Science & TechnologyS


Eye 1

World's first bionic eye receives FDA approval

First Bionic Eye
© Second SightFirst Bionic Eye.
This morning, I was speaking with Brian Mech, the vice-president of the medical device company Second Sight, when his land-line rang. Mech had just been telling me about the fifteen years his company has spent developing the Argus II, a retinal prosthesis that restores partial sight to people with a degenerative eye disease called Retinitis pigmentosa (RP). It had been a long process, Mech said, but he can count on one hand the number of days he hasn't woken up excited about the work ahead. And they were nearing the end--Europe approved the Argus II in 2011, and the FDA was expected to give the green light some time soon.

When his other line rang, Mech excused himself and set down the phone. I could hear a muffled version of his other conversation. After a few seconds, I heard "I gotta go," and then he was back. "Emily," he said, "I'm going to have to run: FDA approval just came through."

And with that, the U.S. has its first bionic eye.

Laptop

A computer program uncovers the evolutionary history of words

The Rosetta Stone
© WikipediaThe Rosetta Stone.
Languages are hard; it takes a trained ear to tease out not just the verbiage but the idiomatic expressions, the tone, the regional trends and ever-shifting insults that make a person truly fluent. This is one reason why even the best apps and Google Translate just can't hack it. Similarly, it takes a trained linguist to know how these words, all sprouted from one root, still grow into endless forms all signifying the same thing. Can a cunning computer solve this problem as well as a smart linguist can? The answer, in this case, may be yes.

A new machine-learning algorithm can use sound rules to suss out the most likely phonetic changes in a shifting language. All words shift over time and place, but certain vowels and pronunciations are going to shift more than others--you say tomato, I say tomahtoe, Canadians say "aboot," and so on. Alexandre Bouchard-Côté and colleagues at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver developed a system that can suggest how words may have sounded in the past, and which sounds were the most likely to shift. Then they compared the results with analysis by human experts, and found the 85 percent of the computer's suggestions were within a single character of the correct words.

Info

Weird quantum theory works in 'big' things

Interferometer
© Tom PurdyScientists detected the uncertainty principle in measurements of a tiny drum about 0.02 inches across, big enough for the naked eye to see.
They knew it was true, but now they've shown it: Scientists have demonstrated that the uncertainty principle, one of the most famous rules of quantum physics, operates in macroscopic objects visible to the naked eye.

The principle, described by physicist Werner Heisenberg nearly a century ago, states that the mere act of measuring the position of a particle, such as an electron, necessarily disturbs its momentum. That means the more precisely you try to measure its location, the less you know about how fast it's moving, and vice versa.

While in theory this principle operates on all objects, in practice its effects were thought to be measurable only in the tiny realm where the rules of quantum mechanics are important. In a new experiment, described in the Feb. 15 issue of the journal Science, physicists have shown that the uncertainty principle effects can be detected in a tiny drum visible to the naked eye.

Comet 2

Behold! Comet Lemmon glows lime green

Comet Lemmon
© Peter Ward, Barden Ridge Observatory
Looking like a lone headlight on a rainy night or a glowing lime in the sky, the bright green ball is actually the coma of Comet Lemmon, caught on camera by Australian astronomer Peter Ward from his Barden Ridge Observatory on Feb. 4 (view the hi-res version here). The comet's steadily-growing tail can be seen extending to the lower right.

Comet Lemmon (C/2012 S1) is currently traveling across the sky in the southern hemisphere and has brightened to a visible magnitude of about 6.2 - just at the limit of what can be seen with the naked eye under very dark, clear skies. Peter used a 14.25″ F7.9 Ritchey-Chretien telescope to capture the image of Lemmon, set against long-exposure trails from background stars.

Fireball 4

Watch the rate of asteroid discovery soar

When I started writing about astronomy 35 years ago, astronomers knew of just a few thousand asteroids. Now they know and have cataloged half a million asteroids! That's one reason we hear so often nowadays about asteroids passing near Earth, like the one that will pass on Friday, February 15, 2013. This video is an awesome depiction of the increasingly fast discovery rate for asteroids, over the past three decades. Scott Manley, formerly of Armagh Observatory, created it.


Or, try another graphical representation, also on Armagh Observatory's website. These are are maps of the inner solar system for the years 1800, 1850, 1900, 1950, 1990, 2000 and 2007 showing the increasing rate of discovery of asteroids.

Bottom line: Video from astronomer Scott Manley shows the increasingly fast rate of discovery of asteroids in our solar system, and hence of asteroids whose orbits cross that of Earth.

Info

Could the sea be conscious? Research reveals how tiny plankton behave like a marine 'megamind'

Megamind_1
© Ed DeLongMegamind: Despite the amazing diversity of marine microbes, a new research paper shows that many different groups work together to react in unison to their surroundings.
Vastly different species of sea microbes work together to respond as one to their surroundings as if they have one 'megamind', new research has revealed.

U.S. researchers have discovered communities of infinitesimal creatures in our oceans react in unison to changes in their environment.

The links between them are not well understood, but findings suggest the creatures rely on each other to almost the same extent as the different cells in a human body.

As an example, if one set of the microbes were, say, creating energy through photosynthesis, which would then produce carbon dioxide, another set of microbes would somehow know and react - perhaps preparing to absorb the carbon dioxide.

The open sea contains an amazing diversity of extremely tiny organisms called picoplankton, which include relatively simple life forms such as marine bacteria, as well as more complicated organisms.

Microbiologists who study wild marine microbes, as opposed to the lab-grown variety, face enormous challenges in getting a clear picture of the daily activities of their subjects.

To take a look at these creatures in their natural habitat, researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute used a new method for collecting marine microbes.

Bulb

Epigenetics shapes fate of brain vs. brawn castes in carpenter ants

Image
© Unknown
The recently published genome sequences of seven well-studied ant species are opening up new vistas for biology and medicine. A detailed look at molecular mechanisms that underlie the complex behavioral differences in two worker castes in the Florida carpenter ant, Camponotus floridanus,has revealed a link to epigenetics. This is the study of how the expression or suppression of particular genes by chemical modifications affects an organism's physical characteristics, development, and behavior. Epigenetic processes not only play a significant role in many diseases, but are also involved in longevity and aging.

Interdisciplinary research teams led by Shelley Berger, PhD, from thePerelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, in collaboration with teams led by Danny Reinberg from New York University and Juergen Liebig from Arizona State University, describe their work in Genome Research. The group found that epigenetic regulation is key to distinguishing one caste, the "majors", as brawny Amazons of the carpenter ant colony, compared to the "minors", their smaller, brainier sisters. These two castes have the same genes, but strikingly distinct behaviors and shape.

Ants, as well as termites and some bees and wasps, are eusocial species that organize themselves into rigid caste-based societies, or colonies, in which only one queen and a small contingent of male ants are usually fertile and reproduce. The rest of a colony is composed of functionally sterile females that are divided into worker castes that perform specialized roles such as foragers, soldiers, and caretakers. InCamponotus floridanus, there are two worker castes that are physically and behaviorally different, yet genetically very similar.

Fireball

Think Friday's close asteroid flyby is sobering? Look at this

When you see computer-generated images of asteroid 2012 DA14′s February 15, 2013 close flyby - showing the asteroid near Earth in space, seen from a distant vantage point - you might see the Earth, the asteroid, perhaps the sun, and maybe a few other planets. Here is another way to picture Earth and close-passing asteroids, from Armagh Observatory in Northern Ireland.

The image below is near-Earth space today - February 13, 2013. It shows all the objects currently within 0.3 AU of Earth - that's 45 million kilometers - or about 30 million miles - or about one-third of the distance between us and the sun. The red oval around Earth represents 3.84 million kilometers, or 10 lunar distances
NEOs
© Computer-generated image via Scott Manley at Armagh ObservatoryAll asteroids currently within a third of Earth’s distance from the sun are shown, with Earth at the center, in pseudo 3D. The red oval around Earth represents a distance 10 times greater than the moon’s distance. View larger

Meteor

If your satellite TV goes out on Friday, can you blame it on an asteroid? Asteroid 2012 DA14: Will it smash a satellite?

If your satellite TV goes out on Friday, can you blame it on an asteroid? Highly unlikely, say scientists monitoring the approach of asteroid 2012 DA14, which will zoom closer to Earth on Friday than any other known object of its size. The celestial visitor, which is almost as wide as the length of an Olympic-sized swimming pool, is due to pass as close as 17,100 miles at 2:24 p.m. EST (7:24 p.m. GMT) on Friday. That's closer than the television and communications satellites which circle the planet some 500 miles higher.

Image
© NASA/JPL-Caltech Artist's impression of asteroid 2012 DA14's Earth flyby.

Info

Turning off the cold: Neuroscientists remove chilly protein from skin

Freezing
© Photos.com
Are you tired of being cold all the time? Do you wish you could turn the cold off at the push of a button? Well neuroscientists from the University of South Carolina (USC) may have some good news for you.

It seems this group of researchers, led by David McKemy, associate professor of neurobiology in the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Science, have been able to isolate chilliness at the cellular level, identifying a network of sensory neurons in the skin that relays the sensation of cold to the brain. McKemy and his colleagues were able to selectively turn off this sensation in mice without affecting their ability to sense both heat and touch.

This study follows previous work by McKemy, in which he discovered a link between the sensation of cold and a protein known as TRPM8 (pronounced trip-em-ate). The TRPM8 protein is a sensor of cold in skin neurons, as well as a receptor for menthol, the cooling component of mint.

Publishing the new work in the February 13 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience, McKemy and his team have isolated and cut off the neurons that express TRPM8, giving them the ability to test the function of these cells specifically.