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Chasing Venus - The Race To Measure The Heavens In The 18th Century

Chasing Venus - The Race To Measure The Heavens In The 18th Century

May 01 2012 | comment(s)

On June 5th and 6th, you will be able to witness a true once-in-a-lifetime event. Venus will pass across the face of the Sun - for about six hours, it will appear as a small black dot on the Sun's surface. It won't happen again until 2117.

Transits of Venus occur only when Venus and the Earth are in a line with the Sun. At other times Venus passes below or above the Sun because the two orbits are at a slight angle to each other. Transits occur in pairs separated by eight years (the last transit was in 2004) with the gap between pairs of transits alternating between 105.5 and 121.5 years.
Hazel Dormice Wonder When To Have Kids Also

Hazel Dormice Wonder When To Have Kids Also

May 01 2012 | comment(s)

If a species´ reproductive strategy is evolutionarily adapted to the environmental constraints encountered by that species in its natural habitat, such as availability of food resources and predictability of the environment, and the aim generally is to produce the largest possible number of surviving offspring under particular conditions, then common dormice are defying that just a little.
Idiothetic Memory - This Spatial Learning Does Not Seem To Worsen With Age

Idiothetic Memory - This Spatial Learning Does Not Seem To Worsen With Age

May 01 2012 | comment(s)

In western countries there are 20 times more people aged 65 years andr older than one hundred years ago. With those demographic changes have come changes in brain research.  Understanding the mechanisms responsible for aging-related changes in cognitive processes, including spatial orientation, has become especially important for people’s everyday lives.
April's Autism Awareness Month Ends: We Return You to Your Regularly Scheduled Programming

April's Autism Awareness Month Ends: We Return You to Your Regularly Scheduled Programming

Apr 30 2012 | comment(s)

April 30. The last day of Autism Awareness Month. The last hurrah, although let's be honest, the wider world didn't really notice all that much and probably didn't learn all that much, either.

The truth is that autism awareness happens at the individual level every time we, as parents, take our autistic children out and have them interact with the world. For autistic people, it happens every time they are out in public and self-disclose, but also when they don't, when the people they interact with don't know they have autism, or as they get to be known by others, when that label fades into the background, and they are just seen as uniquely themselves, perfect as they are.
Texas Fracking Crucifixion: Can The EPA Fairly Regulate The Shale Gas Revolution?

Texas Fracking Crucifixion: Can The EPA Fairly Regulate The Shale Gas Revolution?

Apr 30 2012 | comment(s)

Al Armendariz, the top Environmental Protection Agency official in the oil-rich Southwest region, resigned from his post, effective today. It's the latest twist in the never-ending and increasingly ugly fracking fracas.

Al Armendariz, EPA Official Claiming Its Goal Was To 'Crucify' Fossil Fuel Companies, Resigns

Al Armendariz, EPA Official Claiming Its Goal Was To 'Crucify' Fossil Fuel Companies, Resigns

Apr 30 2012 | comment(s)

Al Armendariz,  head of the EPA's South and Southwest region in Dallas, has resigned.  He has been criticized for using an unelected position at the EPA (he was appointed by Pres.
Where Are All The ITaxes

Where Are All The ITaxes

Apr 30 2012 | comment(s)

If we had a prize for Most Celebrated Business Hero in America, it would have to be Steve Jobs, the late founder of Apple.

The agile doge of Silicon Valley had a “death stare” you couldn’t escape.
He had a up-from-orphan back story you couldn’t resist.
And he had the vision of ten of his fellow technology executives.

That’s why--we’re told--Apple was so good at making the things we love. All things “I”, that is--from iPads and iPhones, to iPods and iTunes.

Lately, it also seems that Jobs and the company he left behind were also awfully good at all things Me.
Aircraft Nose Art - The Psychology

Aircraft Nose Art - The Psychology

Apr 30 2012 | comment(s)

Of all the available publications on 'Aircraft Nose Art', very few have investigated its psychological undercurrents.

An exception is ‘Aircraft Nose Art: From World War I to Today’ (1991). Chapter 1 of which was authored by the late George R. Klare, who was Distinguished Professor of Psychology at Ohio University.
James Cameron And Challenger Deep On National Geographic

James Cameron And Challenger Deep On National Geographic

Apr 30 2012 | comment(s)

The Mariana Trench is perhaps the most isolated place on the planet. Film director James Cameron recently took a real-life expedition to Earth’s ocean floor Cameron describes his journey during an in-depth interview to promote his National Geographic special, airing April 29th: “I was watching the numbers going deeper. The sub slows down as you get to the target depth. There is a long moment of getting to think about it. Then you have to get busy. You have less than a thousand feet from the bottom, you fine-tune the ballast, adjust the camera, turn up the spotlight. As the altimeter counted, I saw the glow of the bottom!” 
Nuclear Fusion - The Latest

Nuclear Fusion - The Latest

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

While cold fusion remains a pipe dream, fusion as an energy source for the future continues to be funded and improved. 

In nuclear fission, current nuclear energy, the nucleus of an atom is split, but in fusion two lightweight atoms join together.  The biggest benefit is no explosion.

The ITER project is seeking to turn nuclear fusion into reality and is making use of the Tokamak reactor for this purpose. Reactors of this type and the plasma used in them to carry out fusion have a number of control problems, and to solve them, electronics engineer Goretti Sevillano has come up with some tools in her thesis defended at the University of the Basque Country.
Excited Xi(b) Baryon - New Particle Discovered At LHC

Excited Xi(b) Baryon - New Particle Discovered At LHC

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

Researchers have discovered a previously unknown particle composed of three quarks in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) particle accelerator. The baryon known as Xi_b^* confirms fundamental assumptions of physics regarding the binding of quarks.

 The baryon family refers to particles that are made up of three quarks and quarks form a group of six particles that differ in their masses and charges. The two lightest quarks, “up” and “down” quarks, form the two atomic components, protons and neutrons. All baryons that are composed of the three lightest quarks (“up”, “down” and “strange” quarks) are known. Only very few baryons with heavy quarks have been observed to date. They can only be generated artificially in particle accelerators, as they are heavy and very unstable. 

Your Next Eyeglasses Could Be Designed After A Moth's Eyes

Your Next Eyeglasses Could Be Designed After A Moth's Eyes

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

If you wear glasses, and they have been created recently, you are reading this article by looking through a tiny, transparent layer of nanomaterial. Anti-reflective coatings based on nanomaterials that reduce the amount of reflected light are used in most optical devices, including glasses, photo lenses, TV screens, solar cells and LED lights.

They could get better in the future. Some of the most efficient ARCs are made by mother nature and are found in the eyes of insects, like moths. The eyes of moths are covered with a layer of tiny bumps which are smaller than the wavelength of incoming light. This natural coating eliminates glare, hiding the moths from predators and improving their nocturnal vision. Some types of ARCs actually mimic the moth's eye.
The dineutron has finally landed

The dineutron has finally landed

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

In a recent PRL article Artemis Spyrou and collaborators have reported on the first observation of an exotic form of nucleons, the long-sought dineutron.

Dineutron was predicted theoretically as a short-lived bound state of two neutrons emitted from a nucleus. The formation is possible due to the strong nuclear force that may hold the two neutrons close by for some time.
Counterintuitive - What The Youthful Brain Does May Not Mean So Much

Counterintuitive - What The Youthful Brain Does May Not Mean So Much

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

Aging is unavoidable - except perhaps for the brain, say researchers. They also present counterintuitive evidence that it is what you do in old age that matters when it comes to maintaining a youthful brain - not what you did earlier in life.

Education alone won't save your brain; PhDs are as likely as high school dropouts to experience memory loss with old age. Don't count on your job either - those with a complex or demanding career may enjoy a limited advantage, but those benefits quickly dwindle after retirement.

Instead, engagement is the secret to success. Those who are socially, mentally and physically stimulated reliably show greater cognitive performance with a brain that appears younger than its years.
Aristotle Vs Galileo: A Battle Over Free Fall

Aristotle Vs Galileo: A Battle Over Free Fall

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

I have been invited to give a 30 minute presentation to high-school kids next week about Free Fall. The physics teacher who is organizing this event also has some nice plans to include a theatrical play, a couple presentations on Galileo's story by the students and an introductory talk by one of his colleague on the same matter.

The request to my side was to prepare something to expand the horizons of students related to the entirely different perspectives on bodies motion in the gravitational field by Aristotle and Galileo.
Desperate Fishwives - Goby Girls Go Gaga

Desperate Fishwives - Goby Girls Go Gaga

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

Gobies are the little fish you may have seen under the pier or swimming around your feet in salty water if you’ve visited the coasts of Western Europe. These seemingly boring brownish fish live a hectic life, lasting only one year. Up close, the gobies are as glamorous as gold fish, in orange fish frocks and shiny bellies full of eggs.

Secretly, they are the stars of “Fishteria Lane.” As the mating season draws to an end, guys drop dead by the hour, making goby girls go all out in their hunt for a mate to father their offspring. 

There's no time to be coy.
Gabapentin Helps Marijuana Addicts Kick The Habit

Gabapentin Helps Marijuana Addicts Kick The Habit

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

Researchers have presented clinical evidence that the drug gabapentin, currently on the market to treat neuropathic pain and epilepsy, also helps people to quit smoking marijuana (cannabis). Unlike traditional addiction treatments, gabapentin targets stress systems in the brain that are activated by drug withdrawal.

In a 12-week trial of 50 treatment-seeking cannabis users, those who took gabapentin used less cannabis, experienced fewer withdrawal symptoms, like sleeplessness, and scored higher on tests of attention, impulse-control, and other cognitive skills, compared to patients who received a placebo. If these results are confirmed by ongoing larger trials, gabapentin could become the first FDA-approved pharmaceutical treatment for cannabis dependence.
Religion 2.0

Religion 2.0

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

This blog is more an ear than a tongue. It needs you, and we need a way to revere life while respecting the gift of our critical intellect. We may need to have fun, may need to let our ideas dance for and by themselves. Some elements of a fresh, non-authority-structured Religion 2.0 might include the following, without apologies for the fuzzy thinking that often starts good things off:
Excessive use of fertilizers is reducing productivity.

Excessive use of fertilizers is reducing productivity.

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

Fertilizers producing wastelands in semi arid and arid regions. Some months ago I attended a conference in Germany where excessive use of nitrogen fertilizers was a cause of concern for the European Nations. Back home there is report that excessive use of nitrogen fertilizers ( Ideal broad generalization is N:P:K: 4:2:1) has resulted in ration of N:P:K 15:9:1. Excessive use of nitrogen and phosphorus in state of Rajasthan. Agriculture department as per recent report (Rajasthan Patrika. 28/04/2012) has accepted that this is causing danger of wasteland development and reduced yield of crops. The use of fertilizers which was 2.4 million tones in 2010-2011 has increased to 2.7 million tones in 2011-2012.
New Stem Cell Found In The Brain - And It Can Form New Brain Cells

New Stem Cell Found In The Brain - And It Can Form New Brain Cells

Apr 29 2012 | comment(s)

A new stem cell has been found that can proliferate and form several different cell types, including new brain cells.  This discovery may be used to develop methods that can repair diseases and injury to the brain.

Analyzing brain tissue from biopsies, the researchers for the first time found stem cells located
around small blood vessels in the brain. The cell’s specific function is still unclear, but its plastic properties suggest great potential. A similar cell type has been identified in several other organs where it can promote regeneration of muscle, bone, cartilage and adipose tissue.