Supply-Laden Russian Cargo Carrier Docks At Space Station

From USA Today:

A fresh load of supplies and equipment has arrived at the International Space Station after a robotic Russian space freighter eased up to the outpost and docked at the back end of the Russian side of the complex.

Two months after an aborted docking, station commander Alexander Skvortsov was ready to take manual control of the approaching spacecraft but its automated docking system worked as intended and the Progress 39 vehicle hooked up with the outpost without incident.

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'Artificial Ovary' Develops Oocytes Into Mature Human Eggs

An artificial ovary An engineered honeycomb of cultured theca cells (top row) envelopes spheres of granulosa cells (GC). The bottom row shows the tissue after 48 hours (left) and after five days. (Credit: Carson Lab / Brown University)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 14, 2010) — Researchers at Brown University and Women & Infants Hospital have invented the first artificial human ovary, an advance that provides a potentially powerful new means for conducting fertility research and could also yield infertility treatments for cancer patients. The team has already used the lab-grown organ to mature human eggs.

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Top 10 Animal Recruits in War

From Live Science:

Humans have enlisted animals to help fight their battles since the dawn of war, and today's militaries use an even wider range of creatures for everything from bomb sniffing to coastline patrolling.

That may seem remarkable, considering that dogs, horses and other animals certainly did not evolve for the purpose of human conflict. Yet nature's designs have not only stood the test of time, but have also inspired human engineers to try to harness their power directly or through mechanical imitations.

Here we count down some of the creatures that have become unwitting recruits in both ancient and modern warfare.

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Why Isn't The Price Of Broadband Obeying Moore's Law?

From Technology Review:

The quality and cost of broadband Internet access haven't budged in years.

The U.S. government doesn't keep an index of broadband internet prices by which to evaluate the success of its broadband promotion policies - the statistics they do have are mushed together with prices for dial-up access - so a couple of researchers at Northwestern University decided to build their own.

What they discovered is that broadband internet prices have remained nearly stagnant since 2004, despite the explosive pace of adoption since then - from approximately 20 percent of U.S. households in 2004 to more than 65 percent today.

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Call To Replace UN Climate Chiefs

Photo: Dr Pachauri is into his second term as IPCC chairman

From The BBC:

Lord Turnbull, the former head of the UK civil service, says the government must push for new leadership of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

He says new leaders are needed to re-build trust in climate science following the "Climategate" e-mails affair and the IPCC's glacier mistake.

Lord Turnbull made his comments in a report on Climategate published by the climate-sceptic think-tank the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), of which he is a trustee.

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This Planet Smells Funny

Image: An artist's concept of GJ 436b peeking out from behind its parent star, an M-dwarf much cooler than the sun.

From Space Daily:

Giant planet GJ 436b in the constellation Leo is missing something. Would you believe swamp gas? To the surprise of astronomers who have been studying the Neptune-sized planet using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, GJ 436b has very little methane (CH4).

"Methane should be abundant on a planet of this temperature and size, but we found 7000 times less methane than what the models predict," says Kevin Stevenson of the University of Central Florida (UCF). Stevenson was lead author of a paper reporting the result in the April 22, 2010, issue of Nature.

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Fooled You! Robots Learn How To Deceive

From Discovery News:

Robots are becoming more human every day. Some robots can already sustain damage and reconfigure themselves, kind of like how our bones heal after we break them. Now others can deceive other intelligent machines and even humans.

Researchers at Georgia Tech have developed algorithms that let robots determine whether they are in a situation where they should deceive other robots or humans.

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Robotic Butlers, Oily Wrecks And Avatars

From New Scientist:

This month on New Scientist TV, you can see a robotic butler being tested in the real world for the first time. Nick Hawes and his team from University of Birmingham, UK, are designing the robot to map a new house by exploring it and identifying objects typical to different types of room.

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A New IED Killer

'Blade' Of Water That Can Cut Through Steel To Be Used In Afghanistan To Destroy IEDs -- The Daily Mail

A device that shoots a blade of water capable of penetrating steel is to be used in Afghanistan to help soldiers disable improvised explosive devices, or IEDs.

The Stingray was developed by Sandia National Laboratories and 3,000 of the gadgets are heading out to U.S. soldiers in the region this year.

Stingrays are filled with water and an explosive material that - when detonated - creates a shockwave that travels through the water and speeds it up, creating a thin, powerful blade of water capable of penetrating steel.

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My Comment: Every little bit will help.

Scientists Investigate Massive Walrus Haul-Out In Alaska ‎

Walrus high on the barrier beaches near Pointt Lay, Alaska, 2010. Photograph: USGS

From The Guardian:

Scientists fear declining Arctic sea ice may have caused an unprecedented mass migration to dry land.

Scientists in the Arctic are reporting a rare mass migration of thousands of walrus from the ice floes to dry land along Alaska's coast.

Researchers from the US Geological Survey (USGS), who have been tracking walrus movements using satellite radio tags, say 10,000 to 20,000 of the animals, mainly mothers and calves, are now congregating in tightly packed herds on the Alaskan side of the Chukchi Sea, in the first such exodus of its kind.

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9/11 Memorial Lights Trap Thousands Of Birds

From Wired Science:

On the evening of the ninth anniversary of 9/11, the twin columns of light projected as a memorial over the World Trade Center site became a source of mystery.

Illuminated in the beams were thousands of small white objects, sparkling and spiraling, unlike anything seen on other nights. Some viewers wondered if they were scraps of paper or plastic caught in updrafts from the spotlights’ heat. From beneath, it was at times like gazing into a snowstorm. It was hard not to think of souls.

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Scientists 'Clone' Human Virus Responsible for Congenital Malformations and Other Life-Threatening Diseases

In this immunofluorescent image, a specimen of human embryonic lung reveals the presence of cytomegalovirus; magnification 25X. (Credit: CDC/Dr. Craig Lyerla)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 14, 2010) — A team of Welsh scientists has successfully cloned a human virus, offering new hope for the treatment of potentially life-threatening diseases.

Human cytomegalovirus (HCMV) is a major infectious cause of congenital malformations worldwide. The virus is also known to cause life-threatening disease in transplant patients and people with HIV/AIDS.

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Why Women Prefer 'Chill' Guys

Composite male faces constructed to differ in levels of testosterone and cortisol. From left to right: low-testosterone, high-cortisol; low-testosterone, low-cortisol. Credit: Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

From Live Science:

Women generally find calm, collected men more attractive, and scientists now suggest they know the biology of why that is.

Investigations into what makes men desirable often focus on testosterone. The hormone is linked with masculine facial traits, such as larger jaws and heavier brows, and is typically associated with better long-term health. As such, it might at first glance make sense from an evolutionary point of view if women found testosterone-laden men especially attractive.

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Pricetag Set For Tiger Conservation

The Bengal tiger is one of the better protected varieties - but even that is in trouble

From The BBC:

The cost of keeping tigers alive in the wild is about $80m (£50m) per year, say conservationists - but only about $50m (£30m) per year is being pledged.

The figures come from a new assessment that suggests targeting efforts in 42 selected breeding sites.

Building tiger populations in these sites would enable other areas to be re-populated later, the researchers report in the journal PLoS Biology.

About 3,500 tigers remain in the wild, and only about 1,000 breeding females.

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NSS Calls For House To Adopt Senate Version of NASA Authorization Act Of 2010

Photo: The Senate bill provides a framework for compromise, which will be required in order to obtain the widespread political support necessary to pass and fund a set of programs that together will enable the United States to once again move beyond low Earth orbit.

From Space Travel:

The National Space Society (NSS) is reaffirming its longstanding and unwavering commitment to further space exploration and development, by calling on the Executive and Legislative branches to incorporate their various proposals into a Unified Space Policy so that the United States can once again begin to move beyond low Earth orbit.

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Hurricane Twins Churn The Atlantic: Big Pics

Images: NOAA/NHC

From Discovery News:

Sept. 14, 2010 -- The busy Atlantic hurricane season that forecasters called for earlier this year has arrived in full force. Last month, Earl and Fiona lined up in tandem on their way through the tropics. This time it's Igor, a powerful Category 4 storm (at left in top image, and in infrared below) and Julia, a newly-minted Category 1 (at right in top image).

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Supercrops: Fixing The Flaws In Photosynthesis

To shade out rivals, plants make much more chlorophyll than they need
(Image: Jonnie Miles/Getty)

From New Scientist:

Many vital crops capture the sun's energy in a surprisingly inefficient way. A borrowed trick or two could make them far more productive

Take a look around you. All the organic things you see, from your hands to the leather of your shoes to the wood in your table, are built of strings of carbon atoms. So too is the petrol in your car and the coal in your local power station. All this carbon came from thin air, from carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

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The Porsche Effect: Why Racy Women Turn A Man To Racy Cars

Racy: The sight of an attractive woman sparks a man's interest in luxury goods from designer watches to flash cars such as Porsches and Ferraris

From The Daily Mail:

Ladies, if the man of your dreams becomes distracted by a passing sports car while talking to you, do not despair.

It means he likes you.

If, however, he starts talking about towels or toasters, he is just not interested.

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Amazon Knocks iPad In Kindle Commercial

From The Mac Observer:

Amazon is knocking Apple’s iPad in a new commercial promoting the Kindle. In the ad (see below), Amazon shows a dorky-looking iPad owner (sunning himself poolside in a T-shirt and khaki shorts) frustrated with not being able to read his device in daylight, while the bikini-clad Kindle user next to him has no such problem.

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Bing Beats Yahoo in Search, a Symbolic Win

From PC World:

Bing's vault over Yahoo in U.S. search volume should come as no surprise to anyone who's been following the horse race, but it's a symbolic milestone for a baby search engine whose prime directive is to take some of Google's advertising pie.

Bing Beats Yahoo in Search, a Symbolic WinWith Yahoo out of the way, according to the latest search share statistics from Nielsen, Bing's goal of becoming a genuine competitor to Google becomes a little more realistic. Bing, along with MSN and Windows Live, now has 13.9 percent of all search share. Yahoo fell to 13.1 percent, and Google still dominates with 65.1 percent. As Search Engine Land points out, Bing is still in third place by other metrics from comScore and Hitwise.

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