Cells Send Dirty Laundry Home to Mom

Bright green protein aggregates are transported from the young daughter cell into the larger mother cell using conveyor-like structures called actin cables. (Credit: University of Gothenburg)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Feb. 8, 2010) — Understanding how aged and damaged mother cells manage to form new and undamaged daughter cells is one of the toughest riddles of ageing, but scientists now know how yeast cells do it. In a groundbreaking study researchers from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, show how the daughter cell uses a mechanical "conveyor belt" to dump damaged proteins in the mother cell.

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Snowpocalypse Seen From Space

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Terra satellite captured this true-color image on February 7, 2010, showing part of the region affected by heavy snowfall. Snow blankets the area hundreds of kilometers inland from the Atlantic coastline. Along the latitude of New York City, however, snow cover thins considerably. Credit: NASA

From Live Science:

The results of the weekend storm that buried many Eastern U.S. locations in 2 feet or more of snow stands out starkly in a new satellite image.

The image from space reveals how the storm swept through Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia but largely spared New York City. The landscape is largely snow-free just north of Manhattan.

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Apple's iPad And The Evolution Of Books -- A Commentary

Consumers seem underwhelmed by Apple's iPad, according to a survey by Retrevo, a US shopping website. Photo from The Telegraph

From The Wall Street Journal:

Steve Jobs recently walked on to a stage in San Francisco and answered a question that authors and publishers have been asking for years: How would he adjust Apple's iPhone technology and iTunes platform to the horizons of the reader? His answer was the iPad, a typically alluring device, featuring a screen big enough for the comfortable reading of books, and a new iBookstore, bringing the text of Harry Potter within reach of America's millions of iTunes users for the first time.

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Space Shuttle Blasts Off For Space Station

From The New York Times:

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — The space shuttle Endeavour thundered into orbit before dawn Monday morning, briefly turning darkness into daylight.

It was the second effort to get the Endeavour off the ground, 24 hours after clouds over the launching pad scrubbed Sunday’s attempt.

Clouds again encroached, but there were enough holes to allow the Endeavour to lift off on schedule at 4:14 a.m., a bright streak rising to the northeast along the East Coast. It was the 130th launching of a shuttle and probably the last night launching as the program winds down and ends after four more flights.

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More News On Today's Space Shuttle Launch

5 Men, 1 Woman Aboard Shuttle Endeavour -- ABC News
Endeavour completes final night launch -- BBC
Shuttle Endeavour blasts off for space station -- Reuters
Endeavour Roars into Night Sky -- FOX News
Endeavour en route to ISS -- Register
Endeavour Starts Mission With Night Launch -- Aviation Week

Wired Chinese Not Worried About Google

From THOnline:

Nation's Web users seem indifferent to the online giant's threat to pull out over censorship.

BEIJING -- A world without Google? They can imagine it just fine in China. After all, it's not like losing "World of Warcraft."

The online giant's threat to pull out of China over censorship has drawn little reaction among the country's 384 million Internet users. No flood of complaints to China's consumer rights agency, like the tens of thousands received in one day when the online fantasy game "World of Warcraft" was yanked last year because of a bureaucratic turf battle. Nor has there been the type of fury that saw 32,000 indignant gamers participate in an online chat session on the "World of Warcraft."

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Moon Base Alpha: If Not U.S., Then Who?

An astronaut's footprint in the lunar soil photographed during the Apollo 11 extravehicular acitivty on the moon in 1969. Which country will leave the next set of prints? NASA

From FOX News:

If the U.S. won’t be going to the moon again anytime soon, who is?

Forty years ago the U.S. raced to plant the first foot on the moon. Now, as India, Russia, South Korea and China compete to return for further exploration, the U.S has all but dropped out -- and even Buzz Aldrin thinks that may be OK.

Aldrin, speaking to FoxNews.com, says the next step for NASA should be to create a long-term plan for more ambitious efforts -- visiting Mars or a nearby asteroid -- aided by robotics and astronauts from other countries. "It's much better to take our experience and aid other countries in conducting their races," says Aldrin.

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Haiti's Environmental Aftermath

Photo: Deforestation in Haiti, left, near its border with the Dominican Republic

From Slate:

What the Jan. 12 earthquake means for the country's ecosystem.

The human toll of the Jan. 12 earthquake in Haiti has been devastating, with the government reporting more than 150,000 dead in the Port-au-Prince area alone. What, if anything, does the disaster mean for the environment?

It's a small solace, but the terrifying 7.0-magnitude earthquake seems not to have caused any major, immediate damage to Haiti's ecosystem. According to Asif Zaidi, operations manager of the U.N. Environmental Program's Post-Conflict and Disaster Management Branch, there has been one small spill near a coastal oil terminal, some minor warehouse fires, and a few small landslides close to Port-au-Prince, but nothing that requires a significant emergency response.

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Germanium Laser Breakthrough Brings Optical Computing Closer

From Gadget Lab:

Researchers at MIT have demonstrated the first laser that uses the element germanium.

The laser, which operates at room temperature, could prove to be an important step toward computer chips that move data using light instead of electricity, say the researchers.

“This is a very important breakthrough, one I would say that has the highest possible significance in the field,” says Eli Yablonovitch, a professor in the electrical engineering and computer science department of the University of California, Berkeley who was not involved in the research told Wired.com. “It will greatly reduce the cost of communications and make for faster chips.”

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Beware Of Geoengineering Using Volcanoes' Tricks

Starving the oceans of oxygen (Image: NASA)

From New Scientist:

WE HACK the climate at our peril. Volcanoes spewed so much sulphate into the atmosphere 94 million years ago that the oceans were starved of oxygen and 27 per cent of marine genera went extinct. Geoengineering our climate could inflict a similar fate on some lakes.

So claims Matthew Hurtgen at Northwestern University in Chicago, who with his colleagues measured sulphur isotopes in sediments on the floor of the Western Interior Seaway. The WIS was a vast body of water that divided the continent of North America down the middle at the time. The team also developed a model to simulate the impact of volcanoes on ocean chemistry.

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DARPA Wants to Override Evolution To Make Immortal Synthetic Organisms

Evolution Done Gone Wrong This will turn out well Syfy

From Popular Science:

It's been a long time since a Pentagon project from the DARPA labs truly evoked a "WTF DARPA?!" response, but our collective jaw dropped when we saw the details on a project known as BioDesign. DARPA hopes to dispense with evolutionary randomness and assemble biological creatures, genetically programmed to live indefinitely and presumably do whatever their human masters want. And, Wired's Danger Room reports, when there's the inevitable problem of said creatures going haywire or realizing that they're intelligent and have feelings, there's a planned self-destruct genetic code that could be triggered.

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NASA, GM Take Giant Leap in Robotic Technology

Robonaut2 -- or R2 for short -- is the next generation dexterous robot, developed through a Space Act Agreement by NASA and General Motors. It is faster, more dexterous and more technologically advanced than its predecessors and able to use its hands to do work beyond the scope of previously introduced humanoid robots. (Credit: NASA)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Feb. 7, 2010) — Robonaut is evolving.

NASA and General Motors are working together to accelerate development of the next generation of robots and related technologies for use in the automotive and aerospace industries.

Engineers and scientists from NASA and GM worked together through a Space Act Agreement at the agency's Johnson Space Center in Houston to build a new humanoid robot capable of working side by side with people. Using leading edge control, sensor and vision technologies, future robots could assist astronauts during hazardous space missions and help GM build safer cars and plants.

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The World's Weirdest Weather

From Live Science:

As if tornadoes, hurricanes and blizzards weren't enough to keep us on our toes, Mother Nature occasionally surprises us with some truly odd weather phenomena: From whirlwinds of fire to bloody rains, it's a strange world of weather out there. - Andrea Thompson

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FCC: iPad Use Could Further Strain AT&T 3G

Image: (Credit: Apple)

From CNET:

Although Apple's iPad has yet to hit the market, the Federal Communications Commission has expressed concern over its potential impact on AT&T's 3G network.

Without naming AT&T, which has secured a carrier deal for the tablet device, Phil Bellaria, director of scenario planning, and John Leibovitz, deputy chief of the Wireless Telecommunications Bureau, outlined their concerns in an FCC blog post Monday:

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How Sperm Swim: A Clue For Male Contraception?

Photo: 3D4Medical.com/Getty

From Time Magazine:

Though sperm are generally considered pretty wriggly little guys, before they are launched into action, so to speak, they aren't racing around. While researchers have long known that what gets them swimming is a change in internal pH level—the more alkaline their pH, the more aggressively they swim—until now, the mechanism by which sperm rapidly drop protons, which changes their pH from acidic to alkaline, wasn't clear. According to this new study, published in the journal Cell, sperm are equipped with tons of tiny little pores that, when open, enable them to release protons and get a move on.

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Giant Meteorites Slammed Earth Around A.D. 500?

An asteroid hurtles toward Earth in an artist's rendering. Illustration by Detlev van Ravenswaay, Astrofoto, Peter Arnold Images, Photolibrary

From National Review:

Pieces of a giant asteroid or comet that broke apart over Earth may have crashed off Australia about 1,500 years ago, says a scientist who has found evidence of the possible impact craters.

Satellite measurements of the Gulf of Carpentaria (see map) revealed tiny changes in sea level that are signs of impact craters on the seabed below, according to new research by marine geophysicist Dallas Abbott.

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Top British Scientist Says UN Panel Is Losing Credibility

From Times Online:

A LEADING British government scientist has warned the United Nations’ climate panel to tackle its blunders or lose all credibility.

Robert Watson, chief scientist at Defra, the environment ministry, who chaired the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) from 1997 to 2002, was speaking after more potential inaccuracies emerged in the IPCC’s 2007 benchmark report on global warming.

The most important is a claim that global warming could cut rain-fed north African crop production by up to 50% by 2020, a remarkably short time for such a dramatic change. The claim has been quoted in speeches by Rajendra Pachauri, the IPCC chairman, and by Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general.

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Before The Swiss Army Knife, What Did Soldiers Use?

(Click Image to Enlarge)
Inspired: The Roman army pen knife, a precursor to today's popular Swiss Army accessory

The Roman Army Knife: Or How The Ingenuity Of The Swiss Was Beaten By 1,800 Years -- The Daily Mail:

The world's first Swiss Army knife' has been revealed - made 1,800 years before its modern counterpart.

An intricately designed Roman implement, which dates back to 200AD, it is made from silver but has an iron blade.

It features a spoon, fork as well as a retractable spike, spatula and small tooth-pick.

Experts believe the spike may have been used by the Romans to extract meat from snails.

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Surf's Up As Pacific Waves Grow

From New Scientist:

GOOD news surfers: waves in the north-east Pacific are getting taller, and the height of the most extreme "100-year" waves is increasing fastest.

Previous data had shown wave height to be increasing in the north-east Pacific and north Atlantic since the late 1980s. Now measurements from a deep-water buoy moored off the Oregon coast since the mid-1970s indicate that the "100-year" waves - the monster waves with a 1 per cent chance of occurring in any given year - could be 40 per cent larger than previous estimates, at 14 metres high.

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Heinz' New Ketchup Packet Dips, Squeezes And Scores (With Video!)

From Popular Mechanics:

You know the fast food driving drill: Heading down the Interstate, you carefully unfold the wrapper to your burger and make a place on your lap. You reach for the french fries and follow one of two strategies—take them from the box, one-by-one and paint them with ketchup from the packet, quickly running out of your supply; or squeeze a puddle of Heinz on the wrapper for dipping, risking stained pants and messy hands. Isn't there a better way?

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Airwaves Abandoned by TV Could Beam High-Speed Internet Everywhere

Internet in the Ether Brian Kaas Design

From Popular Science:

When TV went digital, Verizon, AT&T and other cellphone carriers shelled out a combined $19 billion for some of the freed-up airwaves, known as white spaces. Now wireless company Spectrum Bridge is using the parts that are still unclaimed to deliver high-speed Internet from its broadcast tower to your laptop computer.

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