Mars will be transformed into a shirt-sleeve, habitable world for humanity before century's end, made livable by thawing out the coldish climes of the red planet and altering its now carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere.
How best to carry out a fast-paced, decade by decade planetary facelift of Mars - a technique called "terraforming" - has been outlined by Lowell Wood, a noted physicist and recent retiree of the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and a long-time Visiting Fellow of the Hoover Institution.
Lowell presented his eye-opening Mars manifesto at Flight School, held here June 20-22 at the Aspen Institute, laying out a scientific plan to "experiment on a planet we're not living on."
Science & Technology
The Hubble Space Telescope has imaged two of the largest known asteroids, revealing craters and other features that will soon be the targets of close-up observations by NASA's Dawn spacecraft.
Ceres is round, like a planet, and 590 miles (950 kilometers) wide. The rock, about the size of Texas, contains some 30 to 40 percent of all the mass in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
Thought to be a planet after its discovery in 1801, Ceres was later reclassified as an asteroid. But under the new and controversial planet definition that demoted Pluto, Ceres is now considered a dwarf planet.
Vesta, the other target, is irregularly shaped and about 330 miles (530 kilometers) wide-about the size of Arizona.
Ceres is round, like a planet, and 590 miles (950 kilometers) wide. The rock, about the size of Texas, contains some 30 to 40 percent of all the mass in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.
Thought to be a planet after its discovery in 1801, Ceres was later reclassified as an asteroid. But under the new and controversial planet definition that demoted Pluto, Ceres is now considered a dwarf planet.
Vesta, the other target, is irregularly shaped and about 330 miles (530 kilometers) wide-about the size of Arizona.
Investigators at St. Jude Children's Research Hospital have discovered how a single molecular "on switch" triggers gene activity that might cause effects ranging from learning and memory capabilities to glucose production in the liver.
The "on switch," a protein called CREB, is a transcription factor - a molecule that binds to a section of DNA near a gene and triggers that gene to make the specific protein for which it codes. CREB activates genes in response to a molecule called cAMP, which acts as a messenger for a variety of stimuli including hormones and nerve-signaling molecules called neurotransmitters.
The St. Jude team showed that each gene that responds to CREB chooses which co-factors, or helper molecules, CREB uses to activate that gene. This finding adds an important piece to the puzzle of how cells use CREB to activate specific genes in response to cAMP signals.
It also suggests that the current model scientists use to explain how CREB works is too simple, said Paul Brindle, Ph.D., associate member of the Department of Biochemistry at St. Jude. Brindle is senior author of a report on this work that appears in the June 20 issue of "The EMBO Journal."
The "on switch," a protein called CREB, is a transcription factor - a molecule that binds to a section of DNA near a gene and triggers that gene to make the specific protein for which it codes. CREB activates genes in response to a molecule called cAMP, which acts as a messenger for a variety of stimuli including hormones and nerve-signaling molecules called neurotransmitters.
The St. Jude team showed that each gene that responds to CREB chooses which co-factors, or helper molecules, CREB uses to activate that gene. This finding adds an important piece to the puzzle of how cells use CREB to activate specific genes in response to cAMP signals.
It also suggests that the current model scientists use to explain how CREB works is too simple, said Paul Brindle, Ph.D., associate member of the Department of Biochemistry at St. Jude. Brindle is senior author of a report on this work that appears in the June 20 issue of "The EMBO Journal."
Pioneering work to reduce the use of animals in scientific research - and ultimately remove them from laboratories altogether - has received a major boost at The University of Nottingham.
A laboratory devoted to finding effective alternatives to animal testing has been expanded and completely remodelled in a £240,000 overhaul designed to hasten the development of effective non-animal techniques.
Scientists hope that by developing the use of cell and tissue cultures, computer modelling, cell and molecular biology, epidemiology and other methods, they will one day be able to completely remove animals from medical research - while still maintaining crucial work to defeat diseases that affect millions of people.
The new FRAME Alternatives Laboratory, within the University's Medical School, is to be officially opened by Ed Balls MP, Economic Secretary to the Treasury, on July 6.
A laboratory devoted to finding effective alternatives to animal testing has been expanded and completely remodelled in a £240,000 overhaul designed to hasten the development of effective non-animal techniques.
Scientists hope that by developing the use of cell and tissue cultures, computer modelling, cell and molecular biology, epidemiology and other methods, they will one day be able to completely remove animals from medical research - while still maintaining crucial work to defeat diseases that affect millions of people.
The new FRAME Alternatives Laboratory, within the University's Medical School, is to be officially opened by Ed Balls MP, Economic Secretary to the Treasury, on July 6.
A sheet of molten rock roughly 10 miles thick spreads underneath much of the American Southwest, some 250 miles below Tucson, Ariz. From the surface, you can't see it, smell it or feel it.
But Arizona geophysicists Daniel Toffelmier and James Tyburczy detected the molten layer with a comparatively new and overlooked technique for exploring the deep Earth that uses magnetic eruptions on the sun.
But Arizona geophysicists Daniel Toffelmier and James Tyburczy detected the molten layer with a comparatively new and overlooked technique for exploring the deep Earth that uses magnetic eruptions on the sun.
If you want to peer into the furthest reaches of space, a regular telescope won't do. You need to harness the power of a massive galaxy to bend light from an even more distant galaxy - a gravitational lens. And a team of European astronomers have found one of the luckiest discoveries of all, an Einstein ring, where the lens and more distant galaxy line almost perfectly. Because of its unique shape, they're calling it "The Cosmic Horseshoe".
The discovery was made by more than a dozen astronomers from a handful of European universities, from England to Russia. They published their discovery in a research paper called The Cosmic Horseshoe: Discovery of an Einstein Ring around a Giant Luminous Red Galaxy, which has been submitted to the Astrophysics Journal.
The discovery was made by more than a dozen astronomers from a handful of European universities, from England to Russia. They published their discovery in a research paper called The Cosmic Horseshoe: Discovery of an Einstein Ring around a Giant Luminous Red Galaxy, which has been submitted to the Astrophysics Journal.
Archaeologists have discovered the 3,000-year-old mummy of a high priest to the god Amun in the southern city of Luxor, antiquities supremo Zahi Hawass told the official MENA news agency on Saturday.
The 18th Dynasty mummy of Sennefer was unearthed in a tomb in the Valley of the Kings -- one of the most famous archaeological sites in the world -- by a team from Britain's Cambridge University.
"The mummy was found in tomb 99 in the Valley of the Kings on the west bank of Luxor," Hawass said.
The 18th Dynasty mummy of Sennefer was unearthed in a tomb in the Valley of the Kings -- one of the most famous archaeological sites in the world -- by a team from Britain's Cambridge University.
"The mummy was found in tomb 99 in the Valley of the Kings on the west bank of Luxor," Hawass said.
Here's a story that just hit our radar screen, and we wanted to share the news immediately rather than wait for further facts to come out. In the online journal Terra Nova, a team of Italian researchers led by marine geologist Luca Gasperini reports on what may be the missing Tunguska impact crater.
NASA looked to Mother Nature for guidance on Friday as it sought for a second day to bring space shuttle Atlantis and seven astronauts home from a two-week-long mission.
The U.S. space agency said weather would decide if Atlantis lands at Kennedy Space Center in Florida or at back-up site Edwards Air Force Base in California.
The U.S. space agency said weather would decide if Atlantis lands at Kennedy Space Center in Florida or at back-up site Edwards Air Force Base in California.
Using mathematical theory, UC Irvine scientists have shed light on one of cancer's most troubling puzzles - how cancer cells can alter their own genetic makeup to accelerate tumor growth. The discovery shows for the first time why this change occurs, providing insight into how cancerous tumors thrive and a potential foundation for future cancer treatments.
UCI mathematicians Natalia Komarova, Alexander Sadovsky and Frederic Wan looked at cancer from the point of view of a tumor and asked: What can a tumor do to optimize its own growth? They focused on the phenomenon of genetic instability, a common feature of cancer in which cells mutate at an abnormally fast rate. These mutations can cause cancer cells to grow, or they can cause the cells to die.
The scientists found that cancerous tumors grow best when they are very unstable in early stages of development and become stable in later stages. In other words, tumors thrive when cancerous cells mutate to speed up malignant transformation, and then stay that way by turning off the mutation rate.
UCI mathematicians Natalia Komarova, Alexander Sadovsky and Frederic Wan looked at cancer from the point of view of a tumor and asked: What can a tumor do to optimize its own growth? They focused on the phenomenon of genetic instability, a common feature of cancer in which cells mutate at an abnormally fast rate. These mutations can cause cancer cells to grow, or they can cause the cells to die.
The scientists found that cancerous tumors grow best when they are very unstable in early stages of development and become stable in later stages. In other words, tumors thrive when cancerous cells mutate to speed up malignant transformation, and then stay that way by turning off the mutation rate.
Comment: Here is the conclusion of the study cited above: