Science & TechnologyS

Camera

Single molecule, one million times smaller than a grain of sand, pictured for first time

Claire Bates
DailyMail.co.uk
Sun, 30 Aug 2009 11:46 UTC
Image
© IBMThe delicate inner structure of a pentacene molecule has been imaged with an atomic force microscope
It may look like a piece of honeycomb, but this lattice-shaped image is the first ever close-up view of a single molecule.

Scientists from IBM used an atomic force microscope (AFM) to reveal the chemical bonds within a molecule.

'This is the first time that all the atoms in a molecule have been imaged,' lead researcher Leo Gross said.

The researchers focused on a single molecule of pentacene, which is commonly used in solar cells. The rectangular-shaped organic molecule is made up of 22 carbon atoms and 14 hydrogen atoms.

In the image above the hexagonal shapes of the five carbon rings are clear and even the positions of the hydrogen atoms around the carbon rings can be seen.

To give some perspective, the space between the carbon rings is only 0.14 nanometers across, which is roughly one million times smaller than the diameter of a grain of sand.
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Rocket

Chandrayaan-1: ISRO loses contact, claims mission 'over'


Times of India
Sat, 29 Aug 2009 00:26 UTC
Image
© Graphic courtesy Satish Dhawan Space Centre
Bangalore: Ten months after it was launched, India's maiden moon mission the ambitious Chandrayaan-1 came to an abrupt end on Saturday after ISRO lost communication with the spacecraft, cutting short the dream odyssey that was expected to last two years.

"The mission is definitely over. We have lost contact with the spacecraft," Project Director of the Chandrayaan-1 mission M Annadurai said.

However, he said: "It (Chandrayaan-1) has done its job technically...100 per cent. Scientifically also, it has done almost 90-95 percent of its job".

ISRO chief Madhavan Nair on Saturday virtually admitted that the Chandrayaan-I moon mission could be over, saying it is a "pretty difficult" situation.
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Better Earth

Balmy water once bathed Mars rock claimed to host life

David Shiga
New Scientist
Sat, 29 Aug 2009 21:44 UTC
Image
© NASAIn 1996, researchers suggested that microscopic rod-like structures in a Martian meteorite called ALH84001 were the fossilised remains of tiny bacteria. Although most researchers now doubt the claim, since the structures can be made inorganically, a new study suggests the rock was once bathed in water at the right temperature to support life as we know it.
A 1996 claim of fossilised microbes in a meteorite from Mars has yet to be confirmed, but a new analysis does suggest the rock's Martian environment had the conditions conducive to life.

Researchers led by David McKay of NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, caused a sensation 13 years ago when they proposed that a chunk of Mars rock found in Antarctica, called ALH 84001, contained possible signs of past life on the Red Planet, including complex carbon-based molecules and some microscopic objects shaped like bacteria.

But the claim was never widely accepted. Other scientists countered that the shapes were ambiguous and that the complex carbon-based molecules could have been produced without life, since they are also found in chunks of asteroids that fall to Earth as meteorites, for example.

And some argued that the carbon in the meteorite could have been deposited in very harsh conditions, involving water at more than 150 ยฐC. Even the hardiest known terrestrial microbes die above about 120 ยฐC.

But a new analysis suggests the water involved was cool enough to allow for life, which at least keeps open the possibility of fossilised life in the meteorite. The study was led by Paul Niles of NASA Johnson. Neither he nor any of the other team members were part of the 1996 life claim.
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Popcorn

Flashback NASA plans to move Earth away from the sun

Robin McKie
The Observer
Sun, 10 Jun 2001 12:07 UTC
Image
© Unknown
Scientists have found an unusual way to prevent our planet overheating: move it to a cooler spot.

All you have to do is hurtle a few comets at Earth, and its orbit will be altered. Our world will then be sent spinning into a safer, colder part of the solar system.

This startling idea of improving our interplanetary neighbourhood is the brainchild of a group of Nasa engineers and American astronomers who say their plan could add another six billion years to the useful lifetime of our planet - effectively doubling its working life.

'The technology is not at all far-fetched,' said Dr Greg Laughlin, of the NASA Ames Research Center in California. 'It involves the same techniques that people now suggest could be used to deflect asteroids or comets heading towards Earth. We don't need raw power to move Earth, we just require delicacy of planning and manoeuvring.'

Comment:
"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." Albert Einstein


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Chalkboard

New Study Suggests The Brain Predicts What Eyes In Motion Will See


Science Daily
Sat, 29 Aug 2009 12:20 UTC
When the eyes move, objects in the line of sight suddenly jump to a different place on the retina, but the mind perceives the scene as stable and continuous. A new study reports that the brain predicts the consequences of eye movement even before the eyes take in a new scene.

The study, "Looking ahead: The perceived direction of gaze shifts before the eyes move," published in the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology's peer-reviewed Journal of Vision, asked subjects to shift their eyes to a clock with a fast-moving hand and report the time on the clock when their eyes landed on it. The average reported time was 39 milliseconds before the actual time. As a control task, the clock moved instead of the eyes, and the reported arrival times averaged 27 milliseconds after the actual time.
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Magnify

Acoustic tweezers can position tiny objects

A'ndrea Elyse Messer
Penn State
Fri, 28 Aug 2009 23:16 UTC
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© Tony Jun Huang, Jinjie Shi, Penn StateDynamic patterning of polystyrene beads (diameter of 1.9 ฮผm) through "acoustic tweezers" technology. The wavelength of the applied standing acoustic wave was 200 micrometers and the power intensity was 2,000 watts per meter squared.
University Park -- Manipulating tiny objects like single cells or nanosized beads often requires relatively large, unwieldy equipment, but now a system that uses sound as a tiny tweezers can be small enough to place on a chip, according to Penn State engineers.

"Current methods for moving individual cells or tiny beads include such devices as optical tweezers, which require a lot of energy and could damage or even kill live cells," said Tony Jun Huang, assistant professor of engineering science and mechanics. "Acoustic tweezers are much smaller than optical tweezers and use 500,000 times less energy."

While optical tweezers are large and expensive, acoustic tweezers are smaller than a dime, small enough to fabricate on a chip using standard chip manufacturing techniques. They can also manipulate live cells without damaging or killing them.

Acoustic tweezers differ from eyebrow tweezers in that they position many tiny objects simultaneously and place them equidistant from each other in either parallel lines or on a grid. The grid configuration is probably the most useful for biological applications where researchers can place stem cells on a grid for testing or skin cells on a grid to grow new skin. This allows investigators to see how any type of cell grows.
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Sherlock

Archaeologists Unearth Lavish Macedonian Burial Site in Northern Greece

Nicholas Paphitis
Hartford Courant / The Associated Press
Fri, 28 Aug 2009 18:28 UTC
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© AP Photo/ Aristotle University of Thessalonik. HO) (AP / August 25, 2009)Remains of two large ancient silver vessels found in Aigai, northern Greece, are seen in this undated handout image provided by the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki on Friday, Aug. 28, 2009. One of the vases contained human remains, and archaeologists say the find was made close to a similar burial excavated last year, which may have belonged to an illegitimate son of Alexander the Great, the 4th century B.C. Macedonian warrior king whose empire stretched from modern Greece to India.
Archaeologists said Friday they have unearthed a lavish burial site at the seat of the ancient Macedonian kings in northern Greece, heightening a 2,300-year-old mystery of murder and political intrigue.

The find in the ruins of Aigai came a few meters (yards) from last year's remarkable discovery of what could be the bones of Alexander the Great's murdered teenage son, according to one expert.

Archaeologists are puzzled because both sets of remains were buried under very unusual circumstances: Although cemeteries existed near the site, the bones were taken from an unknown first resting place and re-interred, against all ancient convention, in the heart of the city.

Excavator Chrysoula Saatsoglou-Paliadeli said in an interview that the bones found this week were inside one of two large silver vessels unearthed in the ancient city's marketplace, close to the theater where Alexander's father, King Philip II, was murdered in 336 B.C.
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Attention

Obese People Have 'Severe Brain Degeneration'


Life Science
Tue, 25 Aug 2009 00:00 UTC
A new study finds obese people have 8 percent less brain tissue than normal-weight individuals. Their brains look 16 years older than the brains of lean individuals, researchers said today.

Those classified as overweight have 4 percent less brain tissue and their brains appear to have aged prematurely by 8 years.

The results, based on brain scans of 94 people in their 70s, represent "severe brain degeneration," said Paul Thompson, senior author of the study and a UCLA professor of neurology.
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Telescope

Death Rays From Space: How Bad Are They?

Michael Schirber
space.com
Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:00 UTC
death rays on to earth
© Unknown
Cosmic rays pour down on Earth like a constant rain. We don't much notice these high-energy particles, but they may have played a role in the evolution of life on our planet.

Some of the mass extinctions identified in the fossil record can be linked to an asteroid impact or increased volcanism, but many of the causes of those ancient die-offs are still open for debate.

"There may have been nearby astronomical goings-on that drastically increased the radiation on Earth," says Brian Fields from the University of Illinois.
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Butterfly

Facebook agrees with Canada on privacy controls

Charmaine Noronha
Yahoo! Tech
Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:00 UTC
Facebook agreed Thursday to give users more control over the information they share with outside applications like games and quizzes in response to concerns raised by Canadian privacy officials.

Currently, people who wish to use such software have to agree to share all their data with the application. For example, when a user signs up to take a quiz, the software developer could tap the user's biographical information, photos and hobbies, along with profiles and information on friends, even if such data aren't needed to take the quiz.

With the changes, the application developer will have to specify ahead of time which categories of data the software needs. Users will have the opportunity to hold back certain pieces of information when they approve access. A link also will be provided so users can get an explanation of what information is collected and why.
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