Key Cancer Spread Gene Found

From The BBC:

Scientists have pinpointed a gene linked to more than half of all breast cancers.

The gene, NRG1 (neuregulin-1), is also thought to play a role in many bowel, prostate, ovarian and bladder tumours.

The University of Cambridge team said the breakthrough should provide "vital information" about how cancer spreads.

Experts agreed the finding, published in the journal Oncogene, could represent a very significant advance in the fight against cancer.

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Stunning Underwater Shots Captured By World's Top Female Cave Diver And Her Team

A diver swims inside the passages that lay below Peacock Springs State Park in Florida

From The Daily Mail:

Crawling through underwater caves from Antarctica to Mexico and Florida to Bermuda, it is a good thing that Jill Heinerth is not claustrophobic.

It also helps that Ms Heinerth, 44, is acknowledged as the world's top female cave diver.

Holding the world record for distance travelled in underwater caves as well as being the first person to cave dive in an Antarctic iceberg, Ms Heinerth has been at the top of her game for 20 years.

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Roman Coin Hoards Show More War Means Fewer Babies

From Wired Science:

Coins buried by anxious Italians in the first century B.C. can be used to track the ups and downs of the Roman population during periods of civil war and violence.

In times of instability in the ancient world, people stashed their cash and if they got killed or displaced, they didn’t come back for their Geld. Thus, large numbers of coin hoards are a good quantitative indicator of population decline, two researchers argue in in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science Monday.

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Ultrafast DNA Nanosensor

Image: Glowing DNA: A CCD camera sensor captures the glow of hairpin-shaped DNA nanosensors when they bind with a target gene sequence of anthrax bacteria. Credit: Benjamin Miller, University of Rochester Medical Center

From Technology Review:

A new type of sensor makes diagnosing infections quick and easy.

A portable instrument based on an ultrasensitive nanoscale sensor could detect bacteria in minutes, helping to catch infectious diseases early and prevent their spread. The simple, low-cost device should be available within three years, says Benjamin Miller, professor of dermatology and biomedical engineering at the University of Rochester Medical Center, and codeveloper of the sensor.

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Graphite Mimics Iron's Magnetism: New Nanotech Applications

The electron density of states on a grain boundary of defects. The arrows (pointing in the reader's direction) indicate the direction of the magnetic moments. (Credit: Kees Flipse, Eindhoven University of Technology)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Oct. 5, 2009) — Researchers of Eindhoven University of Technology and the Radboud University Nijmegen in The Netherlands show for the first time why ordinary graphite is a permanent magnet at room temperature. The results are promising for new applications in nanotechnology, such as sensors and detectors. In particular graphite could be a promising candidate for a biosensor material. The results will appear online on 4 October in Nature Physics.

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Green Roofs Curb Global Warming, Study Finds

Chicago's City Hall got a green roof in 2001. The project was designed to test various concepts and methods and to test the benefits. Credit: Wikipedia Commons

From Live Science:

Rooftops covered with plants — logically dubbed “green roofs” — could help fight global warming, scientists now suggest.

Green roofs are growing more popular in cities, with the number of green roofs increasing by more than 35 percent from 2007 to 2008 in the United States, representing more than 3.1 million square feet installed last year. In Germany, widely considered the leader in green roofing, some 12 percent of all flat roofs are green, with the German green roof industry growing 10 to 15 percent annually.

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Sports Jocks Are Oh-So Predictable

Another fast ball... how predictable (Image: Rex Features)

From New Scientist:

A clever athlete knows how to keep an opponent guessing, but professionals act more predictably than they should. So says a study based on game theory, which shows that baseball pitchers throw too many fastballs and American football teams don't pass the ball enough. The finding could give savvy teams an extra victory or two over the course of a season.

The game theory concept of "minimax" says that players in a head-to-head match should follow two basic rules: first, play in a way that minimises your opponent's possible gain; second, be unpredictable.

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The Power Loader Is Real

From Popular Science:

Still no word about the xenomorphs, though.

For everyone out there who's been fighting aliens with a flamethrower, but now needs something with a little more kick, you're in luck. Panasonic has taken a break from hawking TVs and camcorder to build the power loader from Aliens.

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Baby Mammoth Yields Secrets After 40,000 Years In Siberian Tundra

From Times Online:

A baby woolly mammoth that died after being sucked into a muddy river bed 40,000 years ago has revealed more prehistoric secrets of how the species survived in its icy habitat.

The mammoth, known as Lyuba, was about a month old when she died in the Siberian tundra, where she remained until she was discovered by reindeer herders three years ago. Her body was so well preserved in the permafrost that her stomach retained traces of her mother’s milk, and scientists identified sediment in her mouth, trunk and throat — suggesting that she suffocated while struggling to free herself from the mud.

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Energy-From-Waste Powers US Army

The pyrolysis tube at the system's heart can consume 100kg of waste per hour

From The BBC:

A system that generates energy from rubbish is being sent by defence firm Qinetiq to the US army.

The PyTEC system heats mixed waste, releasing a gas that can be burned to produce five times more energy than is required to drive the system.

Qinetiq say that the system, already in use on British navy ship HMS Ocean, has been "containerised" for US army use.

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British Scientists 'Seek And Destroy' Cancer Cells Using Iron Nanoparticles

Photo: The 'nano magnets' wipe out the cancer cells without harming the surrounding tissue

From The Daily Mail:

A revolutionary technique that uses injections of iron nanoparticles to seek out and destroy cancer cells has been developed by British scientists.

The tiny particles are designed to roam through the body's blood vessels in search of tumour cells.

Once they have latched on to their targets, the magnets can be heated from outside the body using a magnetic field - wiping out the cancer cells without harming the surrounding tissue.

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What's Inside A Cup Of Coffee?

Photo: Tim Morris

From Wired Science:

Caffeine
This is why the world produces more than 16 billion pounds of coffee beans per year. It's actually an alkaloid plant toxin (like nicotine and cocaine), a bug killer that stimulates us by blocking neuroreceptors for the sleep chemical adenosine. The result: you, awake.

Water
Hot H2O is a super solvent, leaching flavors and oils out of the coffee bean. A good cup of joe is 98.75 percent water and 1.25 percent soluble plant matter. Caffeine is a diuretic, so coffee newbies pee out the water quickly; java junkies build up resistance.

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Vital Embryo Research Driven Out Of Britain

Professor Justin St John, who has left the UK for Australia (left); Sir Leszek Borysiewicz, of the MRC, which turned down one licence-holder (right). REX

From The Independent:

Scientists abandon plan to develop stem cells after funding dries up.

All research involving the controversial creation of animal-human "hybrid" embryos has been refused funding in Britain and one of the three scientists licensed to carry out the work has left the UK for a job in Australia.

Every one of the three projects to develop embryonic stem cells from cloned embryos created by fusing human cells with animal eggs has now been abandoned, after publicly-funded research councils refused to back the studies aimed at developing new treatments for incurable illnesses ranging from heart disease to Parkinson's.

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Private Space Technology Powers Up

Photo: Rocket science: Franklin Chang Diaz (top) is a former NASA astronaut and founder of Ad Astra Rocket Company. The company has developed a prototype plasma rocket, the VX-200 (bottom), that recently achieved 201 kilowatts of power.
Credit: José Díaz, La Nación (top); Ad Astra Rocket Company (bottom)

From Technology Review:

Former astronaut Franklin Chang Diaz says the private sector can help NASA, and reckons he has the rocket to prove it.

In the coming weeks the Obama administration will decide the future of U.S. human spaceflight. A summary report by the committee tasked with reviewing NASA's current plans and providing recommendations suggests utilizing the commercial sector for unmanned, and perhaps manned, missions as a way to reduce government costs. Franklin Chang Diaz, a former NASA astronaut and founder and president of Ad Astra Rocket Company, agrees.

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Our Changing View Of The Moon

The first drawing of the Moon through a telescope, dated July 26, 1609, by Thomas Harriot. This crude but historic sketch roughly delineates the terminator, the line that marks the boundary between day and night on the lunar surface. The original image is a little more than 15 cm across. The dark patches correspond to Mare Crisium (at the top), Mare Tranquilitatis and Mare Foecunditatis. © Lord Egremont

From MSNBC:

The moon, so bright and large in the sky compared to other celestial objects, has captured the attention of humans at least since the dawn of consciousness. Over these eras, mankind's view of the moon has evolved, from the more mystical image of it as a god, to the thought it was covered in seas and vegetation. Most recently, it's been viewed as a dry and dusty wasteland.

Recent findings of water on the lunar surface could spur yet another shift in the way we see our orbiting companion.

The moon appears in early art thousands of years ago, showing that early man was as enthralled by its eerie glow as later philosophers and scientists.

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Gene Controlling Number Of Brain Cells Pinpointed

A new study suggests that a single gene, called GSK-3, controls the signals that determine how many neurons actually end up composing the brain. (Credit: Image courtesy of University of North Carolina School of Medicine)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Oct. 5, 2009) — In populating the growing brain, neural stem cells must strike a delicate balance between two key processes – proliferation, in which the cells multiply to provide plenty of starting materials – and differentiation, in which those materials evolve into functioning neurons.

If the stem cells proliferate too much, they could grow out of control and produce a tumor. If they proliferate too little, there may not be enough cells to become the billions of neurons of the brain. Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Medicine have now found that this critical balance rests in large part on a single gene, called GSK-3.

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For Women, Sex And Happiness Go Hand-In-Hand

From Live Science:

Women who are sexually satisfied are also happier, no matter their age, a new study suggests. It's not clear which causes the other, however.

You might be thinking, "Duh, better sex makes for a better mood." But in science, thinking something is true doesn't make it so. "A lot of the things we make assumptions about have never been documented," said study researcher Susan Davis of the Women's Health Program at Monash University, Australia.

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Water Lust: Why All The Excitement When H2O Is Found In Space?

ELIXIR OF LIFE: Finding evidence of water in the solar system and beyond is an important signpost for the presence of life. Liquid water is a solvent, a medium and a catalyst for certain types of proteins, and essential to biological processes. © ISTOCKPHOTO.COM

From Scientific American:

Mars, Europa, interstellar nebulae, and now even the moon all seem to be getting wetter with every observation. But what is it about this simple hydrogen-oxygen combo that makes it the sine qua non of finding extraterrestrial life?

When NASA announced last month the finding of water ice in several impact craters on Mars, and either water or hydroxyl widely dispersed on the moon's surface, the solar system became a little more familiar because it seemed a tad more hospitable to life as we know it on Earth.

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Mammoth Black Holes Push Universe To Its Doom

Speaking of black holes, what could be stranger?
Beyond a black hole's gravitational border -- or event horizon -- neither matter nor light can escape. Astrophysicists think dying stars about three to 20 times the mass of the sun can form these strange objects. At the center of galaxies, black holes about 10,000 to 18 billion times heavier than the sun are thought to exist, enlarged by gobbling up gas, dust, stars and small black holes.
What about mid-sized types? Perhaps surprisingly, evidence is both scarce and questionable for their existence.
Caption: Conception of a black hole pulling gas off of a nearby star. Credit: ESA/NASA

From New Scientist:

THE mammoth black holes at the centre of most galaxies may be pushing the universe closer to its final fade-out. And it is all down to the raging disorder within those dark powerhouses.

Disorder is measured by a quantity called entropy, something which has been on the rise ever since the big bang. Chas Egan and Charles Lineweaver of the Australian National University in Canberra used the latest astrophysical data to calculate the total entropy of everything in the universe, from gas to gravitons. It turns out that supermassive black holes are by far the biggest contributors to the universe's entropy. Entropy reflects the number of possible arrangements of matter and energy in an object. The number of different configurations of matter a black hole could contain is staggering because its internal state is completely mysterious.

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Unexpectedly, Cosmic Ray Intensity In Space Reaches Highest Level In 50 Years

Heliosphere Bubble The sun's weakening magnetic bubbles lets more cosmic rays
in to threaten space missions NASA

From Popular Science:

High cosmic ray levels may threaten future human missions to Mars.

Grab those tin foil hats, because NASA says that galactic cosmic rays have reached a record high for the space age.

A NASA probe found that cosmic ray intensities in 2009 had increased by almost 20 percent beyond anything seen in the past 50 years. Such cosmic rays arise from distant supernova explosions and consist mostly of protons and heavier subatomic particles -- just one cosmic ray could disable unlucky satellites or threaten astronauts in space.

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