Scientists writing this week in Geophysical Research Letters say they have pinpointed six spots on the remote Pacific Antarctic Ridge, 1,000 miles from the west coast of Antarctica, where they think  hydrothermal vents are likely to be found.

Two pieces of evidence tipped researchers off to the location of the hidden vents. First, the ocean is stratified with layers of lighter water sitting on top of layers of denser water. Second, when a seafloor vent erupts, it spews gases rich in rare helium-3, an isotope found in earth's mantle and in the magma bubbling below the vent. As helium-3 disperses through the ocean, it mixes into a density layer and stays there, forming a plume that can stretch over thousands of kilometers.

Just as they would in face-to-face dating, people who lie about themselves on internet dating services probably are people-pleasers who want to present themselves in the most favorable light to get someone to like them, according to a study in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships.

More than 5,000 participants in a national Internet matchmaking service were surveyed to determine what kinds of people are most likely to lie during the online dating process. They were asked how likely they were to lie about topics such as assets, relationship goals, personal interests, personal attributes, past relationships, age and weight.

A newly discovered species that shared many characteristics with dinosaurs but fell just outside of the dinosaur family lived 10 million years earlier than the oldest known dinosaurs. Researchers writing in Nature say the discovery of  Asilisaurus kongwe means that dinosaurs and their close relatives such as pterosaurs (flying reptiles) might have also lived much earlier than previously thought.

The research also suggests that at least three times in the evolution of dinosaurs and their closest relatives, meat-eating animals evolved into animals with diets that included plants. These shifts all occurred in less than 10 million years, a relatively short time by geological standards.

Astronomers have discovered a star that may have been among the second generation of stars to form after the Big Bang.

Located in the dwarf galaxy Sculptor some 290,000 light-years away, S1020549 has a remarkably similar chemical make-up to the Milky Way's oldest stars. Its presence supports the theory that our galaxy underwent a "cannibal" phase, growing to its current size by swallowing dwarf galaxies and other galactic building blocks. The discovery of the new star is detailed in Nature.

Dwarf galaxies are small galaxies with just a few billion stars, compared to hundreds of billions in the Milky Way. In the "bottom-up model" of galaxy formation, large galaxies attained their size over billions of years by absorbing their smaller neighbors.

NASA creates dramatic artistic renderings of upcoming launches, in full color animation, often scaled for the IMAX screen.  They're great eye candy, but they are also informative, and have genuine science at their core.

For example, the STEREO solar panel deployment is fascinating to watch, even as a simulation.  It uses a highly accurate 3D model of the actual spacecraft, and attempts to balance physical realism with artistic license.  Noteworthy is the robotic nature of the deployment and the oscillation of the solar panels as they deploy.

This is an English translation of a potpourri of a number of recent papers and reports by one of the most interesting modern Russian journalists, Julia Latynina. I have just added a number of related thoughts.

 Can one make plastic from glucose?

Why Anchors Don't Work


From earliest times to today, from boat safety pamphlet to engineering treatise on marine architecture: all are agreed that the anchor does the work of keeping a boat or ship from moving.

It doesn't.  It can't.

Machines can do work, but an anchor is not a machine.


A vessel on any body of water is subjected to wind and water forces tending to move it.  In order for it to remain in a well defined geographical area the vessel must in some way oppose those forces.  The notion that any anchor, however designed, can somehow cancel those forces is false according to the laws of thermodynamics.

A new report released by the Pew Internet and American Life Project suggests that news has evolved from a consumable product to a participatory experience. Technology has not only changed how, where and when people get their news, but now allows the consumer to tag, share, comment on and even create news.

Richard Dawkins should write a paper entitled "How not to run a Web 2.0 website." Perhaps apt that he is now the former Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science, as he has shown little understanding of his public, which has also damaged his efforts at science communication. How can I make such bold statements?