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Tapping Industrial Waste Heat Could Reduce Fossil Fuel DemandsTapping industrial waste heat could reduce fossil fuel demands in the short term and improve efficiency of countless manufacturing processes, according to scientists.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 9:00 pm High Dosage Brachytherapy Obtains Excellent Results In Head And Neck TumorsHigh-dosage perioperative brachytherapy (applied within the surgical process) obtains excellent results in the treatment of head and neck tumors, at the same time as reducing the period of radiation.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 9:00 pm Bird Can 'Read' Human GazeWe all know that people sometimes change their behavior when someone is looking their way. Now, a new study shows that jackdaws -- birds related to crows and ravens with eyes that appear similar to human eyes -- can do the same.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 9:00 pm Coming Face To Face With AutismIn the first study of its kind researchers will use video clips of spontaneously produced facial expressions in a real life social context to explore emotion recognition in autism.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 9:00 pm Artificial Pump Effectively Backs Up Failing HeartsPatients with severe heart failure can be bridged to eventual transplant by a new, smaller and lighter implantable heart pump, according to a just-completed study of the device.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 9:00 pm New X-ray Spectroscopic Tool For Probing The Interstellar MediumAstronomers have published the first clear detection of signatures long sought in the spectra of X-ray astronomical sources, the so-called EXAFS signatures, standing for "Extended X-ray Absorption Fine Structure." EXAFS is a powerful tool for studying the structure of grains in the interstellar medium. It gives a more detailed picture of the composition and structure of amorphous grains in the ISM.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 9:00 pm External Focus Improves Postural Stability In Patients With Parkinson's DiseasePatients with Parkinson disease may be able to improve their postural stability by directing their attention to the external effects of their movements rather than to the movements of their own body, according to new research.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Hydrogen Cars Closer To Reality With New Storage SystemResearchers have developed a critical part of a hydrogen storage system for cars that makes it possible to fill up a vehicle's fuel tank within five minutes with enough hydrogen to drive 300 miles.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Alzheimer's Disease Linked To Mitochondrial DamageResearchers have demonstrated that attacks on the mitochondrial protein Drp1 by the free radical nitric oxide -- which causes a chemical reaction called S-nitrosylation -- mediates neurodegeneration associated with Alzheimer's disease.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Carbon Dioxide Forms Polymeric Materials Under High PressureCarbon dioxide is a molecular gas at ambient conditions and an important constituent of the Earth's atmosphere. It is also a likely component in the Earth's mantle, and it plays an important role in the life cycle. But at high pressure, carbon dioxide can transform to a solid. Even more interesting, as the pressure increases and temperature varies, the intra- and inter-molecular interactions of carbon dioxide change dramatically and this results in different crystal structures in polymeric dense phases with interesting physical properties, such as "super-hardness". Thus carbon dioxide has become an extremely hot topic in science in the last decade.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 3:00 pm Single Parents: Not What Nature Intended (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - I have recently become a single mother. After 10 years of sharing child care with a man, I am now in charge of everything, and like all single mothers, I am pretty tired. I also feel oddly unsettled - it just doesn't seem right for one person to go it alone as a parent, no matter the recent statistics showing that 25 percent of American household are now headed by single parents. ...Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 2:43 pm Wind may have forced NKorea to delay rocket launch (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 12:30 pm As West warms, some fear for tiny mountain dweller (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 11:00 am Inbreeding taking toll on Michigan wolves (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 10:59 am Hurricane Season 2008 (weather.com)weather.com -Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 10:06 am Grapefruit-Heavy Diet Helped Spur Dangerous Clot (HealthDay)HealthDay - THURSDAY, April 2 (HealthDay News) -- A rare set of interactions involving grapefruit juice, birth control pills and a genetic mutation almost cost a 42-year-old woman her leg, physicians report.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 4 Apr 2009 | 3:50 am Stone circles and megalithsOur country is dotted with mysterious ruins and neolithic sites. Here are just a few ... Seahenge, NorfolkIn 1998, a man walking his dog on the beach at Holme-next-the-Sea stumbled on a circle of tree trunks buried in the sand. The mysterious bronze age monument was uncovered and the 4,000-year-old timbers were carted off for conservation. Channel 4's Time Team constructed a full-size replica a few miles inland in Thornham. The original is in the Lynn Museum, Kings Lynn. Boscawen-un, CornwallHidden in thick gorse is one of the finest prehistoric sites in Cornwall, 19 upright granite blocks placed around a leaning stone, just south of the centre. Navan Fort, ArmaghSeat of King Conchobar and one of the most important prehistoric sites in Northern Ireland. Excavations revealed curiously shaped wooden buildings beneath the barrow and mound which had been deliberately burned Near Armagh City. Pentre Ifan, PembrokeshireA huge capstone is balanced 2.5m high above three slender uprights. Legend says fairies dressed in red coats dance around it. Kit's Coty, KentThree upright stones and one "capstone" are all that remain of a neolithic chamber tomb. • For more see stone-circles.org.uk 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 | 3 Apr 2009 | 11:01 pm Geological wondersThe British Geological Survey reveals the most incredible forgotten rock formations Cresswell Crags, DerbyshireCresswell Crags is a limestone gorge, honeycombed with a network of caves that have formed as water has slowly dissolved away the limestone. It is famously the home of hunters during the last ice age 50,000 to 10,000 years ago and the only known site of palaeolithic (ice age) cave paintings in England, which were discovered in 2003. The story of the Crags is told in a museum at the site. Portrush Sill, Co Antrim, Northern IrelandWithin walking distance of the promenade the rocky skerries and headland at Portrush are geologically infamous. During the 18th century these features were central to the debate about how molten rocks were formed. The "Neptunists" thought that they crystallised from sea water while the "Plutonists" believed it was the result of volcanic activity. The Plutonists showed that fossils (ammonites) in the mudstone were baked by heat from the sill, and so won the argument. Today one can still see the hard sheet of basalt rock that was formed when magma was injected into mud on the seafloor. This sill was formed at the same time as the Giant's Causeway, during a major episode of volcanic activity as the Atlantic ocean began to open 60 million years ago. Fossil Grove, GlasgowGlasgow's Victoria Park is home to some of the most spectacular fossil tree stumps in the UK, which were discovered in the base of an old quarry when the park was laid out in 1887, and which are now protected inside a building. The tree stumps are still in the position where they grew over 300 million years ago, when they were part of a vast, wet and steamy tropical forest that grew on thick peat bogs. After the trees died, the stumps were buried under river mud and sand, to be preserved as fossils. With time, heat and deep burial the peat became the coal seams that powered the Industrial Revolution. Llanddwyn Island, north WalesThe rocky foreshore around the tidal island of Llanddwyn displays spectacular examples of ancient pillowed and fragmented rocks which formed when lava entered the ocean. These features bear testimony to the power of plate tectonic forces and the destruction of an ancient ocean floor. Pontneddfechan, south WalesThe Pontneddfechan area of the Brecon Beacons combines outstanding natural landscape features with a diverse industrial heritage. The carboniferous limestones, mudstones and sandstones have been fractured and twisted, giving rise to precipitous crags and spectacular waterfalls and caves, and are host to abandoned mine entrances and quarries. According to local folklore, King Arthur and his knights still slumber in an underground chamber awaiting the call to rise again and rescue Britain from the scourge of the Saxons. The Ring of Gullion, Counties Down and ArmaghCentered on the brooding mass of Slieve Gullion, the Ring of Gullion comprises a series of hills around six miles across. The Ring marks the position of a circular fracture in the Earth's crust into which molten rock moved, 60 million years ago, beneath an erupting volcano. It is just one of a number of ancient, eroded volcanoes scattered across Scotland and Northern Ireland. Hartland Point, DevonThe rocky cliffs and hidden coves around Hartland Point are known as the "Wreckers Coast" because so many shipwrecks happened here in the past. But these cliffs also spectacularly display rock layers that have been folded into twisted shapes on a grand scale. These carboniferous rocks were originally formed from mud and sand on the seabed, over 300 million years ago. In 1941, Hartland Point was a naval VHF (very high frequency) intercept station for the "Y service", a feeder servicefor the Enigma operation at Bletchley Park. Siccar Point, ScotlandSiccar Point is one of the world's most famous geological sites, yet it lies hidden at the foot of a remote cliff in Berwickshire. It was here, in 1788, that James Hutton, the "father of modern geology" recognised the vast extent of geological time - far beyond the then accepted age of the earth of 6,000 years. He saw that vertically layered rocks at Siccar Point are partly covered by younger, flat-layered rocks. He reasoned that the vertical rocks were originally laid down as flat layers of sand on an ocean floor, and that it must have taken a long time - perhaps millions of years - for these to be folded and lifted out of the water by earth processes and eroded into an irregular landscape, before the younger sandstones could be laid down. Inchnadamph Bone Caves, near Ullapool, ScotlandA walk up a beautiful limestone valley north of Ullapool brings you to the Bone Caves, in which remains of wolves, bears, lynx and arctic foxes have been found. These animals took refuge in the caves tens of thousands of years ago, when Scotland's climate was much colder than it is now. A 2,000-year-old walrus ivory pin, discovered in the caves, indicates that people were here during the iron age. Jurassic mudstones, North YorkshireWhitby is renowned for the church of St Mary, whose churchyard on the East Cliff gave Bram Stoker the inspiration to write Dracula. But the cliffs hold many other secrets. They are made up of Jurassic mudstones, which were laid down on the seafloor over 150 million years ago and contain fossils of ancient sea creatures, including ammonites, which can commonly be found along the beach. The Whitby mudstones also contain the black mineral known as jet, which has been used since the bronze age to make beads and jewellery. • See bgs.ac.uk for more 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 | 3 Apr 2009 | 11:01 pm Anxious Nasa awaits Barack Obama's decision on new chiefBarack Obama's failure to appoint a new chief to run Nasa is fostering an atmosphere of anxiety and uncertainty at the US space agency, a leading industry figure has told the Guardian. The space agency, which is facing one of the toughest periods of its 51-year history, has been without a chief administrator since Michael Griffin stepped down in January, amid newspaper reports of heated arguments with the transition team, which Griffin denied in a memo. The Obama team had originally hoped to replace Griffin with a retired fighter pilot, Scott Gration, but the nomination was blocked by opponents on Capitol Hill. Since then speculation on potential candidates has been rife, with the latest including Chris Scolese, the agency's acting administrator, and two former astronauts, Mae Jemison and Charles Bolden. The state of limbo could not have come at a worse time, with Nasa facing fundamental questions about its future. With only eight space shuttle flights left on the books, and a retirement date for the entire fleet penned in for next year, it is not clear how the world's leading space agency will get its astronauts off the ground once the shuttle has been mothballed. President Obama has inherited a vision for Nasa that would see the agency return astronauts to the moon in 2020, with a more distant goal of a crewed mission to Mars. To do so, Nasa's previous chief drew inspiration from the Apollo project to design two new rockets and a small capsule, collectively known as the Constellation project, which could deliver crews to the International Space Station by 2015, to the moon five years later, and eventually on to Mars. But the Constellation project has come under fire from some quarters of the industry, who argue the new rockets are behind schedule, over budget and facing more serious engineering problems than anticipated. They want to see Nasa abandon the project, at least in part, and instead convert one of its existing satellite-launching rockets, the Atlas 5 or the Delta 4, into one capable of carrying astronauts. "Ask what the mood at Nasa is and anxious is not a bad word. There's uncertainty, and that comes from a contradiction in the signals coming from the White House," said John Logsdon, a member of Nasa's advisory council. In February Obama announced a generous $1bn budget increase for Nasa, taking its total funding to $18.7bn for the year ahead. But last month he said the incoming chief must address a "sense of drift" at the agency and oversee "a new mission that is appropriate for the 21st century". Many in the industry believe that by "drift" Obama was referring to problems with the Constellation programme. "It's important to get the new team in sooner rather than later, because the longer you wait, the greater the impact if you decide to change course and go with one of these alternatives," said Logsdon. The Obama administration has said it will announce a new Nasa chief after the president returns from his current trip to Europe. A final decision on the agency's next generation of rockets will not be the end of Nasa's troubles. The minimum five-year hiatus in crewed launches that will begin from next year could jeopardise thousands of jobs at the shuttle's base and at surrounding businesses in Florida. Phil Plait, an astronomer who worked on the Hubble Space Telescope and now runs the website badastronomy.com, said the agency was in need of a project that would inspire a public that has become blase about regular shuttle flights. "Obama needs to say we're going to the moon, and we're going to put a base there. It's something we should be doing, and it's something that will make sure we are making progress. Let's roll up our sleeves and get it done," he said. 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 | 3 Apr 2009 | 11:01 pm Research and nonsense: which is news?If there is one great joy to be derived from scanning the scientific literature over a week, it is the barrage of studies that challenge your beliefs and preconceptions, demonstrating the weakness of intuition: because if we knew all the answers to start with, there would be no point in doing research. On an abstract level, there's a good short report in the journal Cortex, where researchers in Bologna demonstrate the spectacular hopelessness of memory. One morning in 1980 a bomb exploded in Bologna station: 85 people died, and the clock stopped ominously showing 10.25, the time of the explosion. This image became a famous symbol for the event, but the clock was repaired soon after and worked perfectly for the next 16 years. When it broke again in 1996, it was decided to leave the clock showing 10.25 permanently, as a memorial. The researchers asked 180 people familiar with the station, or working there, with an average age of 55, about the clock: 173 knew it was stopped, and 160 said it had been since 1980. What's more, 127 claimed they had seen it stuck on 10.25 ever since the explosion, including all 21 railway employees. In a similar study published last year, 40% of 150 UK participants claimed to remember seeing closed circuit television footage of the moment of the explosion on the bus in Tavistock Square on 7 July 2005. No such footage exists. That's pretty abstract. How about something practical from the Journal of the American Medical Association? Longstanding homeless people with severe alcohol problems often have many medical and psychiatric problems, it's very difficult to initiate and maintain change in their lifestyles, and people worry - perhaps selfishly - that they cost a lot of money, both for healthcare and for criminal justice issues. Society's response is often to incarcerate them, or offer hostel accommodation where alcohol is forbidden, perhaps unrealistically. Sometimes, perhaps, you may not be able to force someone to stop drinking. So researchers took 95 homeless people with severe alcohol problems, put them into apartments where they could drink all they wanted, and compared them against 39 "waiting list controls", who experienced the pre-existing services as if there was no new initiative. Adding up the financial burdens on the state, participants had overall costs of $4,066 a person a month initially, which decreased to $1,492 after six months and $958 after 12 months in housing. Oddly, people in the project showed substantial declines in drinking despite there being no requirement even to reduce their drinking to remain housed, and although nine died during the study, this is consistent with what you would expect from that group. Miracles, very sadly, are hard to come by. This kind of research is at the interface of medicine and social policy: it's an accident of history that a few people from a science and public health background got involved in the project and did a trial, to get evidence to see if the policy hunch was correct. Robust trials on social policy could happen routinely, if politicians weren't scientifically ignorant and terrified of the possibility that they might have to state - with simple, constructive honesty: "Well, we tried this idea, in all good faith, but it didn't work so we're dropping it now." Or lastly, at the opposite end of the rigour spectrum, you could simply commission research to bolster your preconceptions, like the new survey on Auschwitz to promote the DVD release of a film called The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas - 25% of pupils aged 11-16 did not know the purpose of Auschwitz, said the research. Only 37% knew the precise figure: 6 million were killed in the Holocaust. There was an attack on children and schools for their ignorance, as the Holocaust is on the national curriculum. The researchers were simply asking for specific details at the wrong time. The Holocaust is covered at key stage 3 during year nine, the school year in which children turn 14. If you ask questions of children aged 11-16, and they don't all know the specific details from this horrific period in recent history, then that is not a reflection of stupidity in children or their teachers: it is a reflection of stupidity in the researchers. This incompetent non-research was not published in a journal, and it will not be, with good reason, because it tells us nothing. But it is the only story, of the three mentioned, that has received mainstream media coverage: in the Mirror, Telegraph and Mail, no less. That is the news. 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 | 3 Apr 2009 | 11:01 pm How to read landscapes like an archaeologistEvery earthwork, building, road and hedge tells us something about lost places and forgotten times. Objects in the landscape such as these are the pieces of one enormous archaeological puzzle. However, by turning yourself into a landscape detective, you can unlock some of its secrets. • You may have seen a hill in the distance and asked yourself, why is it that one hill appears to have rings around its top and others nearby don't? Hills are not naturally formed with deep trenches and large steep-sided banks encircling them - these rings are ditches and banks constructed to ward off intruders and demonstrate that it was an iron age hillfort and a centre of power 2,500 years ago. • Say you spot a single stone standing by itself in a field in the middle of nowhere, how do you know if it is prehistoric too? One clue is that stones that have been standing upright for thousands of years will be heavily eroded by rain running down them, smoothing out the surfaces and often also creating complex channels running from the top downwards. However, a single large stone erected in the middle of a field with no erosion and lots of tool marks may be a relatively modern feature called a "rubbing stone", put up by farmers so that cattle can have a good scratch. • Ever wondered why there is an old-looking church standing by itself surrounded only by fields with no buildings or village nearby? Probably a medieval village once lay around it, since deserted and forgotten. A walk in the fields close by can often reveal the lumps and bumps of the former streets and homes of the abandoned settlement. Armed with the skills of a landscape detective - an inquisitive mind, a touch of common sense, and an Ordnance Survey map - it is possible to decode evidence like this to help you understand and enjoy your surroundings. Monuments in the landscape are like fingerprints - every time our ancestors introduced something into the natural landscape, such as a fort, a village or a stone circle, they literally imprinted themselves into it, and you don't have to dig to find evidence of their way of life. • Stewart Ainsworth is resident landscape archaeologist on Channel Four's Time Team 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 | 3 Apr 2009 | 11:01 pm Ice shelf about to break away from Antarctic coast (AP)AP - A massive ice shelf anchored to the Antarctic coast by a narrow and quickly deteriorating ice bridge could break away soon, the European Space Agency warned Friday.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 3 Apr 2009 | 9:06 pm Top 10 Moments in AstronomyFrom Galileo's telescope to the Big Bang's signature, here are astronomy's greatest hits.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 3 Apr 2009 | 8:39 pm SLIDE SHOW: The Week's Top StoriesFind out about smart chicks, mountain mudslides, the anti-HIV cigarette, and more.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 3 Apr 2009 | 8:39 pm Space tours still open despite downturnCAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - The U.S. company that has arranged for six tourists to fly in space said on Friday it is staying open for business despite the economic crisis and a lack of confirmed flight opportunities.Source: Reuters: Science News | 3 Apr 2009 | 8:20 pm Pyrenees Reserve Protects Dark Night SkyFrance aims to set up Europe's first "anti-light-pollution reserve."Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 3 Apr 2009 | 7:30 pm How Baseball Players Catch Fly BallsHow do our eyes, brains, arms and legs combine to track and catch a fly ball?Source: Livescience.com | 3 Apr 2009 | 7:01 pm Hubble Photographs Peoples' ChoiceThe Hubble Space Telescope has photographed a group of colliding galaxies that won a cosmic popularity contest voted on by the public.Source: Livescience.com | 3 Apr 2009 | 6:06 pm Arctic May Be Ice-Free in 30 YearsSome 80 percent of Arctic ice may disappear in the coming decades, scientists warn.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 3 Apr 2009 | 5:30 pm Louisiana Crayfish: Good, Bad and DeliciousStudent researchers head to China to study the impact of Louisiana crayfish on the environment and people.Source: Livescience.com | 3 Apr 2009 | 5:15 pm False Killer Whales Declining Near HawaiiA dolphin species resembling the orca is disappearing at an alarming rate.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 3 Apr 2009 | 5:10 pm NASA Preps for Space FiresPutting out flames in zero gravity is proving to be tricky business.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 3 Apr 2009 | 5:00 pm Fur flies over Taiwan 'fake pandas' April Fool (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 3 Apr 2009 | 4:10 pm Polar footstepsTeam retraces Shackleton's journeySource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 3 Apr 2009 | 3:53 pm US space tourist's return put off by a day (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 3 Apr 2009 | 2:47 pm Chocolate Helps with ... Math?Flavanols in chocolate stimulate blood flow to the brain.Source: Livescience.com | 3 Apr 2009 | 2:24 pm Gene-engineered viruses build a better batteryWASHINGTON (Reuters) - Researchers who have trained a tiny virus to do their bidding said on Thursday they made it build a more efficient and powerful lithium battery.Source: Reuters: Science News | 3 Apr 2009 | 1:56 pm Q and A: Who Was the Historical Jesus?A biblical scholar discusses misconceptions about early Christianity.Source: Discovery News Top Stories : Discovery Channel | 3 Apr 2009 | 1:55 pm Robots Replace Humans as the Great ExplorersHumans have gone to the moon, but robots have gone just about everywhere else in space.Source: Livescience.com | 3 Apr 2009 | 1:48 pm Dogs Do Look Like OwnersPeople can guess pretty successfully what breed of dog a person might own just by looking at the owner.Source: Livescience.com | 3 Apr 2009 | 1:42 pm Single Parents: Not What Nature IntendedWhy does it unsettle us to see one person go it alone as a parent?Source: Livescience.com | 3 Apr 2009 | 1:36 pm
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