Cache And Carry: A Review Of The Kindle

From Scientific American:

The best answer yet to what's black and white and read all over.

I’m not your classic “early adopter” when it comes to new electronic gizardry (a word I just made up that means a combination of gizmo and wizardry, with a secondary definition of bird digestion). I’m not even what one ersatz electronics guru referred to as an “early adapter,” although I do sometimes wonder if my purpose in life has been reduced to making sure my various devices are all plugged in correctly.

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China Starts Building New Space Launch Centre

Chinese astronauts at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in a remote desert area of northwest China's Gansu province. The country has begun construction of its fourth space launch centre as the nation gears up for future manned space flights aboard a new generation of carrier rockets, state media has reported. (AFP/Xinhua/File)

From Yahoo News/AFP:

BEIJING (AFP) – China on Monday began the construction of its fourth space launch centre as the nation gears up for future manned space flights aboard a new generation of carrier rockets, state media reported.

Work started on the Wenchang Space Satellite Launch Centre on southern Hainan island, which will become China's first coastal launching pad when completed in 2013, the Hainan Daily reported.

Chang Wanquan, member of the powerful Central Military Commission, and Chen Qiufa, head of the State Commission for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence, attended Monday's groundbreaking ceremony, the report said.

China's space programme is run by the nation's military.

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More Efficient, And Cheaper, Solar Cells

Photo: Light trap: Incoming light reflects off grooves in a silver band and is redirected along a glass cover. This light, which is usually lost, can then be absorbed by the solar cell. The grooved band is one of three improvements that could significantly lower the cost of making solar power. Credit: Technology Review

From Technology Review:

New manufacturing techniques could cut solar power costs by 20 percent.

Improvements to conventional solar cell manufacturing that could significantly increase the efficiency of multicrystalline silicon cells and bring down the cost of solar power by about 20 percent have been announced by startup 1366 Technologies of Lexington, MA.

Such cost reduction would make solar power more competitive with conventional sources of electricity. In sunny environments, this could bring the cost of solar down to about 15 or 16 cents per kilowatt hour, says Craig Lund, 1366 Technologies's director of business development. That's cheaper than some conventional sources of electricity, especially those used during times of peak electricity demand.

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Brilliant 360-Degree Panorama Of The Milky Way

From Wired Science:

You can see the entire Milky Way at once in this panorama painstakingly stitched together by French photographers.

A much larger, zoomable version available from the European Southern Observatory lets you visit any part of the galaxy.

Working in the dark, dry highlands of Chile with a Nikon D3 digital camera (50 mm lens open at f5.6), Serge Brunier and Frédéric Tapissier patched together 1,200 photos of the night sky into the composite that you see above.

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The Secrets Inside Your Dog's Mind

From Time Magazine:

Brian Hare, assistant professor of evolutionary anthropology at Duke University, holds out a dog biscuit.

"Henry!" he says. Henry is a big black schnauzer-poodle mix--a schnoodle, in the words of his owner, Tracy Kivell, another Duke anthropologist. Kivell holds on to Henry's collar so that he can only gaze at the biscuit.

"You got it?" Hare asks Henry. Hare then steps back until he's standing between a pair of inverted plastic cups on the floor. He quickly puts the hand holding the biscuit under one cup, then the other, and holds up both empty hands. Hare could run a very profitable shell game. No one in the room--neither dog nor human--can tell which cup hides the biscuit.

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Getting Ready For The Day That No One Wants

'Dirty Bomb' Breakthrough -- The Independent

British scientists have developed a revolutionary method of treating victims of radiation contamination. Trials of a new device, no bigger than a small suitcase, which can rapidly detect the extent of cellular damage caused by exposure to a nuclear "dirty bomb" or a radiation leak, will be announced this week. It could mean doctors being able to scan hundreds of potential victims at an incident within hours.

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My Comment: There are budgets in placed to develop technology (like this) because the "powers that be" have made the calculation that one day such a device will be used.

Astronomers Search For Habitable Moons

Scientists believe there are thousands of habitable moons orbiting planets in other solar systems Photo: Michael O'Connell

From The Telegraph:

Moons capable of supporting life like those portrayed in the popular Star Wars films could be scattered all over our galaxy, according to astronomers.

Scientists at University College London believe there are thousands of habitable moons orbiting planets in other solar systems trillions of miles from our own.

They have calculated that it should even be possible to spot these moons using a space telescope launched by Nasa earlier this year to hunt out other planets.

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How Photon Echoes Can Be Used To Create A Quantum Memory Device

Photo: The experiment that generated the photon echo effect. (Credit: Image courtesy of Australian National University)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 14, 2009) — A new way of storing and ‘echoing’ pulses of light has been discovered by a team from The Australian National University, allowing bursts of laser to work as a flexible optical memory and potentially assist in extending the range of quantum information systems.

Technologies like quantum cryptography are being developed to send secure information coded onto light beams from one point to another. Yet at present these systems are unable to extend beyond a distance of 50 to 100 kilometres because, beyond that range, too much of the information is lost.

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It's Raining Less Than Scientists Thought

From Live Science:

Raindrops just broke their own speed record: they can drop faster than anyone thought possible.

Larger drops are speedier than smaller ones because they are heavier and so can more easily overcome air resistance. But there’s a limit to how fast a drop can go, a “terminal velocity” achieved when the downward force of gravity equals the upward drag of the air. Thus, whenever smaller drops are detected apparently beating larger ones in the race to the ground, atmospheric scientists interpret the observations as errors by recording instruments.

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Too Close For Comfort: The Astonishing Twisters Captured By Storm-Chasing Photographer

Up close: A tornado with large Liberty Bell shaped debris cloud swirls across a dirt road less than 500 feet in front of an unmarked Kansas State Trooper patrol car

From The Daily Mail:

Running towards a raging twister might seem insane to most people but for one artist, such perils are all in a day's work.

Storm chaser Jim Reed has narrowly escaped death twice in his pursuit of the perfect stormy shot.

His experiences have been brought together in the revised and expanded version of his award-winning photo book, 'Storm Chaser: A Photographer's Journey.'

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Five New Robots March Into Hall Of Fame

From New Scientist:

The ground-breaking machines have been selected to join 18 real and fictional robots already included in the collection – meet the new entrants and the pick of the previous selections.

The Robot Hall of Fame honours real and fictional robots that have marked or inspired technical breakthroughs in the field. An international jury of of researchers, writers and designers has been adding to the list since 2003.

This year, five new robots have been selected. Click through the images to see them all

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When Nano May Not Be Nano

From A Science Centric:

The same properties of nanoparticles that make them so appealing to manufacturers may also have negative effects on the environment and human health.

However, little is known which particles may be harmful. Part of the problem is determining exactly what a nanoparticle is.

A new analysis by an international team of researchers from the Centre for the Environmental Implications of NanoTechnology (CEINT), based at Duke University, argues for a new look at the way nanoparticles are selected when studying the potential impacts on human health and the environment. They have found that while many small particles are considered to be 'nano,' these materials often do not meet full definition of having special properties that make them different from conventional materials.

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Homing Pigeon Faster Than Internet? In S. Africa, The Answer's Yes.

From The Christian Science Monitor:

Frustrated by Africa's unreliable service, a business needing to send 4GB of data 50 miles put Winston the pigeon up against the Web – and Winston won.

This week, a South African call-center business, frustrated by persistently slow Internet speeds, decided to use a carrier pigeon named Winston to transfer 4 gigabytes of data between two of its offices, just 50 miles apart. At the same time, a computer geek pushed a button on his computer to send data the old-fashioned way, through the Internet.

Winston the pigeon won. It wasn't even close.

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Skeptic Reporter John Stossel Leaves ABC For Fox

From Watts Up With That?

I can understand how frustrating it must have been for Stossel at ABC, given that he’s on the other side of the global warming issue from the news department there, but moving to Fox will minimize the broader impact of what he has been saying about the subject of global warming.

It is worth a flashback though, to his report in 2007 on the issue.

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Why Your Nails Are Growing 25 Per Cent Faster Than Your Grandparents' Did

From The Daily Mail:

The speed of finger and toenail growth has surged by nearly a quarter over the past 70 years, a new study has revealed.

And the modern diet – rich in protein from readily available fish, meat, eggs and poultry – may be behind the spurt.

Researchers from the University of North Carolina compared results to a study of nail growth published by Oxford University in 1938 and another study from the Fifties.

The results revealed that big toenails now grow by more than 2mm a month, compared with 1.65mm in the Thirties.

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The Climate's Warm Future Is Now in the Arctic

CARIBOU CRISIS: Thanks to shifting seasons as a result of climate change, fewer caribou calves are surviving. Courtesy of Eric Post

From Scientific America:

A new survey reveals just how far and how fast global warming is altering the Arctic.

When the summer sea ice goes, the Arctic will lose the ivory gull, Pacific walrus, ringed seal, hooded seal, narwhal and polar bear—all animals that rely on the ice for foraging, reproduction or as refuge from predators. And the sea ice is going, faster and faster: In the past 30 years, minimum sea ice cover in the Arctic Ocean has declined by 45,000 square kilometers annually*—an area twice the size of New Jersey is lost each year.

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Airborne Laser Ready For Flight Tests

The US military's missile-defence laser is taking to the air for its first full-power try-out (Image: Russ Underwood, Lockheed Martin)

From The New Scientist:

IT SHOULD be the moment of truth for the Airborne Laser (ABL). In the coming months, the multibillion-dollar laser built into a customised Boeing 747 will try to shoot a ballistic missile as it rises above the clouds.

Don't expect instant reports of success, though. Instead, if all goes to plan, we're likely to hear about a series of incremental improvements.

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Aging Muscles: 'Hard To Build, Easy To Lose'

New research may explain the ongoing loss of muscle in older people, whose arms and legs become thinner as they age. (Credit: iStockphoto/Özgür Donmaz)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 12, 2009) — Have you ever noticed that people have thinner arms and legs as they get older? As we age it becomes harder to keep our muscles healthy. They get smaller, which decreases strength and increases the likelihood of falls and fractures. New research is showing how this happens — and what to do about it.

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Ancient Chinese Remedy May Work for Flu

From Live Science:

Scientists at the Kaohsiung Medial University in Taiwan have discovered that the roots of a plant used in 1918 to fight the Spanish influenza pandemic produces natural antiviral compounds that kill the swine flu virus, H1N1.

Ferula asafetida is commonly known as Dung of the Devil because of its foul-smelling sap and grows primarily in Iran, Afghanistan and mainland China. In their tests of a group of chemical compounds contained in extracts from the plant, scientists Fang-Rong Chang and Yang-Chan Wu discovered that some of them where more potent in killing the H1N1 virus than a prescription antiviral drug.

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Why NASA Should Bomb the Moon to Find Water: Analysis

From Popular Mechanics:

The Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) is now traveling to the moon at 5592 mph and will crash-land on Oct. 9 in order to gather data from the 6-mile-high impact cloud it will create. Today, as NASA announced the crater where LCROSS will land (Cabeus-A), the mission continues to drum up controversy. Is crash-landing on the moon really necessary for science? Will it be worth the damage done to the moon? To both these questions, PM answers a resounding, Yes. Here's why we're rooting for NASA's October mission to bombard the moon.

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Robotics Rodeo: A Week In Review

The Howe & Howe 'Ripsaw' MS1 (front) is ready for its demo during the Robotics Rodeo at Fort Hood in Killeen, Texas on Sept. 3.

Robotic Rodeo Displays Future Help for Soldiers -- Army.com

WASHINGTON (American Forces Press Service) – Two seemingly different U.S. Army organizations gathered robotics experts, technologists, academecs, soldiers and companies from across the country in search of solutions to help save soldiers’ lives.

The 3rd Corps and U.S. Army Tank Automotive Research, Development and Engineering Center, or TARDEC, based on Fort Hood, Texas, hosted the first Robotics Rodeo to showcase what’s new in the world of automation.

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More News On This Weeks Robotic Rodeo

Robotics Rodeo demos technology to save Soldiers' lives -- Army.mil
Robotic Rodeo Displays Future Help for Soldiers -- U.S. Department of Defense
Army's "Robotics Rodeo" Helps Find Next Generation of Unmanned Vehicles -- Daily Tech
Robots gear up for military duty in 'rodeo' -- Taiwan news
‘Robotics Rodeo' aims to save lives -- Houston Chronicle
Fort Hood shows off its robot army -- Temple Daily Telegram
Photos: Robots on the road to safer convoys -- CNET
Hood hosts ‘Robotics Rodeo’ -- ARMY Times
John Deere goes olive-drab at Robotics Rodeo -- CNET

UCSB Scientists Create Cancer-Stopping Nanoparticle-and-Laser Treatment

This Laser Cures Cancer, Brah: Gary Braun stands by the drug-activating laser courtesy of University of California, Santa Barbara

From Popular Science:

Nanotechnology, lasers, genetics, and cancer? If there was also something about space, this story might have been a PopSci full house. Scientists at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB), have figured out a way to deliver cancer-stopping RNA directly into the nucleus of a diseased cell. To get into the nucleus, the RNA is wrapped in special gold nanoshells which are then selectively opened by a laser.

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How Soldiers Will See In The Dark Without Night Vision Goggles

Image: Dreamstime/Brightqube

Forget the Goggles: Chlorophyll Eye Drops Give Night Vision -- Discover Magazine

What the dragonfish discovered through evolution, the U.S. military wants to apply to the battlefield.

Seeing in the dark could soon be as easy as popping a pill or squeezing some drops into your eyes, thanks to some new science, an unusual deep-sea fish, and a plant pigment.

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My Comment: If this becomes possible .... how war is conducted will certainly change.

Keeping Google Out Of libraries

From The BBC:

The proposed settlement between Google and US publishers must be resisted, argues Bill Thompson

Google is in the middle of a massive project to scan and digitise every book it can get its hands on, whether old or new, and if it gets its way then the US courts will soon endorse an agreement between the search engine giant and the US book industry that will allow it to do this without fear of prosecution for copyright infringement.

Authors and publishers will get some money in return, and we will all benefit from the improved access to digitised books that Google will provide.

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The Hugh Hefner Syndrome – How A Good-looking Partner Makes You More Attractive

Hugh Hefner with bunnies Holly Madison, left, and Bridget Marquardt Photo: AP

From The Telegraph:

Having an attractive mate on your arm makes you look more attractive in the eyes of the opposite sex, claim scientists in research that could explain the continuing appeal of Hugh Hefner.

However going out with a better looking friend of the same sex can have the opposite effect.

Researchers have found that we bask in the reflective glory of our more attractive partners because others assume we must have hidden talents away from our looks.

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Amazing Pictures: Space Shuttle Discovery Soars Through The Clouds Before Landing Safely (After A 2,000 Mile Diversion)

The space shuttle Discovery, lands on runway 22 at
Edwards Air Force Base near Rosamond, California.

From the Daily Mail:

The space shuttle Discovery landed safely in California early today after bad weather forced a switch of its touchdown site at the end of a two-week mission to the International Space Station.

NASA diverted the spaceship to Edwards Air Force Base in California's Mojave Desert after waiting in vain for two days for rain and clouds to clear over the shuttle's home port in Florida, the originally scheduled landing location.

Under partly cloudy desert skies, the shuttle landed at 0053 GMT.

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White Dwarf "Close" To Exploding As Supernova

From Universe Today:

ESA’s XMM-Newton orbiting X-ray telescope has uncovered the first close-up of a white dwarf star that could explode into a type Ia supernova within a few million years. That's relatively soon in cosmic time frames, and although this white dwarf that is orbiting its companion star HD 49798, is far enough away to pose no danger to Earth, it is close enough to become an extraordinarily spectacular celestial sight. Calculations suggest that it will blaze initially with the intensity of the full Moon and be so bright that it will be seen in the daytime sky with the naked eye. But don't worry, it will be awhile!

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Evolution Coup: Study Reveals How Plants Protect Their Genes

Researchers have discovered a new pathway that plants use to protect their genes against dangerous alterations that could also allow some useful mutations to occur. (Credit: iStockphoto/Duncan Walker)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 11, 2009) — Unlike animals and humans, plants can't run and hide when exposed to stressful environmental conditions. So how do plants survive? A new Université de Montréal study, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, has found a key mechanism that enables plants to keep dangerous gene alterations in check to ensure their continued existence.

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Predicting Extraterrestrial Weather

Two Hubble Space Telescope storm watch images from late June and early September offer dramatically contrasting views of the martian surface. At left, the onset of smaller "seed" storms can be seen near the Hellas basin (lower right edge of Mars) and the northern polar cap. A similar surface view at right, taken over two months later, shows the fully developed extent of the obscuring global dust storm. Credit: J. Bell (Cornell), M. Wolff (Space Science Inst.), Hubble Heritage Team (STScI / AURA), NASA

From Live Science:

Maybe even more than average citizens, the world's space agencies rely on daily and seasonal reports to better understand weather on Earth and other planets. Space-mission success ties directly to effective anticipation and navigation of inclement surface and atmospheric conditions.

Mission-design engineers at NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA), and similar organizations need to know what environmental issues a Mars Lander or Rover might face to ensure that heat shields, parachutes and other on-board mechanisms survive the trip through the atmosphere to the surface.

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The Coming Battle Over Fresh Water

Hustle and Flow -- Audubon Magazine

As water becomes increasingly scarce, we may have to charge for every drop.

In a now-famous interview with The New York Times in 1995, Ismail Serageldin, the World Bank’s vice president for environmentally sustainable development, said, “Many of the wars in this century were about oil, but wars of the next century will be over water.” While the situation is currently considerably less dire in the United States than in many other places around the world, an escalating fight over water in the coming years is in the making. We are “entering an era of water reallocation, when water for new uses will come from existing users who have incentives to use less,” says Robert Glennon, the Morris K. Udall professor of law and public policy at the University of Arizona, in his new book Unquenchable: America’s Water Crisis and What to Do About It. Those reallocations can take place through contentious politicking and in the courts, or, Glennon argues, more peaceably, through market forces.

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Nobel Laureate Norman Borlaug Dies At 95

From CNN:

(CNN) -- Nobel laureate Norman E. Borlaug, an agricultural scientist who helped develop disease-resistant wheat used to fight famine in poor countries, died Saturday. He was 95.

Borlaug died from cancer complications in Dallas, Texas, a spokeswoman for Texas A&M University said.

A 1970 recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, Borlaug was a distinguished professor of international agriculture at the university.

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More News On The Passing Of Norman Borlaug

'Green Revolution' pioneer Borlaug dies: report -- AFP
Nobel-winning agricultural scientist Borlaug dies -- Reuters
Agriculture pioneer Borlaug dies -- BBC
Dr. Norman E. Borlaug Passes Away -- Ag Wired
Norman Borlaug -- The Examiner
Norman Borlaug, RIP -- Power Line
Norman Borlaug: The Man Who Saved More Human Lives Than Any Other Has Died -- Reason
A look at honors bestowed on Norman Borlaug -- AP

Why The DOJ Wants More On Yahoo Search Deal

From CNET:

The long road toward Microsoft and Yahoo's search deal could be set to get a little longer, or fall off a cliff.

Both companies have long expected the U.S. Department of Justice to scrutinize the deal to install Microsoft as the exclusive search provider for Yahoo's Web pages, which would also see Yahoo end its time as a search company. Microsoft and Yahoo confirmed Friday that the Justice Department has asked the two companies for more information about their deal, which is a step beyond taking a mere interest in the proceedings.

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NASA Names Target For Water Hunt At Moon's South Pole

Scientists have suggested that water ice millions of years old might be found in the shadowed craters of the moon's north and south poles, where the sun never shines. (AP)

From L.A. Times:

The LCROSS satellite and rocket are to plunge into the surface Oct. 9, stirring up a dust cloud that may contain ice. The find would have major scientific implications and aid future space plans.

NASA scientists announced Friday that they had picked a 60-mile-wide crater near the moon's south pole as the place where they will send a rocket to punch a hole in the lunar surface next month in search of water.

Instruments aboard other satellites and on Earth have detected a significant amount of hydrogen, a telltale marker for water, on the northwest rim of the crater known as Cabeus A.

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On the Scene: NASA's Huge Rocket Test

Ares First Stage Rocket Test: NASA, Walt Lindblom

From Space.com:

PROMONTORY, UTAH – After two previous cancellations of debut engine tests of NASA's new Ares I rocket, there was a bit of trepidation among the spectators near the ATK Space Systems test facility in Promontory Point, Utah.

On Thursday afternoon, ATK successfully test fired the Ares I rocket's first stage, a giant solid-fueled booster, that will be used to launch astronauts on NASA's Orion spacecraft no earlier than 2015. We were on location to witness the high tech fireworks show [SEE VIDEO], $75 million in the making. And while the price tag might be a bit daunting, the spectacle of the test-firing and the magnitude of the Ares project were truly breathtaking

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Aage Bohr

At the nobel Prize ceremony Photo: Bettmann Archive/Corbis

From The Telegraph:

Aage Bohr, who died on September 8 aged 87, was a pioneering nuclear physicist and Nobel Prize winner; in his youth he escaped from Nazi-occupied Denmark with his father, Niels Bohr, a central figure in the Manhattan Project, to whom Aage was a valuable assistant.

The Bohr family fled from Denmark to neutral Sweden in 1943 after Hitler had ordered the deportation of Danish Jews. From Sweden the Bohrs headed for London where Niels became involved in what Aage was later to call, somewhat euphemistically, "the atomic energy project".

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Nanotubes Could Enable Self-Repairing Electronic Circuits

Nanotube Self-Healing Power: Capsules holding carbon nanotubes can put the zazz back in broken circuits J. Mat. Chem./RSC Publishing

From Popular Science:

Researchers develop nanotubes that can help circuits repair critical breaks.

Many people know the familiar wince when a cell phone or laptop hits the floor. But electronic devices of the future may self-repair tiny cracks or breaks in their circuitry with the help of nanotubes.

Researchers from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have created capsules that hold conductive nanotubes and can sit on circuit boards. Mechanical stress that causes a crack in the circuit would also split open some capsules and release the nanotubes to help bridge the gap.

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Potato Blight Has The Genome Of Death

From New Scientist:

THE blight that triggered the great famine in Ireland in 1845 is still the biggest disease threat to spuds worldwide - and it's no wonder.

Researchers have sequenced the genome of the mould that causes blight and found it keeps a huge arsenal of potato-destroying genes, ready to evolve around whatever defences taters can muster. On the plus side, the sequence also suggests ways to fight back.

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Carbon Nanotubes Could Make Efficient Solar Cells

In a carbon nanotube-based photodiode, electrons (blue) and holes (red) - the positively charged areas where electrons used to be before becoming excited - release their excess energy to efficiently create more electron-hole pairs when light is shined on the device. (Credit: Nathan Gabor)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 11, 2009) — Using a carbon nanotube instead of traditional silicon, Cornell researchers have created the basic elements of a solar cell that hopefully will lead to much more efficient ways of converting light to electricity than now used in calculators and on rooftops.

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Life in the Dark: How Organisms Survived Asteroid Impacts

One of the phototrophs used in the experiment was Chlorella vulgaris.
Credit: Charles University in Prague.

From Live Science:

A dinosaur-killing asteroid may have wiped out much of life on Earth 65 million years ago, but now scientists have discovered how smaller organisms might have survived in the darkness following such a catastrophic impact.

Survival may have depended upon jack-of-all-trades organisms called mixotrophs that can consume organic matter in the absence of sunlight. That would have proved crucial during the long months of dust and debris blotting out the sun, when plenty of dead or dying organic matter filled the Earth's oceans and lakes.

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Killer Whales Strain to "Talk" Over Ship Noise?

A baby killer whale surfaces near adults in Puget Sound. The calf was born in March 2009 to a pod that lives near the San Juan Islands off the coast of Washington State.
The San Juan killer whales "talk" more during foraging than traveling, researchers said in September 2009. But since the whales also have to raise their voices to be heard above boat noise, scientists worry that the animals may be using up too much energy during hunts, even as their preferred prey, chinook salmon, are on the decline. Photograph courtesy Center for Whale Research via AP

From National Geographic:

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.

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Junk Cost Estimates Supplied to Augustine Committee Threaten to Sink NASA's Human Spaceflight Program

From The Mars Society:

The Mars Society has examined copies of the cost projections being used by the Augustine Committee in currently considering the future of NASA's human spaceflight program. These estimates, generated by the Aerospace Corporation, a US Air Force funded policy oracle, have no scientific basis and have clearly been composed to make the case that human space exploration is unaffordable.

A copy of the Aerospace Corporation's bizarre cost estimates being used by the Augustine Committee is available here.

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Earlier Model of Human Brain's Energy Usage Underestimated Its Efficiency

A MODEL OF EFFICIENCY?: That mammals' brains appear to conserve energy on the front end of synapse communication leads researchers to believe the advance helped allow bigger brains to develop. ISTOCKPHOTO/KTSIMAGE

From Scientific American:

A long-held model of the brain's efficiency crumbles as researchers find that one function of mammals' brains consumes a lot less energy than previously assumed. Now, basic measurements of neural activity--from brain energy budgets to fMRI results--may have to be reassessed.

The human brain is an incredible energy drain. Taking up only about 2 percent of the body's mass, the organ uses more than a fifth of bodily energy. Ever more accurate calculations of its energy budget at the level of the neuron (nerve cell) are important to researchers ranging from functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) analysts to evolutionary biologists.

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Wide Angle: Swine Flu Outbreak

The last flu pandemic -- the Hong Kong flu of 1968 -- killed about 1 million people. The Hong Kong government has ordered all kindergartens and primary schools closed after a dozen students tested positive for the swine flu. Credit: AP

From Discovery News:

The H1N1 swine flu is a vicious flu strain that's on the rise across the globe. Discovery News tracks its progress from a minor outbreak in Mexico to a full-blown, world-wide pandemic in this Wide Angle.

As the World Health Organization officially declares the H1N1 swine flu has reached Level 6 -- pandemic status -- the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is tracking cases of swine flu in the United States. The CDC is preparing local and state clinics to treat the virus, and some cities have issued face masks and personal contact guidelines to combat the spread of germs. Discovery News looks at how the swine flu outbreak became the next pandemic, how microbes behave and more.

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DNA Fingerprinting 25 Years Old

From BBC:

The scientist behind DNA fingerprinting has called for a change to the law governing DNA databases on the 25th anniversary of his discovery.

Professor Sir Alec Jeffreys uncovered the process by chance in his laboratory at Leicester University.

The technique has since been used to solve crimes and identity cases.

But it has also led to controversy over profiles kept on the national DNA database. "Innocent people do not belong on that database," he said.

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E-book Readers Still Owned By Small Niche

From CNET:

The tech industry buzzes a lot about e-book readers. But how widely are they actually used?

Among 1,529 consumers who responded to a July 2009 questionnaire from research firm In-Stat, only 5.8 percent currently own an e-book reader. And only 11 percent of those questioned said they planned to buy one in the next 12 months, according to the In-Stat report released this week.

Those low results may be even more significant given that In-Stat's survey audience consisted of high-end consumers who typically adopt new technology earlier than the general public.

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NASA & Its Discontents: Frustrated Engineers Battle With NASA Over The Future Of Spaceflight

From Popular Mechanics:

A group of renegade space vehicle designers, including NASA engineers bucking their bosses, are publicly crying out against the current Shuttle retirement plan. Their proposed plan, called Jupiter Direct, is an affront to NASA's current plans for the Ares I rocket, which they say is more costly and time-consuming than it needs to be. This is their story.

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Take An Orbital Vacation On A Surplus Soviet Military Spacecraft

Almaz Spacecraft: Turning guns into space tourism, courtesy of a retrofitted Soviet-era military spacecraft. Excalibur Almaz

From Popular Science:

Space tourists with deep pockets and dreams of recapturing Cold War nostalgia need look no further than Excalibur Almaz. The new company is asking $35 million for a weeklong stay aboard a Soviet-era military spacecraft.

Excalibur's purchase of the Russian military-surplus "Almaz" reentry capsules turned heads in August. But the latest announcement firmly sets Excalibur up as a competitor with Space Adventures, the only private outfit that currently offers rides into orbit aboard the three-man Russian Soyuz spacecraft.

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Surprise In Earth's Upper Atmosphere: Mode Of Energy Transfer From The Solar Wind

In addition to emitting electromagnetic radiation, the sun emits a stream of ionized particles called the solar wind that affects Earth and other planets in the solar system. (Credit: SOHO image composite by Steele Hill (NASA))

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Sep. 11, 2009) — UCLA atmospheric scientists have discovered a previously unknown basic mode of energy transfer from the solar wind to the Earth's magnetosphere. The research, federally funded by the National Science Foundation, could improve the safety and reliability of spacecraft that operate in the upper atmosphere.

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New Glass Resists Small Explosions

From Live Science:

Scientists have created a new type of blast-resistant glass that is thinner, lighter and less vulnerable to small-scale explosions than existing glass.

In tests, the improved glass design has been shown to withstand a hand grenade-strength bomb explosion originating close to the window panel. The blast caused the glass panel to crack, but didn’t puncture the composite layer.

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Brain Cells Slicker Than We Thought

From New Scientist:

Rat brain cells waste little energy when talking to one another. That finding might not sound unusual, but it challenges the long-standing view that brain cells are extremely inefficient at sending signals.

In 1939, Alan Hodgkin of the University of Cambridge and Andrew Huxley of University College London experimented on nerve cells from the giant squid. They concluded that the energy of electrical signals sent along axons – the cells' "cables", each 1 millimetre in diameter in the giant squid – was four times the theoretical minimum.

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Where Did All the Flowers Come From?

RARE PLANT Amborella trichopoda, a small shrub found only on the island of New Caledonia in the South Pacific, represents the oldest living lineage of flowering plants. Sangtae Kim/University of Florida

From The New York Times:

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.”

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