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Thaw point: 'Snowball Earth' was more a slushball

Agence France-Presse
Thu, 06 Dec 2007 08:28 CST

©Unknown

An extraordinary episode of global cooling hundreds of millions of years ago that some experts say caused Earth to completely freeze over has been miscalculated, a new study says.

Instead of "Snowball Earth," the planet really became "Slushball Earth," its authors suggest.

When Do Gas Giants Reach The Point Of No Return

Space Daily
Thu, 06 Dec 2007 08:18 CST

©Unknown

Professor Steve Miller, the final contributing author to the paper, puts the discovery into context: "This gives us an insight to the evolution of giant planets, which typically form as an ice core out in the cold depths of space before migrating in towards their host star over a period of several million years. Now we know that at some point they all probably cross this point of no return and undergo a catastrophic breakdown."

London, UK - Planetary scientists at UCL have identified the point at which a star causes the atmosphere of an orbiting gas giant to become critically unstable, as reported in this week's Nature (December 6). Depending upon their proximity to a host star, giant Jupiter-like planets have atmospheres which are either stable and thin, or unstable and rapidly expanding. This new research enables us to work out whether planets in other systems are stable or unstable by using a three dimensional model to characterise their upper atmospheres.

Dwarf Hippo Fossils Found on Cyprus

Menelaos Hadjicostis
Associated Press
Thu, 06 Dec 2007 05:25 CST

AYIA NAPA, Cyprus - An abattoir used by early Cypriots, a place where animals went to die, or a shelter that ultimately proved a death trap?

©AP Photo/Petros Karadjias

The fossilized remains of dozens of dwarf hippopotamuses lying in an excavated cave outside the resort village of Ayia Napa, some 80km (40 miles) southeast of the capital Nicosia, Cyprus, Wednesday, Nov. 28, 2007. A collapsed cave believed to contain the fossilized remains of dozens of dwarf hippopotamuses that are believed to have swum to this east Mediterranean island as many as 250,000 years ago. The fossils date to 9,000-11,500 BC and could provide clues as to when the island was actually inhabited by humans.

UBC study may solve age-old mystery of missing chemicals from Earth's mantle

Lorraine Chan
University of British Columbia
Wed, 05 Dec 2007 05:02 CST

Observations about the early formation of Earth may answer an age-old question about why the planet's mantle is missing some of the matter that should be present, according to UBC geophysicist John Hernlund.

Earth is made from chondrite, very primitive rocks of meteorites that date from the earliest time of the solar system before the Earth was formed. However, scientists have been puzzled why the composition of Earth's mantle and core differed from that of chondrite.

'Flying Fish' unmanned aircraft takes off and lands on water

Nicole Casal Moore
University of Michigan
Wed, 05 Dec 2007 04:56 CST

Flying fish were the inspiration for an unmanned seaplane with a 7-foot wingspan developed at the University of Michigan. The autonomous craft is believed to be the first seaplane that can initiate and perform its own takeoffs and landings on water.

New book explains age-old mystery of geometrical illusions

Duke University Medical Center
Thu, 29 Sep 2005 20:22 CDT

The insights provided by neurobiologist Dale Purves and his colleagues over the last few years about why the brain doesn't see the world according to the measurements provided by rulers, protractors or photometers suggest that vision operates in way very different from what most neuroscientists imagine.

In a new book "Perceiving Geometry: Geometric Illusions Explained by Natural Scene Statistics" (Springer), Purves and colleague Catherine Howe explore why the brain generates geometric illusions.

Visual perception is a daunting task for the brain, explains Purves, because light streaming into the eye carries only ambiguous information about the environment.

Mystery of Antarctica's 15-Million Year-Old Lake

Casey Kazan
The Daily Galaxy
Tue, 04 Dec 2007 13:54 CST

©n/a

Researchers have thawed ice estimated to be perhaps a million years old or more from above Lake Vostok, an ancient lake that lies hidden more than two miles beneath the frozen surface of Antarctica using novel genomic techniques to determine how tiny, living "time capsules" survived the ages in total darkness, in freezing cold, and without food and energy from the sun.

Stars align for space station buildup

Irene Klotz
Reuters
Wed, 05 Dec 2007 07:14 CST

©REUTERS/NASA

A view of Earth from the International Space Station in an image from NASA TV taken November 20, 2007.

NASA hopes to launch its fourth shuttle mission in six months on Thursday, a pace that will keep the International Space Station on track for completion by 2010.

Roman Throne Discovered in Italian Ruins

Ariel David
Associated Press
Wed, 05 Dec 2007 04:21 CST

ROME - Remnants of the first known surviving Roman throne have been discovered in the lava and ash that buried the city of Herculaneum in the first century, archaeologists said Tuesday.

©AP Photo/Italian Culture Ministry, HO

Undated photo made available by the Italian Culture Ministry in Rome, showing part of a wooden throne dug out between October and November in the ancient southern Italian city of Herculaneum, near Pompeii, one of the Roman cities buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in the year 79. Decorated with ivory bas-reliefs depicting ancient deities, the wooden remains are the first known example of a Roman throne, archaeologists said Tuesday.

'Monster' Arctic Reptile Remains Found

Associated Press
Wed, 05 Dec 2007 04:02 CST

OSLO, Norway - Remains of a bus-sized prehistoric "monster" reptile found on a remote Arctic island may be a new species never before recorded by science, researchers said Tuesday.

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