Science & Technology

It's raining viruses! Billions fall from the sky everyday

RT
Wed, 07 Feb 2018 15:38 UTC

Billions of viruses fall from the sky every day, according to new research which could explain why genetically identical viruses are often found in very different environments around the world.

In a scientific first, a team of international researchers recorded the number of viruses being swept up daily from the Earth's surface into the free troposphere - the lowest layer of the atmosphere, in which nearly all weather occurs.

The study, published in the International Society for Microbial Ecology Journal, describes the detection of hundreds of millions of viruses and bacteria raining down from the sky on a daily basis.

"Every day, more than 800 million viruses are deposited per square metre above the planetary boundary layer - that's 25 viruses for each person in Canada," study co-author and University of British Columbia virologist Curtis Suttle said in a statement.

Egypt: Rare dinosaur discovery could signal more finds

New York Post
Tue, 06 Feb 2018 09:57 UTC

© AP
A humerus or arm bone and a drawing of a Cretaceous period dinosaur displayed in a lab at Mansoura university, in Egypt.

A skeleton has been unearthed in Egypt's Western Desert, whose ancient sands have long helped preserve remains, but unlike most finds this one isn't a mummy - it's a dinosaur.

Researchers from Mansoura University in the country's Nile Delta discovered the new species of long-necked herbivore, which is around the size of a city bus, and it could be just the tip of the sand dune for other desert dinosaur discoveries.

"As in any ecosystem, if we went to the jungle we'll find a lion and a giraffe. So we found the giraffe, where's the lion?" said Hesham Sallam, leader of the excavation team and head of the university's Center for Vertebrate Paleontology.

Comment: Also See:

Another historic SpaceX launch: 'Triple-rocket' Falcon Heavy launches Tesla Roadster to Mars orbit - Two rockets synchronize vertical landings (VIDEO)

Eric Mack
c|net
Tue, 06 Feb 2018 10:46 UTC

© AP/John Raoux
A Falcon 9 SpaceX heavy rocket lifts off from pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Tuesday, Feb. 6, 2018. The Falcon Heavy has three first-stage boosters, strapped together, giving it a total of 27 engines.

Elon Musk's rocket company has sent its most powerful system yet, Falcon Heavy, on its way to space and into history. And the launch was unreal.

After more than two hours of delays due to high-altitude winds Tuesday, SpaceX and its founder and CEO Elon Musk lit up all 27 engines at the base of Falcon Heavy, the most powerful rocket launched from US soil since the Saturn V from NASA's Apollo days.

The demonstration launch has already been historic in multiple other ways.

For the first time ever, a pair of recycled boosters helped send a heavy payload to space. Only eight minutes later, those same two Falcon 9 side boosters returned and landed simultaneously at adjacent landing pads at Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, a sight unlike anything ever seen in spaceflight.

Ground-breaking DNA results on 10,000-year-old fossil reveals Brits were dark skinned, light-eyed and curly-haired

Kerry Lotzof
National History Museum
Wed, 07 Feb 2018 10:11 UTC

Ancient DNA from Cheddar Man, a Mesolithic skeleton discovered in 1903 at Gough's Cave in Cheddar Gorge, Somerset, has helped Museum scientists paint a portrait of one of the oldest modern humans in Britain.

Cheddar Man lived around 10,000 years ago and is the oldest almost complete skeleton of our species, Homo sapiens, ever found in Britain.

New research into ancient DNA extracted from the skeleton has helped scientists to build a portrait of Cheddar Man and his life in Mesolithic Britain.

Comment: Many studies have shown that 10,000 years ago the planet had experienced catastrophic events and climate upheaval:

NASA - 2 new 'potentially hazardous' asteroids careening towards Earth

Chris Mahon
Outer Places
Tue, 06 Feb 2018 10:17 UTC

Two previously unknown "potentially hazardous" asteroids will pass close to Earth this week, and once again we're reminded that a) NASA's ability to spot potentially cataclysmic near-Earth asteroids is currently limited to a few days' warning, and b) the area around Earth is swarming with dozens of giant space rocks, which are apparently stealthy enough to remain undetected until it's too late. Not an encouraging combination, especially after the two near-misses last month (YD7 and 2018 AJ).

Comment: It is a sobering thought but There is NO WAY TO TELL what might hit, and when. The world's observatories were focused on 2012 DA14 when, 6 hours before its scheduled fly-by, another large rock - from another direction - arrived out of nowhere to explode over Chelyabinsk, Russia!

The new asteroids are named 2018 CC and 2018 CB, and are between 9 and 38 meters in size. For comparison, a standard X-Wing is about 12.5 meters long, while the Space Shuttle is about 56 meters.

NASA deems any asteroid that comes within closer than 4.6 million miles of Earth to be "potentially hazardous." This might not sound close in terrestrial terminology but in terms of space distance, it's close enough to worry.

Comment: The skies have been noticeably active recently with an alarming number of space rocks:

New study shows low-intensity electrical stimulation of the brain can boost memory

Times of India
Sun, 04 Feb 2018 15:59 UTC

Tickling the brain with low-intensity electrical stimulation in a specific area can improve verbal memory, a study has revealed.

Researchers found that word recall was enhanced with the stimulation of the brain's lateral temporal cortex, the regions on the sides of the head by the temples and ears.

Patients recalled more words from a previously viewed list when low-amplitude electrical stimulation was delivered to the brain.

Major study finds mid-latitudes ozone layer not repairing as models predict

Andrew Masterson
Cosmos Magazine
Tue, 06 Feb 2018 15:05 UTC

© NASA/Science Photo Library
A coloured satellite map of atmospheric ozone in the southern hemisphere between mid-August and early October 1998. An ozone "hole" is seen over Antarctica.

Pointing to the recovery of the ozone layer as humanity's one great triumph of environmental remediation may have been premature, a new report warns.

A team led by Joanna Haigh of the Grantham Institute at Imperial College London, UK, has discovered that while ozone density is indeed improving at the poles, it is not doing so at lower latitudes, roughly between 60 degrees north and 60 degrees south.

That encompasses everywhere on the planet between the Shetland Islands off the north coast of Scotland to south of Tierra del Fuego at the foot of South America.

The researchers found that although the decrease in ozone concentration is not as great as that seen at the poles before the banning of ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) in 1987, the effects may be worse, because ultraviolet radiation is stronger in the region, and it contains most of the world's population.

Ozone is an inorganic molecule also known as trioxygen, or O₃. It is present in low concentrations throughout the Earth's atmosphere, but is found in much larger levels in the stratosphere, about 20 to 30 kilometres above the planet's surface, where it is formed by the interaction of O₂ with ultraviolet light from the sun.

99-million-year-old bird trapped in amber is the most complete bird fossil yet (PHOTOS)

John Pickrell
National Geographic
Fri, 02 Feb 2018 09:30 UTC

The amber containing the dinosaur-era bird had been polished partway through the body, allowing researchers to peer inside the skull and chest cavity and chemically map its exposed soft tissues.

The squashed remains of a small bird that lived 99 million years ago have been found encased in a cloudy slab of amber from Myanmar (Burma). While previous birds found in Burmese amber have been more visually spectacular, none of them have contained as much of the skeleton as this juvenile, which features the back of the skull, most of the spine, the hips, and parts of one wing and leg.

Comment: More Myanmar amber discoveries:

100 million year old arachnid trapped in amber is a missing link in spider evolution (PHOTOS)

Genelle Weule
ABC News
Mon, 05 Feb 2018 20:22 UTC

Ancient arachnid trapped in amber a missing link in spider evolution

A tiny arachnid discovered in 100-million-year-old amber looks just like a spider, except for one thing: its whip-like tail.

The amazing fossil fills a critical gap in the arachnid family tree between today's spiders and spider-like arachnids that lived before the dinosaurs, say two international teams of scientists.

They have described four male fossil arachnids exquisitely preserved in amber sourced from northern Myanmar in separate papers in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution.

Comment: How fascinating that the spider is considered so young and yet was found next to what are considered to be much older creatures. Also See:

100k times narrower than paper: Indian scientists say they created 'world's thinnest nanosheets'

RT
Mon, 05 Feb 2018 21:53 UTC

Indian scientists say they've managed to create the world's thinnest material, measuring 100,000 times narrower than a sheet of paper. It could be used for next-generation batteries and coatings which absorb ultraviolet rays.

The new material measures just one nanometer in thickness. To put its size into perspective, a human hair is about 80,000 nanometers wide, while the approximate diameter of human DNA is 2.5 nanometers.

It was created by researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, using Magnesium diboride, a compound of boron, The Hindu BusinessLine reported.

"We prepared boron-rich nanosheets by an extremely simple method, which merely involves dissolving a boride compound in water and letting it recrystallize for just the right duration of time," Dr. Kabeer Jasuja of the university's Department of Chemical Engineering told India Science Wire.

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Science & Technology

It's raining viruses! Billions fall from the sky everyday

Egypt: Rare dinosaur discovery could signal more finds

Another historic SpaceX launch: 'Triple-rocket' Falcon Heavy launches Tesla Roadster to Mars orbit - Two rockets synchronize vertical landings (VIDEO)

Ground-breaking DNA results on 10,000-year-old fossil reveals Brits were dark skinned, light-eyed and curly-haired

NASA - 2 new 'potentially hazardous' asteroids careening towards Earth

New study shows low-intensity electrical stimulation of the brain can boost memory

Major study finds mid-latitudes ozone layer not repairing as models predict

99-million-year-old bird trapped in amber is the most complete bird fossil yet (PHOTOS)

100 million year old arachnid trapped in amber is a missing link in spider evolution (PHOTOS)

100k times narrower than paper: Indian scientists say they created 'world's thinnest nanosheets'

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