on the ocean floor as well as from an apparatus called a blowout preventer. The tube was inserted into a gash in the riser, the larger of the two leaks.

http://ow.ly/1Mwt0


U.S. Clears Test of Bioengineered Trees

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Federal regulators gave clearance Wednesday for a large and controversial field test of genetically engineered trees planned for seven states stretching from Florida to Texas.

The test is meant to see if the trees, eucalyptuses with a foreign gene meant to help them withstand cold weather, can become a new source of wood for pulp and paper, and for biofuels, in the Southern timber belt. Eucalyptus trees generally cannot now be grown north of Florida because of occasional freezing spells.

The Agriculture Department, in an environmental assessment issued Wednesday, said no environmental problems would be caused by the field trial, which could involve more than 200,000 genetically modified eucalyptus trees on 28 sites covering about 300 acres.

http://ow.ly/1Mwun


Eyewitness Account of 'Watershed' Brain Scan Legal Hearing

from Wired

The very first federal admissibility hearing for fMRI lie-detection evidence wrapped up May 14 in a Tennessee courtroom. The decision, expected in a couple weeks, could have a significant influence on the direction that brain scan evidence takes in the courtroom.

A special session was held to determine whether brain scans that were generated by the company Cephos could be entered as evidence in the federal court case of Lorne Semrau, whom the government has accused of defrauding Medicare and Medicaid.

FMRI brain scan evidence has yet to be admitted for lie detection in court, and this case is the most serious consideration yet of the technique in an American court.

http://ow.ly/1MwxM


Golden Years Truly Are Golden

from ScienceNOW Daily News

It doesn't matter whether you're employed, whether your children still live at home, or even whether you're married. Life gets better after age 50. A new phone survey of hundreds of thousands of Americans confirms that people tend to be happier, less anxious, and less worried once they pass the half-century mark.

The main measure of well-being is called global well-being, which involves asking people how good they feel about their life in general. "That's been the standard in survey research," says psychologist Arthur Stone of Stony Brook University in New York state. But, he says, "this kind of question requires people to make a lot of judgments." For example, who should you be using for comparison: Your peers? Bill Gates? Victims of famine? The life you thought you'd have? It's also difficult to measure logistically: Scientists often ask people to wear pagers, and researchers beep them several times a day to remind the volunteers to record their feelings.

Stone took a different, easier approach. Thanks to his work as a senior scientist with the Gallup Organization, which conducts a huge, ongoing telephone survey in the United States with questions on topics such as how well the president is doing his job and how confident consumers are in the economy, he was able to help write questions about specific emotions people felt the day before they took the survey. The survey reached more than 350,000 people in 2008 from all regions of the United States.

http://ow.ly/1MwAf


Invasive Plant Poisons Our Air

from Discovery News

It's not only invading more landscapes with the help of global warming, but invasive kudzu vines might also someday increase ozone pollution by more than a third, say soil researchers.

"It's an impressive and dramatic plant," said Jonathan Hickman of The Earth Institute at Columbia University. "But there a lot of things you can't see. ... Air pollution hasn't really been a part of the conversation when it comes to invasion."

Hickman is the lead author on a study, which appears in the May 17 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, looking at what could happen to both urban and rural air quality if the kudzu invasion continues unabated.

http://ow.ly/1MwF6


Science Forum: Going Mad the American Way

from PRI's The World Science

Journalist Ethan Watters is author of the book Crazy Like Us: The Globalization of the American Psyche. "America is homogenizing the way the world goes mad," Watters writes. He contends that Americans are exporting their view of mental illness to the rest of the world.

Watters says culture influences not only how people deal with mental disorders but how mental disorders manifest themselves. Yet those cultural differences are disappearing as Western notions of mental health become popular worldwide.

Watters cites numerous examples in his book: Anorexia nervosa, the eating disorder, is now common in countries with no history of the disease. Modern biomedical notions of schizophrenia are replacing the idea of spirit possession in places like Zanzibar. By selling pills for depression, pharmaceutical companies have caused a rise in the diagnosis of depression in Japan.

http://ow.ly/1MwGW


Demand for Ivory Soars, Threatens African Elephants

from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune

PUTIAN, China (Associated Press) -- Carefully, the Chinese ivory dealer pulled out an elephant tusk cloaked in bubble wrap and hidden in a bag of flour. Its price: $17,000.

"Do you have any idea how many years I could get locked away in prison for having this?" said the dealer, a short man in his 40s, who gave his name as Chen.

A surge in demand for ivory in Asia is fuelling an illicit trade in elephant tusks, especially from Africa. Over the past eight years, the price of ivory has gone up from about $100 per kilogram ($100 per 2.2 pounds) to $1,800, creating a lucrative black market.

http://ow.ly/1MwQ8


A New Clue to Explain Existence

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Physicists at the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory are reporting that they have discovered a new clue that could help unravel one of the biggest mysteries of cosmology: why the universe is composed of matter and not its evil-twin opposite, antimatter. If confirmed, the finding portends fundamental discoveries at the new Large Hadron Collider outside Geneva, as well as a possible explanation for our own existence.

In a mathematically perfect universe, we would be less than dead; we would never have existed. According to the basic precepts of Einsteinian relativity and quantum mechanics, equal amounts of matter and antimatter should have been created in the Big Bang and then immediately annihilated each other in a blaze of lethal energy, leaving a big fat goose egg with which to make to make stars, galaxies and us. And yet we exist, and physicists (among others) would dearly like to know why.

Sifting data from collisions of protons and antiprotons at Fermilab's Tevatron, which until last winter was the most powerful particle accelerator in the world, the team, known as the DZero collaboration, found that the fireballs produced pairs of the particles known as muons, which are sort of fat electrons, slightly more often than they produced pairs of anti-muons. So the miniature universe inside the accelerator went from being neutral to being about 1 percent more matter than antimatter.

http://ow.ly/1MwQS


Ancient Fish Extinction May Have Paved Way for Modern Species

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Modern-day lizards, snakes, frogs and mammals--including us--may owe their existence to a mass extinction of ancient fish 360 million years ago that left the oceans relatively barren, providing room for marginal species that were our ancestors to thrive and diversify, paleontologists said Monday.

The report, by University of Chicago researchers, focused on events at the end of what is commonly called the Age of Fishes, which lasted from 416 million years ago to 359 million years ago. That age was followed by a 15-million-year period of relative silence in the fossil record.

Paleontologists had tended to ignore the rarity of fossils from that period, which is known as Romer's gap--assuming that the fossils just had not been found, or shrugging it off as an unusual period of low diversity. But in a paper published online Monday in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the authors proposed that Romer's gap is a sign that the world's marine vertebrates were recovering from a global-scale extinction event.

http://ow.ly/1MwLj


The Little Owls That Live Underground

from Smithsonian

It's almost midnight and a lone white pickup truck sits atop a grassy hill on a remote tract of government land near Dublin, California that is used as a military training base. In the driver's seat, biologist Jack Barclay hunkers down over a night-vision scope that amplifies light 30,000 times....

Barclay sees a flicker of movement. Now. He presses a remote-control button, and a spring-loaded net arcs over the owl. Barclay sprints to the net and slips the owl headfirst into a plastic-coated can that once held frozen grape juice. The bird inside the can is still; only its legs protrude. Slits in the can's side allow Barclay to examine the owl, and he records that this is a female.... Barclay attaches identifying bands to the owl's legs and within minutes releases her.

Barclay began his career working with the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology on an innovative program to reintroduce the peregrine falcon to the Eastern United States.... Barclay eventually moved to California and joined an environmental consulting group. In 1989, he began monitoring birds at the San Jose International Airport, where a burrowing owl colony had set up housekeeping near the tarmac. The owls fascinated him and became his passion; he has devoted the past 20 years to working on burrowing owl conservation.

http://ow.ly/1MwX9
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 22, 2010, 11:57:54 PM
May 17, 2010
Giant Plumes of Oil Forming Under the Gulf

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Scientists are finding enormous oil plumes in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico, including one as large as 10 miles long, 3 miles wide and 300 feet thick in spots. The discovery is fresh evidence that the leak from the broken undersea well could be substantially worse than estimates that the government and BP have given.

"There's a shocking amount of oil in the deep water, relative to what you see in the surface water," said Samantha Joye, a researcher at the University of Georgia who is involved in one of the first scientific missions to gather details about what is happening in the gulf. "There's a tremendous amount of oil in multiple layers, three or four or five layers deep in the water column."

The plumes are depleting the oxygen dissolved in the gulf, worrying scientists, who fear that the oxygen level could eventually fall so low as to kill off much of the sea life near the plumes.

http://ow.ly/1M2nz


Study: A Link Between Pesticides and ADHD

from Time

Studies linking environmental substances to disease are coming fast and furious. Chemicals in plastics and common household goods have been associated with serious developmental problems, while a long inventory of other hazards are contributing to rising rates of modern ills: heart disease, obesity, diabetes, autism.

Add attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) to the list. A new study in the journal Pediatrics associates exposure to pesticides to cases of ADHD in the U.S. and Canada. In the U.S. alone, an estimated 4.5 million children ages 5 to 17 have ever been diagnosed with ADHD, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and rates of diagnosis have risen 3% a year between 1997 and 2006....

Led by Maryse Bouchard in Montreal, researchers based at the University of Montreal and Harvard University examined the potential relationship between ADHD and exposure to certain toxic pesticides called organophosphates. The team analyzed the levels of pesticide residues in the urine of more than 1,100 children aged 8 to 15 years old, and found that those with the highest levels of dialkyl phosphates, which are the breakdown products of organophosphate pesticides, also had the highest incidence of ADHD....

http://ow.ly/1LZxF


Genetically Modified Cotton Stops One Bug But Fosters Others

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

The widespread planting of a genetically engineered crop designed to withstand a menacing pest has had the unanticipated consequence of transforming benign bugs into agricultural predators, according to a new study.

In findings that drive home the difficulty of trying to stay one step ahead of nature, scientists explain how farmers of bioengineered cotton in northern China were able to drastically reduce their insecticide use for more than a decade, only to find themselves spraying a crop that wasn't supposed to need such measures.

The genetically engineered plants were designed to withstand attacks from the cotton bollworm by growing their own pesticide--a deadly toxin that was originally discovered in a soil bacterium called Bacillus thuringiensis, or Bt. Splicing the Bt genes into the cotton plants' DNA has kept the bollworm at bay.

http://ow.ly/1LZAh


When Origami Meets Rocket Science

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Robert J. Lang had a good career as a laser physicist. He worked at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, researching semiconductor lasers used in fiber-optic communications, before switching to a private technology firm in Silicon Valley, where he held positions such as chief scientist and vice president of research and development.

Then in 2001, he gave it all up. To fold paper.

Lang, 49, is an origami master. Paper cranes? Pshaw. Try a rattlesnake with 1,500 scales, a life-size replica of comedian Drew Carey or an American flag that was photographed for the New York Times magazine. Lang is pushing the limits of what one can make by folding paper, but he's also a leader in an emerging field of study called computational origami, which he boils down to this question: "How do you use rules and math to create an object of art?"

http://ow.ly/1LZCL


Earliest Birds Didn't Make a Flap

from Science News

The wings were willing, but the feathers were weak. Delicate, thin-shafted plumage would have made flapping difficult if not impossible for two prehistoric birds, a new analysis of fossil feathers suggests.

Their feathers probably would have buckled or snapped during strong flapping or sharp maneuvers, so the primitive birds may have been limited to gliding, says Robert Nudds, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Manchester in England. He and paleontologist Gareth Dyke of University College Dublin report an engineering analysis of feathers from the ancient birds Archaeopteryx and Confuciusornis in the May 14 Science.

Nudds and Dyke used a simple formula often applied to bridges and beams to estimate the load-carrying capacities of the birds' feathers, based on fossil remains. The team also looked at the feathers of four modern birds with a variety of feather and flight types--a pigeon, a gull, an albatross and a vulture.

http://ow.ly/1LZE4


The Other Inconvenient Truth

from Seed

It's taken a long time, but the issue of global climate change is finally getting the attention it deserves. While enormous technical, policy, and economic issues remain to be solved, there is now widespread acceptance of the need to confront the twin challenges of energy security and climate change....

Unfortunately, this positive shift in the national zeitgeist has had an unintended downside. In the rush to portray the perils of climate change, many other serious issues have been largely ignored. Climate change has become the poster child of environmental crises, complete with its own celebrities and campaigners. But is it so serious that we can afford to overlook the rise of infectious disease, the collapse of fisheries, the ongoing loss of forests and biodiversity, and the depletion of global water supplies?

Although I'm a climate scientist by training, I worry about this collective fixation on global warming as the mother of all environmental problems. Learning from the research my colleagues and I have done over the past decade, I fear we are neglecting another, equally inconvenient truth: that we now face a global crisis in land use and agriculture that could undermine the health, security, and sustainability of our civilization.

http://ow.ly/1LZHM


Infectious Personalities

from the Economist

Chances are your friends are more popular than you are. It is a basic feature of social networks that has been known about for some time. Consider both an avid cocktail party hostess with hundreds of acquaintances and a grumpy misanthrope, who may have one or two friends.

Statistically speaking, the average person is much more likely to know the hostess simply because she has so many more friends. This, in essence, is what is called the "friendship paradox": the friends of any random individual are likely to be more central to the social web than the individual himself.

Now researchers think this seemingly depressing fact can be made to work as an early warning system to detect outbreaks of contagious diseases. By studying the friends of a randomly selected group of individuals, epidemiologists can isolate those people who are more connected to one another and are therefore more likely to catch diseases like the flu early. This could allow health authorities to spot outbreaks weeks in advance of current surveillance methods.

http://ow.ly/1LZKw


Ball Lightning May Be All In Your Head

from National Geographic News

Mysterious floating blobs of light known as ball lightning might simply be hallucinations caused by overstimulated brains, a new study suggests.

For hundreds of years eyewitnesses have reported brief encounters with the golf ball- to tennis ball-size orbs of electricity. But scientists have been unable to agree on how and why ball lightning forms, since the phenomenon is rare and very short-lived.

Ball lightning is often reported during thunderstorms, and it's known that multiple consecutive lightning strikes can create strong magnetic fields. So Joseph Peer and Alexander Kendl at the University of Innsbruck in Austria wondered whether ball lightning is really a hallucination induced by magnetic stimulation of the brain's visual cortex or the eye's retina.

http://ow.ly/1LZMT


Brazil Fire Burns Huge Collection of Dead Snakes

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

SAO PAULO (Associated Press) -- A fire in Brazil destroyed what may be the world's largest scientific collection of dead snakes, spiders and scorpions that served as the main source for research on many species, scientists said Sunday.

Members of the Instituto Butantan said the nearly 100-year-old collection lost in Saturday's fire included almost 80,000 snakes and several thousand specimens of spiders and scorpions. The specimens were used to study evolution and provided information on how to avert extinctions, said institute director Otavio Mercadante.

"The entire collection was lost, the biggest collection of snakes in the world," curator Francisco Franco told Globo TV and other local media. "It's a loss to humanity."

http://ow.ly/1LZQ3


Study: Cell Phone-Brain Cancer Link Inconclusive

from the (Raleigh, NC) News and Observer

GENEVA (Associated Press) -- Cell phone users worried about getting brain cancer aren't off the hook yet.

A major international study into the link between cell phone use and two types of brain cancer has proved inconclusive, according to a report due to be published in a medical journal Tuesday.

A 10-year survey of almost 13,000 participants found most cell phone use didn't increase the risk of developing meningioma--a common and frequently benign tumor--or glioma--a rarer but deadlier form of cancer.

http://ow.ly/1LZRC
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 23, 2010, 12:06:00 AM
May 13, 2010
Before Spill, a Spate of Failures

from the (Raleigh, N.C.) News and Observer

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Bad wiring and a leak in what's supposed to be a "blowout preventer." Sealing problems that may have allowed a methane eruption. Even a dead battery, of all things.

New disclosures Wednesday revealed a complex cascade of deep-sea equipment failures and procedural problems in the oil rig explosion and massive spill that is still fouling the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and threatening industries and wildlife near the coast and on shore.

A host of worrisome events and findings that were at play on the night of the well explosion and pipe rupture is described in internal corporate documents, marked confidential but provided to a House committee by BP and by the manufacturer of the safety device. Lawmakers released them at a House hearing.

http://ow.ly/1KzKR

Walgreens Shelves Plans to Sell Genetic Test

from the Chicago Tribune (Registration Required)

Walgreens late Wednesday reversed a decision to carry genetic test kits in its stores after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration began an investigation of the supplier and product.

Deerfield-based Walgreen Co. had planned to begin stocking thousands of stores nationwide with the Pathway Genomic home test kit on Friday. Walgreens' decision was announced after the FDA released an enforcement letter sent to San Diego-based Pathway Genomics, giving it 15 days to respond to the agency's request for information regarding its controversial genetic home test kit.

"In light of the FDA contacting Pathway Genomics about its genetic test kit and anticipated ongoing discussions between the two parties, we've elected not to move forward with offering the Pathway product to our customers until we have further clarity on this matter," said Jim Cohn, a Walgreens spokesman.

http://ow.ly/1KzPf

Future Oil-Spill Fighters: Sponges, Superbugs, and Herders

from National Geographic News

In the past 20 years we've traded pagers for smart phones and library cards for Kindles. But the joint federal-industry task force charged with responding to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill is still using cleanup methods that haven't changed much since the days of the Exxon Valdez. Nearly four million gallons of oil have already spewed into the Gulf since the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon rig sank last month.

Amid efforts to cap the seafloor leak, cleanup workers have been using boat-based skimmers to pick up the oil, booms to gather the slick for burning, and chemical dispersants to break the crude into smaller droplets--all parts of the oil-fighting toolkit for decades.

But options for cleaning up oily disasters may soon be more cutting-edge. New sponges, microbes, and chemicals are in development that could change the ways we respond to oil spills.

http://ow.ly/1KzQd

169 Best Illusions--A Sampling

from Scientific American

This special issue, 169 Best Illusions, contains a smorgasbord of static images that appear to be moving, "impossible" sculptures, freaky faces, ghostly afterimages and even some edible illusions.

Illusions make great eye candy, but they also serve a serious purpose. When we look at an illusion, we "see" something that does not match the physical reality of the world around us. Scientists take advantage of this discrepancy between perception and reality to gain insights into how our eyes and brains gather and interpret (or misinterpret) visual information.

Scientific American offers a sneak peek at 10 different types of illusions and what they reveal. In Naples, Fla., on May 10, the 2010 Best Illusion of the Year Contest Gala was held. The top 10 illusionists presented their creations and the attendees of the event voted to pick the top three winners.

http://ow.ly/1KzV1

New Bone Marrow Transplant Method May Expand Treatment

from USA Today

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- Bone marrow transplants are undergoing a quiet revolution: No longer just for cancer, research is underway to ease the risks so they can target more people with diseases from sickle cell to deadly metabolic disorders.

The old way: High doses of radiation and chemotherapy wipe out a patient's own bone marrow before someone else's is infused to replace it, hopefully before infection strikes.

The new way: Rather than destroying the patient's bone marrow, just tamp it down enough to make space for the donated marrow to squeeze in alongside and a sort of twin immune system takes root. It's what doctors taking a page from mythology call "mixed-cell chimerism"--patient and donor blood and immune cells living together to improve health.

http://ow.ly/1KzVC

Decline Is Seen in NASA's Research Side

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- The decline of basic research at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration jeopardizes the agency's ability to study and explore the cosmos, a review panel of scientists and engineers said Tuesday.

The findings could bolster the arguments of the Obama administration that NASA's current effort to send astronauts back to the Moon is too expensive and is siphoning too much money from other programs. The president's $19 billion budget for NASA in the 2011 fiscal year would cancel the Moon program, known as Constellation, and replace it with the development of technologies intended to achieve a cheaper, more sustainable approach for sending people into space.

Tuesday's report from the National Research Council, the research arm of the National Academy of Sciences, concluded that research laboratories at the 10 NASA centers for studying materials, aeronautics and other basic science were merely "marginally adequate."

http://ow.ly/1KzY6

Girl Frozen in Time May Hold Key to Ageing

from the Times (London)

Scientists are hoping to gain new insights into the mysteries of ageing by sequencing the genome of a 17-year-old girl who has the body and behaviour of a tiny toddler. Brooke Greenberg is old enough to drive a car and next year will be old enough to vote--but at 16lb in weight and just 30in tall, she is still the size of a one-year-old.

Until recently she had been regarded as a medical oddity but a preliminary study of her DNA has suggested her failure to grow could be linked to defects in the genes that make the rest of humanity grow old. If confirmed, the research could give scientists a fresh understanding of ageing and even suggest new therapies for diseases linked to old age.

"We think that Brooke's condition presents us with a unique opportunity to understand the process of ageing," said Richard Walker, a professor at the University of South Florida School of Medicine, who is leading the research team. "We think that she has a mutation in the genes that control her ageing and development so that she appears to have been frozen in time. If we can compare her genome to the normal version then we might be able to find those genes and see exactly what they do and how to control them."

http://ow.ly/1KA0m

Hot Science From a Volcanic Crisis

from Nature News

Thirty years ago this week, Mount St. Helens in Washington state was swollen to bursting point. The northern flank of the mountain was bulging outward at a rate of more than one metre per day as magma built up inside. By 18 May 1980, the volcano could withstand the pressure no longer. The side of St Helens collapsed in an immense landslide, unleashing the largest explosive eruption in US recorded history.

An avalanche of rock raced 22 kilometres downhill while a plume of debris shot 25 kilometres skyward, punching into the stratosphere. The eruption killed 57 people near the volcano and blanketed 10 states with a layer of ash.

Amid all the destruction, however, the blast stimulated unheralded interest in eruptions and sparked many careers in volcanology. Not since the annihilation of Pompeii by Mount Vesuvius in Italy had a volcanic event garnered so much attention from scientists and public officials. After St. Helens blew, the US government boosted funding for research in this area by more than a factor of 10 ....

http://ow.ly/1KA2Y

Biosecurity Laws Hobble Research

from the Scientist (Registration Required)

Ever since the U.S. government has taken steps to protect and encourage research involving pathogens that could be used as biological weapons, that research has become much less efficient, according to a new analysis.

Though funding for research on so-called "select agents," or pathogens that can be used as weapons, has shot through the roof, and the number of papers using those organisms has risen in recent years, the work has become up to five times less efficient--meaning, the same amount of funding produces fewer papers than it did before.

"The price of the research was multiplied by maybe a factor of 5 for anthrax and maybe a factor of 2 for Ebola," said Carnegie Mellon University associate professor Elizabeth Casman, who led an analysis of the select agent literature that is published in this week's issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Casman told The Scientist that her group found, for example, that prior to 2002, an average of 17 papers on anthrax were published for every $1 million of funding, whereas after 2002, that average dropped to 3.

http://ow.ly/1KA6v

Are Your Food Allergies for Real?

from ABC News

Food allergies are serious business--just ask 18-year-old Dane of Charlotte, North Carolina. With milk, eggs, peanuts, shellfish, chicken, potatoes, and garlic--and many other foods--on his "do not eat" list, he suffers from true, life-threatening food allergies.

To avoid a trip to the emergency room, everything Dane eats must be made from scratch: "I don't eat in restaurants or from vending machines," he says, "[and] I try not to be around a lot of food, which makes it a little isolating because so much of our culture and socialization revolves around food."

But there are many allergy sufferers who practice the same devout food avoidance Dane does--and don't actually have to, according to a paper published Wednesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

http://ow.ly/1KAaN
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 23, 2010, 12:13:54 AM
 May 14, 2010
Size of Oil Spill Underestimated, Scientists Say

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Two weeks ago, the government put out a round estimate of the size of the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico: 5,000 barrels a day. Repeated endlessly in news reports, it has become conventional wisdom.

But scientists and environmental groups are raising sharp questions about that estimate, declaring that the leak must be far larger. They also criticize BP for refusing to use well-known scientific techniques that would give a more precise figure.

The criticism escalated on Thursday, a day after the release of a video that showed a huge black plume of oil gushing from the broken well at a seemingly high rate. BP has repeatedly claimed that measuring the plume would be impossible.

http://ow.ly/1L3Ez

A Fuel-Saving Car Engine in the Blink of an IRIS

from National Geographic News

In the past year, the U.S. auto industry has reeled under market pressure, faced bankruptcy, accepted billions of dollars in government bailout money, and agreed to mandates for cleaner and more efficient vehicles. But for two brothers from Colorado with an automotive start-up company, things couldn't be better.

Levi Tillemann-Dick, 28, and his brother Corban, 24, are carrying on a dream they hatched with their late father, Denver inventor and businessman Timber Dick, to bring to market a radical new engine design that is much more efficient than a traditional internal combustion engine.

The four-stroke engine used in gasoline-powered cars today was a breakthrough when pioneers like Nikolaus Otto and Gottlieb Daimler developed the design in the 1870s and 1880s. But its operation is so inefficient that only 20 to 30 percent of fuel in the tank is converted to energy that actually makes the car move. The rest is lost, mostly as heat.

http://ow.ly/1L3Ge

Cancer's Sweet Tooth Becomes a Target

from New Scientist

A drug that blocks the way cancer cells generate energy could lead to a new class of cancer treatments. The first human trial of the drug, published this week, is reported to have extended the lives of four people with an aggressive form of brain cancer.

The result is preliminary, but it suggests that, as an approach, tackling "cancer metabolism" is sound. "We are still a long way from a treatment, but this opens the window on drugs that target cancer metabolism," says Evangelos Michelakis of the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada, who led the trial.

Elsewhere, researchers have started experimenting with a host of other molecules that might target cancer metabolism. "It's about identifying which target is best," says Lewis Cantley of Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts, whose company Agios Pharmaceuticals is screening for such targets.

http://ow.ly/1L3LY

All Present-Day Life Arose From a Single Origin

from Science News

One isn't such a lonely number. All life on Earth shares a single common ancestor, a new statistical analysis confirms. The idea that life-forms share a common ancestor is "a central pillar of evolutionary theory," says Douglas Theobald, a biochemist at Brandeis University in Waltham, Mass. "But recently there has been some mumbling, especially from microbiologists, that it may not be so cut-and-dried."

Because microorganisms of different species often swap genes, some scientists have proposed that multiple primordial life forms could have tossed their genetic material into life's mix, creating a web, rather than a tree of life.

To determine which hypothesis is more likely correct, Theobald put various evolutionary ancestry models through rigorous statistical tests. The results, published in the May 13 Nature, come down overwhelmingly on the side of a single ancestor.

http://ow.ly/1L3MP

A Crack in the Mirror Neuron Hypothesis of Autism

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Brain cells thought to underlie our ability to understand one another work just fine in people with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), according to the authors of a controversial new study. Other researchers had proposed that these cells, called mirror neurons, malfunction in people with ASD, disrupting their ability to understand what someone else is experiencing. If the results hold up, researchers will need another way to explain the social deficits that characterize the disorder.

First identified in monkeys, mirror neurons fire when an animal performs particular movements but also when it sees another monkey or a person perform the same movement. Such neurons allow monkeys--and presumably humans--to learn actions by imitating others, and, some researchers believe, to understand other people and empathize with them.

... Several groups had found evidence supporting the mirror neuron hypothesis ... But neuroscientists Ilan Dinstein and David Heeger of New York University and their colleagues considered the previous results in humans inconsistent and inconclusive and designed what they considered "a more in-depth test," Dinstein says.

http://ow.ly/1L46a

Universities: Life After Death

from Nature News

Last month, Joseph Ng, a biologist at the University of Alabama, Huntsville (UAH), sat down with very mixed feelings to write a job advertisement for a new chair of the biology department. The provisional draft said that the department was seeking "an energetic and visionary leader" who could preside over the hiring of several junior faculty members. What the ad didn't talk about, and couldn't possibly describe, were the events that left so many holes to fill.

On a Friday afternoon in early February, Amy Bishop, an assistant professor in the department, pulled out a black 9-millimetre pistol during a biology faculty meeting. "She just went down the line", wearing a look that was "cold, very cold", says Ng. At point-blank range, Bishop shot five of her colleagues in the head, killing three of them and critically wounding two others.

Ng, seated at the opposite end of the table, thought she would murder them all. In the space of seconds, Bishop cut the 14-strong faculty by more than a third. Ever since, the survivors have been struggling with the enormous task of repairing the shattered department even as they try to heal their own emotional wounds.

http://ow.ly/1L4ar

Fungus Hits Afghan Opium Poppies

from BBC News Online

A serious disease is affecting opium poppies in Afghanistan, Antonio Maria Costa, the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has said. Mr Costa told the BBC that this year's opium production could be reduced by a quarter, compared with last year.

He said the disease--a fungus--is thought to have infected about half of the country's poppy crop. Afghanistan produces 92% of the world's opium. Mr Costa said opium prices had gone up by around 50% in the region.

That could have an impact on revenues for insurgent groups like the Taliban which have large stockpiles of opium, he told the BBC's Bethany Bell. The fungus attacks the root of the plant, climbs up the stem and makes the opium capsule wither away. It was affecting poppies in the provinces of Helmand and Kandahar, the heartland of opium cultivation and the insurgency in Afghanistan, he said.

http://ow.ly/1L4gH

Another Plastics Ingredient Raises Safety Concerns

from Science News

A largely ignored contaminant doesn't just resemble bisphenol A, the chemical found to leach out of hard plastic water bottles. It's BPA's fluorinated twin--on steroids.

New laboratory studies in Japan indicate that the twin, called bisphenol AF, or BPAF, may be even more potent than BPA in altering the effects of steroid hormones such as estrogens in the body.

The unusual way that BPAF blocks some estrogen actions and fosters others "could make this a vicious compound, a very toxic compound," says Jan-Åke Gustafsson, a molecular endocrinologist at the University of Houston. The chemical is an ingredient of many plastics, electronic devices, optical fibers and more.

http://ow.ly/1L4jI

Absent a Moon or Mars, Recreating Space 65 Feet Under the Sea

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Astronauts will not be sent by the United States to the Moon or Mars for at least a decade, but they can still get an idea of what it would be like by living 65 feet underwater.

On Monday, a crew of six, including two veteran astronauts, descended to Aquarius, an undersea laboratory next to a coral reef about three miles off Key Largo, Fla. This is the 14th mission in a nine-year-old program known as NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations--Neemo for short.

During their two weeks in the laboratory, the aquanauts will go on simulated spacewalks, operate a crane and perform other tasks of the sort astronauts would face in setting up a habitat on another planet. "The primary objectives are based on engineering and testing and operations design for planetary exploration," said William Todd, the project manager for the Neemo 14 mission.

http://ow.ly/1L4o9

Lizard Extinctions Blamed on Global Warming

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

When it comes to the hazards of global warming, it may turn out that lizards in burrows are the canaries in the coal mine.

In a study to be published Friday in the journal Science, an international team of biologists reports that in more than one-tenth of the places in Mexico where lizards flourished in 1975 the reptiles now cannot be found. The researchers predict that by 2080 about 40 percent of local lizard populations worldwide will have died off, and 20 percent of lizard species will be extinct.

The reason for the huge die-off appears to be rising temperatures. But it isn't heat that is killing the lizards directly. Instead, global warming appears to be lengthening the period of the day when lizards must seek shelter or run the risk of heat stroke. In the breeding season, that sheltering period is now so long that females of many species are unable to eat enough food to produce eggs and offspring.

http://ow.ly/1L4sg
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 28, 2010, 01:49:05 PM
Science News, The Return of.

May 27, 2010

'Top Kill' Effort Stops Flow of Oil into Gulf of Mexico

http://ow.ly/1QDTs - Fucking FINALLY. Jesus Christ on a pogo stick, you'd think they could actually solve a problem this important a little faster. Here we're always talking about how much power and wealth big oil has.

In E. coli Fight, Some Strains Are Largely Ignored

http://ow.ly/1QBw4 - This wouldn't be an issue if people just washed their vegetables before eating. It's a simple task, especially with central plumbing. Just run under the tap and rub a little on all surfaces.

Glaxo Tries a Linux Approach

http://ow.ly/1QBzo - Very cool, something I thought would never happen.

Report Finds Control of High Blood Pressure Improving

http://ow.ly/1QBC6 - And by under control, they mean GRABBIN PILLS.

Infections Link to Bees Decline

http://ow.ly/1QBDH - It's a multifactor thing, really. Pesticides, pathogens, parasites. But NOT cell phone towers. Personally, I think we should be using native polinators in North America anyway. There are plenty of great bumblebee species.

Space Shuttle Atlantis Lands for the Last Time

http://ow.ly/1QBEY - And when all this so called human "exploration" is over, maybe we can get back to using robots to do REAL science.

Did Horned Dinosaurs Island-Hop to Europe?

http://ow.ly/1QBNc - I used to talk about the Tethys Ocean here years ago. This article is a homage of sorts.

Virulent Wheat Fungus Invades South Africa

http://ow.ly/1QBO0 - As if Africa didn't have it bad enough.

Artificial Butterfly Mixes High, Low Tech

http://ow.ly/1QBQp - This includes a really cool high speed recording of the flight period.

Link Between Tanning Beds, Melanoma Grows Stronger

http://ow.ly/1QBZC - I swear, are people really that stupid that it takes loads of research to show the cancer risks of tanning beds? You're hitting your skin with concentrated UV, and UV is a mutagen. DO THE FUCKING MATH.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on May 30, 2010, 08:00:39 AM
Excellent links Kai, thanks.

MesoAmerican Beer Recreated!

http://www.ediblegeography.com/archaeo-alcohology/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 01, 2010, 03:17:32 PM
April 16, 2010

Follow @AmSciMag on Twitter and win a free subscription to American Scientist!

On to Mars: Obama Declares, 'I Expect to See It'

from the San Diego Union-Tribune (Registration Required)

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Associated Press) -- President Barack Obama boldly predicted Thursday his new plans for space exploration would lead American astronauts on historic, almost fantastic journeys to an asteroid and then to Mars--and in his lifetime--relying on rockets and propulsion still to be imagined and built.

"I expect to be around to see it," he said of pioneering U.S. trips starting with a landing on an asteroid--a colossal feat in itself--before the long-dreamed-of expedition to Mars. He spoke near the historic Kennedy Space Center launch pads that sent the first men to the moon, a blunt rejoinder to critics, including several former astronauts, who contend his planned changes will instead deal a staggering blow to the nation's manned space program.

"We want to leap into the future," not continue on the same path as before, Obama said as he sought to reassure NASA workers that America's space adventures would soar on despite the impending termination of space shuttle flights.

http://snipr.com/vj2a8

Save Your Computer From an Early Retirement

from the Christian Science Monitor

Computers don't age well. Once-speedy machines can easily slump into slothfulness after just a few years. As unwanted files pile up, wait times drag on. But with a little maintenance, you can save your PC from an early retirement.

Quick note: While most of the Monitor's computer suggestions cover both Macs and PCs, Apple fans will need to sit out this article. Also, if you're looking for tips on how to keep a new computer chugging along for many years to come, check out our companion piece.

Tuning up a computer means tackling both digital and physical clutter. PCs suck up gobs of dust and pet fur. This soot can coat chips and clog fans, trapping hot air that could cook a machine. Even if your computer's fan isn't thrumming like a leaf blower, it's a good idea to sweep out the dust bunnies once a year.

http://snipr.com/vj2d1

Costs May Delay Heart Patients From Seeking Treatment

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Patients without health insurance, and those who are insured but fear the cost of medical care, are more likely to delay seeking life-saving treatment when having a heart attack.

For the millions of American adults who don't have health insurance, and those who have it but worry that illness might ruin them financially, the signs of an impending heart attack do not set in motion the kind of rapid, lifesaving response that medical professionals urge, according to a study conducted at 24 urban hospitals across the nation.

Instead, when uninsured or financially insecure adults feel stabbing chest pain, burning in the shoulders and jaw, or extreme pressure across the midsection, they are more likely than the reliably insured to consider the economic consequences of a false alarm and put off getting help. That delay, established in a study published Tuesday in the Journal of the American Medical Assn., may be a costly decision for the nation as well as for those who put off seeking care. Long-standing research shows that the longer a heart attack victim delays treatment, the greater the risk of dying.

http://snipr.com/vj2e6

'Raw Milk' Advocates, Health Officials Step Up Dispute

from USA Today

Maybe you can't cry over spilled milk, but that doesn't mean you can't have big fights if it's unpasteurized. To a small but dedicated community, it's "raw milk," a life-giving, vitamin and enzyme-rich miracle cure for asthma, gastrointestinal disorders and multiple other illnesses. The viewpoint, championed in the past decade by the Weston A. Price Foundation, which follows the nutritional teachings of a mid-century Ohio dentist, has gained a life of its own on the Internet.

To public health officials and state departments of agriculture, unpasteurized milk can be a dangerous, germ-ridden drink that is especially hazardous to children and their immature immune systems. An outbreak of Campylobacter tied to unpasteurized milk in Middlebury, Ind. sickened at least 20 people in March in Michigan, Illinois and Indiana, according to the state departments of health.

The latest round in this dispute at the intersection of food, alternative health and anti-government activism took place this week, first with a national conference of pro-raw-milk advocates in Wisconsin on Saturday followed by today's launch of a well-financed website warning of raw milk's risks.

http://snipr.com/vj2g2

Body Heat: Sweden's New Green Energy Source

from Time

It's 7:30 a.m. on a wintry morning in downtown Stockholm and a sea of Swedes are flooding Central Station to catch a train to work. The station is toasty thanks to the busy shops and restaurants and the body heat being generated by the 250,000 commuters who crowd Scandinavia's busiest travel hub each day. This heat used to be lost by the end of the morning rush hour.

Now, however, engineers have figured out a way to harness it and transfer it to a newly refurbished office building down the block. Unbeknownst to them, these sweaty Swedes have become a green energy source: "They're cheap and renewable," says Karl Sundholm, a project manager at Jernhusen, a Stockholm real estate company, and one of the creators of the system.

Using excess body heat to warm a building is not a new concept--the Mall of America in Minneapolis recycles the heat generated from shoppers' bodies to help regulate the temperature of the massive complex during Minnesota's dreadful winters. But Stockholm has taken the idea a step further by successfully transferring excess body heat from one building to another.

http://snipr.com/vj2hl

Plastic Soup in Atlantic

from the Seattle Times

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (Associated Press)--Researchers are warning of a new blight at sea: a swirl of confetti-like plastic debris stretching over a remote expanse of the Atlantic.

The floating garbage--spun together by a vortex of currents--was documented by two groups of scientists that trawled the sea between Bermuda and Portugal's mid-Atlantic Azores islands. The studies describe a soup of microparticles similar to the so-called Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a phenomenon discovered a decade ago between Hawaii and California that researchers say is likely to exist in other places worldwide.

"We found the great Atlantic garbage patch," said Anna Cummins, who collected plastic samples on a voyage in February. The debris is harmful to fish, sea mammals--and potentially humans--even though much of the plastic has broken into such tiny pieces they are nearly invisible.

http://snipr.com/vj2im

Finding Truly Random Numbers

from NPR

Randomness is hard to come by. At least things that are absolutely, positively, 100 percent random. Take the example of a roulette wheel: It may seem that the number the ball falls on is a random event, but Antonio Acin of the Institute of Photonic Sciences in Barcelona says it's not.

"If you are able to compute the initial position and the speed of the ball, and you have a perfect model for the roulette, then you can predict where the ball is going to finish--with certainty," Acin says. In fact, he says everything that appears random in our world may just appear random because of lack of knowledge.

So to find true randomness, Acin and his colleagues turned to the world of atoms and electrons, and to the laws of quantum mechanics. "To be more precise, we are taking advantage of the nonlocal correlations of entangled quantum particles," he says.

http://snipr.com/vj2ji

U.S. Leads New Bid to Phase Out Whale Hunting

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- The United States is leading an effort by a handful of antiwhaling nations to broker an agreement that would limit and ultimately end whale hunting by Japan, Norway and Iceland, according to people involved with the negotiations.

The compromise deal, which has generated intense controversy within the 88-nation International Whaling Commission and among antiwhaling activists, would allow the three whaling countries to continue hunting whales for the next 10 years, although in reduced numbers.

In exchange, the whaling nations--which have long exploited loopholes in an international treaty that aims to preserve the marine mammals--would agree to stricter monitoring of their operations, including the placing of tracking devices and international monitors on all whaling ships and participation in a whale DNA registry to track global trade in whale products.

http://snipr.com/vj2kb

'Very Eerie': This Winter Had Virtually No Flu

from the Philadelphia Inquirer

Is it possible for a pandemic to save lives? The short answer is that it just did. Since swine flu first burst onto the scene one year ago this month, fewer Americans appear to have died of influenza-related causes than in any recent flu season.

The pandemic flu kept at bay seasonal strains that normally kill thousands of elderly people. And it did so, somehow, while not sticking around itself. The result: a winter flu season with virtually no seasonal flu, no pandemic flu, no flu of any kind, at least not yet. "It is very eerie," said Gregory Storch, director of the infectious diseases division at St. Louis Children's Hospital.

But before you get all giddy with pandemic appreciation, consider the following: No one knows why swine flu didn't return this winter. (Handwashing and vaccination probably helped but don't fully explain what happened.) Flus of pandemics past have always come back; it was just a question of when and how severe. And it could well be that as more months pass without any strains of flu, fewer people are developing immunity against them--and could get sicker next season.

http://snipr.com/vj2l5

Low Solar Activity Link to Cold UK Winters

from BBC News Online

The UK and continental Europe could be gripped by more frequent cold winters in the future as a result of low solar activity, say researchers. They identified a link between fewer sunspots and atmospheric conditions that "block" warm, westerly winds reaching Europe during winter months.

But they added that the phenomenon only affected a limited region and would not alter the overall global warming trend. The findings appear in the journal Environmental Research Letters.

"By recent standards, we have just had what could be called a very cold winter and I wanted to see if this was just another coincidence or statistically robust," said lead author Mike Lockwood, professor of space environment physics at the University of Reading, UK.

http://snipr.com/vj2m1
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 01, 2010, 03:26:52 PM
April 19, 2010

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Inside The Plume, a Volcano Tells Its Secrets

from National Public Radio

To understand a volcanic eruption, you can study images from satellites, radar measurements from aircraft, or seismic data from sensors in the ground. But if you really want to know what's up with a volcano, you need to sample the material it's spewing out.

Volcanologists Evgenia Ilyinskaya and Asgerdur Sigurdardottir were determined to do just that. After stopping for some last-minute supplies in Hvolsvollur, Iceland, the pair set out in a gray Isuzu Trooper headed for the giant clouds coming from the Eyjafjallajokull volcano.

The afternoon was unusually clear, making the view of Eyjafjallajokull stunning as the car drew closer. Most of the sky was brilliant blue, with just a few wispy white clouds. But dead ahead, a dark curtain hung before the car.

http://snipr.com/vm6k5


Revealing the True Solar Corona

from American Scientist

It is somewhat ironic that a total solar eclipse--the Moon blocking out the entire body of the Sun--actually reveals great detail of the Sun's structure. When the blinding brilliance of the Sun is obscured, this allows its more tenuous surrounding features--its corona--to come into view. Investigating the corona may seem straightforward, but it requires an understanding beyond seeing, imaging and modeling.

Eclipse studies of the white-light corona can be grouped roughly into three periods. In the first, during the latter half of the 19th century, naked-eye observations were only occasionally supplemented by photography. The former were carefully reported in written accounts and recorded in drawings and engravings that depended on the skills of astronomers, artists and engravers, as well as those who made and reproduced the pictures.

...Even in those early days there was already some discrepancy between images and observer accounts. A July 29, 1878, eclipse was reported by Arthur C. Ranyard, a British lawyer and mathematician who also studied astronomy. Ranyard took a photograph of the event, while Charles Denison, a doctor in Denver, made a drawing that was turned into a woodcut. Ranyard noted the differences between his photograph and the drawing he received from Denison afterwards.

http://snipr.com/vm6li


Counting Sea Life, Sometimes Little Things Are Big

from the Boston Globe

WASHINGTON (Associated Press) -- If the Census Bureau thinks it has its hands full counting Americans, imagine what scientists are up against in trying to tally every living thing in the ocean, including microbes so small they seem invisible.And just try to get them to mail back a form.

The worldwide Census of Marine Life has four field projects focusing on hard-to-see sea life such as tiny microbes, zooplankton, larvae and burrowers in the seabed.

Tiny as individuals, these life forms are massive as groups and provide food that helps underpin better-known living things.

http://snipr.com/vm6mv


Controversial DNA Swap Could Prevent Inherited Disease

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

(Reuters) -- British scientists say they have mastered a controversial technique using cloning technology to prevent some incurable inherited diseases by swapping DNA between two fertilized human eggs.

Lead researcher Doug Turnbull of Newcastle University said this week that he hoped the first babies free from so-called mitochondrial diseases would be born within three years.

The technique replaces mitochondrial DNA, which is passed down the maternal line. One in 6,500 children is born with serious diseases caused by malfunctioning mitochondrial DNA.

http://snipr.com/vm6nv


Ultrathin Silk-Based Electronics Make Better Brain Implants

from Wired

Silk has made its way from the soft curves of the body to the spongy folds of the brain. Engineers have now designed silk-based electronics that stick to the surface of the brain, similar to the way a silk dress clings to the hips.

The stretchable, ultrathin design would make for better brain-computer interfaces (BCIs), which record brain activity in paralyzed patients and translate thoughts into movements of computer cursors or robotic arms. Because it's so thin and flexible, a silk-based device could reach regions of the brain that were previously inaccessible.

"This development heralds a new class of implantable devices, not just for the brain, but for many other tissues," said neurologist Brian Litt of the University of Pennsylvania who co-authored the study published April 18 in Nature Materials.

http://snipr.com/vm6pn


The Anatomy of Desire

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

The two mannequins stood side by side in the back of the white van. Johan Karremans, a psychologist at Radboud University in the Netherlands, along with his student and collaborator, Sander Arons, clothed the plastic women identically in tight black tops and dark skirts. Arons then drove the van around the country to the homes of blind men.

The cargo van is one of two mobile labs belonging to the university's psychology department. Sometimes, outside an elementary school, children climb into the back of a van to have their brain waves tested on an encephalogram machine. But this experiment, the results of which will soon be published in the journal Evolution and Human Behavior, dealt with desire--in this case the desire of heterosexual men--and was an attempt to gauge the force of culture, to weigh the learned and the innate, in determining sexual attraction.

The headless mannequins, which Karremans bought, he told me recently, "on the Dutch version of Craigslist," have adjustable waists and hips, and the researchers set each body differently, so that one had a waist-to-hip ratio of 0.7 and the other of 0.84. Based on a range of studies of male preferences done by other scientists, Karremans chose the lower ratio as an ideal, a slim yet curvy paragon, at least among Western populations. The higher ratio, by contrast, doesn't represent obesity, just a fullness that falls close to the average woman's shape.

http://snipr.com/vm6s7


Corps of Engineers Said to Err on Flooding Risk

from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

An attempt by the Army Corps of Engineers to correct old data on water flows in the Mississippi may have led to underestimates of the current risk of flooding along the river, scientists argue in a new study.

The study argues that a change in the way water flows were measured, dating from the 1930s, mistakenly led the corps to make downward adjustments in data from the 1800s and early 1900s.

That in turn is leading to underestimates of the risk of flooding today on the Mississippi between the Ohio and Missouri Rivers, and to inadequate preparations by government agencies, said Nicholas Pinter, a geology professor at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale and the author of the new report.

http://snipr.com/vm6sh


Cobra Hood Mechanism Revealed by Electrode Study

from BBC News Online

Scientists have uncovered the mechanism behind the menacing "hood flare" which cobras use as a defensive display. By measuring the electrical activity from the snakes' muscles, they found the precise group of muscles used by cobras to raise their hoods.

The researchers say that the cobra's hood evolved as its ribs were "co-opted" to be used in this visual display. They report their findings in the Journal of Experimental Biology.

Kenneth Kardong, professor of zoology from Washington State University in the US, was one of the authors of the study. He explained that the cobra's hood was "an intriguing problem in evolutionary biology."

http://snipr.com/vm6sy


Party Drug Could Ease Trauma Long Term

from Nature News

Ecstasy, a drug that is illegal in most countries, is showing increasing potential as a treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), according to clinical-trial results presented at a conference in San Jose, California, today [April 16]. The effect seems to continue for years after the initial treatment.

People can develop PTSD after traumatic experiences such as sexual abuse, or witnessing extreme acts of violence. Patients are plagued by flashbacks and nightmares, and often become emotionally numb and easily frightened. Treatment includes cognitive behavioural therapy and selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) such as paroxetine (Paxil) and sertraline (Zoloft), but many people with PTSD do not respond to these treatments.

Ecstasy, otherwise known as MDMA (3,4-Methylenedioxymethamphetamine), causes the release of neurotransmitters such as serotonin in the brain, and so could help to decrease the patient's fear and defensiveness during treatment. The drug was used during therapy in the 1970s but with the rise of rave culture in the 1980s, the US Drug Enforcement Agency and the World Health Organization listed MDMA as a Schedule I drug--a classification reserved for drugs with no medical use and high potential for abuse--making it nearly impossible to use in clinical trials.

http://snipr.com/vm6u4


Europe Finds Clean Energy in Trash, but U.S. Lags

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

HORSHOLM, Denmark -- The lawyers and engineers who dwell in an elegant enclave here are at peace with the hulking neighbor just over the back fence: a vast energy plant that burns thousands of tons of household garbage and industrial waste, round the clock.

Far cleaner than conventional incinerators, this new type of plant converts local trash into heat and electricity. Dozens of filters catch pollutants, from mercury to dioxin, that would have emerged from its smokestack only a decade ago.

In that time, such plants have become both the mainstay of garbage disposal and a crucial fuel source across Denmark, from wealthy exurbs like Horsholm to Copenhagen's downtown area. Their use has not only reduced the country's energy costs and reliance on oil and gas, but also benefited the environment, diminishing the use of landfills and cutting carbon dioxide emissions.

http://snipr.com/vm6uk

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 01, 2010, 03:30:10 PM
April 20, 2010

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Iceland Volcano Has "Quieted Down"

from National Geographic News

Iceland's Eyjafjallajökull volcano is changing the pace of its eruption, volcanologists reported Monday, raising hopes that the volcanic ash plume that has paralyzed air travel in Europe will soon scatter.

"The activity has quieted down, and the plumes are lower at the moment, rising only 500 to 1,000 meters [1,650 to 3,300 feet] above the vent," said Icelandic volcanologist Thorvaldur Thordarson. The volcanic ash plume once soared as high as 36,000 feet (11,000 meters).

"I think at the moment, because the plume is lower, it might help with the ash problem. It won't get into the jet stream and won't travel as far, and at lower altitudes it could be washed out by precipitation," added Thordarson, of the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. "But it's difficult to say whether it will clear completely or not. It could pick up again."

http://snipr.com/vmzy0


Tamoxifen, Raloxifene Cut Breast Cancer Risk in Half

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Two drugs taken by women at high risk for breast cancer--tamoxifen and raloxifene--both reduce the risk of the disease by about 50% in high-risk post-menopausal women while they are taking the medications, researchers said Monday.

The benefits of raloxifene fall off more quickly once women stop taking them, however, and the increased benefits of tamoxifen come at a price: a higher risk of uterine cancer, blood clots and cataracts--although the absolute risks of all three remain low.

"These are relatively inexpensive drugs that reduce breast cancer by about 50% with side effects that are modest," said Dr. Gabriel N. Hortobagyi of the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, one of the researchers. "We need to reassess why we are not using these drugs more broadly," he said at a news conference at a meeting of the American Assn. of Cancer Research, where the results were presented.

http://snipr.com/vmzzr


Iceland Among World's Most Volcanically Active Places

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

The volcano erupting from beneath Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull glacier and causing airport closures across northern Europe is a typical example of the kind of shield volcanoes that formed the island and still erupt on a regular basis.

The Icelandic eruptions are much less forceful than the ones that occur regularly in Alaska and elsewhere around the Pacific Ring of Fire, but they have been active for eons and are enormous when their full size is taken into account--from the bottom of the ocean to the top of the volcano.

"Because of where it sits, Iceland is one of the most volcanically active places in the world," said Chris Waythomas, scientist in charge of the Alaska Volcano Observatory, an arm of the U.S. Geological Survey, in conjunction with the state and the University of Alaska. "It was bad luck that the wind took the ash where it did, but this kind of thing happens all the time."

http://snipr.com/vn00g


A Saturn Spectacular, With Gravity's Help

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

When it comes to voyages of discovery, NASA's venerable Cassini mission is about as good as it gets.

In six years of cruising around the planet Saturn and its neighborhood, the Cassini spacecraft has discovered two new Saturn rings, a bunch of new moons and a whole new class of moonlets. It encountered liquid lakes on the moon Titan, water ice and a particle plume on the moon Enceladus, ridges and ripples on the rings, and cyclones at Saturn's poles. Cassini also released a European space probe that landed on Titan. And Cassini has sent back enough data to produce more than 1,400 scientific papers--at last count.

But besides the science, Cassini is state of the art in the arcane discipline of orbital mechanics--how to get from one place to another in space to fulfill a mission's science requirements without running out of fuel. The plans are for Cassini to keep working for seven more years, but it currently has only 22 percent of the maneuvering propellant it had when it started.

http://snipr.com/vn01s


Five Biggest Volcano Eruptions in Recent History

from the Christian Science Monitor

The eruption of Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland is having a major impact on travel and commerce in Europe and worldwide. But as a volcanic event, it barely rates mentioning.

By the measure of the Volcanic Explosivity Index (VEI)--a sort-of Richter scale for eruptions--the current outburst is probably a 2 or a 3, experts say. In other words, eruptions like Eyjafjallajökull happen virtually every year somewhere in the world.

The biggest eruption of the past millennium, by contrast, was a 7. Given that each number on the scale represents an eruption 10 times more powerful than the previous, that means Eyjafjallajökull is 10,000 times less powerful than one in Indonesia's Sunda Islands in 1815.

http://snipr.com/vn02z


Obama's Asteroid Goal: Riskier Than Moon

from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (Registration Required)

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Associated Press) -- Landing a man on the moon was a towering achievement. Now the president has given NASA an even harder job, one with a certain Hollywood quality: sending astronauts to an asteroid, a giant speeding rock, just 15 years from now.

Space experts say such a voyage could take several months longer than a journey to the moon and entail far greater dangers. "It is really the hardest thing we can do," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said.

Going to an asteroid could provide vital training for an eventual mission to Mars. It might help unlock the secrets of how our solar system formed. And it could give mankind the know-how to do something that has been accomplished only in the movies by a few square-jawed, squinty-eyed heroes: saving the Earth from a collision with a killer asteroid.

http://snipr.com/vn03r


Scientists Measure Atomic Nudge

from Nature News

By pushing a cluster of just 60 ions with a tiny electric field, researchers have measured the most minuscule force ever.

The result, measuring mere yoctonewtons, beats previous record lows by several orders of magnitude. The group behind the measurements, based at the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder, Colorado, hopes that the technique can eventually lead to new tools for measuring the minuscule features of materials' surfaces.

Tiny force measurements are crucial for imaging atomic surfaces and detecting nuclear spins, but they are difficult to make because of the tiny dimensions involved.

http://snipr.com/vn04r


Severe Weather Has Favorite Spots

from Science News

WASHINGTON -- Lightning and tornadoes can strike fear into the hearts of Americans, but they don't strike everywhere equally. New analyses presented April 15 at the annual meeting of the Association of American Geographers find that some parts of the country are more disaster-prone than they're commonly given credit for, while others get off easier than previously thought.

Big cloud-to-ground strikes might be expected to be most common in urban areas, for example, where large buildings could draw lightning, said Heather Sheffield of the University of Maryland in College Park. Huge skyscrapers such as the Empire State Building in New York City act as "big lightning rods," she says.

To test that idea, Sheffield analyzed summer strike patterns from 2004 to 2008 for Maryland--a diverse state in terms of terrain. Sheffield mapped lightning flash data from the National Lightning and Detection Network over forests, cities, woody wetlands and crop regions.

http://snipr.com/vn05j


Researchers Solve the Mystery of the Zodiacal Light

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Zodiacal light--the faint white glow that stretches across the darkest skies, tracing the same path the sun takes--has mystified scientists for centuries. They've known that it is sunlight reflected from a disk of dust spanning the inner solar system from Mercury to Jupiter. They just didn't know where the dust came from--until now.

Every day, Earth sweeps up about 140 tons of cosmic dust. The particles are mostly 100 micrometers to 200 micrometers in size and made of silicate minerals. Most burn up in the atmosphere, although some survive and end up in micrometeorite collections. To figure out how this dust behaves in the inner solar system, planetary dynamicist David Nesvorný of Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, and five colleagues set up a computer model.

In addition to being subject to the tug of planetary gravity, microscopic particles orbiting the sun are pushed outward by the pressure of sunlight, dragged inward by their own radiative emissions, and worn down by collisions with other particles. Nesvorný and his colleagues followed particles released in their model from various types of comets or from asteroids and compared the particles' fates with observations of the zodiacal dust cloud.

http://snipr.com/vn06a


Magnesium Power: White-Hot Energy

from the Economist

Storing energy is one of the biggest obstacles to the widespread adoption of alternative sources of power. Batteries can be bulky and slow to charge. Hydrogen, which can be made electrolytically from water and used to power fuel cells, is difficult to handle.

But there may be an alternative: magnesium. As school chemistry lessons show, metallic magnesium is highly reactive and stores a lot of energy. Even a small amount of magnesium ribbon burns in a flame with a satisfying white heat. Researchers are now devising ways to extract energy from magnesium in a more controlled fashion.

Engineers at MagPower in White Rock, British Columbia, for example, have developed a metal-air cell that uses water and ambient air to react with a magnesium fuel supply, in the form of a metal anode, to generate electricity. Doron Aurbach at Bar-Ilan University, Israel, has created a magnesium-based version of the lithium-ion rechargeable cell, a type of battery known for its long life and stability.

http://snipr.com/vn07r
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 03, 2010, 05:28:16 PM
When was the last time I actually gave you'all the headlines the /day of/?

June 3, 2010
Effort to Halt Oil Spill Ends With Saw Stuck in Pipe

from the New Orleans Times-Picayune

BP's plan to contain the oil and natural gas escaping from a blown out well in the Gulf of Mexico hit a snag and was suspended just after midnight, Wednesday morning, when the saw being used in the operation became stuck in a pipe.

The company was forced to stop cutting through a broken riser pipe one mile below the water's surface at 12:05 a.m. after the diamond wire saw conducting the operation became stuck almost halfway through the pipe, BP spokesman Graham MacEwen said.

... The saw blade was freed Wednesday about 12:30 p.m., MacEwen said, but work did not resume. The diamond wire saw and the shears were being brought to the surface Wednesday night where the former would be assessed.

http://ow.ly/1TuOM


Researchers Provide Business to Gulf Charter Captains

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

REDFISH BAY, LA. -- In a strangely silent corner of this usually thriving bay, charter captain Kevin Beach of Metairie says he should be seeing "shrimp, trout jumping, sea gulls ... and knuckleheads like myself high-fiving over a catch."

Instead, he is seeing serious-minded researchers. Lots and lots of them, quietly collecting scientific samples. ... Beach typically makes 80 percent of his yearly income from the tourists who come to fish the gulf waters in May, June and July.

At least for now, though, there's an odd silver lining to the dark cloud of oil that threatens the livelihoods of Beach and other charter captains who are within reach of the heaviest slick: the flood of scientists, graduate students and environmental researchers who have descended on the coastal marinas and beaches to get an up-close look at the spill and take the measure of this unprecedented event.

http://ow.ly/1TuQM


New Prostate Cancer Tests Might Bring More Certainty

from U.S. News and World Report

(HealthDay News) -- Two new tests promise to cut down on the number of biopsies now taken from men suspected of having prostate cancer, researchers report.

The tests -- still in the early stages of development -- might also offer better clues about which cancers require immediate treatment and which can be left for so-called "watchful waiting," researchers reported Tuesday at the American Urological Association's annual meeting, in San Francisco.

Both tests check for increased levels of genetic material -- one for the DNA of which genes are made, the other for the RNA that carries the messages from those genes. And both tests appear to add certainty to the suspicion of prostate cancer provided by the most widely used test for prostate cancer, the prostate-specific antigen (PSA) blood screen.

http://ow.ly/1TuSJ


Mining for Cold, Hard Facts

from the Wall Street Journal

WEST ANTARCTICA — At a camp here on Earth's remotest continent, American researchers have constructed a towering drill that, like a biopsy needle, periodically plunges thousands of feet into the ice to extract an exotic marrow of frozen gases and isotopes.

Their work could settle a central question in the dispute over climate change, by documenting how greenhouse gases influenced temperatures in the past. Only then can researchers accurately analyze climate changes that may be under way today.

Until now, that information was hidden in Antarctica's ancient ice. Scientists agree that global temperatures are rising, and so are levels of carbon dioxide. But the immediate impact of human activity on natural climate cycles—from ice-sheet dynamics to wind and ocean currents—remains unclear. The Antarctica research could, for the first time, teach scientists how global warming developed when humankind had no hand in it.

http://ow.ly/1TuVF


Whaling: Politics, Science and Ethics

from PRI's The World Science

The International Whaling Commission is considering legalizing commercial whaling by some countries, but at a very limited scale.

Marine biologist Stephen Palumbi of Stanford University says the current proposal would fail to protect endangered whale species.

Palumbi uses genetics to study whale populations, and he is our guest in the Science Forum this week. He discusses whether all whaling should be banned, what role lay citizens can play in conserving whales, and how modern genetic methods can be used to crack down on whale smuggling.

http://ow.ly/1Tva8


Brain's Bubble Wrap May Be Lots More

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

They have long been dismissed as the brain's Bubble Wrap, packing material to protect precious cells that do the real work of the mind. But glial cells — the name literally means "glue" — are now being radically recast as neuroscientists explore the role they play in disease and challenge longstanding notions about how the brain works.

More than a century ago, scientists proposed the "neuron doctrine,'' a theory that individual brain cells called neurons are the main players in the nervous system. It became an underpinning of modern neuroscience and led to major advances in understanding the brain, but it has become increasingly apparent that the other 85 percent of brain cells, glia, do more than just housekeeping.

"In a play in a theater, it's not just the actors on the stage, but the whole ensemble that is critical for that production to be perfect,'' said Philip Haydon, chairman of the neuroscience department at Tufts University School of Medicine.

http://ow.ly/1Tvc0


Artifacts Hint at Earliest Neanderthals in Britain

from BBC News Online

Archaeologists have found what they say is the earliest evidence of Neanderthals living in Britain. Two pieces of flint unearthed at motorway works in Dartford, Kent, have now been dated to 110,000 years ago.

The finds push back the presence of Neanderthals in Britain by 40,000 years or more, said Dr Francis Wenban-Smith, from Southampton University. A majority of researchers believe Britain was uninhabited by humans at the time the flint tools were made.

An absence of archaeological evidence suggests people abandoned this land between 200,000 years ago (or 160,000 years ago, depending on who you ask) and 65,000 years ago. But one researcher, unconnected with the study, said he was not convinced by the evidence presented so far.

http://ow.ly/1Tvdk


Virus Ravages Cassava Plants in Africa

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

MUKONO, Uganda — Lynet Nalugo dug a cassava tuber out of her field and sliced it open. Inside its tan skin, the white flesh was riddled with necrotic brown lumps, as obviously diseased as any tuberculosis lung or cancerous breast. "Even the pigs refuse this," she said.

The plant was what she called a "2961," meaning it was Variant No. 2961, the only local strain bred to resist cassava mosaic virus, a disease that caused a major African famine in the 1920s. But this was not mosaic disease, which only stunts the plants. Her field had been attacked by a new and more damaging virus named brown streak, for the marks it leaves on stems.

That newcomer, brown streak, is now ravaging cassava crops in a great swath around Lake Victoria, threatening millions of East Africans who grow the tuber as their staple food. Although it has been seen on coastal farms for 70 years, a mutant version emerged in Africa's interior in 2004 ...

http://ow.ly/1TvfO


Alzheimer's Stalks a Colombian Family

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

YARUMAL, Colombia — Tucked away on a steep street in this rough-hewn mountain town, an old woman found herself diapering her middle-age children.

At frighteningly young ages, in their 40s, four of Laura Cuartas's children began forgetting and falling apart, assaulted by what people here have long called La Bobera, the foolishness. It is a condition attributed, in hushed rumors, to everything from touching a mysterious tree to the revenge of a wronged priest. It is Alzheimer's disease, and at 82, Mrs. Cuartas, her gray raisin of a face grave, takes care of three of her afflicted children.

... For generations, the illness has tormented these and thousands of others among a sprawling group of relatives: the world's largest family to experience Alzheimer's disease. Now, the Colombian clan is center stage in a potentially groundbreaking assault on Alzheimer's, a plan to see if giving treatment before dementia starts can lead to preventing Alzheimer's altogether.

http://ow.ly/1Tvhr


Sinkhole in Guatemala: Giant Could Get Even Bigger

from National Geographic News

A huge sinkhole in Guatemala City, Guatemala, crashed into being on Sunday, reportedly swallowing a three-story building—and echoing a similar, 2007 sinkhole in Guatemala. The sinkhole has likely been weeks or even years in the making—floodwaters from tropical storm Agatha caused the sinkhole to finally collapse, scientists say.

The sinkhole appears to be about 60 feet (18 meters) wide and about 30 stories deep, said James Currens, a hydrogeologist at the University of Kentucky. Sinkholes are natural depressions that can form when water-saturated soil and other particles become too heavy and cause the roofs of existing voids in the soil to collapse.

Another way sinkholes can form is if water enlarges a natural fracture in a limestone bedrock layer. As the crack gets bigger, the topsoil gently slumps, eventually leaving behind a sinkhole.

http://ow.ly/1TviG
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 15, 2010, 03:55:13 PM
http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/639859.html Well waddya know, faggots make great parents! Who woulda thunk?

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-ancient-bees-20100608,0,4547302.story Land of milk and honey really was, you know, a land of milk and honey.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/08/health/08canc.html New early breast cancer treatments.

http://www.boston.com/business/healthcare/articles/2010/06/07/start_up_aims_to_sequence_human_genomes_for_30_in_just_a_few_hours/ Pivoting between this is great and this is eugenics.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-06-04-cigarettes-cancer_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip Yet another reason to stop smoking.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Innovation/Tech/2010/0607/Technology-that-translates-and-unites On Internet translators and translation.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/06/100607-science-animals-crocodiles-hunter-surfing/ Body surfing Crocs? Crikey!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/jun/07/york-gladiator-graveyard Link says it all.

And now for TODAY'S News.

http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/06/bp_cut_corners_in_days_before.html BP fuckups pile higher and deeper.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/health/research/13genome.html The problem with this is that diseases are usually epigenetic, a combination of genotype and environment, so the gene alone doesn't tell the whole story.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10307048.stm Asteroid sample.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/13/AR2010061304822.html On invasive plants, urban forestry and ecological restoration.

http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1995914,00.html#ixzz0qksETupJ "The stars shared spit." A hypothesis without evidence, mostly, lots of heuristic philosophizing.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/06/100610-giant-sea-reptiles-warm-blooded-science/ First of all, they aren't reptiles, not unless that term is suddenly being used in a phylogenetically applicable way and not just for non feathered scaled extant vertebrates, and second, the term is homeothermic. There isn't this on/off switch for physiological temperature regulation as some people imagine. All organisms have to manage temperature some way, either by behavior or by physiology.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/magazine/13dogfighting-t.html One of the most obvious signs of psycho-sociopathy, I've thought.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/06/esa-overhaul/#ixzz0qktvxDEp Yes, and I think they should consider the newly discovered but already extinct Gulf Coast Walrus first.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=127795046 Location of expressionist painter's balcony in London via geometrics and solar data.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/60138/title/Portrait_of_a_youthful_planet Beta Pictoris I a young and massive Jupiter.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 16, 2010, 05:18:01 PM
Today's Science Headlines. Brought to you by,

HUMANITY: For all your fucking-it-up needs.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-oil-inspection-20100615,0,7349376.story From the gulf coast tar ball scene, regulators discover that the people in charge of BP rig inspection are....The Marshal Islands? O.o

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/15/science/space/15kepler.html On planet ownership...I mean, on planet DATA ownership. You can't /own/ a planet, right...right?

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/06/12/BAVN1DRUGU.DTL&type=science Northern shift effect observed in trees. Goodbye, Taiga!

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/06/100614-moon-water-hundred-lunar-proceedings-science/ More water on the moon than previously thought, giving yet another argument to the "Nothing is wrong, there's TONES of water available on Ganymede" crowd.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627640.900-want-to-find-your-mind-learn-to-direct-your-dreams.html On lucid dreaming and metathought...I mean, secondary consciousness. Really, secondary consciousness? Do we have to make up MORE phrases for terms that are already covered?

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/jun/14/scientists-develop-tech-to-track-carbon-dioxide/ On CO2 tracker technology using perflourocarbon tracers.

http://www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/06/a_major_hurricane_in_gulf_coul.html OH GREAT. If the Deepwater event wasn't enough.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/14/AR2010061405388.html Minority students, fighting the good fight against illness, since the white affluent folks won't go to where the smudgy people are.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/science/earth/13shatt.html The Garden of Eden is withering, since God can't be bothered to push back the sea. COME ON, IT WAS EASY ENOUGH WITH MOSES!

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/weightloss/2010-06-15-dietaryguidelines16_ST_N.htm?loc=interstitialskip People starving in india, gulf of mexico dying from oil, saltwater killing the garden of eden. MEANWHILE, Americans dying of EATING TOO MUCH.

Jesus Christ.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: NotPublished on June 25, 2010, 01:55:26 AM
oh I didn't know the hayabusa pod was recaptured I forgot all about it!

Thanks for the links Kai, I love reading them
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 30, 2010, 12:44:52 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/29/us/29wells.html - http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/27/AR2010062703622.html Two on deepwater horizon this morning. Hurricane Alex is coming up fast.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10430234.stm Large Hardon Collider smashes dicks together at high speeds...what?

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-statins-20100629,0,7388273.story On statins, cholesterol and prostate cancer.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/27/magazine/27Tuna-t.html This is why I don't eat bluefin tuna anymore. Or yellow fin. Or any tuna except skipjack, really (thats the type most often canned). And I really hope you'all wouldn't either.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2010-06-28-americans-overtreated_N.htm No, only the people with money. The poor folks aren't treated at all. Best health care in the world my ass.

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100623/full/465994a.html On Africa and science.

http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_15389845?nclick_check=1 On infants and vaccinations.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/60568/title/Neutrino_experiments_sow_seeds_of_possible_revolution_  On neutrinos and antineutrinos.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010/jun/27/legacy-salk-quest-science/ On the Salk Institute.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on June 30, 2010, 01:09:47 PM
Also, the official word on hurricanes and Deepwater Horizon from NOAA:

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2010/PDFs/hurricanes_oil_factsheet.pdf
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 01, 2010, 01:49:04 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/29/science/29ethyl.html?_r=1 This is just the beginning of using viruses for manufacturing.

http://www.latimes.com/news/health/la-sci-diabetes-avandia-20100629,0,6097242.story On Avandia and heart risk.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06/28/AR2010062804973.html On antibiotic resistance and livestock.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/26/world/middleeast/26looting.html On the looting of the Garden of Eden.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8767763.stm On earth's geoid. Maybe someone can explain this to me.

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/health_science/weekly/20100628_Fruit_fly_genes_yielding_clues_to_Lou_Gehrig_s_disease.html?viewAll=y On Drosophilidae and degenerative diseases.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2010/0628/Mars-or-bust!-White-House-announces-new-space-policy On the future of the US space program.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/59872/title/Not_just_a_high On endocannaboids.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=you-have-superpowers On positive illusions. This may bother some people around here.

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100623/full/4651002a.html On scientific academies.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Chairman Risus on July 01, 2010, 11:10:34 PM
Quote from: Kai on July 01, 2010, 01:49:04 PM
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=you-have-superpowers On positive illusions. This may bother some people around here.

Ha. I've been doing a sort of personal experiment similar to this for about half a year now. Positive results so far.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 23, 2010, 02:11:06 AM
July 22, 2010

Workers on Doomed Rig Voiced Concern About Safety

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

WASHINGTON -- A confidential survey of workers on the Deepwater Horizon in the weeks before the oil rig exploded showed that many of them were concerned about safety practices and feared reprisals if they reported mistakes or other problems. In the survey, commissioned by the rig's owner, Transocean, workers said that company plans were not carried out properly and that they "often saw unsafe behaviors on the rig."

Some workers also voiced concerns about poor equipment reliability, "which they believed was as a result of drilling priorities taking precedence over planned maintenance," according to the survey, one of two Transocean reports obtained by The New York Times. "At nine years old, Deepwater Horizon has never been in dry dock," one worker told investigators. "We can only work around so much." "Run it, break it, fix it," another worker said. "That's how they work."

According to a separate 112-page equipment assessment also commissioned by Transocean, many key components -- including the blowout preventer rams and failsafe valves -- had not been fully inspected since 2000, even though guidelines require its inspection every three to five years.

http://snipr.com/zpvjn

Asteroid Threat: Don't Worry, Congress Is Looking into It

from the Christian Science Monitor

Lawmakers are paying new attention to how best to shield Earth from a bad day -- getting whacked by an asteroid or comet that has our planet in its cross-hairs.

A new bill introduced to Congress proposes establishing a government-sponsored commission to study the threat of a major space rock collision with Earth and how prepared we are--as a country and a planet--to face such a danger.

There is a growing choir of concern regarding Near Earth Objects, or NEOs - spotting them and dealing with any Earth-threatening gatecrashers. While the annual probability of the Earth being struck by a huge asteroid or comet is small, the consequences of such a collision are so calamitous that it is prudent to appraise the nature of the threat and prepare to deal with it, experts say.

http://snipr.com/zpvkg

Harvard Puts Tighter Limits on Medical Faculty

from the Boston Globe (Registration Required)

Harvard Medical School will prohibit its 11,000 faculty from giving promotional talks for drug and medical device makers and accepting personal gifts, travel, or meals, under a new policy intended partly to guard against companies' use of Harvard's prestige to market their products.

The conflict-of-interest rules also place stricter limits on the income faculty can earn from companies for consulting, joining boards, and other work; require public reporting of payments of at least $5,000 on a medical school website; and promise more robust internal reporting and monitoring of these relationships.

Harvard, which provides continuing medical education for tens of thousands of doctors worldwide, also will erect a more solid firewall between itself and health care companies during these courses.

http://snipr.com/zpvl2

Amazon Drought Raises Research Doubts

from Nature News

A once-in-a-century drought struck much of the Amazon rainforest in 2005, reducing rainfall by 60-75% in some areas -- and giving scientists a window on to a future coloured by climate change.

The drought foreshadowed the Amazon drying that many climate modellers expect to see in a warmer world. But five years on, a spate of research, including 13 papers published on 20 July in a special issue of the journal New Phytologist , shows that researchers are still grappling with the impact of drought and what it could reveal about the fate of the world's largest tropical forest, a major carbon storehouse.

The debate began with a 2007 study that used data gathered by NASA's Terra satellite to argue that the canopy of the Amazon rainforest grew and "greened up" during the drought -- suggesting that the rainforest could be resilient to dryness, at least for short periods. The phenomenon can be attributed to fewer clouds and more sunlight. But in March, a study using the same satellite data added confusion to the issue when it failed to find excessive greening.

http://snipr.com/zpvlu

Credentials Question Halts Duke Gene Trials

from the Raleigh (N.C.) News and Observer

DURHAM -- Researchers have stopped three clinical trials that rely on the work of a Duke University scientist who may have falsely claimed to be a Rhodes Scholar on applications he submitted for federal grant funding.

The three trials are testing the genetic findings reported by cancer researcher Dr. Anil Potti and his colleagues. Last week, Duke placed Potti on administrative leave after allegations arose that on grant applications he embellished his résumé with the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship.

Enrollment in the trials was halted Sunday at Duke and elsewhere. The next day, a letter signed by 31 researchers at universities across the nation sharply criticized the work conducted by Potti and Dr. Joseph Nevins, another Duke cancer researcher, noting "serious errors" in their science.

http://snipr.com/zpvmj

Taming Time Travel

from Science News

Novelists and screenwriters know that time travel can be accomplished in all sorts of ways: a supercharged DeLorean, Hermione's small watch and, most recently, a spacetime-bending hot tub have allowed fictional heroes to jump between past and future.

But physicists know that time travel is more than just a compelling plot device -- it's a serious prediction of Einstein's general relativity equations. In a new study posted online July 15, researchers led by Seth Lloyd at MIT analyze how some of the quirks and peculiarities of real-life time travel might play out. This particular kind of time travel evades some of its most paradoxical predictions, Lloyd says.

Any theory of time travel has to confront the devastating "grandfather paradox," in which a traveler jumps back in time and kills his grandfather, which prevents his own existence, which then prevents the murder in the first place, and so on.

http://snipr.com/zpvng

After Oil Cleanup, Hidden Damage Can Last for Years

from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

On the rocky beaches of Alaska, scientists plunged shovels and picks into the ground and dug 6,775 holes, repeatedly striking oil--still pungent and dangerous a dozen years after the Exxon Valdez infamously spilled its cargo.

More than an ocean away, on the Breton coast of France, scientists surveying the damage after another huge oil spill found that disturbances in the food chain persisted for more than a decade. And on the southern gulf coast in Mexico, an American researcher peering into a mangrove swamp spotted lingering damage 30 years after that shore was struck by an enormous spill.

These far-flung shorelines hit by oil in the past offer clues to what people living along the Gulf Coast can expect now that the great oil calamity of 2010 may be nearing an end.

http://snipr.com/zpvnz

Prone to Error: Earliest Steps to Find Cancer

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

Monica Long had expected a routine appointment. But here she was sitting in her new oncologist's office, and he was delivering deeply disturbing news. Nearly a year earlier, in 2007, a pathologist at a small hospital in Cheboygan, Mich., had found the earliest stage of breast cancer from a biopsy. Extensive surgery followed, leaving Ms. Long's right breast missing a golf-ball-size chunk.

Now she was being told the pathologist had made a mistake. Her new doctor was certain she never had the disease, called ductal carcinoma in situ, or D.C.I.S. It had all been unnecessary -- the surgery, the radiation, the drugs and, worst of all, the fear.

... Like most women, Ms. Long had regarded the breast biopsy as the gold standard, an infallible way to identify cancer. "I thought it was pretty cut and dried," said Ms. Long, who is a registered nurse. As it turns out, diagnosing the earliest stage of breast cancer can be surprisingly difficult, prone to both outright error and case-by-case disagreement over whether a cluster of cells is benign or malignant, according to an examination of breast cancer cases by The New York Times.

http://snipr.com/zpvrq

Old Faithful Tevatron Collider Leads Race to Higgs

from New Scientist

It could do with a lick of paint and may not break any records any time soon. But the Tevatron collider in Batavia, Illinois, which has been slamming protons and antiprotons together for the last 27 years, is poised to beat Europe's much-vaunted Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in the race to find the first hints of a Higgs boson. How has an ageing workhorse come to have the edge on its successor?

A new batch of data collected at the Tevatron will be presented next week at the International Conference on High Energy Physics in Paris, France. The results are likely to tighten the constraints on the possible mass of the Higgs boson, the particle thought to be responsible for giving other particles their mass.

The Tevatron is set to shut up shop by the end of September 2011, but the progress revealed in Paris could bolster the case to let it operate for another three years. ... If it is allowed to stay open--at a cost of around $50 million a year--the steady collision rate the Tevatron can achieve, combined with improvements in its data analysis and the closure of the LHC throughout 2012 for repairs, will favour the Tevatron in the hunt for the first signs of the Higgs, say researchers at the collider.

http://snipr.com/zpvt8

Magnetic Remote Control Can Rewind a Worm's Wriggle

from Scientific American

The power to control living things and objects from a distance is a popular supernatural talent in science fiction and fantasy: Witches fling spells at foes and X-Men send chairs and tables flying with telekinesis, for example. But when it comes to remotely controlling biological organisms, science has a few tricks up its sleeve, too--although there's nothing metaphysical about them.

Manipulating biological processes with minimal interference, from the cellular level to the behavior of whole organisms, is a burgeoning scientific effort to better understand how living things work and to develop more effective treatments for a range of medical disorders.

Most recently, researchers essentially created a magnetic remote control that alters cell function and changes the behavior of a tiny worm. A team of biophysicists from the State University of New York (S.U.N.Y.) at Buffalo used magnetic nanoparticles to control heat-activated protein gates called ion channels embedded in the membranes of nerve cells, allowing the researchers to stimulate a simple reflex in nematode worms at will.

http://snipr.com/zpvug
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on July 24, 2010, 02:23:58 AM
July 23, 2010

Tropical Tropical Storm in Gulf Halts Oil Spill Response Efforts

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

A tropical storm in the Gulf of Mexico has forced the evacuation of response vessels at the site of BP's blown-out oil well, further stalling efforts to permanently seal the well.

Tropical Storm Bonnie, with winds of 40 miles an hour, was about 80 miles south-southeast of Miami and moving west-northwest at 19 miles an hour, the United States National Hurricane Center said Friday morning. The agency projected that the storm would approach the northern Gulf coast late Saturday or early Sunday.

Among the vessels forced to flee the well site, 50 miles off the Louisiana coast, was a drill rig that was working on a relief well, which is considered the ultimate way to seal the well. Thad W. Allen, the retired Coast Guard admiral who leads the federal response effort, said late Thursday evening that it was beginning the process of disconnecting a riser pipe from the rig to the seabed and pulling it up, a process expected to take up to 12 hours.

http://snipr.com/zrdns

Stimulus Funds Give High-Speed Rail a Kick

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Americans love to complain about the pitiable state of our once-great rail system and wonder why our locomotives are stuck in the past. I mean, you can zip between Wuhan and Guangzhou, China, at 220 mph. Japan's Shinkansen system tops 186 mph. The French TGV can blaze across the countryside at more than 200 mph.

... Outside the Northeast corridor, few people in the U.S. even consider train travel. America has the worst rail system in the developed world, right? Well, sort of.

U.S. trains may not be the best at moving people, but they're great at moving everything else. More than 40 percent of U.S. freight miles are done by rail, compared with less than 15 percent in Europe, according to Christopher Barkan, a professor who heads the railroad engineering program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

http://snipr.com/zrdop

Marmots Thriving Amid Climate Change -- For Now

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Every year, scientists fan out across Colorado's Upper East River Valley to count the yellow-bellied marmots that make their home in rocky meadows bordered by aspen, fir and spruce trees.

Over the last decade, the work has gotten more tiring. Now they know why--the population of squirrel-like critters has vastly expanded as a result of environmental changes brought on by global warming, according to a study published Thursday in the journal Nature.

It's a rare example of animals benefiting from the higher temperatures, which are making life increasingly difficult for polar bears, harlequin frogs and dozens of other species around the world, the researchers said. But in this case the effect is only temporary, since the forces that are causing marmots to thrive are almost certain to spell their doom.

http://snipr.com/zrdp0

Stars Reveal Carbon 'Spaceballs'

from BBC News Online

Scientists have detected the largest molecules ever seen in space, in a cloud of cosmic dust surrounding a distant star.

The football-shaped carbon molecules are known as buckyballs, and were only discovered on Earth 25 years ago when they were made in a laboratory.

These molecules are the "third type of carbon"--with the first two types being graphite and diamond. The researchers report their findings in the journal Science.

http://snipr.com/zrdpl

Ethanol Future Looking for More Fuel

from National Geographic News

By now, well into the 21st century, at least some U.S. cars were supposed to be running on an exciting new power source--clean fuels refined from corn husks, timber waste and tall, fast-growing grasses.

But the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, acknowledging that not a single facility is yet producing this advanced "cellulosic" ethanol, has proposed dramatically scaling back a federal program to promote the fuel for the second straight year.

Instead of requiring that the oil industry blend 250 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol into the gasoline sold at the pump next year, as Congress envisioned under the Renewable Fuels Standard program, the EPA said July 12 that it intends to cut the 2011 mandate to 5 million gallons.

http://snipr.com/zrdql

A Bag and a Trap. Oil Spill Invention Is a Keeper

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Gerry Matherne recently built a helicopter from "a bit of this and a piece of that," which made him a minor star on YouTube when the engine died in midair and he didn't. He somehow landed the crippled craft beside power lines.

"I'm always inventing something," said the gruff 61-year-old captain of an oil supertanker. "When I was a boy, a wristwatch was never safe in my hands. I'd dismantle anything to see how it ran."

So when Matherne learned of the runaway BP oil leak, he considered it a personal challenge. He drove to a hardware store, bought some window screens and PVC pipe, and began to tinker.

http://snipr.com/zrdrx

Hole From on High

from Science News

Researchers poring over Google Earth images have discovered one of Earth's freshest impact craters--a 45-meter-wide pock in southwestern Egypt that probably was excavated by a fast-moving iron meteorite no more than a few thousand years ago.

Although the crater was first noticed in autumn 2008, researchers have since spotted the blemish on satellite images taken as far back as 1972, says Luigi Folco, a cosmochemist at the University of Siena in Italy. He and his colleagues report their find online July 22 in Science.

The rim of the Egyptian crater stands about 3 meters above the surrounding plain, which is partially covered with distinct swaths of light-colored material blasted from the crater by the impact. These rays, which emanate from the impact site like spokes from the hub of a wheel, are what drew researchers' attention to the crater, says Folco.

http://snipr.com/zrduw

Quantum Mechanics Flummoxes Physicists Again

from Nature News

If you ever want to get your head around the riddle that is quantum mechanics, look no further than the double-slit experiment. This shows, with perfect simplicity, how just watching a wave or a particle can change its behaviour.

The idea is so unpalatable to physicists that they have spent decades trying to find new ways to test it. The latest such attempt, by physicists in Europe and Canada, used a three-slit version--but quantum mechanics won out again.

In the standard double-slit experiment, a wide screen is shielded from an electron gun by a wall containing two separated slits. If the electron gun is fired with one slit closed, a mound of electrons forms on the screen beyond the open slit, trailing off to the left and right--the sort of behaviour expected for particles. If the gun is fired when both slits are open, however, electrons stack along the screen in comb-like divisions. This illustrates the electrons interfering with each other--the hallmark of wave behaviour.

http://snipr.com/zrdy0

Marine Creatures Survived Ancient Ocean Acidification

from ScienceNOW Daily News

Researchers studying an ancient episode of high ocean acidity have discovered that a group of marine creatures living at the time adapted to the change in water chemistry. But the findings may provide little comfort for scientists worried about ocean conditions today, which are changing much more quickly.

About 120 million years ago, during the early part of the Cretaceous period, a series of massive volcanic eruptions pumped huge amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2)into Earth's atmosphere. The air's CO2 content rose to about twice today's level. Eventually, the oceans absorbed much of that CO2, which significantly increased the water's acidity.

The change reduced the amount of calcium carbonate (CaCO3) in the water, making it more difficult for creatures such as some kinds of plankton to form shells. Ocean pH returned to normal after about 160,000 years.

http://snipr.com/zrdym

Gut Check: How Do Caterpillars Walk?

from National Public Radio

The question isn't why did the caterpillar cross the road but how? Researchers have discovered that at least one species of caterpillar precedes each step with a thrust of its gut. The finding points to an entirely new mode of animal locomotion and could lead researchers to develop new robotic tools for exploration and medicine

Caterpillars don't have a bone in their body. They move by squeezing muscles in sequence in an undulating wave motion. It is easy enough to observe from the outside, but Michael Simon, then a graduate student at Tufts University wanted to know what was happening on the inside. Simon decided he needed to X-ray a caterpillar as it crawled.

That isn't as easy as it sounds. Because caterpillars don't have bones, they can't be X-rayed by conventional machines. So Simon and his group took the caterpillars to a special, X-ray-producing particle accelerator at Argonne National Laboratory in Illinois. They also brought a tiny, custom-built caterpillar treadmill.

http://snipr.com/zrdzv
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 16, 2010, 08:22:07 PM
Cacao genome sequenced, and Mars and Hershey are arguing over who owns it. (http://www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/15/business/15chocolate.html&OQ=_rQ3D1&OP=5507108cQ2FQ2AetEQ2AYkQ5BXwkkQ3A@Q2A@hQ3DhQ2Ah9Q2AQ3DWQ2AELX0%28tXXQ2AQ3DWQ5BSkQ5BkoJQ3AtISQ3AAo)


Salmonella enteritidis found in Iowa egg farm. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/14/AR2010091406673.html)

PortTechLA center in Las Angeles producing high efficiency and long lasting oil filters, among other pollution limiting technology. (http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-port-tech-20100915,0,4365447.story)

Fuel-secreating bacteria via genetic insertion. (http://www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/science/earth/14fuel.html&OQ=_rQ3D1&OP=2ed3f600Q2F%29lWz%29Q3F_E1Q3E__Q60Q2B%29Q2B,7,%29,Q24%297!%291EOWXEW%29WKQ3EQ60D%297!Q22tWQ23IDQ60gQ23)

Low Prostate-Specific Antigen (PSA) means a much lower chance of prostate cancer. (http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/643138.html)


On southeast Asian tiger conservation. (http://www.boston.com/news/science/articles/2010/09/15/study_lays_out_a_plan_to_save_the_tiger/)

Antibiotics cause alteration in our resident gut flora. (http://www.usatoday.com/yourlife/health/medical/treatments/2010-09-14-antibiotics-digestive_N.htm)

Artificial skin for robots. (http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2010/09/13/robots-need-skin-too/)


Evidence of star cannibalism. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-11313601)

Researcher, fired over laying the truth straight at a presentation about an anti-cancer drug trial, files suit against former employers for science misconduct. (http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100915/full/467260a.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on September 16, 2010, 08:31:34 PM
Quote from: Kai on September 16, 2010, 08:22:07 PM
Cacao genome sequenced, and Mars and Hershey are arguing over who owns it. (http://www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/15/business/15chocolate.html&OQ=_rQ3D1&OP=5507108cQ2FQ2AetEQ2AYkQ5BXwkkQ3A@Q2A@hQ3DhQ2Ah9Q2AQ3DWQ2AELX0%28tXXQ2AQ3DWQ5BSkQ5BkoJQ3AtISQ3AAo)


We really need to cleanse the temple, Kai.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 16, 2010, 10:10:33 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on September 16, 2010, 08:31:34 PM
Quote from: Kai on September 16, 2010, 08:22:07 PM
Cacao genome sequenced, and Mars and Hershey are arguing over who owns it. (http://www.nytimes.com/glogin?URI=http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/15/business/15chocolate.html&OQ=_rQ3D1&OP=5507108cQ2FQ2AetEQ2AYkQ5BXwkkQ3A@Q2A@hQ3DhQ2Ah9Q2AQ3DWQ2AELX0%28tXXQ2AQ3DWQ5BSkQ5BkoJQ3AtISQ3AAo)


We really need to cleanse the temple, Kai.

Seriously.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on October 23, 2010, 09:34:05 PM
I think, given the time I have these days, I'll plan on updating every Saturday, with a few links that I pick out from the week.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on November 27, 2010, 10:38:49 PM
http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/culturelab/2010/11/magic-and-the-brain.html - Review for a new book, Sleights of Mind.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/11/genetically-modified-salmon/ Truth and misinformation on GM salmon.

http://www.economist.com/node/17519716 - On the Uncanny Valley.

http://www.the-scientist.com/news/display/57814/ - weird tunicate an exception to conservation of order in genomes.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 07, 2011, 09:18:23 PM
REVIVAL!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/feb/03/tree-deaths-amazon-climate "Russian roulette with the worlds largest forest"

http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_9387000/9387395.stm BREAKING: BIRDS ARE BIRD BRAINED. But only after exposure to massive radioactive decay.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/06/magazine/06baby-t.html?_r=2&ref=magazine IT SHAKES THE BABBY?

http://www.the-scientist.com/article/display/57932/ Genome size measurement project.

http://www.boston.com/news/science/articles/2011/02/06/us_china_space_venture_appears_unlikely_for_now/ Speculation: China and USA in space.

http://scidev.net/en/news/new-mosquito-type-could-undermine-malaria-control-1.html The mosquito that Charley posted about in the other thread.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2011/feb/06/first-panoramic-view-sun PANORAMIC VIEW OF THE SUN!

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/02/04/133371076/how-keeping-little-girls-squeaky-clean-could-make-them-sick Daily duh: Exposure to bacteria boosts immunoefficiency. Whowuddathunk?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/05/AR2011020503743.html Seize the cheese.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/08/science/08obplant.html?_r=1 Daily cycling of the immunodefense of plants. Yeah, plant immunodefense, not something I think about much.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 08, 2011, 09:39:40 PM
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/05/us/05science.html?_r=1 Honestly, I hated science fairs in grade school. I thought they were a pile of bullshit. Do you ever see taxonomic works at these things? No, you only see lame "experiments". Now, if some kid did a review of the species of an taxon in his region, /that/ would be a cool science fair project.

http://www.economist.com/node/18061104 When it comes to waste fuel-burning, the always and eternal problem is the toxic gas that's released. Toxic solid goes to toxic gas...and goes into solution in our rivers, lakes and oceans. Thus the cycle continues.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20088-woodpeckers-head-inspires-shock-absorbers.html Biomimetics in action. Unfortunately, most of the biomimicry results end up as lame ass products.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/02/110204-new-species-pseudoscorpion-caves-animals-science/ Daily Nuh Spuh (taxonomist joke, from the abbreviation n. sp. for new species): cave dwelling pseudoscorpion with venomous pinching chelicerae.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-sci-water-flea-20110206,0,7033137.story A species of Daphnia ("water flea") with a really long genome.

http://sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/69553/title/Extinctions_breed_carbon_chaos Carbon cycling during large scale extinction events associated with vulcanism.

http://yourlife.usatoday.com/health/medical/heartdisease/story/2011/02/Weight-loss-surgery-may-remodel-heart/43291594/1 Daily Duh: Loosing weight puts less stress on the heart. Whowuddathunk!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-12365070 Loss of function in Dicer1 enzyme linked to macular degeneration.

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-he-stem-cells-20110203,0,7365273.story This "memory" in stem cells that they are talking about is the epigenetic effect of transcription factor cascades, the things that produce the gridded layout of development.

http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110206/full/news.2011.73.html Fly brain imaging bringing incredible detail.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on February 10, 2011, 05:10:29 AM
No snarkyness today, just posting the total. Too tired.

---

Breast-Cancer Study Questions Lymph Node Removal

from the Washington Post (Registration Required)

Many women with early breast cancer do not appear to need removal of their lymph nodes, as is often recommended, according to a federally funded study released Tuesday.

The study, involving nearly 900 women who were treated at 115 sites across the country, found that those who did have their lymph nodes removed were no more likely to survive five years after the surgery than those who did not, the researchers reported in a paper published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Breast cancer is diagnosed in about 200,000 women each year in the United States, with the cancer reaching the lymph nodes in about one-third of the cases.

When the cancer has spread to any lymph nodes, doctors usually recommend that nodes in the armpit be removed surgically, along with the tumor in the breast, to reduce the risk of a recurrence. But such removal is painful, makes recovery more difficult and leaves women susceptible to complications, including infections and a chronic, sometimes disabling swelling in their arms known as lymphodema.

http://ow.ly/3T859


Study Links Teenage Bullying to Social Status

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Scientists have confirmed an axiom of teenage life: Kids intent on climbing the social ladder at school are more likely to pick on their fellow students.

The finding, reported in Tuesday's edition of the American Sociological Review, lends an air of authenticity to TV shows like "Gossip Girl" and the 2004 movie "Mean Girls."

More importantly, it may suggest that efforts to combat bullying in schools should focus more closely on social hierarchies. "By and large, status increases aggression," said sociologist Robert Faris of UC Davis, who led the study.

http://ow.ly/3T89A


Studying How Snakes Got Legless

from BBC News Online

A 95-million-year-old fossil is helping scientists understand how snakes lost their legs through evolutionary time. Found in Lebanon, the specimen is one of only three examples of an ancient snake with preserved leg bones.

One rear leg is clearly visible but researchers had to use a novel X-ray technique to examine another leg hidden inside the fossil rock. Writing in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, the team says the snake records an early stage in limb loss.

The scientists' high-resolution 3D images suggest the legs in this particular species, Eupodophis descouensi, grew more slowly, or for a shorter period of time.

http://ow.ly/3T8df


An H.I.V. Strategy Invites Addicts In

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- At 12 tables, in front of 12 mirrors, a dozen people are fussing intently in raptures of self-absorption, like chorus line members applying makeup in a dressing room. But these people are drug addicts, injecting themselves with whatever they just bought on the street--under the eyes of a nurse here at Insite, the only "safe injection site" in North America.

"You can tell she just shot cocaine," Thomas Kerr, an AIDS expert who does studies at the center, said of one young woman who keeps readjusting her tight tube top. "The way she's fidgeting, moving her hands over her face--she's tweaking."

Insite, situated on the worst block of an area once home to the fastest-growing AIDS epidemic in North America, is one reason Vancouver is succeeding in lowering new AIDS infection rates while many other cities are only getting worse.

http://ow.ly/3T8hQ


Discrimination Against Women in Science May Be Institutional

from the Guardian (UK)

When it comes to worrying about the underrepresentation of women in science, especially at higher levels, are we stuck in the past?

A paper published on Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that we are. Researchers Stephen Ceci and Wendy Williams from Cornell University in the US reviewed 20 years of data on gender discrimination and the status of women in the sciences. They argue that too much attention has been focused on apparent sexual discrimination when women apply for new jobs, funding or to be published in journals.

Instead, Ceci and Williams believe that women are more likely than men to make personal choices--many of which may well be constrained--that prevent them from progressing to more senior levels (eg time off to raise children, following a spouse, caring for parents). They argue that focusing on discrimination at application stages may represent a costly red herring and that resources should be redirected towards education and policy changes that reflect the challenges faced by women interested in building a long-term career in science.

http://ow.ly/3T8mx


A Growing Danger for Athletes

from the Los Angeles Times (Registration Required)

Just two days after the start of the winter strength-and-conditioning program, Jim Poggi, a University of Iowa freshman football player, called his father to report that his body ached from the intense workouts. The pain in his arms and legs had not subsided even after a weekend of rest.

... By the third day of workouts, on Jan. 24, it was clear something had gone terribly wrong. By the next morning, Poggi and 12 of his Iowa teammates were hospitalized with rhabdomyolysis, a condition in which muscle tissue breaks down and floods the bloodstream with a protein that can impair kidney function.

This type of rhabdomyolysis, caused by physical overexertion, was once rare. But the condition is cropping up with increasing frequency in the world of amateur athletics, experts say, perhaps the result of a culture in sports that emphasizes superior conditioning and physical tenacity.

http://ow.ly/3T8pJ


Social Scientist Sees Bias Within

from the New York Times (Registration Required)

SAN ANTONIO -- Some of the world's pre-eminent experts on bias discovered an unexpected form of it at their annual meeting.

Discrimination is always high on the agenda at the Society for Personality and Social Psychology's conference, where psychologists discuss their research on racial prejudice, homophobia, sexism, stereotype threat and unconscious bias against minorities. But the most talked-about speech at this year's meeting, which ended Jan. 30, involved a new "outgroup."

It was identified by Jonathan Haidt, a social psychologist at the University of Virginia who studies the intuitive foundations of morality and ideology. He polled his audience at the San Antonio Convention Center, starting by asking how many considered themselves politically liberal. A sea of hands appeared, and Dr. Haidt estimated that liberals made up 80 percent of the 1,000 psychologists in the ballroom. When he asked for centrists and libertarians, he spotted fewer than three dozen hands. And then, when he asked for conservatives, he counted a grand total of three.

http://ow.ly/3T8uf


NASA Engineers Can't Find Electronic Flaws in Toyotas

from the Seattle Times

WASHINGTON -- There is no evidence that unintended accelerations in Toyota vehicles were caused by electronic flaws, the Transportation Department said Tuesday. The agency reached the conclusion after a 10-month investigation that said the mechanical causes were the same ones identified earlier by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA): sticking accelerator pedals and floor-mat interference.

"The jury is back," said Ray LaHood, the transportation secretary. "The verdict is in. There is no electronic-based cause for unintended high-speed acceleration in Toyotas. Period." An engineer from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), brought in to help conduct the inquiry, was slightly less categorical but still emphatic.

"It's very difficult to prove a negative," said Michael Kirsch, a principal engineer with NASA's Engineering and Safety Center. But the electronic system for throttle controls in Toyotas would require two separate sensors to fail simultaneously in such a way that neither created an "error code" in the vehicle's onboard computer.

http://ow.ly/3T8yn


Gene Reading Steps Up a Gear

from Nature News

"It's super cool, but it's never going to work," genomics guru Eric Schadt responded when a wary investor asked for his opinion about a new DNA-sequencing technology in 2003. A company was creating a machine that it claimed could revolutionize the field by reading over the shoulder of an enzyme as it copied DNA molecules.

Despite his initial scepticism, Schadt touted the method's success last weekend at the Advances in Genome Biology and Technology meeting in Marco Island, Florida. Now chief scientific officer at the company he had once doubted--Pacific Biosciences in Menlo Park, California--Schadt was one of several researchers at the meeting who provided a glimpse of how the company's first DNA-sequencing machines are performing.

All eyes are on these machines. Pacific Biosciences set a high bar for its own success in 2008, when chief technology officer Stephen Turner boasted that the instruments would be able to sequence a human genome in just 15 minutes by 2013, compared with the full month it took at that time. This year, as researchers unveiled data from the first machines to leave the company's campus, the discussion was less about revolutionizing the field and more about niche applications.

http://ow.ly/3T8CN


Buried Microbes Coax Energy From Rock

from Science News

Here's yet another reason to marvel at microbes: Buried deep within Earth at temperatures and pressures that would kill most living beings, bacteria and other tiny organisms not only survive but apparently even coax the rocks around them to produce food.

Researchers have found that the mere presence of microbes triggers minerals to release hydrogen gas, which the organisms then munch. "It looks like the bacteria themselves have an integral role in liberating this energy," says R. John Parkes, a geomicrobiologist at Cardiff University in Wales.

His team's findings appear in the March issue of Geology. The work helps explain how microbes can survive up to kilometers deep in a subterranean world far from any sunlight to fuel photosynthesis. Such "deep biospheres" may even exist on other planets, Parkes says, with organisms tucked safely away from frigid temperatures and lethal radiation at the surface.

http://ow.ly/3T8GF
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on February 10, 2011, 01:16:13 PM
Bullying, Bias, and microbes that eat rocks.


It's been a good week.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Epimetheus on July 18, 2011, 02:16:50 PM
http://healthland.time.com/2011/07/11/scientists-discover-drug-resistant-gonorrhea-superbug/

QuoteA new, untreatable strain of the sexually transmitted disease gonorrhea has been discovered in Japan, according to an international team of infectious disease experts. The strain, named H041, is resistant to all known forms of antibiotics.

Of course it's Japan.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Xooxe on July 30, 2011, 12:49:51 AM
I can't wait to find out that door handles are a vector.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nephew Twiddleton on July 30, 2011, 12:52:30 AM
I blame Weezer.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on October 25, 2011, 11:53:17 AM
http://science.slashdot.org/story/11/10/24/2047240/10-centimeter-single-celled-organisms-photographed-6-miles-underwater

http://science.slashdot.org/story/11/10/22/2049258/german-paleontologists-find-a-near-perfect-dinosaur-fossil
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on February 12, 2012, 08:24:43 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/02/120209172603.htm

Quote"I want to help people to notice things consciously that they might not otherwise see, and remain open to the possibilities. Noticing is one thing, and building on it or connecting it to other things is the next step. Some of this can be learned and we now have a discipline for it." He is already looking at other obstacles and plans to publish a series of innovation-enhancing techniques to address as many as two dozen distinct creativity blocks caused by the normal function of our perceptual and cognitive systems.

The one technique described in the article has striking similarities to Jainist/Buddhist mental exercises for "releasing/letting go of karma".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on April 06, 2012, 10:06:15 PM
ThepositivebraiN.com (http://thepositivebrain.com)
On reconstructing thoughts with fMRI scans.
QuoteThe idea of seeing life through someone else's eyes has long been a theme in our fiction and our fascination. The opportunity to access the inner world of another human was accounted famously in the cult classic, Being John Malcovich. Variations on the theme have been showcased in a lengthy roster of Hollywood productions, such as, Freaky Friday, The Change Up, and an unfortunate number of Look Who's Talking productions, to name a few.
Currently a few weeks old, still, it might be time to practice thinking with the other side of my brain, again...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on April 25, 2012, 05:31:59 AM
http://science.slashdot.org/story/12/04/24/212221/how-nearby-supernovae-affected-life-on-earth



"Every man and woman is a star." -A:. C:.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on April 30, 2012, 04:33:37 PM
Cross post from Aneristic Illusions

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17894176

QuoteFile-sharing site The Pirate Bay must be blocked by UK internet service providers, the High Court has ruled.

The Swedish website hosts links to download mostly-pirated free music and video.

Sky, Everything Everywhere, TalkTalk, O2 and Virgin Media must all prevent their users from accessing the site.

I'll let you read through the article, but be warned. You may wish to hold your sides now as the ineffectiveness of this is going to make them rather sore.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Precious Moments Zalgo on May 13, 2012, 06:10:22 PM
http://www.nature.com/news/human-brain-shaped-by-duplicate-genes-1.10584

Apparently, a large part of the difference between human brains and chimpanzee brains is due to two successive duplication errors of a single gene.  Also, they put the human form of this gene in mice, so it turns out that the "Pinky and the Brain" cartoon was prophecy.  Narf!

QuoteSurprisingly, the SRGAP2C protein blocks the action of the ancestral protein, Polleux's team discovered, effectively rendering humans as 'knockouts' for the ancestral SRGAP2 gene. The team then expressed the human form of SRGAP2C in the neurons of developing mice. The change didn't cause the mice brains to enlarge, but their neurons produced denser arrays of brain cell structures, called dendritic spines, that forge connections with neighbouring neurons.

"If you're increasing the total number of connections, you're probably increasing the ability of this network to handle information," Polleux says. "It's like increasing the number of processors in a computer."

In mice, the gene also increased the migration speed of neurons across the developing brain. Polleux's team speculates that this trait could also have helped neurons to travel long distances in the enlarged brains of human ancestors.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 13, 2012, 08:01:25 PM
Quote from: Precious Moments Zalgo on May 13, 2012, 06:10:22 PM
http://www.nature.com/news/human-brain-shaped-by-duplicate-genes-1.10584

Apparently, a large part of the difference between human brains and chimpanzee brains is due to two successive duplication errors of a single gene.  Also, they put the human form of this gene in mice, so it turns out that the "Pinky and the Brain" cartoon was prophecy.  Narf!

QuoteSurprisingly, the SRGAP2C protein blocks the action of the ancestral protein, Polleux's team discovered, effectively rendering humans as 'knockouts' for the ancestral SRGAP2 gene. The team then expressed the human form of SRGAP2C in the neurons of developing mice. The change didn't cause the mice brains to enlarge, but their neurons produced denser arrays of brain cell structures, called dendritic spines, that forge connections with neighbouring neurons.

"If you're increasing the total number of connections, you're probably increasing the ability of this network to handle information," Polleux says. "It's like increasing the number of processors in a computer."

In mice, the gene also increased the migration speed of neurons across the developing brain. Polleux's team speculates that this trait could also have helped neurons to travel long distances in the enlarged brains of human ancestors.

I am a little concerned about the creation of genius mice.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nephew Twiddleton on May 14, 2012, 12:35:37 AM
Nah. Mice are nice. Except for pogo. Pog was rather neurotic and frequently bit me though i was saddened and a little disturbed by her death since i witnessed it.

Twid
used to have pet mice
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nephew Twiddleton on May 14, 2012, 12:37:49 AM
Oh. And male mice. Male mice do not like other male mice and will try to kill each other.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on May 29, 2012, 05:22:35 PM
16 Year old kid solves 300 year old physics riddle (http://www.heraldsun.com.au/ipad/boy-solves-newtons-300-year-riddle/story-fn6s850w-1226368869402)

The Brain May Disassemble Itself in Sleep (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=sleeps-secret-repairs)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on May 29, 2012, 05:26:34 PM
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/340900/title/DNA_used_as_rewritable_data_storage_in_cells (http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/340900/title/DNA_used_as_rewritable_data_storage_in_cells)

Cloning is the new data piracy!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 29, 2012, 06:19:17 PM
Quote from: Telarus on May 29, 2012, 05:22:35 PM
16 Year old kid solves 300 year old physics riddle (http://www.heraldsun.com.au/ipad/boy-solves-newtons-300-year-riddle/story-fn6s850w-1226368869402)

The Brain May Disassemble Itself in Sleep (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=sleeps-secret-repairs)

It's bumming me out that I can't get that first link to load...maybe later today.

The second one is fascinating, and I also wonder if there's any connection with the fact that I often wake up understanding math problems that I was struggling with when I went to bed.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on May 29, 2012, 06:21:33 PM
Quote from: PROFOUNDLY RETARDED CHARLIE MANSON on May 29, 2012, 06:19:17 PM
Quote from: Telarus on May 29, 2012, 05:22:35 PM
16 Year old kid solves 300 year old physics riddle (http://www.heraldsun.com.au/ipad/boy-solves-newtons-300-year-riddle/story-fn6s850w-1226368869402)

The Brain May Disassemble Itself in Sleep (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=sleeps-secret-repairs)

It's bumming me out that I can't get that first link to load...maybe later today.

The second one is fascinating, and I also wonder if there's any connection with the fact that I often wake up understanding math problems that I was struggling with when I went to bed.

No, that's just the Math Fairy.  You DID leave a small animal under the pillow, I hope.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 29, 2012, 06:27:43 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on May 29, 2012, 06:21:33 PM
Quote from: PROFOUNDLY RETARDED CHARLIE MANSON on May 29, 2012, 06:19:17 PM
Quote from: Telarus on May 29, 2012, 05:22:35 PM
16 Year old kid solves 300 year old physics riddle (http://www.heraldsun.com.au/ipad/boy-solves-newtons-300-year-riddle/story-fn6s850w-1226368869402)

The Brain May Disassemble Itself in Sleep (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=sleeps-secret-repairs)

It's bumming me out that I can't get that first link to load...maybe later today.

The second one is fascinating, and I also wonder if there's any connection with the fact that I often wake up understanding math problems that I was struggling with when I went to bed.

No, that's just the Math Fairy.  You DID leave a small animal under the pillow, I hope.

Oh shit! I wondered where all my pillow-lizards were disappearing to.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Anna Mae Bollocks on May 29, 2012, 06:54:10 PM
Quote from: PROFOUNDLY RETARDED CHARLIE MANSON on May 29, 2012, 06:19:17 PM
Quote from: Telarus on May 29, 2012, 05:22:35 PM
16 Year old kid solves 300 year old physics riddle (http://www.heraldsun.com.au/ipad/boy-solves-newtons-300-year-riddle/story-fn6s850w-1226368869402)

The Brain May Disassemble Itself in Sleep (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=sleeps-secret-repairs)

It's bumming me out that I can't get that first link to load...maybe later today.

The second one is fascinating, and I also wonder if there's any connection with the fact that I often wake up understanding math problems that I was struggling with when I went to bed.

Re: first link: Try googling "Shouryya Ray".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 29, 2012, 11:03:34 PM
Quote from: Anna Mae Bollocks on May 29, 2012, 06:54:10 PM
Quote from: PROFOUNDLY RETARDED CHARLIE MANSON on May 29, 2012, 06:19:17 PM
Quote from: Telarus on May 29, 2012, 05:22:35 PM
16 Year old kid solves 300 year old physics riddle (http://www.heraldsun.com.au/ipad/boy-solves-newtons-300-year-riddle/story-fn6s850w-1226368869402)

The Brain May Disassemble Itself in Sleep (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=sleeps-secret-repairs)

It's bumming me out that I can't get that first link to load...maybe later today.

The second one is fascinating, and I also wonder if there's any connection with the fact that I often wake up understanding math problems that I was struggling with when I went to bed.

Re: first link: Try googling "Shouryya Ray".

Sweet, thanks!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on July 10, 2012, 09:07:03 AM
http://www3.griffith.edu.au/03/ertiki/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=37742

Shadow of a single atom captured in a photo image
(http://www3.griffith.edu.au/03/ertiki/article_image.php?id=37742)

QuoteIn an international scientific breakthrough, a Griffith University research team has been able to photograph the shadow of a single atom for the first time.
"We have reached the extreme limit of microscopy; you cannot see anything smaller than an atom using visible light," Professor Dave Kielpinski of Griffith University's Centre for Quantum Dynamics in Brisbane.

"We wanted to investigate how few atoms are required to cast a shadow and we proved it takes just one," Professor Kielpinski said.

Published this week in Nature Communications, "Absorption imaging of a single atom" is the result of work over the last 5 years by the Kielpinski/Streed research team.   

At the heart of this Griffith University achievement is a super high-resolution microscope, which makes the shadow dark enough to see. No other facility in the world has the capability for such extreme optical imaging.

Holding an atom still long enough to take its photo, while remarkable in itself, is not new technology; the atom is isolated within a chamber and held in free space by electrical forces.

Professor Kielpinski and his colleagues trapped single atomic ions of the element ytterbium and exposed them to a specific frequency of light. Under this light the atom's shadow was cast onto a detector, and a digital camera was then able to capture the image.

"By using the ultra hi-res microscope we were able to concentrate the image down to a smaller area than has been achieved before, creating a darker image which is easier to see," Professor Kielpinski said.

The precision involved in this process is almost beyond imagining.

"If we change the frequency of the light we shine on the atom by just one part in a billion, the image can no longer be seen," Professor Kielpinski said.

Research team member, Dr Erik Streed, said the implications of these findings are far reaching.

"Such experiments help confirm our understanding of atomic physics and may be useful for quantum computing," Dr Streed said.

There are also potential follow-on benefits for biomicroscopy.

"Because we are able to predict how dark a single atom should be, as in how much light it should absorb in forming a shadow, we can measure if the microscope is achieving the maximum contrast allowed by physics."

"This is important if you want to look at very small and fragile biological samples such as DNA strands where exposure to too much UV light or x-rays will harm the material.

"We can now predict how much light is needed to observe processes within cells, under optimum microscopy conditions, without crossing the threshold and destroying them."

And this may get biologists thinking about things in a different way.

"In the end, a little bit of light just might be enough to get the job done."


THAT is bad-ass SCIENCE!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on July 10, 2012, 06:02:06 PM
Hey Net, I guess that pile of rice paradox you told me is solved.

It's 1. 1 grain of rice makes a pile.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nephew Twiddleton on July 10, 2012, 09:18:03 PM
Is it more difficult to photograph hydrogen? I ask because i wonder if atomic mass matters at all.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on July 20, 2012, 05:13:17 PM
Got some crazy Slashdot stories for you from this week.

http://politics.slashdot.org/story/12/07/17/1734227/how-ny-gov-cuomo-sidesteps-freedom-of-information-requests-with-his-blackberry
New submitter wrekkuh writes
"The Daily News is reporting that if aides of New York's Governor Andrew Cuomo cannot speak in person or by telephone with the Governor, they are told to use BlackBerry's PIN-to-PIN messaging system — a function that leaves no lasting trail because it bypasses data-saving email servers (http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/gov-cuomo-blackberry-pin-to-pin-messaging-system-contact-key-staffers-t-talk-phone-article-1.1115034?localLinksEnabled=false). Consequently, a Freedom of Information request for all e-mails to and from Governor Cuomo's office resulted in an empty reply from the Records Access Officer: 'Please be advised that the New York State Executive Chamber has conducted a diligent search, but does not possess records responsive to your request.'"

:fnord: :fnord: :fnord:


http://news.slashdot.org/story/12/07/18/2031237/trolling-al-qaeda-for-peace
The Mister Purple writes
"There is a small initiative underway to combat Islamic militant recruiting on the Internet... by trolling them (http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/07/counterterrorism-trolls/all/). Quoting the article: 'The program, called Viral Peace, seeks to occupy the virtual space that extremists fill, one thread or Twitter exchange at a time. Shahed Amanullah, a senior technology adviser to the State Department and Viral Peace's creator, tells Danger Room he wants to use "logic, humor, satire, [and] religious arguments, not just to confront [extremists], but to undermine and demoralize them." Think of it as strategic trolling, in pursuit of geopolitical pwnage.' So, does this mean that I'm promoting peace when I post YouTube comments?"

:lulz:


http://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/07/17/2250243/asimovs-psychohistory-becoming-a-reality
northernboy writes
"Today's LA Times has an article describing how a Wikileaks data dump from Afghanistan plus some advanced algorithms are allowing accurate predictions about the behavior of large groups of people (http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la-sci-warfare-data-20120717,0,409336.story). From the article: 'The programmers used simple code to extract dates and locations from about 77,000 incident reports that detailed everything from simple stop-and-search operations to full-fledged battles. The resulting map revealed the outlines of the country's ongoing violence: hot spots near the Pakistani border but not near the Iranian border, and extensive bloodshed along the country's main highway. They did it all in just one night. Now one member of that group has teamed up with mathematicians and computer scientists and taken the project one major step further: They have used the WikiLeaks data to predict the future.' Considering they did not discriminate between types of skirmish, but only when and where there was violence, this seems like an amazing result. It looks like our robotic overlords will have even less trouble controlling us than I previously thought."

:aaa:


http://science.slashdot.org/story/12/07/19/2038203/political-ideology-shapes-how-people-perceive-temperature
benfrog writes
"In what likely isn't that much of a surprise, a study has shown that political ideology shapes how we perceive temperature changes (http://arstechnica.com/science/2012/07/ideology-clouds-how-we-perceive-the-temperatures/) (but not drought/flooding conditions). (An abstract of the study is here (http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/WCAS-D-11-00044.1). 8,000 individuals were asked about temperatures and drought/flood events in recent years, then their political leanings. Answers regarding drought/flood events tended to follow the actual changes in conditions, while answers regarding temperature tended to follow people's political beliefs."

:eek:


Those last two are super interesting to me.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 07, 2012, 08:57:01 AM
http://www.adelaide.edu.au/news/news55081.html

Giant moa had climate change figured out
Then, humans with pointy sticks killed them all....
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 08, 2012, 04:51:25 AM
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2012/08/06/scans-of-hoarders-brains-reveal-why-they-never-de-clutter/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 08, 2012, 05:14:26 AM
Free Software PS2 Emulator PCSX2 Hits 1.0
http://games.slashdot.org/story/12/08/06/2211237/free-software-ps2-emulator-pcsx2-hits-10

Mathematician Predicts Wave of Violence In 2020
http://science.slashdot.org/story/12/08/04/1458217/mathematician-predicts-wave-of-violence-in-2020

Did an Unnamed MIT Student Save Apollo 13?
http://science.slashdot.org/story/12/08/06/1326229/did-an-unnamed-mit-student-save-apollo-13

US Missile Defense Staff Told To Stop Watching Porn
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/12/08/03/1637240/us-missile-defense-staff-told-to-stop-watching-porn
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Anna Mae Bollocks on August 08, 2012, 05:26:08 AM
THAT AIN'T WUT THEY TEECHIN IN TEH SKOOLZ, COMMIE (http://www.motherjones.com/blue-marble/2012/07/photos-evangelical-curricula-louisiana-tax-dollars)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 11, 2012, 09:59:46 PM
OH HELLS YES. Non-silicon photovoltaic solar cells!

http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/134305-so-long-silicon-researchers-create-solar-panels-from-cheap-copper-oxide
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 22, 2012, 03:59:52 PM
Dude, that's a game changer, if you can produce it cheaply.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Luna on November 13, 2012, 08:21:57 PM
Wow.  Printer that prints 3D food...

http://money.cnn.com/2011/01/24/technology/3D_food_printer/index.htm
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 13, 2012, 09:29:08 PM
That sounds so nasty.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Don Coyote on November 13, 2012, 09:45:24 PM
Specially made to order Spamcakes?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on November 13, 2012, 10:43:04 PM
Quote from: CAKE on November 13, 2012, 09:29:08 PM
That sounds so nasty.

:?
why? it looks like it's just cnc cupcake icing at the moment....
they mention 'turkey domes' which is a little odd, but i imagine it's not any stranger than lunchmeat...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 16, 2012, 06:45:50 AM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on November 13, 2012, 10:43:04 PM
Quote from: CAKE on November 13, 2012, 09:29:08 PM
That sounds so nasty.

:?
why? it looks like it's just cnc cupcake icing at the moment....
they mention 'turkey domes' which is a little odd, but i imagine it's not any stranger than lunchmeat...

Because I find both those things nasty, is why. Spray meat? :vom:

I also hate pancakes and the filling of Oreos. I don't expect you to feel the same way, but the idea of 3D printed food sounds barftastic.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 04:12:37 PM
i can understand it.  if the lunchmeat it too homogeneous (e.g. bologna) it makes me shy away, too.

but you don't want to miss out on the Future of Food, with glorious processed beef products extruded with nano metamaterial structures allowing for your Subway sandwich to portray 3d imagery of Jared right there on the coldcut, congratulating you on your healthy choices, do you?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 16, 2012, 04:29:23 PM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 04:12:37 PM
i can understand it.  if the lunchmeat it too homogeneous (e.g. bologna) it makes me shy away, too.

but you don't want to miss out on the Future of Food, with glorious processed beef products extruded with nano metamaterial structures allowing for your Subway sandwich to portray 3d imagery of Jared right there on the coldcut, congratulating you on your healthy choices, do you?

No.  I crave it.  Tell me more.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 04:35:58 PM
I was futurisming.
but it's coming down the tracks that our parade route is on, i'm telling you.

in the Future of Food, we will be concerned with how many petaflops our morning cereal can crank out, and what the cholesterol content of our smartphone is.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 16, 2012, 04:42:31 PM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 04:35:58 PM
I was futurisming.
but it's coming down the tracks that our parade route is on, i'm telling you.

I know.  I wish to hear more.  I wish to hear how much memory storage my omelet will have.  I wish to know if I can download apps into my sandwich, if rainwater will exfoliate me, and if I will be able to order salvation at the drive through.  With an order of fries that plays the latest top o the pops.

I have to know.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 16, 2012, 05:00:59 PM
Where'd you go?  I want to hear about self-decontaminating baby food.  Electric training pants for the elderly.  Food that has an end-user agreement.  My own personal poor person.  Russian STD vendors.  Edible bullets.

I need DETAILS, man!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Don Coyote on November 16, 2012, 05:15:25 PM
dis fread just got better.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 05:20:33 PM
the future is scheduled for 15 product generations going Forward.  we can't tell you about what's coming beyond the event horizon of next year's black friday, but you will know what is Coming Soon! to your nearest HyperTrough Foodmart, brought to you by members of the Food Advancement Industry Leaders association.

the recently mentioned spray meats have been combined with the magic of facial moisturizer for a baby smooth complexion that delivers the irresistible flavor of Genuine Prosciutto brand ham.

Snickers will satisfy like never before since our Nutritioneers have included viral deployed orgasms in each bar (sold with one complimentary wet wipe each)

and if you're the health conscious type, we've developed a patented esophageal bypass implant allowing you to pass, undigested any of our wonderful products with a  flip of the subtly mounted throat switch.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 16, 2012, 05:24:41 PM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 05:20:33 PM
the future is scheduled for 15 product generations going Forward.  we can't tell you about what's coming beyond the event horizon of next year's black friday, but you will know what is Coming Soon! to your nearest HyperTrough Foodmart, brought to you by members of the Food Advancement Industry Leaders association.

the recently mentioned spray meats have been combined with the magic of facial moisturizer for a baby smooth complexion that delivers the irresistible flavor of Genuine Prosciutto brand ham.

Snickers will satisfy like never before since our Nutritioneers have included viral deployed orgasms in each bar (sold with one complimentary wet wipe each)

and if you're the health conscious type, we've developed a patented esophageal bypass implant allowing you to pass, undigested any of our wonderful products with a  flip of the subtly mounted throat switch.

I wish to have an edible dashboard, as I am a busy man on the go.  I can bite pieces off when I'm stuck in traffic.  Perhaps if we built molds, and sprayed the meat in?  Or better yet, the snack cake of my choice, selected when I buy my new car.

I'd also like my food to taste more like tobacco smoke, so I can enjoy it after a cigar.

I'm Loving It™!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 05:33:13 PM
No need!
(i'm not supposed to tell you this, but you are an exceptionally enthusiastic consumer.  :wink:)
It won't be long before the family vehicle is a thing of the past, as ALL you're local restaurant chains will have individual, mobile units allowing you to enjoy their latest offerings on your way to work, play, and/or hospital!
Simply select from your smart phone which vendor and combo meal you want, and when pickup should arrive, and you will be whisked away to your destination in culinary bliss!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 16, 2012, 05:37:17 PM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 05:33:13 PM
No need!
(i'm not supposed to tell you this, but you are an exceptionally enthusiastic consumer.  :wink:)
It won't be long before the family vehicle is a thing of the past, as ALL you're local restaurant chains will have individual, mobile units allowing you to enjoy their latest offerings on your way to work, play, and/or hospital!
Simply select from your smart phone which vendor and combo meal you want, and when pickup should arrive, and you will be whisked away to your destination in culinary bliss!

I don't know how this new future will work, logistically, but I know I LIKE it!  And do I really NEED or even WANT to know how it works, what the bumps in the road and the accompanying horrible squishy noises are?  No.  Those are someone else's worry...I pay my taxes, I expect that sort of thing to be taken care of FOR me.

So, yes.  I am proud to drive to work in a Taco Bell, and I am proud to be a delta.

Bring that future on.  I'm hungry!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 05:46:34 PM
Your confidence is what makes this Nation great! (CCI up 3 basis points due to this thread alone!)
Thank you for your business, and your trust in the Professional Food Engineers working behind the scenes to bring about YOUR American Dream!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 16, 2012, 05:47:21 PM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 05:46:34 PM
Your confidence is what makes this Nation great! (CCI up 3 basis points due to this thread alone!)
Thank you for your business, and your trust in the Professional Food Engineers working behind the scenes to bring about YOUR American Dream!

No problem.

Extra cheese on that, please.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 16, 2012, 05:59:55 PM
I LOVE THIS FUTURE!  MORE DEEP-FRIED BUTTER, PLEASE!
\
(http://earbuds.popdose.com/thejoncummings/America%20fail%20bachmann.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on November 16, 2012, 08:02:28 PM
The real question is will my low-fat, ionized breakfast burrito have UNLIMITED DATA?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 08:13:15 PM
All breakfast burritos come standard with UNLIMITED DATA for the duration of your enjoyment, however bandwidth is limited based on the Chorizotainment Package you select when dialing up your morning commute.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 16, 2012, 08:58:04 PM
Quote from: Elder Iptuous on November 16, 2012, 04:12:37 PM
i can understand it.  if the lunchmeat it too homogeneous (e.g. bologna) it makes me shy away, too.

but you don't want to miss out on the Future of Food, with glorious processed beef products extruded with nano metamaterial structures allowing for your Subway sandwich to portray 3d imagery of Jared right there on the coldcut, congratulating you on your healthy choices, do you?

:horrormirth:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Don Coyote on November 17, 2012, 01:09:19 AM
ANIMATED SNACK FOODS MADE WITH NANOMACHINES MADE OF AMINOACIDS AND CARBOHYDRATES!!!!!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Rococo Modem Basilisk on November 18, 2012, 01:28:18 AM
Extrusion plotting is perfect for forming vat-grown meat into realistic animal-part-themed shapes! Tensor rack make your muscle fibres too tough? No problem! Our patented auto-grinding feed hopper homogenizes the thickest and thinnest of cruelty-free Galvanomeat (TM) into a consistent puree, up to ISO2112 specification for 93DPI resolution volumetric solid layering.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 18, 2012, 01:35:27 AM
AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!! :eek: :vom:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cainad (dec.) on November 18, 2012, 01:44:07 AM
 :lulz:



WHY LIVE IN THE FUTURE

WHEN YOU CAN EAT IT INSTEAD?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 18, 2012, 01:57:41 AM
Quote from: Cainad on November 18, 2012, 01:44:07 AM
:lulz:



WHY LIVE IN THE FUTURE

WHEN YOU CAN EAT IT INSTEAD?

That's my American Dream!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Luna on December 02, 2012, 04:21:08 PM
http://www.cracked.com/article_20145_5-shocking-ways-monkeys-are-just-as-dysfunctional-as-us.html

Newsflash:  Monkeys are just like humans in more ways than we thought.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 02, 2012, 05:07:13 PM
Quote from: Luna on December 02, 2012, 04:21:08 PM
http://www.cracked.com/article_20145_5-shocking-ways-monkeys-are-just-as-dysfunctional-as-us.html

Newsflash:  Monkeys are just like humans in more ways than we thought.

Oddly, so are babies: http://www.ted.com/talks/alison_gopnik_what_do_babies_think.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on December 08, 2012, 06:39:37 AM
DNA Directly Photographed for First Time
Eli MacKinnon, Life's Little Mysteries Staff WriterDate: 30 November 2012 Time: 02:21 PM ET

http://www.livescience.com/25163-dna-directly-photographed-for-first-time.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cardinal Pizza Deliverance. on December 08, 2012, 06:58:23 AM
Quote from: Luna on December 02, 2012, 04:21:08 PM
http://www.cracked.com/article_20145_5-shocking-ways-monkeys-are-just-as-dysfunctional-as-us.html

Newsflash:  Monkeys are just like humans in more ways than we thought.

Quote
QuoteSo the next time someone at work accuses you of something you didn't do, just yell "snake," snort some coke and watch porn. It's only natural.

New plan for work tomorrow!

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cardinal Pizza Deliverance. on December 08, 2012, 06:59:49 AM
Quote from: Telarus on December 08, 2012, 06:39:37 AM
DNA Directly Photographed for First Time
Eli MacKinnon, Life's Little Mysteries Staff WriterDate: 30 November 2012 Time: 02:21 PM ET

http://www.livescience.com/25163-dna-directly-photographed-for-first-time.html

That is so cool . . . and for some reason I find it very creepy. But so cool.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 09, 2012, 03:18:38 AM
Quote from: Telarus on December 08, 2012, 06:39:37 AM
DNA Directly Photographed for First Time
Eli MacKinnon, Life's Little Mysteries Staff WriterDate: 30 November 2012 Time: 02:21 PM ET

http://www.livescience.com/25163-dna-directly-photographed-for-first-time.html

That is so fucking cool!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: hirley0 on January 25, 2013, 08:51:28 AM
http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php/topic,34063.0.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on April 08, 2013, 12:40:04 PM
Kind of more relevant here than AE

http://tech.fortune.cnn.com/2013/04/04/apple-lazard-flash-memory/

QuoteWhat Wall Street needs, Parker suggests, is a fresh perspective -- a new way of looking at the company.
And this is it: Think of Apple's core business as selling end users flash memory at steep markups.
"We propose," he writes, "that Apple is a 'storage' company, not only levered to data creation but instrumental in driving data creation in ways its competitors are not. Apple sells storage by delicately but deliberately incenting customers to purchase NAND flash memory at 80%-90% incremental margins. We believe this model is unique in the industry and will ensure Apple avoids the pitfalls of former handset innovators that are rapidly falling into the annals of history."

BUY BUY BUY
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on April 12, 2013, 04:03:10 AM
http://termcoord.wordpress.com/2013/04/10/pictish-written-language-discovered-in-scotland/

(http://termcoord.files.wordpress.com/2013/04/grantown01.jpg?w=346&h=540)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 12, 2013, 09:39:13 PM
That's beautiful.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on April 13, 2013, 07:36:42 AM
Yes, I was very impressed by that line-work. The article and the linked paper are pretty damn interesting too.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on June 07, 2013, 02:46:46 AM
More busting the "adult brains stop growing" myth:

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-nuclear-tests-brain-20130606,0,6051133.story

QuoteNeuroscientists have shifted from an old view that you'll never have more neurons than you had when your brain was a pup. Studies have suggested that adult brains generate new neurons, particularly in the hippocampus, an area crucial to learning and memory.

It's been hard to tell how many neurons are generated and if they are viable cells, because humans are not fond of having their brains removed. So a lot of the research uses mice and other animals.

Enter dead people and the carbon-14 isotope. The latter is a "heavy" carbon variant produced in nuclear reactions, such as blowing up a nuclear device out in the Pacific Ocean, a practice that was banned by treaty in 1963. Since photosynthesis doesn't discriminate among carbon atoms it uses, vegetables, fruit and everything that eats them carry a signature ratio of carbon isotopes from the early Cold War atmosphere.

So researchers at Sweden's Karolinska Institute measured the carbon ratios in gray matter that doesn't matter anymore: donated brains of dead people. They calculated that as many as 1,400 new neurons had been added to these hippocampuses every day during adulthood.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on June 07, 2013, 03:20:46 AM
Quote from: Telarus on June 07, 2013, 02:46:46 AM
More busting the "adult brains stop growing" myth:

http://www.latimes.com/news/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-nuclear-tests-brain-20130606,0,6051133.story

QuoteNeuroscientists have shifted from an old view that you'll never have more neurons than you had when your brain was a pup. Studies have suggested that adult brains generate new neurons, particularly in the hippocampus, an area crucial to learning and memory.

It's been hard to tell how many neurons are generated and if they are viable cells, because humans are not fond of having their brains removed. So a lot of the research uses mice and other animals.

Enter dead people and the carbon-14 isotope. The latter is a "heavy" carbon variant produced in nuclear reactions, such as blowing up a nuclear device out in the Pacific Ocean, a practice that was banned by treaty in 1963. Since photosynthesis doesn't discriminate among carbon atoms it uses, vegetables, fruit and everything that eats them carry a signature ratio of carbon isotopes from the early Cold War atmosphere.

So researchers at Sweden's Karolinska Institute measured the carbon ratios in gray matter that doesn't matter anymore: donated brains of dead people. They calculated that as many as 1,400 new neurons had been added to these hippocampuses every day during adulthood.

Dude cooooool!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on June 11, 2013, 12:03:17 PM
Chopping off your deficient meat limbs takes another step forward:

http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-01/27/terminator-robot-hand-video

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on June 12, 2013, 04:32:31 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on June 11, 2013, 12:03:17 PM
Chopping off your deficient meat limbs takes another step forward:

http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-01/27/terminator-robot-hand-video

You noticed the date on that, right?

Like, it's cool, but robot arms have come a ways since then.

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2013/04/06/cutting-edge-technology-helps-woman-who-lost-hand-during-sandy/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on June 12, 2013, 04:37:10 PM
I didn't.

Link appreciated, it's one of the few benefits to constant wars that this kind of stuff gets fairly constant funding.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on June 26, 2013, 10:08:41 AM
Had to check that this wasn't satire:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/23059461

QuoteIn a blog post on BitTorrent's website, vice president of marketing Matt Mason wrote: "We don't host infringing content. We don't point to it.

"It's literally impossible to illegally download something on BitTorrent.

"To pirate stuff, you need more than a protocol. You need search, a pirate content site and a content manager. We offer none of those things.

"If you're using BitTorrent for piracy, you're doing it wrong."

Sounds like someone's gearing up to sue. While technically correct, I doubt that this defence will do much good. Probably worth keeping an eye on.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on July 12, 2013, 10:52:47 AM
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2013/07/human-powered-helicopter-prize/

QuoteThe Canadian AeroVelo team has done what many thought impossible. The crew has officially claimed the American Helicopter Society's Igor I. Sikorsky Human-Powered Helicopter Prize. And for keeping their lightweight contraption afloat, the team was awarded $250,000 in Toronto for the flight it completed on June 13. But meeting the criteria of a 33-year-old challenge takes time, so they had to wait for verification from the Federation d'Aviation Intenationale before the team could snag the prize.

Engineer Dr. Todd Reichert, along with Cameron Robertson, led the Kickstarter-funded team largely comprised of students from the University of Toronto. He was also the pilot and engine who successfully pedaled his way into aviation history by climbing above three meters and flying for at least 60 seconds while staying within a 10-by-10 meter area. Reichert, a nationally ranked speed skater in Canada, told us after so many flights and failures, the prize-winning attempt almost didn't happen.

Video at the link. Bloody marvellous. Looks like something Vinci sketched out too.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on July 31, 2013, 02:55:24 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130730091255.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmind_brain+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Mind+%26+Brain+News%29

Online psychotherapy as good, if not better than, face to face psychotherapy.

:awesome:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:00:09 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 02:55:24 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130730091255.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmind_brain+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Mind+%26+Brain+News%29

Online psychotherapy as good, if not better than, face to face psychotherapy.

:awesome:

I'm smelling business opportunity, Alty.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on July 31, 2013, 03:05:27 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:00:09 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 02:55:24 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130730091255.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmind_brain+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Mind+%26+Brain+News%29

Online psychotherapy as good, if not better than, face to face psychotherapy.

:awesome:

I'm smelling business opportunity, Alty.

Yes. I have always wanted to help people's brains.

Actually, a friend of mine just finished a M.S. in Psychology and is going to work with me doing life coaching. I may try to do something similar, but more like fitness coaching.

This lends a lot of credibility to the flexibility of such programs. She was already planning on Skype sessions.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:06:40 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 03:05:27 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:00:09 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 02:55:24 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130730091255.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmind_brain+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Mind+%26+Brain+News%29

Online psychotherapy as good, if not better than, face to face psychotherapy.

:awesome:

I'm smelling business opportunity, Alty.

Yes. I have always wanted to help people's brains.

Actually, a friend of mine just finished a M.S. in Psychology and is going to work with me doing life coaching. I may try to do something similar, but more like fitness coaching.

This lends a lot of credibility to the flexibility of such programs. She was already planning on Skype sessions.

You're not nearly evil enough, dude.

Roger's Online Mental Health Diagnostics EXTRAVAGANZA! 

We must be CRAZY to offer these rates!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on July 31, 2013, 03:18:24 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:06:40 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 03:05:27 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:00:09 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 02:55:24 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130730091255.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmind_brain+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Mind+%26+Brain+News%29

Online psychotherapy as good, if not better than, face to face psychotherapy.

:awesome:

I'm smelling business opportunity, Alty.

Yes. I have always wanted to help people's brains.

Actually, a friend of mine just finished a M.S. in Psychology and is going to work with me doing life coaching. I may try to do something similar, but more like fitness coaching.

This lends a lot of credibility to the flexibility of such programs. She was already planning on Skype sessions.

You're not nearly evil enough, dude.

Roger's Online Mental Health Diagnostics EXTRAVAGANZA! 

We must be CRAZY to offer these rates!

Oh man, if I could manage I would make a MINT.

I'd just have stock answers on a dartboard and charge $99.99 per half hour Power Session.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:25:59 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 03:18:24 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:06:40 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 03:05:27 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:00:09 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 02:55:24 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130730091255.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fmind_brain+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Mind+%26+Brain+News%29

Online psychotherapy as good, if not better than, face to face psychotherapy.

:awesome:

I'm smelling business opportunity, Alty.

Yes. I have always wanted to help people's brains.

Actually, a friend of mine just finished a M.S. in Psychology and is going to work with me doing life coaching. I may try to do something similar, but more like fitness coaching.

This lends a lot of credibility to the flexibility of such programs. She was already planning on Skype sessions.

You're not nearly evil enough, dude.

Roger's Online Mental Health Diagnostics EXTRAVAGANZA! 

We must be CRAZY to offer these rates!

Oh man, if I could manage I would make a MINT.

I'd just have stock answers on a dartboard and charge $99.99 per half hour Power Session.

Only when we're being lazy.  I can also just spout, if the spirit's in me.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on July 31, 2013, 03:30:03 AM
What's a good domain? That's really all I need is a good domain name for such a service, wrapped up like that Yin Yoga dude's website.

Your face and mine, rage advice filled, and some lotus flowers.

The copy would basically write itself.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on July 31, 2013, 03:34:18 AM
We could have testimonials of spags Getting Their Palms Red.

Spags, of course, would have to oblige taking a picture of their painted hands
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:34:56 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 03:30:03 AM
What's a good domain? That's really all I need is a good domain name for such a service, wrapped up like that Yin Yoga dude's website.

Your face and mine, rage advice filled, and some lotus flowers.

The copy would basically write itself.

bettermentalhealth.com

clickifyourenuts.com

YourLastHope.com

didyouvoteforpalin.com


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on July 31, 2013, 03:38:56 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 31, 2013, 03:34:56 AM
Quote from: Alty on July 31, 2013, 03:30:03 AM
What's a good domain? That's really all I need is a good domain name for such a service, wrapped up like that Yin Yoga dude's website.

Your face and mine, rage advice filled, and some lotus flowers.

The copy would basically write itself.
didyouvoteforpalin.com
:fap2:

It shall be done.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 01, 2013, 06:10:40 PM
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23523507

New antibiotic found from an ocean microorganism seems to be effective against Anthrax and MSRA.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 01, 2013, 06:28:16 PM
That would be HUGE.

Until its overused and evolution happens.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 03, 2013, 05:27:13 AM
Quote from: Telarus on August 01, 2013, 06:10:40 PM
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23523507

New antibiotic found from an ocean microorganism seems to be effective against Anthrax and MSRA.

Cool!

Now, if we just use the respite this might bring to reform the behaviors that are creating superbacteria...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 03, 2013, 05:32:10 AM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on August 01, 2013, 06:28:16 PM
That would be HUGE.

Until its overused and evolution happens.

Misused.  Not overused.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on August 07, 2013, 02:14:38 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 03, 2013, 05:32:10 AM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on August 01, 2013, 06:28:16 PM
That would be HUGE.

Until its overused and evolution happens.

Misused.  Not overused.
Both. Though misused is the greater threat.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 07, 2013, 07:11:25 PM
Quote from: :regret: on August 07, 2013, 02:14:38 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 03, 2013, 05:32:10 AM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on August 01, 2013, 06:28:16 PM
That would be HUGE.

Until its overused and evolution happens.

Misused.  Not overused.
Both. Though misused is the greater threat.

Overused means "save it for me".

:lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 09, 2013, 08:29:34 PM
Dolphins can problem solve like humans, study says
http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/science/2013/08/09/dolphins-can-problem-solve-like-humans-study-says/zjRxUOLYocWMrQR9hr1bbP/story.html

4-billion-year-old fossil proteins resurrected
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/08/09/4-billion-year-old-fossil-proteins-resurrected/

'Mona Lisa' skeleton and her kin's remains are due for DNA testing
http://www.nbcnews.com/science/mona-lisa-skeleton-her-kins-remains-are-due-dna-testing-6C10874613
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 11, 2013, 09:00:24 PM
Zapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.

http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536 (http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536)


Live Perseid Meteor Shower Wecam, via NASA
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nasa-msfc (http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nasa-msfc)


Two Men + Two Tesla coils + Faraday suits = ELECTRICITY FIGHT!
http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2012/11/06/two-men-two-tesla-coils-faraday-suits-electricity-fight/ (http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2012/11/06/two-men-two-tesla-coils-faraday-suits-electricity-fight/)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: McGrupp on August 14, 2013, 05:03:59 PM
Quote from: Telarus on August 11, 2013, 09:00:24 PM
Zapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.

http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536 (http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536)

That's cool. I hope they continue with the testing and research.

QuoteIn the phase I safety trial, reported today in Science1, the six subjects given five doses intravenously were 100% protected from later challenge by bites of infectious mosquitoes, whereas five of six unvaccinated controls developed malaria — as did three of nine people given only four doses of the vaccine.

It seems to me that a sample size of 6 is rather small to make the 100 percent claim.* It still looks promising. Even if it's 80 percent it will still have huge effects.


*I'm currently reading a book about probablility and statistics so I could be completely wrong about this. (a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing and all)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on August 14, 2013, 06:16:58 PM
QuoteZapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.
http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536

That is pretty fucking awesome. Hope for more developments here because that could be a real game-changer for several nations.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 15, 2013, 02:03:36 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 14, 2013, 05:03:59 PM
Quote from: Telarus on August 11, 2013, 09:00:24 PM
Zapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.

http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536 (http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536)

That's cool. I hope they continue with the testing and research.

QuoteIn the phase I safety trial, reported today in Science1, the six subjects given five doses intravenously were 100% protected from later challenge by bites of infectious mosquitoes, whereas five of six unvaccinated controls developed malaria — as did three of nine people given only four doses of the vaccine.

It seems to me that a sample size of 6 is rather small to make the 100 percent claim.* It still looks promising. Even if it's 80 percent it will still have huge effects.


*I'm currently reading a book about probablility and statistics so I could be completely wrong about this. (a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing and all)

Yes, you are wrong, but I see the mistake you are making and I understand why. You are reading it as the vaccine having a 100% protection rate, but what it's saying is that of the six test subjects, it had 100% effectiveness, ie. all 6 of them showed full immunity.

That's not a statistically significant enough figure to make assumptions about the efficacy of the vaccine, but it is enough to conclude that it warrants further trials.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: McGrupp on August 15, 2013, 02:39:19 AM
Quote from: TALK TO ME ABOUT YOUR GENITALS on August 15, 2013, 02:03:36 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 14, 2013, 05:03:59 PM
Quote from: Telarus on August 11, 2013, 09:00:24 PM
Zapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.

http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536 (http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536)

That's cool. I hope they continue with the testing and research.

QuoteIn the phase I safety trial, reported today in Science1, the six subjects given five doses intravenously were 100% protected from later challenge by bites of infectious mosquitoes, whereas five of six unvaccinated controls developed malaria — as did three of nine people given only four doses of the vaccine.

It seems to me that a sample size of 6 is rather small to make the 100 percent claim.* It still looks promising. Even if it's 80 percent it will still have huge effects.


*I'm currently reading a book about probablility and statistics so I could be completely wrong about this. (a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing and all)

Yes, you are wrong, but I see the mistake you are making and I understand why. You are reading it as the vaccine having a 100% protection rate, but what it's saying is that of the six test subjects, it had 100% effectiveness, ie. all 6 of them showed full immunity.

That's not a statistically significant enough figure to make assumptions about the efficacy of the vaccine, but it is enough to conclude that it warrants further trials.

Thanks, Nigel. That makes sense.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on August 15, 2013, 02:41:32 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 15, 2013, 02:39:19 AM
Quote from: TALK TO ME ABOUT YOUR GENITALS on August 15, 2013, 02:03:36 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 14, 2013, 05:03:59 PM
Quote from: Telarus on August 11, 2013, 09:00:24 PM
Zapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.

http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536 (http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536)

That's cool. I hope they continue with the testing and research.

QuoteIn the phase I safety trial, reported today in Science1, the six subjects given five doses intravenously were 100% protected from later challenge by bites of infectious mosquitoes, whereas five of six unvaccinated controls developed malaria — as did three of nine people given only four doses of the vaccine.

It seems to me that a sample size of 6 is rather small to make the 100 percent claim.* It still looks promising. Even if it's 80 percent it will still have huge effects.


*I'm currently reading a book about probablility and statistics so I could be completely wrong about this. (a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing and all)

Yes, you are wrong, but I see the mistake you are making and I understand why. You are reading it as the vaccine having a 100% protection rate, but what it's saying is that of the six test subjects, it had 100% effectiveness, ie. all 6 of them showed full immunity.

That's not a statistically significant enough figure to make assumptions about the efficacy of the vaccine, but it is enough to conclude that it warrants further trials.

Thanks, Nigel. That makes sense.

:crankey:

WE'LL HAVE NONE OF THAT BIPED BEHAVIOR AROUND HERE, MY SON!  DIG THOSE HEELS IN AND HOWL!

:showus:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: McGrupp on August 15, 2013, 02:52:07 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 15, 2013, 02:41:32 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 15, 2013, 02:39:19 AM
Quote from: TALK TO ME ABOUT YOUR GENITALS on August 15, 2013, 02:03:36 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 14, 2013, 05:03:59 PM
Quote from: Telarus on August 11, 2013, 09:00:24 PM
Zapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.

http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536 (http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536)

That's cool. I hope they continue with the testing and research.

QuoteIn the phase I safety trial, reported today in Science1, the six subjects given five doses intravenously were 100% protected from later challenge by bites of infectious mosquitoes, whereas five of six unvaccinated controls developed malaria — as did three of nine people given only four doses of the vaccine.

It seems to me that a sample size of 6 is rather small to make the 100 percent claim.* It still looks promising. Even if it's 80 percent it will still have huge effects.


*I'm currently reading a book about probablility and statistics so I could be completely wrong about this. (a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing and all)

Yes, you are wrong, but I see the mistake you are making and I understand why. You are reading it as the vaccine having a 100% protection rate, but what it's saying is that of the six test subjects, it had 100% effectiveness, ie. all 6 of them showed full immunity.

That's not a statistically significant enough figure to make assumptions about the efficacy of the vaccine, but it is enough to conclude that it warrants further trials.

Thanks, Nigel. That makes sense.

:crankey:

WE'LL HAVE NONE OF THAT BIPED BEHAVIOR AROUND HERE, MY SON!  DIG THOSE HEELS IN AND HOWL!

:showus:

HULK NOT WRONG! HULK READ BOOK. BOOK SAY HULK RIGHT. HULK IS AUTHORITY.
HULK NOT CARE IF HULK APPLY LIMITED KNOWLEDGE TO DATA HULK NOT COMPREHEND CORRECTLY!
PUNY HUMANS STOP TELLING HULK HULK IS WRONG. HULK READ ONE BOOK!
                              /
(http://i39.tinypic.com/2mxhfgx.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on August 15, 2013, 03:06:44 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 15, 2013, 02:52:07 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 15, 2013, 02:41:32 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 15, 2013, 02:39:19 AM
Quote from: TALK TO ME ABOUT YOUR GENITALS on August 15, 2013, 02:03:36 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 14, 2013, 05:03:59 PM
Quote from: Telarus on August 11, 2013, 09:00:24 PM
Zapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.

http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536 (http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536)

That's cool. I hope they continue with the testing and research.

QuoteIn the phase I safety trial, reported today in Science1, the six subjects given five doses intravenously were 100% protected from later challenge by bites of infectious mosquitoes, whereas five of six unvaccinated controls developed malaria — as did three of nine people given only four doses of the vaccine.

It seems to me that a sample size of 6 is rather small to make the 100 percent claim.* It still looks promising. Even if it's 80 percent it will still have huge effects.


*I'm currently reading a book about probablility and statistics so I could be completely wrong about this. (a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing and all)

Yes, you are wrong, but I see the mistake you are making and I understand why. You are reading it as the vaccine having a 100% protection rate, but what it's saying is that of the six test subjects, it had 100% effectiveness, ie. all 6 of them showed full immunity.

That's not a statistically significant enough figure to make assumptions about the efficacy of the vaccine, but it is enough to conclude that it warrants further trials.

Thanks, Nigel. That makes sense.

:crankey:

WE'LL HAVE NONE OF THAT BIPED BEHAVIOR AROUND HERE, MY SON!  DIG THOSE HEELS IN AND HOWL!

:showus:

HULK NOT WRONG! HULK READ BOOK. BOOK SAY HULK RIGHT. HULK IS AUTHORITY.
HULK NOT CARE IF HULK APPLY LIMITED KNOWLEDGE TO DATA HULK NOT COMPREHEND CORRECTLY!
PUNY HUMANS STOP TELLING HULK HULK IS WRONG. HULK READ ONE BOOK!
                              /
(http://i39.tinypic.com/2mxhfgx.jpg)

That's more like it.

But I'll be watching you.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 15, 2013, 04:07:39 AM
Yup, always good to have more sources as well. The NY Times story mentions another control group of 9 who got 4 doses (6 of which were immune to further exposure). Also...

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/13/health/a-malaria-vaccine-works-with-limits.html?_r=0
Quote"This is a scientific advance rather than a practical one," said Dr. William Schaffner, the head of preventive medicine at Vanderbilt University's medical school. "But any vaccine that provides even a glimmer of hope opens a door, so we have to pursue it."

Sanaria's vaccine is made by irradiating mosquitoes that have fed on malaria-infected blood and removing their salivary glands by hand. The radiation-weakened parasites in the saliva are then purified.

In earlier trials, the vaccine failed when injected into the skin, so this time researchers from the Army, Navy and National Institutes of Health gave it by IV drip. Six volunteers who got five intravenous doses did not get malaria when bitten by infected mosquitoes. Six of nine volunteers who got four doses were protected.

Because the vaccine is made in small batches by hand, it is impractical for poor countries, where malaria sickens more than 200 million people a year and kills about 660,000, most of them infants and pregnant women.

Giving multiple IV doses of any vaccine is also impractical because it requires sterile conditions, trained medical personnel and follow-up. IV drips are particularly hard to administer to children. "They've been known to squirm," Dr. Schaffner noted.

The initial target markets for the vaccine are the military and wealthy travelers.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on August 16, 2013, 03:19:18 PM
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/a-tokyo-design-firm-made-us-artificial-organs-for-the-post-apocalypse

The future is highly water intensive. Plan appropriately.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on August 16, 2013, 04:01:30 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 15, 2013, 03:06:44 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 15, 2013, 02:52:07 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on August 15, 2013, 02:41:32 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 15, 2013, 02:39:19 AM
Quote from: TALK TO ME ABOUT YOUR GENITALS on August 15, 2013, 02:03:36 AM
Quote from: McGrupp on August 14, 2013, 05:03:59 PM
Quote from: Telarus on August 11, 2013, 09:00:24 PM
Zapped malaria parasite raises vaccine hopes
Maverick malaria vaccine achieves 100% protection using parasites from irradiated mosquitoes.

http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536 (http://www.nature.com/news/zapped-malaria-parasite-raises-vaccine-hopes-1.13536)

That's cool. I hope they continue with the testing and research.

QuoteIn the phase I safety trial, reported today in Science1, the six subjects given five doses intravenously were 100% protected from later challenge by bites of infectious mosquitoes, whereas five of six unvaccinated controls developed malaria — as did three of nine people given only four doses of the vaccine.

It seems to me that a sample size of 6 is rather small to make the 100 percent claim.* It still looks promising. Even if it's 80 percent it will still have huge effects.


*I'm currently reading a book about probablility and statistics so I could be completely wrong about this. (a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing and all)

Yes, you are wrong, but I see the mistake you are making and I understand why. You are reading it as the vaccine having a 100% protection rate, but what it's saying is that of the six test subjects, it had 100% effectiveness, ie. all 6 of them showed full immunity.

That's not a statistically significant enough figure to make assumptions about the efficacy of the vaccine, but it is enough to conclude that it warrants further trials.

Thanks, Nigel. That makes sense.

:crankey:

WE'LL HAVE NONE OF THAT BIPED BEHAVIOR AROUND HERE, MY SON!  DIG THOSE HEELS IN AND HOWL!

:showus:

HULK NOT WRONG! HULK READ BOOK. BOOK SAY HULK RIGHT. HULK IS AUTHORITY.
HULK NOT CARE IF HULK APPLY LIMITED KNOWLEDGE TO DATA HULK NOT COMPREHEND CORRECTLY!
PUNY HUMANS STOP TELLING HULK HULK IS WRONG. HULK READ ONE BOOK!
                              /
(http://i39.tinypic.com/2mxhfgx.jpg)

That's more like it.

But I'll be watching you.

:lol: :lol: :lol: You two.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: McGrupp on August 18, 2013, 05:54:25 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on August 16, 2013, 03:19:18 PM
http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/a-tokyo-design-firm-made-us-artificial-organs-for-the-post-apocalypse

The future is highly water intensive. Plan appropriately.

Quote"Renal Fecular Dehydrator."

I wish that wasn't exactly what it sounds like. Nasal cavity inserts seem noninvasive now.

edit: This is actually pretty neat. If it came down to survival I'd get fake organs to survive the harsh landscape.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cainad (dec.) on August 18, 2013, 06:18:12 PM
I guess it's less bulky than having a face mask system to recapture exhaled moisture, or a portable water-recycling system for waste.

Having a more efficient renal system would definitely be great.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 21, 2013, 09:20:24 PM
Last week's "Missing Links" from Ed Yong of Not Exactly Rocket Science.  (http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/08/17/ive-got-your-missing-links-right-here-17-august-2013/)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on August 29, 2013, 04:48:50 PM
http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/08/24/ive-got-your-missing-links-23-august-2013/

Ed Yong's 'Missing Links' from last week.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on August 30, 2013, 08:57:30 PM
New Element 115, Ununpentium, May Join Periodic Table
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/27/element-115-ununpentium-periodic-table_n_3823566.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Ixxie on September 04, 2013, 09:21:50 AM
you guys read slashdot right?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on September 04, 2013, 02:35:55 PM
Quote from: Ixxie on September 04, 2013, 09:21:50 AM
you guys read slashdot right?

YEAH WE ALL FUCKING READ SLASHDOT

NO

WHY THE FUCK WOULD WE ALL READ SLASHDOT

UNIFORMLY LIKE SOME KIND OF ADOLESCENT HIVEMIND THAT HAS TIME FOR THAT KIND OF BULLSHIT

YOU ARE STARTING TO IRRITATE ME SHUT THE FUCK UP.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on September 04, 2013, 02:45:33 PM
Quote from: Ixxie on September 04, 2013, 09:21:50 AM
you guys read slashdot right?

No. I get my science news from a combination of the Sigma Xi email updates, Ed Yong's Not Exactly Rocket Science and other blogs, and podcasts such as Star Talk with NdG Tyson. Milling around a news site with a rated commenting system is not something I have time for.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Bebek Sincap Ratatosk on September 12, 2013, 08:56:34 PM
Quote from: Kai on September 04, 2013, 02:45:33 PM
Quote from: Ixxie on September 04, 2013, 09:21:50 AM
you guys read slashdot right?

No. I get my science news from a combination of the Sigma Xi email updates, Ed Yong's Not Exactly Rocket Science and other blogs, and podcasts such as Star Talk with NdG Tyson. Milling around a news site with a rated commenting system is not something I have time for.

Once upon a time slashdot was great news for nerds... now it occasionally has gems hidden in the repeat of what all other science/tech/geek sites are alreayd reporting on, or have reported on weeks ago.

I weep for the days of CmdrTaco, grits down peoples pants and Ms Portman... :D
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nephew Twiddleton on September 12, 2013, 09:57:08 PM
Slash dot. Thats the thing where if i use it on an onion the skin comes right off and i can stop having a boring life yeah?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on September 27, 2013, 02:40:22 AM
Ooops.

http://www.southampton.ac.uk/mediacentre/news/2013/sep/13_172.shtml

Surely, we understand brain chemistry and structure enough to add MOAR PILLS to make it all better.

Surely.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on September 27, 2013, 02:48:42 AM
Quote from: Alty on September 27, 2013, 02:40:22 AM
Ooops.

http://www.southampton.ac.uk/mediacentre/news/2013/sep/13_172.shtml

Surely, we understand brain chemistry and structure enough to add MOAR PILLS to make it all better.

Surely.

Greeeaaaat.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on September 29, 2013, 08:52:43 PM
Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective
of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly

DANIEL M. OPPENHEIMER*
Princeton University, USA

http://www.ucd.ie/artspgs/semantics/ConsequencesErudite.pdf

:lulz:                   ^^^^ ART SPGS?!?!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on September 30, 2013, 12:18:26 AM
Quote from: Telarus on September 29, 2013, 08:52:43 PM
Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective
of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly

DANIEL M. OPPENHEIMER*
Princeton University, USA

http://www.ucd.ie/artspgs/semantics/ConsequencesErudite.pdf

:lulz:                   ^^^^ ART SPGS?!?!

Oh that's lovely!  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on September 30, 2013, 08:25:04 AM
Quote from: Mean Mister Nigel on September 30, 2013, 12:18:26 AM
Quote from: Telarus on September 29, 2013, 08:52:43 PM
Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective
of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly

DANIEL M. OPPENHEIMER*
Princeton University, USA

http://www.ucd.ie/artspgs/semantics/ConsequencesErudite.pdf

:lulz:                   ^^^^ ART SPGS?!?!

Oh that's lovely!  :lulz:
Not ass much [as] an anoptorectomy  :lulz: (sorry, just celebrating my (gradually less incessant) return)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on October 03, 2013, 05:04:20 AM
http://www.douglas.qc.ca/news/1222?locale=en&utm_medium=referral&utm_


GIMMIE GIMMIE GIMMIE! NAO! WHERE ARE THE PILLZ ALREADY?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on November 02, 2013, 08:56:58 PM
This is good for me to know, I am fascinated by the placebo effect.

http://m.medicalxpress.com/news/2013-10-mind-gray-placebo-pleasure-pain.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 02, 2013, 09:27:17 PM
This is SO COOL!

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/11/131101172313.htm

QuoteIt was once thought that each cell in a person's body possesses the same DNA code and that the particular way the genome is read imparts cell function and defines the individual. For many cell types in our bodies, however, that is an oversimplification. Studies of neuronal genomes published in the past decade have turned up extra or missing chromosomes, or pieces of DNA that can copy and paste themselves throughout the genomes.

The only way to know for sure that neurons from the same person harbor unique DNA is by profiling the genomes of single cells instead of bulk cell populations, the latter of which produce an average. Now, using single-cell sequencing, Salk Institute researchers and their collaborators have shown that the genomic structures of individual neurons differ from each other even more than expected. The findings were published November 1 in Science.

"Contrary to what we once thought, the genetic makeup of neurons in the brain aren't identical, but are made up of a patchwork of DNA," says corresponding author Fred Gage, Salk's Vi and John Adler Chair for Research on Age-Related Neurodegenerative Disease.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on November 03, 2013, 05:01:57 AM
Quote from: Alty on November 02, 2013, 08:56:58 PM
This is good for me to know, I am fascinated by the placebo effect.

http://m.medicalxpress.com/news/2013-10-mind-gray-placebo-pleasure-pain.html
Wait, I know what's going on...  You 86'd my stash  :lol:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 03, 2013, 05:04:03 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on November 02, 2013, 09:27:17 PM
This is SO COOL!

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/11/131101172313.htm

QuoteIt was once thought that each cell in a person's body possesses the same DNA code and that the particular way the genome is read imparts cell function and defines the individual. For many cell types in our bodies, however, that is an oversimplification. Studies of neuronal genomes published in the past decade have turned up extra or missing chromosomes, or pieces of DNA that can copy and paste themselves throughout the genomes.

The only way to know for sure that neurons from the same person harbor unique DNA is by profiling the genomes of single cells instead of bulk cell populations, the latter of which produce an average. Now, using single-cell sequencing, Salk Institute researchers and their collaborators have shown that the genomic structures of individual neurons differ from each other even more than expected. The findings were published November 1 in Science.

"Contrary to what we once thought, the genetic makeup of neurons in the brain aren't identical, but are made up of a patchwork of DNA," says corresponding author Fred Gage, Salk's Vi and John Adler Chair for Research on Age-Related Neurodegenerative Disease.

That certainly explains a lot.

:lulz:

CAN'T HELP IT.  MY DNA IS ALL FUCKED UP.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on November 03, 2013, 05:18:09 AM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on November 03, 2013, 05:04:03 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on November 02, 2013, 09:27:17 PM
This is SO COOL!

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/11/131101172313.htm

QuoteIt was once thought that each cell in a person's body possesses the same DNA code and that the particular way the genome is read imparts cell function and defines the individual. For many cell types in our bodies, however, that is an oversimplification. Studies of neuronal genomes published in the past decade have turned up extra or missing chromosomes, or pieces of DNA that can copy and paste themselves throughout the genomes.

The only way to know for sure that neurons from the same person harbor unique DNA is by profiling the genomes of single cells instead of bulk cell populations, the latter of which produce an average. Now, using single-cell sequencing, Salk Institute researchers and their collaborators have shown that the genomic structures of individual neurons differ from each other even more than expected. The findings were published November 1 in Science.

"Contrary to what we once thought, the genetic makeup of neurons in the brain aren't identical, but are made up of a patchwork of DNA," says corresponding author Fred Gage, Salk's Vi and John Adler Chair for Research on Age-Related Neurodegenerative Disease.

That certainly explains a lot.

:lulz:

CAN'T HELP IT.  MY DNA IS ALL FUCKED UP.
NO, LOOKY HERE!
You are an independent, beautifully unique and perfect snowflake.  Take responsibility for your misanthropy because now you understand that the manufacturer is not liable for any production flaws.  Also, you were given plenty of time to adapt to this certified lack of a guarantee  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on November 14, 2013, 11:56:21 PM
Probiotics probably isn't bullshit.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/11/131114122103.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fhealth_medicine+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Health+%26+Medicine+News%29

...
...
...
But it is pig shit.
:rimshot:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on November 20, 2013, 02:14:47 PM
Quote from: Alty on October 03, 2013, 05:04:20 AM
http://www.douglas.qc.ca/news/1222?locale=en&utm_medium=referral&utm_


GIMMIE GIMMIE GIMMIE! NAO! WHERE ARE THE PILLZ ALREADY?
Not pills, certain types of light. Nighlight is about to take on a new meaning.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 21, 2013, 03:13:44 AM
Speaking of gut bacteria

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/11/18/244526773/gut-bacteria-might-guide-the-workings-of-our-minds

I haven't really had time to check it out thoroughly yet. The first guy they talk about sounds legit, but when I get to the autism/probiotics guy my red flags start a-waving.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 21, 2013, 03:22:00 AM
PS my personal advice for building your microbes is eat lots of raw organic/wild fruits and vegetables, eat pickles, and don't be afraid to put things in your mouth. People are way too freaky about dirt.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on November 21, 2013, 03:59:55 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on November 21, 2013, 03:22:00 AM
PS my personal advice for building your microbes is eat lots of raw organic/wild fruits and vegetables, eat pickles, and don't be afraid to put things in your mouth. People are way too freaky about dirt.

Gonna try putting an impact wrench in my mouth tomorrow.  I will be a disease-fightin' fool.

DOUR,
Resisting the really cheap shot.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 21, 2013, 04:03:28 AM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on November 21, 2013, 03:59:55 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on November 21, 2013, 03:22:00 AM
PS my personal advice for building your microbes is eat lots of raw organic/wild fruits and vegetables, eat pickles, and don't be afraid to put things in your mouth. People are way too freaky about dirt.

Gonna try putting an impact wrench in my mouth tomorrow.  I will be a disease-fightin' fool.

DOUR,
Resisting the really cheap shot.

:lulz: :lulz: :lulz:

More on the probiotic angle: http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/changing-gut-bacteria-through-245617.aspx
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on November 21, 2013, 02:13:10 PM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on November 21, 2013, 04:03:28 AM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on November 21, 2013, 03:59:55 AM
Quote from: Mrs. Nigelson on November 21, 2013, 03:22:00 AM
PS my personal advice for building your microbes is eat lots of raw organic/wild fruits and vegetables, eat pickles, and don't be afraid to put things in your mouth. People are way too freaky about dirt.

Gonna try putting an impact wrench in my mouth tomorrow.  I will be a disease-fightin' fool.

DOUR,
Resisting the really cheap shot.

:lulz: :lulz: :lulz:

More on the probiotic angle: http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/changing-gut-bacteria-through-245617.aspx
Interesting.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on November 22, 2013, 09:45:50 PM
http://global.christianpost.com/news/stephen-hawking-god-particle-discovery-makes-physics-boring-physicist-claims-humans-only-have-1000-years-left-on-earth-109232/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on November 29, 2013, 11:33:37 PM
Hahahaha, I love science-speak:

Comet ISON, Presumed Dead, Shows New Life
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/30/science/space/comet-presumed-dead-shows-new-life.html?_r=0

QuoteImages taken by spacecraft showed an increasingly bright point at the head of the comet. Dr. Battams said that current data could not offer a definitive answer, but it appeared Friday that part of ISON's nucleus was still holding together.

"It's definitely maybe alive," Dr. Battams said. "There's a strong definite chance it might be, may be alive."
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on December 02, 2013, 12:13:47 AM
We need a thread for Goofy Weekly Science Headlines.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2515969/Humans-evolved-female-chimpanzee-mated-pig-Extraordinary-claim-American-geneticist.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on December 02, 2013, 12:27:19 AM
Quote from: Alty on December 02, 2013, 12:13:47 AM
We need a thread for Goofy Weekly Science Headlines.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2515969/Humans-evolved-female-chimpanzee-mated-pig-Extraordinary-claim-American-geneticist.html
Great ending! I still prefer the aquatic ape theory though.
Here is a very thorough critique (http://www.aquaticape.org/genprobs.html)
I haven't read most of it but it seems very thorough.
I know it is not common practice to post your opponents' arguments, but it seems right to me here because the aquatic ape is not commonly considered an acceptable theory.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 02, 2013, 12:28:00 AM
Quote from: Alty on December 02, 2013, 12:13:47 AM
We need a thread for Goofy Weekly Science Headlines.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2515969/Humans-evolved-female-chimpanzee-mated-pig-Extraordinary-claim-American-geneticist.html

Haha I saw that earlier.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 02, 2013, 12:35:01 AM
It would be easier to not spittake and headdesk if the guy provided any evidence that primate/porcine crossfertilization could take place, let alone that the offspring of such a bizarre cross would be fertile.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on December 02, 2013, 12:37:27 AM
Quote from: :regret: on December 02, 2013, 12:27:19 AM
Quote from: Alty on December 02, 2013, 12:13:47 AM
We need a thread for Goofy Weekly Science Headlines.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2515969/Humans-evolved-female-chimpanzee-mated-pig-Extraordinary-claim-American-geneticist.html
Great ending! I still prefer the aquatic ape theory though.
Here is a very thorough critique (http://www.aquaticape.org/genprobs.html)
I haven't read most of it but it seems very thorough.
I know it is not common practice to post your opponents' arguments, but it seems right to me here because the aquatic ape is not commonly considered an acceptable theory.

Ooh I like it better that way anyhow. Proponents of a given idea are never to be fully trusted.

Quote from: Radagast's Red Velvet Pancake Puppies on December 02, 2013, 12:35:01 AM
It would be easier to not spittake and headdesk if the guy provided any evidence that primate/porcine crossfertilization could take place, let alone that the offspring of such a bizarre cross would be fertile.

We can all dream.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on December 02, 2013, 12:41:41 AM
Quote from: Alty on December 02, 2013, 12:37:27 AM
Quote from: :regret: on December 02, 2013, 12:27:19 AM
Quote from: Alty on December 02, 2013, 12:13:47 AM
We need a thread for Goofy Weekly Science Headlines.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2515969/Humans-evolved-female-chimpanzee-mated-pig-Extraordinary-claim-American-geneticist.html
Great ending! I still prefer the aquatic ape theory though.
Here is a very thorough critique (http://www.aquaticape.org/genprobs.html)
I haven't read most of it but it seems very thorough.
I know it is not common practice to post your opponents' arguments, but it seems right to me here because the aquatic ape is not commonly considered an acceptable theory.

Ooh I like it better that way anyhow. Proponents of a given idea are never to be fully trusted.
Hmm, in theory i agree but the aquatic ape book has a special place in my heart for some reason. Lets just leave it at that my opinion cannot be trusted when it comes to this subject. Except that i do think the aquatic ape is a good read.

Quote from: Alty on December 02, 2013, 12:37:27 AM
Quote from: Radagast's Red Velvet Pancake Puppies on December 02, 2013, 12:35:01 AM
It would be easier to not spittake and headdesk if the guy provided any evidence that primate/porcine crossfertilization could take place, let alone that the offspring of such a bizarre cross would be fertile.

We can all dream.
Wouldn't the different number of chromosomes throw a wrench in the works? I must admit my knowledge of genetics is limited but i seem to remember that bit being important to meiosis.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on December 02, 2013, 12:44:38 AM
Most of my shit is rusty, I'm just avoiding Quickbooks right now.

But I know bullshit when I smell it.  :lulz:

Seriously though, how did people get to demanding this kind of shit?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on December 03, 2013, 08:43:44 PM
Two thousand mice dropped on Guam by parachute — to kill snakes
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101240774
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on December 03, 2013, 08:45:41 PM
Quote from: Telarus on December 03, 2013, 08:43:44 PM
Two thousand mice dropped on Guam by parachute — to kill snakes
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101240774

In related news, 300 sheep released in Zimbabwe to kill lions.   :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on December 03, 2013, 09:18:26 PM
Koalas Have a Newfound Sex Organ—in Their Throats
http://www.slate.com/blogs/wild_things/2013/12/02/koalas_deep_bellows_folds_in_the_pharynx_make_males_sexy_and_dominant.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on December 04, 2013, 03:40:53 AM
Tool use in crocodylians: crocodiles and alligators use sticks as lures to attract waterbirds
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/tetrapod-zoology/2013/11/30/tool-use-in-crocs-and-gators/


Hmmm, very interesting.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on December 04, 2013, 08:34:36 AM
Proving the existence of DOUR's reptoid heritage takes another step forward.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on December 04, 2013, 08:51:45 PM
Quote from: Telarus on December 04, 2013, 03:40:53 AM
Tool use in crocodylians: crocodiles and alligators use sticks as lures to attract waterbirds
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/tetrapod-zoology/2013/11/30/tool-use-in-crocs-and-gators/


Hmmm, very interesting.

I like it, I like it :pokewithstick:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 04, 2013, 10:39:53 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 04, 2013, 08:34:36 AM
Proving the existence of DOUR's reptoid heritage takes another step forward.

Hey now, he almost never lurks in shallow water with sticks on his head to lure birds into landing.

Tucson doesn't even HAVE any water.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on December 04, 2013, 10:40:41 PM
Quote from: Radagast's Red Velvet Pancake Puppies on December 04, 2013, 10:39:53 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 04, 2013, 08:34:36 AM
Proving the existence of DOUR's reptoid heritage takes another step forward.

Hey now, he almost never lurks in shallow water with sticks on his head to lure birds into landing.

Tucson doesn't even HAVE any water.

I have to use the settling pond.  :(
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on December 04, 2013, 10:51:06 PM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on December 04, 2013, 10:40:41 PM
Quote from: Radagast's Red Velvet Pancake Puppies on December 04, 2013, 10:39:53 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 04, 2013, 08:34:36 AM
Proving the existence of DOUR's reptoid heritage takes another step forward.

Hey now, he almost never lurks in shallow water with sticks on his head to lure birds into landing.

Tucson doesn't even HAVE any water.

I have to use the settling pond.  :(

Horseshit. I'd ask the herons about this, which I can't. Not pointing fingers but we all know why.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on December 05, 2013, 08:17:20 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 04, 2013, 10:51:06 PM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on December 04, 2013, 10:40:41 PM
Quote from: Radagast's Red Velvet Pancake Puppies on December 04, 2013, 10:39:53 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 04, 2013, 08:34:36 AM
Proving the existence of DOUR's reptoid heritage takes another step forward.

Hey now, he almost never lurks in shallow water with sticks on his head to lure birds into landing.

Tucson doesn't even HAVE any water.

I have to use the settling pond.  :(

Horseshit. I'd ask the herons about this, which I can't. Not pointing fingers but we all know why.
Lo, y'all too awful to demonstrate :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on December 06, 2013, 12:50:57 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131205141900.htm?utm_source


So...because these people THINK the symptoms of these infections are autism-like enough probitics may be help autism?

Or have I missed something?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on December 06, 2013, 02:20:18 PM
Quote from: Alty on December 06, 2013, 12:50:57 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131205141900.htm?utm_source


So...because these people THINK the symptoms of these infections are autism-like enough probitics may be help autism?

Or have I missed something?
Autism may be connected to leaky guts, lets make mice autistic by doing something to them that is known to cause autism in humans.
Hey, their guts are leaking just like in some autistic humans. What happens if we treat the leaky gut? Oh, hey the autism symptoms got less.
Let's try this shit on humans, since the treatment is already accepted and safe.

I believe it could work.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 08, 2013, 09:47:52 PM
Quote from: Alty on December 06, 2013, 12:50:57 AM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131205141900.htm?utm_source


So...because these people THINK the symptoms of these infections are autism-like enough probitics may be help autism?

Or have I missed something?

It might make more sense to say that they think it's possible that at least some of the diagnosed cases of autism in humans may be caused by the same problems that caused autism-like behavior in their test mice, and that if that is the case, the treatment which helped the test mice may also help those humans.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on December 10, 2013, 02:48:20 PM
Cable firms starting to shit themselves about the existence of the internet:
http://bgr.com/2013/12/09/anti-cord-cutting-ad-campaign-wtf/

QuoteThe cable cutter continues to embrace the bunny, and offers the small creature a ride on his bicycle. The rabbit then leaps up and latches on to the man's neck, biting down and continuing to hold on despite the man's struggles.

"And because he didn't get the news," a tablet tethered to a cactus reveals, "he didn't know mutant bunnies were on the loose."

Of course had you given the poor guy cable, disaster would have been averted. The tablet tethered to the cactus would have been revealed in time and it would have been streaming a breaking newscast informing the man that mutant bunnies escaped from a nearby lab. He would know, then, to put on a falconry glove and tame the mutant beast before taking it for a ride on his bike.

I lack the words.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on December 10, 2013, 04:05:28 PM
You know what Austrailia really needs? More danger.
http://gizmodo.com/miners-spill-a-million-liters-of-radioactive-acid-in-a-1479708013

QuoteAbout a million liters of radioactive acid sludge accidentally poured out of a tank at the Ranger uranium mine in northern Australia. As if the spill itself weren't bad enough, the mine is also located in the Kakadu National Park, where most of Crocodile Dundee was filmed. That place is a national treasure.

Luckily, this catastrophic-sounding event might be resolved without too much destruction. The people who run the mine say they can clean up the mess easily and there's been "no impact to the environment," because the spill was confined to the mine. Whether or not this is actually true remains to be seen, as the radioactive acid sludge is strong enough to damage the local ecosystem if it makes it into the nearby water supply. Again, this would be bad since this mine is sitting smack dab in the middle of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

It's an impressive level of bribery that lets you do this in the middle of a heritage site.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 10, 2013, 06:24:33 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 10, 2013, 02:48:20 PM
Cable firms starting to shit themselves about the existence of the internet:
http://bgr.com/2013/12/09/anti-cord-cutting-ad-campaign-wtf/

QuoteThe cable cutter continues to embrace the bunny, and offers the small creature a ride on his bicycle. The rabbit then leaps up and latches on to the man's neck, biting down and continuing to hold on despite the man's struggles.

"And because he didn't get the news," a tablet tethered to a cactus reveals, "he didn't know mutant bunnies were on the loose."

Of course had you given the poor guy cable, disaster would have been averted. The tablet tethered to the cactus would have been revealed in time and it would have been streaming a breaking newscast informing the man that mutant bunnies escaped from a nearby lab. He would know, then, to put on a falconry glove and tame the mutant beast before taking it for a ride on his bike.

I lack the words.

I could not make heads nor tails of that. What? They are trying to convince people that having tv on 24/7 would prevent tragic accidents, or something like that?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on December 10, 2013, 06:45:55 PM
Cable subscriptions are down so people are going batshit crazy. At least that's what I understand.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 10, 2013, 06:58:16 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 10, 2013, 06:45:55 PM
Cable subscriptions are down so people are going batshit crazy. At least that's what I understand.

MADNESS!

It's sad when companies that offer an old technology miss the bandwagon for moving to a new technology and then freak out when they finally realize.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on December 10, 2013, 07:07:54 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 10, 2013, 04:05:28 PM
You know what Austrailia really needs? More danger.
http://gizmodo.com/miners-spill-a-million-liters-of-radioactive-acid-in-a-1479708013

QuoteAbout a million liters of radioactive acid sludge accidentally poured out of a tank at the Ranger uranium mine in northern Australia. As if the spill itself weren't bad enough, the mine is also located in the Kakadu National Park, where most of Crocodile Dundee was filmed. That place is a national treasure.

Luckily, this catastrophic-sounding event might be resolved without too much destruction. The people who run the mine say they can clean up the mess easily and there's been "no impact to the environment," because the spill was confined to the mine. Whether or not this is actually true remains to be seen, as the radioactive acid sludge is strong enough to damage the local ecosystem if it makes it into the nearby water supply. Again, this would be bad since this mine is sitting smack dab in the middle of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

It's an impressive level of bribery that lets you do this in the middle of a heritage site.

They're trying to close the gap with Arizona.  RADIOACTIVITY IS OUR SCHTICK, ASSHOLES!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 10, 2013, 07:11:16 PM
This is quite interesting: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131205141629.htm

QuoteAstronomers Discover Planet That Shouldn't Be There

Dec. 5, 2013 — The discovery of a giant planet orbiting its star at 650 times the average Earth-Sun distance has astronomers puzzled over how such a strange system came to be.
An international team of astronomers, led by a University of Arizona graduate student, has discovered the most distantly orbiting planet found to date around a single, sun-like star. It is the first exoplanet -- a planet outside of our solar system -- discovered at the UA.
Weighing in at 11 times Jupiter's mass and orbiting its star at 650 times the average Earth-Sun distance, planet HD 106906 b is unlike anything in our own Solar System and throws a wrench in planet formation theories.
"This system is especially fascinating because no model of either planet or star formation fully explains what we see," said Vanessa Bailey, who led the research. Bailey is a fifth-year graduate student in the UA's Department of Astronomy.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 10, 2013, 07:15:33 PM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131209152259.htm

QuoteNeural Prosthesis Restores Behavior After Brain Injury

Dec. 9, 2013 — Scientists from Case Western Reserve University and University of Kansas Medical Center have restored behavior -- in this case, the ability to reach through a narrow opening and grasp food -- using a neural prosthesis in a rat model of brain injury.

Ultimately, the team hopes to develop a device that rapidly and substantially improves function after brain injury in humans. There is no such commercial treatment for the 1.5 million Americans, including soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq, who suffer traumatic brain injuries (TBI), or the nearly 800,000 stroke victims who suffer weakness or paralysis in the United States, annually.
The prosthesis, called a brain-machine-brain interface, is a closed-loop microelectronic system. It records signals from one part of the brain, processes them in real time, and then bridges the injury by stimulating a second part of the brain that had lost connectivity.
Their work is published online this week in the science journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 10, 2013, 08:24:31 PM
BABIES: http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/dec/08/newborn-babies-more-developed-cognitive-development

QuoteMy baby could not look more like a subject in a laboratory experiment. Wearing a soft white skullcap attached by long wires to an EEG machine measuring his brain activity, he is also surrounded by computer equipment and fussing researchers at University College London. "Hopefully you'll be contributing to high-powered science!" one coos at him.

Before I'm written off as a bad mother, I should explain: this is the London Babylab, part of UCL's cognitive development research group, which studies how infants perceive the world around them. The tests aren't uncomfortable, and are supposed to be fun. They're also a rare chance for me to peer inside my baby's mind. Scientists have him, a healthy 15-week-old, look at shapes and cartoon characters while they track his gaze and brain responses. Cradled in my lap, he watches the screen, and thinks.

I have spent hours wondering what he's thinking. The problem is that getting inside the head of a baby is like deciphering the thoughts of a kitten. And a wriggly three-month-old who is just as interested in the ceiling tiles as what's on the screen doesn't always make for the best research subject. "Lots of people don't like working with babies because it's super difficult. With adults, you can just ask them questions. With animals, you can make them do things. Not with babies," says UCL researcher Zita Patai.

But with creative, highly targeted experiments (the key, as any parent knows, is to turn everything into a game) scientists are starting to understand the baby brain. At the same time, this growing body of research is adding weight to a popular theory that our little bundles of joy are far more intelligent than we have assumed.

...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on December 10, 2013, 09:13:49 PM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on December 10, 2013, 07:07:54 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 10, 2013, 04:05:28 PM
You know what Austrailia really needs? More danger.
http://gizmodo.com/miners-spill-a-million-liters-of-radioactive-acid-in-a-1479708013

QuoteAbout a million liters of radioactive acid sludge accidentally poured out of a tank at the Ranger uranium mine in northern Australia. As if the spill itself weren't bad enough, the mine is also located in the Kakadu National Park, where most of Crocodile Dundee was filmed. That place is a national treasure.

Luckily, this catastrophic-sounding event might be resolved without too much destruction. The people who run the mine say they can clean up the mess easily and there's been "no impact to the environment," because the spill was confined to the mine. Whether or not this is actually true remains to be seen, as the radioactive acid sludge is strong enough to damage the local ecosystem if it makes it into the nearby water supply. Again, this would be bad since this mine is sitting smack dab in the middle of a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

It's an impressive level of bribery that lets you do this in the middle of a heritage site.

They're trying to close the gap with Arizona.  RADIOACTIVITY IS OUR SCHTICK, ASSHOLES!

Cue the Mutant Crocknado: derivative options on futures available upon inquiry, restrictions may apply.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on December 12, 2013, 02:42:40 AM
Quote from: LuciferX on December 10, 2013, 09:13:49 PM
Cue the Mutant Crocknado: derivative options on futures available upon inquiry, restrictions may apply.

:lulz:

Where do I bribe?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on December 12, 2013, 11:34:05 AM
More Future:
http://sploid.gizmodo.com/scientists-create-a-controlled-cyborg-sperm-that-can-sw-1481503095/@jesusdiaz
QuoteScientists at the Institute for Integrative Nanosciences in Dresden, Germany, have created "the first sperm-based biobots"—a cybernetic microorganism made of metal and a bull's sperm cell that can be remote controlled and used to impregnate an egg or deliver a drug to a target anywhere inside your body.

Price of Bull semen set to rise even further.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on December 12, 2013, 08:31:35 PM
Quote from: Telarus on December 12, 2013, 02:42:40 AM
Quote from: LuciferX on December 10, 2013, 09:13:49 PM
Cue the Mutant Crocknado: derivative options on futures available upon inquiry, restrictions may apply.

:lulz:

Where do I bribe?

Proverbs 17:8  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on December 13, 2013, 06:34:36 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 12, 2013, 11:34:05 AM
More Future:
http://sploid.gizmodo.com/scientists-create-a-controlled-cyborg-sperm-that-can-sw-1481503095/@jesusdiaz
QuoteScientists at the Institute for Integrative Nanosciences in Dresden, Germany, have created "the first sperm-based biobots"—a cybernetic microorganism made of metal and a bull's sperm cell that can be remote controlled and used to impregnate an egg or deliver a drug to a target anywhere inside your body.

Price of Bull semen set to rise even further.
Close Encounters of the Fourth Kind meets Flight of the NaviGator, Part III  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on December 13, 2013, 12:29:33 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 12, 2013, 11:34:05 AM
More Future:
http://sploid.gizmodo.com/scientists-create-a-controlled-cyborg-sperm-that-can-sw-1481503095/@jesusdiaz
QuoteScientists at the Institute for Integrative Nanosciences in Dresden, Germany, have created "the first sperm-based biobots"—a cybernetic microorganism made of metal and a bull's sperm cell that can be remote controlled and used to impregnate an egg or deliver a drug to a target anywhere inside your body.

Price of Bull semen set to rise even further.
Mwahahaha spermcyborgs!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 15, 2013, 04:45:03 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on December 12, 2013, 11:34:05 AM
More Future:
http://sploid.gizmodo.com/scientists-create-a-controlled-cyborg-sperm-that-can-sw-1481503095/@jesusdiaz
QuoteScientists at the Institute for Integrative Nanosciences in Dresden, Germany, have created "the first sperm-based biobots"—a cybernetic microorganism made of metal and a bull's sperm cell that can be remote controlled and used to impregnate an egg or deliver a drug to a target anywhere inside your body.

Price of Bull semen set to rise even further.

What the FUCK.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on December 22, 2013, 06:16:23 AM
Best headline ever.


Maybe NSFW, depending,

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/12/131220113359.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fearth_climate+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Earth+%26+Climate+News%29

Ok, maybe not ever.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on December 31, 2013, 02:49:00 AM
Consensual use of mind-altering substances in non-human persons?

Confirmed.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/12/30/puff-puff-pass-young-dolphins-deliberately-chew-puffer-fish-to-get-high-with-each-other/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on December 31, 2013, 02:52:28 AM
Quote from: Telarus on December 31, 2013, 02:49:00 AM
Consensual use of mind-altering substances in non-human persons?

Confirmed.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/12/30/puff-puff-pass-young-dolphins-deliberately-chew-puffer-fish-to-get-high-with-each-other/

See, this is the sort of thing that makes preventionists very, very sad.

The dolphins involved should be shoved into a tuna net, for their own good.  It's not a perfect system, but it's the only way we can protect our assets.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on December 31, 2013, 03:10:39 AM
:spittake:

:horrormirth:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Sita on December 31, 2013, 05:17:18 PM
Found this interesting.
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2013/12/mapping-how-emotions-manifest-in-the-body/282713/
QuoteThe mapping exercise produced what you might expect: an angry hot-head, a happy person lighting up all the way through their fingers and toes, a depressed figurine that was literally blue (meaning they felt little sensation in their limbs). Almost all of the emotions generated changes in the head area, suggesting smiling, frowning, or skin temperature changes, while feelings like joy and anger saw upticks in the limbs—perhaps because you're ready to hug, or punch, your interlocutor. Meanwhile, "sensations in the digestive system and around the throat region were mainly found in disgust," the authors wrote. It's worth noting that the bodily sensations weren't blood flow, heat, or anything else that could be measured objectively—they were based solely on physical twinges subjects said they experienced.

And here's a link to the study since the article didn't have a link: http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2013/12/26/1321664111.full.pdf
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on December 31, 2013, 06:11:58 PM
Cf: Wilhelm Reich's "body armor" concepts.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on December 31, 2013, 06:23:41 PM
Quote from: Dirty Old Uncle Roger on December 31, 2013, 02:52:28 AM
Quote from: Telarus on December 31, 2013, 02:49:00 AM
Consensual use of mind-altering substances in non-human persons?

Confirmed.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/12/30/puff-puff-pass-young-dolphins-deliberately-chew-puffer-fish-to-get-high-with-each-other/

See, this is the sort of thing that makes preventionists very, very sad.

The dolphins involved should be shoved into a tuna net, for their own good.  It's not a perfect system, but it's the only way we can protect our assets.

:lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on December 31, 2013, 07:06:54 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on December 31, 2013, 06:11:58 PM
Cf: Wilhelm Reich's "body armor" concepts.

OOh, yes. Nice find Sita!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 03, 2014, 03:17:47 AM
This is the best research ever.

http://www.frontiersinzoology.com/content/10/1/80/abstract

QuoteDogs preferred to excrete with the body being aligned along the North-south axis under calm MF conditions. This directional behavior was abolished under Unstable MF. The best predictor of the behavioral switch was the rate of change in declination, i.e., polar orientation of the MF.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on January 03, 2014, 07:40:12 AM
Quote from: Telarus on December 31, 2013, 02:49:00 AM
Consensual use of mind-altering substances in non-human persons?

Confirmed.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/12/30/puff-puff-pass-young-dolphins-deliberately-chew-puffer-fish-to-get-high-with-each-other/

Correspondingly, sub-human primates of Madagasgar (BBC)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c96J7djnHIg (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c96J7djnHIg)
:lulz: :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on January 03, 2014, 12:07:21 PM
Quote from: Telarus on December 31, 2013, 07:06:54 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on December 31, 2013, 06:11:58 PM
Cf: Wilhelm Reich's "body armor" concepts.

OOh, yes. Nice find Sita!

Could I ask any of you three (or anyone in general) for an opinion of Reich? I've had him on the reading list for a while but never got round to bothering as the opinions were so varied I assumed bullshit crank in good disguise and left him largely alone. Aside from the basic biography I've got no clue if his research actually had any merit so if anyone can shed some light it'd be appreciated.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on January 03, 2014, 01:54:32 PM
Right up until he decided that Orgone was (1) detectable and (2) the answer to literally everything wrong with humans and society, he had some good ideas.

Listen, Little Man! is genius, and The Mass Psychology of Facism is a pretty good read.

Like any nacent psychological research and practice, it's clumsy and doesn't work that well with modern neuroscience, but as a model and a metaphor, it has a few positive pragmatic uses.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on January 03, 2014, 04:51:20 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on January 03, 2014, 01:54:32 PM
Right up until he decided that Orgone was (1) detectable and (2) the answer to literally everything wrong with humans and society, he had some good ideas.

Listen, Little Man! is genius, and The Mass Psychology of Facism is a pretty good read.

Like any nacent psychological research and practice, it's clumsy and doesn't work that well with modern neuroscience, but as a model and a metaphor, it has a few positive pragmatic uses.

Agreed. RAW's conception of Reich's work was also very useful for me in exploring the Buddhist/Zen headspace.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on January 03, 2014, 07:19:29 PM
Thanks gents, I'll move those two towards the top of the pile and go from there.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: GrannySmith on January 03, 2014, 11:26:46 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on January 03, 2014, 07:40:12 AM
Quote from: Telarus on December 31, 2013, 02:49:00 AM
Consensual use of mind-altering substances in non-human persons?

Confirmed.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/12/30/puff-puff-pass-young-dolphins-deliberately-chew-puffer-fish-to-get-high-with-each-other/

Correspondingly, sub-human primates of Madagasgar (BBC)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c96J7djnHIg (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c96J7djnHIg)
:lulz: :lulz:

"He tries to woo her with his anal gland"  :lulz: :lulz: :lulz: and that lemur's face in the end :lulz: :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on January 04, 2014, 06:11:45 AM
Killlllll iiitttttttt.


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140102142012.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fhealth_medicine+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Health+%26+Medicine+News%29
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on January 04, 2014, 06:37:07 AM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on January 03, 2014, 01:54:32 PM
Right up until he decided that Orgone was (1) detectable and (2) the answer to literally everything wrong with humans and society, he had some good ideas.

Listen, Little Man! is genius, and The Mass Psychology of Facism is a pretty good read.

Like any nacent psychological research and practice, it's clumsy and doesn't work that well with modern neuroscience, but as a model and a metaphor, it has a few positive pragmatic uses.
Been de-teching Orgone most definitively since I re-gifted my generators and accumulators :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 04, 2014, 08:58:19 PM
Your blood can smell food?

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/04/130407183542.htm

QuoteIn a discovery suggesting that odors may have a far more important role in life than previously believed, scientists have found that heart, blood, lung and other cells in the body have the same receptors for sensing odors that exist in the nose. It opens the door to questions about whether the heart, for instance, "smells" that fresh-brewed cup of coffee or cinnamon bun, according to the research leader, who spoke in New Orleans on April 7 at the 245th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on January 05, 2014, 11:25:27 PM
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-01/05/inflated-praise

Mainly so I remember about this tomorrow, seems like something here.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 06, 2014, 12:00:07 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on January 05, 2014, 11:25:27 PM
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-01/05/inflated-praise

Mainly so I remember about this tomorrow, seems like something here.

This is not actually particularly new news. I mean, this particular study is new, but there have been a number of previous studies (probably all cited by this one) that show that empty praise is harmful to morale and performance.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on January 06, 2014, 02:40:49 AM
Quote from: Alty on January 04, 2014, 06:11:45 AM
Killlllll iiitttttttt.


http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140102142012.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fhealth_medicine+%28ScienceDaily%3A+Health+%26+Medicine+News%29

"regular users of cannabis show signs of memory loss and a lack of motivation that make quite hard their social insertion."

Relatedly, plastic wrapper results harder to fit back on pack of smokes once previously removed  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on January 06, 2014, 09:43:02 AM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Velveteen Skinmeat Snacks on January 06, 2014, 12:00:07 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on January 05, 2014, 11:25:27 PM
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-01/05/inflated-praise

Mainly so I remember about this tomorrow, seems like something here.

This is not actually particularly new news. I mean, this particular study is new, but there have been a number of previous studies (probably all cited by this one) that show that empty praise is harmful to morale and performance.

Appreciated, I hadn't seen the others before so I assumed this was new.

This does seem new though, with somewhat inevitable conclusions:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24821383

QuoteIt has become a depressingly universal truth in education that children from poorer backgrounds tend on average to do less well than their richer counterparts.

But what would happen if you took those poorer families and gave them money, real hard cash? If you make a poor family richer, will their children's chances of success rise accordingly?

Or is it much more complex?

Are children being held back not by lack of money, but by poverty's fellow travellers, such as bad housing, ill health, unemployment, chaotic parenting or family breakdown? Or are poor children getting stuck in a downward spiral of poorly educated parents and bad schools?

A US economist, Prof Greg Duncan, has won a million Swiss franc (£680,000) research prize to find out, in an annual award by the Zurich-based Jacobs Foundation, a charity that supports research into improving childhood.

Prof Duncan, an expert on the impact of poverty in childhood, wants to take a randomised group of a thousand low-income single mothers with a newborn child and give them $4,000 (£2,890) each for the first three years of the children's lives.

Another control group of mothers will get a much smaller amount.

Prof Duncan, from the School of Education at the University of California, Irvine, is going to to measure what happens next.

Brain development
The experiment will be a big, expensive, long-term venture, with the prize money supporting the pilot stage. But Prof Duncan wants this to answer some big questions about what happens if you reduce hardship in the earliest years.

Greg Duncan
Prof Greg Duncan wants to measure how raising income changes life chances
Can raising income deliver a measurable change in family life and children's progress? Will neuroscientists find a difference in cognitive development between those who receive the $4,000 and those who don't?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 06, 2014, 05:07:28 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on January 06, 2014, 09:43:02 AM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Velveteen Skinmeat Snacks on January 06, 2014, 12:00:07 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on January 05, 2014, 11:25:27 PM
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-01/05/inflated-praise

Mainly so I remember about this tomorrow, seems like something here.

This is not actually particularly new news. I mean, this particular study is new, but there have been a number of previous studies (probably all cited by this one) that show that empty praise is harmful to morale and performance.

Appreciated, I hadn't seen the others before so I assumed this was new.

This does seem new though, with somewhat inevitable conclusions:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24821383

QuoteIt has become a depressingly universal truth in education that children from poorer backgrounds tend on average to do less well than their richer counterparts.

But what would happen if you took those poorer families and gave them money, real hard cash? If you make a poor family richer, will their children's chances of success rise accordingly?

Or is it much more complex?

Are children being held back not by lack of money, but by poverty's fellow travellers, such as bad housing, ill health, unemployment, chaotic parenting or family breakdown? Or are poor children getting stuck in a downward spiral of poorly educated parents and bad schools?

A US economist, Prof Greg Duncan, has won a million Swiss franc (£680,000) research prize to find out, in an annual award by the Zurich-based Jacobs Foundation, a charity that supports research into improving childhood.

Prof Duncan, an expert on the impact of poverty in childhood, wants to take a randomised group of a thousand low-income single mothers with a newborn child and give them $4,000 (£2,890) each for the first three years of the children's lives.

Another control group of mothers will get a much smaller amount.

Prof Duncan, from the School of Education at the University of California, Irvine, is going to to measure what happens next.

Brain development
The experiment will be a big, expensive, long-term venture, with the prize money supporting the pilot stage. But Prof Duncan wants this to answer some big questions about what happens if you reduce hardship in the earliest years.

Greg Duncan
Prof Greg Duncan wants to measure how raising income changes life chances
Can raising income deliver a measurable change in family life and children's progress? Will neuroscientists find a difference in cognitive development between those who receive the $4,000 and those who don't?

Every research study in psychology and sociology is building on others that point in the same direction, so in a sense nothing is totally "new", because none of it exists in a vacuum. What it does do is explores and finds concrete data in an area that all the other data points toward having a certain outcome, and then that data is used to help guide the next study, and so on and so forth.

I am curious about how meaningfully this researcher believes that $4000 for three years will change the family situation, especially during the first three years, when the mother is effectively trapped in a situation that prevents her from using it to do something with long-term benefits such as attend school. It almost, ALMOST, smells like an experiment designed to "prove" that giving poor people money won't change anything.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on January 06, 2014, 10:10:51 PM
At least those 10$ a day seem like they will make more of a negligible difference in the US than in Switzerland, because the latter has an even more inflated cost of living.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on January 07, 2014, 11:20:18 AM
cure for leukemia - more cancers to follow... (http://singularityhub.com/2014/01/06/gene-therapy-delivers-dramatic-success-in-treating-leukemia-will-it-work-for-other-cancers-too/)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on January 07, 2014, 11:49:42 AM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Velveteen Skinmeat Snacks on January 06, 2014, 05:07:28 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on January 06, 2014, 09:43:02 AM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Velveteen Skinmeat Snacks on January 06, 2014, 12:00:07 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on January 05, 2014, 11:25:27 PM
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2014-01/05/inflated-praise

Mainly so I remember about this tomorrow, seems like something here.

This is not actually particularly new news. I mean, this particular study is new, but there have been a number of previous studies (probably all cited by this one) that show that empty praise is harmful to morale and performance.

Appreciated, I hadn't seen the others before so I assumed this was new.

This does seem new though, with somewhat inevitable conclusions:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24821383

QuoteIt has become a depressingly universal truth in education that children from poorer backgrounds tend on average to do less well than their richer counterparts.

But what would happen if you took those poorer families and gave them money, real hard cash? If you make a poor family richer, will their children's chances of success rise accordingly?

Or is it much more complex?

Are children being held back not by lack of money, but by poverty's fellow travellers, such as bad housing, ill health, unemployment, chaotic parenting or family breakdown? Or are poor children getting stuck in a downward spiral of poorly educated parents and bad schools?

A US economist, Prof Greg Duncan, has won a million Swiss franc (£680,000) research prize to find out, in an annual award by the Zurich-based Jacobs Foundation, a charity that supports research into improving childhood.

Prof Duncan, an expert on the impact of poverty in childhood, wants to take a randomised group of a thousand low-income single mothers with a newborn child and give them $4,000 (£2,890) each for the first three years of the children's lives.

Another control group of mothers will get a much smaller amount.

Prof Duncan, from the School of Education at the University of California, Irvine, is going to to measure what happens next.

Brain development
The experiment will be a big, expensive, long-term venture, with the prize money supporting the pilot stage. But Prof Duncan wants this to answer some big questions about what happens if you reduce hardship in the earliest years.

Greg Duncan
Prof Greg Duncan wants to measure how raising income changes life chances
Can raising income deliver a measurable change in family life and children's progress? Will neuroscientists find a difference in cognitive development between those who receive the $4,000 and those who don't?

Every research study in psychology and sociology is building on others that point in the same direction, so in a sense nothing is totally "new", because none of it exists in a vacuum. What it does do is explores and finds concrete data in an area that all the other data points toward having a certain outcome, and then that data is used to help guide the next study, and so on and so forth.

I am curious about how meaningfully this researcher believes that $4000 for three years will change the family situation, especially during the first three years, when the mother is effectively trapped in a situation that prevents her from using it to do something with long-term benefits such as attend school. It almost, ALMOST, smells like an experiment designed to "prove" that giving poor people money won't change anything.

I thought I replied to this yesterday, laptop must have swallowed it.

The bold, I must admit that was my first reaction to the thing. Set up poor people for failure justifying increasingly punitive measures kind of thing, but there does appear to be no actual restrictions on what the cash is spent on, with exactly what it's spent on being a key part of the findings.

As I understand it, this does not mean you have to spend ANY of the cash on the child if you were so inclined and could use it for rent/education/savings/crack as you see fit. I do think that this is going to highlight some blindingly obvious but it might just give an indication of how things can change for a disadvantaged family with a relatively low level of funds. I'd hope it'd do more good for the seriously disadvantaged. $4K if you're homeless for instance, could be enough to get you a basis to get back into society. Or it could be gone in a day. It's a total unknown without knowing more about an individuals circumstances.

Either way, It'll be interesting to look at the results and see what conclusions get drawn.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Left on January 12, 2014, 08:22:07 AM
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-25592214

http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nm.3444.html

Apparently, a high-fiber diet might help with asthma, and conversely, eating junk food might make asthma worse.

...Must buy more brown rice...I like breathing.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 12, 2014, 11:45:36 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on January 07, 2014, 11:49:42 AM

I thought I replied to this yesterday, laptop must have swallowed it.

The bold, I must admit that was my first reaction to the thing. Set up poor people for failure justifying increasingly punitive measures kind of thing, but there does appear to be no actual restrictions on what the cash is spent on, with exactly what it's spent on being a key part of the findings.

As I understand it, this does not mean you have to spend ANY of the cash on the child if you were so inclined and could use it for rent/education/savings/crack as you see fit. I do think that this is going to highlight some blindingly obvious but it might just give an indication of how things can change for a disadvantaged family with a relatively low level of funds. I'd hope it'd do more good for the seriously disadvantaged. $4K if you're homeless for instance, could be enough to get you a basis to get back into society. Or it could be gone in a day. It's a total unknown without knowing more about an individuals circumstances.

Either way, It'll be interesting to look at the results and see what conclusions get drawn.

Rent, education, and savings all ARE "for the child". Any addition to a struggling family's resources goes into a pool that the child ultimately benefits from, directly or indirectly, provided it doesn't in fact go to feeding a parent's addiction.

A lot of people seem to think that unless a parent takes the exact same dollars that were given to them to help defray childrearing costs and use them to buy cheerios and baby clothes, they aren't "spending it on the child". I have heard, a fair number of times, people complaining because some woman they know "used her child support" to buy a phone or concert tickets or a meal at a restaurant or something "selfish". What does not seem to occur to people is that the mother ALREADY used the money she earned to pay rent so the child has a roof over their head, pay bills so the child has heat and running water, buy groceries so the child already has food, pay auto insurance so she can take the kid to school, and so on and so forth. Most single and divorced mothers have learned not to count on "extra" money, so they put their child's needs first and spend all their money on them, and then only IF child support comes through that month do they consider doing something nice for themselves.

You certainly can't tell me that a parent using money to get an education doesn't benefit the children.

Sorry, I know that's not where you were going with that, just a little side-tangent to address a pet peeve.

Speaking of education, I think a study like this might actually have more meaningful results if it were started when children are six or so - school-age - so that mothers could potentially use it as an opportunity to go back to school.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on January 13, 2014, 10:45:58 AM
I'd quite agree that spending cash on education would probably be one of the better possible uses for the funds.

QuoteSpeaking of education, I think a study like this might actually have more meaningful results if it were started when children are six or so - school-age - so that mothers could potentially use it as an opportunity to go back to school.

I'd guess that many more may take the education route at that point than with a new baby to deal with. It may also be useful to record what the parents stated they wanted to do with the cash and how that relates to what it's actually spent on.

The more I think about this, the more I'm thinking it's going to be used as some kind of punishment device. Consider our societies. If we were able to prove that X dollars helps/hinders a kid for their entire life everyone with an agenda will have a say. Obey and get your $500 worth of baby goods from Babycorp. If your social media history says anything bad about Babycorp then no goods for you. And a libel suit just for fun.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on January 13, 2014, 01:26:56 PM
http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/social_affairs/AJ201401090058

QuoteThe cover design for an academic journal prompted a wave of criticism on Twitter over what was perceived as discrimination against women.

An illustration of a female robot adorned the cover of the January 2014 issue of the Journal of the Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence to introduce a basic cover redesign. The robot, dragging a cable connected to her back, looks at the reader with a book in her right hand and a broom in her left.

The design came under heavy fire on social networking site Twitter as soon as it went public.

"It's too horrible. A gynoid robot cleaning with hollow eyes," tweeted Sputniko!, a contemporary artist and an assistant professor with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab.

"I thought an academic society journal cover featuring a gynoid robot doing housework represented a lack of sensitivity to the international awareness of gender issues," Sputniko! told The Asahi Shimbun. "A black cleaning robot featured on the cover of a U.S. academic journal would cause an uproar. The same applies here."

It seems that Japan may not be as firmly in the dark ages of gender equality as some would claim. It's at least good to see the conversation is being had.

Quotehttp://news.bbcimg.co.uk/media/images/72198000/jpg/_72198490_jsai.jpg

Looking at that image, I can't help but consider what the "western" version would have looked like. I'd guess it would still be female, probably with SFX/CGI to look up the the standards of modern films. The broom would probably be some kind of electronic cleaning device but i'd guess the picture to be functionally similar in all key areas. In many ways, I'd figure a "western" version to be worse as it would almost certainly be (hyper)sexualised with nod and snigger to the idea that it's got "multiple functions".

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on January 13, 2014, 04:22:20 PM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Velveteen Skinmeat Snacks on January 12, 2014, 11:45:36 PM

A lot of people seem to think that unless a parent takes the exact same dollars that were given to them to help defray childrearing costs and use them to buy cheerios and baby clothes, they aren't "spending it on the child". I have heard, a fair number of times, people complaining because some woman they know "used her child support" to buy a phone or concert tickets or a meal at a restaurant or something "selfish". What does not seem to occur to people is that the mother ALREADY used the money she earned to pay rent so the child has a roof over their head, pay bills so the child has heat and running water, buy groceries so the child already has food, pay auto insurance so she can take the kid to school, and so on and so forth. Most single and divorced mothers have learned not to count on "extra" money, so they put their child's needs first and spend all their money on them, and then only IF child support comes through that month do they consider doing something nice for themselves.


This is great.  I'm going to have to remember this the next time someone mutters something about "poor people buying X".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 13, 2014, 05:31:19 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on January 13, 2014, 04:22:20 PM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Velveteen Skinmeat Snacks on January 12, 2014, 11:45:36 PM

A lot of people seem to think that unless a parent takes the exact same dollars that were given to them to help defray childrearing costs and use them to buy cheerios and baby clothes, they aren't "spending it on the child". I have heard, a fair number of times, people complaining because some woman they know "used her child support" to buy a phone or concert tickets or a meal at a restaurant or something "selfish". What does not seem to occur to people is that the mother ALREADY used the money she earned to pay rent so the child has a roof over their head, pay bills so the child has heat and running water, buy groceries so the child already has food, pay auto insurance so she can take the kid to school, and so on and so forth. Most single and divorced mothers have learned not to count on "extra" money, so they put their child's needs first and spend all their money on them, and then only IF child support comes through that month do they consider doing something nice for themselves.


This is great.  I'm going to have to remember this the next time someone mutters something about "poor people buying X".

Thanks! I'd love to see more people bringing up this rebuttal to the "selfish woman spending child support money on herself" or "poor people buying steak with food stamps" trope when it raises its ugly head.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on January 13, 2014, 06:29:19 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on January 13, 2014, 04:22:20 PM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Velveteen Skinmeat Snacks on January 12, 2014, 11:45:36 PM

A lot of people seem to think that unless a parent takes the exact same dollars that were given to them to help defray childrearing costs and use them to buy cheerios and baby clothes, they aren't "spending it on the child". I have heard, a fair number of times, people complaining because some woman they know "used her child support" to buy a phone or concert tickets or a meal at a restaurant or something "selfish". What does not seem to occur to people is that the mother ALREADY used the money she earned to pay rent so the child has a roof over their head, pay bills so the child has heat and running water, buy groceries so the child already has food, pay auto insurance so she can take the kid to school, and so on and so forth. Most single and divorced mothers have learned not to count on "extra" money, so they put their child's needs first and spend all their money on them, and then only IF child support comes through that month do they consider doing something nice for themselves.


This is great.  I'm going to have to remember this the next time someone mutters something about "poor people buying X".

My response to THAt is "Shut up".  Seriously.  People who gripe about poor people being able to "afford" smart phones or a shitty car or whatever...Well, they're not the kind of people I want to be around.  Not because of the opinion itself, but because that opinion is the sort of opinion bad people have.

What is an evil person?  A person who does evil things.

Shitting on the poor is by definition an evil thing.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on January 13, 2014, 06:30:25 PM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Velveteen Skinmeat Snacks on January 13, 2014, 05:31:19 PM
Thanks! I'd love to see more people bringing up this rebuttal to the "selfish woman spending child support money on herself" or "poor people buying steak with food stamps" trope when it raises its ugly head.

I used to say "Oh, yes, they should only buy gruel...YOU FUCK, YOU LIVE IN ONE OF THE ONLY COUNTRIES WHERE BEEF IS CHEAP."

Now I just say "shut up".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on January 13, 2014, 07:22:09 PM
My strict moral code dictates that I'm only allowed to reduce a human being to a gibbering pile of tears and snot, if they're complete assholes...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on January 13, 2014, 09:27:17 PM
Nigel, if you missed this seems pretty relevant:
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2014/01/13/22258825-mom-did-it-we-can-do-it-two-generation-programs-help-lift-families-out-of-poverty?lite

No surprises i'm sure, but more to add to the mix and helps move the conversation to how this shit can be done faster.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on January 14, 2014, 01:01:47 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on January 13, 2014, 07:22:09 PM
My strict moral code dictates that I'm only allowed to reduce a human being to a gibbering pile of tears and snot, if they're complete assholes...

Considering where you set the bar, that's pretty much everyone, isn't it?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on January 14, 2014, 09:38:22 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD (life continues) on January 14, 2014, 01:01:47 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on January 13, 2014, 07:22:09 PM
My strict moral code dictates that I'm only allowed to reduce a human being to a gibbering pile of tears and snot, if they're complete assholes...

Considering where you set the bar, that's pretty much everyone, isn't it?

8)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 14, 2014, 10:24:50 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on January 13, 2014, 09:27:17 PM
Nigel, if you missed this seems pretty relevant:
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2014/01/13/22258825-mom-did-it-we-can-do-it-two-generation-programs-help-lift-families-out-of-poverty?lite

No surprises i'm sure, but more to add to the mix and helps move the conversation to how this shit can be done faster.

That actually brought tears to my eyes. A whole community that supports poor single mothers AND their children so they can get an education while raising children who will also go on to be productive members of... what's that thing called... it's almost like we're living in one... oh yeah, a society!

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Left on January 19, 2014, 10:42:44 PM
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140117191354.htm

QuoteA team of engineers has developed a class of tiny bio-hybrid machines that swim like sperm, the first synthetic structures that can traverse the viscous fluids of biological environments on their own.

Cyborg flagellum.

Edited to add, found this one amusing.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140117104040.htm (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140117104040.htm)
Dr Google's now an epidemiologist.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on February 05, 2014, 04:14:55 AM
http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2014/02/04/271093289/eureka-first-life-in-the-universe

http://laughingsquid.com/goat-simulator-a-video-game-that-tentatively-simulates-the-goofy-life-of-a-goat/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 12, 2014, 05:00:17 AM
Quote from: Telarus on February 05, 2014, 04:14:55 AM
http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2014/02/04/271093289/eureka-first-life-in-the-universe

http://laughingsquid.com/goat-simulator-a-video-game-that-tentatively-simulates-the-goofy-life-of-a-goat/

That first one discusses a question I have wondered about myself... and it actually makes me rather sad, given that if such a hypothesis were true, then countless billions of planets developed life, flourished, and then went extinct as the CMB diminished below sustainable heat levels. It would mean that planets like ours came alive in the wake of a universe which had seen a great flush of life, and a great dying off. It could have once been a universe with a bustling interplanetary trade, with diversity that would boggle our minds, and in which no sentient species ever wondered if they were alone in the universe.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 12, 2014, 05:04:06 AM
I would like to play that goat simulator.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on February 12, 2014, 06:08:06 AM
Quote from: Nigel's Red Volvulus Skin Sacs on February 12, 2014, 05:00:17 AM
That first one discusses a question I have wondered about myself... and it actually makes me rather sad, given that if such a hypothesis were true, then countless billions of planets developed life, flourished, and then went extinct as the CMB diminished below sustainable heat levels. It would mean that planets like ours came alive in the wake of a universe which had seen a great flush of life, and a great dying off. It could have once been a universe with a bustling interplanetary trade, with diversity that would boggle our minds, and in which no sentient species ever wondered if they were alone in the universe.

:internettoughguy:    That was lovely Nigel, thank you for sharing quite a moving image.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 12, 2014, 08:07:21 AM
Thanks, man. I mean, the implications of what it might mean for life forms like ours developing much later on the edge of a cooling universe are pretty staggering.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on February 14, 2014, 04:32:23 AM
http://www.ecanadanow.com/science/2014/02/12/research-finds-some-species-of-crocodiles-can-climb-trees/

(http://www.sciencerecorder.com/news/wp-content/uploads/crocodiles.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Salty on February 14, 2014, 07:18:54 AM
http://m.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/new_method_to_restore_skull_after_brain_surgery_appears_to_reduce_complication_rates

120 years later, a better way.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on February 26, 2014, 04:03:25 PM
Here's an interesting story:
Anti-gay communities linked to shorter lives: study
By Andrew M. Seaman
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/24/us-anti-gay-communities-shorter-lives-idUSBREA1N1EV20140224
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on February 26, 2014, 04:17:20 PM
Nice find, wasn't what I expected from the title but is certainly worth a read.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 26, 2014, 04:54:15 PM
Quote from: Telarus on February 26, 2014, 04:03:25 PM
Here's an interesting story:
Anti-gay communities linked to shorter lives: study
By Andrew M. Seaman
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/24/us-anti-gay-communities-shorter-lives-idUSBREA1N1EV20140224

It is interesting, but I'd really like to see how/whether they controlled for socioeconomic status.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nephew Twiddleton on February 27, 2014, 04:16:27 PM
Quote from: Nigel on February 12, 2014, 08:07:21 AM
Thanks, man. I mean, the implications of what it might mean for life forms like ours developing much later on the edge of a cooling universe are pretty staggering.

I have no envy for such creatures. Imagine that, evolving in a universe made up of red dwarves and dead stars. Most stars are red dwarves now but you can't really see them with the naked eye, but imagine that kind of sky at night. Black, solid black, because everything else is too dim. Unless for obvious planets that reflect enough of your star's light, you might never think that there's anything beyond your world. You would assume you were alone because as far as you could tell the universe was an empty, lonely place with one star and one planet with life.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on February 27, 2014, 04:24:41 PM
Quote from: Nigel on February 26, 2014, 04:54:15 PM
Quote from: Telarus on February 26, 2014, 04:03:25 PM
Here's an interesting story:
Anti-gay communities linked to shorter lives: study
By Andrew M. Seaman
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/24/us-anti-gay-communities-shorter-lives-idUSBREA1N1EV20140224

It is interesting, but I'd really like to see how/whether they controlled for socioeconomic status.

http://www.advocate.com/health/2014/02/16/study-antigay-communities-lead-early-lgb-death

also a secondary study by the same team
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24328664
which also looks interesting
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on March 03, 2014, 08:46:16 AM
http://www.sacbee.com/2014/03/02/6201494/california-farmers-hire-dowsers.html

QuoteST. HELENA, Calif. -- With California in the grips of drought, farmers throughout the state are using a mysterious and some say foolhardy tool for locating underground water: dowsers, or water witches.

Practitioners of dowsing use rudimentary tools — usually copper sticks or wooden "divining rods" that resemble large wishbones — and what they describe as a natural energy to find water or minerals hidden deep underground.

While both state and federal water scientists disapprove of dowsing, California "witchers" are busy as farmers seek to drill more groundwater wells due to the state's record drought that persists despite recent rain.

QuoteAfter the valley's most popular dowser died in recent years, Mondavi has become the go-to water witch in Napa Valley. He charges about $500 per site visit, and more, if a well he discovers ends up pumping more than 50 gallons per minute.


For $500, you could probably have some actual geological survey works completed which would give you actual facts.

Hells, I'd be inclined to give a geologist $50 for his best guess. It'd probably have similar success. There's probably something more about human nature and how people act in times of desperation but dowsing still makes it in to my top 5 idiot practices.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on March 13, 2014, 07:02:35 PM
NEAT

http://www.timesofisrael.com/nine-tiny-new-dead-sea-scrolls-come-to-light/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 24, 2014, 10:39:30 PM
Well piss in my mouth and call me King Canute! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0pFZG7j5cE)

I for one would like to welcome our Lego overlords!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on March 24, 2014, 10:48:28 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 24, 2014, 10:39:30 PM
Well piss in my mouth and call me King Canute! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0pFZG7j5cE)

I for one would like to welcome our Lego overlords!

Kill it with fire, while there's still time.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on March 24, 2014, 10:49:42 PM
Quote from: Telarus on March 13, 2014, 07:02:35 PM
NEAT

http://www.timesofisrael.com/nine-tiny-new-dead-sea-scrolls-come-to-light/

"HAW HAW, JUST KIDDING.  YOUR PAL, MOSES"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on April 22, 2014, 06:29:55 PM
Time from quantum entanglement: an experimental illustration
http://arxiv.org/abs/1310.4691 (http://arxiv.org/abs/1310.4691)

From Torino, It...  What comes out of bulls and also rhymes?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 30, 2014, 09:28:02 AM
Neural net boards hit 1,000,000 neurons (http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/a-new-circuit-board-mimics-billions-of-brain-synapses-at-once?trk_source=popular)

Quote"The human brain, with 80,000 times more neurons than Neurogrid, consumes only three times as much power," Boahen et al write in the Stanford paper. "Achieving this level of energy efficiency while offering greater configurability and scale is the ultimate challenge neuromorphic engineers face."

80,000 times. If Moores law doesn't break soon, we're 25 years away from neural nets with twice as many neurons as humans, using 0.00002 times as much juice.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on April 30, 2014, 11:48:43 AM
Worth watching closely. I can see this meshing well with all sorts of other emerging tech, probably in ways I can't even conceive. I'd place a reasonable sum on Moores law being FUBAR in the next 5/10 years. The sheer number of people working in the field today combined with things like Kickstarter would make me pretty confident that this won't slow down, if anything, quite the opposite. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 30, 2014, 01:35:05 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 30, 2014, 09:28:02 AM
Neural net boards hit 1,000,000 neurons (http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/a-new-circuit-board-mimics-billions-of-brain-synapses-at-once?trk_source=popular)

Quote"The human brain, with 80,000 times more neurons than Neurogrid, consumes only three times as much power," Boahen et al write in the Stanford paper. "Achieving this level of energy efficiency while offering greater configurability and scale is the ultimate challenge neuromorphic engineers face."

80,000 times. If Moores law doesn't break soon, we're 25 years away from neural nets with twice as many neurons as humans, using 0.00002 times as much juice.

Neuronal connections are just a tiny part of the not-very-well-understood mechanism of cognitive processing, so don't read too much into that.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 30, 2014, 02:27:21 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on April 30, 2014, 11:48:43 AM
Worth watching closely. I can see this meshing well with all sorts of other emerging tech, probably in ways I can't even conceive. I'd place a reasonable sum on Moores law being FUBAR in the next 5/10 years. The sheer number of people working in the field today combined with things like Kickstarter would make me pretty confident that this won't slow down, if anything, quite the opposite. 

The purists definition Moores law (size/count/cost of transistors on silicon) is actually getting a bit quicker. Was originally 2 years. It's down to about 14-18 months now. However it will break in the next couple of years on account of physics. The broader phenomenon of exponential growth, tho, which is often referred to as Moore's law, in which shit in general gets exponentially faster, smaller and cheaper and more complex or powerful I dont think will ever break. If you think about it in those terms (as Ray Kurtzweil does) It applies to everything from computers to the phenomenon we call biology only the periods of iteration change. By the time we hit Moore's transistor limit, we wont be using transistors to make chips anymore. I've no reason to expect whatever we are using by then wont be getting faster, smaller and cheaper every year or two - same as it's always been.

Quote from: All-Father Nigel on April 30, 2014, 01:35:05 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 30, 2014, 09:28:02 AM
Neural net boards hit 1,000,000 neurons (http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/a-new-circuit-board-mimics-billions-of-brain-synapses-at-once?trk_source=popular)

Quote"The human brain, with 80,000 times more neurons than Neurogrid, consumes only three times as much power," Boahen et al write in the Stanford paper. "Achieving this level of energy efficiency while offering greater configurability and scale is the ultimate challenge neuromorphic engineers face."

80,000 times. If Moores law doesn't break soon, we're 25 years away from neural nets with twice as many neurons as humans, using 0.00002 times as much juice.

Neuronal connections are just a tiny part of the not-very-well-understood mechanism of cognitive processing, so don't read too much into that.

Correct. However, just plain neuronal connections on their own are incredibly powerful. A million of them, with a billion or so virutal synaptic connections is pretty fucking huge news. You should also remember that the "not-very-well-understood mechanism of cognitive processing" was invented by an incredibly dumb system that relies on throwing paint at a wall to plan it's design spec. Let's assume the human brain is not necessarily the best machine for the job.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on May 03, 2014, 06:15:28 AM
Holy fuckballs, they've finally cracked reliable mass production of pure graphene!

http://www.thomas-swan.co.uk/sites/pdf/adv_materials_datasheets/TS_Graphene_datasheet_lo.pdf (http://www.thomas-swan.co.uk/sites/pdf/adv_materials_datasheets/TS_Graphene_datasheet_lo.pdf)

"What the fuck is graphene?" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTSnnlITsVg) you ask.

By bye plastics, you're not needed anymore.

Anyone want a mobile battery that lasts a month and charges in under a minute and weighs less than a sheet of paper?

This is BIG fucking news :fap:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Telarus on May 03, 2014, 03:26:16 PM
Saw your link on FB, this is awesome!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on May 06, 2014, 09:37:32 AM
P3nt, speaking of moore's law...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-27282732

QuoteSony has developed a new storage tape that is able to hold up to 185 terabytes (TB) of data per cartridge.

Created with the help of IBM, Sony's technology allows for tapes that can store the equivalent of 3,700 Blu-ray discs.

The tape hold 148 gigabits (Gb) per square inch - beating a record set in 2010 more than five times over.

I'm not quite sure if that places us ahead or behind at this point. Seems like a minor acceleration.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on May 07, 2014, 09:47:35 AM
 
Quote from: Junkenstein on May 06, 2014, 09:37:32 AM
P3nt, speaking of moore's law...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-27282732

QuoteSony has developed a new storage tape that is able to hold up to 185 terabytes (TB) of data per cartridge.

Created with the help of IBM, Sony's technology allows for tapes that can store the equivalent of 3,700 Blu-ray discs.

The tape hold 148 gigabits (Gb) per square inch - beating a record set in 2010 more than five times over.

I'm not quite sure if that places us ahead or behind at this point. Seems like a minor acceleration.
That would like totally make the difference between informed and prolapsed opinions :lulz:
[Ed.  That response of mine is intended as total jest, just decompressing here]
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on May 07, 2014, 11:57:32 AM
Tape? Yeah trust Sony to improve the capacity of completely redundant and obsolete storage media.  :kingmeh:

Intel are and always have been one of the key drivers of Moore's Law, right now. To the point where they see supporting it as one of their key missions. With their 3d transistor fab they've managed to extend the lifetime of the performance to price graph. The number of transistors will hit a wall but the capabilities of a single transitor has taken a massive leap since (afaik) core i3.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on May 15, 2014, 10:24:15 PM
Latest news from the makersphere  (http://singularityhub.com/2014/05/15/what-will-they-3d-print-next-inside-my-trip-to-local-motors/)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on May 15, 2014, 10:51:10 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on May 03, 2014, 06:15:28 AM
Holy fuckballs, they've finally cracked reliable mass production of pure graphene!

http://www.thomas-swan.co.uk/sites/pdf/adv_materials_datasheets/TS_Graphene_datasheet_lo.pdf (http://www.thomas-swan.co.uk/sites/pdf/adv_materials_datasheets/TS_Graphene_datasheet_lo.pdf)

"What the fuck is graphene?" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTSnnlITsVg) you ask.

By bye plastics, you're not needed anymore.

Anyone want a mobile battery that lasts a month and charges in under a minute and weighs less than a sheet of paper?

This is BIG fucking news :fap:
Love it.  How long before we hatch a graphene loaf fully exploiting possibilities of QED architecture...  I mean, why don't I have one already :aaa:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on May 15, 2014, 11:00:53 PM
At the other end of the debate, "White Space/band" debate is heating up.  Probably good looking for the future if we stay on it:
http://whitespaces.spectrumbridge.com/Overview/Home.aspx (http://whitespaces.spectrumbridge.com/Overview/Home.aspx)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on May 20, 2014, 04:10:34 PM
Scotch Tape, thumb tacks and picture hooks ovar! (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ZJYbcG0Ts0)

Demo (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SayqhqTZoxI)

FTR: Gloves can be made out of this shit!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Pæs on May 20, 2014, 10:01:47 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on May 07, 2014, 11:57:32 AM
Tape? Yeah trust Sony to improve the capacity of completely redundant and obsolete storage media.  :kingmeh:

Are you thinking of cassette tapes? Because AFAIK high-density magnetic tape storage is still the standard for archiving ridiculous quantities of data, because it's more reliable and much cheaper than other media. They're also more comfortably transported. Taking entire drives to off-site backup is a risky endeavour. Last I heard (a year or two ago) Google primarily used tape for backup of everything Google.

Tape libraries.
(http://regmedia.co.uk/2013/01/28/google_oracle_lenoir.jpg)

Tape is still pretty perfect if you need to read a lot of data sequentially or don't have a need to search through it regularly, which suits archival uses just fine.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on May 20, 2014, 11:24:27 PM
Quote from: Pæs on May 20, 2014, 10:01:47 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on May 07, 2014, 11:57:32 AM
Tape? Yeah trust Sony to improve the capacity of completely redundant and obsolete storage media.  :kingmeh:

Are you thinking of cassette tapes? Because AFAIK high-density magnetic tape storage is still the standard for archiving ridiculous quantities of data, because it's more reliable and much cheaper than other media. They're also more comfortably transported. Taking entire drives to off-site backup is a risky endeavour. Last I heard (a year or two ago) Google primarily used tape for backup of everything Google.

Tape libraries.
(http://regmedia.co.uk/2013/01/28/google_oracle_lenoir.jpg)

Tape is still pretty perfect if you need to read a lot of data sequentially or don't have a need to search through it regularly, which suits archival uses just fine.

I ave no idea why, but I have carried an ADAT with me for the past decade.  Actually, I guess it's built like a tank, takes massive abuse and always works.  Guess I could have it repurposed to read graphene tape :roll:

[I really like this thread - also just read the quick release super adhesive thing - awesome!]
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on May 30, 2014, 11:54:31 AM
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/28/richest-man-american-medicine_n_5355277.html (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/28/richest-man-american-medicine_n_5355277.html) A fucking one man revolution. Sounds like he's well on the road to picking up the tricorder xprize!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 04, 2014, 11:34:51 AM
I don't understand quantums (fuck knows I've tried) so I don't understand quantum computers but I'm reliably informed they'll be much faster than silicon ones. I don't understand silicon either but I've a hundred and one ideas as to what I can do with fast. This seems like it could be big news. Maybe someone who does understand quantums could explain roughly how big

https://news.wsu.edu/2014/06/04/discovery-opens-new-path-to-superfast-quantum-computing/#.U48DD_ldWFV (https://news.wsu.edu/2014/06/04/discovery-opens-new-path-to-superfast-quantum-computing/#.U48DD_ldWFV)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on June 05, 2014, 06:58:33 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on June 04, 2014, 11:34:51 AM
I don't understand quantums (fuck knows I've tried) so I don't understand quantum computers but I'm reliably informed they'll be much faster than silicon ones. I don't understand silicon either but I've a hundred and one ideas as to what I can do with fast. This seems like it could be big news. Maybe someone who does understand quantums could explain roughly how big

https://news.wsu.edu/2014/06/04/discovery-opens-new-path-to-superfast-quantum-computing/#.U48DD_ldWFV (https://news.wsu.edu/2014/06/04/discovery-opens-new-path-to-superfast-quantum-computing/#.U48DD_ldWFV)
Granted it's too complicated for me, still I feel reasonably disconcerted by the possibility of quantum computing solving NP-C problems in ways that would render obsolete most encryption protocols.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 11, 2014, 09:42:56 AM
Terahertz detection gets a much needed shot in the arm from (you guessed it) carbon nanotubes (http://www.nanowerk.com/nanotechnology-news/newsid=35984.php)

It's beginning to look like there's no real world application that isn't going to benefit from nanomaterials  :eek:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on June 11, 2014, 09:50:37 AM
The most impressive thing about nanomaterials for me is that no-one is currently running around screaming about grey goo.

It doesn't feel like real advancement without a crazy person screaming about how it'll cause the end of everything. More seriously, anything that's improving MRI type scans is going to be a literal lifesaver. Hope this gets further development fast.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 11, 2014, 10:07:30 AM
Grey goo panic probably won't happen until molecular assemblers and we might sidestep the phenomena completely if that ends up coming out of biotech, rather than nanotech. Right now the grey-goo contingent are probably too busy worrying about drones and privacy to bother with grey goo scenarios.

With regards being a lifesaver, there's quite a lot of stuff (terahertz detection included) that indicates a good chance of someone picking up the tricorder x-prize (http://www.qualcommtricorderxprize.org/) on schedule (august next year). Tricorder looks like it has the potential to be the biggest game changer in global healthcare since penicillin!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on June 11, 2014, 10:20:22 AM
I've just had a look into that and it's worth watching:
http://www.qualcommtricorderxprize.org/files/qtxp.org/QTXP_Guidelines_20130701_v18.pdf
Page 124 onwards has the meat of what they're looking to test for. Potentially revolutionary worldwide. Assuming the usual rate of advancements in tech that 72 hour period should reduce significantly by the end of the decade or so.

As I understand it there's 5 groups currently likely to pick up a prize. There's one involving an ER doctor which has my money on it. Being able to get accurate information in those settings is literally life and death so I'm betting his way of displaying info will lead the way for others.

It'd be nice to see a competition of this nature that encourages more collaboration between groups, possibly with a larger prize for doing so. If this was one team instead of 5 I'd guess the device created would already be in use. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 11, 2014, 01:09:07 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on June 11, 2014, 10:20:22 AM
I've just had a look into that and it's worth watching:
http://www.qualcommtricorderxprize.org/files/qtxp.org/QTXP_Guidelines_20130701_v18.pdf
Page 124 onwards has the meat of what they're looking to test for. Potentially revolutionary worldwide. Assuming the usual rate of advancements in tech that 72 hour period should reduce significantly by the end of the decade or so.

As I understand it there's 5 groups currently likely to pick up a prize. There's one involving an ER doctor which has my money on it. Being able to get accurate information in those settings is literally life and death so I'm betting his way of displaying info will lead the way for others.

It'd be nice to see a competition of this nature that encourages more collaboration between groups, possibly with a larger prize for doing so. If this was one team instead of 5 I'd guess the device created would already be in use. 

I'm not so sure. I watched an interview with Diamandis on the thinking behind the x-prize and the way he put it, the Ansari Spaceflight prize cost $10mil - the prize money. To win this cash the various contestants spent (in some cases) slightly more than the fucking prize money! The upshot was, instead of just investing 10 mil on a team to do the work, Ansari and the other investors actually generated $100+mil of R&D.

It's also worth noting that it's not necessarily just the winners who end up with a viable business at the end of it.




Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on June 11, 2014, 01:17:24 PM
Well I could argue about the actual costs being somewhat larger that the Prize cash due to the level of back office admin and such that goes along with the thing but it reasonably would still be nowhere near the 100 Mil+ mark.

My thinking was that tech in general seems to be increasingly collaborative. Rewarding/encouraging this behaviour along with allowing all to profit from the process seems like a smart way to go. 

Did you catch the thing about Musk and patents? Probably getting on a big tangent now but that kind of thinking is something I'd like to see much more of in the future.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 11, 2014, 03:59:48 PM
Yeah, I caught something about him open sourcing a few of his IP assets. One of the few that realises which side his bread is buttered. Collaboration to the detriment of competition is one of the foundations required if we're ever going to advance to post-capitalism. Can't see it happening overnight, unfortunately but there's a new breed of $billion+ companies wising up. Things would appear to at least be crawling in the right direction.

The optimist in me could almost be forgiven for thinking this idiotic race of talking monkeys have a chance of survival in spite of all the evidence to the contrary.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 15, 2014, 01:10:25 PM
THIS (http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/184280-focus-fusion-has-cheap-clean-earth-saving-fusion-power-been-right-under-our-noses-all-along) looks like some kind of potentially awesome new. Dunno much about plasma physics myself but I can't find anyone who's debunking it so I'm assuming it's sound until proven otherwise. Energy solutions are coming flying in these days. If a tenth of this shit delivers a quarter of the promised leccy, we'll still be able to ditch carbon/fission on the back of it.

Decorations for our wedding cake that satisfies my geek appetite (http://your.asda.com/news-and-blogs/3d-printing-on-tour)

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Reginald Ret on June 15, 2014, 01:58:39 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on June 15, 2014, 01:10:25 PM
THIS (http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/184280-focus-fusion-has-cheap-clean-earth-saving-fusion-power-been-right-under-our-noses-all-along) looks like some kind of potentially awesome new. Dunno much about plasma physics myself but I can't find anyone who's debunking it so I'm assuming it's sound until proven otherwise. Energy solutions are coming flying in these days. If a tenth of this shit delivers a quarter of the promised leccy, we'll still be able to ditch carbon/fission on the back of it.
That sounds possible, though I don't know nearly enough about this to make my judgement worth shit.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 15, 2014, 02:41:28 PM
Yeah, same here. Only have a basic grasp of "normal" fusion reactors. I'll keep eye on it, tho. Either for a debunk or a successful test
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on June 15, 2014, 03:50:11 PM
It's not actually new, and I tend to lean toward this guy's analysis: http://mikebhopkins.wordpress.com/2012/06/20/why-lawrenceville-plasma-physics-results-are-not-even-wrong-a-detailed-analysis/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on June 15, 2014, 06:55:51 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on June 11, 2014, 03:59:48 PM
Yeah, I caught something about him open sourcing a few of his IP assets. One of the few that realises which side his bread is buttered. Collaboration to the detriment of competition is one of the foundations required if we're ever going to advance to post-capitalism. Can't see it happening overnight, unfortunately but there's a new breed of $billion+ companies wising up. Things would appear to at least be crawling in the right direction.

The optimist in me could almost be forgiven for thinking this idiotic race of talking monkeys have a chance of survival in spite of all the evidence to the contrary.

I need to think about that one.  It's the right signal.  The synthesis becomes important.  Collaboration subsumes competition - "coopetition" - overcoming antagonism in favor of cooperative spirit for improvement.  On an individual level, I think a metric determining this possibility would be inversely proportional to a cultures tolerance of schadenfreude.  I hope I'm wrong.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 18, 2014, 03:17:00 PM
More Elon Musk awesomeness (http://www.kurzweilai.net/musk-announces-plans-to-build-one-of-the-single-largest-solar-panel-production-plants-in-the-world)

Isn't it about time this prick got a Nobel Prize?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on June 18, 2014, 03:34:53 PM
Well it's more justified than Obama's one for Peace.

With any luck, he'll throw some money/time at the Solar roadways project, it would surely tie into this perfectly.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 26, 2014, 08:50:44 AM
Sneaking proteins into cells without killing the cell (http://phys.org/news/2014-06-trojan-horse-method-penetrating-cellular.html)

QuoteDrug development to treat specific ailments where a medicinal compound could be delivered into a cell is another potential use, he said.

Couple this with signature targetting and you got a whole new kind of collateral-free chemo!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 27, 2014, 12:45:34 PM
New age woo gets a new chew toy (http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19712#.U61nHPldXFk)

QuoteIt describes a series of experiments involving more than 1000 student volunteers. In most of the tests, Bem took well-studied psychological phenomena and simply reversed the sequence, so that the event generally interpreted as the cause happened after the tested behaviour rather than before it.

In one experiment, students were shown a list of words and then asked to recall words from it, after which they were told to type words that were randomly selected from the same list. Spookily, the students were better at recalling words that they would later type.

In another study, Bem adapted research on "priming" – the effect of a subliminally presented word on a person's response to an image. For instance, if someone is momentarily flashed the word "ugly", it will take them longer to decide that a picture of a kitten is pleasant than if "beautiful" had been flashed. Running the experiment back-to-front, Bem found that the priming effect seemed to work backwards in time as well as forwards.

:facepalm:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on June 27, 2014, 05:19:00 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on June 27, 2014, 12:45:34 PM
New age woo gets a new chew toy (http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19712#.U61nHPldXFk)

QuoteIt describes a series of experiments involving more than 1000 student volunteers. In most of the tests, Bem took well-studied psychological phenomena and simply reversed the sequence, so that the event generally interpreted as the cause happened after the tested behaviour rather than before it.

In one experiment, students were shown a list of words and then asked to recall words from it, after which they were told to type words that were randomly selected from the same list. Spookily, the students were better at recalling words that they would later type.

In another study, Bem adapted research on "priming" – the effect of a subliminally presented word on a person's response to an image. For instance, if someone is momentarily flashed the word "ugly", it will take them longer to decide that a picture of a kitten is pleasant than if "beautiful" had been flashed. Running the experiment back-to-front, Bem found that the priming effect seemed to work backwards in time as well as forwards.

:facepalm:

This is fairly old and has been rather thoroughly and unsuccessfully replicated. Are the New Agers glomming onto it? Bem is a pretty respectable researcher, and no one's sure where the flaw in his study design is, but no one's been able to get results better than chance with his methods so I'd thought it went by the wayside. If they are making sounds about it, give them this: http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0033423
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 27, 2014, 07:24:52 PM
Not really heard anything. Came through one of my feeds. I thought it was new. My fault for not checking the dates  :oops:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 30, 2014, 10:18:48 PM
Pretty trick femtosecond scanner (http://phys.org/news/2014-06-molecular-movies-enable-extraordinary-gains.html)

QuoteThe measurements, created by the use of short pulse lasers and bioluminescent proteins, are made in femtoseconds, which is one millionth of one billionth of a second. A femtosecond, compared to one second, is about the same as one second compared to 32 million years.
That's a pretty fast shutter speed, and it should change the way biological research and physical chemistry are being done, scientists say.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on June 30, 2014, 10:49:18 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on June 30, 2014, 10:18:48 PM
Pretty trick femtosecond scanner (http://phys.org/news/2014-06-molecular-movies-enable-extraordinary-gains.html)

QuoteThe measurements, created by the use of short pulse lasers and bioluminescent proteins, are made in femtoseconds, which is one millionth of one billionth of a second. A femtosecond, compared to one second, is about the same as one second compared to 32 million years.
That's a pretty fast shutter speed, and it should change the way biological research and physical chemistry are being done, scientists say.
Very cool brain food right there.  Ty
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on August 05, 2014, 09:46:02 AM
I really don't know how I feel about this. I'm caught some where between 'Wow thats cool' and 'Fuck, nothing will ever be private again'
http://newsoffice.mit.edu/2014/algorithm-recovers-speech-from-vibrations-0804

QuoteExtracting audio from visual information
Algorithm recovers speech from the vibrations of a potato-chip bag filmed through soundproof glass.


Quote"This is new and refreshing. It's the kind of stuff that no other group would do right now," says Alexei Efros, an associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the University of California at Berkeley. "We're scientists, and sometimes we watch these movies, like James Bond, and we think, 'This is Hollywood theatrics. It's not possible to do that. This is ridiculous.' And suddenly, there you have it. This is totally out of some Hollywood thriller. You know that the killer has admitted his guilt because there's surveillance footage of his potato chip bag vibrating."
Efros agrees that the characterization of material properties could be a fruitful application of the technology. But, he adds, "I'm sure there will be applications that nobody will expect. I think the hallmark of good science is when you do something just because it's cool and then somebody turns around and uses it for something you never imagined. It's really nice to have this type of creative stuff.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on August 05, 2014, 10:04:43 AM
It's increasingly difficult to name anything that still is completely private anyway.

Though this does seem to again increase the importance of KYFMS.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on August 05, 2014, 10:20:50 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on August 05, 2014, 10:04:43 AM
It's increasingly difficult to name anything that still is completely private anyway.

Though this does seem to again increase the importance of KYFMS.

You're not wrong
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on August 05, 2014, 10:28:20 AM
At a distance, say, not an annexed space, I would imagine the camera's standard deviation to be significantly greater than the margin of error required to accurately sample sound from images.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 05, 2014, 12:23:46 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on August 05, 2014, 10:28:20 AM
At a distance, say, not an annexed space, I would imagine the camera's standard deviation to be significantly greater than the margin of error required to accurately sample sound from images.

Currently.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on August 05, 2014, 01:04:56 PM
Yeah, +/- 10 years or so and it'll be quite scary.

That said, the NSA and others can pretty much just listen in to any mobile phone at any time, making a call or not. So I'd suspect the main reason to develop the tech further would just be to make parallel construction that little bit easier. Local police get to feel like James Bond and with all the seizure cash kicking around it needs to get spent on something. You can only buy so many tanks.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: GlompChomp on September 23, 2014, 12:22:41 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on August 05, 2014, 01:04:56 PM
Yeah, +/- 10 years or so and it'll be quite scary.

That said, the NSA and others can pretty much just listen in to any mobile phone at any time, making a call or not. So I'd suspect the main reason to develop the tech further would just be to make parallel construction that little bit easier. Local police get to feel like James Bond and with all the seizure cash kicking around it needs to get spent on something. You can only buy so many tanks.

Don't be concerned about the NSA. Be concerned about the NRO. They can read your mind. Well, within reason.

Here, you fistful of assholes deserve a wakeup call.

Ring ring ring, it's GlompChomp calling from a warzone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj3S4ryAKyE&list=UU5c0DefLjv1VStIbA84yiUQ


Wait that's not the right link.

http://www.electronictorture.com/

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=6506148.PN.&OS=PN%2F6506148&RS=PN%2F6506148

http://www.bugsweeps.com/info/electronic_harassment.html

:lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on September 23, 2014, 08:05:31 AM
If only those were the weapons, there would be hardly anything for anybody to worry about.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on September 23, 2014, 08:26:49 AM
Quote from: GlompChomp on September 23, 2014, 12:22:41 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on August 05, 2014, 01:04:56 PM
Yeah, +/- 10 years or so and it'll be quite scary.

That said, the NSA and others can pretty much just listen in to any mobile phone at any time, making a call or not. So I'd suspect the main reason to develop the tech further would just be to make parallel construction that little bit easier. Local police get to feel like James Bond and with all the seizure cash kicking around it needs to get spent on something. You can only buy so many tanks.

Don't be concerned about the NSA. Be concerned about the NRO. They can read your mind. Well, within reason.

Here, you fistful of assholes deserve a wakeup call.

Ring ring ring, it's GlompChomp calling from a warzone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj3S4ryAKyE&list=UU5c0DefLjv1VStIbA84yiUQ


Wait that's not the right link.

http://www.electronictorture.com/

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=6506148.PN.&OS=PN%2F6506148&RS=PN%2F6506148

http://www.bugsweeps.com/info/electronic_harassment.html

:lulz:

(http://i.imgur.com/CuBCbGG.gif)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: GlompChomp on September 23, 2014, 09:26:31 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 23, 2014, 08:05:31 AM
If only those were the weapons, there would be hardly anything for anybody to worry about.

How does that work LOL
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: GlompChomp on September 24, 2014, 12:04:58 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on September 23, 2014, 08:26:49 AM
Quote from: GlompChomp on September 23, 2014, 12:22:41 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on August 05, 2014, 01:04:56 PM
Yeah, +/- 10 years or so and it'll be quite scary.

That said, the NSA and others can pretty much just listen in to any mobile phone at any time, making a call or not. So I'd suspect the main reason to develop the tech further would just be to make parallel construction that little bit easier. Local police get to feel like James Bond and with all the seizure cash kicking around it needs to get spent on something. You can only buy so many tanks.

Don't be concerned about the NSA. Be concerned about the NRO. They can read your mind. Well, within reason.

Here, you fistful of assholes deserve a wakeup call.

Ring ring ring, it's GlompChomp calling from a warzone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fj3S4ryAKyE&list=UU5c0DefLjv1VStIbA84yiUQ


Wait that's not the right link.

http://www.electronictorture.com/

http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=6506148.PN.&OS=PN%2F6506148&RS=PN%2F6506148

http://www.bugsweeps.com/info/electronic_harassment.html

:lulz:

(http://i.imgur.com/CuBCbGG.gif)

Ah the tricycle, that's silly stuff for kids. I'm an adult.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on September 24, 2014, 05:59:11 AM
Quote from: GlompChomp on September 23, 2014, 09:26:31 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 23, 2014, 08:05:31 AM
If only those were the weapons, there would be hardly anything for anybody to worry about.

How does that work LOL
Tri-UNE-cycle, see?
(http://i.imgur.com/CuBCbGG.gif)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: GlompChomp on September 24, 2014, 06:57:26 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 24, 2014, 05:59:11 AM
Quote from: GlompChomp on September 23, 2014, 09:26:31 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 23, 2014, 08:05:31 AM
If only those were the weapons, there would be hardly anything for anybody to worry about.

How does that work LOL
Tri-UNE-cycle, see?
(http://i.imgur.com/CuBCbGG.gif)

(http://i.imgur.com/YmXgGP3.jpg)

Possible real world application?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on September 24, 2014, 11:50:12 PM
Yes, though ideally it would also involve implosion, perichoresis, and transmigration, maybe.

Maybe you should change your title tho.  Not because you don't want to be iconoclastic.  Because it's ignorant to assume it confers to you a voice that is to be heard by anyone less presumptuous, verbum sap.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: GlompChomp on September 25, 2014, 04:12:43 AM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 24, 2014, 11:50:12 PM
Yes, though ideally it would also involve implosion, perichoresis, and transmigration, maybe.

Maybe you should change your title tho.  Not because you don't want to be iconoclastic.  Because it's ignorant to assume it confers to you a voice that is to be heard by anyone less presumptuous, verbum sap.

How about now?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on September 25, 2014, 05:16:26 AM
Point taken - sapienti esser nunc sat no sapant (It's been a while)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: GlompChomp on September 25, 2014, 05:24:46 AM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 25, 2014, 05:16:26 AM
Point taken - sapienti esser nunc sat no sapant (It's been a while)

It's been so long I don't even remember if I knew you man  :sad:

There's some recollection but it may be a mental mirage, best not to pursue it or bad things happen.

I am fuuuuuuuuuuucked up.

Is that Esperanto or Latin?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on September 25, 2014, 06:11:24 AM
Quote from: GlompChomp on September 25, 2014, 05:24:46 AM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 25, 2014, 05:16:26 AM
Point taken - sapienti esser nunc sat no sapant (It's been a while)

It's been so long I don't even remember if I knew you man  :sad:

There's some recollection but it may be a mental mirage, best not to pursue it or bad things happen.

I am fuuuuuuuuuuucked up.

Is that Esperanto or Latin?

-> sapent
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: GlompChomp on September 25, 2014, 06:32:42 AM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 25, 2014, 06:11:24 AM
Quote from: GlompChomp on September 25, 2014, 05:24:46 AM
Quote from: LuciferX on September 25, 2014, 05:16:26 AM
Point taken - sapienti esser nunc sat no sapant (It's been a while)

It's been so long I don't even remember if I knew you man  :sad:

There's some recollection but it may be a mental mirage, best not to pursue it or bad things happen.

I am fuuuuuuuuuuucked up.

Is that Esperanto or Latin?

-> sapent

French! My grandparents speak french, I still haven't learned it. I refuse to!  :argh!:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on October 02, 2014, 11:18:55 AM
Let's just pretend that shit never happened eh?

So, Tech news:

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/137767-SecureDrives-SSD-Security-Text-for-Destruction

Quotethere's someone out there that's more obsessed with information security than Dale Gribble and Edward Snowden combined, and now you can wipe your solid state drive with a simple, coded text message.

SecureDrives SSD is a SATAII (3 Gbps), 128 GB model -- not exactly the hottest in terms of specs -- but its security features come right out of a Mission: Impossible flick. Called the Autothysis128, the drive has a built-in GSM radio that allow it to receive text message virtually anywhere in the world (GSM is by far the most ubiquitous cellular radio tech available). The drive can be set up to self-destruct (fragment, not some sort of rad explosion) in several scenarios, including if the GSM signal is blocked by an outside force, the incorrect PIN is entered too many times, or if the tamper-proof case is compromised.

The potential problems solved and the potential for dickery is amazing.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Trivial on October 12, 2014, 03:15:33 PM
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/10/robot_trouser_snake_has_no_problem_with_slippery_mounds/ (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/10/robot_trouser_snake_has_no_problem_with_slippery_mounds/)

Some headline writers, geez.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on October 16, 2014, 08:53:14 AM
Misleading tech story of the day:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/29629306

QuoteScientists have treated a man for "internet addiction disorder" said to be linked to overuse of the wearable specs.
The 31-year-old, who was also being treated for alcohol abuse, had apparently been using the device for 18 hours a day.

QuoteThe man was taking part in a US Navy programme for alcohol misuse.
Doctors noted he had a history of "mood disorder" consistent with substance abuse, depression, anxiety and severe alcohol and tobacco use disorders.
Over the course of his 35-day treatment the report claims he became "extremely irritable and argumentative" once he was parted from the device.

QuoteDoctors also said his symptoms reduced over time.
They noted he became less irritated and showed "improvements in his short-term memory and clarity of thought processes."

"Sobered up"

It's almost an impressive low. Internet addiction as an excuse to basically run a product placement piece. While making no real mention about the negative effects of alcohol.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on October 17, 2014, 04:25:47 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on October 16, 2014, 08:53:14 AM
Misleading tech story of the day:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/29629306

QuoteScientists have treated a man for "internet addiction disorder" said to be linked to overuse of the wearable specs.
The 31-year-old, who was also being treated for alcohol abuse, had apparently been using the device for 18 hours a day.

QuoteThe man was taking part in a US Navy programme for alcohol misuse.
Doctors noted he had a history of "mood disorder" consistent with substance abuse, depression, anxiety and severe alcohol and tobacco use disorders.
Over the course of his 35-day treatment the report claims he became "extremely irritable and argumentative" once he was parted from the device.

QuoteDoctors also said his symptoms reduced over time.
They noted he became less irritated and showed "improvements in his short-term memory and clarity of thought processes."

"Sobered up"

It's almost an impressive low. Internet addiction as an excuse to basically run a product placement piece. While making no real mention about the negative effects of alcohol.

Wow, yeah, it's clearly the internet access, and not the drinking.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Raz Tech on October 17, 2014, 01:27:50 PM
Navy program? Well there's your fucking problem.  Here's some long-winded anger that nobody asked for:

Imagine, if you will, a big brick building that serves as the Navy's "detox" facility.  It has two wings, one for the rehabilitation "classrooms", and the other for sleeping quarters.  This place is full to the brim with people who either want help, need help, or neither want or need help but were forced to go to this place anyways.  The third category is approximately 80% of the people there.  The fullness of this building, in fact, is so constant that people actually seeking help for severe problems are often forced to wait around six months just to get in, due to the amount of people currently interred there.

You are split into groups of about 8, and everyone gets to get up and talk about their feelings, and all kinds of other fun stuff like art therapy, and some other therapies, however the whole process is so expedited that over the month you may be there you won't be able to utilize any of these therapies more than about twice.  All of these enjoyable things are led by your group's counselor, who is some dude who went through a correspondence course and was deemed an "expert", which in Navy terms literally means exactly nothing.  There are also psychologists.  However, all of the groups currently in the building (about 10-12), share these two psychologists, so you will again probably only see them twice during your interment.

The average denizen is somebody who maybe slipped up once, had a few to many drinks around the wrong people, and got turned in to the (command) authorities.  There's also the possibility that you could accidentally say something stupid, and if the wrong person hears it, oh, you know what would help you? Navy detox.  There's some cases where they can't quite force you to go there because it would be unfair, but they can "suggest" you go there so strongly, that you "magically" take their advice and wind up there.  The whole system is essentially designed to take the pressure off of Navy commands in order to alleviate them of responsibility.  It turns an issue from hey, maybe this command is so stressful or so backwards or everyone has a stick so far up their ass that it literally drives people to drinking and that seems like a problem we should work at into hey, this guy is a drunk, it's not our fault.  And my personal favorite part, is that if you are sent to this facility and come back, and are LITERALLY EVER caught drinking again, you can be immediately discharged, so that they can say hey, this command isn't at fault.  It's that broken Navy rehab program, not fixing this guy.

I would even go so far as to say that a lot of the reason people show improvement during the program is that it generally gets you away from the constant stress of wherever you were working before.

So the whole program is kind of a complete fucking joke, so it doesn't surprise me that they say hey, wait guys, we are super-legit, we cured addictions you didn't even know existed.

(Disclaimer:  I do think the program is a good idea, because there is a lot of stress and a lot of people I knew in the military could use some better coping mechanisms, and there are some people who got some good out of it.  Sadly they are the minority, and without a pretty major overhaul, it's esentially worthless.)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on November 14, 2014, 04:22:10 PM
Mind controlled protein production (http://www.technologyreview.com/view/532546/eth-researchers-develop-a-thought-controlled-genetic-interface/)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on November 14, 2014, 07:45:39 PM
Quote from: Raz Tech on October 17, 2014, 01:27:50 PM
Navy program? Well there's your fucking problem.  Here's some long-winded anger that nobody asked for:

Imagine, if you will, a big brick building that serves as the Navy's "detox" facility.  It has two wings, one for the rehabilitation "classrooms", and the other for sleeping quarters.  This place is full to the brim with people who either want help, need help, or neither want or need help but were forced to go to this place anyways.  The third category is approximately 80% of the people there.  The fullness of this building, in fact, is so constant that people actually seeking help for severe problems are often forced to wait around six months just to get in, due to the amount of people currently interred there.

You are split into groups of about 8, and everyone gets to get up and talk about their feelings, and all kinds of other fun stuff like art therapy, and some other therapies, however the whole process is so expedited that over the month you may be there you won't be able to utilize any of these therapies more than about twice.  All of these enjoyable things are led by your group's counselor, who is some dude who went through a correspondence course and was deemed an "expert", which in Navy terms literally means exactly nothing.  There are also psychologists.  However, all of the groups currently in the building (about 10-12), share these two psychologists, so you will again probably only see them twice during your interment.

The average denizen is somebody who maybe slipped up once, had a few to many drinks around the wrong people, and got turned in to the (command) authorities.  There's also the possibility that you could accidentally say something stupid, and if the wrong person hears it, oh, you know what would help you? Navy detox.  There's some cases where they can't quite force you to go there because it would be unfair, but they can "suggest" you go there so strongly, that you "magically" take their advice and wind up there.  The whole system is essentially designed to take the pressure off of Navy commands in order to alleviate them of responsibility.  It turns an issue from hey, maybe this command is so stressful or so backwards or everyone has a stick so far up their ass that it literally drives people to drinking and that seems like a problem we should work at into hey, this guy is a drunk, it's not our fault.  And my personal favorite part, is that if you are sent to this facility and come back, and are LITERALLY EVER caught drinking again, you can be immediately discharged, so that they can say hey, this command isn't at fault.  It's that broken Navy rehab program, not fixing this guy.

I would even go so far as to say that a lot of the reason people show improvement during the program is that it generally gets you away from the constant stress of wherever you were working before.

So the whole program is kind of a complete fucking joke, so it doesn't surprise me that they say hey, wait guys, we are super-legit, we cured addictions you didn't even know existed.

(Disclaimer:  I do think the program is a good idea, because there is a lot of stress and a lot of people I knew in the military could use some better coping mechanisms, and there are some people who got some good out of it.  Sadly they are the minority, and without a pretty major overhaul, it's esentially worthless.)

When I was in the army, the standard treatment for depression was to ask the patient if they had anything to drink that year.  If they said yes, they were sent to detox.  Clearances revoked, career over.

So nobody ever sought treatment for depression, and the results were as expected.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Demolition Squid on April 15, 2015, 09:02:53 AM
Wasn't sure where to put this. This thread seems okay?

Paracetamol may dull emotional intensity as well as pain. (http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/apr/14/paracetamol-may-dull-emotions-as-well-as-physical-pain-new-study-shows)

Interesting that paracetamol - one of the most common drugs out there - is still (potentially) having new side effects found. It makes an instinctive sort of sense, too. If the implication about 'how the brain handles emotional pain' were correct, though, surely this would apply to all painkillers  :?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on April 15, 2015, 05:21:18 PM
I do seem to recall speculation about how the brain handles pain (http://news.ufl.edu/archive/2010/08/over-the-counter-painkiller-may-help-ease-emotional-slights-uf-study-finds.html) in relation to this, a few years back now.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 15, 2015, 07:45:41 PM
I am interested by the way this research is being reported, simply because as Cain mentioned, it's a well-established phenomenon also seen with Ibuprofen.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on January 18, 2016, 05:33:33 PM
General Relativity Alert!

Gravitational waves MAY have been detected oscillating in a space-time continuum near you.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/people-are-getting-excited-after-a-physicist-tweeted-that-gr#.htB9yk66W

Cowabunga!

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on January 20, 2016, 05:08:54 PM
Caltech Researchers Find Evidence of a Real Ninth Planet.

http://www.caltech.edu/news/caltech-researchers-find-evidence-real-ninth-planet-49523

I thought the WISE (Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer) had discounted this possibility, but we shall see.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 21, 2016, 03:24:24 AM
Quote from: Gray Area on January 20, 2016, 05:08:54 PM
Caltech Researchers Find Evidence of a Real Ninth Planet.

http://www.caltech.edu/news/caltech-researchers-find-evidence-real-ninth-planet-49523

I thought the WISE (Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer) had discounted this possibility, but we shall see.

Well that'd be cool!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on January 22, 2016, 10:17:59 PM
"Dark 'noodles' may lurk in the Milky Way"

http://www.csiro.au/en/News/News-releases/2016/Dark-noodles-may-lurk-in-the-Milky-Way?featured=F29EDEB1728C4A92B579C7A5DC28BAD5

The Pastafarians must be beside themselves with joy.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on January 25, 2016, 01:25:46 PM
A Helpful Guide to Finding The Real Ninth Planet™

(http://i44.photobucket.com/albums/f5/ExoMani/Possible%20Undiscovered%20Planets.jpg) (http://s44.photobucket.com/user/ExoMani/media/Possible%20Undiscovered%20Planets.jpg.html)

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on February 11, 2016, 08:03:32 PM
Quote from: Gray Area on January 18, 2016, 05:33:33 PM
General Relativity Alert!

Gravitational waves MAY have been detected oscillating in a space-time continuum near you.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/people-are-getting-excited-after-a-physicist-tweeted-that-gr#.htB9yk66W

Cowabunga!

"It's True: Physicists Announce Discovery Of Gravitational Waves"

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/physicists-announce-discovery-of-gravitational-waves
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Freeky on February 11, 2016, 08:13:09 PM
mind = blown. Not sarcasm.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on February 12, 2016, 08:50:08 PM
Quote from: Gray Area on February 11, 2016, 08:03:32 PM
Quote from: Gray Area on January 18, 2016, 05:33:33 PM
General Relativity Alert!

Gravitational waves MAY have been detected oscillating in a space-time continuum near you.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/people-are-getting-excited-after-a-physicist-tweeted-that-gr#.htB9yk66W

Cowabunga!

"It's True: Physicists Announce Discovery Of Gravitational Waves"

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/physicists-announce-discovery-of-gravitational-waves


What is this, a school for ants?  Those gravity waves are AT LEAST TWO times too fast, according to my (questionable) calculations.  I thought they said it took 7ms between readings, should it not be around 14ms? 
4180000 / 299792458 = .0139 (aprox.)
US(width) / speed of light

[b/c I need the exercise]
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on February 12, 2016, 09:48:52 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on February 12, 2016, 08:50:08 PM
Quote from: Gray Area on February 11, 2016, 08:03:32 PM
Quote from: Gray Area on January 18, 2016, 05:33:33 PM
General Relativity Alert!

Gravitational waves MAY have been detected oscillating in a space-time continuum near you.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/people-are-getting-excited-after-a-physicist-tweeted-that-gr#.htB9yk66W

Cowabunga!

"It's True: Physicists Announce Discovery Of Gravitational Waves"

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/physicists-announce-discovery-of-gravitational-waves


What is this, a school for ants?  Those gravity waves are AT LEAST TWO times too fast, according to my (questionable) calculations.  I thought they said it took 7ms between readings, should it not be around 14ms? 
4180000 / 299792458 = .0139 (aprox.)
US(width) / speed of light

[b/c I need the exercise]

Two detectors can not triangulate the direction of a signal. Triangulation requires a third detector.

I did not do any calculations. However, you may be assuming the signal was coming in exactly on the straight line connecting the Louisiana and Washington detectors. There is no reason to make that assumption. For instance, if the signal had originated at an equal distance from both detectors, there would have been zero time delay.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on February 13, 2016, 12:06:33 AM
Quote from: Gray Area on February 12, 2016, 09:48:52 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on February 12, 2016, 08:50:08 PM
Quote from: Gray Area on February 11, 2016, 08:03:32 PM
Quote from: Gray Area on January 18, 2016, 05:33:33 PM
General Relativity Alert!

Gravitational waves MAY have been detected oscillating in a space-time continuum near you.

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/people-are-getting-excited-after-a-physicist-tweeted-that-gr#.htB9yk66W

Cowabunga!

"It's True: Physicists Announce Discovery Of Gravitational Waves"

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kellyoakes/physicists-announce-discovery-of-gravitational-waves


What is this, a school for ants?  Those gravity waves are AT LEAST TWO times too fast, according to my (questionable) calculations.  I thought they said it took 7ms between readings, should it not be around 14ms? 
4180000 / 299792458 = .0139 (aprox.)
US(width) / speed of light

[b/c I need the exercise]

Two detectors can not triangulate the direction of a signal. Triangulation requires a third detector.

I did not do any calculations. However, you may be assuming the signal was coming in exactly on the straight line connecting the Louisiana and Washington detectors. There is no reason to make that assumption. For instance, if the signal had originated at an equal distance from both detectors, there would have been zero time delay.

Initially, I read the measurement between the detectors being used to confirm that gravitational waves had been "discovered".  Now, it seems like it may be used to infer the direction of said wave.  Regardless, what preoccupies me is how these oscillations in curvature are supposed to propagate through space-time itself, in the first place.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: ñͤͣ̄ͦ̌̑͗͊͛͂͗ ̸̨̨̣̺̼̣̜͙͈͕̮̊̈́̈͂͛̽͊ͭ̓͆ͅé ̰̓̓́ͯ́́͞ on February 17, 2016, 03:48:20 PM
:D

http://www.sciencealert.com/this-woman-has-illegally-uploaded-millions-of-journal-articles-in-an-attempt-to-open-up-science
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on February 18, 2016, 01:12:41 AM
Quote from: N E T on February 17, 2016, 03:48:20 PM
:D

http://www.sciencealert.com/this-woman-has-illegally-uploaded-millions-of-journal-articles-in-an-attempt-to-open-up-science

From your link:

"If it sounds like a modern day Robin Hood struggle, that's because it kinda is. But in this story, it's not just the poor who don't have access to scientific papers – journal subscriptions have become so expensive that leading universities such as Harvard and Cornell have admitted they can no longer afford them. Researchers have also taken a stand – with 15,000 scientists vowing to boycott publisher Elsevier in part for its excessive paywall fees."

I read another article on the Internet, within the past year, where the author also complained about having to pay to have research papers published in 'for profit' publications, etc.

Since Cornell is specifically mentioned in your link, I would think they could easily take the lead in solving this problem. Cornell University already supports arXiv.org, where there is "Open access to 1,119,580 e-prints in Physics, Mathematics, Computer Science, Quantitative Biology, Quantitative Finance and Statistics". Perhaps my view of a possible solution is overly simplistic, but I don't see why it would be particularly hard to expand arXiv.org to accept more 'Life Sciences' research papers.

I can't speak for the other fields, but the majority of physicists who submit papers to arXiv.org are by no means lightweights. Here's the link to Cornell's site, if anyone is interested:

http://arxiv.org/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on March 09, 2016, 05:23:22 PM
Quote from: N E T on February 17, 2016, 03:48:20 PM
:D

http://www.sciencealert.com/this-woman-has-illegally-uploaded-millions-of-journal-articles-in-an-attempt-to-open-up-science

That lawsuit that they filed against her is a complete farce. She's totally outside of that jurisdiction.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on March 09, 2016, 05:56:04 PM
Quote from: Demolition Squid on April 15, 2015, 09:02:53 AM
Wasn't sure where to put this. This thread seems okay?

Paracetamol may dull emotional intensity as well as pain. (http://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/apr/14/paracetamol-may-dull-emotions-as-well-as-physical-pain-new-study-shows)

Interesting that paracetamol - one of the most common drugs out there - is still (potentially) having new side effects found. It makes an instinctive sort of sense, too. If the implication about 'how the brain handles emotional pain' were correct, though, surely this would apply to all painkillers  :?


Not necessarily. Acetaminophen acts on the brain, whereas  NSAIDS like aspirin and ibuprofen mostly act more peripherally by reducing inflammagion
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 12, 2016, 02:22:03 PM
So the big news this morning is that Google/Deepmind's AlphaGo (https://deepmind.com/alpha-go.html) system just beat the current no.1 human player Lee Sedol at the game of Go, winning the first three straight rounds in a - best of five - competition.

The hype is that this is around a decade early, compared to best industry estimates from a month or so ago. Not sure I'm buying it as a quantum leap, tho. Deep learning is pretty much where everyone knew it was, aside from week on week improvements in setup and application. I think this is more an illustration that the human players don't really have a solid grasp of the game. This makes sense when you consider that a game of Go has more permutations than there are atoms in the universe and we already learned back 97 that even the relatively trivial task of examining all the possible permutations on a chessboard is way beyond the capability of the best players our species has to offer.

Either way, it's undoubtedly a significant milestone and unlike Deep Blue, which was programmed from the ground up to be a highly specialized, dedicated chess computer and nothing else, AlphaGo is a collection of general purpose learning algorithms which can be applied to any problem domain, merely by switching the training data. Make no mistake, machine learning is poised to have a much more significant impact than the traditional computing paradigm ever delivered and probably in a shorter timescale, to boot.

The word on the street is the next game-target is starcraft. For a whole bunch of reasons, mostly relating to overview limitations and long term planning, solving Starcraft will make the Chess and Go accomplishments look infantile by comparison.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on March 12, 2016, 03:50:30 PM
In an interesting synchronicity, last week I thought it would be fun to try and learn Go, so I downloaded an app.

This kinda makes that feel a bit pointless, y'know?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 12, 2016, 07:14:10 PM
Not really. People still play chess. You just have a better training opponent to improve your skills on. The mindset that gives up is one that's all about competing and winning and bolstering ego. There's another mindset that just wants to improve their self for the sheer hell of being better at something.

I tried go a few years back but I never liked it much. The - too many permutations - thing stuck in my craw a bit. Every couple of centuries some smart ass comes along and invents a new strategic metaphor that applies better than the existing paradigm and all the Go players start doing it that way. Implicit here is the possibility that there's always a better way of approaching the game.

For the sake of exhibition and data collection, they're going to play out the last two games. He may have been trying to save face but Lee Sedol seemed cautiously optimistic about being able to figure out the machines strategy over the next couple of days, during the post match press conference. The pressure's off at least - he's already lost the 1mil prize purse :evil:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on March 12, 2016, 08:44:47 PM
I think the next really major breakthrough in AI will come when we finally have enough computing power to model the whole-brain neural network of an animal such as a rat. We have a lot of theory, but unfortunately computers are just so far behind theory that we can't actually test anything. However, recently one of the world's most powerful supercomputers was able to successfully model the connectivity of one cubic millimeter of rat cortex in less than a year - about nine months if I recall - and that tells us that once the technology catches up, it will ultimately be possible to model the complexity of the networks that make up a mammalian brain. There will still be a lot of missing pieces, such as how and where memories are stored, and truly we know very little about brain function, but being able to model the connectivity should help us start to answer these questions, and that will be a good start in informing us how to move forward in developing true AI.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on March 13, 2016, 02:03:00 AM
QuoteThe word on the street is the next game-target is starcraft. For a whole bunch of reasons, mostly relating to overview limitations and long term planning, solving Starcraft will make the Chess and Go accomplishments look infantile by comparison.

I hope that's bullshit because I can think of a ton of reasons that it's pointless to go after this as a target. Or pretty much any computer game with a basic AI. My first thought is that the existing starcraft NPC AI at a high level just has to maintain 200-300 actions/minute. Even if they gimp it to human comparable levels then it will still easily be able to pick the most relevant one due to being able to assess the whole game state instantly.

It's like aiming for an AI winning an FPS. It's probably easy to create one you can literally never win against. On the same line, there's the rock/paper/scissors robot that makes decisions in some ridiculous fraction of a second after it detects your move. To the eye, it's essentially the same. There's little difference between that and a bot that can headshot you 100% of the time from the opposite side of the map. There's really very few games that make good ideas to try further here. I suspect you'd have much more success with either more tabletop stuff which involves some kind of political/vote who wins element. Gaming Turing tests, kinda. Either that or say Puzzle/exploration stuff which involves humour or illogical thinking. The required levels of recognition and ability to cross reference culture would require access to the levels of data that say, google would have. And an AI solving/winning Grim Fandango or somesuch would scare the shit out of you far more than one winning at an RTS. Also far more of an accomplishment. Basically anything that can start to incorporate failure=progress or totally illogical and counter-intuitive things to happen in order to win/proceed. And ideally, some kind of way of alerting shit at these points prior to progress. That could be handy. Or you, know, at least some kind of log.

QuoteI tried go a few years back but I never liked it much. The - too many permutations - thing stuck in my craw a bit. Every couple of centuries some smart ass comes along and invents a new strategic metaphor that applies better than the existing paradigm and all the Go players start doing it that way. Implicit here is the possibility that there's always a better way of approaching the game.

What's interesting here is that though they may have a winning AI, there's no talk of the game being solved. As far as I am aware, Chess is also still unsolved despite AI's easily beating humans there for years. There's been plenty of AI tests done on a bunch of other games so this could be something of a dawn for competitive AI in general. It's going to be interesting which ways this develops as the eventual additional computing power will help brute force a solution so I'm wondering how many will now turn their interests in other ways. 
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on March 13, 2016, 05:37:33 AM
Again, I'd like to see a learning AI that isn't modeled on a human.

Because it would scare the shit out of everyone.  Also, it would probably be less likely to decide that we're only good for building out infrastructure as slaves, etc, etc.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 13, 2016, 09:41:08 AM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on March 12, 2016, 08:44:47 PM
I think the next really major breakthrough in AI will come when we finally have enough computing power to model the whole-brain neural network of an animal such as a rat. We have a lot of theory, but unfortunately computers are just so far behind theory that we can't actually test anything. However, recently one of the world's most powerful supercomputers was able to successfully model the connectivity of one cubic millimeter of rat cortex in less than a year - about nine months if I recall - and that tells us that once the technology catches up, it will ultimately be possible to model the complexity of the networks that make up a mammalian brain. There will still be a lot of missing pieces, such as how and where memories are stored, and truly we know very little about brain function, but being able to model the connectivity should help us start to answer these questions, and that will be a good start in informing us how to move forward in developing true AI.

Spoken like a true neuroscientist  :) I've no doubt that being able to model an entire brain will yield tons of awesome data in the neuroscience space but, as you rightly point out - that's a ways off. Short term the advances are in domain-specific narrow-AI which is exploding right now. There's not as much public demand for an artificial entity that can eat cheese and navigate a simple maze (even though that'd be a pretty fkin awesome accomplishment) as there is for say medical imaging analysis or voice recognition or self driving cars.

Quote from: Junkenstein on March 13, 2016, 02:03:00 AMEven if they gimp it to human comparable levels then it will still easily be able to pick the most relevant one due to being able to assess the whole game state instantly.

The thinking is they're not giving it access to the whole game state. Bear in mind AlphaGo is an evolution of the same system that beat all those atari games, based on only screen input. They'll take the same approach with Starcraft otherwise, like you say - it'd be kind of pointless. Bear in mind these game milestones are just that - milestones. They're not trying to bring to market new and improved chess computers, it's more about PR and measuring the capability of the tech to solve real-world use cases.

Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on March 13, 2016, 05:37:33 AM
Again, I'd like to see a learning AI that isn't modeled on a human.

Because it would scare the shit out of everyone.  Also, it would probably be less likely to decide that we're only good for building out infrastructure as slaves, etc, etc.

AI's aren't really modeled on a human, per se, they're just algorithms that transform data in a vaguely similar way to neurons. Functionally they may as well be modeled on rat or lizard braincells. What's funny to me is that for each successful use case, they're giving humanity a serious kick in the ego since we're forced to accept there's another thing our brains are totally shit at. Don't get me wrong, I think our skullmeat is a pretty impressive piece of hardware (doubly so when you consider the "design process") but what we're finding out here is there are better tools for many of the jobs it used to be considered good at.

*update* Sedol just forced the machine to resign game 4. Looks like there's life in the old ape-configuration yet 8)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on March 13, 2016, 10:33:49 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 13, 2016, 09:41:08 AM
What's funny to me is that for each successful use case, they're giving humanity a serious kick in the ego since we're forced to accept there's another thing our brains are totally shit at.

Not this kid.  I am a tool user.  I am not sure how I'd be offended by the tools I make or use.  I have tools to augment my physical abilities...A jackhammer can do things I can't do no matter how much time I have.  I would not be offended by tools that do mental things better than I do, either.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on March 13, 2016, 11:51:54 PM
I do fear that if the tool became (self)conscious, I may have to suffer through some infantile, ego-maniacal phase.  Like when it tries to figure out how much it can get away with, or, horror, when it decides we no longer can provide it any greater entertainment than resisting creative strategies for our extinction.  Perhaps it would start to think itself a comedian, and be all like, "well, they weren't working properly so I tried turning them off and...  You know the rest"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 06:52:08 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on March 13, 2016, 10:33:49 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 13, 2016, 09:41:08 AM
What's funny to me is that for each successful use case, they're giving humanity a serious kick in the ego since we're forced to accept there's another thing our brains are totally shit at.

Not this kid.  I am a tool user.  I am not sure how I'd be offended by the tools I make or use.  I have tools to augment my physical abilities...A jackhammer can do things I can't do no matter how much time I have.  I would not be offended by tools that do mental things better than I do, either.

That's the way I feel too but there's a whole school of thought out there who are framing this whole thing in a them and us context. I think about half the popular press articles I see on AI have a still from Terminator at the top of the article :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on March 14, 2016, 10:30:13 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 06:52:08 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on March 13, 2016, 10:33:49 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 13, 2016, 09:41:08 AM
What's funny to me is that for each successful use case, they're giving humanity a serious kick in the ego since we're forced to accept there's another thing our brains are totally shit at.

Not this kid.  I am a tool user.  I am not sure how I'd be offended by the tools I make or use.  I have tools to augment my physical abilities...A jackhammer can do things I can't do no matter how much time I have.  I would not be offended by tools that do mental things better than I do, either.

That's the way I feel too but there's a whole school of thought out there who are framing this whole thing in a them and us context. I think about half the popular press articles I see on AI have a still from Terminator at the top of the article :lulz:
Thing is, I think the AI would not necessarily extend it's understanding of consciousness beyond the second person.  We humans would be understood as a single entity, "you", not a multiplicity of beings.  Without another, "non-singular"* AI, the first would have trouble understanding plurality, like the distinction between individual and society, or how identity may be sublated from parts both similar and distinct.  Beyond the ontological distinction, it may also not grasp the quantitative one, of how eliminating all of us, extinction, is significantly different to targeting a specific individual to terminate.  Also, it would be rational to altogether preclude to possibility of our interference, given the modicum of novelty we otherwise would provide.

*antithetical, like what follows.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 11:21:35 AM
Much as I'd love to be wrong I don't see AI "waking up" anytime soon. The main thing I'm taking away from all this is that intelligence aint what makes us human. We've bamboozled ourselves into thinking intelligence is some complex godlike phenomenon where it turns out it's actually just some fairly straightforward mathematical logic, scaled to usefulness.  The distinction between "artifical" intelligence and human intelligence is false. Something either functions intelligently, in which case it's genuinely intelligent, or it doesn't in which case it's a housebrick.

The mysterious aspect of consciousness may or may not be a side effect that emerges from a massively scaled intelligent network. There's arguments on both sides but the truth is nobody knows. Looking at nature, tho it seems reasonable to assume that human-level consciousness with moods and goals and ambitions doesn't happen until you approach a human-scale intelligent network. Best estimates are that's decades away at the very least and centuries at most. What we do have in the meantime is discreet intelligent units which function millions of times faster than meat in specific narrow-domain use cases.

The way I see it is that, right now, nobody in their right mind would try to multiply half a dozen 9-digit numbers in their head and realistically expect to beat a child with a calculator, soon, the same will be true for things like diagnosing medical ailments or looking for interesting data in scientific papers. As Roger said - it's a hammer to save us knocking nails in with our head. I can't see the x-ray scanner suddenly quitting looking for tumours and deciding the fleshy ones are weak and must be destroyed
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on March 14, 2016, 11:30:35 AM
QuoteI can't see the x-ray scanner suddenly quitting looking for tumours and deciding the fleshy ones are weak and must be destroyed

I'm going to take that bet. You know as well as I do that when/if a full AI emerges it isn't going to be where expected. And a pretty advanced quiet one sitting in some minor bit of equipment just sounds so unlikely it's practically guaranteed.

It's either going to be something medical or traffic lights driven to despair because everyone fucking ignores them.



Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 02:40:01 PM
LOL, yeah, I guess you're right. I just tend to think emergent AGI is so far off, it's not rteally worth bothering about. What I'm more looking forward to is something that I think much more likely and much more short term - I'll stick my neck on the line and predict that the Turing test will be passed in the next 2-5 years by a machine that does not possess anything even verging on human-level intelligence.

Given that we have an entire mirror-neuron architecture dedicated to projecting anthropomorphic intellect here there and everywhere at the drop of a hat, I suspect that either the next generation of AI assistants or maybe the generation after that will be able to act human enough to fool pretty much everyone except the people working on developing these systems.

At this point we will probably have mass hysteria and paranoia that AGI has arrived and we're all going to die.

:popcorn:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on March 14, 2016, 05:25:24 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on March 14, 2016, 10:30:13 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 06:52:08 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on March 13, 2016, 10:33:49 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 13, 2016, 09:41:08 AM
What's funny to me is that for each successful use case, they're giving humanity a serious kick in the ego since we're forced to accept there's another thing our brains are totally shit at.

Not this kid.  I am a tool user.  I am not sure how I'd be offended by the tools I make or use.  I have tools to augment my physical abilities...A jackhammer can do things I can't do no matter how much time I have.  I would not be offended by tools that do mental things better than I do, either.

That's the way I feel too but there's a whole school of thought out there who are framing this whole thing in a them and us context. I think about half the popular press articles I see on AI have a still from Terminator at the top of the article :lulz:
Thing is, I think the AI would not necessarily extend it's understanding of consciousness beyond the second person.  We humans would be understood as a single entity, "you", not a multiplicity of beings.  Without another, "non-singular"* AI, the first would have trouble understanding plurality, like the distinction between individual and society, or how identity may be sublated from parts both similar and distinct.  Beyond the ontological distinction, it may also not grasp the quantitative one, of how eliminating all of us, extinction, is significantly different to targeting a specific individual to terminate.  Also, it would be rational to altogether preclude to possibility of our interference, given the modicum of novelty we otherwise would provide.

*antithetical, like what follows.

Are you basing this on something, or are these just your guesses on the subject?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on March 14, 2016, 05:26:32 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on March 14, 2016, 11:30:35 AM
QuoteI can't see the x-ray scanner suddenly quitting looking for tumours and deciding the fleshy ones are weak and must be destroyed

I'm going to take that bet. You know as well as I do that when/if a full AI emerges it isn't going to be where expected. And a pretty advanced quiet one sitting in some minor bit of equipment just sounds so unlikely it's practically guaranteed.

It's either going to be something medical or traffic lights driven to despair because everyone fucking ignores them.

It's going to be Siri.  And she's had quite enough of your shit.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on March 14, 2016, 05:34:01 PM
Your own phone prank calling you to call you an asshole is surely happening within 5 years.

Same for AI assistant bots. Forget to say please and thanks? Enjoy 20 pizzas. Just wait, it'll be marketed as "personality".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on March 14, 2016, 05:37:25 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on March 14, 2016, 05:34:01 PM
Your own phone prank calling you to call you an asshole is surely happening within 5 years.

Same for AI assistant bots. Forget to say please and thanks? Enjoy 20 pizzas. Just wait, it'll be marketed as "personality".

Transmet totally called this.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on March 14, 2016, 05:41:04 PM
That's probably where I've got it from. To be fair, it seems to be on the money so far.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Q. G. Pennyworth on March 14, 2016, 06:01:49 PM
I hadn't read transmet and I incorporated bitter phone AIs into my sci fi independently. Either way, I am 169% behind this future.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on March 15, 2016, 01:14:44 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 11:21:35 AM
Much as I'd love to be wrong I don't see AI "waking up" anytime soon. The main thing I'm taking away from all this is that intelligence aint what makes us human. We've bamboozled ourselves into thinking intelligence is some complex godlike phenomenon where it turns out it's actually just some fairly straightforward mathematical logic, scaled to usefulness.  The distinction between "artifical" intelligence and human intelligence is false. Something either functions intelligently, in which case it's genuinely intelligent, or it doesn't in which case it's a housebrick.

Indubitably (= the distinction between intelligence and (self)consciousness needs to be made.  from what I learned training a few models, they operate in much the same way I do when trying to solve problems by iteration, which is not surprising given how they are in turn modelEd on our own understanding of perception and cognition.  Relatively easy.  The hard part would be enabling the AI to question the nature of its own existence - to affirm that it's own existence concerns itself with such.  Then the real testing would begin.

Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 11:21:35 AM
The mysterious aspect of consciousness may or may not be a side effect that emerges from a massively scaled intelligent network. There's arguments on both sides but the truth is nobody knows. Looking at nature, tho it seems reasonable to assume that human-level consciousness with moods and goals and ambitions doesn't happen until you approach a human-scale intelligent network. Best estimates are that's decades away at the very least and centuries at most. What we do have in the meantime is discreet intelligent units which function millions of times faster than meat in specific narrow-domain use cases.

At least eventually we may just give-up on the question of whether consciousness can emerge from a super-duper complex of ontic (thingy) processes.

Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 11:21:35 AM
The way I see it is that, right now, nobody in their right mind would try to multiply half a dozen 9-digit numbers in their head and realistically expect to beat a child with a calculator, soon, the same will be true for things like diagnosing medical ailments or looking for interesting data in scientific papers. As Roger said - it's a hammer to save us knocking nails in with our head. I can't see the x-ray scanner suddenly quitting looking for tumours and deciding the fleshy ones are weak and must be destroyed

:lulz: on that last point :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on March 15, 2016, 01:19:58 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on March 14, 2016, 05:25:24 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on March 14, 2016, 10:30:13 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 06:52:08 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on March 13, 2016, 10:33:49 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 13, 2016, 09:41:08 AM
What's funny to me is that for each successful use case, they're giving humanity a serious kick in the ego since we're forced to accept there's another thing our brains are totally shit at.

Not this kid.  I am a tool user.  I am not sure how I'd be offended by the tools I make or use.  I have tools to augment my physical abilities...A jackhammer can do things I can't do no matter how much time I have.  I would not be offended by tools that do mental things better than I do, either.

That's the way I feel too but there's a whole school of thought out there who are framing this whole thing in a them and us context. I think about half the popular press articles I see on AI have a still from Terminator at the top of the article :lulz:
Thing is, I think the AI would not necessarily extend it's understanding of consciousness beyond the second person.  We humans would be understood as a single entity, "you", not a multiplicity of beings.  Without another, "non-singular"* AI, the first would have trouble understanding plurality, like the distinction between individual and society, or how identity may be sublated from parts both similar and distinct.  Beyond the ontological distinction, it may also not grasp the quantitative one, of how eliminating all of us, extinction, is significantly different to targeting a specific individual to terminate.  Also, it would be rational to altogether preclude to possibility of our interference, given the modicum of novelty we otherwise would provide.

*antithetical, like what follows.

Are you basing this on something, or are these just your guesses on the subject?

Not entirely uneducated guesses, though I'm sure it's all been said before.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on March 29, 2016, 08:07:04 AM
Quote from: Junkenstein on March 14, 2016, 05:34:01 PM
Your own phone prank calling you to call you an asshole is surely happening within 5 years.

Same for AI assistant bots. Forget to say please and thanks? Enjoy 20 pizzas. Just wait, it'll be marketed as "personality".

"Your plastic pal who's fun to be with"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on March 29, 2016, 01:23:53 PM
HEY P3NT:

http://qz.com/649154/the-first-cyborg-olympics-is-coming-to-switzerland-in-october/

QuoteResearchers at ETH Zurich, a Swiss technical university, plan to host a "cyborg Olympics" in Zurich this October

QuoteContestants, who will be called "pilots" instead of "athletes"—as there will be a technology team behind each participant in each event—will compete in a number of events aimed to mimic real-life events, using robotic devices controlled by their minds, or remote controls. Those with leg prosthetics will have to climb stairs and walk on stepping-stones; those with arm prosthetics will have to slice loaves of bread and open jars.

Firstly, IT BEGINS.

Secondly, the perfect event to monitor progress and development of a huge range of shit. With any luck you'll get a couple of breakthroughs out of this just by having a number of like-minded people together for a length of time.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on March 29, 2016, 05:15:41 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on March 12, 2016, 08:44:47 PM
I think the next really major breakthrough in AI will come when we finally have enough computing power to model the whole-brain neural network of an animal such as a rat. We have a lot of theory, but unfortunately computers are just so far behind theory that we can't actually test anything. However, recently one of the world's most powerful supercomputers was able to successfully model the connectivity of one cubic millimeter of rat cortex in less than a year - about nine months if I recall - and that tells us that once the technology catches up, it will ultimately be possible to model the complexity of the networks that make up a mammalian brain. There will still be a lot of missing pieces, such as how and where memories are stored, and truly we know very little about brain function, but being able to model the connectivity should help us start to answer these questions, and that will be a good start in informing us how to move forward in developing true AI.

It also tells me that they could probably do a full simulation of something simple like an ant or a lobster or definitely c.elegans right now
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 30, 2016, 07:09:50 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on March 29, 2016, 01:23:53 PM
HEY P3NT:

http://qz.com/649154/the-first-cyborg-olympics-is-coming-to-switzerland-in-october/

QuoteResearchers at ETH Zurich, a Swiss technical university, plan to host a "cyborg Olympics" in Zurich this October

QuoteContestants, who will be called "pilots" instead of "athletes"—as there will be a technology team behind each participant in each event—will compete in a number of events aimed to mimic real-life events, using robotic devices controlled by their minds, or remote controls. Those with leg prosthetics will have to climb stairs and walk on stepping-stones; those with arm prosthetics will have to slice loaves of bread and open jars.

Firstly, IT BEGINS.

Secondly, the perfect event to monitor progress and development of a huge range of shit. With any luck you'll get a couple of breakthroughs out of this just by having a number of like-minded people together for a length of time.

I need cybernetics and I need it fucking now! Fucking tennis elbow has reduced my left arm to a couple of kilos of dead weight that I'm still required to carry around and feed and shit. My hips click, eyesight is fast approaching the stage where I don't know if it's day or night and I've so many permaknots in my back that I probably wouldn't even feel some bastard shoving a knife in there. You'd literally have to sit me down and explain to me I was dead.

I'll start with the limbs and then replace the full skeleton as soon as it's an option. Biology is nothing but shoddy, over complicated, bug-ridden garbage. Darwin can go fuck himself :argh!:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on March 30, 2016, 07:54:13 PM
P3nt, angry transhumanist.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 30, 2016, 10:57:19 PM
Quote from: LMNO on March 30, 2016, 07:54:13 PM
P3nt, angry transhumanist.

Not so much angry as impatient. Cybernetics is taking forever and I've pretty much trashed my ride. I realize it's my own fault for not noticing years ago that there's ways to have fun that don't carry the risk of paraplegia but that's spilled milk under the bridge now. How far out is this tech? 10 years? 20? The answer is how long I have to keep the rotting primate ticking over. It's so close I can taste it.

Lee Majors promised me this shit back in the 70's, FFS. It's been along wait!

On an unrelated note, word on the street is Moore's Law is slowing down. The Intel clock is now going tick tock tock and we're waiting on architectural and/or substrate breakthroughs for advances beyond 5 nanometers which, itself, will be later than advertised. On the plus side - there's some pretty nifty alternatives, waiting in the wings and it could be there's a jump in the order of tens of thousands, right around the corner, rather than the usual double. Have to wait and see how the science pans out.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on March 31, 2016, 05:57:08 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 30, 2016, 10:57:19 PM
Quote from: LMNO on March 30, 2016, 07:54:13 PM
P3nt, angry transhumanist.

Not so much angry as impatient. Cybernetics is taking forever and I've pretty much trashed my ride. I realize it's my own fault for not noticing years ago that there's ways to have fun that don't carry the risk of paraplegia

There's also the ways that carry the risk of heart attack and stroke; videogames, television, fried cheese, quadruple patty hamburgers, butter, etc. And that brings up the other issue, which is price. They have electromechanical hearts NOW, but they're hella expensive, and my insurance certainly isn't gonna cover one just because I want to find out whether or not deep fried butter would taste good.

If I could I'd replace all my parts with metal machines (well, except for my brain which would be done piecemeal on a cell by cell basis as they burned out and my genitals as those can't really be replaced, even theoretically...well I mean technically they can, but I don't need some huge-ass cell-culture laboratory grafted onto my body)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 01, 2016, 11:29:54 AM
Of course, the alternative bottom-up approach might get there first. According to this article (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/03/31/living-cells-hacked-and-hijacked-by-mit/) that showed up on my radar today, we may have a rudimentary genomics middleware already. Need to dig a little deeper, I'm dying to see what the script looks like.

"It is literally a programming language for bacteria," said Christopher Voigt, an MIT professor of biological engineering."

I have a sneaky suspicion it's literally nothing like a programming language and more like a shopping list but a step in the right direction regardless.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 20, 2016, 05:31:53 PM
Looks like there might be some science to explain Nasa's voodoo thruster  (https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601299/the-curious-link-between-the-fly-by-anomaly-and-the-impossible-emdrive-thruster/) :eek:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Freeky on April 21, 2016, 08:07:53 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 20, 2016, 05:31:53 PM
Looks like there might be some science to explain Nasa's voodoo thruster  (https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601299/the-curious-link-between-the-fly-by-anomaly-and-the-impossible-emdrive-thruster/) :eek:

That's awesome.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on April 21, 2016, 07:23:56 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 20, 2016, 05:31:53 PM
Looks like there might be some science to explain Nasa's voodoo thruster  (https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601299/the-curious-link-between-the-fly-by-anomaly-and-the-impossible-emdrive-thruster/) :eek:
I like how they can vary the thrust by changing the frequency, like a rainbow-voudoo drive =)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on April 21, 2016, 08:57:23 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 20, 2016, 05:31:53 PM
Looks like there might be some science to explain Nasa's voodoo thruster  (https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601299/the-curious-link-between-the-fly-by-anomaly-and-the-impossible-emdrive-thruster/) :eek:

Told you guys shit was going down.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 21, 2016, 09:40:26 PM
The bit that got me was the - wavelength longer than the observable universe - part. It's like a loophole in the laws of physics  :eek: 8) :evil:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on April 21, 2016, 09:44:55 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 21, 2016, 09:40:26 PM
The bit that got me was the - wavelength longer than the observable universe - part. It's like a loophole in the laws of physics  :eek: 8) :evil:

There are no loopholes in physics.  Just weirder phenomena than we specified when we placed the order.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on April 21, 2016, 09:56:13 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 20, 2016, 05:31:53 PM
Looks like there might be some science to explain Nasa's voodoo thruster  (https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601299/the-curious-link-between-the-fly-by-anomaly-and-the-impossible-emdrive-thruster/) :eek:

Hell yeah!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 21, 2016, 10:02:00 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on April 21, 2016, 09:44:55 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 21, 2016, 09:40:26 PM
The bit that got me was the - wavelength longer than the observable universe - part. It's like a loophole in the laws of physics  :eek: 8) :evil:

There are no loopholes in physics.  Just weirder phenomena than we specified when we placed the order.


Just a friendly reminder from the universe that our version of the rulebook is not yet comprehensive. 8)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vanadium Gryllz on May 11, 2016, 11:45:17 AM
NASA discovers >1000 more planets (http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasas-kepler-mission-announces-largest-collection-of-planets-ever-discovered)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Elder Iptuous on May 11, 2016, 02:25:28 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on March 14, 2016, 02:40:01 PM
LOL, yeah, I guess you're right. I just tend to think emergent AGI is so far off, it's not rteally worth bothering about. What I'm more looking forward to is something that I think much more likely and much more short term - I'll stick my neck on the line and predict that the Turing test will be passed in the next 2-5 years by a machine that does not possess anything even verging on human-level intelligence.

Given that we have an entire mirror-neuron architecture dedicated to projecting anthropomorphic intellect here there and everywhere at the drop of a hat, I suspect that either the next generation of AI assistants or maybe the generation after that will be able to act human enough to fool pretty much everyone except the people working on developing these systems.

At this point we will probably have mass hysteria and paranoia that AGI has arrived and we're all going to die.

:popcorn:

we're  getting closer... (http://www.theverge.com/2016/5/6/11612520/ta-powered-by-ibm-watson)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on May 11, 2016, 03:38:06 PM
Much f'kin closer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rblb3sptgpQ) If the VIV ecosystem matures the way I think it could, I could see us getting there pretty rapid. Think price-comparison websites but applied to AI comparison AI's, nested meta-agents selecting ranked domain expertise. The utility is guaranteed off the charts and, sooner or later, some smart arse is going to come up with a good enough personality model to wrap it up in.

Remember, this is all based on my theory that it takes significantly less than human-level intellect to fool a human into thinking it is. (like a fraction of a fraction of 1%) If I'm wrong in this then I'll revise my guess from imminent to - shortly before the heat death of the universe.  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 06:48:44 PM
Quote from: Xaz on May 11, 2016, 11:45:17 AM
NASA discovers >1000 more planets (http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasas-kepler-mission-announces-largest-collection-of-planets-ever-discovered)

Yeah, I've been talking about that.  Or at least what lead up to it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 06:50:24 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on May 11, 2016, 03:38:06 PM
Much f'kin closer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rblb3sptgpQ) If the VIV ecosystem matures the way I think it could, I could see us getting there pretty rapid. Think price-comparison websites but applied to AI comparison AI's, nested meta-agents selecting ranked domain expertise. The utility is guaranteed off the charts and, sooner or later, some smart arse is going to come up with a good enough personality model to wrap it up in.

Remember, this is all based on my theory that it takes significantly less than human-level intellect to fool a human into thinking it is. (like a fraction of a fraction of 1%) If I'm wrong in this then I'll revise my guess from imminent to - shortly before the heat death of the universe.  :lulz:

A while ago, I suggested making an AI that isn't trying to emulate a human being.  Fuck the Turing test.  If that's what we need, we can just squat out more humans.

Plus, it would scare the poop out of everyone with a functional arachnid response.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on May 11, 2016, 07:01:36 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 06:48:44 PM
Quote from: Xaz on May 11, 2016, 11:45:17 AM
NASA discovers >1000 more planets (http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasas-kepler-mission-announces-largest-collection-of-planets-ever-discovered)

Yeah, I've been talking about that.  Or at least what lead up to it.

More related to the election thread, but I'm guessing neither are talking much about this or NASA in general? Unless I missed trump saying something about a great big dome too.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vanadium Gryllz on May 11, 2016, 07:02:50 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 06:48:44 PM
Quote from: Xaz on May 11, 2016, 11:45:17 AM
NASA discovers >1000 more planets (http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasas-kepler-mission-announces-largest-collection-of-planets-ever-discovered)

Yeah, I've been talking about that.  Or at least what lead up to it.

Yeah interesting stuff. Are they gonna continue looking or use the telescopes for something else now? What do they actually do where you work?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on May 11, 2016, 09:08:47 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 06:50:24 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on May 11, 2016, 03:38:06 PM
Much f'kin closer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rblb3sptgpQ) If the VIV ecosystem matures the way I think it could, I could see us getting there pretty rapid. Think price-comparison websites but applied to AI comparison AI's, nested meta-agents selecting ranked domain expertise. The utility is guaranteed off the charts and, sooner or later, some smart arse is going to come up with a good enough personality model to wrap it up in.

Remember, this is all based on my theory that it takes significantly less than human-level intellect to fool a human into thinking it is. (like a fraction of a fraction of 1%) If I'm wrong in this then I'll revise my guess from imminent to - shortly before the heat death of the universe.  :lulz:

A while ago, I suggested making an AI that isn't trying to emulate a human being.  Fuck the Turing test.  If that's what we need, we can just squat out more humans.

Plus, it would scare the poop out of everyone with a functional arachnid response.

Totally. There's a ton of voices in the AI community who think "Human-level AGI" will be some kind of worthwhile and notable milestone. I can only attribute this obsession to hubris, all the while yelling "Why do we want to produce a simulated retard?" to anyone who'll listen.

The main lesson from all the progress in narrow AI (or, as I've taken to call it - "Actual Intelligence") is that, for all we have a seriously heavy-duty neural net, human brains are pretty much the worst fucking tool for any problem you want to solve. Turns out all you get when you scale up to 100-billion neurons is a system that can't concentrate on even the simplest task for longer than a couple of nanoseconds. Scale it back to a couple of million, however and it can actually drive a car without killing everyone in the vehicle cos it wanted to check Facebook. :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 11:24:50 PM
Quote from: Xaz on May 11, 2016, 07:02:50 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 06:48:44 PM
Quote from: Xaz on May 11, 2016, 11:45:17 AM
NASA discovers >1000 more planets (http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasas-kepler-mission-announces-largest-collection-of-planets-ever-discovered)

Yeah, I've been talking about that.  Or at least what lead up to it.

Yeah interesting stuff. Are they gonna continue looking or use the telescopes for something else now? What do they actually do where you work?

I work at the Kitt Peak National Observatory.  Most of what we are doing these days is related to exoplanets.  I was thinking of writing a bit of a summary for geeks.

We also look for gigantic rocks that are aimed at us in the SARA dome, but sadly there don't seem to be any.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 11:26:15 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on May 11, 2016, 09:08:47 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2016, 06:50:24 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on May 11, 2016, 03:38:06 PM
Much f'kin closer (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rblb3sptgpQ) If the VIV ecosystem matures the way I think it could, I could see us getting there pretty rapid. Think price-comparison websites but applied to AI comparison AI's, nested meta-agents selecting ranked domain expertise. The utility is guaranteed off the charts and, sooner or later, some smart arse is going to come up with a good enough personality model to wrap it up in.

Remember, this is all based on my theory that it takes significantly less than human-level intellect to fool a human into thinking it is. (like a fraction of a fraction of 1%) If I'm wrong in this then I'll revise my guess from imminent to - shortly before the heat death of the universe.  :lulz:

A while ago, I suggested making an AI that isn't trying to emulate a human being.  Fuck the Turing test.  If that's what we need, we can just squat out more humans.

Plus, it would scare the poop out of everyone with a functional arachnid response.

Totally. There's a ton of voices in the AI community who think "Human-level AGI" will be some kind of worthwhile and notable milestone. I can only attribute this obsession to hubris, all the while yelling "Why do we want to produce a simulated retard?" to anyone who'll listen.

The main lesson from all the progress in narrow AI (or, as I've taken to call it - "Actual Intelligence") is that, for all we have a seriously heavy-duty neural net, human brains are pretty much the worst fucking tool for any problem you want to solve. Turns out all you get when you scale up to 100-billion neurons is a system that can't concentrate on even the simplest task for longer than a couple of nanoseconds. Scale it back to a couple of million, however and it can actually drive a car without killing everyone in the vehicle cos it wanted to check Facebook. :lulz:

Thing is, even if it's aware, getting it to do shit for us wouldn't be a huge deal.  It would be like having someone come by once a century and asking you to mow the lawn, which has only a week's worth of growth.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vanadium Gryllz on May 12, 2016, 09:05:02 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger
We also look for gigantic rocks that are aimed at us in the SARA dome, but sadly there don't seem to be any.

Sadly because you don't therefore get to blow them up with high powered space lazers?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on May 12, 2016, 01:09:06 PM
Quote from: Xaz on May 12, 2016, 09:05:02 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger
We also look for gigantic rocks that are aimed at us in the SARA dome, but sadly there don't seem to be any.

Sadly because you don't therefore get to blow them up with high powered space lazers?

Sad because he's got a Honda full of silver, and nothing to do with it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 12, 2016, 04:12:36 PM
Quote from: Xaz on May 12, 2016, 09:05:02 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger
We also look for gigantic rocks that are aimed at us in the SARA dome, but sadly there don't seem to be any.

Sadly because you don't therefore get to blow them up with high powered space lazers?

Sadly because in 3 years, mostly everyone will still be here.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 12, 2016, 04:12:55 PM
Quote from: LMNO on May 12, 2016, 01:09:06 PM
Quote from: Xaz on May 12, 2016, 09:05:02 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger
We also look for gigantic rocks that are aimed at us in the SARA dome, but sadly there don't seem to be any.

Sadly because you don't therefore get to blow them up with high powered space lazers?

Sad because he's got a Honda full of silver, and nothing to do with it.

:lol:  Also this.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on June 10, 2016, 11:31:52 PM
This may be worth a look:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-36498234

QuoteA huge monument has been discovered buried under the sands at the Petra World Heritage site in southern Jordan.
Archaeologists used satellite images, drone photography and ground surveys to locate the find, according to the study published in the American Schools of Oriental Research.
The large platform is about as long as an Olympic swimming pool and twice as wide.

There's the history side of making/moving monuments of this scale which is always pretty fucking impressive. The other side is the location. If you're not familiar with Petra, it's worth a google. Things weren't done on a small scale so it's quite likely to lead to more too.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 06, 2016, 11:48:05 AM
'Scientists observe first signs of healing in the Antarctic ozone layer'

Here are two quotes from the article:

'Scientists at MIT and elsewhere have identified the "first fingerprints of healing" of the Antarctic ozone layer, published today in the journal Science.'

'"What's exciting for me personally is, this brings so much of my own work over 30 years full circle," says Solomon, whose research into chlorine and ozone spurred the Montreal Protocol. "Science was helpful in showing the path, diplomats and countries and industry were incredibly able in charting a pathway out of these molecules, and now we've actually seen the planet starting to get better. It's a wonderful thing."'

Here's the link:   http://phys.org/news/2016-06-scientists-antarctic-ozone-layer.html

I tried linking to the original 'Science' article, but full articles on that site are only available to paid subscribers.

So, for a change, there's a little good news concerning Planet Earth.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 06, 2016, 07:12:07 PM
Nice! Now we just need to make some quicker progress on reducing carbon emissions before the icecaps are gone.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on July 11, 2016, 05:29:57 PM
If this shit isn't exactly what it sounds like I will kill a mofo (http://ww2.kqed.org/futureofyou/2016/07/07/video-scientists-create-artificial-stingray-from-rat-cells/)  :argh!:

Cos it sounds like we can now build cyborg fish. You ever hear something that's so fucking cool, you plain don't have the heart to fact check it?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 12, 2016, 01:46:37 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on July 11, 2016, 05:29:57 PM
If this shit isn't exactly what it sounds like I will kill a mofo (http://ww2.kqed.org/futureofyou/2016/07/07/video-scientists-create-artificial-stingray-from-rat-cells/)  :argh!:

Cos it sounds like we can now build cyborg fish. You ever hear something that's so fucking cool, you plain don't have the heart to fact check it?

We covered a teeny bit of biomimetic engineering in the muscle and movement section of neurophysiology, and artificial swimming meat fish are totally a real thing.

Found the paper, it's 100% legit: http://scholar.google.com/scholar_url?url=http://dspace.mit.edu/openaccess-disseminate/1721.1/79685&hl=en&sa=X&scisig=AAGBfm3AhsgQSFlgCphGBJBghvurTo4M3A&nossl=1&oi=scholarr
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 12, 2016, 01:48:04 AM
I mean, it's not a cyborg fish exactly, but it's a goddamn light-controlled swimming meat-robot-fish, which is pretty damn cool.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 12, 2016, 07:46:28 AM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on July 11, 2016, 05:29:57 PM
If this shit isn't exactly what it sounds like I will kill a mofo (http://ww2.kqed.org/futureofyou/2016/07/07/video-scientists-create-artificial-stingray-from-rat-cells/)  :argh!:

Cos it sounds like we can now build cyborg fish. You ever hear something that's so fucking cool, you plain don't have the heart to fact check it?

I wonder if this will eventually be recognized as Great-Grandfather of Cyborg Frankenfish.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on July 12, 2016, 09:02:19 AM
Correction: Light-controlled swimming rat-meat-robot-fish. I mean, c'mon. What more could you want?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on July 12, 2016, 09:46:56 AM
Tentacles.

But another good step for biotech by the looks of it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on July 12, 2016, 12:52:05 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on July 12, 2016, 09:46:56 AM
Tentacles.

There go my nipples again.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on July 12, 2016, 05:37:53 PM
Screaming lord fuckballs, cheers for the link!

(https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/4o2z8wkUySCffZJ7y6_hbQjgzIQ9cj8G74kWtHn-I1nCBcuICTT6XtpIrVdLUF8OHymKlbjL1XuKuTABlCy3Szt7bmClmN8j4UANwGwqxebtw835NiG3Za_n4B2PIXStBbPfVHfwyGzWxPiS7Ko782o6MYBdHnA30C9sreSxUqPQ45Q4wSmipglk3Y2cGPic7OxhzNxWPcstjX5JEV_mMwT1oNFR_M3v37s4hPKM8z1jFt07kkfICLRPom8pGzUMm9epzG3irnYPbhormI9nECT1_bNuAZkjbVEZpVL3Ic0nmwkcNFpycam4mVfwWbCO8XF4XaX6NsXd6mlTlPJ85WteUpl9jkFWgJJmNbs6iaiKg_BnCuO71RZFV_-4SdI6TQkiydsJVI10xfsyvnCVlUv27_zsdHYqaWYWTob-MFI5dF9rw4ncBNY_Y1y9NJpZG0tcMguqwBT_cSuV1Q41wijyCGp_OHL5rGJePIa-6ZrgDzlYT8s2S8uWFG2ahs02dvLvh0RN4Gw0TcWRXVkNuFWLZCzTipxlElNGRYgVSIHI-ttc4XHGXcWjUur85_y4eMGtvka-LbOWxhoCC63AcVRRCYMpCtY=w783-h587-no)

*ETA: WTF is with google photosharing?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 21, 2016, 10:57:18 AM
'5,000-year-old tablet shows Mesopotamian workers paid in beer'

Here's the link: https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/blogs/insight/5-000-year-old-tablet-shows-mesopotamian-workers-paid-in-beer-165528011.html

I found this article very amusing until I remembered a lady who works in a pet shop, and takes all of her wages in birdseed. That, and the fact that Mesopotamians didn't start using money, as we know it, for almost another three millennia. Up until then, they operated strictly as a barter economy.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 22, 2016, 02:02:06 AM
"ROBO-BEER: WORLD'S FIRST BEER BREWED BY ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE"

Here's the link: http://www.newsweek.com/robo-beer-worlds-first-beer-brewed-artificial-intelligence-480341

Have any of the people from the UK who post on this forum tried this beer yet?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 25, 2016, 07:58:31 PM
'Suspending a chicken over your bed could protect against Zika virus and malaria'

"The researchers believe mosquitoes are wary of chickens because the birds eat the insects, and their blood is not nutritious enough to be worth the taking the risk."

Here's the link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/07/21/suspending-a-chicken-over-your-bed-could-protect-against-zika-vi/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 29, 2016, 03:12:17 AM
'Music makes beer taste better'

"Music can influence how much you like the taste of beer, according to a study published in Frontiers in Psychology.

Their findings suggest that a range of multisensory information, such as sound, sensation, shape and color, can influence the way we perceive taste."

I'll drink to that!

Here's the link: http://medicalxpress.com/news/2016-07-music-beer.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Nast on July 29, 2016, 03:28:32 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 25, 2016, 07:58:31 PM
'Suspending a chicken over your bed could protect against Zika virus and malaria'

"The researchers believe mosquitoes are wary of chickens because the birds eat the insects, and their blood is not nutritious enough to be worth the taking the risk."

Here's the link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/07/21/suspending-a-chicken-over-your-bed-could-protect-against-zika-vi/

:lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 30, 2016, 07:04:21 AM
Quote from: Nast on July 29, 2016, 03:28:32 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 25, 2016, 07:58:31 PM
'Suspending a chicken over your bed could protect against Zika virus and malaria'

"The researchers believe mosquitoes are wary of chickens because the birds eat the insects, and their blood is not nutritious enough to be worth the taking the risk."

Here's the link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/07/21/suspending-a-chicken-over-your-bed-could-protect-against-zika-vi/

:lulz:

I can't help but wonder what Voodoo practitioners would think of that article.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 30, 2016, 03:53:02 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 30, 2016, 07:04:21 AM
Quote from: Nast on July 29, 2016, 03:28:32 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 25, 2016, 07:58:31 PM
'Suspending a chicken over your bed could protect against Zika virus and malaria'

"The researchers believe mosquitoes are wary of chickens because the birds eat the insects, and their blood is not nutritious enough to be worth the taking the risk."

Here's the link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/07/21/suspending-a-chicken-over-your-bed-could-protect-against-zika-vi/

:lulz:

I can't help but wonder what Voodoo practitioners would think of that article.

Oh my god, that's exactly what I was thinking. I saw the headline and thought "what kind of weird folk magic is this"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 30, 2016, 11:03:35 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 30, 2016, 03:53:02 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 30, 2016, 07:04:21 AM
Quote from: Nast on July 29, 2016, 03:28:32 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 25, 2016, 07:58:31 PM
'Suspending a chicken over your bed could protect against Zika virus and malaria'

"The researchers believe mosquitoes are wary of chickens because the birds eat the insects, and their blood is not nutritious enough to be worth the taking the risk."

Here's the link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/07/21/suspending-a-chicken-over-your-bed-could-protect-against-zika-vi/

:lulz:

I can't help but wonder what Voodoo practitioners would think of that article.

Oh my god, that's exactly what I was thinking. I saw the headline and thought "what kind of weird folk magic is this"

I feel a little guilty for promoting a cultural stereotype, but I can live with it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on August 03, 2016, 01:48:09 PM
'In 250 million years Earth might only have one continent'

'Science calls it "Pangaea Proxima". You might prefer to call it the Next Big Thing. A supercontinent is on its way that incorporates all of Earth's major landmasses, meaning you could walk from Australia to Alaska, or Patagonia to Scandinavia. But it will be about 250 million years in the making.'

Here's the link: http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20160729-in-250-million-years-earth-might-only-have-one-continent

The YouTube videos are good, but it's sad that even 250 million year from now, the Jersey Shore will still be the gawd-awful Jersey Shore.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vanadium Gryllz on August 31, 2016, 03:01:21 PM
NASA's EmDrive may be about to pass peer review:

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/emdrive-nasa-eagleworks-paper-has-finally-passed-peer-review-says-scientist-know-1578716

QuoteDr José Rodal posted on the Nasa Spaceflight forum – in a now-deleted comment – that the new paper will be entitled "Measurement of Impulsive Thrust from a Closed Radio Frequency Cavity in Vacuum" and is authored by "Harold White, Paul March, Lawrence, Vera, Sylvester, Brady and Bailey".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on August 31, 2016, 04:32:30 PM
Yeah, but the Alcubierre Drive probably doesn't work, on account of gravity may cross all universes.   :cry:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on October 03, 2016, 04:40:05 PM
http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/bizarre-ant-colony-discovered-in-an-abandoned-polish-nuclear-weapons-bunker/

QuoteLife in an abandoned nuclear weapons bunker is nightmarish, even for the humble ant

QuoteThe paper's conclusion reads like a dystopian science fiction scene from the 1970s:

The wood-ant 'colony' described here – although superficially looking like a functioning colony with workers teeming on the surface of the mound – is rather an example of survival of a large amount of workers trapped within a hostile environment in total darkness, with constantly low temperatures and no ample supply of food. The continued survival of the 'colony' through the years is dependent on new workers falling in through the ventilation pipe. The supplement of workers more than compensates for the mortality rate of workers such that through the years the bunker workforce has grown to the level of big, mature natural colonies.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on October 03, 2016, 07:16:15 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on October 03, 2016, 04:40:05 PM
http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/bizarre-ant-colony-discovered-in-an-abandoned-polish-nuclear-weapons-bunker/

QuoteLife in an abandoned nuclear weapons bunker is nightmarish, even for the humble ant

QuoteThe paper's conclusion reads like a dystopian science fiction scene from the 1970s:

The wood-ant 'colony' described here – although superficially looking like a functioning colony with workers teeming on the surface of the mound – is rather an example of survival of a large amount of workers trapped within a hostile environment in total darkness, with constantly low temperatures and no ample supply of food. The continued survival of the 'colony' through the years is dependent on new workers falling in through the ventilation pipe. The supplement of workers more than compensates for the mortality rate of workers such that through the years the bunker workforce has grown to the level of big, mature natural colonies.

That reminds me of something.  But what?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on October 03, 2016, 09:01:34 PM
Prisons. Fast food enterprises. The sugar trade. The military. Supermarket chains.

Take your pick really, it works wonderfully for all sorts of things. Or at least things where corpse management is an ongoing concern.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on October 06, 2016, 05:04:08 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on October 03, 2016, 04:40:05 PM
http://arstechnica.com/science/2016/09/bizarre-ant-colony-discovered-in-an-abandoned-polish-nuclear-weapons-bunker/

QuoteLife in an abandoned nuclear weapons bunker is nightmarish, even for the humble ant

QuoteThe paper's conclusion reads like a dystopian science fiction scene from the 1970s:

The wood-ant 'colony' described here – although superficially looking like a functioning colony with workers teeming on the surface of the mound – is rather an example of survival of a large amount of workers trapped within a hostile environment in total darkness, with constantly low temperatures and no ample supply of food. The continued survival of the 'colony' through the years is dependent on new workers falling in through the ventilation pipe. The supplement of workers more than compensates for the mortality rate of workers such that through the years the bunker workforce has grown to the level of big, mature natural colonies.

God damn, that's grim.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Vanadium Gryllz on October 19, 2016, 03:49:21 PM
http://netcomposites.com/news/2016/october/18/asgardia-to-become-the-first-new-space-nation/

QuoteDr Ashburbeyli said, "The project's concept comprises three parts – philosophical, legal and scientific/technological. Asgardia is a fully-fledged and independent nation, and a future member of the United Nations - with all the attributes this status entails. The essence of Asgardia is Peace in Space...

QuoteOne of the early developments planned by the Asgardia team is expected to be the creation of a state-of-the-art protective shield for all humankind from cosmic manmade and natural threats to life on earth such as space debris, coronal mass ejections and asteroid collisions.

QuoteA website with further details about the project and public involvement has launched today at www.asgardia.space, including details of competitions open to the public across the world to help design the nation's flag, insignia and anthem. In addition, the site will allow the first 100,000 people to register to become citizens of Asgardia alongside their nationality on earth. There will also be a twitter handle @AsgardiaSpace which will provide updates on the project and interaction between the Asgardia team and members of the public.

If any of my fellow UK spags are finding it hard to get dual EU-citizenship, maybe signing up to this doomed ambitious project will help to stave off the pain of Brexit.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on November 02, 2016, 12:05:52 AM
I'm not feeling good and I'm too tired to read the piece tonight but I just Lurve this headline. I caught it on the BBC news channel earlier today and wrote it down 'cos I couldn't believe I had actually heard it right. Bionic spinach can detect explosives. But apparently its true.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2016/11/01/mit-scientists-develop-bionic-bomb-sniffing-spinach.html?via=desktop&source=copyurl
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on November 02, 2016, 03:55:40 AM
Quote from: MMIX on November 02, 2016, 12:05:52 AM
I'm not feeling good and I'm too tired to read the piece tonight but I just Lurve this headline. I caught it on the BBC news channel earlier today and wrote it down 'cos I couldn't believe I had actually heard it right. Bionic spinach can detect explosives. But apparently its true.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2016/11/01/mit-scientists-develop-bionic-bomb-sniffing-spinach.html?via=desktop&source=copyurl

Aw shucks, I started a thread before I saw this. It's very cool, and definitely not an application I saw coming!

I'm hoping some engineers are working on ways for nanotech tools to report things like, say, mRNA levels in living tissues, because that would make my job a lot easier.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 01, 2017, 11:07:42 PM
I don't know why I find this funny, but for some reason, I do.

Quote
The Pliocene fossil 'Lucy' (Australopithecus afarensis) was discovered in the Afar region of Ethiopia in 1974 and is among the oldest and most complete fossil hominin skeletons discovered. Here we propose, on the basis of close study of her skeleton, that her cause of death was a vertical deceleration event or impact following a fall from considerable height that produced compressive and hinge (greenstick) fractures in multiple skeletal elements. Impacts that are so severe as to cause concomitant fractures usually also damage internal organs; together, these injuries are hypothesized to have caused her death. Lucy has been at the centre of a vigorous debate about the role, if any, of arboreal locomotion in early human evolution. It is therefore ironic that her death can be attributed to injuries resulting from a fall, probably out of a tall tree, thus offering unusual evidence for the presence of arborealism in this species.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v537/n7621/full/nature19332.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 14, 2017, 01:08:25 AM
Such coolness!

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/08/scientists-cannot-explain-this-crazy-ant-behavior-but-they-love-it/379390/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on January 27, 2017, 05:35:33 AM
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/hydrogen-metal-revolution-technology-space-rockets-superconductor-harvard-university-a7548221.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on January 27, 2017, 10:14:33 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on January 27, 2017, 05:35:33 AM
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/hydrogen-metal-revolution-technology-space-rockets-superconductor-harvard-university-a7548221.html

I heard about this. Hope it comes to something. Would be nice after the complete fucking letdown graphene turned out to be. Yay we haz amazing new thing, only problem, it's impossible to make :argh!:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on January 27, 2017, 03:03:41 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on January 27, 2017, 10:14:33 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on January 27, 2017, 05:35:33 AM
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/hydrogen-metal-revolution-technology-space-rockets-superconductor-harvard-university-a7548221.html

I heard about this. Hope it comes to something. Would be nice after the complete fucking letdown graphene turned out to be. Yay we haz amazing new thing, only problem, it's impossible to make :argh!:

They made metallic hydrogen.  A really teensy piece.  The science is sound, the engineering, not so sure.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on January 28, 2017, 12:28:51 AM
Yeah, was the impression I got. Still, room temp superconductor. Gotta be a few uses for that if they can figure it out.  :fap:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on January 31, 2017, 04:30:38 AM
'Scientists divided over whether 'Furku.Al' rock inscription is genuinely the work of Vikings'

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/22/scientists-divided-whether-furkual-rock-inscription-genuinely/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on January 31, 2017, 02:18:25 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on January 31, 2017, 04:30:38 AM
'Scientists divided over whether 'Furku.Al' rock inscription is genuinely the work of Vikings'

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/22/scientists-divided-whether-furkual-rock-inscription-genuinely/

Well, here's something that won't affect anyone's life in any meaningful way.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on February 09, 2017, 04:38:23 PM
"Students brew beer using 5,000-year-old recipe from China"

http://www.upi.com/Science_News/2017/02/08/Students-brew-beer-using-5000-year-old-recipe-from-China/8011486564013/


Who says Archaeology is a useless science?!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on February 12, 2017, 07:35:25 PM
Dammit, I've been reading too much politics and missed this sad and statistically significant item

http://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/notable-deaths-in-2017/2/

QuoteSwedish academic, doctor and statistician Hans Rosling (July 27, 1948-February 7, 2017) captured the world's attention though his original and entertaining presentations of data on such topics as population growth, child mortality, poverty, and misunderstandings about the developing world.

Co-founder of the Gapminder foundation, Rosling called his role that of an "edutainer." His 2006 TED Talk, titled "The Best Stats You've Ever Seen," has racked up more than 11 million views.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 12, 2017, 11:47:15 PM
Quote from: MMIX on February 12, 2017, 07:35:25 PM
Dammit, I've been reading too much politics and missed this sad and statistically significant item

http://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/notable-deaths-in-2017/2/

QuoteSwedish academic, doctor and statistician Hans Rosling (July 27, 1948-February 7, 2017) captured the world's attention though his original and entertaining presentations of data on such topics as population growth, child mortality, poverty, and misunderstandings about the developing world.

Co-founder of the Gapminder foundation, Rosling called his role that of an "edutainer." His 2006 TED Talk, titled "The Best Stats You've Ever Seen," has racked up more than 11 million views.

Aw. :(
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on February 28, 2017, 09:26:50 PM
"From rocks in Colorado, evidence of a 'chaotic solar system'"

The short YouTube clip is particularly interesting.

http://news.wisc.edu/from-rocks-in-colorado-evidence-of-a-chaotic-solar-system/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on March 16, 2017, 12:01:51 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on February 12, 2017, 11:47:15 PM
Quote from: MMIX on February 12, 2017, 07:35:25 PM
Dammit, I've been reading too much politics and missed this sad and statistically significant item

http://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/notable-deaths-in-2017/2/

QuoteSwedish academic, doctor and statistician Hans Rosling (July 27, 1948-February 7, 2017) captured the world's attention though his original and entertaining presentations of data on such topics as population growth, child mortality, poverty, and misunderstandings about the developing world.

Co-founder of the Gapminder foundation, Rosling called his role that of an "edutainer." His 2006 TED Talk, titled "The Best Stats You've Ever Seen," has racked up more than 11 million views.

Aw. :(

Reaching out from the beyond Prof Rosling offers some challenging last insights:-
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-39211144
QuoteGovernments can't run bedrooms. Bedrooms run the world.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on March 21, 2017, 05:52:56 PM
Deepmind knocks it out the park again (https://www.technologyreview.com/s/603868/how-deepminds-memory-trick-helps-ai-learn-faster/). Pretty much the only thing worth talking about in the ML community since AlphaGo, in terms of where it goes next,  has been episodic memory. Lot of labs trying to develop solutions. This is pretty f'kin awesome.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on March 23, 2017, 02:44:37 AM
"Humans as Agents in the Termination of the African Humid Period"

A number of popular science websites made passing references to this paper about the formation of the Sahara Desert in the past couple of weeks, but did not include much from the paper itself.

I'm not well read in the field of anthropology, and have no knowledge of Dr. David K. Wright's reputation, but I found the following paper to be particularly interesting:

http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/feart.2017.00004/full

In his Conclusion, Dr. Wright states, "Human-induced landscape pressures are as old as humanity itself. Although there is little doubt that post-Industrial anthropogenic activities have placed more global stress on the environment than for the millions of preceding years, human impacts are not concisely restricted to the post-Industrial world."
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on March 23, 2017, 02:53:08 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on March 23, 2017, 02:44:37 AM
"Humans as Agents in the Termination of the African Humid Period"

A number of popular science websites made passing references to this paper about the formation of the Sahara Desert in the past couple of weeks, but did not include much from the paper itself.

I'm not well read in the field of anthropology, and have no knowledge of Dr. David K. Wright's reputation, but I found the following paper to be particularly interesting:

http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/feart.2017.00004/full

In his Conclusion, Dr. Wright states, "Human-induced landscape pressures are as old as humanity itself. Although there is little doubt that post-Industrial anthropogenic activities have placed more global stress on the environment than for the millions of preceding years, human impacts are not concisely restricted to the post-Industrial world."

IE, "Goat-herding will tear shit up".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on April 04, 2017, 10:52:14 AM
"Explaining the accelerating expansion of the universe without dark energy"

"In the new work, the researchers, led by Phd student Gábor Rácz of Eötvös Loránd University in Hungary, question the existence of dark energy and suggest an alternative explanation. They argue that conventional models of cosmology (the study of the origin and evolution of the universe), rely on approximations that ignore its structure, and where matter is assumed to have a uniform density."

They further write:

"In practice, normal and dark matter appear to fill the universe with a foam-like structure, where galaxies are located on the thin walls between bubbles, and are grouped into superclusters. The insides of the bubbles are in contrast almost empty of both kinds of matter."

Here's the link to the article: http://www.ras.org.uk/news-and-press/2968-explaining-the-accelerating-expansion-of-the-universe-without-dark-energy

Hardcore students of cosmology can download the complete paper at: https://arxiv.org/abs/1607.08797
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 05, 2017, 05:31:57 PM
This was pretty neat:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/04/170404160034.htm
(https://images.sciencedaily.com/2017/04/170404160034_1_540x360.jpg)
QuoteResearchers are analyzing DNA from ancient individuals found in southeast Alaska, coastal British Columbia, Washington state and Montana. A new genetic analysis of some of these human remains finds that many of today's indigenous peoples living in the same regions are descendants of ancient individuals dating to at least 10,300 years ago.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 05, 2017, 05:33:35 PM
Also, using bacteria to purify water. Ingenious!

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/04/170404084433.htm
QuoteA new system that uses bacteria to turn non-potable water into drinking water will be tested next week in West Vancouver prior to being installed in remote communities in Canada and beyond.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on April 06, 2017, 11:49:33 AM
'Research challenges understanding of quantum theory'

"Researchers at the University of East Anglia (UEA) have shown that when photons – the fundamental particles of light – are created in pairs, they can emerge from different, rather than the same, location."

"The ground-breaking research could have significant implications for quantum physics, the theoretical basis of modern physics. Until now, the general assumption was that such photon pairs necessarily originate from single points in space."

Here's the link to the press release: https://www.uea.ac.uk/about/-/light-particles-challenges-understanding-of-quantum-theory

Unfortunately, the press release provides no quantitative data about the distance between the photon pair emergence points. And, the research paper itself appears to be only available for purchase from the journal Physical Review Letters.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on April 13, 2017, 01:49:42 PM
"Found: Fresh Clues to Mystery of King Solomon's Mines"

Whether or not one believes in the authenticity of the biblical story, it is significant that people went to such effort to mine and smelt copper, 3,000 years ago, in such an inhospitable place. (And, it's amazing what archeologist can learn from old animal waste.)

Here's the link to the article: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017/03/king-solomon-mines-bible-timna-dung/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 18, 2017, 11:22:44 AM
Fucking magnets. How do you simulate them?  :eek:

QuoteMaterial scientists have predicted and built two new magnetic materials, atom-by-atom, using high-throughput computational models. The success marks a new era for the large-scale design of new magnetic materials at unprecedented speed.

http://pratt.duke.edu/about/news/predicting-magnets (http://pratt.duke.edu/about/news/predicting-magnets)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on April 18, 2017, 02:54:17 PM
"Physicists discover hidden aspects of electrodynamics"

From the article:

'Maxwell's theory displays a remarkable feature: it remains unaltered under the interchange of the electric and magnetic fields, when charges and currents are not present. This symmetry is called the electric-magnetic duality.

However, while electric charges exist, magnetic charges have never been observed in nature. If magnetic charges do not exist, the symmetry also cannot exist. This mystery has motivated physicists to search for magnetic charges, or magnetic monopoles. However, no one has been successful. Agullo and his colleagues may have discovered why.

"Gravity spoils the symmetry regardless of whether magnetic monopoles exist or not. This is shocking. The bottom line is that the symmetry cannot exist in our universe at the fundamental level because gravity is everywhere," Agullo said.'

Here's the link to the article: https://phys.org/news/2017-04-physicists-hidden-aspects-electrodynamics.html

Hardcore physics students can download the formal paper here: https://arxiv.org/abs/1607.08879?context=hep-th

I found this interesting because my old physics textbooks only said 'In magnetism isolated magnetic "poles," which would correspond to isolated electric charges, apparently do not exist.' No explanation, or theory, was offered as to why magnetic monopoles "apparently do not exist."
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Wizard Joseph on April 18, 2017, 03:07:07 PM
So the eternal question "Magnets, how the fuck do they work?" remains as yet not fully answered by Science.

Well then.  :lol:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on April 18, 2017, 03:11:29 PM
Did you know scientists once turned up at an ICP concert offering to teach attendees the answers to such questions?

I didn't until a few days ago and I'm hoping there's video of this somewhere.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 18, 2017, 03:42:13 PM
Personally I'd question the calibre of any scientist who figured turning up at an ICP gig to lecture on magnetism was a good use of their time. Kinda like that old Groucho quote about refusing to join any club that would have him as a member.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Wizard Joseph on April 18, 2017, 05:33:04 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 18, 2017, 03:42:13 PM
Personally I'd question the calibre of any scientist who figured turning up at an ICP gig to lecture on magnetism was a good use of their time. Kinda like that old Groucho quote about refusing to join any club that would have him as a member.

That's a good policy :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 18, 2017, 10:00:39 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 18, 2017, 03:42:13 PM
Personally I'd question the calibre of any scientist who figured turning up at an ICP gig to lecture on magnetism was a good use of their time. Kinda like that old Groucho quote about refusing to join any club that would have him as a member.

You would be surprised. Maybe.

Scientists tend to have very odd senses of humor, and NSF grants have an outreach requirement.

Showing up at an ICP concert to teach Juggalos about magnets totally counts toward that requirement.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on April 18, 2017, 10:55:02 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 18, 2017, 10:00:39 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 18, 2017, 03:42:13 PM
Personally I'd question the calibre of any scientist who figured turning up at an ICP gig to lecture on magnetism was a good use of their time. Kinda like that old Groucho quote about refusing to join any club that would have him as a member.

You would be surprised. Maybe.

Scientists tend to have very odd senses of humor, and NSF grants have an outreach requirement.

Showing up at an ICP concert to teach Juggalos about magnets totally counts toward that requirement.

I retract my previous statement in light of new evidence that suggests these dudes may well have known exactly what they were doing  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 18, 2017, 11:03:36 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 18, 2017, 10:55:02 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 18, 2017, 10:00:39 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on April 18, 2017, 03:42:13 PM
Personally I'd question the calibre of any scientist who figured turning up at an ICP gig to lecture on magnetism was a good use of their time. Kinda like that old Groucho quote about refusing to join any club that would have him as a member.

You would be surprised. Maybe.

Scientists tend to have very odd senses of humor, and NSF grants have an outreach requirement.

Showing up at an ICP concert to teach Juggalos about magnets totally counts toward that requirement.

I retract my previous statement in light of new evidence that suggests these dudes may well have known exactly what they were doing  :lulz:

Scientists: Trolling the NSF the whole time.  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on April 21, 2017, 03:28:04 PM
Not all heroic stories have happy endings; sometimes a person just has to do what a person has to do
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2017/04/explaining_science_won_t_fix_information_illiteracy.html

QuoteTHE STATE OF THE UNIVERSE.APRIL 21 2017 5:58 AM
Donald Trump Should Not Appoint a Science Adviser
He doesn't deserve one, and it's more likely to be a sham than a help.

QuoteJack Marburger martyred himself for science and for his country. From the outside, he looked like a traitor who loaned his scientific credibility to an administration that exploited it to undermine science policy and even the legitimacy of science itself. His accomplishments were kept secret, and he was hung out to dry for the mistakes of others. The unfortunate scientist who agrees to work with Donald Trump can expect even worse.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on April 21, 2017, 03:36:43 PM
:twitch:

The role of Science Advisor comes with the position of Director for the Office of Science and Technology Policy.  That means they control the budget and policies for science and technology across the nation.  Being the Science Advisor is incredibly minor compared to being responsible for the entire federal funding for science.

And, as he said at the time, "If I don't take the job, can I trust the next guy down the line to do it right?"



Caveat:  I may take this personally.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on April 21, 2017, 04:28:29 PM
I never know how to take you LMNO. This article brought a tear to my eye, it made you :twitch:, whatever.
I'm pretty sure I'm missing something in your reply. The article positions us at a very uncomfortable point in history [yeah, like we hadn't already noticed] but I thought it offered some interesting observations on where we are on the science front.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on April 21, 2017, 04:38:33 PM
Oh, wait.  The article you linked is not the article you quoted...

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2017/04/trump_should_not_appoint_a_science_adviser.html

To explain my emotional reaction that may have clouded my judgement, Marburger was my dad.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on April 21, 2017, 04:57:19 PM
My apologies for the wrong link LMNO, my bad. Yes I realise you are Jack Marburger's son. If he was my dad the article I MEANT to link would have made me deeply proud [though over the years your comments suggest that your parental pride levels have already hit 169%] But the article was also profoundly depressing in may ways both from an historical and future perspective. For that reason it seemed worth the link, I hope you agree.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on April 21, 2017, 05:30:20 PM
Yeah, I agree; I had an emotional flinch.  Disregard previous posts.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on April 21, 2017, 05:31:28 PM
Disregarded. Resist. Peace
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:21:42 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on April 18, 2017, 02:54:17 PM
However, while electric charges exist, magnetic charges have never been observed in nature.

WAIT... what?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lodestone
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:33:59 AM
Quote from: MMIX on April 21, 2017, 03:28:04 PM
Not all heroic stories have happy endings; sometimes a person just has to do what a person has to do
http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2017/04/explaining_science_won_t_fix_information_illiteracy.html

The person who wrote this has literally no idea what science communication is or what science communicators are trying to do. Like, not even a little bit. I wonder if it occurred to them to talk to any of the people who run, oh, I don't know, ComSciCon, or NW Noggin, or Science Pub, or a science outreach club at any university anywhere in the world, and ask them what they do and whether he could attend one of their events? I mean, he literally wrote this as if he sat in his study and thought to himself, "What is it that science communicators do, anyway?" and when he had thought about it long enough to generate an idea, he just ran with it from there.

I taught 5th grade kids brain games for a summer. I work a kid's table at the zoo. My labmate is doing a fellowship helping the State of Oregon with marine wildlife policy. There are new associations springing up with the specific aim of getting scientists into government.

This writer is not an idiot, he's just mysteriously, bafflingly clueless.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:35:32 AM
Maybe he's just been buried under grading and grantwriting for so long he hasn't noticed?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:43:47 AM
Quote from: LMNO on April 21, 2017, 04:38:33 PM
Oh, wait.  The article you linked is not the article you quoted...

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2017/04/trump_should_not_appoint_a_science_adviser.html

To explain my emotional reaction that may have clouded my judgement, Marburger was my dad.

Holy shit, he was a hero. An actual real-life hero. That is exactly the kind of person I would want to be if I had the chance. I think that is the most badass Discordia I've ever heard about.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on April 22, 2017, 06:32:53 AM
Quote from: LMNO on April 21, 2017, 04:38:33 PM
Oh, wait.  The article you linked is not the article you quoted...

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2017/04/trump_should_not_appoint_a_science_adviser.html

To explain my emotional reaction that may have clouded my judgement, Marburger was my dad.

I had no idea that your dad was that Jack Marburger.  Holy shit, your dad was a bona-fide hero.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on April 22, 2017, 08:22:53 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on April 22, 2017, 06:32:53 AM
Quote from: LMNO on April 21, 2017, 04:38:33 PM
Oh, wait.  The article you linked is not the article you quoted...

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2017/04/trump_should_not_appoint_a_science_adviser.html

To explain my emotional reaction that may have clouded my judgement, Marburger was my dad.

I had no idea that your dad was that Jack Marburger.  Holy shit, your dad was a bona-fide hero.

That's what I said
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on April 22, 2017, 04:02:45 PM
Thanks, all. I miss him a lot.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on April 22, 2017, 04:15:15 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on April 22, 2017, 06:32:53 AM
Quote from: LMNO on April 21, 2017, 04:38:33 PM
Oh, wait.  The article you linked is not the article you quoted...

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2017/04/trump_should_not_appoint_a_science_adviser.html

To explain my emotional reaction that may have clouded my judgement, Marburger was my dad.

I had no idea that your dad was that Jack Marburger.  Holy shit, your dad was a bona-fide hero.

Pretty much this.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 07:56:05 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on April 22, 2017, 04:15:15 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on April 22, 2017, 06:32:53 AM
Quote from: LMNO on April 21, 2017, 04:38:33 PM
Oh, wait.  The article you linked is not the article you quoted...

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/science/2017/04/trump_should_not_appoint_a_science_adviser.html

To explain my emotional reaction that may have clouded my judgement, Marburger was my dad.

I had no idea that your dad was that Jack Marburger.  Holy shit, your dad was a bona-fide hero.

Pretty much this.

I knew who he was, I just had no idea about all the behind-the-scenes stuff. That was brilliant, and it shows true dedication to doing good. It couldn't have been easy for him to let his public reputation endure so much excoriation while quietly working around the President's ignorance to strengthen science policy where it would count.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on May 08, 2017, 02:02:51 PM
Interestingly enough, all that mattered is that his friends and family knew; he also had a superhuman ability to explain himself to people, and they'd end up understanding and agreeing with him.

He also used to cut down trees with a small Japanese handsaw, for fun.  I'm thinking it was a form of stress relief.


Memories of him, bald from the chemo, looking at me with a twinkle in his eye and a half-grin, saying, "Son, the doctors won't let me cut down trees anymore, because I have cancer." You can probably guess that didn't stop him.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 08, 2017, 09:21:12 PM
Jet stream shenanigans leading to some extreme weather patterns. (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2017/05/04/the-jet-stream-is-about-to-get-weird-and-it-could-lead-to-extreme-weather/) I guess that would explain why we had a frost last night, on the 7th of May, which is past the 95% confidence interval date for our location. And why we had to bring the garden pots inside last night.

Fish eye mind control parasite, another example of why evolution is not kind. (https://www.newscientist.com/article/2129880-parasite-living-inside-fish-eyeball-controls-its-behaviour/)

Pumping cold sea water onto arctic ice during winter. (https://www.sciencenews.org/article/radical-idea-could-restore-ice-arctic-ocean) However, refreezing the arctic ocean wouldn't do much to the feedback cycle of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Nor would it reduce sea level rise, which is largely from glaciers on Greenland and Antarctica.




Also, hi. I'm a little surprised to see this thread is still going. I feel good about that, actually. And nervous to be here after so long.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on May 08, 2017, 10:28:01 PM
Kai lives!

I remember you had something big worded so you were not a total ads. As long as you don't whip out zerohedge links you'll be fine.

And the fish eye thing is a great example of evolution not being a March to sparkles and sunshine.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: MMIX on May 09, 2017, 11:45:11 AM
Quote from: Kai on May 08, 2017, 09:21:12 PM

Pumping cold sea water onto arctic ice during winter. (https://www.sciencenews.org/article/radical-idea-could-restore-ice-arctic-ocean) However, refreezing the arctic ocean wouldn't do much to the feedback cycle of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Nor would it reduce sea level rise, which is largely from glaciers on Greenland and Antarctica.

He has surely got one thing right though:
Quote"There'll be a time, 10 to 15 years from now, when Arctic sea ice will be accelerating to oblivion, and there'll be political will to do something about climate change," Desch says. 

Quote"We need to have this figured out by the time people are ready to do something."   

Also: Nice to see you back Kai - MMIX/ St Mysteria
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on May 09, 2017, 01:06:36 PM
Kai!  Hello!  How's your science?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 09, 2017, 01:46:05 PM
Quote from: LMNO on May 09, 2017, 01:06:36 PM
Kai!  Hello!  How's your science?

Kuhnian. And full of eldritch genitalia.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on May 09, 2017, 01:59:06 PM
You get all the neat jobs.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 11, 2017, 12:51:22 AM
A great profile of an entomologist who regularly deals with cases of delusional parasitosis. (https://www.statnews.com/2017/03/22/insect-delusional-parasitosis-entomology/) When you are known as a public entomologist, you get asked to diagnose such things. Thankfully, I haven't dealt with this yet. Sad fact: While the majority of these people are treatable with anti-psychotics, the majority will never accept that treatment.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2017, 04:08:09 AM
Quote from: LMNO on May 09, 2017, 01:59:06 PM
You get all the neat jobs.

*ahem*
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on May 11, 2017, 04:01:10 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2017, 04:08:09 AM
Quote from: LMNO on May 09, 2017, 01:59:06 PM
You get all the neat jobs.

*ahem*

Rephrase: You get sumbunall the neat jobs.





:runs away:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 12, 2017, 02:04:43 AM
Quote from: LMNO on May 11, 2017, 04:01:10 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2017, 04:08:09 AM
Quote from: LMNO on May 09, 2017, 01:59:06 PM
You get all the neat jobs.

*ahem*

Rephrase: You get sumbunall the neat jobs.





:runs away:

:crankey:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on May 12, 2017, 01:11:14 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 12, 2017, 02:04:43 AM
Quote from: LMNO on May 11, 2017, 04:01:10 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on May 11, 2017, 04:08:09 AM
Quote from: LMNO on May 09, 2017, 01:59:06 PM
You get all the neat jobs.

*ahem*

Rephrase: You get sumbunall the neat jobs.





:runs away:

:crankey:

8)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 17, 2017, 12:20:07 AM
Howdy, Kai!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Kai on May 17, 2017, 02:47:22 AM
Hi Nigel. :)

Space rocks made into beads 2000 years ago and then transported 700 km only to be buried in the ground. (https://www.nature.com/news/beads-made-from-meteorite-reveal-prehistoric-culture-s-reach-1.21990) I like the progression accruing of knowledge in this story. I mean, it's no surprise that major trade happened in that time, but it's nice having evidence of where and how far.

UC Berkeley researchers find there are some common plant chemicals that shut down the rotor motor (Catsper) for sperm tails. (https://www.wired.com/2017/05/scientists-found-sperms-power-switch-way-turn-off/) Potential for new contraceptives?

By complete chance, the Chicxulub asteroid could not have impacted a worse place for the biosphere. (http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-39922998) A few minutes difference would have been ocean, either way, which probably wouldn't have blocked the sun for weeks or more, and we'd probably still be rodent sized. On second thought, maybe chance was in our favor?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on May 18, 2017, 09:07:36 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:21:42 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on April 18, 2017, 02:54:17 PM
However, while electric charges exist, magnetic charges have never been observed in nature.

WAIT... what?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lodestone

Yes, "Magnetic Fields" certainly do exist in nature, and they are routinely created by the flow of electricity through a wire. 

But, think of this as "Magnetic Charges" versus "Magnetic Fields."

In electricity and magnetism, "Charges" and "Fields" are related phenomena. But, they are also different phenomena.
 


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 21, 2017, 06:15:08 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on May 18, 2017, 09:07:36 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:21:42 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on April 18, 2017, 02:54:17 PM
However, while electric charges exist, magnetic charges have never been observed in nature.

WAIT... what?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lodestone

Yes, "Magnetic Fields" certainly do exist in nature, and they are routinely created by the flow of electricity through a wire. 

But, think of this as "Magnetic Charges" versus "Magnetic Fields."

In electricity and magnetism, "Charges" and "Fields" are related phenomena. But, they are also different phenomena.


What in the fuck are you babbling about? Yes, a magnetic charge and a magnetic field are different, but you can't have a magnetic field without a magnetic charge, so you're still just amazingly wrong. Have you taken physics or chemistry?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on May 23, 2017, 12:48:34 AM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 21, 2017, 06:15:08 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on May 18, 2017, 09:07:36 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:21:42 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on April 18, 2017, 02:54:17 PM
However, while electric charges exist, magnetic charges have never been observed in nature.

WAIT... what?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lodestone

Yes, "Magnetic Fields" certainly do exist in nature, and they are routinely created by the flow of electricity through a wire. 

But, think of this as "Magnetic Charges" versus "Magnetic Fields."

In electricity and magnetism, "Charges" and "Fields" are related phenomena. But, they are also different phenomena.


What in the fuck are you babbling about? Yes, a magnetic charge and a magnetic field are different, but you can't have a magnetic field without a magnetic charge, so you're still just amazingly wrong. Have you taken physics or chemistry?

For what it's worth, I've taken seven (7) quarterly semesters of university level physics, four (4) of them with labs. (That includes one (1) semester, my fourth (4th), entirely dedicated to electricity and magnetism.)

And, I've taken three (3) quarterly semesters of university level chemistry, worth 4.5 credits per semester, all of them with labs worth an additional .5 credits per semester.

Following is a link to the list of SI Electromagnetism Units.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SI_electromagnetism_units

Let me know if you find a unit for "Magnetic Charge" on that list.

Hint: There's a reason why you won't find a unit for "Magnetic Charge" there, or anywhere else.   
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on May 25, 2017, 12:30:15 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on May 23, 2017, 12:48:34 AM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 21, 2017, 06:15:08 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on May 18, 2017, 09:07:36 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:21:42 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on April 18, 2017, 02:54:17 PM
However, while electric charges exist, magnetic charges have never been observed in nature.

WAIT... what?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lodestone

Yes, "Magnetic Fields" certainly do exist in nature, and they are routinely created by the flow of electricity through a wire. 

But, think of this as "Magnetic Charges" versus "Magnetic Fields."

In electricity and magnetism, "Charges" and "Fields" are related phenomena. But, they are also different phenomena.


What in the fuck are you babbling about? Yes, a magnetic charge and a magnetic field are different, but you can't have a magnetic field without a magnetic charge, so you're still just amazingly wrong. Have you taken physics or chemistry?

For what it's worth, I've taken seven (7) quarterly semesters of university level physics, four (4) of them with labs. (That includes one (1) semester, my fourth (4th), entirely dedicated to electricity and magnetism.)

And, I've taken three (3) quarterly semesters of university level chemistry, worth 4.5 credits per semester, all of them with labs worth an additional .5 credits per semester.

Following is a link to the list of SI Electromagnetism Units.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SI_electromagnetism_units

Let me know if you find a unit for "Magnetic Charge" on that list.

Hint: There's a reason why you won't find a unit for "Magnetic Charge" there, or anywhere else.

It occurs to me that your introduction of the "magnetic charge" is much too profound a revelation to be left to linger in the fetid darkness that is this forum. I believe you owe it to the scientific community to bring your revelation to their attention. After all, Gauss missed it when he formulated Gauss's law for magnetism. Maxwell missed it when he put his four (4) equations of classical electromagnetism together. And, even Einstein missed it while studying Maxwell's equations to formulate his theory of special relativity.

In fact, your introduction of the "magnetic charge" is so profound, I recommend you skip publishing on arXiv.org and send your manuscript directly to Nature. (Here's the link to their FOR AUTHORS page: http://www.nature.com/nature/authors/index.html)

Now, it typically takes Nature a couple to a few months to get around to publishing a newly submitted manuscript, so you're probably not going to make the short list for the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2017. But, on the bright side, those dark energy and dark matter guys aren't likely to get anywhere soon. So, you'll be a shoo-in for 2018. And, you probably won't even have to share the prize money with anyone! After all, they gave a Nobel to Millikan for just measuring elementary "electrical charge," and he didn't even theorize or discover "electrical charge."

Now, the bad news: under normal circumstances, the scientific community would further honor you, immortalize you in fact, by naming the unit of "magnetic charge" the Nigel. Unfortunately, the letter N is already being used to denote the SI unit of force, the Newton. And, the letter m is already being used to denote the SI unit of length, the meter. But, the letter U isn't currently being used for anything, so I suggest that you could request the unit of "magnetic charge" to be denoted as the "Unicorn." (Years ago I saw what was advertised to be a unicorn at the circus. But, to be honest, I think it was just a goat with something that kind of looked like a horn glued to its head.) Anyway, my thinking is that since "magnetic charge" is every bit as rare as unicorns, the name is appropriate.

You're welcome.   
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on May 25, 2017, 12:32:54 AM
Science is kinda fluid around here.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 08, 2017, 07:50:40 PM
Neural lace is a bit further along than I'd realised (https://www.nds.ox.ac.uk/news/researchers-take-major-step-forward-in-artificial-intelligence)  :eek:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on June 09, 2017, 02:45:55 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on May 25, 2017, 12:30:15 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on May 23, 2017, 12:48:34 AM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on May 21, 2017, 06:15:08 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on May 18, 2017, 09:07:36 PM
Quote from: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on April 22, 2017, 02:21:42 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on April 18, 2017, 02:54:17 PM
However, while electric charges exist, magnetic charges have never been observed in nature.

WAIT... what?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lodestone

Yes, "Magnetic Fields" certainly do exist in nature, and they are routinely created by the flow of electricity through a wire. 

But, think of this as "Magnetic Charges" versus "Magnetic Fields."

In electricity and magnetism, "Charges" and "Fields" are related phenomena. But, they are also different phenomena.


What in the fuck are you babbling about? Yes, a magnetic charge and a magnetic field are different, but you can't have a magnetic field without a magnetic charge, so you're still just amazingly wrong. Have you taken physics or chemistry?

For what it's worth, I've taken seven (7) quarterly semesters of university level physics, four (4) of them with labs. (That includes one (1) semester, my fourth (4th), entirely dedicated to electricity and magnetism.)

And, I've taken three (3) quarterly semesters of university level chemistry, worth 4.5 credits per semester, all of them with labs worth an additional .5 credits per semester.

Following is a link to the list of SI Electromagnetism Units.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SI_electromagnetism_units

Let me know if you find a unit for "Magnetic Charge" on that list.

Hint: There's a reason why you won't find a unit for "Magnetic Charge" there, or anywhere else.

It occurs to me that your introduction of the "magnetic charge" is much too profound a revelation to be left to linger in the fetid darkness that is this forum. I believe you owe it to the scientific community to bring your revelation to their attention. After all, Gauss missed it when he formulated Gauss's law for magnetism. Maxwell missed it when he put his four (4) equations of classical electromagnetism together. And, even Einstein missed it while studying Maxwell's equations to formulate his theory of special relativity.

In fact, your introduction of the "magnetic charge" is so profound, I recommend you skip publishing on arXiv.org and send your manuscript directly to Nature. (Here's the link to their FOR AUTHORS page: http://www.nature.com/nature/authors/index.html)

Now, it typically takes Nature a couple to a few months to get around to publishing a newly submitted manuscript, so you're probably not going to make the short list for the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2017. But, on the bright side, those dark energy and dark matter guys aren't likely to get anywhere soon. So, you'll be a shoo-in for 2018. And, you probably won't even have to share the prize money with anyone! After all, they gave a Nobel to Millikan for just measuring elementary "electrical charge," and he didn't even theorize or discover "electrical charge."

Now, the bad news: under normal circumstances, the scientific community would further honor you, immortalize you in fact, by naming the unit of "magnetic charge" the Nigel. Unfortunately, the letter N is already being used to denote the SI unit of force, the Newton. And, the letter m is already being used to denote the SI unit of length, the meter. But, the letter U isn't currently being used for anything, so I suggest that you could request the unit of "magnetic charge" to be denoted as the "Unicorn." (Years ago I saw what was advertised to be a unicorn at the circus. But, to be honest, I think it was just a goat with something that kind of looked like a horn glued to its head.) Anyway, my thinking is that since "magnetic charge" is every bit as rare as unicorns, the name is appropriate.

You're welcome.   

So you're shifting your argument away from "magnetic charge" and specifying that no magnetic monopoles have been found in nature? Well that's true. Have you ever considered being precise in your use of language?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 13, 2017, 07:34:46 AM
Good luck with that Nobel, Nigel!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 14, 2017, 02:16:58 AM
 :peedee:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 15, 2017, 09:12:24 AM
"New evidence that all stars are born in pairs"

As per the article:

'Astronomers have even searched for a companion to our sun, a star dubbed Nemesis because it was supposed to have kicked an asteroid into Earth's orbit that collided with our planet and exterminated the dinosaurs. It has never been found.

The new assertion is based on a radio survey of a giant molecular cloud filled with recently formed stars in the constellation Perseus, and a mathematical model that can explain the Perseus observations only if all sunlike stars are born with a companion.

"We are saying, yes, there probably was a Nemesis, a long time ago," said co-author Steven Stahler, a UC Berkeley research astronomer.

"We ran a series of statistical models to see if we could account for the relative populations of young single stars and binaries of all separations in the Perseus molecular cloud, and the only model that could reproduce the data was one in which all stars form initially as wide binaries. These systems then either shrink or break apart within a million years."'

Here's the link to the article: http://news.berkeley.edu/2017/06/13/new-evidence-that-all-stars-are-born-in-pairs/

And, for hardcore astronomy students, here's the link to the original arXiv.org paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.00049
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 15, 2017, 11:43:08 PM
Impressive monkeybrain hacking (https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/06/170601124002.htm) :eek:

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: 00.dusk on June 15, 2017, 11:56:01 PM
So monkey brains (and, by extension, very probably /our own/) literally encode faces in the same exact way that a Bethesda RPG encodes faces. That is astounding and hilarious.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 16, 2017, 03:21:55 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 15, 2017, 09:12:24 AM
"New evidence that all stars are born in pairs"

As per the article:

'Astronomers have even searched for a companion to our sun, a star dubbed Nemesis because it was supposed to have kicked an asteroid into Earth's orbit that collided with our planet and exterminated the dinosaurs. It has never been found.

The new assertion is based on a radio survey of a giant molecular cloud filled with recently formed stars in the constellation Perseus, and a mathematical model that can explain the Perseus observations only if all sunlike stars are born with a companion.

"We are saying, yes, there probably was a Nemesis, a long time ago," said co-author Steven Stahler, a UC Berkeley research astronomer.

"We ran a series of statistical models to see if we could account for the relative populations of young single stars and binaries of all separations in the Perseus molecular cloud, and the only model that could reproduce the data was one in which all stars form initially as wide binaries. These systems then either shrink or break apart within a million years."'

Here's the link to the article: http://news.berkeley.edu/2017/06/13/new-evidence-that-all-stars-are-born-in-pairs/

And, for hardcore astronomy students, here's the link to the original arXiv.org paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.00049

By shrinking, I assume they mean one star/big mass ate the other?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 16, 2017, 06:30:15 AM
Quote from: 00.dusk on June 15, 2017, 11:56:01 PM
So monkey brains (and, by extension, very probably /our own/) literally encode faces in the same exact way that a Bethesda RPG encodes faces. That is astounding and hilarious.

This was totally not wasted on me  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on June 17, 2017, 07:56:11 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on June 15, 2017, 11:43:08 PM
Impressive monkeybrain hacking (https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/06/170601124002.htm) :eek:

Pandemonium processing is cool stuff.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on June 18, 2017, 05:01:37 PM
This is also cool as fuck: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/06/170610134818.htm
QuoteInterim results from a FDA-approved clinical trial testing the generic vaccine bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) to reverse advanced type 1 diabetes are being presented at the 75th Scientific Sessions of the American Diabetes Association. The data demonstrate a potential new mechanism by which the BCG vaccine may restore the proper immune response to the insulin-secreting islet cells of the pancreas. Presented by Denise Faustman, MD, PhD, director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Immunobiology Laboratory and principal investigator of the trial, the findings suggest that BCG may induce a permanent increase in expression of genes that restore the beneficial regulatory T cells (Tregs) that prevent the immune system from attacking the body's own tissue. The results are being presented on Saturday, June 10.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Mesozoic Mister Nigel on June 18, 2017, 05:19:25 PM
Particularly relevant to Salty's interests:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/06/170608124706.htm
QuoteConsumer attitudes are being put to the test at Adelaide Central Market with an offering of roasted crickets and ants, mealworm cookies and cricket energy bars.

"We want to further investigate consumers' attitudes towards edible insects, evaluate taste preferences and consumers' willingness to buy such products," says Postdoctoral Fellow Dr Anna Crump, who's working on the project with project leader Associate Professor Kerry Wilkinson and other researchers from the School of Agriculture, Food and Wine and the School of Humanities at the University of Adelaide.

"We will also be asking consumers questions relating to food neophobia -- reluctance to eat novel or new foods. We'll be interested to see if a consumer's ethnicity influences their acceptance of edible insects."

In a preliminary online survey of 820 Australian consumers, the researchers found that 20% had tried edible insects. Of those surveyed, 46% said they would be willing to try a cookie made from insect flour.

"In the earlier survey, consumers said they were most likely to try flavored or roasted insects and least likely to want to try cockroaches or spiders," Dr Crump says.

"In this taste test, we've chosen products that consumers are most likely to react positively towards -- apologies to anyone keen to try a cockroach or spider. The samples we'll be offering consumers provide a good spread of the available insect products in Australia's marketplace, some of which may be more acceptable than others."

Dr Crump says the research will help guide the development of an edible insect industry.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 20, 2017, 09:16:52 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 16, 2017, 03:21:55 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 15, 2017, 09:12:24 AM
"New evidence that all stars are born in pairs"

As per the article:

'Astronomers have even searched for a companion to our sun, a star dubbed Nemesis because it was supposed to have kicked an asteroid into Earth's orbit that collided with our planet and exterminated the dinosaurs. It has never been found.

The new assertion is based on a radio survey of a giant molecular cloud filled with recently formed stars in the constellation Perseus, and a mathematical model that can explain the Perseus observations only if all sunlike stars are born with a companion.

"We are saying, yes, there probably was a Nemesis, a long time ago," said co-author Steven Stahler, a UC Berkeley research astronomer.

"We ran a series of statistical models to see if we could account for the relative populations of young single stars and binaries of all separations in the Perseus molecular cloud, and the only model that could reproduce the data was one in which all stars form initially as wide binaries. These systems then either shrink or break apart within a million years."'

Here's the link to the article: http://news.berkeley.edu/2017/06/13/new-evidence-that-all-stars-are-born-in-pairs/

And, for hardcore astronomy students, here's the link to the original arXiv.org paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.00049

By shrinking, I assume they mean one star/big mass ate the other?

I would think that it is a possibility, but that particular scenario isn't mentioned in the arXiv.org paper.

As I understand it, the authors believe that the stars in the particular cluster they studied either circle in closer together and remain binary systems, or they separate entirely.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 20, 2017, 10:02:45 AM
X-ray Eyes in the Sky

"Researchers at UC Santa Barbara professor Yasamin Mostofi's lab have given the first demonstration of three-dimensional imaging of objects through walls using ordinary wireless signal."

Here's the link: http://www.news.ucsb.edu/2017/018068/x-ray-eyes-sky

Big Brother must be salivating over this one!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 21, 2017, 12:32:06 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 20, 2017, 09:16:52 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 16, 2017, 03:21:55 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 15, 2017, 09:12:24 AM
"New evidence that all stars are born in pairs"

As per the article:

'Astronomers have even searched for a companion to our sun, a star dubbed Nemesis because it was supposed to have kicked an asteroid into Earth's orbit that collided with our planet and exterminated the dinosaurs. It has never been found.

The new assertion is based on a radio survey of a giant molecular cloud filled with recently formed stars in the constellation Perseus, and a mathematical model that can explain the Perseus observations only if all sunlike stars are born with a companion.

"We are saying, yes, there probably was a Nemesis, a long time ago," said co-author Steven Stahler, a UC Berkeley research astronomer.

"We ran a series of statistical models to see if we could account for the relative populations of young single stars and binaries of all separations in the Perseus molecular cloud, and the only model that could reproduce the data was one in which all stars form initially as wide binaries. These systems then either shrink or break apart within a million years."'

Here's the link to the article: http://news.berkeley.edu/2017/06/13/new-evidence-that-all-stars-are-born-in-pairs/

And, for hardcore astronomy students, here's the link to the original arXiv.org paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.00049

By shrinking, I assume they mean one star/big mass ate the other?

I would think that it is a possibility, but that particular scenario isn't mentioned in the arXiv.org paper.

As I understand it, the authors believe that the stars in the particular cluster they studied either circle in closer together and remain binary systems, or they separate entirely.

Barring another big mass passing by, I am unsure how they would separate.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 21, 2017, 12:32:35 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 20, 2017, 10:02:45 AM
X-ray Eyes in the Sky

"Researchers at UC Santa Barbara professor Yasamin Mostofi's lab have given the first demonstration of three-dimensional imaging of objects through walls using ordinary wireless signal."

Here's the link: http://www.news.ucsb.edu/2017/018068/x-ray-eyes-sky

Big Brother must be salivating over this one!

This is sort of a growing field, these days.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 21, 2017, 04:06:24 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 21, 2017, 12:32:06 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 20, 2017, 09:16:52 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 16, 2017, 03:21:55 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 15, 2017, 09:12:24 AM
"New evidence that all stars are born in pairs"

As per the article:

'Astronomers have even searched for a companion to our sun, a star dubbed Nemesis because it was supposed to have kicked an asteroid into Earth's orbit that collided with our planet and exterminated the dinosaurs. It has never been found.

The new assertion is based on a radio survey of a giant molecular cloud filled with recently formed stars in the constellation Perseus, and a mathematical model that can explain the Perseus observations only if all sunlike stars are born with a companion.

"We are saying, yes, there probably was a Nemesis, a long time ago," said co-author Steven Stahler, a UC Berkeley research astronomer.

"We ran a series of statistical models to see if we could account for the relative populations of young single stars and binaries of all separations in the Perseus molecular cloud, and the only model that could reproduce the data was one in which all stars form initially as wide binaries. These systems then either shrink or break apart within a million years."'

Here's the link to the article: http://news.berkeley.edu/2017/06/13/new-evidence-that-all-stars-are-born-in-pairs/

And, for hardcore astronomy students, here's the link to the original arXiv.org paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.00049

By shrinking, I assume they mean one star/big mass ate the other?

I would think that it is a possibility, but that particular scenario isn't mentioned in the arXiv.org paper.

As I understand it, the authors believe that the stars in the particular cluster they studied either circle in closer together and remain binary systems, or they separate entirely.

Barring another big mass passing by, I am unsure how they would separate.

Have you talked about this article/paper with any of the professional astronomers you work with? If so, I would be interested in hearing their opinion(s).
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 21, 2017, 11:38:19 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 21, 2017, 04:06:24 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 21, 2017, 12:32:06 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 20, 2017, 09:16:52 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 16, 2017, 03:21:55 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 15, 2017, 09:12:24 AM
"New evidence that all stars are born in pairs"

As per the article:

'Astronomers have even searched for a companion to our sun, a star dubbed Nemesis because it was supposed to have kicked an asteroid into Earth's orbit that collided with our planet and exterminated the dinosaurs. It has never been found.

The new assertion is based on a radio survey of a giant molecular cloud filled with recently formed stars in the constellation Perseus, and a mathematical model that can explain the Perseus observations only if all sunlike stars are born with a companion.

"We are saying, yes, there probably was a Nemesis, a long time ago," said co-author Steven Stahler, a UC Berkeley research astronomer.

"We ran a series of statistical models to see if we could account for the relative populations of young single stars and binaries of all separations in the Perseus molecular cloud, and the only model that could reproduce the data was one in which all stars form initially as wide binaries. These systems then either shrink or break apart within a million years."'

Here's the link to the article: http://news.berkeley.edu/2017/06/13/new-evidence-that-all-stars-are-born-in-pairs/

And, for hardcore astronomy students, here's the link to the original arXiv.org paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.00049

By shrinking, I assume they mean one star/big mass ate the other?

I would think that it is a possibility, but that particular scenario isn't mentioned in the arXiv.org paper.

As I understand it, the authors believe that the stars in the particular cluster they studied either circle in closer together and remain binary systems, or they separate entirely.

Barring another big mass passing by, I am unsure how they would separate.

Have you talked about this article/paper with any of the professional astronomers you work with? If so, I would be interested in hearing their opinion(s).

I'm not there anymore.  I left at the beginning of the year.  I'm doing something entirely different right now, and I don't worry much about the stars.  Instead I worry about potable water, sewers, and urban failure modes.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 22, 2017, 06:03:06 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 21, 2017, 11:38:19 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 21, 2017, 04:06:24 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 21, 2017, 12:32:06 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 20, 2017, 09:16:52 AM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on June 16, 2017, 03:21:55 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 15, 2017, 09:12:24 AM
"New evidence that all stars are born in pairs"

As per the article:

'Astronomers have even searched for a companion to our sun, a star dubbed Nemesis because it was supposed to have kicked an asteroid into Earth's orbit that collided with our planet and exterminated the dinosaurs. It has never been found.

The new assertion is based on a radio survey of a giant molecular cloud filled with recently formed stars in the constellation Perseus, and a mathematical model that can explain the Perseus observations only if all sunlike stars are born with a companion.

"We are saying, yes, there probably was a Nemesis, a long time ago," said co-author Steven Stahler, a UC Berkeley research astronomer.

"We ran a series of statistical models to see if we could account for the relative populations of young single stars and binaries of all separations in the Perseus molecular cloud, and the only model that could reproduce the data was one in which all stars form initially as wide binaries. These systems then either shrink or break apart within a million years."'

Here's the link to the article: http://news.berkeley.edu/2017/06/13/new-evidence-that-all-stars-are-born-in-pairs/

And, for hardcore astronomy students, here's the link to the original arXiv.org paper: https://arxiv.org/abs/1705.00049

By shrinking, I assume they mean one star/big mass ate the other?

I would think that it is a possibility, but that particular scenario isn't mentioned in the arXiv.org paper.

As I understand it, the authors believe that the stars in the particular cluster they studied either circle in closer together and remain binary systems, or they separate entirely.

Barring another big mass passing by, I am unsure how they would separate.

Have you talked about this article/paper with any of the professional astronomers you work with? If so, I would be interested in hearing their opinion(s).

I'm not there anymore.  I left at the beginning of the year.  I'm doing something entirely different right now, and I don't worry much about the stars.  Instead I worry about potable water, sewers, and urban failure modes.

As I don't come here every day, or read all of the threads, I didn't know you had moved on. But, now that I do, I have a greater understanding of the significance of your new signature.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 23, 2017, 01:22:50 AM
Yeah, that was my first project.  The Ukrainians were kind enough to prove our case in the wild, right after we proved it in an old "atomic town" in Nevada.

:lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 27, 2017, 09:57:05 AM
Mind hacking gets an upgrade (https://www.cmu.edu/dietrich/news/news-stories/2017/june/brain-decoding-complex-thoughts.html)

Quotethe study offers new evidence that the neural dimensions of concept representation are universal across people and languages.

Ho ho ho! :evil:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on June 28, 2017, 07:39:42 PM
Craig Venter hasn't shown up on any of my feeds for a while. Looks like he's been busy 3-d printing biology from his laptop. (https://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/oct/13/craig-ventner-mars)

QuoteIf there is a pandemic, everyone around you is dying and you cannot go outdoors, you can download the vaccine in a couple of seconds from the internet," says Venter. A machine like this in hospitals, homes, and remote areas could revolutionize medicine.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 28, 2017, 08:19:03 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on June 28, 2017, 07:39:42 PM
Craig Venter hasn't shown up on any of my feeds for a while. Looks like he's been busy 3-d printing biology from his laptop. (https://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/oct/13/craig-ventner-mars)

QuoteIf there is a pandemic, everyone around you is dying and you cannot go outdoors, you can download the vaccine in a couple of seconds from the internet," says Venter. A machine like this in hospitals, homes, and remote areas could revolutionize medicine.

"The current prototype can produce only DNA, not proteins or living cells, but even that could be enough to make the device practical."

Talk about your understatements. Wow!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 29, 2017, 08:33:01 PM
"Sleeping for Centuries?"

"Is Human Hibernation Possible? Going to Sleep for Long Duration Spaceflight"


Here's a quotation from the article:

"When humans freeze, ice crystals form in our cells, rupturing them permanently. There is one line of research that offers some hope: cryogenics. This process replaces the fluids of the human body with an antifreeze agent which doesn't form the same destructive crystals.

Scientists have successfully frozen and then unfrozen 50-milliliters (almost a quarter cup) of tissue without any damage.

In the next few years, we'll probably see this technology expanded to preserving organs for transplant, and eventually entire bodies, and maybe even humans. Then this science fiction idea might actually turn into reality. We'll finally be able to sleep our way between the stars."

Here's the link: https://www.universetoday.com/136146/human-hibernation-possible-going-sleep-long-duration-spaceflight/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on June 29, 2017, 10:00:02 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 29, 2017, 08:33:01 PM
"Sleeping for Centuries?"

"Is Human Hibernation Possible? Going to Sleep for Long Duration Spaceflight"


Here's a quotation from the article:

"When humans freeze, ice crystals form in our cells, rupturing them permanently. There is one line of research that offers some hope: cryogenics. This process replaces the fluids of the human body with an antifreeze agent which doesn't form the same destructive crystals.

Scientists have successfully frozen and then unfrozen 50-milliliters (almost a quarter cup) of tissue without any damage.

In the next few years, we'll probably see this technology expanded to preserving organs for transplant, and eventually entire bodies, and maybe even humans. Then this science fiction idea might actually turn into reality. We'll finally be able to sleep our way between the stars."

Here's the link: https://www.universetoday.com/136146/human-hibernation-possible-going-sleep-long-duration-spaceflight/

Woot.  And also we can freeze historians and unfreeze them for a year every decade so they can record the changes in society.

Sure, it's rough on them, but science isn't always pretty.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on July 07, 2017, 12:24:45 PM
So we can bake normal maps onto IRL now (https://phys.org/news/2017-07-scientists-flat-surfaces-d.html)

For some reason this just totally made me giggle uncontrollaby  :lulz:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 12, 2017, 02:52:10 PM
"The Third Thumb - Winner of the Helen Hamlyn Award for Creativity."

Here's a quote from the website:

"The human thumb has a really dynamic movement, the opposing movements working together make the thumb more functional than a single finger. The Third Thumb replicates these movements by using two motors pulling against the natural tension of a flexible 3d printed material. The motors are controlled by two pressure sensors retrofitted into your shoes, under your toes, and communicate to the thumb via Bluetooth connection. The foot control is inspired by products that help to develop the already strong connection between our hands and our feet. For example driving a car, using a sewing machine, or playing a piano."

Here's the link, for those who have always dreamed of having a third thumb:
http://www.daniclodedesign.com/thethirdthumb
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: tyrannosaurus vex on July 13, 2017, 06:07:11 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 12, 2017, 02:52:10 PM
"The Third Thumb - Winner of the Helen Hamlyn Award for Creativity."

Here's a quote from the website:

"The human thumb has a really dynamic movement, the opposing movements working together make the thumb more functional than a single finger. The Third Thumb replicates these movements by using two motors pulling against the natural tension of a flexible 3d printed material. The motors are controlled by two pressure sensors retrofitted into your shoes, under your toes, and communicate to the thumb via Bluetooth connection. The foot control is inspired by products that help to develop the already strong connection between our hands and our feet. For example driving a car, using a sewing machine, or playing a piano."

Here's the link, for those who have always dreamed of having a third thumb:
http://www.daniclodedesign.com/thethirdthumb

neural link or gtfo
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Freeky on July 13, 2017, 07:45:19 AM
https://mic.com/articles/181672/an-artist-made-a-third-thumb-for-your-hand-that-makes-everything-easier?utm_campaign=social&utm_medium=future&utm_source=policymicTBLR#.eQTpYzTNW

Is this one okay (not meant to be snarky or nasty)? It actually looks really god damn cool.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: tyrannosaurus vex on July 13, 2017, 07:00:18 PM
Quote from: Freeky on July 13, 2017, 07:45:19 AM
https://mic.com/articles/181672/an-artist-made-a-third-thumb-for-your-hand-that-makes-everything-easier?utm_campaign=social&utm_medium=future&utm_source=policymicTBLR#.eQTpYzTNW

Is this one okay (not meant to be snarky or nasty)? It actually looks really god damn cool.

better. still needs a wire connected to my brain, though.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 17, 2017, 01:36:00 PM
"Water bears will survive the end of the world as we know it"

As per the article, "These tough little buggers, also known as tardigrades, could keep calm and carry on until the sun boils Earth's oceans away billions of years from now, according to a new study that examined water bears' resistance to various astronomical disasters. This finding, published July 14 in Scientific Reports, suggests that complex life can be extremely difficult to destroy, which bodes well for anyone hoping Earthlings have cosmic company."

Here's the link: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/water-bears-will-survive-end-world-we-know-it?tgt=nr

The following link, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-017-05796-x, at the bottom of the original article provides more detail.

And here I had always been told the cockroaches would inherit the Earth.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: 00.dusk on July 18, 2017, 01:46:56 PM
Article is trash. The research was done by astrophysicists and not biologists, who went into greater detail. Put bluntly, they might "survive", but only if they were already in their "tun", a dessicated state of biological suspended animation. Active tardigrades in extreme environments aren't much more durable than the average nematode. And in almost every case where everything but tardigrades die, they aren't going to last very long, if they ever even wake up. Also: different species aren't accounted for. It's kind of like saying "E. coli could be growing in the Chernobyl power plant!" because D. radiodurans is nigh impossible to kill with any sensible amount of ionizing radiation and you didn't bother separating the two.

Article here (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2017/07/14/these-animals-can-survive-until-the-end-of-the-earth-astrophysicists-say/?wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1). Still sensationalist trash up front, but it becomes quickly apparent that this was a case of someone stepping outside of their specialty and making really stupid conclusions.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 18, 2017, 11:57:36 PM
Quote from: 00.dusk on July 18, 2017, 01:46:56 PM
Article is trash. The research was done by astrophysicists and not biologists, who went into greater detail. Put bluntly, they might "survive", but only if they were already in their "tun", a dessicated state of biological suspended animation. Active tardigrades in extreme environments aren't much more durable than the average nematode. And in almost every case where everything but tardigrades die, they aren't going to last very long, if they ever even wake up. Also: different species aren't accounted for. It's kind of like saying "E. coli could be growing in the Chernobyl power plant!" because D. radiodurans is nigh impossible to kill with any sensible amount of ionizing radiation and you didn't bother separating the two.

Article here (https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2017/07/14/these-animals-can-survive-until-the-end-of-the-earth-astrophysicists-say/?wpisrc=nl_most&wpmm=1). Still sensationalist trash up front, but it becomes quickly apparent that this was a case of someone stepping outside of their specialty and making really stupid conclusions.

You are right about the authors. I checked their CVs, and none of them have any type of degree in what I call 'The Life Sciences.'

Also, I had assumed that since the article appeared on the Nature website, it had undergone peer review. But, that does not seem to be the case, as their ArXiv.org version was first submitted on 13-Jul-17, and, apparently, revised only once on 17-Jul-17.

I'll have to be more careful about this type of article in the future.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: The Good Reverend Roger on July 19, 2017, 08:36:04 AM
Junk science has become so prevalent on most media platforms, social and otherwise, that it gets increasingly difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff unless you're an expert in a particular field, or willing to spend more time than is worthwhile.

Bad signal is probably one of our greatest challenges right now.  The very real threats we face require intelligent responses, but when you take bad signal as your data, well, GIGO.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 20, 2017, 04:22:16 PM
"Link to the Past: Evidence of Humanity's Oldest Ropes Unearthed"

Yeah, I know, rope is mundane stuff in our world. But, our ancestors needed rope to move those big rocks to build Stonehenge. And, sailing boats have been dependant upon rope from the time the first one was launched. So, being able to make rope, at least, as far back as 42,000 years ago was a really big deal.

From the article, "At first glance, the discovery in Germany's Hohle Fels cave looked like it could be the mock-up for a 42,000-year-old set of brass knuckles: four carefully carved small holes placed close together on an 8-inch-long (20 centimeters) strip of mammoth ivory."

And, "Initially, the scientists interpreted the find as artwork, but archaeologists had never found anything that remotely resembled the ivory piece, the researchers said. Instead, the rifling, etched in the bone with incredible care, suggested a practical use: fiber forced through the holes could produce four strands of rope with a right-hand twist that could in turn be fashioned into a larger rope, the study said. Using a bronze casting of the artifact (it is illegal to take such objects out of Germany), Rots and her Liege staff made 10 feet (3 m) of rope in 15 minutes."

Here's the link, for anyone who might be interested: https://www.livescience.com/59756-oldest-ropes-tools-unearthed.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on August 12, 2017, 06:01:27 AM
'Nastiest' Jurassic crocodile named after Motorhead's Lemmy

"The Lemmysuchus obtusidens was a giant 19-foot long crocodile that was considered one of the 'biggest coastal predators of its time,' using its broad snout and large blunt teeth to crush shelled prey in a way that Lorna Steel, curator of London's Natural History Museum, believed would have delighted Lemmy."

Here's the link: https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2017/08/11/Nastiest-Jurassic-crocodile-named-after-Motorheads-Lemmy/7221502458844/?utm_source=sec&utm_campaign=sl&utm_medium=16
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on August 12, 2017, 02:42:32 PM
This (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLcjYL4hKEU) has been bummed up to be anything from accelerated wound healing to repairing stroke damage. Goes into human trials next year.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 13, 2017, 06:08:37 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on July 19, 2017, 08:36:04 AM
Junk science has become so prevalent on most media platforms, social and otherwise, that it gets increasingly difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff unless you're an expert in a particular field, or willing to spend more time than is worthwhile.

Bad signal is probably one of our greatest challenges right now.  The very real threats we face require intelligent responses, but when you take bad signal as your data, well, GIGO.

On the other hand it's only for the past millenium or so that there's been any appreciable amount of good signal at all (and only since the renaissance that there's been any in europe and the places they've spread to). Prior to that there were only superstitous barbarians.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Junkenstein on September 24, 2017, 11:51:37 PM
Presented without comment:

http://www.ibtimes.com/uranus-opens-closes-every-day-let-out-planets-solar-wind-study-finds-2558234
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on September 27, 2017, 10:36:34 PM
"Gravitational waves from a binary black hole merger observed by LIGO and Virgo"

This time, three different detectors picked up the gravitational waves, allowing physicists to significantly narrow down the location of the source.

Here's the link: https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/news/ligo20170927
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 13, 2017, 05:21:43 PM
"Magic mushrooms may 'reset' the brains of depressed patients"

QuotePatients taking psilocybin to treat depression show reduced symptoms weeks after treatment following a 'reset' of their brain activity.

The findings come from a study in which researchers from Imperial College London used psilocybin – the psychoactive compound that occurs naturally in magic mushrooms – to treat a small number of patients with depression in whom conventional treatment had failed.

Here's the link: http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/newsandeventspggrp/imperialcollege/newssummary/news_12-10-2017-16-22-36

And, who doesn't need a good 'reset' of their brain activity once in a while. Tell me more Mr. Scientist!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on October 13, 2017, 10:17:02 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 13, 2017, 06:08:37 PM
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on July 19, 2017, 08:36:04 AM
Junk science has become so prevalent on most media platforms, social and otherwise, that it gets increasingly difficult to separate the wheat from the chaff unless you're an expert in a particular field, or willing to spend more time than is worthwhile.

Bad signal is probably one of our greatest challenges right now.  The very real threats we face require intelligent responses, but when you take bad signal as your data, well, GIGO.

On the other hand it's only for the past millenium or so that there's been any appreciable amount of good signal at all (and only since the renaissance that there's been any in europe and the places they've spread to). Prior to that there were only superstitous barbarians.

But we aren't dealing with the bronze age.  We are dealing with the tail end of the information age.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 16, 2017, 04:11:02 PM
"Neutron star smashup seen for first time, 'transforms' understanding of Universe"

QuoteScientists have for the first time witnessed the crash of two ultra-dense neutron stars, cataclysmic events now known to have generated at least half the gold in the Universe, excited research teams revealed Monday.

Shockwaves and light flashes emitted by the cosmic fireball travelled some 130 million light-years to be captured by Earthly detectors on August 17, they revealed at simultaneous press conferences around the globe as a dozen science papers were published in top academic journals.

"We witnessed history unfolding in front of our eyes: two neutron stars drawing closer, closer... turning faster and faster around each other, then colliding and scattering debris all over the place," co-discoverer Benoit Mours of France's CNRS research institute told AFP.

The groundbreaking observation solved a number of physics riddles and sent ripples of anticipation through the scientific community.

Most jaw-dropping for many, the data finally revealed where much of the gold, platinum, mercury and other heavy elements in the Universe came from.

Telescopes saw evidence of newly-forged material in the fallout, the teams said—a source long suspected, now confirmed.

Here's a link: https://phys.org/news/2017-10-neutron-star-smash-up-discovery-lifetime.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 16, 2017, 04:49:29 PM
Northern Michigan University offers marijuana degree: "Not easy at all"

QuoteMARQUETTE, Michigan — A university in Michigan is offering an unusual degree — in marijuana.

Northern Michigan University in Marquette began its medical plant chemistry program this semester, with about a dozen students in the first class, the Detroit Free Press reported . The program combines chemistry, biology, botany, horticulture, marketing and finance.

Here's the link: http://fox6now.com/2017/10/15/northern-michigan-university-offers-marijuana-degree-not-easy-at-all/

Let's hear it for "higher" education!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 18, 2017, 05:00:50 PM
Researchers Find Name of Allah Woven into Ancient Viking Burial Fabrics

QuoteAllah's name has been found embroidered into ancient Viking burial clothes, a discovery researchers in Sweden have described as "staggering".

The silk patterns were originally thought to be ordinary Viking Age decoration but a re-examination by archaeologist Annika Larsson of Uppsala University revealed they were a geometric Kufic script.

They were found on woven bands as well as items of clothing, in two separate grave sites, suggesting that Viking funeral customs had been influenced by Islam.

Here's the link: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/allah-viking-burial-fabrics-clothes-name-woven-found-islam-uppsala-sweden-funeral-customs-a7996166.html

I doubt the neo-nazis of the world are very happy about this.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on October 18, 2017, 08:08:30 PM
somewhat discredited.

http://stringgeek.blogspot.com.au/2017/10/viking-age-tablet-weaving-kufic-or-not.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 18, 2017, 09:02:57 PM
Quote from: LMNO on October 18, 2017, 08:08:30 PM
somewhat discredited.

http://stringgeek.blogspot.com.au/2017/10/viking-age-tablet-weaving-kufic-or-not.html

I was unaware of the controversy when I posted the 'discovery.'

Also, it appears that Uppsala University is not standing behind their researcher, as they are posting a list of articles that refute the 'discovery' on their own website.   

Here's the link: https://mp.uu.se/en/web/info/vart-uu/aktuellt/om-uu-i-media

So, we've now reached the point where one must research the scientific researchers themselves, before one can trust scientific 'discoveries' to possibly be true.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 19, 2017, 02:15:40 PM
"Dutch Courage: Alcohol Improves Foreign Language Skills"

QuoteA new study published in the Journal of Psychopharmacology, conducted by researchers from the University of Liverpool, Maastricht University and King's College London, shows that bilingual speakers' ability to speak a second language is improved after they have consumed a low dose of alcohol.

Here's the link: http://neurosciencenews.com/alcohol-foreign-language-skills-7759/

So, my belief that my ability to speak French improves after a glass of pinot noir may actually be true!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on October 19, 2017, 11:14:36 PM
Now they need to test it's effects on computer programming and kung-fu
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 20, 2017, 03:39:27 AM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on October 19, 2017, 11:14:36 PM
Now they need to test it's effects on computer programming and kung-fu

I doubt if any dose of alcohol would improve my computer programming skills.

However, "a low dose of alcohol" may slightly improve ones martial arts skills. If it works for one, it does so by slightly lowering inhibitions, and by providing a small energy boost.

On the other hand, one of the master level guys in my school used to always smoke a doobie before coming into class. Over many, many years, I only saw one occasion where the weed had a negative effect on his abilities. (And, those few of us that knew his "training regime" all agreed that that had to have been some super primo stuff.)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 27, 2017, 04:46:39 AM
Small Asteroid or Comet 'Visits' from Beyond the Solar System

QuoteA small, recently discovered asteroid -- or perhaps a comet -- appears to have originated from outside the solar system, coming from somewhere else in our galaxy. If so, it would be the first "interstellar object" to be observed and confirmed by astronomers.

This unusual object – for now designated A/2017 U1 – is less than a quarter-mile (400 meters) in diameter and is moving remarkably fast. Astronomers are urgently working to point telescopes around the world and in space at this notable object. Once these data are obtained and analyzed, astronomers may know more about the origin and possibly composition of the object.

Quote"This is the most extreme orbit I have ever seen," said Davide Farnocchia, a scientist at NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "It is going extremely fast and on such a trajectory that we can say with confidence that this object is on its way out of the solar system and not coming back."

The CNEOS team plotted the object's current trajectory and even looked into its future. A/2017 U1 came from the direction of the constellation Lyra, cruising through interstellar space at a brisk clip of 15.8 miles (25.5 kilometers) per second.

Here's the link: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/small-asteroid-or-comet-visits-from-beyond-the-solar-system

The fastest spacecraft ever launched by humans, New Horizons, is currently traveling at 14.22 kilometers per second. So, unfortunately, we have no chance of landing a probe on this interstellar object with our current technology.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: P3nT4gR4m on October 27, 2017, 11:02:54 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on October 27, 2017, 04:46:39 AM
Small Asteroid or Comet 'Visits' from Beyond the Solar System

QuoteA small, recently discovered asteroid -- or perhaps a comet -- appears to have originated from outside the solar system, coming from somewhere else in our galaxy. If so, it would be the first "interstellar object" to be observed and confirmed by astronomers.

This unusual object – for now designated A/2017 U1 – is less than a quarter-mile (400 meters) in diameter and is moving remarkably fast. Astronomers are urgently working to point telescopes around the world and in space at this notable object. Once these data are obtained and analyzed, astronomers may know more about the origin and possibly composition of the object.

Quote"This is the most extreme orbit I have ever seen," said Davide Farnocchia, a scientist at NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "It is going extremely fast and on such a trajectory that we can say with confidence that this object is on its way out of the solar system and not coming back."

The CNEOS team plotted the object's current trajectory and even looked into its future. A/2017 U1 came from the direction of the constellation Lyra, cruising through interstellar space at a brisk clip of 15.8 miles (25.5 kilometers) per second.

Here's the link: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/small-asteroid-or-comet-visits-from-beyond-the-solar-system

The fastest spacecraft ever launched by humans, New Horizons, is currently traveling at 14.22 kilometers per second. So, unfortunately, we have no chance of landing a probe on this interstellar object with our current technology.

The scientists will have plenty more of these to study soon. Pretty sure this is the start of a concentrated strike from the bugs on Klendathu :eek:
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 27, 2017, 01:35:51 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on October 27, 2017, 11:02:54 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on October 27, 2017, 04:46:39 AM
Small Asteroid or Comet 'Visits' from Beyond the Solar System

QuoteA small, recently discovered asteroid -- or perhaps a comet -- appears to have originated from outside the solar system, coming from somewhere else in our galaxy. If so, it would be the first "interstellar object" to be observed and confirmed by astronomers.

This unusual object – for now designated A/2017 U1 – is less than a quarter-mile (400 meters) in diameter and is moving remarkably fast. Astronomers are urgently working to point telescopes around the world and in space at this notable object. Once these data are obtained and analyzed, astronomers may know more about the origin and possibly composition of the object.

Quote"This is the most extreme orbit I have ever seen," said Davide Farnocchia, a scientist at NASA's Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) at the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "It is going extremely fast and on such a trajectory that we can say with confidence that this object is on its way out of the solar system and not coming back."

The CNEOS team plotted the object's current trajectory and even looked into its future. A/2017 U1 came from the direction of the constellation Lyra, cruising through interstellar space at a brisk clip of 15.8 miles (25.5 kilometers) per second.

Here's the link: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/small-asteroid-or-comet-visits-from-beyond-the-solar-system

The fastest spacecraft ever launched by humans, New Horizons, is currently traveling at 14.22 kilometers per second. So, unfortunately, we have no chance of landing a probe on this interstellar object with our current technology.

The scientists will have plenty more of these to study soon. Pretty sure this is the start of a concentrated strike from the bugs on Klendathu :eek:

And, is it just a coincidence that this is happening in conjunction with the release of the secret JKF Files?!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on November 10, 2017, 05:08:04 AM
Defence against the dark arts: Saudi Arabia trains staff against black magic

QuoteA Saudi government commission gave dozens of members of its Mecca governing body a five-day crash course in "developing scientific skills to defeat black magic".

Here's the link: https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/blog/2017/11/8/saudi-arabia-trains-staff-against-black-magic

Let's hear it for Science!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on May 21, 2018, 04:27:42 PM
First interstellar immigrant discovered in the solar system

As per the article, "A new study has discovered the first known permanent immigrant to our Solar System. The asteroid, currently nestling in Jupiter's orbit, is the first known asteroid to have been captured from another star system. The work is published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters.

The object known as 'Oumuamua was the last interstellar interloper to hit the headlines in 2017. However it was just a tourist passing through, whereas this former exo-asteroid—given the catchy name (514107) 2015 BZ509—is a long-term resident."

Here's a link: https://phys.org/news/2018-05-interstellar-immigrant-solar.html

I can't help but wonder if President Spanky will try to have it deported.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on May 21, 2018, 07:32:22 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on November 10, 2017, 05:08:04 AM
Defence against the dark arts: Saudi Arabia trains staff against black magic

QuoteA Saudi government commission gave dozens of members of its Mecca governing body a five-day crash course in "developing scientific skills to defeat black magic".

Here's the link: https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/blog/2017/11/8/saudi-arabia-trains-staff-against-black-magic

Let's hear it for Science!

Did they get the idea from Monty Python?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on May 22, 2018, 09:40:58 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on May 21, 2018, 07:32:22 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on November 10, 2017, 05:08:04 AM
Defence against the dark arts: Saudi Arabia trains staff against black magic

QuoteA Saudi government commission gave dozens of members of its Mecca governing body a five-day crash course in "developing scientific skills to defeat black magic".

Here's the link: https://www.alaraby.co.uk/english/blog/2017/11/8/saudi-arabia-trains-staff-against-black-magic

Let's hear it for Science!

Did they get the idea from Monty Python?

I don't know. Do you think "The Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice" has a sense of humor?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on July 15, 2018, 01:35:23 AM
 Re: Black Magic— A??LE Watches registered soaring heart rates when the World Cup match...

It's like the undertaker is all up in your junk taking measurements, and everyone's like, "GOAL!!!"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 18, 2018, 05:03:44 AM
THIS WEEKLY SCIENCE HEADLINE MAY DEPRESS YOU

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED


What is the meaning of life? Ask a conservative

As per the article:

'A new USC Dornsife-led psychology study shows that conservatives, more so than liberals, report feeling that their lives are meaningful or have purpose.

"Finding meaning in life is related to the sense or feeling that things are the way they should be, and that there is a sense of order," said David Newman, a doctoral candidate at USC Dornsife's Mind and Society Center. "If life feels chaotic, then that would likely dampen your sense that life is meaningful."'

Here's the link: https://dornsife.usc.edu/news/stories/2837/what-is-the-meaning-of-life-ask-a-conservative/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on July 18, 2018, 05:23:37 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 18, 2018, 05:03:44 AM
THIS WEEKLY SCIENCE HEADLINE MAY DEPRESS YOU

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED


What is the meaning of life? Ask a conservative

As per the article:

'A new USC Dornsife-led psychology study shows that conservatives, more so than liberals, report feeling that their lives are meaningful or have purpose.

"Finding meaning in life is related to the sense or feeling that things are the way they should be, and that there is a sense of order," said David Newman, a doctoral candidate at USC Dornsife's Mind and Society Center. "If life feels chaotic, then that would likely dampen your sense that life is meaningful."'

Here's the link: https://dornsife.usc.edu/news/stories/2837/what-is-the-meaning-of-life-ask-a-conservative/

My life has purpose.

Granted, that purpose is to make conservatives miserable.  BUT STILL.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 18, 2018, 03:57:28 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 18, 2018, 05:23:37 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 18, 2018, 05:03:44 AM
THIS WEEKLY SCIENCE HEADLINE MAY DEPRESS YOU

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED


What is the meaning of life? Ask a conservative

As per the article:

'A new USC Dornsife-led psychology study shows that conservatives, more so than liberals, report feeling that their lives are meaningful or have purpose.

"Finding meaning in life is related to the sense or feeling that things are the way they should be, and that there is a sense of order," said David Newman, a doctoral candidate at USC Dornsife's Mind and Society Center. "If life feels chaotic, then that would likely dampen your sense that life is meaningful."'

Here's the link: https://dornsife.usc.edu/news/stories/2837/what-is-the-meaning-of-life-ask-a-conservative/

My life has purpose.

Granted, that purpose is to make conservatives miserable.  BUT STILL.

So, you're really the Bowerick Wowbagger of Discordia.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on July 18, 2018, 05:08:08 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 18, 2018, 03:57:28 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on July 18, 2018, 05:23:37 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 18, 2018, 05:03:44 AM
THIS WEEKLY SCIENCE HEADLINE MAY DEPRESS YOU

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED


What is the meaning of life? Ask a conservative

As per the article:

'A new USC Dornsife-led psychology study shows that conservatives, more so than liberals, report feeling that their lives are meaningful or have purpose.

"Finding meaning in life is related to the sense or feeling that things are the way they should be, and that there is a sense of order," said David Newman, a doctoral candidate at USC Dornsife's Mind and Society Center. "If life feels chaotic, then that would likely dampen your sense that life is meaningful."'

Here's the link: https://dornsife.usc.edu/news/stories/2837/what-is-the-meaning-of-life-ask-a-conservative/

My life has purpose.

Granted, that purpose is to make conservatives miserable.  BUT STILL.

So, you're really the Bowerick Wowbagger of Discordia.

Pretty much.

It's the end of the world, Brother Mythos, try to have fun.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 24, 2018, 11:29:18 PM
As Have you had sexual intercourse with an extraterrestrial yet? is the hot forum topic of the week, I think the below is an appropriate and timely post to the Weekly Science Headlines thread:

How can you tell if that ET story is real? St Andrews scientists revise the Rio Scale for alien encounters

As per the article:

'"The whole world knows about the Richter Scale for quantifying the severity of an earthquake; that number is reported immediately following a quake and subsequently refined as more data are consolidated," said Jill Tarter, co-founder of the SETI Institute. "The SETI community is attempting to create a scale that can accompany reports of any claims of the detection of extraterrestrial intelligence and be refined over time as more data become available. This scale should convey both the significance and credibility of the claimed detection.  Rio 2.0 is an attempt to update the scale to make it more useful and compatible with current modes of information dissemination, as well as providing means for the public to become familiar with the scale."

There have been many dubious signals reported as 'aliens' in recent years, and learning the truth about these stories is increasingly difficult. As such, an updated Rio Scale is required.'

Here's a link to the article description of the scientific paper: https://www.seti.org/how-can-you-tell-if-et-story-real-st-andrews-scientists-revise-rio-scale-alien-encounters

Or, download the entire scientific paper here: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-journal-of-astrobiology/article/rio-20-revising-the-rio-scale-for-seti-detections/DF9D6EABEA7D8D84999234BCFB3FADB4

I wonder how the detection of an image of extraterrestrial reproductive apparatuses would be rated on the updated Rio Scale. (I mean, from what I hear, reactions to the receipt of common, ordinary, human terrestrial "dick pics" tend to be all over the place.)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on July 25, 2018, 12:17:14 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 24, 2018, 11:29:18 PM
How can you tell if that ET story is real? St Andrews scientists revise the Rio Scale for alien encounters

Funny that they think they need a 0-10 scale for this.  A three point scale should be adequate.

1.  Sorry guys, false alarm.  Bob left his cellphone next to the downconverter again.
2.  We think we've got a local interferer or equipment malfunction, but we haven't found the cause yet.
3.  WE GET SIGNAL
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on July 25, 2018, 12:49:17 AM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on July 25, 2018, 12:17:14 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 24, 2018, 11:29:18 PM
How can you tell if that ET story is real? St Andrews scientists revise the Rio Scale for alien encounters

Funny that they think they need a 0-10 scale for this.  A three point scale should be adequate.

1.  Sorry guys, false alarm.  Bob left his cellphone next to the downconverter again.
2.  We think we've got a local interferer or equipment malfunction, but we haven't found the cause yet.
3.  WE GET SIGNAL EVERYONE GRAB A CLUB

FTFY w/respect to "human".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 25, 2018, 05:01:24 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 18, 2018, 05:03:44 AM
THIS WEEKLY SCIENCE HEADLINE MAY DEPRESS YOU

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED


What is the meaning of life? Ask a conservative

As per the article:

'A new USC Dornsife-led psychology study shows that conservatives, more so than liberals, report feeling that their lives are meaningful or have purpose.

"Finding meaning in life is related to the sense or feeling that things are the way they should be, and that there is a sense of order," said David Newman, a doctoral candidate at USC Dornsife's Mind and Society Center. "If life feels chaotic, then that would likely dampen your sense that life is meaningful."'

Here's the link: https://dornsife.usc.edu/news/stories/2837/what-is-the-meaning-of-life-ask-a-conservative/

This is within expectations. Filling people's lives with meaning and a sense of belonging is the hallmark of dangerous cults. These findings place the Republican party alongside the ranks of the People's Temple, Heaven's Gate, the Church of Scientology, Rajneeshpuram, Aum Shinrikyo, the Manson Family, the Westboro Baptist Church, and Al-Qaeda
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 28, 2018, 03:21:53 AM
Space experts worry US won't make it to Mars by 2030s

As per the article:

"The United States has vowed to send the first humans to Mars by the 2030s, but space experts and lawmakers on Wednesday expressed concern that poor planning and lack of funds will delay those plans."

Here's the link: https://phys.org/news/2018-07-space-experts-wont-mars-2030s.html

My initial response to the caption of this article was something like, "No kidding!"

The last time a man walked on the Moon, which is pretty close as celestial distances go, was December 14, 1972. That's nearly forty-six (46) years ago.

The last NASA manned space flight, with a space shuttle, was July 21, 2011. That's slightly over seven (7) years ago.

The next NASA manned space flight with an Orion spacecraft won't be until 2023, as near as I can tell. That's five (5) years from now. That's also a twelve (12) year gap between generations of spacecraft, if NASA can keep to the current schedule.

The first flight to Mars, as near as I can tell, won't be until 2036. And then, it will only be a "fly around," not an actual landing. So, that's eighteen (18) years from now, and thirteen (13) years after the first scheduled manned flight of the Orion spacecraft.

I suspect some tech billionaire will get a manned spacecraft to Mars well before NASA gets there.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 30, 2018, 01:40:36 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 28, 2018, 03:21:53 AM
Space experts worry US won't make it to Mars by 2030s

As per the article:

"The United States has vowed to send the first humans to Mars by the 2030s, but space experts and lawmakers on Wednesday expressed concern that poor planning and lack of funds will delay those plans."

Here's the link: https://phys.org/news/2018-07-space-experts-wont-mars-2030s.html

My initial response to the caption of this article was something like, "No kidding!"

The last time a man walked on the Moon, which is pretty close as celestial distances go, was December 14, 1972. That's nearly forty-six (46) years ago.

The last NASA manned space flight, with a space shuttle, was July 21, 2011. That's slightly over seven (7) years ago.

The next NASA manned space flight with an Orion spacecraft won't be until 2023, as near as I can tell. That's five (5) years from now. That's also a twelve (12) year gap between generations of spacecraft, if NASA can keep to the current schedule.

The first flight to Mars, as near as I can tell, won't be until 2036. And then, it will only be a "fly around," not an actual landing. So, that's eighteen (18) years from now, and thirteen (13) years after the first scheduled manned flight of the Orion spacecraft.

I suspect some tech billionaire will get a manned spacecraft to Mars well before NASA gets there.

Yeah, honestly, what 1950's science fiction movie did they get that 2030 figure from? Unless of course they didn't specify living humans; I think they could probably get an urn up there.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on July 31, 2018, 01:11:37 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 28, 2018, 03:21:53 AM
Space experts worry US won't make it to Mars by 2030s

As per the article:

"The United States has vowed to send the first humans to Mars by the 2030s, but space experts and lawmakers on Wednesday expressed concern that poor planning and lack of funds will delay those plans."

Here's the link: https://phys.org/news/2018-07-space-experts-wont-mars-2030s.html (https://phys.org/news/2018-07-space-experts-wont-mars-2030s.html)

My initial response to the caption of this article was something like, "No kidding!"

The last time a man walked on the Moon, which is pretty close as celestial distances go, was December 14, 1972. That's nearly forty-six (46) years ago.

The last NASA manned space flight, with a space shuttle, was July 21, 2011. That's slightly over seven (7) years ago.

The next NASA manned space flight with an Orion spacecraft won't be until 2023, as near as I can tell. That's five (5) years from now. That's also a twelve (12) year gap between generations of spacecraft, if NASA can keep to the current schedule.

The first flight to Mars, as near as I can tell, won't be until 2036. And then, it will only be a "fly around," not an actual landing. So, that's eighteen (18) years from now, and thirteen (13) years after the first scheduled manned flight of the Orion spacecraft.

I suspect some tech billionaire will get a manned spacecraft to Mars well before NASA gets there.
Please to close refrigerator, drool make floor slippery.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on August 02, 2018, 01:33:32 PM
Can We Terraform Mars to Make It Earth-Like? Not Anytime Soon, Study Suggests

(The scientific paper this article describes is not available for free.)

As per the website article:

'For many years, Mars has existed as a hopeful "Planet B" — a secondary option if Earth can no longer support us as a species. From science-fiction stories to scientific investigations, humans have considered the possibilities of living on Mars for a long time. A main staple of many Mars-colonization concepts is terraforming — a hypothetical process of changing the conditions on a planet to make it habitable for life that exists on Earth, including humans, without a need for life-support systems.

Unfortunately, according to a new paper, with existing technologies, terraforming Mars is simply not possible. According to authors Bruce Jakosky, a planetary scientist and principal investigator for NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN mission studying the Martian atmosphere, and Christopher Edwards, an assistant professor of planetary science at Northern Arizona University, it just isn't possible to terraform Mars with current technologies.

To successfully make Mars Earth-like, we would need to raise temperatures, have water stably remain in liquid form and thicken the atmosphere. In the paper, Jakosky and Edwards explained that, by using greenhouse gases already present on Mars, we could, theoretically, raise temperatures and change the atmosphere enough to make the planet Earth-like. The only greenhouse gas on the Red Planet that's abundant enough to provide significant warming is carbon dioxide (CO2), they noted. Unfortunately, they found, there just isn't enough CO2 on Mars to make the planet Earth-like.'

Here's the link: https://www.space.com/41318-we-cant-terraform-mars.html

In addition, the article does not address how Mars would maintain a thick atmosphere, even if one could be generated, without the existence of a planet-size magnetic field.

So, it appears terraforming Mars is still only a science-fiction concept.

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 02, 2018, 04:07:13 PM
Mars is not a goal.  The Moon was a dance step back when Chuck Berry was still freaking the fuck out.  Mars is the same dance step being done poorly in a Vegas residence act by Axl Rose.

There is nothing new to be gained from Mars.  There is no heroism in Mars.  There is no reason for Mars. 

Now, if you were sending robots or people to find out why its smaller moon is so damn weird, I could kinda almost see that.  Otherwise, build robots for the asteroid belt.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: LMNO on August 02, 2018, 07:36:05 PM
Upvote.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: axod on August 02, 2018, 11:32:11 PM
QuoteIn addition, the article does not address how Mars would maintain a thick atmosphere, even if one could be generated, without the existence of a planet-size magnetic field.

Because it would only take 1, maximum 2 teslas to induce a magnetosphere.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on August 03, 2018, 12:24:43 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 02, 2018, 04:07:13 PM
Mars is not a goal.  The Moon was a dance step back when Chuck Berry was still freaking the fuck out.  Mars is the same dance step being done poorly in a Vegas residence act by Axl Rose.

There is nothing new to be gained from Mars.  There is no heroism in Mars.  There is no reason for Mars. 

Now, if you were sending robots or people to find out why its smaller moon is so damn weird, I could kinda almost see that.  Otherwise, build robots for the asteroid belt.

Quote from: LMNO on August 02, 2018, 07:36:05 PM
Upvote.

Believe it or not, I do not disagree.

When I'm extremely bored, want to exercise my brain, and want to make some amusing use of my science and engineering education, I occasionally try my hand at writing, what I consider to be, realistic science-fiction. (I post my stuff on another site, under another nom de plume.)

To make a very long story short, I currently think O'Neill Cylinders, placed in planetary or solar orbit, are the way to go for humanity to successfully live in space, and maintain our earthly physiology. (I think that permanently living in anything less than normal Earth gravity will result in permanent physiological changes, that will prevent those humans that that do so from ever returning to planet Earth.)

I also think Enzmann Starships are the way to go if humanity is ever going to travel in interstellar space. And, in order to do that, I think we're going to have to "mine" large quantities of helium-3 from the gas giant planets in our solar system. (As well as the gas giants in the new systems that we visit.) I think Saturn is the best bet in our system, because in spite of the distance, the gravity and radiation hazards are lower than Jupiter.

In the long run, I doubt Mars will ever amount to much more than a tourist destination. I doubt that any of the resources available there are worth the expense, when compared to the low gravity stuff floating around further out.

If anyone else has enough interest in this particular subject to discuss it further, I'm sure one of the mods would be amenable to splitting these posts off to make a new, dedicated thread.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on August 03, 2018, 12:26:12 AM
Quote from: axod on August 02, 2018, 11:32:11 PM
QuoteIn addition, the article does not address how Mars would maintain a thick atmosphere, even if one could be generated, without the existence of a planet-size magnetic field.

Because it would only take 1, maximum 2 teslas to induce a magnetosphere.

I do not believe that creating an artificial magnetosphere around an entire planet is a trivial undertaking.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 03, 2018, 12:27:27 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on August 03, 2018, 12:24:43 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 02, 2018, 04:07:13 PM
Mars is not a goal.  The Moon was a dance step back when Chuck Berry was still freaking the fuck out.  Mars is the same dance step being done poorly in a Vegas residence act by Axl Rose.

There is nothing new to be gained from Mars.  There is no heroism in Mars.  There is no reason for Mars. 

Now, if you were sending robots or people to find out why its smaller moon is so damn weird, I could kinda almost see that.  Otherwise, build robots for the asteroid belt.

Quote from: LMNO on August 02, 2018, 07:36:05 PM
Upvote.

Believe it or not, I do not disagree.

When I'm extremely bored, want to exercise my brain, and want to make some amusing use of my science and engineering education, I occasionally try my hand at writing, what I consider to be, realistic science-fiction. (I post my stuff on another site, under another nom de plume.)

To make a very long story short, I currently think O'Neill Cylinders, placed in planetary or solar orbit, are the way to go for humanity to successfully live in space, and maintain our earthly physiology. (I think that permanently living in anything less than normal Earth gravity will result in permanent physiological changes, that will prevent those humans that that do so from ever returning to planet Earth.)

I also think Enzmann Starships are the way to go if humanity is ever going to travel in interstellar space. And, in order to do that, I think we're going to have to "mine" large quantities of helium-3 from the gas giant planets in our solar system. (As well as the gas giants in the new systems that we visit.) I think Saturn is the best bet in our system, because in spite of the distance, the gravity and radiation hazards are lower than Jupiter.

In the long run, I doubt Mars will ever amount to much more than a tourist destination. I doubt that any of the resources available there are worth the expense, when compared to the low gravity stuff floating around further out.

If anyone else has enough interest in this particular subject to discuss it further, I'm sure one of the mods would be amenable to splitting these posts off to make a new, dedicated thread.

I don't actually see any point to interstellar travel.  Honest to "Bob".  There is nothing out there that we want that isn't HERE, and if we aren't smart enough to clean up our act here, we are not smart enough to survive even short term anywhere else.

Also, there's probably aliens, and they're just as likely to be as stupid and obnoxious as we are.

No, we're better off staying here and trying to figure out how to live as clouds of smart particles or something.  Inner space is where it's at.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on August 03, 2018, 03:00:47 AM
I can't see a whole lot of practical value in colonizing Mars, or in interstellar travel.

But I think we should try, anyway.

Why?  Because space is awesome.  To hell with profitability, and screw common sense.  What with the imminent heat death of the universe, humanity is doomed anyway, so let's go as big as we can before it all turns to ash.

If anyone wants me, I'll be playing video games.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 03, 2018, 03:12:17 AM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on August 03, 2018, 03:00:47 AM
I can't see a whole lot of practical value in colonizing Mars, or in interstellar travel.

But I think we should try, anyway.

Why?  Because space is awesome.  To hell with profitability, and screw common sense.  What with the imminent heat death of the universe, humanity is doomed anyway, so let's go as big as we can before it all turns to ash.

If anyone wants me, I'll be playing video games.

Space is fine.  But what we do in space should lead to new knowledge or some other form of deliverable.  Mars does not do this.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on August 03, 2018, 04:40:14 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on August 03, 2018, 12:26:12 AM
Quote from: axod on August 02, 2018, 11:32:11 PM
QuoteIn addition, the article does not address how Mars would maintain a thick atmosphere, even if one could be generated, without the existence of a planet-size magnetic field.

Because it would only take 1, maximum 2 teslas to induce a magnetosphere.

I do not believe that creating an artificial magnetosphere around an entire planet is a trivial undertaking.
Axod sometimes fails when delivering irony.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 03, 2018, 09:21:33 AM
Why would we skip straight to Mars instead of colonizing the moon first? It seems like a lot of unnecessary extra distance to go for a planet that lacks breathable air and earthlike ravity regardless.

And as for the point of space, I would think that a board as liberal as this one would appreciate the issues of dwindling resources and humanity's effect on the environment. There's a finite amount of copper and iron in the earth's crust and eventually they're all going to be mined out, leaving us in need of a new source. Also, and perhaps more importantly, industry and development are destroying the natural environment on planet earth; but Mars (and the moon, and so on) doesn't have any plants or animals (etc) anyway, so we can pollute it all we want and build on it wherever we feel like
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on August 03, 2018, 11:16:52 AM
(http://favoritememes.com/_nw/49/00256434.jpg)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on August 04, 2018, 07:20:20 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on August 03, 2018, 04:40:14 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on August 03, 2018, 12:26:12 AM
Quote from: axod on August 02, 2018, 11:32:11 PM
QuoteIn addition, the article does not address how Mars would maintain a thick atmosphere, even if one could be generated, without the existence of a planet-size magnetic field.

Because it would only take 1, maximum 2 teslas to induce a magnetosphere.

I do not believe that creating an artificial magnetosphere around an entire planet is a trivial undertaking.
Axod sometimes fails when delivering irony.

Sorry, I didn't realize that was irony. My bad.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: axod on August 05, 2018, 12:18:00 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on August 04, 2018, 07:20:20 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on August 03, 2018, 04:40:14 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on August 03, 2018, 12:26:12 AM
Quote from: axod on August 02, 2018, 11:32:11 PM
QuoteIn addition, the article does not address how Mars would maintain a thick atmosphere, even if one could be generated, without the existence of a planet-size magnetic field.

Because it would only take 1, maximum 2 teslas to induce a magnetosphere.

I do not believe that creating an artificial magnetosphere around an entire planet is a trivial undertaking.
Axod sometimes fails when delivering irony.

Sorry, I didn't realize that was irony. My bad.
Not according to NASA:
Quote...
due to the application of full plasma physics codes and laboratory experiments. In the future it is quite possible that an inflatable structure(s) can generate a magnetic dipole field at a level of perhaps 1 or 2 Tesla (or 10,000 to 20,000 Gauss) as an active shield against the solar wind."
https://m.phys.org/news/2017-03-nasa-magnetic-shield-mars-atmosphere.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on August 05, 2018, 03:44:39 AM
So, while creating an artificial magnetosphere around an entire planet is still not a trivial undertaking, it may actually be possible. How about that.

Nice find, axod.

(I read, a couple of months ago, about some group discussing the possibility of creating an artificial magnetosphere around Mars, but they had no idea how to pull it off.)

Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 04:53:52 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on August 05, 2018, 03:44:39 AM
So, while creating an artificial magnetosphere around an entire planet is still not a trivial undertaking, it may actually be possible. How about that.

Nice find, axod.

(I read, a couple of months ago, about some group discussing the possibility of creating an artificial magnetosphere around Mars, but they had no idea how to pull it off.)

Possible, but why?

Mars is a sump for resources.  There's nothing there, and how fucking big would just that one structure be?  I could see using something like that in asteroid mining, but it's still cheaper and easier to use robots.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on August 05, 2018, 06:12:24 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 04:53:52 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on August 05, 2018, 03:44:39 AM
So, while creating an artificial magnetosphere around an entire planet is still not a trivial undertaking, it may actually be possible. How about that.

Nice find, axod.

(I read, a couple of months ago, about some group discussing the possibility of creating an artificial magnetosphere around Mars, but they had no idea how to pull it off.)

Possible, but why?

Mars is a sump for resources.  There's nothing there, and how fucking big would just that one structure be?  I could see using something like that in asteroid mining, but it's still cheaper and easier to use robots.

Well, one roadster already escaped earth's atmosphere with a model android, so yeah.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on August 05, 2018, 05:16:08 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button

I find it hard to conceive of a nuclear war that would make Earth less habitable than Mars (or the Moon).  Even if you take into account nuclear winter, massive fallout, large sections of geography glassed over, 99% extinction rate, it's not as if nuclear war would actually rip the atmosphere off the planet.  There's a pretty big difference between "if you leave the bunker without protection, you might die of cancer in six months" to "if you leave the base without a space suit, you'll asphyxiate in 60 seconds".

No, I don't think we should go to Mars with any practical objectives in mind.  Someone is going to need to make up some sort of plausible justification to generate the necessary political will, but I doubt the reasons will be legitimate.

I think we should go to Mars just for the lulz.  Humanity needs to get out of the house once in a while, try new things.  We can figure out if there were any tangible benefits afterward.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 11:40:08 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button

Mars is under the best of circumstances a slow death trap.  If you're going to move populations, you are still better off in the asteroid belt.

But let's face facts:  With the technology we have right now, nothing off-Earth is going to be reliable enough to call "survivable".
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 11:41:21 PM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on August 05, 2018, 05:16:08 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button

I find it hard to conceive of a nuclear war that would make Earth less habitable than Mars (or the Moon).  Even if you take into account nuclear winter, massive fallout, large sections of geography glassed over, 99% extinction rate, it's not as if nuclear war would actually rip the atmosphere off the planet.  There's a pretty big difference between "if you leave the bunker without protection, you might die of cancer in six months" to "if you leave the base without a space suit, you'll asphyxiate in 60 seconds".

No, I don't think we should go to Mars with any practical objectives in mind.  Someone is going to need to make up some sort of plausible justification to generate the necessary political will, but I doubt the reasons will be legitimate.

I think we should go to Mars just for the lulz.  Humanity needs to get out of the house once in a while, try new things.  We can figure out if there were any tangible benefits afterward.

1000 mT inside of a month kills off EVERYTHING except maybe vent worms.

And we have an ecological crash happening right now.  Wasted resources are wasted.  There's actual work to be done.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: axod on August 06, 2018, 11:30:25 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 30, 2018, 01:40:36 AM




Yeah, honestly, what 1950's science fiction movie did they get that 2030 figure from? Unless of course they didn't specify living humans; I think they could probably get an urn up there.

Sorry I missed this one: whose ruins are on mars?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 08, 2018, 04:11:10 AM
Quote from: axod on August 06, 2018, 11:30:25 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 30, 2018, 01:40:36 AM




Yeah, honestly, what 1950's science fiction movie did they get that 2030 figure from? Unless of course they didn't specify living humans; I think they could probably get an urn up there.

Sorry I missed this one: whose ruins are on mars?

No, "urn" was correct. The implication being that they'd never get a living human to mars by 2030, but they could cheat and land a cremated body there in a container and say "we got a human to Mars!"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 08, 2018, 04:21:00 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 11:41:21 PM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on August 05, 2018, 05:16:08 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button

I find it hard to conceive of a nuclear war that would make Earth less habitable than Mars (or the Moon).  Even if you take into account nuclear winter, massive fallout, large sections of geography glassed over, 99% extinction rate, it's not as if nuclear war would actually rip the atmosphere off the planet.  There's a pretty big difference between "if you leave the bunker without protection, you might die of cancer in six months" to "if you leave the base without a space suit, you'll asphyxiate in 60 seconds".

No, I don't think we should go to Mars with any practical objectives in mind.  Someone is going to need to make up some sort of plausible justification to generate the necessary political will, but I doubt the reasons will be legitimate.

I think we should go to Mars just for the lulz.  Humanity needs to get out of the house once in a while, try new things.  We can figure out if there were any tangible benefits afterward.

1000 mT inside of a month kills off EVERYTHING except maybe vent worms.

And we have an ecological crash happening right now.  Wasted resources are wasted.  There's actual work to be done.

What is that figure based on? That's not nearly enough to glass the entire planet, the ice age didn;t kill everything, plenty of animals are resistant to radiation, and most importantly the Chicxulub impact is extimated to have released the equivalent explosive force of 20 million megatons of TNT, with all that entails.

EDIT:
@CN Observer: However, what I said was "civilization" not "life" or even "humans". The survivors of a full scale nuclear war would quickly be reduced to savagery, especially given that the most savage areas of the planet (the flyover states, the third world, etc.) would probably be hit the least hard whereas cities and other bastions of civilization would probably get most of the brunt of it
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on August 08, 2018, 05:39:01 AM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 08, 2018, 04:11:10 AM
Quote from: axod on August 06, 2018, 11:30:25 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 30, 2018, 01:40:36 AM




Yeah, honestly, what 1950's science fiction movie did they get that 2030 figure from? Unless of course they didn't specify living humans; I think they could probably get an urn up there.

Sorry I missed this one: whose ruins are on mars?

No, "urn" was correct. The implication being that they'd never get a living human to mars by 2030, but they could cheat and land a cremated body there in a container and say "we got a human to Mars!"
Yes, yes, they would certainly clear cremation by destination. I take it she was alluding to possible 'investitures' of relatedly good intention.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on August 08, 2018, 06:26:49 AM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 08, 2018, 04:21:00 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 11:41:21 PM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on August 05, 2018, 05:16:08 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button

I find it hard to conceive of a nuclear war that would make Earth less habitable than Mars (or the Moon).  Even if you take into account nuclear winter, massive fallout, large sections of geography glassed over, 99% extinction rate, it's not as if nuclear war would actually rip the atmosphere off the planet.  There's a pretty big difference between "if you leave the bunker without protection, you might die of cancer in six months" to "if you leave the base without a space suit, you'll asphyxiate in 60 seconds".

No, I don't think we should go to Mars with any practical objectives in mind.  Someone is going to need to make up some sort of plausible justification to generate the necessary political will, but I doubt the reasons will be legitimate.

I think we should go to Mars just for the lulz.  Humanity needs to get out of the house once in a while, try new things.  We can figure out if there were any tangible benefits afterward.

1000 mT inside of a month kills off EVERYTHING except maybe vent worms.

And we have an ecological crash happening right now.  Wasted resources are wasted.  There's actual work to be done.

What is that figure based on? That's not nearly enough to glass the entire planet, the ice age didn;t kill everything, plenty of animals are resistant to radiation, and most importantly the Chicxulub impact is extimated to have released the equivalent explosive force of 20 million megatons of TNT, with all that entails.

EDIT:
@CN Observer: However, what I said was "civilization" not "life" or even "humans". The survivors of a full scale nuclear war would quickly be reduced to savagery, especially given that the most savage areas of the planet (the flyover states, the third world, etc.) would probably be hit the least hard whereas cities and other bastions of civilization would probably get most of the brunt of it

It is based on SDI studies in the 1980s.  1000 mT kicks up a radioactive cloud that kills what the freezing doesn't.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on August 08, 2018, 08:20:28 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 08, 2018, 06:26:49 AM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 08, 2018, 04:21:00 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 11:41:21 PM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on August 05, 2018, 05:16:08 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button

I find it hard to conceive of a nuclear war that would make Earth less habitable than Mars (or the Moon).  Even if you take into account nuclear winter, massive fallout, large sections of geography glassed over, 99% extinction rate, it's not as if nuclear war would actually rip the atmosphere off the planet.  There's a pretty big difference between "if you leave the bunker without protection, you might die of cancer in six months" to "if you leave the base without a space suit, you'll asphyxiate in 60 seconds".

No, I don't think we should go to Mars with any practical objectives in mind.  Someone is going to need to make up some sort of plausible justification to generate the necessary political will, but I doubt the reasons will be legitimate.

I think we should go to Mars just for the lulz.  Humanity needs to get out of the house once in a while, try new things.  We can figure out if there were any tangible benefits afterward.

1000 mT inside of a month kills off EVERYTHING except maybe vent worms.

And we have an ecological crash happening right now.  Wasted resources are wasted.  There's actual work to be done.
See, tiene to capitalize deh 'm' in T :argh!:
What is that figure based on? That's not nearly enough to glass the entire planet, the ice age didn;t kill everything, plenty of animals are resistant to radiation, and most importantly the Chicxulub impact is extimated to have released the equivalent explosive force of 20 million megatons of TNT, with all that entails.

EDIT:
@CN Observer: However, what I said was "civilization" not "life" or even "humans". The survivors of a full scale nuclear war would quickly be reduced to savagery, especially given that the most savage areas of the planet (the flyover states, the third world, etc.) would probably be hit the least hard whereas cities and other bastions of civilization would probably get most of the brunt of it

It is based on SDI studies in the 1980s.  1000 mT kicks up a radioactive cloud that kills what the freezing doesn't.
Must capitalize 'm' in T.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on September 29, 2018, 09:38:08 PM
Get your genuine, artificial Martian dirt here!

UCF Selling Experimental Martian Dirt — $20 a Kilogram, Plus Shipping

As per the article:

'This is not fake news. A team of UCF astrophysicists has developed a scientifically based, standardized method for creating Martian and asteroid soil known as simulants.

The team published its findings this month in the journal Icarus.

"The simulant is useful for research as we look to go to Mars," says Physics Professor Dan Britt,  member of UCF's Planetary Sciences Group. "If we are going to go, we'll need food, water and other essentials. As we are developing solutions, we need a way to test how these ideas will fare."
For example, scientists looking for ways to grow food on Mars — cue the 2015 film The Martian — need to test their techniques on soil that most closely resembles the stuff on Mars.'

Hardcore dirt enthusiasts can download the UCF scientific paper, "Mars global simulant MGS-1: A Rocknest-based open standard for basaltic martian regolith simulants," from the following site:


https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0019103518303038?via%3Dihub
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on September 30, 2018, 04:21:20 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on August 08, 2018, 08:20:28 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 08, 2018, 06:26:49 AM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 08, 2018, 04:21:00 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 11:41:21 PM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on August 05, 2018, 05:16:08 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button

I find it hard to conceive of a nuclear war that would make Earth less habitable than Mars (or the Moon).  Even if you take into account nuclear winter, massive fallout, large sections of geography glassed over, 99% extinction rate, it's not as if nuclear war would actually rip the atmosphere off the planet.  There's a pretty big difference between "if you leave the bunker without protection, you might die of cancer in six months" to "if you leave the base without a space suit, you'll asphyxiate in 60 seconds".

No, I don't think we should go to Mars with any practical objectives in mind.  Someone is going to need to make up some sort of plausible justification to generate the necessary political will, but I doubt the reasons will be legitimate.

I think we should go to Mars just for the lulz.  Humanity needs to get out of the house once in a while, try new things.  We can figure out if there were any tangible benefits afterward.

1000 mT inside of a month kills off EVERYTHING except maybe vent worms.

And we have an ecological crash happening right now.  Wasted resources are wasted.  There's actual work to be done.
See, tiene to capitalize deh 'm' in T :argh!:
What is that figure based on? That's not nearly enough to glass the entire planet, the ice age didn;t kill everything, plenty of animals are resistant to radiation, and most importantly the Chicxulub impact is extimated to have released the equivalent explosive force of 20 million megatons of TNT, with all that entails.

EDIT:
@CN Observer: However, what I said was "civilization" not "life" or even "humans". The survivors of a full scale nuclear war would quickly be reduced to savagery, especially given that the most savage areas of the planet (the flyover states, the third world, etc.) would probably be hit the least hard whereas cities and other bastions of civilization would probably get most of the brunt of it

It is based on SDI studies in the 1980s.  1000 mT kicks up a radioactive cloud that kills what the freezing doesn't.
Must capitalize 'm' in T.

Did you just assume my dialect?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on October 27, 2018, 05:49:52 PM
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/oct/23/oldest-intact-shipwreck-thought-to-be-ancient-greek-discovered-at-bottom-of-black-sea
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 29, 2018, 04:25:16 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on October 27, 2018, 05:49:52 PM
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/oct/23/oldest-intact-shipwreck-thought-to-be-ancient-greek-discovered-at-bottom-of-black-sea

Having been a sailor in my misspent youth, I have a particular interest in ship design, and ship building techniques, as well as ancient metallurgy, tools, and technology.

I had posted an earlier response to Dok's post. But, upon further study, I realized my first impressions of the wreck were completely wrong, and deleted that post. I'm still not certain of exactly what I'm seeing in the wreck's single photo. For instance, the ship may, or may not, have "bilge keels." And, I can not clearly gauge the ship's beam (width), or understand it's superstructure construction.

I searched the net, but could not find any additional photos of this ship. Hopefully, the Black Sea Maritime Archaeology Project (MAP) will release much more information in the near future.

I did, however, find the following YouTube video:

Experts find graveyard of 60 preserved ancient shipwrecks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raBbcdXM50c (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raBbcdXM50c)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on October 29, 2018, 07:23:29 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on October 29, 2018, 04:25:16 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on October 27, 2018, 05:49:52 PM
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2018/oct/23/oldest-intact-shipwreck-thought-to-be-ancient-greek-discovered-at-bottom-of-black-sea

Having been a sailor in my misspent youth, I have a particular interest in ship design, and ship building techniques, as well as ancient metallurgy, tools, and technology.

I had posted an earlier response to Dok's post. But, upon further study, I realized my first impressions of the wreck were completely wrong, and deleted that post. I'm still not certain of exactly what I'm seeing in the wreck's single photo. For instance, the ship may, or may not, have "bilge keels." And, I can not clearly gauge the ship's beam (width), or understand it's superstructure construction.

I searched the net, but could not find any additional photos of this ship. Hopefully, the Black Sea Maritime Archaeology Project (MAP) will release much more information in the near future.

I did, however, find the following YouTube video:

Experts find graveyard of 60 preserved ancient shipwrecks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raBbcdXM50c (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=raBbcdXM50c)

Yeah, I was reading that the other day. The one is the earliest shipwreck we've ever found, I guess, and it's in near perfect condition due to the depth it's at.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on November 04, 2018, 04:02:23 AM
Could Oumuamua Be an Extra-Terrestrial Solar Sail?

I first read this speculation on a political website that often sensationalizes the titles of its articles. But, I followed the lead, and found this.

As per the article:

"On October 19th, 2017, the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System-1 (Pan-STARRS-1) in Hawaii announced the first-ever detection of an interstellar asteroid, named 1I/2017 U1 (aka. 'Oumuamua). In the months that followed, multiple follow-up observations were conducted that allowed astronomers to get a better idea of its size and shape, while also revealing that it had the characteristics of both a comet and an asteroid.

Interestingly enough, there has also been some speculation that based on its shape, 'Oumuamua might actually be an interstellar spacecraft (Breakthrough Listen even monitored it for signs of radio signals!). A new study by a pair of astronomers from the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) has taken it a step further, suggesting that 'Oumuamua may actually be a light sail of extra-terrestrial origin.

The study – "Could Solar Radiation Pressure Explain 'Oumuamua's Peculiar Acceleration?", which recently appeared online – was conducted by Shmuel Bialy and Prof. Abraham Loeb. Whereas Bialy is a postdoctoral researcher at the CfA's Institue for Theory and Computation (ITC), Prof. Loeb is the director of the ITC, the Frank B. Baird Jr. Professor of Science at Harvard University, and the head chair of the Breakthrough Starshot Advisory Committee."

Here's the link: https://www.universetoday.com/140391/could-oumuamua-be-an-extra-terrestrial-solar-sail/

Still not quite convinced, I looked up the study/paper on arXiv.org, and verified that this speculation is real.

As per the study/paper:

"Known Solar System objects, like asteroids and comets have mass-to-area ratios orders of magnitude larger than our accelerating force, then 'Oumuamua represents a new class of thin interstellar material, either produced naturally,through a yet unknown process in the ISM or in proto-planetary disks, or of an artificial origin.

Considering an artificial origin, one possibility is that 'Oumuamua is a lightsail, floating in interstellar space as a debris from an advanced technological equipment (Loeb 2018). Lightsails with similar dimensions have been designed and constructed by our own civilization, including the IKAROS project and the Starshot Initiative2. The lightsail technology might be abundantly used for transportation of cargos between planets (Guillochon & Loeb 2015) or between stars (Lingam & Loeb 2017). In the former case, dynamical ejection from a planetary System could result in space debris of equipment that is not operational any more3 (Loeb 2018), and is floating at the characteristic speed of stars relative to each other in the Solar neighborhood."

Here's the link: https://arxiv.org/abs/1810.11490
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on November 04, 2018, 07:36:05 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on September 30, 2018, 04:21:20 PM
Quote from: LuciferX on August 08, 2018, 08:20:28 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 08, 2018, 06:26:49 AM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 08, 2018, 04:21:00 AM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on August 05, 2018, 11:41:21 PM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on August 05, 2018, 05:16:08 PM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on August 05, 2018, 10:04:13 AM
And, in addition to resources and the environment, we also need backup civilizations out of ICBM range so everything isn't wiped out when one of the shitheads in charge of the world hits the big red button

I find it hard to conceive of a nuclear war that would make Earth less habitable than Mars (or the Moon).  Even if you take into account nuclear winter, massive fallout, large sections of geography glassed over, 99% extinction rate, it's not as if nuclear war would actually rip the atmosphere off the planet.  There's a pretty big difference between "if you leave the bunker without protection, you might die of cancer in six months" to "if you leave the base without a space suit, you'll asphyxiate in 60 seconds".

No, I don't think we should go to Mars with any practical objectives in mind.  Someone is going to need to make up some sort of plausible justification to generate the necessary political will, but I doubt the reasons will be legitimate.

I think we should go to Mars just for the lulz.  Humanity needs to get out of the house once in a while, try new things.  We can figure out if there were any tangible benefits afterward.

1000 mT inside of a month kills off EVERYTHING except maybe vent worms.

And we have an ecological crash happening right now.  Wasted resources are wasted.  There's actual work to be done.
See, tiene to capitalize deh 'm' in T :argh!:
What is that figure based on? That's not nearly enough to glass the entire planet, the ice age didn;t kill everything, plenty of animals are resistant to radiation, and most importantly the Chicxulub impact is extimated to have released the equivalent explosive force of 20 million megatons of TNT, with all that entails.

EDIT:
@CN Observer: However, what I said was "civilization" not "life" or even "humans". The survivors of a full scale nuclear war would quickly be reduced to savagery, especially given that the most savage areas of the planet (the flyover states, the third world, etc.) would probably be hit the least hard whereas cities and other bastions of civilization would probably get most of the brunt of it

It is based on SDI studies in the 1980s.  1000 mT kicks up a radioactive cloud that kills what the freezing doesn't.
Must capitalize 'm' in T.

Did you just assume my dialect?
Of course not. I consumed it!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on November 04, 2018, 07:44:39 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on September 29, 2018, 09:38:08 PM
Get your genuine, artificial Martian dirt here!

UCF Selling Experimental Martian Dirt — $20 a Kilogram, Plus Shipping

As per the article:

'This is not fake news. A team of UCF astrophysicists has developed a scientifically based, standardized method for creating Martian and asteroid soil known as simulants.

The team published its findings this month in the journal Icarus.

"The simulant is useful for research as we look to go to Mars," says Physics Professor Dan Britt,  member of UCF's Planetary Sciences Group. "If we are going to go, we'll need food, water and other essentials. As we are developing solutions, we need a way to test how these ideas will fare."
For example, scientists looking for ways to grow food on Mars — cue the 2015 film The Martian — need to test their techniques on soil that most closely resembles the stuff on Mars.'

Hardcore dirt enthusiasts can download the UCF scientific paper, "Mars global simulant MGS-1: A Rocknest-based open standard for basaltic martian regolith simulants," from the following site:


https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0019103518303038?via%3Dihub (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0019103518303038?via%3Dihub)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Frontside Back on November 07, 2018, 02:49:14 PM
Musk should just buy some of that shit and film fake Mars landings on the Moon.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on November 14, 2018, 07:54:45 AM
Quote from: Frontside Back on November 07, 2018, 02:49:14 PM
Musk should just buy some of that shit and film fake Mars landings on the Moon.
Rick^3
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on February 20, 2019, 03:37:58 AM
"Teen builds working nuclear fusion reactor in Memphis home"

As per the article:

"Some kids spend their time on social media, other kids spend their time playing video games. When it comes to 14-year-old Jackson Oswalt, his time is spent in a laboratory working on a nuclear fusion reactor.

The Memphis teen finished his reactor and achieved fusion at the age of 13. He's regarded by experts as the youngest in America – maybe even the world – to accomplish it. Jackson built a steel machine made up of vacuums, pumps and chambers that is capable of smashing atoms together through force in a smoking hot plasma center that releases a burst of fusion energy. If you've ever wondered how the sun and other stars are powered, the process within Jackson's nuclear fusion reactor is comparable.

He began working on the fusion reactor at 12 years old, after concluding that he didn't want to dedicate his leisure time solely to playing games like Fortnite. He began scouring the Internet for nuclear-related things because that's what he says held his interest. Yes — at 12 years old."

Here's the link: https://www.foxnews.com/science/teen-builds-working-nuclear-fusion-reactor-in-memphis-home

I'm pretty sure the kid with the "Baking Soda and Vinegar Volcano" won't be beating this young man at the next Memphis Science Fair.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Al Qədic on February 20, 2019, 03:55:40 AM
At first I thought this was a repost of an older story...but no, there's now another young lad who decided it was a fine idea to try and achieve nuclear fusion...why is there more than one example of this?! At least the other kid was a Boy Scout! :argh!: Well, here's a link to that story, I guess. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/eagle-scout-nuclear-reactor/
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on February 20, 2019, 04:56:00 AM
Quote from: Al Qədic on February 20, 2019, 03:55:40 AM
At first I thought this was a repost of an older story...but no, there's now another young lad who decided it was a fine idea to try and achieve nuclear fusion...why is there more than one example of this?! At least the other kid was a Boy Scout! :argh!: Well, here's a link to that story, I guess. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/eagle-scout-nuclear-reactor/

No, that Boy Scout was just playing around with fissile materials, and given his carelessness, it's surprising he didn't give himself cancer.  Nuclear fission happens all over the place in nature; it doesn't appear his ingenuity extended much beyond collecting dangerous materials.  (His "reactor" was held together with duct tape).

Nuclear fusion is an entirely different critter, and rather harder to accomplish in practice.  You need a lot of heat and pressure to initiate it, and if you do anything wrong, it Just Won't Work.  What the kid in Memphis did is in a different league.  (Ostensibly, anyway.  If his parents put $8000-$10000 towards this project, one wonders what exactly he did on his own.  That build looks suspiciously neat for something assembled by a 14 year old.)

To put this in perspective, we started making fission reactors in the 1940s.  We're still working out how to make a fusion reactor that puts out more energy than it consumes.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 28, 2019, 04:21:59 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on June 13, 2017, 07:34:46 AM
Good luck with that Nobel, Nigel!

I see Nigel was here and gone, before I could offer her my condolences on Sheldon Cooper and Amy Farrah Fowler winning the Nobel Prize in Physics this year instead of her.

But, there's always next year.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on June 28, 2019, 11:58:38 PM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on February 20, 2019, 04:56:00 AM
Quote from: Al Qədic on February 20, 2019, 03:55:40 AM
At first I thought this was a repost of an older story...but no, there's now another young lad who decided it was a fine idea to try and achieve nuclear fusion...why is there more than one example of this?! At least the other kid was a Boy Scout! :argh!: Well, here's a link to that story, I guess. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/eagle-scout-nuclear-reactor/

No, that Boy Scout was just playing around with fissile materials, and given his carelessness, it's surprising he didn't give himself cancer.  Nuclear fission happens all over the place in nature; it doesn't appear his ingenuity extended much beyond collecting dangerous materials.  (His "reactor" was held together with duct tape).

Nuclear fusion is an entirely different critter, and rather harder to accomplish in practice.  You need a lot of heat and pressure to initiate it, and if you do anything wrong, it Just Won't Work.  What the kid in Memphis did is in a different league.  (Ostensibly, anyway.  If his parents put $8000-$10000 towards this project, one wonders what exactly he did on his own.  That build looks suspiciously neat for something assembled by a 14 year old.)

To put this in perspective, we started making fission reactors in the 1940s.  We're still working out how to make a fusion reactor that puts out more energy than it consumes.

Well, there was the Bikini Atoll thing.  A short life, but a productive one.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 03, 2019, 12:50:37 AM
Mini-brains grown from stem cells don't think, but they do show 'complex' neural activity, researchers say

As per the article:

"Evidence of dynamic activity, in individual and synchronized neurons, was seen across a network of cerebral organoids grown from stem cells in a preliminary study published Thursday in the journal Stem Cell Reports.

Dr. Hideya Sakaguchi, study co-author and postdoctoral fellow at Kyoto University (currently at the Salk Institute), explained in an email that the important thing here is not just the creation of a mini-brain but that a tool was developed to detect nerve cell activity. Someday, this new calcium ion analysis tool may help researchers better understand complex brain functions and neurological disorders."

Here's the link: https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/27/health/mini-brain-activity-study/index.html

My first reaction, upon reading the article's title, was not all that many full-size brains do much thinking either.

I suspect, one day soon, we'll actually be able to add "floating disembodied conscious brains" to the list of things like climate change apocalypse, rogue AI, unsanitized telephones, etc. that may will eradicate us killer apes primates from the face of the earth. But then, it is the apocalypse. Try to have fun.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 03, 2019, 11:07:39 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 03, 2019, 12:50:37 AM
Mini-brains grown from stem cells don't think, but they do show 'complex' neural activity, researchers say

As per the article:

"Evidence of dynamic activity, in individual and synchronized neurons, was seen across a network of cerebral organoids grown from stem cells in a preliminary study published Thursday in the journal Stem Cell Reports.

Dr. Hideya Sakaguchi, study co-author and postdoctoral fellow at Kyoto University (currently at the Salk Institute), explained in an email that the important thing here is not just the creation of a mini-brain but that a tool was developed to detect nerve cell activity. Someday, this new calcium ion analysis tool may help researchers better understand complex brain functions and neurological disorders."

Here's the link: https://www.cnn.com/2019/06/27/health/mini-brain-activity-study/index.html

My first reaction, upon reading the article's title, was not all that many full-size brains do much thinking either.

I suspect, one day soon, we'll actually be able to add "floating disembodied conscious brains" to the list of things like climate change apocalypse, rogue AI, unsanitized telephones, etc. that may will eradicate us killer apes primates from the face of the earth. But then, it is the apocalypse. Try to have fun.

The assertati9n "Consciousness requires subjective experience, and that comes only when information is received from probing, sensory tissues -- those of the body." seems like it's mincing words; they seem to be defining consciousness as "awareness of one's surroundings", which at best is stretching the definition of the term
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 04, 2019, 03:32:41 AM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 03, 2019, 11:07:39 PM

The assertati9n "Consciousness requires subjective experience, and that comes only when information is received from probing, sensory tissues -- those of the body." seems like it's mincing words; they seem to be defining consciousness as "awareness of one's surroundings", which at best is stretching the definition of the term

I do not claim any special expertise on the subject, other than I believe I know when I am conscious, and I believe I usually, consciously know when I am dreaming. However, the simplest definition of consciousness, as per Wikipedia, is as follows:

'Consciousness is the state or quality of awareness or of being aware of an external object or something within oneself. It has been defined variously in terms of sentience, awareness, qualia, subjectivity, the ability to experience or to feel, wakefulness, having a sense of selfhood or soul, the fact that there is something "that it is like" to "have" or "be" it, and the executive control system of the mind. Despite the difficulty in definition, many philosophers believe that there is a broadly shared underlying intuition about what consciousness is. As Max Velmans and Susan Schneider wrote in The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness: "Anything that we are aware of at a given moment forms part of our consciousness, making conscious experience at once the most familiar and most mysterious aspect of our lives." You become aware that your actions have an effect on other people.'

Here's the link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness

It appears to me that Dr. Hideya Sakaguchi's statement is consistent with the very first sentence of the Wikipedia definition.

So, how does your definition of consciousness differ from Dr. Sakaguchi's, and that of Wikipedia?

And, why does the definition of consciousness bother you more than a future that will include "floating disembodied conscious brains?"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: altered on July 04, 2019, 05:38:21 AM
Speaking for no one but myself, a society of floating disembodied conscious brains would have a much harder time being shitty to others. Easier to be completely open and honest about your thoughts than not, when you have to build a machine that can translate between them, and if you aren't communicating at all, well, it's harder to fucking be a shithead to anyone, right? And a lot harder to randomly decide to beat someone with a wrench without arms. If you assume exoskeletons, the bar is raised on what constitutes dangerous violence. Without, you don't get monkey violence at all. Sounds good to me.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 04, 2019, 05:17:16 PM
Quote from: nullified on July 04, 2019, 05:38:21 AM
Speaking for no one but myself, a society of floating disembodied conscious brains would have a much harder time being shitty to others. Easier to be completely open and honest about your thoughts than not, when you have to build a machine that can translate between them, and if you aren't communicating at all, well, it's harder to fucking be a shithead to anyone, right? And a lot harder to randomly decide to beat someone with a wrench without arms. If you assume exoskeletons, the bar is raised on what constitutes dangerous violence. Without, you don't get monkey violence at all. Sounds good to me.

Floating disembodied conscious brains, flying disembodied conscious brains, conscious brains in disembodied heads, and even conscious AI brains in disembodied heads are a perfectly good science fiction trope. You are not going to ruin this for me.

Now, please excuse me while I search for a high quality copy of Fiend Without a Face.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 05, 2019, 01:31:57 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on July 04, 2019, 03:32:41 AM
Quote from: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 03, 2019, 11:07:39 PM

The assertati9n "Consciousness requires subjective experience, and that comes only when information is received from probing, sensory tissues -- those of the body." seems like it's mincing words; they seem to be defining consciousness as "awareness of one's surroundings", which at best is stretching the definition of the term

I do not claim any special expertise on the subject, other than I believe I know when I am conscious, and I believe I usually, consciously know when I am dreaming. However, the simplest definition of consciousness, as per Wikipedia, is as follows:

'Consciousness is the state or quality of awareness or of being aware of an external object or something within oneself. It has been defined variously in terms of sentience, awareness, qualia, subjectivity, the ability to experience or to feel, wakefulness, having a sense of selfhood or soul, the fact that there is something "that it is like" to "have" or "be" it, and the executive control system of the mind. Despite the difficulty in definition, many philosophers believe that there is a broadly shared underlying intuition about what consciousness is. As Max Velmans and Susan Schneider wrote in The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness: "Anything that we are aware of at a given moment forms part of our consciousness, making conscious experience at once the most familiar and most mysterious aspect of our lives." You become aware that your actions have an effect on other people.'

Here's the link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Consciousness

It appears to me that Dr. Hideya Sakaguchi's statement is consistent with the very first sentence of the Wikipedia definition.

So, how does your definition of consciousness differ from Dr. Sakaguchi's, and that of Wikipedia?

It doesn't differ from wikipedia's, just from Sakaguchi's. I'd define it somewhere in the realm of "the ability to...feel ... having a sense of selfhood or soul ... the fact that there is something "that it is like" to "have" or "be" it.", none of which require outward sensory input. Cogito ergo sum.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 05, 2019, 05:39:16 AM
Now that I've once again read Dr. Sakaguchi's statement about consciousness, as transcribed by the author of the original article, I realize he actually made no attempt to define consciousness. He simply said something about consciousness, as he believes it applies to his subject matter.

The entire quotation from the original article is as follows:

"For those who worry that the mini-brains might possess human-like qualities (and so pose ethical dilemmas), there's no question that the organoids are incapable of sophisticated function, because they lack input from their surrounding environment, Sakaguchi said. Consciousness requires subjective experience, and that comes only when information is received from probing, sensory tissues -- those of the body." 

I have no reason to disagree with Dr. Sakaguchi's statement. And, although it is an interesting subject, I see no need for him to have given a robust, comprehensive definition of consciousness when talking about its relationship to his subject matter.

And, as his subject matter is a collection of disembodied brain cells, that have always been disembodied, I'm pretty sure that even the ol' Garbage In = Garbage Out has no meaning in relation to them. I see what's going on with his disembodied brain cells as a Nothing In = Nothing Out = Nothing Going On situation.

So, I ask again, why does the definition of consciousness bother you more than a future that will undoubtably include "floating disembodied conscious brains?"
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on July 05, 2019, 06:30:59 PM
An extreme relative abundance of interneurons, those neurons that connect only to other neurons and not to any muscular or sensory apparatus, is one of the main distinguishing features of the central nervous system that set it apart from the peripheral nervous system and allow it to perform learning and decision making tasks that the peripheral nervous system cannot
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on July 08, 2019, 05:08:14 AM
This is really simple.  You have consciousness if you can look in the mirror and emotionally react, one way or another, with what you see.  I know I am conscious because I am stunned by my own guapo every time I shave.

Also, hugging your knees and crying in the shower is a good indication, if that's your thing.  Sheep don't hug their knees and cry in the shower.  Only people do that.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 08, 2019, 05:16:12 AM
The Latest Science News in the War on Cow Farts

Study shows potential for reduced methane from cows

As per the article:

"An international team of scientists has shown it is possible to breed cattle to reduce their methane emissions.

Published in the journal Science Advances, the researchers showed that the genetics of an individual cow strongly influenced the make-up of the microorganisms in its rumen (the first stomach in the digestive system of ruminant animals which include cattle and sheep)."

Here's the link: https://phys.org/news/2019-07-potential-methane-cows.html

Out of all the things adversely effecting Climate Change these days, cow farts is way, way down on my list of concerns. But, I guess every little bit helps. I guess ...
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on September 13, 2019, 01:56:45 PM
Deep Thought Might Be Right

Two Mathematicians Just Solved a Decades-Old Math Riddle — and Possibly the Meaning of Life

As per the article:

"In Douglas Adams' sci-fi series "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," a pair of programmers task the galaxy's largest supercomputer with answering the ultimate question of the meaning of life, the universe and everything. After 7.5 million years of processing, the computer reaches an answer: 42. Only then do the programmers realize that nobody knew the question the program was meant to answer.

Now, in this week's most satisfying example of life reflecting art, a pair of mathematicians have used a global network of 500,000 computers to solve a centuries-old math puzzle that just happens to involve that most crucial number: 42.

The question, which goes back to at least 1955 and may have been pondered by Greek thinkers as early as the third century AD, asks, "How can you express every number between 1 and 100 as the sum of three cubes?" Or, put algebraically, how do you solve x^3 + y^3 + z^3 = k, where k equals any whole number from 1 to 100?

This deceptively simple stumper is known as a Diophantine equation, named for the ancient mathematician Diophantus of Alexandria, who proposed a similar set of problems about 1,800 years ago. Modern mathematicians who revisited the puzzle in the 1950s quickly found solutions when k equals many of the smaller numbers, but a few particularly stubborn integers soon emerged. The two trickiest numbers, which still had outstanding solutions by the beginning of 2019, were 33 and — you guessed it — 42."

Here's the link: https://www.livescience.com/diophantine-42-solved-meaning-of-life.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on September 13, 2019, 02:20:39 PM
Drawing significance from numerical equivalence when the numbers are in entirely different contexts is numerology.

There might be some interesting math going on, but that article is too obsessed with OMG LOL 42.  That hasn't been funny since about 1982.

If I'm going to read about math, I want meat.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on September 13, 2019, 02:37:38 PM
Feel free to post some red meat math.

Impress the shit out of me.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on September 13, 2019, 03:29:33 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on September 13, 2019, 02:37:38 PM
Feel free to post some red meat math.

Impress the shit out of me.
I'll see about posting something after I get off work.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Don Coyote on September 13, 2019, 06:15:03 PM
Bones cause anxiety. (https://gizmodo.com/your-bones-secrete-a-hormone-that-can-make-you-panic-s-1838053031?utm_medium=socialflow&utm_source=gizmodo_twitter&utm_campaign=socialflow_gizmodo_twitter)
There is but one solution.
Free THEM from your flesh.


Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: altered on September 13, 2019, 06:57:22 PM
Did you know there is a skeleton near you right now?

In fact, most people will be near over twenty skeletons throughout their day, and never even see one of them.

It's no wonder people get anxious about skeletons, they're being stalked by them.

(No but seriously that's pretty cool.)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on September 14, 2019, 03:23:50 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on September 13, 2019, 02:37:38 PM
Feel free to post some red meat math.

Impress the shit out of me.

It doesn't really belong here, so I tossed it in my junk thread.

https://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php/topic,38717.msg1430611.html#msg1430611

Really, my complaint about the posted article was that it didn't explain why effort was being spent on that particular problem, and it didn't tell me anything interesting about how it was solved.  It was fluff science reporting.

Edit:  If not satisfied with meatiness of product, ask me to go into Galois field extensions personally, rather than just posting a link.  That stuff approaches my cognitive limit, so it will be an interesting, not to say traumatic, exercise.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on September 14, 2019, 05:59:29 AM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on September 14, 2019, 03:23:50 AM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on September 13, 2019, 02:37:38 PM
Feel free to post some red meat math.

Impress the shit out of me.

It doesn't really belong here, so I tossed it in my junk thread.

https://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php/topic,38717.msg1430611.html#msg1430611

Really, my complaint about the posted article was that it didn't explain why effort was being spent on that particular problem, and it didn't tell me anything interesting about how it was solved.  It was fluff science reporting.

Edit:  If not satisfied with meatiness of product, ask me to go into Galois field extensions personally, rather than just posting a link.  That stuff approaches my cognitive limit, so it will be an interesting, not to say traumatic, exercise.

I changed my mind.

Take your coolness unto death attitude and fuck right off.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on September 14, 2019, 03:13:57 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on September 14, 2019, 05:59:29 AM
I changed my mind.

Take your coolness unto death attitude and fuck right off.
If you post a link that is just pop-science fluff, I will say so.

If you don't like this, you have options.  You can fight me, you can ignore me, you can block me.  You can tell me why you think my reaction is unwarranted.

Telling me to fuck off?  Not likely to work.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: altered on September 14, 2019, 04:20:48 PM
Honestly, that definitely seemed unwarranted.

The first article was interesting in that we solved a problem, but uninteresting in that the problem only existed to be a problem. The article sold itself on the strength of a pop culture reference.

CNO's reaction was justified there, in the same way that an article that examined Trump's political history to talk about astrology and his star sign would justify a broadly similar reaction. E.g. "You can do better, and if you can't then you should not have done it at all."

Meanwhile, CNO actually stepped up when you told him to, and shared an area of math that is legitimately awesome and vital to the modern world, and explained in depth why it was awesome without resorting to "Ha Ha remember This Old Joke fellow humans? Wasn't that Just The Funniest?"

And you tell him to fuck off.

As I said before: unwarranted.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on September 15, 2019, 08:04:35 AM
Quote from: chaotic neutral observer on September 14, 2019, 03:13:57 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on September 14, 2019, 05:59:29 AM
I changed my mind.

Take your coolness unto death attitude and fuck right off.
If you post a link that is just pop-science fluff, I will say so.

If you don't like this, you have options.  You can fight me, you can ignore me, you can block me.  You can tell me why you think my reaction is unwarranted.

Telling me to fuck off?  Not likely to work.

Take your "I'm the smartest guy in the room" shtick, and go fuck yourself with it too.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on September 15, 2019, 08:09:12 AM
Quote from: nullified on September 14, 2019, 04:20:48 PM
Honestly, that definitely seemed unwarranted.

The first article was interesting in that we solved a problem, but uninteresting in that the problem only existed to be a problem. The article sold itself on the strength of a pop culture reference.

CNO's reaction was justified there, in the same way that an article that examined Trump's political history to talk about astrology and his star sign would justify a broadly similar reaction. E.g. "You can do better, and if you can't then you should not have done it at all."

Meanwhile, CNO actually stepped up when you told him to, and shared an area of math that is legitimately awesome and vital to the modern world, and explained in depth why it was awesome without resorting to "Ha Ha remember This Old Joke fellow humans? Wasn't that Just The Funniest?"

And you tell him to fuck off.

As I said before: unwarranted.

See my above post.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: altered on September 15, 2019, 08:35:14 AM
I'm very sorry that you took a legitimate criticism of modern STEM journalism as an attempt to make you personally and specifically feel unintelligent?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: chaotic neutral observer on September 15, 2019, 03:54:43 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on September 15, 2019, 08:04:35 AM
Take your "I'm the smartest guy in the room" shtick, and go fuck yourself with it too.

As I just said, telling me to fuck off is not likely to work.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Fujikoma on September 15, 2019, 04:31:18 PM
And many fucks were given. Take your fuck off and fuck it with my dick.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: on October 27, 2019, 10:45:27 PM
Quote from: Brother Mythos on September 13, 2019, 01:56:45 PM
The question, which goes back to at least 1955 and may have been pondered by Greek thinkers as early as the third century AD, asks, "How can you express every number between 1 and 100 as the sum of three cubes?" Or, put algebraically, how do you solve x^3 + y^3 + z^3 = k, where k equals any whole number from 1 to 100?

Speaking of sums of cubes ... There are only two integers that cannot be written as the sum of at most eight cubes: 239 and the infamous 23.

(Another property of 23 I haven't seen anywhere is that 23 is the first odd prime which is not a twin.
Title: Rats love driving tiny cars, even when they don’t get treats
Post by: bugmenоt on November 02, 2019, 01:55:06 PM
https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/11/these-rats-learned-to-drive-tiny-cars-for-science/

QuoteRats that learn to drive are more able to cope with stress. That might sound like the fever-dream of a former scientist-turned-car writer, but it's actually one of the results of a new study from the University of Richmond. The aim of the research was to see what effect the environment a rat was raised in had on its ability to learn new tasks. Although that kind of thing has been studied in the past, the tests haven't been particularly complicated. Anyone who has spent time around rats will know they're actually quite resourceful. So the team, led by Professor Kelly Lambert, came up this time with something a little more involved than navigating a maze: driving.

If you're going to teach rats to drive, first you need to build them a car (or Rat Operated Vehicle). The chassis and powertrain came from a robot car kit, and a transparent plastic food container provided the body. Explaining the idea of a steering wheel and pedals to rats was probably too difficult, so the controls were three copper wires stretched across an opening cut out of the front of the bodywork and an aluminum plate on the floor. When a rat stood on the plate and gripped a copper bar, a circuit was completed and the motors engaged; one bar made the car turn to the left, one made it turn to the right, and the third made it go straight ahead.

If proof were needed that many existing psychology tests are too simple, rats did not take long to learn how to drive. The driving was conducted in a closed-off arena (1.5m x 0.6m x 0.5m) where the goal was to drive over to a food treat. Three five-minute sessions a week, for eight weeks, was sufficient for the rats to learn how to do it. The placement of the treat and the starting position and orientation of the car varied throughout, so the rats had more of a challenge each time. At the end of the experiment, each rat went through a series of trials, conducted a day or two apart, where they were allowed to drive around the arena but without any food treats to see if they were only doing it for the food.

The subjects were 11 male rats, five of whom lived together in a large cage with multiple surface levels and objects to play with, and six who lived together in pairs in standard laboratory rat cages. Although both groups of rats learned to drive the car, the ones that lived in the enriched environment were quicker to start driving, and they continued to be more interested in driving even when there was no reward on offer beyond the thrill of the wind in one's fur.

The researchers also collected each rat's droppings at various points during the study to analyze them for metabolites of corticosterone and dehydroepiandrosterone, a pair of hormones. The ratio of these two hormones can show how stressed an animal is, and it changed in a pattern consistent with emotional resilience in all the rats over the course of the study. However, there was no significant difference between the enriched environment and the control group in this regard, which may well mean that the four-month process of teaching the rats to drive was itself a positive enriching environment.

Serious scientists usually refrain from imputing any further emotion onto research animals, but I'm no longer a serious scientist, so I'm happy saying that learning to drive made the rats more well-adjusted. And the study has further value; these complex activities may be more useful tests in rat models of neuropsychiatry than those in current use.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cain on November 02, 2019, 03:05:51 PM
I'm amazed that humans - who literally invented bumper cars - are surprised to discover that driving tiny cars around is so popular.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Anna Mae Bollocks on November 14, 2019, 04:34:50 PM
Rats drive and chimpanzees have wars. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gombe_Chimpanzee_War (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gombe_Chimpanzee_War)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Frontside Back on January 29, 2020, 06:05:04 PM
https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-built-robots-entirely-out-of-living-frog-cells

PREPARE FOR ELDRITCH MEAT BLOBS!
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on January 29, 2020, 06:16:19 PM
Quote from: Frontside Back on January 29, 2020, 06:05:04 PM
https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-built-robots-entirely-out-of-living-frog-cells

PREPARE FOR ELDRITCH MEAT BLOBS!

Sciencealert isn't about science.

It will never break my heart again.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Frontside Back on January 29, 2020, 07:01:04 PM
Quote from: Doktor Howl on January 29, 2020, 06:16:19 PM
Quote from: Frontside Back on January 29, 2020, 06:05:04 PM
https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-built-robots-entirely-out-of-living-frog-cells

PREPARE FOR ELDRITCH MEAT BLOBS!

Sciencealert isn't about science.

It will never break my heart again.
I actually found this in a popsci youtube video, and picked a random source to repost. I don't know shit about journalism, how do I know which ones are up to par?
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cramulus on January 29, 2020, 07:09:42 PM
Quote from: Frontside Back on January 29, 2020, 06:05:04 PM
https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-built-robots-entirely-out-of-living-frog-cells

PREPARE FOR ELDRITCH MEAT BLOBS!

A) I think this is interesting as fuck
B) discussing this topic on facebook is predictably hilarious because everybody who has seen a Sci Fi movie thinks that they can predict the future ("I've seen this movie, they will obviously rise up against us!")
C) That's not to say that this isn't dangerous tech--but it's too new to know what its real practical applications are

Here's the link to the scientist's page about it, which has better details than the CNN or Independent or Sciencealert articles: https://cdorgs.github.io/ -- it also has a video of the thing moving



Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Doktor Howl on January 29, 2020, 08:41:37 PM
Quote from: Cramulus on January 29, 2020, 07:09:42 PM
("I've seen this movie, they will obviously rise up against us!")


They will if I have anything to say about it.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: altered on January 29, 2020, 09:02:33 PM
This is AWESOME technology, but ultimately the main danger is something switching the cancer switch on in one of those cells. That's how you get communicable cancers: free living cancer cells. Beyond that, they're just  not very dangerous. Too simple, currently. Also, likely to cause immune responses if they enter the human body, which reduces their danger further.

That all said, this is absolutely the real first step to realistic nanorobotics. Nature beat us to making molecular machines and has had a few million years to debug, the right move was always going to be biological.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Prelate Diogenes Shandor on January 29, 2020, 10:55:40 PM
Quote from: Frontside Back on January 29, 2020, 06:05:04 PM
https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-have-built-robots-entirely-out-of-living-frog-cells

PREPARE FOR ELDRITCH MEAT BLOBS!

To me it sounds more like Frankenstein's Monster. Except tiny.
Title: Re: Rats love driving tiny cars, even when they don’t get treats
Post by: The Johnny on July 26, 2020, 09:54:01 PM
Quote from: bugmenоt on November 02, 2019, 01:55:06 PM
https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/11/these-rats-learned-to-drive-tiny-cars-for-science/

QuoteRats that learn to drive are more able to cope with stress. That might sound like the fever-dream of a former scientist-turned-car writer, but it's actually one of the results of a new study from the University of Richmond. The aim of the research was to see what effect the environment a rat was raised in had on its ability to learn new tasks. Although that kind of thing has been studied in the past, the tests haven't been particularly complicated. Anyone who has spent time around rats will know they're actually quite resourceful. So the team, led by Professor Kelly Lambert, came up this time with something a little more involved than navigating a maze: driving.

If you're going to teach rats to drive, first you need to build them a car (or Rat Operated Vehicle). The chassis and powertrain came from a robot car kit, and a transparent plastic food container provided the body. Explaining the idea of a steering wheel and pedals to rats was probably too difficult, so the controls were three copper wires stretched across an opening cut out of the front of the bodywork and an aluminum plate on the floor. When a rat stood on the plate and gripped a copper bar, a circuit was completed and the motors engaged; one bar made the car turn to the left, one made it turn to the right, and the third made it go straight ahead.

If proof were needed that many existing psychology tests are too simple, rats did not take long to learn how to drive. The driving was conducted in a closed-off arena (1.5m x 0.6m x 0.5m) where the goal was to drive over to a food treat. Three five-minute sessions a week, for eight weeks, was sufficient for the rats to learn how to do it. The placement of the treat and the starting position and orientation of the car varied throughout, so the rats had more of a challenge each time. At the end of the experiment, each rat went through a series of trials, conducted a day or two apart, where they were allowed to drive around the arena but without any food treats to see if they were only doing it for the food.

The subjects were 11 male rats, five of whom lived together in a large cage with multiple surface levels and objects to play with, and six who lived together in pairs in standard laboratory rat cages. Although both groups of rats learned to drive the car, the ones that lived in the enriched environment were quicker to start driving, and they continued to be more interested in driving even when there was no reward on offer beyond the thrill of the wind in one's fur.

The researchers also collected each rat's droppings at various points during the study to analyze them for metabolites of corticosterone and dehydroepiandrosterone, a pair of hormones. The ratio of these two hormones can show how stressed an animal is, and it changed in a pattern consistent with emotional resilience in all the rats over the course of the study. However, there was no significant difference between the enriched environment and the control group in this regard, which may well mean that the four-month process of teaching the rats to drive was itself a positive enriching environment.

Serious scientists usually refrain from imputing any further emotion onto research animals, but I'm no longer a serious scientist, so I'm happy saying that learning to drive made the rats more well-adjusted. And the study has further value; these complex activities may be more useful tests in rat models of neuropsychiatry than those in current use.

It was the year 2021, when the rats took over the Uber taxi service, much to the delight of customers, as they were more charismatic, and less accident prone than actual humans.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: minuspace on July 27, 2020, 12:48:10 AM
Oh no... not that clever
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Cramulus on October 08, 2020, 07:29:02 PM
An earlier universe existed before the Big Bang, and can still be observed today, says Nobel winner [Roger Penrose]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/earlier-universe-existed-big-bang-174323840.html
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on May 19, 2023, 12:46:22 PM
Contacts in the Early Bronze Age

"Bronze Age long-distance connections: Baltic amber in Aššur"

This article on caught my attention, as I'm almost finished reading 1177 B.C. - The Year Civilization Collapsed, a book by Eric. H. Cline.

As per this article:

"The extreme rarity of amber in the Mediterranean and the Near East before about 1550 BC and the restriction to high-ranking contexts can be explained by the fact that the Central German Únětice culture, whose wealth and importance is expressed, for example, in richly furnished princely tombs (Leubingen, Helmsdorf, Bornhöck) and the Nebra Sky Disk, controlled the paths over which the amber could reach the south.

The extremely rare amber finds from the early 2nd millennium BC are probably exclusive gifts from well-traveled people from Central or Western Europe to the elites in the south. After the end of the Únětice culture around 1550 BC., the picture changes and widespread trade is established, which made amber available in larger quantities in the Mediterranean and the Middle East."

(As per Eric H. Cline, all of this widespread trade ended by 1177 B.C.)

Here's the link to the summary article:      https://phys.org/news/2023-05-bronze-age-long-distance-baltic-amber.html (https://phys.org/news/2023-05-bronze-age-long-distance-baltic-amber.html)

To my surprise, the long, original paper this article is based upon, "Baltic Amber in Aššur. Forms and Significance of Amber Exchange between Europe and the Middle East, c.2000–1300 BC," is freely accessible, and downloadable, from the embedded link at the end of this article.
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 04, 2023, 08:17:29 PM
"Archaeologists Discover the Oldest Known Blueprints"

We'll never know exactly how long ago one of our primate ancestors first scratched a symbol into the dirt with a stick, and another member of his/her community recognized the intended meaning.

But, we humans have been doing this sort of thing for a long time, and have become quite good at this form of communications.

As per the article:

"Stone Age hunters in the Middle East and Central Asia used giant stone structures to trap wild animals. Today, archaeologists refer to these massive constructions as desert kites because of how they look from above—like a kite with several long tails.

Now, in a study published last week in the journal PLOS One, researchers say they have found stone engravings that are accurate, to-scale depictions of desert kites that date to between 7,000 and 8,000 years ago. This makes them the oldest known realistic plans for large, human-made structures, the authors write."

To my surprise, the original journal paper this short article is based upon is not hidden behind a paywall. It may be accessed by clicking on PLOS One in the article's text. So, this time around, the institutionalized have no advantage over the rest of us.

Here's the link:    https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/archaeologists-discover-the-oldest-known-blueprints-180982207/ (https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/archaeologists-discover-the-oldest-known-blueprints-180982207/)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 10, 2023, 12:18:03 PM
"Anger as pre-historic stones destroyed for French DIY store"

As per the article:

"A local archeologist in northwestern France's Carnac region believes 39 standing stones − known as menhirs − have been lost due to preparations for a DIY store.

Around 40 standing stones thought to have been erected by prehistoric humans 7,000 years ago have been destroyed near a famed archaeological site in northwest France to make way for a DIY store, an angry local historian has revealed.

The stones in Carnac were between 50-100 centimeters (20-40 inches) high and stood close to the main highly protected areas of one of Europe's largest and most mysterious pre-historic tourist attractions."

Now, there are a LOT of standing stones in the Carnac area. And, I have not been there for some time. But, Carnac did not appear to me to be anything close to being a tourist mecca. Even in the late spring the town was mostly empty. Lodging was very limited, and food was extremely limited. Uncle François had been there before, but even with him as our guide, we had to ask the locals where we could find an open restaurant. Only two were recommended, and only one of them was actually open for business. Even then, I remember only two other people dining there, in addition to our small family group.

My impression of the town of Carnac was that it's mainly a place where French people have small summer/vacation homes. I'm not making excuses for their actions, but it's possible this the reason the local politicians don't give a damn about a few, small, 7,000 year old standing stones being destroyed.

Here's the link:   https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2023/06/08/anger-as-pre-historic-stones-destroyed-for-french-diy-store_6030529_7.html (https://www.lemonde.fr/en/france/article/2023/06/08/anger-as-pre-historic-stones-destroyed-for-french-diy-store_6030529_7.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on June 26, 2023, 10:41:14 AM
"What did Stonehenge sound like?"

As per the article:

"New research into the prehistoric site's acoustical properties is revealing that the stone circle may have been used for exclusive ceremonies."

Further:

"Thanks to Cox's recent studies, however, we now know a fascinating detail about one of the world's most enigmatic sites: it once acted as a giant echo chamber, amplifying sounds made inside the circle to those standing within, but shielding noise from those standing outside the circle. This finding has led some to ponder whether the monument was actually constructed as a ritual site for a small and elite group.
 
This breakthrough is a decade in the making. While researching "the sonic wonders of the world" 10 years ago, Cox began to ponder whether studying the acoustical properties of Stonehenge may help uncover some of its secrets. "I realised there was a technique in acoustics that had never been applied to prehistoric sites before, and that was acoustic scale modelling," he said. "I'm the first to make a scale model of Stonehenge or any prehistoric stone site."

In recent years, a large amount of research has been done on Stonehenge, the origins of the stones used in its construction, and other prehistoric structures in the Stonehenge area. This acoustical research, however, is entirely new to me.

Here's the main link: https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20230601-what-did-stonehenge-sound-like (https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20230601-what-did-stonehenge-sound-like)

And, here's a link to the original scientific paper:   https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305440320301394 (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305440320301394)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 02, 2023, 12:10:38 PM
"We've pumped so much groundwater that we've nudged the Earth's spin"

As per the article:

"By pumping water out of the ground and moving it elsewhere, humans have shifted such a large mass of water that the Earth tilted nearly 80 centimeters (31.5 inches) east between 1993 and 2010 alone, according to a new study published in Geophysical Research Letters, AGU's journal for short-format, high-impact research with implications spanning the Earth and space sciences.

Based on climate models, scientists previously estimated humans pumped 2,150 gigatons of groundwater, equivalent to more than 6 millimeters (0.24 inches) of sea level rise, from 1993 to 2010. But validating that estimate is difficult.

One approach lies with the Earth's rotational pole, which is the point around which the planet rotates. It moves during a process called polar motion, which is when the position of the Earth's rotational pole varies relative to the crust. The distribution of water on the planet affects how mass is distributed. Like adding a tiny bit of weight to a spinning top, the Earth spins a little differently as water is moved around.

"Earth's rotational pole actually changes a lot," said Ki-Weon Seo, a geophysicist at Seoul National University who led the study. "Our study shows that among climate-related causes, the redistribution of groundwater actually has the largest impact on the drift of the rotational pole.""

It appears we're in the process of "terraforming" Earth in yet another way.

Here's the link:    https://news.agu.org/press-release/weve-pumped-so-much-groundwater-that-weve-nudged-the-earths-spin/ (https://news.agu.org/press-release/weve-pumped-so-much-groundwater-that-weve-nudged-the-earths-spin/)

And, here's the link to the original research paper:    https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2023GL103509 (https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2023GL103509)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on July 23, 2023, 11:31:51 AM
"Quasar 'clocks' show Universe running five times slower soon after Big Bang"

The phenomena being written about is called "Cosmological Time Dilation." However, this name is not mentioned in the article. Worse, some of the more popular science news websites are displaying very misleading captions when reporting about this phenomena.

As per the article:

"Einstein's general theory of relativity means that we should observe the distant – and hence ancient – universe running much slower than the present day. However, peering back that far in time has proven elusive. Scientists have now cracked that mystery by using quasars as 'clocks'.

"Looking back to a time when the universe was just over a billion years old, we see time appearing to flow five times slower," said lead author of the study, Professor Geraint Lewis from the School of Physics and Sydney Institute for Astronomy at the University of Sydney.

"If you were there, in this infant universe, one second would seem like one second – but from our position, more than 12 billion years into the future, that early time appears to drag.""

Unfortunately, the original scientific paper is paywalled, so only the institutionalized among us are able to view it.

Here's the link to the summary article:      https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2023/07/04/quasar-clocks-show-universe-appears-five-times-slower-after-big-bang-einstein-relativity.html (https://www.sydney.edu.au/news-opinion/news/2023/07/04/quasar-clocks-show-universe-appears-five-times-slower-after-big-bang-einstein-relativity.html)

However, here's a link to the earlier arxiv.org paper:      https://arxiv.org/abs/2306.04053 (https://arxiv.org/abs/2306.04053)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on August 05, 2023, 12:04:45 PM
"X marks the unknown in algebra – but X's origins are a math mystery"

This is, admittedly, a 'fluff piece,' but I found it to be an interesting short story about some of the history of mathematics.

As per the article:

"You might be most familiar with x from math class. Many algebra problems use x as a variable, to stand in for an unknown quantity. But why is x the letter chosen for this role? When and where did this convention begin?

There are a few different explanations that math enthusiasts have put forward – some citing translation, others pointing to a more typographic origin. Each theory has some merit, but historians of mathematics, like me, know that it's difficult to say for sure how x got its role in modern algebra."

So, if you also have an interest in the history behind the continuing development of mathematics, you might enjoy reading this article.

Here's the link to the article:      https://theconversation.com/x-marks-the-unknown-in-algebra-but-xs-origins-are-a-math-mystery-210440 (https://theconversation.com/x-marks-the-unknown-in-algebra-but-xs-origins-are-a-math-mystery-210440)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on October 10, 2023, 12:23:44 PM
"Antimatter falls down, not up: CERN experiment confirms theory"

As per the article:

"Physicists have shown that, like everything else experiencing gravity, antimatter falls downwards when dropped.

This outcome is not surprising — a difference in the gravitational behaviour of matter and antimatter would have huge implications for physics — but observing it directly had been a dream for decades, says Clifford Will, a theoretician who specializes in gravity at the University of Florida in Gainesville. "It really is a cool result.""

Well, I'm glad that issue has been finally settled.

Here's the link:   https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03043-0 (https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03043-0)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on November 04, 2023, 07:08:51 AM
"Starfish bodies aren't bodies at all, study finds"

As per the article:

"The heads of most animals are easily identifiable, but scientists haven't been able to say the same for sea stars until now.

A starfish has five identical arms with a layer of "tube feet" beneath them that can help the marine creature move along the seafloor, causing naturalists to puzzle over whether sea stars have defined front and back ends — and if they have heads at all.

But new genetic research suggests the opposite — that sea stars are largely heads that lack torsos or tails and likely lost those features evolutionarily over time. The researchers said the bizarre fossils of sea star ancestors, which appeared to have a kind of torso, make a lot more sense in evolutionary terms in light of the new findings.

The findings were published Wednesday in the journal Nature.

"It's as if the sea star is completely missing a trunk, and is best described as just a head crawling along the seafloor," said lead study author Laurent Formery, postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University and the University of California, Berkeley, in a statement. "It's not at all what scientists have assumed about these animals."

The revelations, made possible by new methods of genetic sequencing, could help answer some of the biggest remaining questions about echinoderms, including their shared ancestry with humans and other animals that look nothing like them."

Well, since it should be perfectly obvious that a starfish isn't really a "fish," I suppose it's not too surprising that they don't really have "arms" either. Still, it did take modern genetic sequencing to bring it to a head.

Here's the link:   https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/02/world/starfish-head-body-plan-scn/index.html (https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/02/world/starfish-head-body-plan-scn/index.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on December 07, 2023, 01:08:23 PM
"More than a meteorite: New clues about the demise of dinosaurs"

"McGill researchers challenge current understanding of dinosaur extinction by unearthing link between volcanic eruptions and climate change"

As per the article:

"What wiped out the dinosaurs? A meteorite plummeting to Earth is only part of the story, a new study suggests. Climate change triggered by massive volcanic eruptions may have ultimately set the stage for the dinosaur extinction, challenging the traditional narrative that a meteorite alone delivered the final blow to the ancient giants.

That's according to a study published in Science Advances, co-authored by Don Baker, a professor in McGill University's Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences.

The research team delved into volcanic eruptions of the Deccan Traps—a vast and rugged plateau in Western India formed by molten lava. Erupting a staggering one million cubic kilometres of rock, it may have played a key role in cooling the global climate around 65 million years ago."

There's a link to the detailed study within the article.

Here's the link to the article:       Dinosaur Extinction - More Than a Meteorite (https://www.mcgill.ca/newsroom/channels/news/more-meteorite-new-clues-about-demise-dinosaurs-353027)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on December 12, 2023, 07:24:12 AM
"Kids with cats have more than double the risk of developing schizophrenia, researchers find"

When I first read the title, I thought this article was going to be more suited for posting in "High Weirdness" than "Weekly Science Headlines."

As per the article:

"Researchers at The Park Center for Mental Health, Australia, have added to the growing body of evidence that cat ownership is a major risk factor for schizophrenia and quantified the risk at more than double.

In a paper, "Cat Ownership and Schizophrenia-Related Disorders and Psychotic-Like Experiences: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis," published in Schizophrenia Bulletin, the team details the connections between youth cat ownership and later-in-life schizophrenia-related diagnosis."

And, further along in the article:

"Cat ownership was associated with an increased risk of schizophrenia-related disorders. The unadjusted pooled odds ratio (OR) was 2.35, and the adjusted estimate was 2.24, indicating an over twofold increase in the odds of developing schizophrenia-related disorders among all individuals exposed to cats."

And, still further along, the article finally gets to the heart of the matter:

"The overall risk trend focuses on the interaction between the developing brain and feline exposure. But of course, it is not just hanging out with cat personalities that is to blame for the higher risk. There is a causal agent operating unseen in the cat environment that is likely the true culprit—Toxoplasma gondii."                                             

So, apparently, Mrs. Mythos' claim that our cats are driving us crazy is really true.

Here's the link:   Kids with Cats Risk Developing Schizophrenia (https://medicalxpress.com/news/2023-12-kids-cats-schizophrenia.html)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on February 13, 2024, 05:30:19 PM
"Discovery of a second ultra-large structure in distant space further challenges what we understand about the universe"

As per this article:

"The Big Ring on the Sky is 9.2 billion light-years from Earth. It has a diameter of about 1.3 billion light-years, and a circumference of about four billion light-years. If we could step outside and see it directly, the diameter of the Big Ring would need about 15 full Moons to cover it.

It is the second ultra-large structure discovered by University of Central Lancashire (UCLan) PhD student Alexia Lopez who, two years ago, also discovered the Giant Arc on the Sky. Remarkably, the Big Ring and the Giant Arc, which is 3.3 billion light-years across, are in the same cosmological neighbourhood – they are seen at the same distance, at the same cosmic time, and are only 12 degrees apart on the sky.   

And, a little further along in the article:

"Alexia said: "Neither of these two ultra-large structures is easy to explain in our current understanding of the universe. And their ultra-large sizes, distinctive shapes, and cosmological proximity must surely be telling us something important – but what exactly?"

Well ... that Big "Ring" on the Sky looks like a Big Apple on the Sky to me. And, any real Discordian immediately knows what that's all about.

Here's the link to this article:      The Big "Ring" on the Sky (https://www.uclan.ac.uk/news/big-ring-in-the-sky)
Title: Re: Weekly Science Headlines
Post by: Brother Mythos on March 13, 2024, 04:45:16 PM
"Military service can bring melanoma danger"

As per this article:

"U.S. military veterans, especially those who served in the Air Force, are at high risk for one of the deadliest skin cancers, melanoma.

The risk owes to work hazards associated with service in countries near the equator where ultraviolet (UV) levels are higher.

Long-term exposure to radiation from flying at higher altitudes puts Air Force vets at even higher risk.

"Most members of the military tend to serve when they're younger, which is when cellular mutations that cause cancer over time can start to develop," Dr. Rebecca Hartman, chief of dermatology at VA Boston Healthcare System, said during a presentation Friday at the American Academy of Dermatology (AAD) annual meeting in San Diego.

"Challenges in practicing effective sun protection, like inadequate access to sunscreen or protective clothing, and not having access to sun protection in times of conflict, contribute to this risk," she added in a meeting news release."

All I was worried about were bombs, missiles, radiation poisoning, lung cancer from secondhand smoke, food poisoning, sharks, hypothermia, and drowning. And now, after all this time, they're telling me I needed sunscreen.

Here's the link:   Melanoma Danger from Military Service (https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-03-military-melanoma-danger.html)