Most Detailed Pictures Of Earth Revealed By Nasa

The view of our home planet was taken from 700 km above the Earth's surface and is made up of thousands of images 'stitched' together Photo: BARCROFT

From The Telegraph:

The most detailed and amazing set of composite satellite images of the Earth ever produced, have been disclosed by Nasa scientists.

Perfectly capturing the fragility of the Earth in one remarkable shot, the composition shows the entire North American continent, Central America, the northern half of South America, Greenland and the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans.

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What's Wrong With Venture Capital?

The exception: Google’s successful initial public offering over five years ago did not usher in a new era of good times for venture capitalists; it merely served to underscore how rare these happy events have become. Credit: Getty Images

From Technology Review:

The old mechanism for funding the commercialization of new technologies is in trouble.

In the summer of 1996, Silicon Valley venture capitalists put a few million dollars into a telecom-equipment startup called Juniper Networks. Three years later, after a few more rounds of funding and the release of its first product, Juniper enjoyed an initial public offering of shares, or IPO. At the end of its first day of trading, it was worth nearly $5 billion, and within nine months, it was worth almost 10 times that. The original venture investors, meanwhile, were able to walk away with profits of better than 10,000 percent.

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Coldest Winter In UK For More Than 30 Years... But Met Office Defends Its Long Range Forecast

Mothers tow children on their sledges in Hampshire, in January. The Met Office has confirmed that 2009/10 winter was the coldest since 1978/79

From The Daily Mail:

Perhaps someone should ask workers at the Met Office to take a rain check on their optimism.

After predicting just a 20 per cent chance of a colder than average winter, they were left embarrassed again when official figures revealed it was the coldest for more than 30 years.

Temperatures in December, January and February struggled to stay above zero, with the UK's average a chilly 1.5c (35f), making it the deepest freeze since 1978-79.

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The Mystery Of The Silent Aliens

From New Scientist:

Sixty years ago, space aliens were the preserve of lunatics and eccentrics, thanks to decades of sci-fi schlock, flying-saucer nonsense and Lowellian fantasies of Martian canals. Then, in 1950, came Enrico Fermi and his paradox - "Where the hell is everyone?" - and, 10 years later, the first attempts to put the search for ET on a scientific footing, courtesy of Frank Drake, who pointed a radio telescope at Tau Ceti and heard... silence.

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Etched Ostrich Eggs Illustrate Human Sophistication

From The BBC:

Inscribed ostrich shell fragments found in South Africa are among the earliest examples of the use of symbolism by modern humans, scientists say.

The etched shells from Diepkloof Rock Shelter in Western Cape have been dated to about 60,000 years ago.

Details are reported in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The researchers, who have investigated the material since 1999, argue that the markings are almost certainly a form of messaging - of graphic communication.

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'Ministrokes' May Cause More Damage Than Thought

From New Science:

Common test given to patients after the passing attacks appears to miss some cognitive impairments.

SAN ANTONIO — As many as four in 10 people referred to a clinic with signs of a “ministroke” may have subtle cognitive damage that standard tests miss, a new study shows.

The findings, reported by Canadian researchers February 24 at the International Stroke Conference in San Antonio, Texas, suggest that after suffering the ministrokes many patients lose some ability to process abstract thoughts, reason things out and make quick calculations — what doctors call “executive function.”

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Titanic vs. Lusitania: How People Behave In A Disaster

An illustration of the Titanic as it sank in the Atlantic Ocean
Time & Life Pictures / Getty

From Time Magazine:

It's hard to remember your manners when you think you're about to die. The human species may have developed an elaborate social and behavioral code, but we drop it fast when we're scared enough — as any stampeding mob reveals.

That primal push-pull is at work during wars, natural disasters and any other time our hides are on the line. It was perhaps never more poignantly played out than during the two greatest maritime disasters in history: the sinking of the Titanic and the Lusitania. A team of behavioral economists from Switzerland and Australia have published a new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) that takes an imaginative new look at who survived and who perished aboard the two ships, and what the demographics of death say about how well social norms hold up in a crisis.

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Microsoft's Ballmer Talks Bing, Twitter

Photo: Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer (right) and Search Engine Land's Danny Sullivan listen to an audience question at SMX West. (Credit: Tom Krazit/CNET)

From CNET:

SANTA CLARA, Calif.--Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer maintains a secret Twitter account for providing running commentary on high-school basketball matches: but that doesn't mean he wants to buy the company.

Ballmer's booming voice filled the Santa Clara Convention Center on Tuesday morning at SMX West, where he was interviewed on stage by Search Engine Land's Danny Sullivan on a wide range of topics related to Microsoft, Bing, and the company's struggling yet strategically important Internet business. Having wrapped up its search deal with Yahoo and restructured a separate search and advertising deal with Facebook, it wouldn't be surprising if Ballmer was looking for something new to do with that division.

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Google’s China Exit Strategy: Watch This Space

From Wired:

A top Google lawyer told Congress Tuesday that the company still has no idea when or if it will make good on its public ultimatum in January to pull out of China unless it is allowed to stop censoring search results.

“We are still weighing our options,” Google Vice President and Deputy General Counsel Nicole Wong told the Senate Judiciary committee in a hearing on internet freedom.

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'Biological Clock' Could Be a Key to Better Health, Longer Life

This fruit fly is used by researchers at Oregon State University for studies of the genes that control the "biological clock" in this and many other animal species, including humans. (Credit: Photo courtesy of Oregon State University)

From Science Daily:

Science Daily (Mar. 2, 2010) — If you aren't getting a good, consistent and regular night's sleep, a new study suggests it could reduce your ability to handle oxidative stress, cause impacts to your health, increase motor and neurological deterioration, speed aging and ultimately cut short your life.

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Where The Quakes In Chile Struck

This map of topography and water depth along the Chilean coast shows quake locations and magnitudes (black circles), with lighter colors indicating higher elevation on land and shallower depth in the water. The boundary where the two tectonic plates converge is marked by a red line. Also there is a trench where the Nazca Plate begins to dive beneath the South America Plate. When these plates get locked together for any time the pressure will eventually break, resulting in an earthquake like the 8.8 magnitude temblor on Feb. 27. Credit: NASA Earth Observatory.

From Live Science:

The 8.8-magnitude earthquake that devastated parts of Chile was the result of a collision between two giant slabs of Earth.

The jolt occurred along a so-called subduction zone, where one tectonic plate dives beneath another. In this case, the Nazca Plate is plowing under the South America Plate at an average rate of 3 inches (80 millimeters) a year. In addition to the Feb. 27 earthquake and others, the plate collision gives rise to the spectacular Andes Mountains.

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Wiseguys Indicted In $25 Million Online Ticket Ring

From Wired News:

A ring of ticket brokers has been indicted in connection to an elaborate hacking scheme that used bots and other fraudulent means to purchase more than 1 million tickets for concerts, sporting events and other events.

The defendants made more than $25 million in profits from the resale of the tickets between 2002 and 2009.

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More News On This Ticket Scam

Four Men Indicted In Online Ticket Scam -- PC World
Four men charged in computerized online ticket scam -- CNET
Four Indicted in CAPTCHA Hacks of Ticket Sites -- PC Magazine
4 Californians indicted in alleged ticket reselling scam -- L.A. Times
Couldn’t Get Those Coveted Gaga Tickets? Here’s Why -- Wall Street Journal
Wiseguys net $25m in ticket scalping racket -- Register

The Great Tradition Of Bungling Boffins

Galileo wasn't immune to the odd bad idea himself. Simon Callow in the television production of Galileo's Daughter Photo: CHANNEL 4

From The Telegraph:

As recent events have shown, all scientists can make mistakes. Michael Brooks recounts their most heroic failures across the ages.

It is hardly surprising that public confidence in science has taken a dip lately, what with all the turmoil surrounding climate change research, the failure of the peer review process to block Andrew Wakefield's paper on MMR, and the near-comical troubles at the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland.

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Year Of The Laser

From Technology Review:

The laser, a device used in everything from astrophysics to biology, was invented 50 years ago.

This year is the 50th anniversary of the laser, a device used in applications from performing precise surgical procedures to measuring gravitational waves. In 1917, Albert Einstein proposed that a photon hitting an atom in a high energy state would cause the atom to release a second photon identical in frequency and direction to the first. In the 1950s, scientists searched for a way to achieve this stimulated emission and amplify it so that a group of excited atoms would release photons in a chain reaction. In 1959, American physicist Gordon Gould publicly used the term “light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation” for the first time. A year later, scientists demonstrated the first working optical laser.

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Big Bang Collider Restarts At Cern In Bid To Discover Origins Of The Universe

Technicians install electric cables at the heart of the ATLAS detector, part of the Large Hadron Collider, which was restarted last night

From The Daily Mail:

Scientists have restarted the world largest atom smasher over-night, in a fresh bid to uncover the secrets of the universe.

The European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN, sent low energy beams of protons in both directions around the 17-mile particle accelerator under the Swiss-French border at Geneva.

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Why The Chile quake Tsunami Was Smaller Than Feared

Focused spread (Image: NOAA)

From New Scientist:

The earthquake in Chile on Saturday was one of the biggest the world has felt in the past century – so why was the tsunami that spread across the Pacific smaller than originally feared?

The magnitude-8.8 earthquake was devastating, claiming at least 700 lives. Large tsunami waves were reported along parts of Chile's coastline: reports suggest the town of Constitución was worst affected by the wave.

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Nose Scanning Techniques Could Sniff Out Criminals

Faces were analysed and mapped with a computer program

From The BBC:

We already have iris and fingerprint scanning but noses could be an even better method of identification, says a study from the University of Bath, UK.

The researchers scanned noses in 3D and characterised them by tip, ridge profile and the nasion, or area between the eyes.

They found 6 main nose types: Roman, Greek, Nubian, hawk, snub and turn-up.

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Chile Quake Among Most Powerful Ever

From Discovery News:

The so-called megathrust quake that rocked the western coast of South America is the most powerful of its kind.

THE GIST:

* The 8.8-magnitude earthquake is similar to the 2004 Indian Ocean temblor that triggered devastating tsunamis.
* Called megathrusts, these quakes occur when one tectonic plate dives beneath another.
* The Chile tremor unleashed about 50 gigatons of energy.

The huge earthquake that struck off the coast of Chile belongs to an "elite class" of mega earthquakes, experts said, and is similar to the 2004 Indian Ocean temblor that triggered deadly tsunami waves.

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A Bird's Eye View Of The Chile Earthquake's Energy Distribution

NOAA's Distributed Energy Map of the Chile Earthquake NOAA

From Popular Science:

It’s easy to think of tsunamis as phenomenon that mimic the behavior of ripples on the surface of water; you toss a stone into a pond and the resulting energy from the splash moves out away from the epicenter in a series of even, concentric circles. But this NOAA energy distribution map from the 8.8 magnitude earthquake in Chile over the weekend tells a different story.

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New 'Alien Invader' Star Clusters Found in Milky Way

As many as one quarter of the star clusters in our Milky Way -- many more than previously thought -- are invaders from other galaxies, according to a new study. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

From Science Daily:

ScienceDaily (Feb. 26, 2010) — As many as one quarter of the star clusters in our Milky Way -- many more than previously thought -- are invaders from other galaxies, according to a new study. The report also suggests there may be as many as six dwarf galaxies yet to be discovered within the Milky Way rather than the two that were previously confirmed.

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