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World’s First Successful ViKY Robot-assisted Surgery For Pancreatic TumorsDoctors performed the world's first successful minimally invasive distal pancreatectomy using the ViKY system's revolutionary robotic, compact laparoscope holder. The technology, developed in France and tested on thousands of patients in Europe, made its debut in a cancer setting in the United States at Fox Chase.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Why Is There More Matter Than Antimatter In The Natural World?Mathematicians have for the first time estimated, from mathematical symmetry arguments, the size of a fundamental imbalance pervading the subatomic world. This imbalance, called the CP violation, distinguishes matter from antimatter and is essential to understanding why matter predominates over antimatter in the natural world.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm New Surface Material That Resists Biofilm Growth CreatedThis is the tale of two biological substances -- cells from mammals and bacteria. It's a story about the havoc these microscopic entities can wreak on all manner of surfaces, from mighty ships to teeth and medical devices, and how two researchers are discovering new ways prevent the damage.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm New Nanogenerator May Charge IPods And Cell Phones With A Wave Of The HandA new nanogenerator may charge iPods and cell phones with a wave of the hand. Scientists have described technology that converts mechanical energy from body movements or even the flow of blood in the body into electric energy that can be used to power a broad range of electronic devices without using batteries.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Brain Activity Associated With Phantom Limbs, Study ShowsPhantom limbs, often described after amputation, are also experienced as an extra limb in patients who are paralyzed on one side following a stroke. Referred to as supernumerary phantom limb, patients can usually perceive these limbs as a vivid somatosensory presence of an extra limb, but generally cannot see or intentionally move them.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm TV Shows Convey Mixed Messages About Alcohol Consumption In YouthEfforts to dissuade youth consumption through negative alcohol consumption depictions can be thwarted by portrayals of positive consumption in prime-time television programming. A new study reveals that television series often portray mixed messages about alcohol, but the positive and negative messages were shown differently.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm Why Certain Fishes Went Extinct 65 Million Years AgoLarge size and a fast bite spelled doom for bony fishes during the last mass extinction 65 million years ago (the same one that led to the extinction of thousands of species of flora and fauna, including dinosaurs). Today, those same features characterize large predatory bony fishes, such as tuna and billfishes, that are currently in decline and at risk of extinction themselves. The hardest hit species are consistently big predators.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 3:00 pm Anti-microbial Catheter To Cut Infection Risk For Dialysis PatientsMedical experts have shown that an innovative anti-microbial catheter could vastly improve treatment and the quality of life for many community-based dialysis patients.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 3:00 pm New Listening Device Should Help Find Trapped MinersScientists devised a new way to find miners trapped by cave-ins. The method involves installing iron plates and sledgehammers at regular intervals inside mines, and sensitive listening devices on the ground overhead.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 3:00 pm Bioengineered Proteins: Trial Confirms New Way To Tackle CancerRe-engineering a protein that helps prevent tumors spreading and growing has created a potentially powerful therapy for people with many different types of cancer. In a new study, Canadian researchers modified the tumor inhibiting protein, von Hippel-Lindau, and demonstrated that it could suppress tumour growth in mice.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 3:00 pm Dam bursts near Indonesian capital, killing 58 (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 12:30 pm Astronaut Chef Redefines Cooking on High (SPACE.com)SPACE.com - Astronaut Sandra Magnus is headed back to Earth on the space shuttle Discovery after months at the International Space Station, where she dreamt up new ways to cook in zero gravity.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 12:02 pm Toshiba, Sharp mull 'solar power tie-up' (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 11:09 am Richard BlackCarbon: deciding who should be using lessSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 27 Mar 2009 | 9:53 am Science GCSE standards 'lowered'The exams watchdog for England says boards have to take action after finding standards in science GCSEs have fallen.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 27 Mar 2009 | 9:09 am Lights out in 84 countries for Earth Hour 2009 (AP)AP - The lights are going down from the Great Pyramids to the Acropolis, the Eiffel Tower to Sears Tower, as more than 2,800 municipalities in 84 countries plan Saturday to mark the second worldwide Earth Hour.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 9:00 am Space experimentRussian reality TV show simulates Mars flightSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 27 Mar 2009 | 8:12 am Mount Redoubt blows its topThe eruption in Alaska on 23 March produced some spectacular images as its ash cloud reached around 15km above sea levelSource: Evolution, genetics, medicine, physics & astronomy news | guardian.co.uk | 27 Mar 2009 | 8:00 am Discovery gets house in order before re-entry (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 7:25 am Crabs 'sense and remember pain'Research on hermit crabs indicates that they not only suffer pain but also retain a memory of it.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 27 Mar 2009 | 7:18 am Tesla unveils four-door electric sedanHAWTHORNE, California (Reuters) - Electric car start-up Tesla Motors Inc unveiled its newest, cheapest vehicle on Thursday, a four-door sedan that can carry five adults and could travel up to 300 miles per charge.Source: Reuters: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 6:46 am Alaska volcano erupts twice, sends ash 12 miles up (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 5:46 am Genes May Boost Harm to Kids From Secondhand Smoke (HealthDay)HealthDay - THURSDAY, March 26 (HealthDay News) -- Variations in several genes can influence children's lung growth and function, as well as how vulnerable they are to secondhand smoke, say University of Southern California researchers.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 3:47 am The Truth About Skydiving Risks (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - Faulty parachutes can obviously kill skydivers, but more often human error is involved, says an ER physician who practices and studied the sport.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 27 Mar 2009 | 2:55 am The best way to avoid catastropheBiochar schemes would remove carbon from the atmosphere and increase food supply, says Peter Read I believe that George Monbiot, in rubbishing the concept of biochar, misrepresents my work (Woodchips with everything. It's the Atkins plan of the low-carbon world, 24 March). "The great green miracle works like this: we turn the planet's surface into charcoal. Sorry, not charcoal ... Now we say biochar." I coined the word about four years ago. It doesn't mean charcoal like you burn on the barbecue, but finely divided pyrolysed (OK, George, "cooked" if you like) biomass prepared for soil improvement. Monbiot says that I propose "new biomass plantations of trees and sugar covering 1.4bn hectares ... Read says the new plantations can be created across 'land on which the occupants are not engaged in economic activity'". But this degraded land is former forest that has been logged over and abandoned - not, as Monbiot says, "land occupied by subsistence farmers, pastoralists, hunters and gatherers". Given the chance, impoverished people often opt for a waged income. Does Monbiot wish to keep them impoverished for ever? In reality there is not the shortage of land Monbiot implies but a desperate shortage of investment in the land. His "global total" of 1.36bn hectares of arable land does not include 2.38bn of unused potential arable land reported by the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation, into which such investment, eg irrigation, might go. Moreover, the productivity of the 1.36bn could be raised with biochar pyrolysed from currently wasted agricultural residues, thus linking carbon removal with increased food supply and incomes. Monbiot misses the point that the need for land-use improvements comes from the threat of climatic catastrophe. With too much carbon in the atmosphere and oceans, some of it has to be removed and put somewhere safer. Using the gift of nature - photosynthesis which enables green plants to use the sun's energy to absorb atmospheric carbon - is the only economic way. One threat arises from the accumulation, summer after summer, of melt-water flowing down crevasses in Greenland's ice sheet to the rock surface under the ice, lubricating glacial flows into the oceans. Studies of pre-historic climate show that this happens suddenly, when the last sticking point gives way, raising sea levels by a metre or so, possibly in a decade. Arctic temperatures have to be brought down, not just stabilised. Emissions reductions alone, however drastic, cannot do that job. The remedy is not "an easy way out" but needs hard work and good policy resulting in, to quote last year's Sustainable Biofuels Consensus, "a landscape that provides food, fodder, fibre, and energy; that offers opportunities for rural development; that diversifies energy supply, restores ecosystems, protects biodiversity, and sequesters carbon." I do not want my grandchildren to be conscripted into the food, land and water wars that will break out unless an effective plan is devised and implemented. This would not involve usurping the rights of existing occupiers of the land but, since their rights and livelihoods will be extinguished anyhow in such wars, such usurpation would, if necessary, be preferable to catastrophic climatic change. Get your priorities sorted, George. • Peter Read is an honorary research fellow at the Centre for Energy Research, Massey University, New Zealand 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 | 27 Mar 2009 | 12:01 am Science GCSE criticised by exams regulatorMore than 500,000 students have been told their science GCSE qualification has been "dumbed down" because of "significant causes for concern" about the quality of the exams last year. The regulator, Ofqual, has ordered a review after an investigation found a "lack of challenge" in papers, standards differing wildly across three main exam boards, and too many multiple-choice questions. Ofqual blames the exams agency, the Qualification and Curriculum Authority, for designing flawed criteria and the boards for setting "poor quality" assessments. But last night the finger was also pointed at ministers after it emerged the government was criticised for rushing in the GCSE before pilots were finished. Concerns have been raised about the 21st-century science GCSE since its teaching began in September 2006. The first students sat the full GCSE last summer. Ofqual's objections include: • Exam boards designed the GCSEs so differently there was no guarantee the grades were equivalent across the boards. • The most able students were not stretched. There was a "lack of challenge" in some of the papers. • There were too many multiple-choice questions, even on papers designed for the most able students. David Laws, education spokesman for the Liberal Democrats, said: "There is now clear evidence that GCSE science has been dumbed down, with the most able students not being properly stretched." A separate Ofqual paper on physics at GCSE criticised the new modular exam structure introduced in 2007, saying there was an "overall decline in the standards of performance at each grade boundary" in GCSEs set by the main exam boards. Ofqual has ordered a revision of the papers for the physics and science GCSE exams for this year. The QCA has been told to overhaul the entire criteria for 2011. However, there are still concerns about the value of the qualifications. Last year 537,606 students sat the science exams and 75,383 took physics. The chair of Ofqual, Kathleen Tattersall, said: "Our monitoring shows revisions to the GCSE science criteria in 2005 have led to a fall in the quality of science assessments." Ofqual will also investigate biology and chemistry to see if there are further problems. Ministers insisted the problems were isolated to the science GCSEs, but the report will trigger concerns because both GCSEs are entirely modular, a model which all GCSEs will follow from September. The 21st-century science GCSE was introduced to make the subject more relevant by including more topical debates, such as global warming and GM foods, to address the falling numbers of science students beyond GCSE. In 2007 a science and technology select committee report noted that the rollout of the science GCSE was ordered before the pilots had ended. Ian Gibson, chair of the committee at the time, said: "It was rushed in without piloting at a time that there was panic about science course closures at universities because there weren't enough students coming through." John Dunford, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: "Ofqual is clear its criticisms are of science not of the GCSE in general." Jim Knight, the schools minister, said: "This is a science problem not a GCSE problem - I am reassured by Ofqual's findings that 'the system is generally in good health'." 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 | 27 Mar 2009 | 12:01 am 5 Things You Must Never ForgetWhether it is a name, date or directions, there always seems to be something new to remember.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 11:45 pm Bad News: Scientists Make Cheap Gas From Coal
Electric cars have been getting a lot of buzz lately, but a more immediately viable transportation fuel of the future could be liquid derived from coal. Scientists have devised a new way to transform coal into gas for your car using far less energy than the current process. The advance makes scaling up the environmentally unfriendly fuel more economical than greener alternatives. If oil prices rise again, adoption of the new coal-to-liquid technology, reported this week in Science, could undercut adoption of electric vehicles or next-generation biofuels. And that's bad news for the fight against climate change. The new process could cut the energy cost of producing the fuel by 20 percent just by rejiggering the intermediate chemical steps, said co-author Ben Glasser of the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. But coal-derived fuel could produce as much as twice as much CO2 as traditional petroleum fuels and at best will emit at least as much of the greenhouse gas. "The bottom line is that there's one fatal flaw in their proposed process from a climate protection standpoint," Pushker Karecha of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies wrote in an e-mail to Wired.com. "It would allow liquid fuel CO2 emissions to continue increasing indefinitely." The race for alternative fuels kicked into high gear last year, with the price of oil reaching $150 a barrel before plummeting down below $40 this year. Still, though experts disagree on the specifics of timing, it's clear that conventional oil sources will eventually run out. The list of contenders to replace oil is long and diverse. Alternative fuels could include next-gen ethanol, algal biofuel, hydrogen and natural gas, or cars could go largely electric. But the problem with all the new fuels is that they have to scale up — and that's harder than it sounds. Plus, many fear that biofuels could cause massive, negative land-use changes. The process of cooking coal into liquid fuel, on the other hand, has already proven itself on a massive scale. Take coal, add some water, cook it, and you've got a liquid fuel for your car. The hydrogen in the water bonds to the carbon and voila: hydrocarbons, such as octane. It's the very fact that coal-to-liquids could work that make them such a scary idea for people devoted to fighting climate change. The Nazis used the so-called Fisher-Tropsch process to provide up to half of their transportation fuel needs during World War II. Later, South Africa began a major coal-to-liquids program during the Apartheid era and now maintain the world's largest CTL industry in the world. The country's factories produce 160,000 barrels of fuel a day, a little more than all the residents and businesses in Utah use each day. The traditional process uses carbon
monoxide, carbon dioxide, and hydrogen as the ingredients in the
molecular soup that gets turned into hydrocarbons. The Science process uses just CO2 and hydrogen. Glasser's new production method allows them to set a lower limit on the amount of energy that would be needed to transform solid coal into fuel. The very best possible CTL process would require 350 megawatts of input to make 80,000 gallons of fuel; the current process uses more than 1,000 megawatts. Even with the small efficiency gains, a large, domestic, carbon-intensive source of transportation fuel would throw a wrench into many plans to reduce emissions from vehicles. "What they're proposing is simply not
allowable if we want to avoid the perils of unconstrained anthropogenic climate
change," Karecha said. "The long-term solution has to be solar, wind, renewable, but in the meantime I know as a chemical engineer that the easiest thing is to improve on what you're already doing," Glasser said. "The hope is that what we learn with coal-to-liquids, we can take one step further and start using municipal waste or cooking oil, for example, as the carbon source." In this case, though, green-tech advocates say that improving a fossil-fuel technology could slow
the adoption of other, more sustainable transportation options. "We are simply running out of time to avoid catastrophic warming, and we no longer have the luxury of grossly misallocating capital and fuels to expensive boondoggles like coal-to-liquid," Joe Romm, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, told the House Science and Technology Subcommittee on Energy and Environment last year. The conflict over which energy source replaces oil as it becomes more scarce is likely to be a massively divisive political topic. The winning technology could play a huge role in determining whether the American economy can decarbonize before the effects of catastrophic climate change occur. "Peak Oil and peak gas and peak coal could really go either way for the climate," Kharecha said at last year's American Geophysical Union conference. "It all depends on choices for subsequent energy sources." See Also:
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 | 26 Mar 2009 | 11:42 pm The Truth About Skydiving RisksA skydiving physician studies the risks of his sport.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 9:34 pm New MRI techniques could mean faster scans: studyLONDON (Reuters) - Two new techniques using different approaches to see molecular changes inside people's bodies could lead to faster, more detailed imaging scans that better detect health problems, researchers said on Thursday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 26 Mar 2009 | 7:55 pm Scientists find safer way to make human stem cellsCHICAGO (Reuters) - U.S. researchers said on Thursday they have found a safer way to coax human skin cells into becoming powerful embryonic-like stem cells, taking a step closer to their potential use as treatments for diseases.Source: Reuters: Science News | 26 Mar 2009 | 7:43 pm Gorilla Gets a Brain ScanFubo, a 42-year-old western lowland gorilla, recently suffered a seizure.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 6:53 pm Hamsters Get Nanotechnology Now But We Could Be Waiting for Ten YearsSALT LAKE CITY — Bend, stretch, or shake a zinc oxide nanowire and it will generate a tiny electrical pulse. Link several of them together, and they could crank out enough juice to power microscopic gadgets. As machines get smaller, their demand for power decreases drastically, says Zhong Lin Wang, a nanotechnology expert from Georgia Tech. Nano-devices would require so little energy that they could be powered by sound waves and muscle twitches. To prove his point, Wang attached a single nanowire to the back of a hamster and then hooked it up to an oscilloscope. As the rodent it scurried around, it generated 70 millivolts. When the critter stopped to lick itself, the power levels decreased. Wang explained how to make the minuscule generators in a recent issue of the journal NANO letters, and explained their purpose during a press conference here at the American Chemical Society meeting this week. He said that researchers could build all sorts of tiny sensors, which could monitor the environment, or drift around in our bodies checking for cancer and excess insulin. But each of those devices needs a reliable power supply. Perhaps his simple generators could provide the answer. By harvesting little bits energy from their surroundings, they would be remarkably low-maintenance. There are no batteries to change, no fuel cells to fill, just a little rod to bend. The zinc oxide nanowires are piezoelectric, which means that energy flows through them when they are stretched or compressed. As the rodent moved, the nanowires bent, sending a stream of electrons rushing through the power meter. Simple human movements, like bending a finger, worked just as well. Despite that success, Wang said that it could be a decade before nano-sensors are on the market. Researchers have many more obstacles to overcome. For instance, Wang is still looking for a way to connect the nanowires to sensors or other machines. Building a complicated device with nano-sized parts isn't easy.
Photo and Video: Zhong Lin Wang / Georgia Tech Source: Wired: Wired Science | 26 Mar 2009 | 6:42 pm Space shuttle crew rechecks ship for damageCAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - The shuttle Discovery astronauts used a robot arm and laser scanners to recheck their ship's heat shield for damage on Thursday in preparation for their return to Earth on Saturday.Source: Reuters: Science News | 26 Mar 2009 | 6:17 pm Dust Responsible for Most of Atlantic WarmingLack of dust over Atlantic Ocean responsible for more than two-thirds of ocean warming.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 6:16 pm Millions of fish shoal in secondsScientists have recorded the critical point at which herring suddenly form vast shoals covering tens of kilometres.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Mar 2009 | 6:01 pm Alaska's Mt. Redoubt Volcano Erupts AgainIn a pattern that began Sunday night, Mount Redoubt spews another ash cloud.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 26 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm New Tech Can Monitor Vast Groups of FishNew tech reveals herring shoals plunge to deeper waters at dawn and then scatter.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 26 Mar 2009 | 6:00 pm US space tourist blasts off for second space trip (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Mar 2009 | 5:48 pm Mars domes may be 'mud volcanoes'The Martian surface shows structures that look like mud volcanoes, which would be key sites to search for life.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Mar 2009 | 5:09 pm The Real Story Behind 'The Haunting in Connecticut'The new film "The Haunting in Connecticut" tells the story of the Snedeker family.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 4:42 pm SLIDE SHOW: North Dakota Braces for FloodsAs two swollen rivers grow to record heights, North Dakota prepares for the worst.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 26 Mar 2009 | 4:32 pm Pourable Batteries Could Store Green PowerScientists develop large liquid batteries that can store huge amounts of energy.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 26 Mar 2009 | 4:32 pm Geithner Not the Only Treasury Secretary to Face CalamityStepping in as President Obama's new Secretary of the Treasury this past January was a bit like taking over as captain of the sinking Titanic.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 4:17 pm Your Webside Seat to the Texas Evolution Showdown
Over the next two days, the Texas Board of Education will decide whether to dilute its science education standards, and you can hear it all from the comfort of your very own seat. At stake in the short term are curriculum guidelines referring to the evolution of complex organisms from a common ancestor, evolution's "strengths and weaknesses" and the intricacies of planetary formation. At stake in the longer term is the nature of science education in the southern United States, and whether children will learn to equate intellectual coherence with incoherence. Earlier this week, the heavy hitters of evolutionary "debate" landed in Austin, from Lawrence Krauss to Casey Luskin. (Lest anyone think the controversy involves legitimate hypotheses about evolutionary mechanisms not described in the guidelines — of which there are many — other attendees included the conservative Free Market Foundation and Focus on the Family. This is not a fight over science, but over reason.) On Thursday and Friday, the Board members themselves will discuss the amendments. The Texas Freedom Network and Texas Citizens for Science are liveblogging the hearings, which start Thursday at 10 a.m. Central time. You can also listen to them live on the Texas Board of Education website. See Also:
Brandon Keim's Twitter stream and Del.icio.us feed; Wired Science on Facebook. Source: Wired: Wired Science | 26 Mar 2009 | 4:14 pm Creationism in the classroomEvolution is a scientific fact – except, perhaps, in Texas, where the school board is trying to cast doubt on it Imagine that your state legislature has decided to revamp the way that health and medicine are taught in public schools. To do this, they must tackle the "germ theory of disease", the idea that infectious disease is caused by microorganisms such as viruses and bacteria. The legislature, noting that this idea has many vocal opponents, declares that it is "only a theory". Many people, for instance, think that Aids has nothing to do with viruses, but is the byproduct of a dissipated life. Christian Scientists believe that disease results from sin and ignorance, spiritual healers implicate disturbed auras and shamans cite demonic possession. In light of this "controversy", the legislature sets up a school board that includes not only doctors, but also shamans, faith healers and, for good measure a few "psychic surgeons" who pretend to extract veal cutlets from patients' intact bodies. Taking account of these diverse views, the board recommends that from now on all teaching of modern medicine must be accompanied by a discussion of its weaknesses, including the "evidence" that Aids results from drug use and malnutrition, as well as from impure thoughts and evil spirits. And our failure to understand the complexities of chronic fatigue syndrome might be seen as reflecting its causation by an inscrutable and supernatural designer. You would rightly be furious if all this happened. After all, the "germ theory" of disease is more than just a theory – it's a fact. Like all scientific theories, it might be wrong, but in this case that chance is roughly zero. That is because the germ theory works. Antibiotic and antiviral drugs really do cure diseases, while spiritual healing does not. Only an idiot, you'd say, would try to tamper with medical education in this way. But this is precisely what is happening in Texas with respect to another well-established theory of biology: evolution. Like the "germ theory" of disease, the "theory" of evolution is also a fact, as firmly established as the proposition that bacteria cause tuberculosis, or viruses cause Aids. And the fact of evolution is supported by mountains of evidence from many areas of biology. Every one of the thousands of sequences of DNA that have been studied support the theory of evolution. What's more, evolution explains many puzzling observations about biology, like the existence of transitional fossils, vestigial organs and nonfunctional genes, that are incomprehensible under any creationist view. No serious biologist doubts the major tenets of the modern theory of evolution, which are these: life began around 3.5 billion years ago, all living species have common ancestors, descent involves evolution (genetic change over time), lineages divide, forming new species that lead to the branching tree of life, this change took immense spans of time, and that, in the vast majority of cases the diversification and change was due to natural selection and other well-understood evolutionary processes. So what do creationism and its new incarnation of "intelligent design" explain? Nothing. Despite all this, the Texas school board will vote this week on a bill that requires educators and textbooks to play up the "problems" with evolution, emphasising both its "strengths and weaknesses". The weaknesses supposedly involve "the insufficiency of common ancestry to explain the sudden appearance, stasis and sequential nature of groups in the fossil record." This is nonsense, of course. There is a mountain of evidence for common ancestry – ancestry that clearly explains the "sequential nature of groups in the fossil record". The bill also requires schools to teach "the insufficiency of natural selection to explain the complexity of cells." More nonsense, straight out of the playbook of intelligent design. Of course we don't understand everything about the evolution of cells – if evolution had all the answers it would be a dead field – but there is plenty of evidence that natural selection was involved in cell evolution, and not a shred of evidence that it wasn't. The mention of "sudden appearance" of species leaves no doubt about the bill's motivation, which is to promote Biblically-based creationism in public schools. Tellingly, the Texas bill is not aimed at discussing the "strengths and weaknesses" of chemistry, physics or astronomy. It singles out evolution for one reason alone: it is the only branch of science that some Christians perceive as endangering their theology. It's no surprise, then, that seven of the 15 members of the Texas state board of education have a socially conservative agenda, several of them explicitly endorsing creationism. And the head of the school board, one Don McElroy, is a creationist dentist whose pedagogical experience is limited to teaching Sunday school. McElroy also holds the Biblically-based view that the world is only 6,000-10,000 years old. How can it be that someone with such preposterous views is given any say in the education of our children? What happens in Texas doesn't stay in Texas. That state is a sizeable consumer of public school textbooks, and it's likely that if it waters down its science standards, textbook publishers all over the country will follow suit. This makes every American school hostage to the caprices of a few benighted Texas legislators. What's next? Since there are many who deny the Holocaust, can we expect legislation requiring history classes to discuss the "strengths and weaknesses" of the idea that Nazis persecuted Jews? Should we teach our children astrology in their psychology classes as an alternative theory of human behaviour? And, given the number of shamans in the world, shouldn't their views be represented in medical schools? Our children will face enormous challenges when they grow up: global warming, depletion of fossil fuels, overpopulation, epidemic disease. There is no better way to prepare their generation than to teach them how to distinguish fact from mythology, and to encourage them to have good reasons for what they believe. How sad that in the 21st century the Texas legislature proposes the exact opposite, indoctrinating our children with false ideas based squarely on religious dogma. Can't we just let our kids learn real science? Jerry Coyne's latest book is Why Evolution is True (Viking), which summarises the many lines of evidence for evolution. 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 | 26 Mar 2009 | 4:00 pm Crew Bolts to Space Station in Cramped CapsuleA space tourist and two astronauts will rendezvous with the International Space Station.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 26 Mar 2009 | 3:49 pm Wallace and Gromit's world recreated at the Science MuseumA World of Cracking Ideas intended to inspire young visitors The multiple Oscar-winning animator Nick Park had the odd feeling of being about five inches high and made of Plasticine as he stood leaning on the gate of the impeccable garden of 62 West Wallaby Street – a gate he has sketched and modelled hundreds of times but never seen taller than a coffee cup. The world of Wallace and Gromit has been recreated in a £2m exhibition on the second floor of the Science Museum, complete with mad machines, giant cabbages, villainous rabbits, extensive research library on cheese, improbable collections – one illustrating the evolution of the welly boot – and kitchen cupboards stuffed with the packets and jars fondly remembered from Park's own childhood in Preston, Lancashire. Wallace and Gromit's world of genius inventions that very nearly work perfectly, and hoarded bits and bobs that might come in handy one day, is very much Park's own, he revealed. "To this day I find it really difficult to throw away a cardboard tube or a bit of plastic packaging – I think oh, I could use that for something." He cannot remember a time when he didn't draw, but he was following his father's example and creating inventions, including a bottle that squeezed out different colour wools which he was so proud of he sent it to Blue Peter, even before he started borrowing his mother's home movie camera and making his own animations from the age of 12. Like the most dazzling creations of Wallace, there was often some tediously fundamental flaw in his inventions. He remembers with modest pride the staggering patent nut cracker he built in metalwork class, working on the principle of a jack hammer and highly likely to remove a finger. Its only practical disadvantage was that it proved impossible to fit even a hazelnut into its jaws. Tellingly, Park has said of Wallace that all his inventions are based on using a sledge hammer to crack a nut. The exhibition is jointly funded by the Intellectual Property Office, and intended to encourage small visitors not just to fuel the thinking cap with brainwaves, or to hurl bean bags to bring the television set within reach of the sofa – avoiding the need for anything as dull as a remote control – but to come up with and patent their own inventions. It includes the inspiring story of Sam Houghton, who saw his father struggling with two brooms to sweep up twigs and leaves, and raced to find a stout rubber band to fasten them together. Sam is five, but his father is a patent attorney: as of last April, Sam's broom enhancer is registered as British patent number 2438091. The exhibition ends in Wallace's own museum, selected on his behalf from the Science Museum's vast stores by curators John Liffen and Andrew Nahum: as Liffen is mad on communications, and Nahum on flight, they sensed Wallace would be too. Their assemblage includes a truly Wallacian piece of kit, a home tin can sealing machine. Liffen believes it was one of those paid for at the time of the second world war by donations from American housewives, and sent to rescue their unfortunate British sisters from the archaic practice of bottling in glass jars: the thrifty and houseproud Gromit would approve. • Wallace and Gromit present A World of Cracking Ideas, Science Museum, London, until 1 November 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 | 26 Mar 2009 | 3:16 pm Slower spin 'made moon's bulge'Scientists believe they have worked out why Saturn's moon Iapetus has a giant ridge around its circumference.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Mar 2009 | 3:14 pm Flowing Blood Could Power iPods and Cell PhonesPower generated from flowing blood could one day be converted to electricity.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 3:11 pm German court rules PETA Holocaust ad offensive (AP)AP - Germany's highest court has ruled that a PETA ad campaign comparing animal slaughterhouses to the Holocaust is an offense against human dignity.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 26 Mar 2009 | 3:06 pm Fargo Flood Fears Rising With RiverAs the Red River approaches record highs, officials in Fargo, N.D., raise the dikes.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 26 Mar 2009 | 2:49 pm At Microgravity University, Zero-G Is the ProfNASA gives university students a chance to fly experiments in weightlessness.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 26 Mar 2009 | 2:21 pm Dogs (Not Chimps) Most Like HumansDogs, not chimps, are most like us, in terms of behavior, researchers argue.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 26 Mar 2009 | 2:17 pm Microsoft billionaire is first tourist to visit space twiceCharles Simonyi, who paid $60m for two trips, on board 19th International Space Station mission Charles Simonyi, the American software billionaire, took off on his second rocket trip as a space tourist today - becoming the first to go into space twice. He was onboard the Soyuz TMA-14 spacecraft, which took off into the leaden skies from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on schedule at 1149 GMT today, and is due to dock with the International Space Station (ISS) in two days' time. Fellow cosmonaut Gennady Padalka from Russia told a live feed from the craft after take-off: "We are feeling well. Everything is going well." As he spoke, a fluffy white toy could be seen hanging above the crew in the cabin. A US astronaut, Michael Barratt, is also onboard. Simonyi, 60, who was born in Hungary, made his fortune developing software at Microsoft, before setting up his own company. He is the fifth space tourist - and the second Hungarian - to go into space and first made a two-week trip to the ISS in April 2007. At an observation post near the launch pad, Simonyi's wife, Lisa Persdotter, burst into tears and hugged her relatives as the rocket took off and gradually disappeared from view. His friends, including Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, opened bottles of champagne and cheered as loudspeakers at Baikonur announced the blast-off had been successful. Simonyi, who has paid $60m for his two trips, has promised this will be his last. "I cannot fly for the third time because I have just married and I have to spend time with my family." He is due to return to earth on 7 April with Michael Fincke, US commander of outgoing Expedition 19, and Russian flight engineer Yuri Lonchakov. Eric Anderson, head of Space Adventures, the company arranging space trips, said: "He is in great spirits, he is very excited. He feels very privileged to be able to go into space again." A Russian space industry source has told Reuters that two space tourists could be launched in 2011. Space Adventures has admitted its business had been affected by the global financial crisis. "The number of billionaires has been cut in half," Anderson told the agency. "It's a very long-term thing. You don't just wake up in the morning one day and decide to go into space." 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 | 26 Mar 2009 | 2:10 pm New Gold Rush: Party Like It's 1849With gold prices over $900 and jobs scarce, a new gold rush is on.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 2:04 pm Radio astronomy gets grant boostRadio astronomy across Europe is to be supported by a ten million euro grant to scientists at the University of Manchester.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Mar 2009 | 1:41 pm Depression Linked to Brain ThinningA structural difference in the brain, in particular a thinning of the right hemisphere, is linked to a higher risk for depression.Source: Livescience.com | 26 Mar 2009 | 1:13 pm U.S. billionaire roars into space historyBAIKONUR, Kazakhstan (Reuters) - U.S. billionaire Charles Simonyi roared into space aboard a Russian rocket on Thursday, making history as the first tourist to make the epic journey twice.Source: Reuters: Science News | 26 Mar 2009 | 1:00 pm Space tourist blasts off to ISSUS tycoon Charles Simonyi blasts off for the International Space Station, the first space tourist to make the trip twice.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Mar 2009 | 12:21 pm Lingering painStudies continue to probe the effects of the Bhopal leakSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 26 Mar 2009 | 11:25 am
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