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Inorganic Chameleon Show Promise In Energy And Nano ResearchThe multifaceted material perovskite could be of benefit in three key applications: fuel cells, gas separation prior to the storage of carbon dioxide and nanocomponents in electronic products. Consequently, the material can be of significance to both energy systems of the future and the development of nanoelectronics, according to new research.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Listening To Pleasant Music Could Help Restore Vision In Stroke Patients, Suggests StudyPatients who have lost part of their visual awareness following a stroke can show an improved ability to see when they are listening to music they like, according to a new study.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Omega-3 Fatty Acids Reduce Risk Of Advanced Prostate CancerOmega-3 fatty acids appear protective against advanced prostate cancer, and this effect may be modified by a genetic variant in the COX-2 gene, according to a report in Clinical Cancer Research.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Auditory Regions Of Brain Convert To Sense Of Touch, Hearing Loss Study FindsResearchers have discovered that adult animals with hearing loss actually re-route the sense of touch into the hearing parts of the brain.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Swimming Pool Game 'Marco Polo' Used To Develop Robot ControlScientists have used a popular kids swimming pool game to guide their development of a system for controlling moving robots that can autonomously detect and capture other moving targets.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Evolution Of Fins And Limbs Linked With That Of GillsThe genetic toolkit animals use to build fins and limbs is the same one that controls the development of part of the gill skeleton in sharks. Also, the skeleton of any animal appendage is probably patterned by the developmental genetic program that regulates the formation of shark gills. This finding is consistent with an old theory, often discounted in textbooks, that fins and (later) limbs evolved from the gills of an extinct vertebrate.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Deep-sea Corals May Be Oldest Living Marine OrganismDeep-sea corals from about 400 meters off the coast of the Hawaiian Islands are much older than once believed and some may be the oldest living marine organisms known to man. Researchers have determined that two groups of Hawaiian deep-sea corals are far older than previously recorded.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 3:00 pm Vaccine To Prevent Colon Cancer Being Tested In PatientsResearchers have begun testing a vaccine that might be able to prevent colon cancer in people at high risk for developing the disease. If shown to be effective, it might spare patients the risk and inconvenience of repeated invasive surveillance tests, such as colonoscopy, that are now necessary to spot and remove precancerous polyps.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 3:00 pm Lab-on-a-chip Homes In On How Cancer Cells Break FreeEngineers have invented a method to help figure out how cancer cells break free from neighboring tissue, an "escape" that can spread the disease to other parts of the body.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 3:00 pm New Theoretical Model Of Tumor Growth And Metastasis Based On Differences In Tissue PressureA new article describes a theoretical model of tumor growth and metastasis based on differences in tissue pressure.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 3:00 pm Pesticide Lingers in Atmosphere, Trapping HeatA common anti-termite pesticide is a potent greenhouse gas, new research shows.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 25 Mar 2009 | 1:10 pm Kuwait income hits $70 bln in 11 months (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 12:25 pm Delta forceMozambique moves people off flood plains, but at a costSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 25 Mar 2009 | 12:18 pm All-women team set for South PoleAn eight-strong team of women plan to trek the South Pole to mark the Commonwealth's 60th anniversary.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 25 Mar 2009 | 12:04 pm Shuttle Discovery to Leave Space Station Today (SPACE.com)SPACE.com - Astronauts aboard the International Space Station are packing up their spacecraft Wednesday as the shuttle Discovery prepares to head home after delivering new solar wings to the outpost.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 12:00 pm Scientists' group lambasts Daily Express• Light bulb article contained eight factual errors, say scientists A row has broken out between the Daily Express and a lobby group representing scientists over the paper's coverage of the potential dangers of low-energy lightbulbs. The Science Media Centre (SMC), which describes itself as an independent organisation set up to promote accurate reporting of scientific issues in the media, has complained to the Express following a front-page story earlier this month based on one of its press briefings. On Saturday 14 March the Express splashed with a story claiming that low-energy light bulbs were potentially hazardous, headlined: "Dangers of Low Energy Lightbulbs: They contain poisonous mercury powder". The article quoted several scientists who spoke at the SMC briefing. The SMC has written to Penny Stretton, the Daily Express journalist who wrote the article, to complain about what it claims was the paper's "sensationalised" and "inaccurate" front page. In the email, seen by MediaGuardian.co.uk, the SMC's director, Fiona Fox, said: "Over six years we have run hundreds of these trademark 'background briefings' on some of the most controversial issues of the day and ... we rarely encounter mis-reporting." Fox also claimed the story contained eight factual errors. These included giving one of the experts quoted in the article, Dr Robert Sarkany, the wrong title, she said. Fox also pointed out that compact fluorescent lightbulbs contain mercury vapour not powder, as the Express reported. The Express news editor, Greg Swift, said the paper stood by its story, describing it as "A factual and accurate account of the SMC briefing". Swift added that he was unhappy about the way the SMC had chosen to complain. "The correct way to address the issue would be to write a letter to the paper and give us time to respond," he said. Stretton, an experienced reporter at the paper, went to the briefing because her colleague, Jo Willey, was unable to attend. Willey is standing in for Victoria Fletcher as health editor at the Express while Fletcher is on maternity leave. In her email to the Express, Fox also said that "after this experience" the SMC had decided to bar journalists from passing personal invitations to its briefings on to colleagues. "We will be writing to all the science, health and environment reporters who frequent these briefings to tell them that in future invitations to background briefings are not transferable," she added. The SMC then sent a second email to journalists at rival media organisations confirming that, following the Express story, it plans to change the rules governing its press conferences. In that email, Fox told reporters: "It's really unfair for them [scientists] to have to wake up to this kind of inaccurate story." Swift denied the Express story was "sensationalist", arguing that every paper had the right to report the facts as they saw fit. He added that the second email sent by Fox's to reporters contained "inaccurate and damaging allegations" and criticised her decision to send it. "It's unfair to single out a journalist," he said. Other media organisations have already complained about the SMC's proposed new arrangements for its briefings, pointing out that it could prevent them from sending journalists to cover them. It is thought that the SMC has already agreed to make exceptions in many cases. Fox emphasised that the SMC had always enjoyed a good relationship with the Daily Express and was confident that would continue. • To contact the MediaGuardian news desk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 3353 3857. For all other inquiries please call the main Guardian switchboard on 020 3353 2000. • If you are writing a comment for publication, please mark clearly "for publication". guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 25 Mar 2009 | 11:48 am Scientists find new species in Papua New Guinea (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 11:30 am Hurricane Season 2008 (weather.com)weather.com -Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 10:05 am Porton Down veterans had raised death rates after chemical warfare testsVeterans of Ministry of Defence tests at Porton Down in the UK involving chemical warfare agents such as sarin, lewisite and sulphur mustard had a higher mortality rate in subsequent years British servicemen who acted as guinea pigs in controversial chemical warfare tests at Porton Down in Wiltshire subsequently had a higher mortality rate than others in the forces, a study has found. The Ministry of Defence tested hundreds of chemical agents on military volunteers for decades after the First World War, prompting concerns among some veterans that their health had been permanently damaged. More than half of the Porton Down veterans were exposed to known or suspected cancer-causing chemicals. In most cases, experiments ran over one to four weeks, with servicemen typically exposed to chemical or biological agents twice each week. The MoD-funded study of more than 18,000 men who took part in the tests found that their risk of dying between 1941 and 2004 was 6% higher than that for other members of the forces, although they were no more likely to die from cancer. Researchers at the University of Oxford compared the medical records of 18,276 servicemen who had tests at Porton Down and 17,600 other military veterans. By 2004, 7,306 of the men involved in the tests had died, compared with 6,900 who were not. Katherine Venables, who led the study, said it was impossible to tell whether the extra deaths were caused by nerve agents such as sarin; blistering agents such as lewisite and sulphur mustard, and antidotes for nerve agents, including atropine. The study found that the Porton Down veterans were slightly more likely to die from heart disease, infectious diseases, parasites and "external causes", which includes accidents, suicide and homicide. Some of these deaths may be explained by smoking, poor diet and other factors unrelated to the chemicals used in the tests. Most of the Porton Down volunteers spent longer in the forces than the comparison group of servicemen, and so could have spent more time on foreign deployments, where their chances of contracting diseases and parasites or being involved in accidents was higher. Servicemen were also asked to volunteer for the tests, and so on average may have been a more risk-taking group in other areas of their lives. "If the Porton Down veterans smoked a bit more than our comparison group, that might explain a 6% excess in cardiovascular deaths, but we can't exclude the possibility that it is related to either the experience of going to Porton Down, or specific exposures at the lab," said Venables, whose study appears in the British Medical Journal. In a second paper in the journal, Venables' team found the same group of Porton Down servicemen were no more likely to have died from cancer than other servicemen. They were, however, more likely to be diagnosed and successfully treated for early stage cancers. "There was a 45% increase in malignant neoplasms in the Porton Down group, and these are usually pre-cancerous lesions," said Venables. These early-stage cancers were picked up in 93 servicemen who spent time at Porton Down, compared with only 64 of the other servicemen. Venables said her team cannot explain the figures, but it is possible that servicemen who were involved in tests, which often involved having cancer-causing chemicals painted onto their skin, were more vigilant for early signs of cancer. "We had no idea what we were going to find when we set out to do this study," said Venables. "We haven't found evidence of a hugely increased risk compared with other military personnel who didn't go to Porton Down, and overall I take that as reassuring," she said. The higher death rate among the Porton Down veterans may be an underestimate, as the men had gone through a selection process before the MoD tests that eliminated all but the most healthy. In an editorial in the journal, Malcom Sim, an epidemiologist at Monash University in Melbourne, said there was still a question mark over the health impacts of the tests and called for more work in the area. Last year, in an out-of-court settlement after Porton Down volunteers claimed the government's testing programme had put their health at risk, the MoD said it would apologise to hundreds of former service personnel and offered a £3m compensation package. In 1999, Wiltshire police force began an investigation into experiments at Porton Down following a complaint over the death of 20-year-old aircraftman Ronal Maddison, who died shortly after having liquid sarin dripped on his arm. An inquest into his death in 2004 recorded a verdict of unlawful killing, but the Crown Prosecution Service decided not to press charges against surviving scientists who had overseen the experiments. The MoD paid the Maddison family £100,000 in compensation. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 25 Mar 2009 | 8:17 am New species found in Papua-New GuineaWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Jumping spiders, a striped gecko and a chirping frog are among more than 50 new species discovered in Papua-New Guinea, the environmental group Conservation International reported on Tuesday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 7:55 am New species found in Papua-New Guinea (Reuters)Reuters - Jumping spiders, a striped gecko and a chirping frog are among more than 50 new species discovered in Papua-New Guinea, the environmental group Conservation International reported on Tuesday.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 7:55 am Too greenWhy a renewable energy scheme ran out of moneySource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 25 Mar 2009 | 7:22 am Shuttle, space station crews part after 8 days (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 7:10 am Venice seaport eyes algae to fuel energy needsROME (Reuters) - Venice's seaport plans to become self-sufficient in its energy needs by building a power plant fueled by algae, in what would be the first facility of its kind in Italy, the port authority said.Source: Reuters: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 6:37 am Welcome visitor: Long-tailed tit flies into RSPB's top 10Mild winters and a new diet help the long-tailed tit make it into the top 10 birds spotted in UK gardens, says the RSPB.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 25 Mar 2009 | 5:43 am Study IDs Variations in Black, White Genomes (HealthDay)HealthDay - TUESDAY, March 24 (HealthDay News) -- U.S. researchers have identified 1,362 copy number variations (CNVs) in the human genome of blacks and 1,972 in whites.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 3:48 am Why Toddlers Don't Do What They're Told (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - Are you listening to me? Didn't I just tell you to get your coat? Helloooo! It's cold out there...Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 2:45 am Religious People Work Harder to Stall DeathWhen you're near death, how hard do you want doctors to work on keeping you alive?Source: Livescience.com | 25 Mar 2009 | 2:24 am African weather center to help Red CrossDAKAR (Reuters) - A pan-African weather center will help the Red Cross respond faster to floods and drought by feeding it weather forecasts tailored to its needs, the aid group said on Tuesday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 1:51 am Oil terminal a concern as Alaska volcano rumbles (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 1:22 am Photos of Alaskan Volcano's Eruption
The U.S. Geological Survey's Alaska Volcano Observatory finally released a batch of photos from of Mount Redoubt Volcano, which has erupted explosively six times since Sunday evening. Some of the more dramatic, taken on Monday, are included below.
Flooding caused by the melting of Drift Glacier by the eruption. Flood waters reached as high as 25 feet. AVO/USGS
Flood waters from the summit of Mount Redoubt running down through Drift Glacier. AVO/USGS
Mud deposited by flood waters in the lower Drift valley. AVO/USGS
Ash haze in Cook Inlet with the summit Mount Spurr visible. AVO/USGS
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 25 Mar 2009 | 1:00 am Single embryo best for fertility treatment: studyLONDON (Reuters) - Implanting a single embryo is the cheapest and most effective way for women to have a healthy baby through fertility treatment, Finnish researchers said on Wednesday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 25 Mar 2009 | 12:42 am Mild winters push long-tailed tit up garden bird chart• Record number of participants in January's garden bird survey The long-tailed tit has emerged as the surprise success story of the RSPB's Big Garden Birdwatch, its annual garden bird-counting survey. The RSPB believes that the tiny bird's rapid growth in numbers is due to a run of mild UK winters. This year's Big Garden Birdwatch, which took place in January, involved a record 552,000 participants across the UK, who logged garden visits by 8.5m birds of 73 different species. It is the largest mass-participation wildlife survey anywhere in the world. As in previous years, house sparrows and starlings were the two most populous species in gardens. The RSPB warned, however, that their high position concealed the fact both species have suffered major declines since the survey first began in 1979. House sparrow numbers have fallen by 63% since the first survey, and starling numbers have dropped by 79%. This year's survey did bring one small sign of hope, with house sparrow numbers rising slightly, up almost 3% on 2008. "There's no longer much food in the countryside for sparrows and starlings, so they come into our towns where our new houses are virtually impenetrable and insect numbers are down because of pollution," BBC Springwatch presenter Chris Packham said, adding that the species' long-term decline is not irreversible. The big surprise this year was the long-tailed tit, rising from 14th to 10th place with numbers up 89% on 2008. At 14cm long, and weighing little more than a 50p coin, the long-tailed tit suffers badly from freezing weather. From the late 1970s to the mid-1980s a series of bitter winters caused the population to plummet, but a long run of mild winters has brought the species into the top 10 garden birds for the first time. "A few years ago this bird wouldn't often have been seen on feeders, preferring instead to forage in the countryside," said Dr Mark Avery, the RSPB's director of conservation. "As more of us stock our feeders this little bird realises what we have to offer, and it's yet another beautiful bird we can enjoy from our windows." Packham also praised the rising popularity of bird-feeding. "The great thing about this birdwatch is that not only are we engaging with half a million people, but the vast majority have put out feed for birds. From ubergeeks like myself to old ladies, people are making a difference to bird populations," said Packham. Long-tailed tits were not the only surprise from this year's survey, with many respondents in the east of England enjoying sightings of waxwings, a scarce and irregular winter visitor from Scandinavia. The waxwing leapt 13 places up the bird-spotting chart, which the RSPB's Big Garden Birdwatch coordinator Sarah Kelly attributed partly to gardens with berry-bearing shrubs. A change in what we feed birds is also said to be causing a greater diversity of species. "Gone are the days when all that was available was a bag of peanuts – as we become more aware of the different types of food suitable for garden birds, we are reaping the benefits with even more species on our tables and feeders than ever," said Avery. The survey follows a recent report by Durham University, which said that climate change is leaving some native British birds facing extinction. Experts warn that changes in the British climate such as milder winters and drier summers could leave some species struggling to adapt. "Drier weather and sudden flooding in summer will affect inveterbrates including worms in the soil, which will in turn affect birds such as songthrushes, starlings and blackbirds," said Peter Brash, an ecologist for the National Trust. "I also hope that we'll see gardeners keep hold of lawns by picking drought-resistant varieties of grass rather than tarmacing over them because of higher temperatures." Ecologists note that a warmer climate will, however, be good news for some bird species. "We would expect changes in the relative abundance of some of our common birds as climates warm across the UK and Europe, with some species increasing and some decreasing in abundance," said Dr Stephen Willis, lecturer in ecology at Durham University. "We project that the collared dove and goldfinch, both now common UK garden birds, should be doing better across Europe as the climate changes." Up and down the Big Garden Birdwatch charts • Siskins are down from number 20 in 2008 to 26 this year • Goldcrests up from number 46 last year to 34 • Buzzards down from 41 to 46 • Herring gulls up from 43 to 37 • Bramblings down from 36 to 49 this year • Waxwings up from 72 to 59 • Black redstarts fell from 55 last year to 73 in 2009 guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 25 Mar 2009 | 12:05 am Porton Down 'not death sentence'War veterans of Porton Down face no greater risk of dying of cancer but health concerns remain, experts say.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 25 Mar 2009 | 12:01 am The trillion dollar questionAs Obama proposes a $1,000,000,000,000 rescue plan, Marcus du Sautoy offers a handy guide to the mind-bogglingly big numbers being bandied about The global recession has brought us a slew of numbers so large, with so many noughts attached, that it's getting difficult to put them into any kind of perspective. The Bank of England recently announced it was injecting up to £150 billion of new money into the British economy, an unimaginable amount - yet now we hear Barack Obama is proposing to splash out a further $1trn (one trillion dollars) to rescue Wall Street's floundering institutions. And even that's not as much as Britain's national debt has been recalculated at - £1.5trn - following the classification of Lloyds and the Royal Bank of Scotland as public corporations. Millions, billions, trillions - names most of us are familiar with, even if we can't specify the number of zeros. In January, Zimbabwe printed a dollar note with a number containing 11 zeros, only to further deflate its currency a month later. And it still doesn't match the Hungarian National Bank in 1946, which came up with the highest denomination banknote ever issued: a 100 quintillion (20 zeros) peng note. To make any sense of what's going on (and how bad things really are), you need a feeling for quite how big these numbers are. So here's a brief guide, from zero right up to the biggest of them all. 0 or zeroA relative newcomer on the mathematical scene, zero wasn't recognised as a number in its own right until the Indians started exploring its properties in the seventh century AD (they are also responsible for the other nine symbols we use for recording numbers, known as the Arabic-Hindu system). Zero was introduced to Europe by the Italian mathematician Fibonacci in the 12th century - and the authorities were so suspicious of it that in 1299 the government of Florence banned its use. The Indians' invention of the number zero is directly related to their fascination with large numbers. The Sanskrit saga Lalitavistara gives an account of Gautama Buddha, who is asked at one point to name all of the numbers up to those with 421 zeros. A time-consuming task. 10The base-10 system we use today is a direct result of the fact we count on our 10 fingers (the Simpsons, presumably, are working in base eight). Other cultures were not so hooked on powers of 10: the ancient Babylonians collected things in powers of 60, and we see hangovers of their system of numbers in the modern world. The fact that there are 60 minutes in an hour and 360 degrees in a circle is a relic of the Babylonians' choice of base 60. The effect of putting zeros on the end of a Babylonian number is therefore even more devastating than on our modern decimal notation. 1,000,000 (one million)We really start to see the power of the Arabic-Hindu system coming into its own as we hit the big numbers. The Romans had to keep on cooking up new letters every time their numbers got bigger - C for 100, D for 500, M for 1,000 - because they didn't have zeros to add on to the end. To give a sense of how big a million is, 1m seconds is just over 11½ days and if you laid 1m pound coins end to end, they would stretch for 14 miles. 1,000,000,000 (one billion)In the UK, this number used to be called, simply, 1,000 million, while a billion was reserved for a million million (a number with 12 zeros). But pressure to standardise our numbers with the US drove Harold Wilson to announce in 1974 that any government mention of a billion would from then on mean a number with nine zeros. If you really want someone to blame for the confusion over billions, however, it's the French. Throughout history, they have flip-flopped between different definitions, wreaking havoc on the names of numbers. In 1480, they proposed that a billion have 12 zeros, which is what the British adopted. Then, in the middle of the 17th century, they knocked three zeros off, so a billion became a number with nine zeros. The young United States inherited this new definition. Then in 1948, the French reverted back to the old system. 1,000,000,000,000 (one trillion)To help Obama put the full scale of his rescue plan into perspective, one trillion seconds would take you back 31,709 years to the time of the hunter-gatherers. If you lined up the 1.5tn pound coins that were reported to have been wiped off the global markets on one single black Friday, they would get you from here to Mars. 1,000,000,000,000,000 (one quadrillion)Mathematicians write this number as 1015: the superscript tells you how many zeros there are after the one. Given that we are already wiping trillions off the markets, this is the next order of magnitude that's surely soon going to start appearing on the scene. The Americans and British call this number a quadrillion, although the European name is a billiard. The world's derivative market has a notional value of nearly half a quadrillion dollars - that's 10 times the value of the world's output, which is why it is regarded as a ticking timebomb by some analysts. Line up a quadrillion pound coins, and they will take you outside our solar system. 10100 ... (one googol)This numerical name was coined in 1938 by a nine-year-old boy, Milton Sirotta, who was asked by his mathematical uncle to think of a name for a number with one followed by 100 zeros. If that's not mindboggling enough, a "googolplex" is a number with a googol number of zeros. As surely everyone knows, a misspelt version of this number is now the name of a rather well-known internet search engine. It was also the answer to the million pound question given by Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? cheat Major Charles Ingram. 316470269330 ... 66697152511This is the largest prime number that has been discovered (with the aid of a large computer) to date. It has nearly 13m digits and was only found in August of last year. Printing the full number would require a G2 page about 30 miles long, and it would take more than two months to read aloud all the digits. It earned the discoverer a prize of $100,000 for the first prime number to break the 10m-digit barrier. The next prize on offer is $150,000, for a prime number with more than 100m digits. Thanks to the ancient Greek mathematician Euclid, we know that there are prime numbers out there with as many digits as we want. A zillionAsk a child to name a really big number and they will often go for a zillion. This name does not correspond to any particular number, but has gone into the lexicon to mean a number of indefinitely large magnitude, coined by the American writer Damon Runyon, the author of Guys and Dolls. InfinityThe smart kids will go for infinity as the largest number imaginable. Until the end of the 19th century, the concept represented the unknowable - but amazingly, in 1874, a mathematician called Georg Cantor revealed that there are many sorts of infinity, some larger than others. He also showed how one can make sense of adding and multiplying infinities. He paid for his investigation, however, spending much of his life in a German mental asylum in Halle. So, in the great scheme of the mathematical universe, the numbers being bandied about over the last few weeks are pretty small beer. However bad it gets, mathematicians will always be ready with a name and notation to tackle the next onslaught of bad economic figures. • Marcus du Sautoy is professor of mathematics at the University of Oxford. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 25 Mar 2009 | 12:01 am Briny pools 'may exist on Mars'Pools of salty water might be able to exist just below the surface of Mars, planetary scientists tell a major US conference.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 24 Mar 2009 | 11:45 pm Obama quizzes astronauts about life in spaceHOUSTON (Reuters) - Astronauts aboard the International Space Station took a break from construction tasks on Tuesday to answer questions from schoolchildren and U.S. President Barack Obama about the rigors of space life.Source: Reuters: Science News | 24 Mar 2009 | 11:32 pm Scientists Tell Texas: Time to EvolveSeveral leading scientists have sent a letter to the Texas State Board of Education.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 8:31 pm Cell Phones and Video Games Don't Ruin AcademicsUsing cell phones and playing video games may not be as harmful as some have suggested.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 7:44 pm NASA Planetary Images Get Microsoft Makeover
One hundred terabytes of high-resolution images of our planetary neighbors will become easier to access, thanks to a new partnership between NASA and Microsoft Research's WorldWide Telescope. The new agreement, announced today, will push images from NASA's Planetary Data System into Microsoft's easier-to-navigate product. NASA's system is great for researchers looking for complete datasets, but the FTP front-end could scare off non-nerds. "Making NASA's scientific and astronomical data more accessible to the public is a high priority for NASA, especially given the new administration's recent emphasis on open government and transparency," said Ed Weiler, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington, in a press release.
NASA has launched a variety of internet-savvy initiatives in recent months, from the smart twittering of @MarsPhoenix to a new partnership with Google Mars to a climate change tracking site designed by Cisco. They don't always work out perfectly, like when a recent poll to name a space-station component got Colbert-rolled, but they show that the agency takes its mandate seriously to disseminate information in forms both astronomers and the public can use. Rather than building proprietary websites that try to mean all things to all people, NASA is feeding its public-domain data out into the internet ecosystem and letting other people make cool stuff out of it. NASA Ames is even building a set of tools that can convert planetary data into a variety of formats that enable different types of use. NASA Ames head, Pete Worden, acknowledged that, twittering, "Cool roll-out of NASA Cooperation with Microsoft. Now we have a trifecta — Google, Cisco, Microsoft." WorldWide Telescope, which is available only for Microsoft operating systems, will incorporate the NASA data by the end of 2009. See Also:
Image: An image of Saturn's rings from the Cassini-Huygens mission. NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal's Twitter , Google Reader feed, and project site, Inventing Green: the lost history of American clean tech; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 24 Mar 2009 | 7:37 pm Alaska's Mount Redoubt Still TremblingAfter multiple eruptions, Mount Redoubt is showing signs of further instability.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 24 Mar 2009 | 7:07 pm Hair Bleach Turns Green
A new hair bleach derived from a forest soil fungus could provide a natural alternative to the hydrogen peroxide that's now used to turn anyone into a blonde. Traditional peroxide does a great job breaking down melanin — the human body's natural pigment — but it's made with an energy-intensive process, and it's easy to overdo it and fry your hair. The new enzyme, described Tuesday at the American Chemical Society meeting in Salt Lake City by Kenzo Koike of the Kao Corporation's Beauty Research Center in Tokyo, accomplishes the same bleaching task, but it's produced by a forest soil fungus and is gentler on the hair. It requires a little bit of hydrogen peroxide to make it effective, but the enzyme helps control the free radicals that can damage repetitively dyed hair. That makes it an ideal candidate as an additive to traditional hair bleaches, Koike said in a release. But Kao Corporation isn't the only Big Beauty corporation trying to make a better hair dye. Back in 2007, Proctor & Gamble touted their own solution — backed up by 18 patents — to the free radical problem. See Also:
Image: Kenzo Koike/Kao Corporation. WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal's Twitter , Google Reader feed, and project site, Inventing Green: the lost history of American clean tech; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 24 Mar 2009 | 6:58 pm Spider Bite Cures Paralyzed Man: Miracle or Bad Reporting?News reports of a man walking again thanks to a spider bite are likely wrong.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 6:48 pm Unique Killer-Whale Pod Doomed by Exxon Valdez
Most of Prince William Sound's animal populations will someday recover from the lingering effects of the Exxon Valdez oil spill. One, however, will not: a community of killer whales unlike any other in the world. "It's a separate population. Their genetics, their acoustics, are different from any other killer whales that we see in the North Pacific," said Craig Matkin, director of the North Gulf Oceanic Society, who has studied the region's whales for three decades. Known to researchers as the AT1 pod, the whales' home range fell within the 11,000 square miles of crude oil dumped by the ship when it ran aground March 24, 1989. Nine of the pod's 22 whales subsequently died, likely from oil ingestion — a blow from which the group, already struggling to cope with pollution and declining populations of the seals which they need for food, never recovered. "It was the last nail in the coffin," said Matkin. No calves have been born to the pod since the spill. Just seven members of AT1 remain, and their days as a viable community are numbered. Other local killer whale populations, including the AB pod — which lost seven of its 35 members after the spill, with seven other members leaving to join another pod in an act of pod dissolution unprecedented among killer whales — have slowly rebounded. But those whales are less distinctive than those in AT1, whose closest genetic relatives are found 1,000 miles away in the Bering Sea, a distribution that likely represents a millenniums-old ancestral split. However, it's not just genetics that make the AT1 whales special, said Matkin. It's their songs. As he and colleagues reported in a 2005 Canadian Journal of Zoology paper, AT1's are the only so-called transient — seal-eating, locality-bound — killer whales to vary songs according to context, with pitch and intonation dependent on whether they're hunting or traveling. (Listen to an AT1 song.) "Each resident pod has a separate dialect," said Matkin. "AT1 doesn't have a different dialect, but a whole different call structure." One could even think of their songs as an entirely different language.
Matkin recalled one animal from the AB pod. "When she saw the boat, she really liked to get in the propeller wash and stick her nose right up there, in the bubbles coming off the boat," he said. "We called that the whale jacuzzi. On occasion, she'd follow us in to anchor while her group was moving on. One time, we took her back. She'd just become a mother before the spill. She was an animal we knew well." Citations: "Vocal repertoire and acoustic behavior of the isolated AT1 killer whale subpopulation in southern Alaska." By Eva L. Saulitis, Craig O. Matkin, and Francis H. Fay. Canadian Journal of Zoology, Vol. 83 No. 8, Aug. 1, 2005. "Ongoing population-level impacts on killer whales Orcinus orca following the ‘Exxon Valdez’ oil spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska." By C. O. Matkin, E. L. Saulitis, G. M. Ellis, P. Olesiuk, S. D. Rice. Marine Ecology Progress Series, Vol. 356, March 18, 2008. Images: 1. Canadian Journal of Zoology 2. Craig Matkin/North Gulf Oceanic Society Audio: Craig Matkin/North Gulf Oceanic Society See Also:
Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 24 Mar 2009 | 6:45 pm UK ships super-telescope's 'ears'A European-built receiver is to begin its journey to form part of what will become the world's largest radio telescope.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 24 Mar 2009 | 6:36 pm Let the Earth remove CO2 for usJames Lovelock: George Monbiot is wrong to dismiss biochar out of hand – burying carbon is one way to tackle climate change I usually agree with George Monbiot and love the way he says it but this time – with his assertion that the latest miracle mass fuel cure, biochar, does not stand up – he has got it only half right. Yes, it is silly to rename charcoal as biochar and yes, it would be wrong to plant anything specifically to make charcoal. So I agree, George, it would be wrong to have plantations in the tropics just to make charcoal. I said in my recent book that perhaps the only tool we had to bring carbon dioxide back to pre-industrial levels was to let the biosphere pump it from the air for us. It currently removes 550bn tons a year, about 18 times more than we emit, but 99.9% of the carbon captured this way goes back to the air as CO2 when things are eaten. What we have to do is turn a portion of all the waste of agriculture into charcoal and bury it. Consider grain like wheat or rice; most of the plant mass is in the stems, stalks and roots and we only eat the seeds. So instead of just ploughing in the stalks or turning them into cardboard, make it into charcoal and bury it or sink it in the ocean. We don't need plantations or crops planted for biochar, what we need is a charcoal maker on every farm so the farmer can turn his waste into carbon. Charcoal making might even work instead of landfill for waste paper and plastic. Incidentally, in making charcoal this way, there is a by-product of biofuel that the farmer can sell. If we are to make this idea work it is vital that it pays for itself and requires no subsidy. Subsidies almost always breed scams and this is true of most forms of renewable energy now proposed and used. No one would invest in plantations to make charcoal without a subsidy, but if we can show the farmers they can turn their waste to profit they will do it freely and help us and Gaia too. There is no chance that carbon capture and storage from industry or power stations will make a dent in CO2 accumulation, even if we had the will and money to do it. But we have to grow food, so why not help Gaia do the job of CO2 removal for us? • James Lovelock is an independent scientist, author, researcher, environmentalist. He is known for proposing the Gaia hypothesis. guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 24 Mar 2009 | 6:12 pm The Exxon Valdez Spill Is All Around Us
The final legacy of the Exxon Valdez oil spill is not a pristine ecosystem's defilement, or the destruction of millions of animals. It's the accumulation of scientific knowledge about oil in our environment. Contrary to the conventional wisdom of 1989, oil isn't just a problem in a the immediate aftermath of a spill, when coastlines and wildlife are covered in a hideous, highly photogenic slick. It wreaks a subtle, long-term havoc, as toxic chemicals enter ecological cycles and take decades to break down. That's not only true in Prince William Sound, but around the United States, where millions of gallons of oil spill every single year. "Most of the oil that runs off roads and parking lots doesn't go into sewage treatment plants," said Mary Kelly, co-director of the Environmental Defense Fund's land, water and wildlife program. "It just runs off into waterways." When the Exxon Valdez ran ashore off Prince William Sound on March 24, 1989, it wasn't the first tanker to founder at sea. It was, however, the first tanker to deposit its load — 11 million gallons of crude oil, eventually covering 11,000 square miles of ocean — in such an economically and environmentally important ecosystem, and thus squarely in the public eye. To this day, images of oil-choked birds and oil-fouled shorelines are burned into the memories of a generation. Local and national outrage forced Exxon into paying billions of dollars to clean the mess. Some of this money went to scientists who monitored the region's recovery. For the first time, researchers had the resources necessary to thoroughly study an oil spill's effects. These proved even uglier than they first appeared. Researchers expected the oil to break up in a few years. Instead, it will take more than a century. They found that oil's compounds, especially polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons — carcinogenic molecules that attach to fat, and refuse to break down in water — are toxic at levels hundreds, even thousands of times lower than was previously believed.
And if those consequences seem remote, limited to a distant corner of a state disconnected from mainland America, then consider this: According to the National Marine Fisheries Service, six Exxon Valdez spills' worth of oil seep into the U.S. environment every single year, dripping from vehicles and washed into sewers where it's carried directly into streams and finally to the sea. "That's what you get in urbanized and urbanizing estuaries. Each rainfall brings the next batch of spilled oil and grease," said Charles Peterson, a University of North Carolina marine ecologist who has studied the effects of the Exxon Valdez spill for decades. "It fits the long-term exposure criteria which we've shown were so devastating in Prince William Sound." Oil enters the environment through what's known as non-point sources. There's no obvious villain, like a breached oil tanker or belching smokestack. Instead there are millions of cars trailing oil roads, and weekend mechanics pouring cans into curbside drains. Rain gathers the oil and takes it into sewers. Sometimes sewage pipes flow directly into rivers, streams and bays. Sometimes they join domestic waste pipes and flow into a water treatment plant. But even then, oil can literally fall through the cracks before it arrives. "We have a situation where many municipalities put in their systems using wood pipes and cast iron pipes, and those are failing," said Benjamin Gann, government relations coordinator at the National Utilities Contractors Association. That result, estimates NUCA, is about 2.5 billion gallons of sewage spills every year — a daunting number, and one that pales in comparison to the 950 billion gallons of untreated sewage spewed by directly-polluting pipes and so-called combined sewer overflows. During the latter, rainfall runoff surges so powerfully that waste processing plants can't handle it, and dump waste without treatment. In its annual evaluation of U.S. infrastructure, the American Society of Civil Engineers gave the nation's wastewater system a D-minus grade — far worse than the country's bridges, which after the 2007 Minneapolis bridge collapse were nationally recognized as a disaster. Government efforts to control non-point source pollution — inspired in part, said Peterson, by Exxon Valdez-prompted research on oil toxicity — are well-meaning, but the jury's out on their effectiveness. The Environmental Protection Agency in 2003 added storm overflow guidelines to their suite of water pollution regulations, but Peterson said it's too soon to know their effectiveness. Others are less optimistic. "The storm-water regulations have little teeth to them at all," said Katherine Baer, senior director of the clean water program at American Rivers, a nonprofit environmental group. "Municipalities have to implement a plan, which includes monitoring, but in terms of controlling the sources of pollution, we've had almost no advance." The federal economic stimulus package passed in January contains roughly $4 billion for clean water, of which $1.2 billion is earmarked for "green infrastructure" — green roofs, porous concretes, and other technologies that can at least reduce the surges that cause sewage plants to overflow. It's a welcome investment, said Baer, but the EPA estimates that $390 billion is needed to upgrade water systems nationwide, and Gann called the stimulus figure "a down payment" on what's needed. Moreover, said Baer, "Global warming is going to be one more added stress on our infrastructure. Storms will be more intense, and you're going to see more intense runoffs and overflows." The effects of all this oil have yet to be quantified. Unlike Prince William Sound, researchers haven't spent decades looking for damage caused by chronic oil exposures in America's waters. It's not inconceivable that a state of permanent toxicity has come to seem natural. If oil "kills all these organisms through long-term exposures in Prince William Sound," said Peterson, "think what it's doing in Boston Harbor and San Pedro and every other place where this is going on." Images: 1. Flickr/Jim Brickett 2. Flickr/Daquella Manera See Also:
Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 24 Mar 2009 | 5:47 pm Team Tornado: Chasing Twisters for ScienceRide with Reed Timmer and his colleagues on their quests to photograph and video-capture dangerous weather phenomena at frighteningly close distances.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 5:41 pm Beached whales to be put downWhales beached on British shores will be humanely killed as soon as possible after they are found, under new guidelines Whales beached on British shores will be humanely killed as soon as possible after they are found, under new official guidelines. Scientists and conservationists say recent research shows that trying to return stranded whales to their ocean habitats was impractical in the UK and that any attempts to do so merely prolonged the suffering of the animals. The Marine Animal Rescue Coalition, which includes the RSPCA and is responsible for handling stranded marine animals, worked with scientists from the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) on the new policy, announced today. It states that stranded whales should be put down by a lethal injection of an opiate unless there were clear reasons not to do so. The policy would apply to deep-sea creatures such as beaked and sperm whales but not to dolphins or porpoises, which are also sometimes found stranded on UK shores. "We now have a clear direction for those who respond to the strandings, " said Tony Woodley of the RSPCA. "The presumption will be euthanasia unless the animal can be refloated in a very short period of time into oceanic-depth water, which is extremely unlikely in the British Isles because of the logistics of getting animals to those waters in that time period." Paul Jepson of ZSL, who has led much of the research on stranded marine animals in recent years, said: "Between 2002 and 2006, there were 30 sperm whales and 24 beaked whales reported stranded in the UK and none of them survived." Marine animals can become stranded for several reasons, including the effects of disease or pollution or as a result of trauma from collisions with boats or other animals. Once onshore, their bodies undergo rapid deterioration. Recent research on blood samples taken from stranded whales, including the famous beaked whale that swam into the Thames in January 2006, all point to the same causes of death: dehydration and irreparable muscle and kidney damage. Deep-sea marine animals such as beak or sperm whales use an oxygen-carrying protein called myoglobin in their muscles to carry much of the oxygen they need to swim deep in the sea. When they are stranded on land, their dense muscles become compressed under their own weight. The cells die and release the myoglobin into the bloodstream, which is toxic for the kidneys. Stranded whales were also found to be dehydrated because their only source of water is the food they eat. When the whales get lost in the North Sea or other relatively shallow waters, they cannot find anything to eat. "They become so weak with dehydration, they strand and a whole cascade of physiological compromises begins," said Jepson. Because of this rapid deterioration, which can happen within hours and become irreversible well before the stranded whales could be moved back into deep waters, scientists have concluded that it is virtually impossible to save the creatures. Dolphins and porpoises deteriorate more slowly, and live in much shallower waters, so refloating them is often easy. "We like to base good policy on science and this is one example where the science shows us that the animals, when they strand, are severely compromised," said Adam Grogan of the RSPCA. He said the lack of recent strandings made it a good time to announce the change in policy because emotions tended to run high when the whales were in trouble. "It's only fair to tell everybody that in the future it's very likely that, to put it out of its suffering, euthanasia is likely to be the most likely option." guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2009 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds
Source: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 24 Mar 2009 | 5:31 pm Cold Fusion 'Evidence' UnveiledResearchers say they have the first clear evidence that cold fusion devices can work.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 24 Mar 2009 | 5:27 pm NASA Might Name Toilet For Comedian Stephen ColbertNASA may consider putting comedian Stephen Colbert's name on a space toilet.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 5:16 pm Meeting needsCutting meat from diets could do more harm than goodSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 24 Mar 2009 | 5:13 pm Arctic trek team pushes forwardThe UK team trying to measure Arctic sea-ice thickness on a trek to the North Pole says the weather is turning in its favour.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 24 Mar 2009 | 5:02 pm Dog Tail-Chasing Linked to High CholesterolWhen a dog compulsively chases its tail, could diet be the hidden cause?Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 24 Mar 2009 | 4:48 pm SLIDE SHOW: Space CookingAstronaut Sandra Magnus comes up with some creative recipes in space.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 24 Mar 2009 | 4:35 pm Red meat raises risk of all kinds of deathWASHINGTON (Reuters) - People who eat the most red meat and the most processed meat have the highest overall risk of death from all causes, including heart disease and cancer, U.S. researchers reported on Monday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 24 Mar 2009 | 4:29 pm Wrinkle-Blasting Laser Treatments SoarA cosmetic surgery technique called laser resurfacing is soaring in popularity.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 4:26 pm Antibiotic ban on livestock may hurt U.S. food safetyWASHINGTON (Reuters) - A bill that would ban the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in animals would hurt the health of livestock and poultry while compromising efforts to protect the safety of the country's food supply, the leader of the largest U.S. farm group said on Tuesday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 24 Mar 2009 | 3:53 pm Group says 5.3 million in U.S. have Alzheimer'sWASHINGTON (Reuters) - An estimated 5.3 million Americans have Alzheimer's, and each patient on average costs Medicare three times more than patients without the disease, the Alzheimer's Association reported on Tuesday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 24 Mar 2009 | 3:44 pm Comedian Wins Space Station Name ContestThe name "Colbert" beats out NASA's suggestions for a new space station room.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 24 Mar 2009 | 3:27 pm Smart-Braking Cars Save FuelDrivers willing to give up the gas pedal and brakes could save 25 percent on fuel.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 24 Mar 2009 | 3:27 pm Earth WatchIndia's Nano-man drives road to climate concernsSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 24 Mar 2009 | 3:05 pm Giza Pyramids Align Toward City of Sun GodThe odd arrangement of Egypt's Giza pyramids was no accident.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 24 Mar 2009 | 2:35 pm Let sunshine in to fight tuberculosis, WHO saysGENEVA (Reuters) - Ventilation and some sunshine could go a long way to reduce tuberculosis risks in hospitals and prisons, two strongholds of the contagious lung disease, the World Health Organization said.Source: Reuters: Science News | 24 Mar 2009 | 2:32 pm Gang of Juvenile Dinosaurs Discovered (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - Three juvenile Triceratops, a species thought to be solitary, died together in a flood and now have been found in a 66 million-year-old bone bed in Montana, lending more evidence to the idea that teen dinosaurs were gregarious gangsters.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 24 Mar 2009 | 2:32 pm Gang of Juvenile Dinosaurs DiscoveredA new fossil find suggests that young Triceratops dinosaurs were gregarious gangsters, not solitary types.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 2:24 pm Astronaut Experiments With Cooking in SpaceAstronaut Sandy Magnus developed a collection of key orbital kitchen tips.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 24 Mar 2009 | 2:15 pm Sidewalk Science: How Water Splashes Atop Your ShoesWalking on a wet sidewalk after a rainstorm leaves the tops of shoes soaked.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 1:40 pm What Does an Egyptian Pharaoh Smell Like?She may have ruled like a man, but Egyptian queen Hatshepsut still preferred to smell like a lady.Source: Livescience.com | 24 Mar 2009 | 1:32 pm
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