Flu Widespread In Most Of U.S.

From The L.A. Times:

The infections are 'overwhelmingly' pandemic H1N1 influenza, or swine flu, the CDC director says. Vaccine demand exceeds supply, but that will soon reverse, he says.

Influenza is widespread in most of the United States, with the incidence continuing to increase in some states and to decline very slightly in others, the director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday. The infections are "overwhelmingly" pandemic H1N1 influenza, commonly known as swine flu.

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Light Pollution: Night Skies, Dark No More

(Click Image to Enlarge)

From U.S. News And Report:

The ecological risks and health effects of a bright night are becoming more apparent.

The night is not what it was. Once, the Earth was cast perpetually half in shadow. Man and beast slept beneath inky skies, dotted with glittering stars. Then came fire, the candle, and the light bulb, gradually drawing back the curtain of darkness and giving us unprecedented control over our lives.

But a brighter world, it is becoming increasingly clear, has its drawbacks. A study released last month finding that breast cancer is nearly twice as common in brightly lit communities as in dark ones only added to a growing body of evidence that artificial light threatens not just stargazing but also public health, wildlife, and possibly even safety.

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Gmail, Yahoo And AOL Dragged Into Hotmail Hack Alert

From Times Online:

The theft of thousands of passwords to online email services is now known to include account details for all major e-mail providers, including Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo and AOL.

Full details of over 10,000 e-mail accounts were published on a specialist website for developers on October 1. As reported yesterday, the list was believed to comprise Microsoft Hotmail accounts, but it has since emerged that users of other e-mail services, such as Google’s Gmail, may also have had their passwords stolen.

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Why Nondrinkers May Be More Depressed

Ruediger Knobloch / A.B. / Corbis

From Time Magazine:

Alcohol has a peculiar relationship to happiness. We drink to celebrate, but because alcohol works as a depressant, it ends up deadening feelings. Not surprisingly, there's an observable correlation between alcoholism and depression, and even though it's not always clear which leads to which, everyone knows you can't drink like a Sterling Cooper employee for too long before becoming a perpetual sad sack.

But if alcohol can lead to depression, does that mean abstaining from alcohol will make you happier? A new study suggests that the opposite actually tends to be true. In fact, those who never drink are at significantly higher risk for not only depression but also anxiety disorders, compared with those who consume alcohol regularly.

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New Vaccine May Immunize Addicts from Cocaine's Pleasurable Effects

HIGH HOPES: Vaccines to decrease cocaine use have been in the works for years, but this new trial has had some encouraging results. ISTOCKPHOTO/MILOSJOKIC

From Scientific American:

Clinical trial data suggest that although pharmacotherapy for cocaine may be on the horizon, challenges remain.

Unlike opiates such as heroin or prescription painkillers, there is no medication specifically approved to help curb cocaine consumption. Now, an experimental vaccine offers hope for a new approach, researchers say, that spurs on antibodies, which bind with cocaine molecules and apparently helps some addicts stop feeling the pleasurable effects of the drug—thus deconditioning them out of their dependency.

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Run Silent Run Deep Submarines Of The Future Could Get A Communications Upgrade U.S. Navy

Run Silent Run Deep Submarines of the future could get a communications upgrade
U.S. Navy

From Popular Science:

A physicist claims that the "ghost particles" of our world could help communicate with underwater submariners.

Submariners should brace for some crazy science to match those Crazy Ivan maneuvers. A physicist says that ghost-like neutrinos that pass easily through just about everything could provide a future method of communication with deep sea submarines.

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How Twitter Can Be Used

Hat Tip: Geek Press

Bees Fight Back Against Colony Collapse Disorder: Some Honey Bees Toss Out Varroa Mites

ARS researchers have developed honey bees that more aggressively deal with varroa mites, a parasite that is one of the major problems damaging honey bees today. (Credit: Photo by Stephen Ausmus)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Oct. 5, 2009) — Honey bees are now fighting back aggressively against Varroa mites, thanks to Agricultural Research Service (ARS) efforts to develop bees with a genetic trait that allows them to more easily find the mites and toss them out of the broodnest.

The parasitic Varroa mite attacks the honey bee, Apis mellifera L., by feeding on its hemolymph, which is the combination of blood and fluid inside a bee. Colonies can be weakened or killed, depending on the severity of the infestation. Most colonies eventually die from varroa infestation if left untreated.

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Myths About Diabetes And Diet Persist

From Live Science:

Once upon a time, in the dark ages of the 1960s and '70s, a diabetes diet meant avoiding sugar. Refrigerators of diabetics were filled with Fresca; sugar bowls were filled with Sweet'N Low; and, for the most part, plates were still filled with meat and potatoes.

That diet didn't work so well, and self-administered insulin shots were often needed to keep blood-sugar levels safe.

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Rocket Company Tests World's Most Powerful Ion Engine

In the next few years, the VASIMR ion engine could be used to
boost the space station's orbit (Illustration: Ad Astra Rocket Company)

From New Scientist:

Rockets that would use charged particles to propel super-fast missions to Mars are one step closer, now that a small-scale prototype has been demonstrated at full power.

The ion engine may be used to maintain the orbit of the International Space Station within the next five years, and could lay the groundwork for rockets that could one day travel to Mars in about a month.

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LCROSS Impact Site Picked

From Discover Magazine:

NASA has chosen the final destination for the LCROSS lunar impacting probe: the crater Cabeus A, near the Moon’s south pole.

So why is NASA smacking a probe into the Moon at high speed, and why there?

The idea is that over millions and billions of years, a lot of comets have hit the Moon. The water from these comets hits the surface and sublimates away… but if any settles at the bottoms of deep craters near the Moon’s poles, these permanently shadowed regions can act as a refrigerator, keeping the water from disappearing. It can stay there, locked up as ice, for a long, long time. Some estimates indicate there could be billions of tons of ice near the Moon’s south pole.

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A Brief History Of Climate Change

From The BBC:

As the UN climate summit in Copenhagen approaches, BBC News environment correspondent Richard Black traces key milestones, scientific discoveries, technical innovations and political action.

1712 - British ironmonger Thomas Newcomen invents the first widely used steam engine, paving the way for the Industrial Revolution and industrial scale use of coal.

1800 - world population reaches one billion.

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Nobel Prize For Physics Awarded

Half of this year's Nobel Prize in Physics went to Charles K. Kao, center. The other half of the prize was shared by two researchers at Bell Labs, Willard S. Boyle, left, and George E. Smith. Reuters

Nobel Awarded for Advances in Harnessing Light -- New York Times

The mastery of light through technology was the theme of this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics as the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences honored breakthroughs in fiber optics and digital photography.

Half of the $1.4 million prize went to Charles K. Kao for insights in the mid-1960s about how to get light to travel long distances through glass strands, leading to a revolution in fiber optic cables. The other half of the prize was shared by two researchers at Bell Labs, Willard S. Boyle and George E. Smith, for inventing the semiconductor sensor known as a charge-coupled device, or CCD for short. CCDs now fill digital cameras by the millions.

The prize will be awarded in Stockholm on Dec. 10.

Read more ....

More News On The Awarding Of The Nobel Prize In Physics

Excerpts from 2009 Nobel physics prize -- AP
‘Masters of light’ scoop Nobel physics prize -- Financial Times
3 Scientists Win 2009 Nobel Prize in Physics -- Voice of America
Nobel Prize in Physics -- Scientific American
3 win Nobel in physics for digital devices -- CNN
Nobel honours 'masters of light' -- BBC
Communication pioneers win 2009 physics Nobe -- Reuters
FACTBOX: The Nobel prize for Physics -- Reuters
Recent winners of the Nobel Prize in physics -- AP

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.

Read more ....

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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U.S. Trio Wins Medicine Nobel For Ageing Research

The statue of Alfred Nobel at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. Photo AFP

From Reuters:

STOCKHOLM, Oct 5 (Reuters) - Three Americans were awarded the Nobel prize for medicine on Monday for the discovery of a built-in protection device in chromosomes, a finding that sheds light on ageing and may help in the fight against cancer.

Australian-born Elizabeth Blackburn, British-born Jack Szostak and Carol Greider won the prize of 10 million Swedish crowns ($1.42 million), Sweden's Karolinska Institute said.

The institute said the three had "solved a major problem in biology", namely how chromosomes were copied completely during cell division and protected against degradation.

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More News On This Years Nobel Prize For Medicine

Excerpts from 2009 Nobel medicine prize -- AP
US trio win Nobel Medicine Prize for research on ageing -- AFP
Sharon Begley Predicts The Nobel Prize Laureates: Blackburn, Greider and Szostak Win For Telomeres Research -- Newsweek
Nobel Prize: Why Immortality Is a Bad Thing -- Wall Street Journal
Americans Win Nobel Medicine Prize For Insights Into Aging, Cancer -- NPR
U.S. trio wins medicine Nobel for ageing research -- Reuters
‘Immortality Enzyme’ Wins Three Americans Nobel Prize -- Bloomberg
Nobel Prize in Medicine awarded to U.S. trio -- CBC
FACTBOX: Winners of the Nobel prize for Medicine -- Reuters
Recent winners of the Nobel Prize in medicine -- AP

Why Women Dominate Social Networking

From CNET:

Should you be one of those who believe that men are neanderthal, socially awkward hairy animals while women are socially aware, smoothly sensitive beings, then I have some statistics that might increase your estimation of your own superior judgment.

According to research by Brian Solis, sourcing his data from Google's Ad Planner, the majority of functioning beings on almost all social networking sites are women.

Published on Information Is Beautiful, the numbers might create an encouraging belief that if social networking is the future, then the future is female.

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Making Tsunamis

The terrible Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004 was just the latest and greatest mega-wave to wash over the planet. It taught us a lot, however, though we have lots more to learn. Photo credit: NASA

From Discovery:

There are several ways to make the Earth's most deadly waves. We count the ways, explore the history and the science of tsunami making.

• Timeline: History's Worst Tsunamis
  The Indian Ocean Tsunami of 2004 was one of the worst in history, but not the first time monster waves attacked. Humanity has a long and sad history of losing to tsunamis.
• Video: Evidence Links Asteroid to New York Tsunami
  Did an asteroid once roar through what's today one of the most densely populated place in the United States? Discovery's Jorge Ribas reports on the latest evidence and modeling.
• Slide Show: Top Six Ways to Make a Tsunami
  Larry O'Hanlon counts them off. Be happy if you are only exposed to one or two of these tsunami makers. Keep in mind: Almost no one is entirely free of the tsunami threat.

Read more ....

Robot Fish Could Prevent Crashes

From The BBC:

Robots that mimic the behaviour of fish have been developed by Japanese car firm Nissan, who believe the technique can be used in crash avoidance systems.

The tiny robots, called Eporo, can move in a fleet without bumping into their travelling companions.

It is the second time the firm has looked to the animal kingdom for inspiration for its designs.

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Mitochondrial Death Channels

Figure 1. A 53-year-old patient experiencing sporadic discomfort undergoes a coronary angiogram. The results are ominous. Severe stenosis (narrowing) is visible in the pinched regions (top middle), indicating the buildup of fatty deposits within the artery. If a wandering clot blocks the pinhole opening of a nearly clogged vessel, a heart attack ensues. With bloodflow blocked, cardiac cells downstream are starved for oxygen, leading to drastic metabolic changes as the cells struggle to survive. The most important changes affect mitochondria, the powerhouses of cell metabolism. The inset shows mitochondria (orange) arrayed among cardiac muscle fibrils (blue), where they are positioned to supply a steady stream of ATP to contracting muscle. Under oxidative stress, the mitochondria can also release potent effectors that lead directly to apoptosis—cell suicide. The trigger for the opening of the so-called mitochondrial death channels is, ironically, the return of oxygen to starved tissue during reperfusion. Learning to control the activities of the death channels could vastly improve the outlook for heart attack victims.

Top image by Zephyr/Photo Researchers, Inc.; bottom image by Steve Gschmeissner/Photo Researchers, Inc.

From American Scientist:

In heart attacks, cells die if they aren’t perfused with fresh oxygen—and kill themselves if they are. Understanding cell suicide may greatly improve outcomes.

Coronary artery disease is the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in North America and Europe. More than 12 million people in the United States have coronary artery disease, and more than 7 million have had a myocardial infarction (heart attack). Chronic stable angina (chest pain) is the initial manifestation of coronary artery disease in approximately half of all presenting patients, and about 16.5 million Americans (more than 5 percent) currently have stable angina.

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Ancient Earth's Magnetic Field Was Structured Like Today's Two-pole Model

The well-exposed layering of basalt flows in formations near Lake Superior is aiding scientific understanding of the geomagnetic field in ancient times. Nicholas Swanson-Hysell, a Princeton graduate student, examines the details of the top of a lava flow. (Credit: Photo by Catherine Rose)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Oct. 3, 2009) — Princeton University scientists have shown that, in ancient times, the Earth's magnetic field was structured like the two-pole model of today, suggesting that the methods geoscientists use to reconstruct the geography of early land masses on the globe are accurate. The findings may lead to a better understanding of historical continental movement, which relates to changes in climate.

Read more ....

Exercisers Drink More Alcohol

Live Science:

Here’s a question for your buddies at the next golf outing or bowling league night: Are we more active because we drink more or do we drink more because we’re more active? Recent research showed that there is a correlation between the two, but could not offer a solid reason.

Either way, another study claims the combination of moderate alcohol use and exercise will help our hearts more than just choosing one over the other.

Read more ....

The Fashion Of The Future

If you want to know what the hot looks will be a decade further on,
don't ask a designer: talk to a scientist.

From The Telegraph:

As the dust settles after London Fashion Week, scientists and designers are working on the fashion of the future, says Raymond Oliver.

As London recovers from the glamour and glitz of its 25th annual Fashion Week, the haute couture caravan moves on from Milan to Paris. By the end of the trip, we should have some idea of the trends that will be making their way from catwalk to high street in the early months of 2010. But if you want to know what the hot looks will be a decade further on, don't ask a designer – talk to a scientist.

Read more ....

A Whole New World: The Amazing Map Based On Population That Shows Britain Is Still A Big Player

(Click Image to Enlarge)
New world view: China and India are the big players in this population
based map as opposed to land mass

From The Daily Mail:

It is a world away from the world we know. But this is how the countries of the world look if maps are based on population size rather than land mass.

Academics came up with the startling images after throwing away 500 years of conventional cartography. The result was this very different global landscape.

Read more ....

India's Thirst Is Making Us All Wet

From New Scientist:

ONE nation's thirst for groundwater is having an impact on global sea levels. Satellite measurements show that northern India is sucking some 54 trillion litres of water out of the ground every year. This is threatening a major water crisis and adding to global sea level rise.

Virendra Tiwari from the National Geophysical Research Institute in Hyderabad, India, and colleagues used gravity data from the GRACE satellite to monitor the loss of continental mass around the world since 2002. Regions where water is being removed from the ground have less mass and therefore exert a smaller gravitational pull on the satellite.

Read more ....

Windows 7 To Usher In Crush Of Cheap Laptops

Image: HP ProBook 5310m starts at $699: this class of business laptop used to start at well over $1,000. (Credit: Hewlett-Packard)

From CNET:

Call it the Netbook halo effect: small and cheap is infectious. A quick peek at the lineups of new laptops slated for an October 22 roll-out from Hewlett-Packard and Toshiba make it clear that the prices of mainstream and higher-end laptops are diving, even as the technology gets better.

"There's a new reality in laptop pricing," said Bob O'Donnell, an analyst at market-researcher IDC. "It's getting harder and harder to sell anything over $800." O'Donnell cited a data point that showed the average selling price of notebooks falling below desktops briefly in retail. "That may have been an anomaly, but the fact that's it's even close is indicative of this phenomenon."

Read more ....

'Mini-Colosseum' Excavated in Rome

Ulysses: A statue of Ulysses, also known as the famous Greek epic hero Odysseus. A 'mini-Colosseum' that lies beneath an airport may have hosted Roman emperors. With the help of ground penetrating radar, the archaeologists have uncovered luxuriously decorated rooms, a colonnaded garden, and this finely carved marble head, among other artifacts. University of Southampton

From Discovery News:

Beneath Rome's Fiumicino airport lies a "mini-Colosseum" that may have played host to Roman emperors, according to British archaeologists.

The foundations of the amphitheater, which are oval-shaped like the much larger arena in the heart of Rome, have been unearthed at the site of Portus, a 2nd century A.D. harbor near Ostia's port on the Tiber River.

A monumental seaport that saved imperial Rome from starvation, Portus is now reduced to a large hexagonal pond on a marshy land owned by a noble family, the Duke Sforza Cesarinis.

Read more ....

US 'Red Tape' Dogged India Moon Mission

From The BBC:

The recent discovery of water on the Moon by India's inaugural lunar mission almost never happened because of a twin helping of good old-fashioned red tape and lingering Cold War suspicions, reports science writer Pallava Bagla.

Hidden behind the euphoria of the find is a less publicised tale of complex back room dealings between Indian and American space science teams.

Back in 2004, scientists from the two countries were eager to collaborate, but the Bureau of Export Control in the US did not share this enthusiasm. In fact it was seen by some on the Indian side as being singularly obstinate.

Read more ....

10 Dirty Little Restaurant Secrets

Photo: travelbex, Flickr.

From Slashfood:

There's a reason most restaurants keep the kitchen doors closed -- and it's not just because it's so hot back there.

It can be tough for restaurateurs to turn a profit and Slashfood has uncovered some of the ultra-dirty deeds even the best restaurants commit in order to pinch pennies.

Read on for 10 true stories about the subtle, sneaky and sometimes downright disgusting ways restaurants cheat to save a buck -- and how you might be paying the price.

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Hat Tip: Geek Press

How A Biofuel 'Miracle' Ruined Kenyan Farmers

Kenyan market vendors selling maize in Kagemi
Simon Maina / AFP / Getty

From Time Magazine:

Everyone in Kibwezi, a village in southeastern Kenya parched by four years of drought, remembers the promises. It all started in 2000, when the government started preaching the word about a plant called jatropha curcas. That surprised people in Kibwezi because everyone already knew about Jatropha — it's a weed. Sometimes people planted it to fence off their farms, but usually they just ignored it.

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Fantastic Photos Of Our Solar System

The robotic Cassini spacecraft which is now orbiting Saturn looked back toward the eclipsed Sun and saw a view unlike any other. CICLOPS, JPL, ESA, NASA

From The Smithsonian:

In the past decade, extraordinary space missions have discovered new features of the Sun, the planets and their moons.

We've been looking at other planets through telescopes for four centuries. But if you really want to get to know a place, there's no substitute for being there. And in the past decade, more than 20 spacecraft have ventured into the deepest reaches of our solar system. These probes, unlike the Hubble Space Telescope and other observatories that merely orbit Earth, have actually traveled to other planets and approached the Sun, sending back pictures that humble or awe, even as they advance astronomers' understanding of our corner of the universe.

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Using Synthetic Evolution To Study The Brain: Key Part Of Neurons Modeled On Computer

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Oct. 3, 2009) — The human brain has evolved over millions of years to become a vast network of billions of neurons and synaptic connections. Understanding it is one of humankind’s greatest pursuits.

But to understand how the brain processes information, researchers must first understand the very basics of neurons — even down to how proteins inside the neurons act to change the neuron’s voltage.

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Drink From The Fountain Of Youth With A Grain Of Salt

From Live Science:

Two studies announced today could make you downright giddy with youthful optimism, but you'd be wise to take them with a grain of salt.

One says half of babies born in rich nations today could live to be 100, Reuters reports. The speculation is based on the idea that the recent historic rise in life expectancy could continue. Don't bank on it.

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