I am something of a historical repository for my family. So I have some cool stuff from way back, like a photograph of my great-great-great grandfather, and then also more recent items, like one of my mother's 'ration' books (coupons still attached!) from World War 2 and a wax record my grandfather made for her at a USO(1) before he left to occupy Japan at the war's conclusion.
The following is a horoscope based on the specific personality type common to users of Science20.com. After reading, please comment your evaluation of its accuracy. Then come back tomorrow for post discussing the methodology of accurately modeling group personality based on website preference.
You have a need for other people to like and admire you, and yet you tend to be critical of yourself. While you have some personality weaknesses you are generally able to compensate for them.
We know bugs adapt to resist drugs. How do they do it? We help them, really.
Incomplete dose regimen, self prescription and indiscriminate disposals let them develop resistance. One of the ways by which antibiotics work is by inducing heavy metal (such as silver, copper, manganese etc) toxicity. So bacteria have developed methods to eliminate heavy metals. They have special pumps called efflux pumps, that are made up of proteins.
I grew up on the Flathead Indian Reservation in western Montana. There is a National Bison Range located on the reservation where a herd of buffalo literally roam.
Scientists know that time passes faster at higher elevations. It's a curious aspect of Einstein's theories of relativity that previously had to be measured by comparing clocks on the Earth's surface and rockets.
But NIST physicists have made it a lot more personal - a scale of about 1 foot - and showed that you even age faster if you are taller than your relative. The good news is you won't be able to see the difference, that one foot difference in height adds about 90 billionths of a second over a 79-year lifetime.
The NIST researchers also observed another aspect of relativity, that time passes more slowly when you move faster, at speeds comparable to a car traveling about 20 miles per hour.
It may seem like a waste of time that young people play video games for hours on end but, at least for some, it may help them in surgery one day.
A new study says reorganization of the brain's cortical network in young men with significant experience playing video games gives them an advantage not only in those games but also with other tasks requiring visuomotor skills.
Water-gel-based solar devices, what researchers liken to "artificial leaves", can act like solar cells to produce electricity, bringing technology a bit closer to solar cells that more closely mimic the efficiency of nature and farther from the disaster of today that advocates want mandated and subsidized for questionable benefit.
If it pans out, they will be less expensive and more environmentally friendly than silicon-based solar cells.
The bendable artificial leaves are composed of water-based gel infused with light-sensitive molecules – the researchers even used plant chlorophyll in one of the experiments – coupled with electrodes coated by carbon materials, like carbon nanotubes or graphite.
Recently scientists have discovered that a little molecule called Triclosan can help us eradicate a condition that affects 2 billion people around the world (we are only 6.7 billion total right?). A parasitic infection called toxoplasmosis affects those many people is caused by a protozoan Toxoplasma gondii.
A total of 11% of the population in the US and up to 80% of the people in Brazil suffer by toxoplasmosis. Domestic cats are primary carriers, but many animals and humans also can carry the bug. It can pass on from even mother to the baby in the womb :( It causes morbidity and mortality to some extent, although it is a nuisance to the bigger extent.
Recently Scientists have figured that Malagasy spiders spin world’s toughest
biological material (link to the full article given below). There was another article on the secret of oysters sticking together (link is below). Silk, wool from sheep camel etc, are routinely used, we know. Why am I writing about spider webs and oyster shells? You might be surprised.
Simple answer: Just don't be there in the first place.
I am currently on fieldwork on Santorini, which does involve a fair bit of walking from outcrop to outcrop. Walking past deposits from the last big eruption, the Minoan, I can't help but be impressed by the size of some of the chunks of rock the eruption transported. To pass the time, I have been playing a game of "what would I do if the volcano erupted now", thinking about pyroclastic flows and trying to work out where would be safest. So just a quick post until I get back and can write up the trip in some more detail.
