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SSRIs and cardiovascular health: Popular antidepressants may have beneficial side effects for cardiovascular healthA class of antidepressants known as selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors may provide a boost to cardiovascular health by affecting the way platelets, small cells in the blood involved in clotting, clump together.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 3:00 pm Magnetic fields drive drug-loaded nanoparticles to reduce blood vessel blockages in an animal studyScientists and engineers have used uniform magnetic fields to drive iron-bearing nanoparticles to metal stents in injured blood vessels, where the particles deliver a drug payload that successfully prevents blockages in those vessels. In this animal study, the novel technique achieved better results at a lower dose than conventional non-magnetic stent therapy.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 3:00 pm Molecular marker could help spot pancreatic cancer earlyResearchers have identified a molecular marker of pancreatic cancer that may help spot the disease at its earliest stages, when it can be treated more successfully with surgery.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 3:00 pm Paper wasps and honey bees share a genetic toolkitThey are both nest-building social insects, but paper wasps and honey bees organize their colonies in very different ways. In a new study, researchers report that despite their differences, these insects rely on the same network of genes to guide their social behavior.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 3:00 pm Lensless imaging of whole biological cells with soft X-raysScientists have used X-ray diffraction microscopy to make images of whole yeast cells, achieving the highest resolution -- 11 to 13 nanometers (billionths of a meter) -- ever obtained with this method for biological specimens. Their success indicates that full 3-D tomography of whole cells at equivalent resolution should soon be possible.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 3:00 pm More than half of liver patients experience neurocognitive impairmentsFifty-four percent of liver patients also display neurocognitive impairments such as short term memory loss, a study found. The average score of impaired patients was lower than that of patients with early-stage Alzheimer's disease.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 3:00 pm Making serial parts out of metal powderComplex-shaped components in aircraft engines can be produced quickly and at a reasonable price using selective laser melting, as researchers in Germany recently demonstrated.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 9:00 am Naturally occurring microbe fights potentially deadly Clostridium difficile infectionAn international team of researchers has discovered a naturally occurring microorganism that directly targets a bacteria that causes a sometimes deadly intestinal disease in young children and the elderly.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 9:00 am Toddlers and TV: Early exposure has negative and long-term impactWant kids who are smarter and thinner? Keep them away from the television set as toddlers. A shocking study from child experts has found that television exposure at age two forecasts negative consequences for kids, ranging from poor school adjustment to unhealthy habits.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 9:00 am New therapy for cocaine toxicity: Enzyme break downs cocaine into inactive products nearly 1,000 times faster than human body doesResearchers have developed and tested a modified enzyme that can break down cocaine into inactive products nearly 1,000 times faster than the human body does regularly. The engineered enzyme, called CocE, may be an excellent candidate for clinical use.Source: ScienceDaily: Latest Science News | 8 May 2010 | 9:00 am The nation's weather (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 8 May 2010 | 3:15 am Pakistan test-fires missiles: military (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 8 May 2010 | 2:50 am For election data that matters, we have our nerds to thank | Ben GoldacreNeed to know who won where, or what dodgy statistics politicians deployed? Then don't expect the state to provide Data matters. We use it to understand what has happened in the world and it to make decisions about what to do next. But in among the graphics and electoral cock-ups lies a terrible truth: a small army of amateurs are doing a better job of collecting and disseminating political data than the state. Chris Taggart blogs at CountCulture and was baffled to discover that there is no central or open record of local election results. The Electoral Commission's website passes the buck to the BBC, where you can find seat numbers for each area, but not how many votes were cast for each candidate. Plymouth University holds an unofficial database of results, and pays people to type them in, painstakingly. They charge for access, which is perfectly understandable. So for democracy, open analysis and public record, it might as well not exist. "Want to look back at how people voted in your local council elections over the past 10 years?" asks Chris: "Tough. Want to compare turnout between different areas, and different periods? No can do. Want an easy way to see how close the election was last time, and how much your vote might make a difference? Forget it." Like so many data problems, all that's needed is a tweak: all this information is known to someone, somewhere and it's all been typed in, several times over, in several places – local websites, newspapers and so on. Taggart is pushing a simple solution, common throughout IT: a standard set of invisible tags on all local authority results webpages, so that the data can be consistently read and understood by computers, and collated for analysis by anyone who wants it. It costs nothing, it's already compulsory for public consultation data, and Chris is making headway, pushing his simple idea, to solve a huge problem. Until the StraightChoice project was set up by idealistic nerds, nobody kept a record of the election materials distributed to the public across the country. Anyone could send them in as an image and Julian Todd now has an archive political librarians would cry for – and it betrays many crimes. There are dodgy graphs, with parties using playfully distorted axes, and even European and local election figures where it suits them (a Conservative leaflet in Holborn and St Pancras demotes the Liberal Democrats from their actual second place to third, and so on). They want a system where copies of every leaflet are formally sent to the Electoral Commission, as with copyright libraries, and regulations which are enforced to forbid graphs which mislead tactical voters. Beside evidence of sneakiness, these volunteer projects are generating data that provides a valuable insight into how politics works, on a par with the stuff you'd find on UKDA, the UK Data Archive for academics. StraightChoice has found a huge variation in activity, from a single leaflet in a safe Liverpool seat to 51 in the nearby marginal Liverpool of Wavertree. What about policies? Francis Irving is one of the founders of MySociety, a charity set up to facilitate public engagement with democracy. They built TheyWorkForYou, which tells you more about parliamentary activity than Hansard, using the same dataset. "Wouldn't it be nice," he asks, "to have structured data on what the candidates think on a series of local and national issues?" Neither academics, nor parties, nor the media have achieved this: but 6,000 activists around the country have worked on a crowd-sourcing operation built around DemocracyClub, again set up by two volunteers, Seb Bacon and Tim Green. With the help of mySociety, they populated the YourNextMP database of candidates, itself the baby of another volunteer, Edmund von der Burg. This data is now freely available, a resource for any political theorist or technically capable adolescent, down to its rawest form. Data is the fabric of our lives, and everywhere around us: but to be analysed, so it can generate knowledge and understanding, it must be corralled. In an ideal world, these empty frameworks would be built by national institutions: until they wake up, we have our nerds. • More Guardian election comment from Cif at the polls guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 8 May 2010 | 2:28 am Huge dome probes ocean depths to cap US oil leak (AFP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 8 May 2010 | 1:24 am Bubble of methane triggered rig blast (AP)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 8 May 2010 | 1:18 am Containment dome suspended just above U.S. Gulf leak (Reuters)
Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 May 2010 | 11:27 pm Genes Tie Blood Fat to Heart Disease (HealthDay)HealthDay - THURSDAY, May 6 (HealthDay News) -- Scientists have long debated the role triglyceride levels might play in heart disease, and finally they have genetic evidence linking high concentrations of the blood fat to an increased risk of heart trouble.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 May 2010 | 9:49 pm Three Genes Linked to Variations in Eye Color (HealthDay)HealthDay - FRIDAY, May 7 (HealthDay News) -- Dutch researchers report that they've linked three genes to subtle variations in human eye color.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 May 2010 | 9:49 pm New Commercial Rocket Still Aims for May Launch Debut (SPACE.com)SPACE.com - A brand-new commercial Falcon 9 rocket designed to haul cargo to the International Space Station is still set to make its debut launch this month, despite delays in receiving final approval of its emergency destruct system in case it strays off course, the booster's makers said.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 May 2010 | 7:00 pm Girls Confide in Parents More Than Boys (LiveScience.com)LiveScience.com - Teens might divulge school crushes and other dating issues with mom and dad, but when it comes to sex, mum's the word.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 May 2010 | 6:00 pm Montana, Idaho consider increased wolf hunt quotas (AP)AP - Hunters in Montana would be allowed to kill nearly three times as many gray wolves this fall compared with last year's inaugural hunt, under a proposal announced Friday by state wildlife officials.Source: Yahoo! News: Science News | 7 May 2010 | 5:52 pm Baby Star Blows a Bubble, Force-Feeding a Stellar 'Goliath'The Herschel Space Observatory has spotted a young star blasting a cavity out of a nebula. The resulting 'bubble' is sparking the birth of more stars, one of them with the potential to grow into a stellar 'Goliath'.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 4:52 pm Scientists bemoan loss of expertise in electionLONDON (Reuters) - Britain's scientific community was dismayed Friday at the loss of some its leading advocates in parliamentary elections, and experts said they feared health and science policymaking would suffer as a result.Source: Reuters: Science News | 7 May 2010 | 3:43 pm Photo: Icelandic Volcano Begins Erupting Again
Iceland’s Eyjafjallajökull volcano began erupting again earlier this week. This image, captured May 6 by the European Space Agency’s Envisat satellite, clearly shows the grayish brown ash of the plume blowing east. The eruption is the latest in a string that began March 20 and that grounded flights in many parts of Europe for a week. How big a problem the ash clouds become depends not just on the size of the eruption, but on the direction of the wind. Planes can’t fly through ash-heavy airspace because there is a danger that the silicates in the plume will turn into glass inside the jet engines. Image: European Space Agency
WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal’s Twitter, Tumblr, and forthcoming book on the history of green technology; Wired Science on Twitter and Facebook.
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 7 May 2010 | 3:20 pm Publisher seeks patentScientist applies to protect online reviewing and journal-publishing process.<img src="http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/news/rss/today/~4/vArNIXA1NqY" height="1" width="1"/>Source: NatureNews - All articles published today - nature.com science feeds | 7 May 2010 | 2:51 pm Finding the Right Asteroid for Astronauts to Land on
The Little Prince, who stood tall on his fictional house-sized asteroid B612, may soon have company. Since President Obama announced last month that NASA plans to send people to an asteroid by 2025 (SN: 5/8/10, p. 10), scientists have been scrambling to fill in the details. Before astronauts can embark on such a journey, they need to choose a destination.
Asteroids come in a menagerie of sizes, shapes and trajectories. Some are little more than giant loose rubble piles, while others are densely packed. Though Obama’s proposal didn’t point to any specific destinations, Elvis says that a worthy asteroid ought to have a few key features, including a slow spin rate, no problematic satellites and a solar orbit that allows for a long and recurring launch window. “Are they spinning rapidly? Are they elongated? Is there strange, irregular gravity?” Elvis asks. If the asteroid is “lumpy and nasty, that’s not good.”
The most important consideration, though, is that the asteroid is easy to get to. While the majority of asteroids reside in a belt between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter, some come close to Earth. A relatively nearby asteroid that circles the sun at a speed similar to the Earth’s would be ideal, Elvis reported. So far, six of 6,699 known near-Earth asteroids seem to have amenable orbits. For many researchers, the visit will be a mini–Mars-mission — a chance to test strategies and equipment before traveling to the red planet. A round-trip journey to a nearby asteroid might take about half a year. A mission to Mars would take more than twice as long. “If you want to climb Mount Everest, you don’t climb K2 first,” says astronaut and astronomer John Grunsfeld of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. Practicing deep space maneuvers on a nearby asteroid would be like climbing Washington’s Mount Rainier before tackling the Himalayas. To find their Mount Rainier, astronomers first need to map all the asteroids. Scientists have pinpointed many of those big enough to destroy the Earth, but a lot of the rocks smaller than a kilometer in diameter haven’t been identified, says planetary scientist Bill Bottke of the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado. Bottke recently coauthored a National Research Council report outlining possible approaches to cataloging all asteroids near Earth. Once the asteroids are tallied, selection criteria such as those proposed by Elvis can be considered. (Regardless of choice, it is unlikely that the asteroid will have enough gravity to allow a landing. Rather, astronauts would probably tether their spacecraft to the asteroid and move as it moves, possibly zipping to the rock in a smaller vehicle.) Planetary scientist Paul Abell of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston says an asteroid’s composition might also affect its desirability. Visiting an asteroid that holds water-ice, for example, might help astronauts figure out how to extract water for drinking and for fuel, a technique that could come in handy during pit stops on a long trip to Mars. Of course, a crewed mission to an asteroid would garner rich scientific rewards in its own right. Visiting an asteroid “tells you about what existed back when planets were forming,” Bottke says. Asteroids may host carbon-containing molecules, which could hold clues to the beginning of life on Earth. So far, scientists have gleaned much of their information about the early solar system from meteorites that have landed on Earth, but these samples lose a lot of material as they flame through the atmosphere, he says.
But having “non-artificial intelligence,” as planetary astronomer Andrew Rivkin of Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, puts it, doesn’t mean a thing unless the astronauts survive the trip. Keeping them safe on a long flight to an asteroid, as well as to Mars, will pose new challenges. “Going to an asteroid is a new idea, but I don’t think all of the complications have been thought through,” Bottke says. “I think everyone’s being a little cavalier about jumping on the bandwagon.” For instance, researchers will need to quantify the doses of radiation that astronauts will experience on the journey. An inopportune solar flare could be deadly, and the requisite protective shielding could be too heavy to carry. If researchers can identify a flight plan that will keep astronauts healthy and safe, Earth’s homebodies may be protected as well. Another hope — and another reason to probe a nearby asteroid — is that such a mission could uncover new ways to deflect or destroy a life-threatening rock careening toward Earth. “A lot of the objects that we’ll be able to get to as human beings are the ones that represent the greatest threat,” Abell says. The difficulties of the proposed visit are great, but the morale boost from accomplishing the mission is “powerful, if not tangible,” Rivkin says. Adds Grunsfeld, who has been on five space flights: “This is about the bigger picture. It’s the start of humans going out and exploring the solar system.” Asteroids to watch:More than 6,500 asteroids are known to enter Earth’s neighborhood. Of these, 1,100-plus are classified as “potentially hazardous” — meaning they can approach Earth relatively closely and have diameters larger than 150 meters. The orbits of a few of these asteroids are shown below. 25143 Itokawa grabbed public attention when it became the target of the Japanese Hayabusa mission, which launched in 2003, imaged the asteroid and attempted to collect soil samples. (The recovery capsule is expected to land in Australia in June.) The asteroid’s next close approach will be in March 2030, when it will pass within 56.3 million kilometers of Earth. Recent observations suggest asteroid 2005 YU55 is 400 meters long, twice as large as previously thought. The measurements were taken in April as the Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico tracked the asteroid passing within 2.3 million kilometers of Earth. On its next approach, in November 2011, the body is expected to get much closer — a mere 325,000 kilometers away. 6344 P-L was first discovered in 1960, but then researchers lost track of it. The asteroid was rediscovered in 2007 and given the name 2007 RR9 before it was recognized. The asteroid has a highly elongated orbit that takes 4.7 years to traverse, and its next close approach to Earth will be in November 2040, when it will pass within 11 million kilometers. Images: 1) Eros./NASA. 2) Artist’s rendering of the NEAR spacecraft that landed on Eros./NASA. See Also:
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 7 May 2010 | 2:46 pm Birth Control Pill Turns 50Many young women today use "the pill" to treat acne, improve mood and, of course, prevent pregnancy.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 1:45 pm How the Containment Dome WorksHere's how BP's oil-spill containment dome will work in its first test at such depths.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 1:34 pm How the Gulf Oil Spill Containment Dome Will WorkHere's how the Gulf oil spill containment dome will work and the risks involved.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 1:30 pm DNA Frees Innocent Man, But What About Eyewitnesses?An innocent man was recently freed by DNA testing; but what about the people who saw him do it?Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 1:29 pm Molecular modelling's $10-million comeback?Is Bill Gates's decision to invest in software company Schrödinger an early sign of a new computer-aided era for drug design, asks Derek Lowe. Or is it just another small step on what's been a rather lengthy journey?Source: NatureNews - All articles published today - nature.com science feeds | 7 May 2010 | 1:00 pm Better Oil Dispersant Tests Delayed in Gulf
A promising alternative to the highly toxic oil dispersant being used in the Gulf is finally being tested, but slowly. Dispersit was approved 10 years ago by the Environmental Protection Agency for emergency cleanup use. In lab comparisons, it’s twice as good at breaking down South Louisiana crude oil as Corexit 9500, the primary dispersant used by British Petroleum and the U.S. Coast Guard. It’s also half as toxic. Even as British Petroleum has started using Corexit in the Gulf and ordered 15 million gallons from the manufacturer, those early tests are being run yet again on Dispersit. The Coast Guard and British Petroleum have not ordered Dispersit in bulk, which could potentially save valuable days if Dispersit is judged effective for field use. “They’re performing the same lab tests that were done originally in the EPA approval testing. They’re not even testing it at sea,” said Bruce Gebhardt, an executive at U.S. Polychemical corporation, Dispersit’s manufacturer. “That’s the frustrating part.”
That Corexit would be the first line of dispersant defense in the Gulf makes sense. Originally synthesized by Exxon, various formulations of it have been used for decades to dilute spilled oil and accelerate its natural breakdown. “Corexit 9500 is the dispersant that was in all the stockpiles. When something like this happens, you need hundreds and hundreds of tons,” said Alun Lewis, a dispersant expert and oil-spill consultant. “There’s a big bank of knowledge about Corexit,” he said. “I don’t know of testing that’s been done with Dispersit, besides approval testing by the EPA.” That lack of testing is part of a general trend by the oil industry and Coast Guard, who have been slow to develop new cleanup tools or strategies. Over the last decade, as the oil industry successfully lobbied governments for lax offshore drilling regulation – the Deepwater Horizon’s operators didn’t even need to complete an environmental impact assessment – there has been little emphasis on testing products like Dispersit. “The reality is, we blow them out of the water. But Corexit is the Exxon product, the 800-pound gorilla,” said Gebhardt. “We’ve never been able to move off the shelves. We were never successful in getting them to switch stockpiles. The Coast Guard expressed interest, but it’s a big expense, and you don’t do it unless you’re in pain. Now they’re in pain.” Lab tests only provide general information, and field tests on Dispersit need to be run. But the delay in starting open-water tests, rather than the same flask-based experiments that originally suggested Dispersit’s superiority, seems perplexing. So does the decision not to have Dispersit production start immediately in earnest, making a stockpile immediately available. Twenty thousand gallons of Corexit 9500 are now being used in the Gulf every day. An earlier formulation was linked to respiratory, nervous system and blood disorders among cleanup crews for the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Environmentalists worry that Corexit could affect workers, harm fish and shellfish in the Gulf, and ultimately enter the human food chain. Neither the Coast Guard nor authorities at the the Deepwater Horizon unified command center responded to queries. According to Gebhardt, the Coast Guard has not told him how long it will take to complete the basic lab tests. The testing schedule was apparently hindered by difficulties in recovering usable oil samples from choppy seas. “I’ve got all my suppliers sitting, waiting with their stocks. I could make product quickly. I can’t do that until they give me the go. We could be up in three days, running at 20,000 gallons a day,” said Gebhardt. “I just hope the call comes soon.” Image: Dispersant spray maintenance team./United States Coast Guard. See Also:
Brandon Keim’s Twitter stream and reportorial outtakes; Wired Science on Twitter. Brandon is currently working on a book about ecological tipping points.
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 7 May 2010 | 12:28 pm Calling All Plastic-Loving MicrobesIn marine environments, there are particular types of microbes that love plastic. They're all over the stuff, happily binding to it and forming coatings. This spring, intrepid scientists are testing samples from an estuary in Northern England to see what ...Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 12:22 pm Security Cameras: Who's Watching You?As the investigation into the failed Times Square bombing revealed, security cameras are everywhere. But studies show they may not be so effective.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 12:15 pm New Global Map of Every Country’s Tallest Building
You can now see the tallest building in every country of the world on one big map, thanks to an obsessive documentarian of engineering accomplishments. The anonymous cartographer described the new map on the website, Google Earth Hacks using his handle, blackdogprod. “I have fanatically spent the last year thoroughly studying every country in the world to find the correct building,” blackdogprod wrote. “I’ve used every resource available on the internet to find and verify the tallest building in every country, with the most accurate height available.” Finally, you can settle that debate over the tallest building in Uganda. It is the Kampala Hilton at 295 feet! And in Trinidad and Tobago, the International Waterfront Towers take the blue ribbon at 394 feet. The tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa skyscraper in Dubai stands 2,717 feet tall. That’s an order of magnitude higher than the tallest building in most countries. If that sounds preposterous, wait until you see it from space. The image below was captured by a GeoEye satellite and has a resolution of half a meter (1.65 feet).
Images: 1) Google Earth. 2) GeoEye See Also:
WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal’s Twitter, Tumblr, and forthcoming book on the history of green technology; Wired Science on Twitter and Facebook.
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 7 May 2010 | 12:11 pm Coyotes in New York City Lead Surge in Urban WildlifeCoyotes, raccoon, deer and other forms of urban wildlife are popping up across Manhattan.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 11:44 am Older Mothers Outnumber Teen Moms: SurveyI'm finally in vogue! More women in the United States are waiting longer now to have children than ever before, according to a new survey by the Pew Research Center. I had my child when I was 41, a full ...Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 11:42 am Drought may halve Jersey's potato cropThey planted late because of the long winter and still the early crops were killed by frost. And then came the worst drought in 34 years.... With their papery, easily removable skin and their tender, waxy flesh, Jersey royals are the most prized of the spring crop of potatoes. Their short harvesting season starts around now and farmers usually send more than 30,000 tonnes to the UK in the early months. But the crop may fail to materialise from Jersey this year as the Channel Island has been hit by the worst drought in 34 years. According to potato growers, the first crop may be cut in half because of a lack of rainfall in April. While the rest of the UK was suffering downpours over last weekend's bank holiday, just 2mm fell in Jersey. Mike Renourd, technical director for the Jersey Royal Company, said today: "It's looking like the first half of the crop will have a significant yield reduction." He added that supermarket representatives had visited farms in recent days because the crop was potentially so low. The crop of Jersey royals – served in salads or just boiled and garnished with butter — is already two weeks late because of the long winter, which meant planting came later and the early crops were killed by frost. "Traditionally, coming up in the next couple of weeks you'd have the big volume coming on line where all the retailers would look to do the big promotions this week, next week and the week after, but clearly that volume is down," Renourd told the Grocer magazine. Renourd said the potatoes planted later in the season were growing normally. Sales of all Jersey potatoes were worth £45.7m in the year to April, up more than 20% on the year before, according to the retail analyst Kantar. Volumes were up 32.5% to 37.9m tonnes. In 2008 the crop began rotting in fields after a deluge hit the island. Rob Burrow, of the market information department at the UK Agriculture and Horticulture Development Board, said: "As far as I understand it has been a very dry season, one of the driest for many years. There are concerns for the reduction in yield that might occur. They normally send around 30-35,000 tonnes during the early season from the middle of April until the end of June. The early total crop market by British potato growers is around 230,000 tonnes." He added that potatoes on the mainland had not been affected by drought. "The first early potatoes we produce on the mainland are the rocket, premier and arrow in Cornwall. Those are around 10-14 days later than normal because of the cold, wet winter, which delayed the development of the early crops and delayed planting in some cases. "Temperatures up until now have been on the low side so they could do with some warmer weather to boost the crop more. There's been rain in Cornwall this week so crops are growing fairly well at the moment and yields have been increasing perhaps a little bit more than expected in the last 10 days." guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds Source: Science news, comment and analysis | guardian.co.uk | 7 May 2010 | 11:30 am What are the Benefits of Social Networks?What are the benefits of social networks? Boston College Professor Jerry Kane has received an National Science Foundation career award to study the use of social media technology in the classroom and in business.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 11:29 am What Causes Moms and Kids to Bond?Scientists have identified the hormone oxytocin as important to human bondingSource: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 11:26 am Why We Don’t Need to Worry About Space InvadersI’m not losing any sleep worrying about awaking one morning to see and alien mothership hovering over Washington D.C.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 11:02 am Can You Really Die in Your Nightmares?A real disease suddenly kills otherwise healthy young people in their sleep.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 11:02 am Photo: Looking Back at the Space Station From Earth
The newly installed cupola on the International Space Station provides the astronauts with a window onto the Earth below them. Now, Ralf Vandebergh has captured an image of that space station component from his backyard telescope. The new viewing station was launched in February on space shuttle mission STS-130 and attached to the Tranquility module. Vandebergh manually tracks the ISS with his telescope and camera setup, and it takes a fortuitous set of circumstances to capture a great image. “The best results occur mostly as a surprise when lighting angle, viewing angle, seeing, distance and other factors of the objects are favorable,” Vandebergh explains on his website. If you want to see what the view is like from inside the cupola, the photo below should give you a good idea. Astronaut Soichi Noguchi has been shooting amazing photos from that perch, which he regularly posts to Twitter.
Image: 1. Ralf Vandebergh. 2. NASA. See Also:
WiSci 2.0: Alexis Madrigal’s Twitter, Tumblr, and forthcoming book on the history of green technology; Wired Science on Twitter and Facebook.
Source: Wired: Wired Science | 7 May 2010 | 10:59 am Rats top invasive mammals tableBrown rats are among the most invasive mammals in Europe, according to a wide-ranging assessment.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 7 May 2010 | 10:40 am 'Dome' Lowered Into Sea to Cap Oil LeakThe 100-ton dome is designed to funnel leaking oil from the Gulf up to a containment vessel for reprocessing.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 10:31 am Social Media Used to Update Public About Oil SpillSocial media is playing an important role in gulf oil spill relief efforts.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 10:19 am Surprising Skin Cancer Risk: Too Much DrivingMore facial skin cancers occur on the left side, suggesting long hours behind the wheel might put people at risk for this condition, a new study finds.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 10:18 am Science NationScience for the People: Surprising discoveries and fascinating researchers.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 9:29 am Girls Confide in Parents More Than BoysGirls are more likely than boys to talk to mom about dating issues, but when it comes to sex, the teens become tight-lipped.Source: Livescience.com | 7 May 2010 | 9:21 am Headless Statue Hints at Tomb of Cleopatra: HawassDr. Zahi Hawass, the head of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, tells Discovery News why the findings at Taposiris Magna (today called Abusir) are important.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 8:47 am Biological Passport Nabs Cheating CyclistsThe new tool measures blood and body chemistry over time and appears to finally be putting a dent in sports doping.Source: Discovery News - Top Stories | 7 May 2010 | 8:42 am Big softie - huge 'monster squid' not fearsomeThe colossal squid, once feared as a sea monster, is not the fast and voracious predator previously thought, say scientists.Source: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 7 May 2010 | 5:48 am SpacemanHerschel telescope paints the cosmic landscapeSource: BBC News | Science & Environment | UK Edition | 7 May 2010 | 2:30 am
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Though robots have successfully landed on two asteroids so far — Eros and Itokawa — people could accomplish experiments that robots couldn’t. “Having humans in the mix gives you a lot of flexibility,” Abell says. A human with a hammer could pick up a rock and then choose to discard it in favor of a more intriguing rock somewhere else.
