The Top 4 Sites To Land On Mars And Their Biggest Mysteries

Holden Crater

From Popular Mechanics:

The Spirit Rover is nearly history, stuck deep in sand, and while Opportunity travels on, it's not likely that it will travel much farther. Now, scientists are building the next rover to be sent to Mars. But before they fuel the rockets, researchers have to pick a spot to explore. Here are NASA's frontrunners.

Call it the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's version of the Final Four. Scientists at the Pasadena, Calif.–based NASA research center will decide within the next two years where to send the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover after it launches in the fall of 2011. MSL's mission is to scour the Red Planet for environments that may once have harbored, or may still harbor, microbial organisms. Such an environment would have to contain the basic ingredients of life—including water, organic carbon and a source of energy to sustain the microbes' metabolism.

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Nearby T Pyxidis Supernova Could Destroy Life On Earth

Too Close for Comfort T Pyxidis, a star on the verge of growing too massive and collapsing into a type Ia supernova, was discovered to be closer to Earth than previously thought – close enough to end life here when it finally explodes. NASA

From Popular Science:

Doomsdayers and 2012 blog-keepers, take note. Astronomers at this week's American Astronomical Society meeting revealed that a massive white dwarf star in the throes of multiple nova is much closer to our solar system than once thought. When it does finally collapse into a type Ia supernova -- okay, if it collapses into a type Ia supernova -- the resulting thermonuclear blast will destroy life on earth. Seriously.

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NASA's Kepler Finds Its First Five Planets - An Odd Assortment

Kepler's first five exoplanets are compared to those in our
solar system in this illustration from NASA. NASA

From Christian Science Monitor:

NASA's Kepler space telescope is just beginning its three-year mission to find Earth-like planets in habitable zones around stars. The first new planets it has found, announced Monday, include two so hot they would melt iron.

NASA's planet-hunting telescope Kepler has bagged its first quarry: five new planets Neptune's size and larger, including one with the density of Styrofoam, making it one of the lightest planets yet found.

In addition to the new planets, Kepler results suggest that the light output from two-thirds of some 43,000 sun-like stars in its field of view is virtually as stable as the sun's output.

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'Ferropaper' Is New Technology For Small Motors, Robots

Purdue researchers have created a magnetic "ferropaper" that might be used to make low-cost "micromotors" for surgical instruments, tiny tweezers to study cells and miniature speakers. Babak Ziaie, a professor of electrical and computer engineering and biomedical engineering, holds a miniature birdlike shape made from the material. The wings move slowly, but the structure is not capable of flight. (Credit: Purdue University photo/Andrew Hancock)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Jan. 6, 2010) — Researchers at Purdue University have created a magnetic "ferropaper" that might be used to make low-cost "micromotors" for surgical instruments, tiny tweezers to study cells and miniature speakers.

The material is made by impregnating ordinary paper -- even newsprint -- with a mixture of mineral oil and "magnetic nanoparticles" of iron oxide. The nanoparticle-laden paper can then be moved using a magnetic field.

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Mystery of World's Biggest Beasts Possibly Solved

The primitive whale Mammalodon colliveri might have sucked up prey from seafloor mud, suggesting the origin of today's giant filter-feeding whales. Credit: Brian Choo, Museum Victoria

From Live Science:

The origins of the largest animals in the world, the baleen whales, might be rooted in the mud, which they potentially sucked up like vacuum cleaners, analysis of a bizarre extinct dwarf whale now suggests.

The baleen whales include the largest animal to have ever lived, the blue whale. Instead of teeth, they use baleen to feed — plates with frayed edges in the upper jaw that filter seafood from the water.

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Milky Way's Dark Matter 'Turned On Its Side'

From New Scientist:

The cloud of dark matter that is thought to surround the Milky Way may be shaped like a squashed beach ball. This halo of invisible matter also seems to sit at an unexpected angle – which could be a strike against a theory that challenges Einstein's account of gravity.

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Intermediate Black Hole Implicated In Star's Death

From Discovery News:

Astronomers presenting at the American Astronomical Society (AAS) meeting in Washington D.C. on Jan. 4, have reported the detection of the emission generated by a black hole as it devoured a white dwarf star in the elliptical galaxy NGC 1399.

This may not appear to be a huge deal to begin with -- stars being eaten by supermassive black holes in the centers of galaxies have been detected before -- but it would appear that this particular white dwarf was ripped apart and then devoured by a mysterious "intermediate-mass" black hole.

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Study Pinpoints Autism Clusters in Calif.

Image: (CBS/iStockphoto)

From CBS News:

More Cases Found in Areas where Parents are Better Educated and Near Autism Treatment Centers

(CBS) Researchers in California have identified 10 regions in the state where cases of autism are higher than in nearby regions.

The study finds that the areas, called clusters, are in places where parents have above average levels of education, or are also places located near large autism treatment facilities.

The research, conducted by scientists at UC Davis, showed that the clusters appear in highly populated areas of Southern California and the Bay Area.

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Two Killer Whale Types Found In UK Waters

Forming a new species? The 'type 2' dolphin hunting killer whales.

From The BBC:

Scientists have revealed that there is not one but two types of killer whale living in UK waters.

Each differs in its appearance and diet, with males of one type being almost two metres longer than the other.

The killer whales could be at an early stage of becoming two separate species, the researchers say.

The international group of scientists has published its results in the journal Molecular Ecology.

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Oil And Gas Drilling In Greenland To Begin This Summer

From Popular Mechanics:

When the 748-foot Stena Forth plows into the deep waters of Greenland’s Disko West zone next summer, the advanced drillship will be taking the first crack at what could be the world’s biggest untapped reservoir of oil and gas. The ship, built by Samsung in South Korea’s Geoje shipyard just over a year ago, can drill to 35,000 feet, in 10,000 feet of water.

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Manned And Unmanned Helicopters Most Efficient When Working Together

Flock of Copters Fly, my pretties! U.S. Army/Spc. George Welcome

From Popular Science:

Flying alongside drones might seem a bit strange for U.S. Army chopper pilots, but it has major payoffs. The U.S. Army found that a mixed flight force of manned and unmanned helicopters could locate and kill 90 percent of targets, compared to manned helicopter forces that located just 70 percent of targets, according to DOD Buzz.

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My Comment: This is another reason why unmanned helicopters and UAVs are the big thing in the military .... their kill rate is impressive.

Tellyphone: America Is Finally Poised To Get Mobile Television

From The Economist:

YOUR correspondent is always miffed when he sees others taking for granted things he has waited years for. Case in point: the way the Japanese think it is perfectly normal to watch live national and local television free on their mobile phones. In fact, they can do so on practically anything they care to carry around with them—from portable game consoles and electronic dictionaries to satnavs for their cars. And it is not just in Japan that you can watch live television on the hoof. It is also taken for granted in South Korea, China, Brazil and parts of Europe.

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Whale Activists Say Their Catamaran Was Sunk By Japanese Vessel

Whale Wars: How Was The Sea Shepherd's New Ship Sunk? -- Christian Science Monitor

Paul Watson, star of "Whale Wars," and his eco-vigliantes at the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society have been sailing close to the legal wind for some time, harassing Japanese whalers. Wednesday the Sea Shepherd's $2.5 million speedboat Ady Gil was sunk.

The reaction of Paul Watson, the controversial leader of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, to the destruction of the crown jewel in his tiny anti-whaling fleet on Wednesday was swift. But Watson also managed to get a plug in for his reality TV show, "Whale Wars."

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When Robots Want Rights

Many believe super-intelligent machines are inevitable,
but will we treat them as mere property? REUTERS

From The Globe And Mail:

Many believe super-intelligent machines are inevitable, but will we treat them as mere property? REUTERS

In late November, Gecko Systems announced that it had been running trials of a “fully autonomous personal companion home-care robot,” also known as a “CareBot,” designed to help elderly or disabled people live independently. The company reported that a woman with short-term memory loss broke into a big smile when the robot asked her, “Would you like a bowl of ice cream?” The woman answered “yes,” and presumably the robot did the rest.

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Nature's Most Precise Clocks May Make 'Galactic GPS' Possible: Pulsars Help In Search For Gravitational Waves

Fermi Large Area Telescope first year map of the gamma-ray sky at energies above 100 MeV with the locations of the new millisecond pulsars shown. The symbols are color coded according to the discovery team: red led by Scott Ransom (NRAO) using NRAO's Green Bank Telescope (GBT), cyan led by Mallory Roberts (Eureka Scientific/GMU/NRL) also using the GBT, green led by Fernando Camilo (Columbia University) using Australia's CSIRO Parkes Observatory, white led by Mike Keith (ATNF) also using Parkes, and yellow led by Ismael Cognard (CNRS) using France's Nançay Radio Telescope. (Credit: NASA/DOE/Fermi LAT Collaboration)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Jan. 6, 2010) — Radio astronomers have uncovered 17 millisecond pulsars in our galaxy by studying unknown high-energy sources detected by NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope. The astronomers made the discovery in less than three months. Such a jump in the pace of locating these hard-to-find objects holds the promise of using them as a kind of "galactic GPS" to detect gravitational waves passing near Earth.

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All Creatures' Calls Are Somewhat Alike

An analysis of over 500 animal species shows that the sounds they make are pretty similar.
Credit: Stockxpert

From Live Science:

Mother Nature offers up a cacophony of diverse sounds. But after examining the calls of hundreds of species from cricket chirps to chimp hoots, scientists have found they aren't so different from one another.

Their research on the calls made by nearly 500 animal species has led to simple mathematical models that can predict an animal's sounds based on the rate at which that individual takes up and uses energy.

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Astronomers Predict Discovery Of Avatar Moon

Avatar has become the fastest movie yet to break box office records for hitting US$1 billion in ticket sales. Now astronomers says it could be possible to find an Earth-like world as depicted in the film. Credit: 20th Century Fox

From Cosmos:

SYDNEY: Habitable alien moons such as 'Pandora' – the world featured in the blockbuster film Avatar – could be detectable within a decade, says a new study.

In that movie, the fictional, life-harbouring moon is found orbiting a gas giant called Polyphemus, which itself orbits the star Alpha Centauri A.

NASA's Kepler Mission has already shown the potential to detect Earth-sized planets within the Milky Way (see "Kepler telescope finds five new exoplanets").

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Kepler Telescope Spots 'Styrofoam' Planet

NASA's Kepler telescope has discovered five giant planets that whip around their stars on tight orbits (Illustration: NASA/JPL)

From New Scientist:

A giant planet with the density of Styrofoam is one of a clutch of new exoplanets discovered by NASA's Kepler telescope. The planets are too hot to support life as we know it, but the discoveries, made during the telescope's first few weeks of operation, suggest Kepler is on the right track to find Earth's twins, researchers say.

More than 400 planets have now been found orbiting other stars, but Earth-sized planets – which may be the best habitats for life – have remained elusive.

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Where Is El Niño When We Need Him?

From Discovery News:

Just when we might be expecting the influence of unusually high Pacific ocean temperatures to warm us up -- or for global warming to bring relief -- along comes another wave of incredibly cold storms. How the season finally turns out is still up in the air, so to speak, but clearly, that weather patterns that are typical of El Niño have not taken hold across the United States.

And it's easy to forget that global warming is a long-term climate trend that has little to do with individual seasons in one part of the world or another. In fact, it might be hard to appreciate just now, but the year just ended -- 2009 is a single data point -- actually came in a little warmer than the two years before and is fairly close to the middle range of model simulations of the long-term trend that has provoked international scientific concern about global warming.

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Google Unveils Nexus One Smartphone

Watch CBS News Videos Online

From CBS News/CNET:

(CNET) You've read all the exhaustive coverage of Google's Nexus One phone over the last month. The Android-based device emerged at a company holiday party and has been the talk of the smartphone industry ever since. And at an event here at its headquarters on Tuesday, Google unveiled the Nexus One and announced a plan to sell it directly to consumers. The following is a live blog from the event.

9:52 a.m.: We're awaiting the start of Google's Android event here in Building 43 at Google's headquarters in Mountain View. The event is expected to start in about 10 minutes, and the requisite pounding get-excited music is blaring inside a large conference room. There's maybe 100 people crammed into the room, and Google executives Vic Gundotra and Andy Rubin have already been spotted.

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