Sunday, March 15, 2009
Planets Like Earth Appear To Be Out There
From Japan Times:
LONDON — The real wonder of our age is this. You can go on the Web, type in PlanetQuest New Worlds Atlas, or Extrasolar Planets Encyclopedia, or NASA Star and Exoplanet Database, and directly access the data on 340 new planets that have been discovered in the past five years.
That number is set to grow very fast now, for on March 6 The U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) successfully launched the Kepler telescope, which will find many more planets including potentially Earth-like ones. It will stare unblinkingly at an area of space containing about 100,000 relatively near stars, watching for the tiny dimming of a star that happens when one of its planets passes between the star and us.
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After 10 Years, Space Station Finally Nears Completion
The space shuttle Discovery sits on launch pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla. (Scott Audette/REUTERS) From Christian Science Monitor:
The Space Shuttle Discovery will bring the last US-made piece to the space station when it launches Wednesday.
A decade ago, the United States docked its first module, Destiny, to an embryonic International Space Station. Tonight, the space shuttle Discovery is set to launch an American segment that could be called “Finally!”
The last major US-built component – a 15.5-ton truss bearing the station’s last set of solar panels – is nestled snuggly in Discovery’s cargo bay, awaiting the orbiter’s launch, now scheduled for Thursday night after Wednesday’s planned launch was scrubbed due to a hydrogen gas leak.
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Shuttle Discovery Lifts Off On Mission To ISS -- News Updates March 15, 2009
The US Space Shuttle Discovery lifts off. Photo AFPFrom AFP:
CAPE CANAVERAL (AFP) — The shuttle Discovery has blasted off on a mission to outfit the International Space Station with a final pair of solar wings ahead of the arrival in a few weeks of an expanded space crew.
The spacecraft launched at 7:43 pm (2343 GMT) from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Just over eight minutes later, the shuttle entered orbit.
The journey was expected to take two days to reach the ISS, where the seven-member crew was to deliver and install the fourth and final pair of solar wings on the orbiting ISS, in one of the last major tasks of the more than decade-long effort to construct the station.
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More News On The Launch Of Discovery
Discovery blasts off into space -- BBC
Successful Launch Starts Shuttle Mission -- Aviation Week
Discovery heads to International Space Station -- Orlando Sentinel
STS-119 Launches into Space…Finally -- The Future Of Things
Discovery blasts off for mission to international space station -- CBC
Space shuttle Discovery reaches orbit successfully -- Scientific American
Space Shuttle Discovery successfully launches after a month of delays -- Wikinews
Backgrounder: Crew members of U.S. space shuttle Discovery's STS-119 mission -- China View
Low-Energy Light Bulbs Can Cause Rashes And Swelling To Sensitive Skin, Warn Experts
A break with tradition: Medical experts say people with light-sensitive skin disorders should be exempt from using low-energy light bulbsFrom Daily Mail Online:
The phasing out of traditional light bulbs could cause misery for thousands who have light-sensitive skin disorders, medical experts warned yesterday.
Dr Robert Sarkany said some low-energy bulbs gave vulnerable people painful rashes and swelling.
He backed calls by patient groups for the Government to give medical exemptions for those at risk.
The warning comes as British shops start to clear their shelves of traditional bulbs, which are being replaced by more energy-efficient versions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
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'Supermodel' Satellite Set To Fly
In orbit, the same side of the GOCE satellite remains facing the Sun. The spacecraft is equipped with four body-mounted and two wing-mounted solar panels. Due to the configuration in orbit, the solar panels will experience extreme temperature variations so it has been necessary to use materials that will tolerate temperatures as high as 160ºC and as low as -170ºC. (Credit: ESA - AOES Medialab)From The BBC:
Europe is set to launch one of its most challenging space missions to date.
The Goce satellite will map minute variations in the pull of gravity experienced across the planet.
Scientists will use its data to improve their understanding of how the oceans move, and to frame a universal system to measure height anywhere on Earth.
The super-sleek spacecraft will go into orbit on a modified intercontinental ballistic missile from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in north-west Russia.
Lift-off for the Rockot vehicle is timed for 1421 GMT on Monday.
Most satellites launched into space are ugly boxes. The European Space Agency's (Esa) Goce satellite is very different.
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Earth's Dimming Skies: Before And After
From Wired Science:
Earth's skies have dimmed since the mid-1970s, as airborne pollutants scatter the sun's rays and turn blue skies into a milky haze.
The effect was quantified in a study published on Thursday in Science, and widely covered by the press. But the study explained the effect with graphs, and stories only described a phenomena for which words aren't enough.
Enter Photoshop and the guidance of study co-author Kaicun Wang, a University of Maryland, College Park atmospheric scientist. The resulting visualization takes the worst dimming, experienced in southeast Asia, and applies it to a view of the Golden Gate Bridge.
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Tiny Brain Region Key To Fear Of Rivals And Predators
A piece of the brain's hypothalamus (shown in middle of the above model) is key to animals' fear of territorial rivals and predators, according to a new study. Without it, animals lose all sense of caution. (Credit: iStockphoto/Karen Roach)From Science Daily:
ScienceDaily (Mar. 15, 2009) — Mice lose their fear of territorial rivals when a tiny piece of their brain is neutralized, a new study reports.
The study adds to evidence that primal fear responses do not depend on the amygdala – long a favored region of fear researchers – but on an obscure corner of the primeval brain.
A group of neuroscientists led by Larry Swanson of the University of Southern California studied the brain activity of rats and mice exposed to cats, or to rival rodents defending their territory.
Both experiences activated neurons in the dorsal premammillary nucleus, part of an ancient brain region called the hypothalamus.
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Metamaterial Revolution: The New Science of Making Anything Disappear
A metamaterial sends rays of light cascading around a ball, rendering it invisible,in this schematic. David Schurg
From Discover:
Engineers are working with metamaterials to create super-microscopes, optical computers, and yes, invisibility cloaks
Xiang Zhang remembers the day he recognized that something extraordinary was happening around him. It was in 2000, at a workshop organized by DARPA (the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) to explore a tantalizing idea: that radical new kinds of engineered materials might enable us to extend our control over matter in seemingly magical ways.
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Saturday, March 14, 2009
Thrill Seekers Lack Brakes In The Brain
From ScienCentral:
New research gives a possible explanation for why some of us are thrill seekers and others like to play it safe. The study found that some of us can’t control the release of a certain brain chemical.
"Adrenaline Junkies" Actually Prefer Dopamine
Wouldn’t it be amazing if researchers could scan our brains and see whether we have thrill seeking personality traits? Vanderbilt University psychologist David Zald has come pretty close. He has conducted a study that links thrill seeking behavior with a difference in specific part of the dopamine system in the brain.
“Dopamine does a number of different things. Probably most importantly though it’s involved in motivation and reward,” explains Zald. “And it’s the critical chemical in terms of people really wanting to do things.”
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Technique Disables Plutonium's Use in Bombs
Keeping Nuke Fuel Safe: Scientists report that adding the element Americium, a synthetic compound used in commercial smoke detectors and industrial gauges, to nuclear power plant fuel generates higher-than-normal concentrations of a particular type of plutonium, rendering it useless for armaments without additional processing. iStockPhotoFrom Discover Magazine:
Israeli scientists have devised a technique to keep plutonium produced in nuclear power plants from being used in nuclear bombs.
Adding the element Americium, a synthetic compound used in commercial smoke detectors and industrial gauges, to nuclear power plant fuel generates higher-than-normal concentrations of a particular type of plutonium, rendering it useless for armaments without additional processing.
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My Comment: One small step to insure such materials do not fall into the hands of those who may harbor ill will.
Global Hurricane Activity Has Decreased To The Lowest Level In 30 Years.
(Click the Above Image to Enlarge)Figure: Global 24-month running sum time-series of
Accumulated Cyclone Energy updated through March 12, 2009.
From Watts Up With That?
Very important: global hurricane activity includes the 80-90 tropical cyclones that develop around the world during a given calendar year, including the 12-15 that occur in the North Atlantic (Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean included). The heightened activity in the North Atlantic since 1995 is included in the data used to create this figure.
As previously reported here and here at Climate Audit, and chronicled at my Florida State Global Hurricane Update page, both Northern Hemisphere and overall Global hurricane activity has continued to sink to levels not seen since the 1970s. Even more astounding, when the Southern Hemisphere hurricane data is analyzed to create a global value, we see that Global Hurricane Energy has sunk to 30-year lows, at the least. Since hurricane intensity and detection data is problematic as one goes back in time, when reporting and observing practices were different than today, it is possible that we underestimated global hurricane energy during the 1970s. See notes at bottom to avoid terminology discombobulation.
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Why Is Obama Going Gray?
Barack Obama in January 2008, a few days after he became president. Credit: White HouseFrom Live Science:
News reports today point out that President Obama is going a little gray at the temples. Is it the stress of the job, or is he due to go gray about now anyway?
We saw it happen to George Bush, and in dramatic fashion with Bill Clinton. Obama saw his own grayer self coming.
"Seniors, listen up. I'm getting gray hair myself," Obama said at a campaign stop in Indiana last spring, according to The Washington Post. "The gray is coming quick," he said a few months later. "By the time I'm sworn in, I will look the part."
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Solar Panels In The Sahara 'Could Power The Whole Of Europe'
A solar power plant in the Mojave Desert. (Solar Systems/AP)From Times Online:
All of Europe’s energy needs could be supplied by building an array of solar panels in the Sahara, the climate change conference has been told.
Technological advances combined with falling costs have made it realistic to consider North Africa as Europe’s main source of imported energy. By harnessing the power of the Sun, possibly in tandem with wind farms along the North African coastline, Europe could easily meet its 2020 target of generating at least 20 per cent of its energy from renewable sources.
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Old Age Begins At 27: Scientists Reveal New Research Into Ageing
Photo: Getting old already? 27-year-old singer Beyonce Knowles is already past her mental peak according to new researchFrom The Daily Mail:
Old age is often blamed for causing us to misplace car keys, forget a word or lose our train of thought.
But new research shows that many well-known effects of ageing may start decades before our twilight years.
According to scientists, our mental abilities begin to decline from the age of 27 after reaching a peak at 22.
The researchers studied 2,000 men and women aged 18 to 60 over seven years. The people involved – who were mostly in good health and well-educated – had to solve visual puzzles, recall words and story details and spot patterns in letters and symbols.
Similar tests are often used to diagnose mental disabilities and declines, including dementia.
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'Peking Man' Older Than Thought; Somehow Adapted To Cold
Darryl Granger, a Purdue professor of earth and atmospheric sciences, stands with the accelerator mass spectrometer used in a study that determined the age of "Peking Man" was around 200,000 years older than previously thought. Purdue is the only university in the nation with an accelerator mass spectrometer powerful enough to perform the type of testing used in this study. (Credit: Purdue News Service photo/Andrew Hancock)From Science Daily:
ScienceDaily (Mar. 13, 2009) — A new dating method has found that "Peking Man" is around 200,000 years older than previously thought, suggesting he somehow adapted to the cold of a mild glacial period.
A dating method developed by a Purdue University researcher allowed a more accurate determination of the age of the Zhoukoudian, China, site of remains of Homo erectus, commonly known as "Peking Man." The site was found to be 680,000-780,000 years old. Earlier estimates put the age at 230,000-500,000 years old.
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Brain Scans Can Read Memories
From Live Science:Humans create memories of locations in physical or virtual space as they move around – and it all shows up on brain scans.
Researchers tracked brain activity related to "spatial memory" as volunteers moved about inside a virtual reality setup. Their new study challenges previous scientific thinking by showing that memories are recorded in regular patterns.
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Friday, March 13, 2009
Physicists Get Closer To Finding The 'God Particle'
Photo: Emeritus professor at the University of Edinburgh, British Peter Higgs, seen here on April 7, 2008, smiles during a press conference in Geneva. Physicists have come closer to finding the elusive "God Particle," which they hope could one day explain why particles have mass, the US Department of Energy's Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory announced Friday. (AFP/File/Fabrice Coffrini)From Yahoo News/AFP:
CHICAGO (AFP) – Physicists have come closer to finding the elusive "God Particle," which they hope could one day explain why particles have mass, the US Department of Energy's Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory announced Friday.
Researchers at the Fermilab have managed to shrink the territory where the elusive Higgs Boson particle is expected to be found -- a discovery placing the American research institute ahead of its European rival in the race to discover one of the biggest prizes in physics.
Physicists have long puzzled over how particles acquire mass.
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Scientist: Warming Could Cut Population to 1 Billion
Photo: Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, spoke several times at the climate conference in Copenhagen. Lizette Kabré. Climate congress, Copenhagen 2009.From Dot.com/New York Times:
[UPDATE, 1:45 p.m.: A roundup of economists' and scientists' views at the Copenhagen climate meeting and a reaction from Mike Hulme, a participating scientist.]
COPENHAGEN — A scientist known for his aggressive stance on climate policy made an apocalyptic prediction on Thursay.
Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, said that if the buildup of greenhouse gases and its consequences pushed global temperatures 9 degrees Fahrenheit higher than today — well below the upper temperature range that scientists project could occur from global warming — Earth’s population would be devastated. [UPDATED, 6:10 p.m: The preceding line was adjusted to reflect that Dr. Schellnhuber was not describing a worst-case warming projection. h/t to Joe Romm.]
“In a very cynical way, it’s a triumph for science because at last we have stabilized something –- namely the estimates for the carrying capacity of the planet, namely below 1 billion people,” said Dr. Schellnhuber, who has advised German Chancellor Angela Merkel on climate policy and is a visiting professor at Oxford.
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Physicist Develops Battery Using New Source Of Energy
The top is a graphic representation of the overall device structure. The diameter is roughly that of a human hair. The bottom is a magnified image of the central part. The white spots are atoms and the white circles are the nano-magnets, the "working part" of the device. Credit: Pham Nam HaiFrom Physorg.com:
Researchers at the University of Miami and at the Universities of Tokyo and Tohoku, Japan, have been able to prove the existence of a "spin battery," a battery that is "charged" by applying a large magnetic field to nano-magnets in a device called a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ). The new technology is a step towards the creation of computer hard drives with no moving parts, which would be much faster, less expensive and use less energy than current ones. In the future, the new battery could be developed to power cars.
The study will be published in an upcoming issue of Nature and is available in an online advance publication of the journal.
The device created by University of Miami Physicist Stewart E. Barnes, of the College of Arts and Sciences and his collaborators can store energy in magnets rather than through chemical reactions. Like a winding up toy car, the spin battery is "wound up" by applying a large magnetic field --no chemistry involved. The device is potentially better than anything found so far, said Barnes.
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Want To Rewire Your Brain? Study Music
Studying music can change the way a brain is wired, new research finds.(ABC News Photo Illustration)
From ABC News:
All Those Hours at the Piano Paid Off: A Musician's Brain Recognizes Sound That Carries Emotion.
All those hours practicing the piano pay off big time by biologically enhancing a person's ability to quickly recognize and mentally process sounds that carry emotion, according to a new study.
The study, from Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., offers a new line of evidence that the brain we end up with is not necessarily the same brain we started out with.
"We are measuring what the nervous system has become, based on an individual's experience with sound," Nina Kraus, director of the university's groundbreaking Auditory Neuroscience Laboratory, said in a telephone interview.
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