You've heard of a jellyfish sting, maybe you've even experienced one. But have you ever seen one?
When a jellyfish actually stings someone or something, the action is often too small and too fast to see with the naked eye. This video, however, captures a real-life sting in slow motion!
Destin from SmarterEveryDay visited toxinologist Dr. Jamie Seymour, one of the team members present when Steve Irwin, "The Crocodile Hunter," was fatally stung by a stingray in 2006.
At James Cook University in Australia, researchers used a microscope and high-speed camera to discover what exactly happens when a jellyfish, or in this specific case, an anemone, stings you. They have wanted to capture the process on camera for years, but only now has the technology been able to do so.
Science & Technology
© Ethan Miller / Getty Images / AFP
A solar receiver and boiler on top of a tower is seen between the backs of heliostats reflecting sunlight towards it at the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the Mojave Desert in California near Primm, Nevada.
A solar receiver and boiler on top of a tower is seen between the backs of heliostats reflecting sunlight towards it at the Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System in the Mojave Desert in California near Primm, Nevada.
According to the Associated Press, workers at the BrightSource Energy plant in the Mojave Desert even have a nickname for the singed birds, which burn up into smoke when they fly into heavily concentrated sun rays: "Streamers." When US Fish and Wildlife officials observed the situation in 2013, they witnessed an average of one "streamer" every couple of minutes.
With estimates ranging from 1,000 dead birds a year to 28,000, the agency is seeking an official death toll for one year of operation at the plant. BrightSource is responsible for delivering the lower number, while the higher one was projected by the Center for Biological Diversity. For now, the agency is also calling on the committee in charge of approving new projects to delay BrightSource's latest application.
Opened in February, the plant has been powering 140,000 homes with the electricity it generates. The facility is composed of three 40-story towers, which produce steam and rotate turbines after the water contained inside is boiled by the solar rays reflected onto it by some 300,000 mirrors.
Speaking with the AP, Garry George of the California chapter of the Audubon Society called the bird deaths "alarming."
© Tsewang Tashi, M.D.
This image depicts Tibetan locals living at 4,300m.
This image depicts Tibetan locals living at 4,300m.
"These findings help us understand the unique aspects of Tibetan adaptation to high altitudes, and to better understand human evolution," said Josef Prchal, M.D., senior author and University of Utah professor of internal medicine.
For his research, Prchal needed Tibetans to donate blood, from which he could extract their DNA, a task that turned out to be more difficult than he ever imagined. It took several trips to Asia, meeting with Chinese officials and representatives of exiled Tibetans in India, to get the necessary permissions to recruit subjects for the study. But he quickly learned that official documents would not be enough. Wary of foreigners, the Tibetans refused to participate.
© NASA
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, Expedition 32 flight engineer, poses for a photo after undergoing a blood draw in space
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, Expedition 32 flight engineer, poses for a photo after undergoing a blood draw in space
But a NASA study published in the Journal of Interferon & Cytokine Research has taken a small step for man's journey to distant planets. NASA scientists analyzed blood samples taken before, during, and after missions to the International Space Station, looking for indications of how astronauts' immune systems handle the unusual environment. The results indicate that things get a little bit wonky.
© Reuters / Joshua Lott
Called "Five-O," the app has been designed specifically for mobile phones and encourages users to record and document every encounter they have with police officers. By doing so, users can submit ratings for local law enforcement, allowing people to see how each area's police departments stack up in terms of civil behavior.
Speaking with Business Insider, 16-year-old Ima Christian of Decatur, Georgia, said her siblings came up with the idea after regularly hearing reports of police abuse around the United States.
"We've been hearing about the negative instances in the news, for instance most recently the Michael Brown case, and we always talk about these issues with our parents," she said. "They always try to reinforce that we should focus on solutions. It's important to talk about the issues, but they try to make us focus on finding solutions. That made us think why don't we create an app to help us solve this problem."
© www.natureworldnews.com
The dodder plant is a parasite that attacks its host.
The dodder plant is a parasite that attacks its host.
As described in a study recently published in the journal Science, weed science expert Jim Westwood of Virginia Tech took a close look at how the parasitic plant called a dodder attacks his host.
© www.wikipedy.com
The dodder sends suckers called haustoria into a nettle stem to tap its host's tissues.
The dodder sends suckers called haustoria into a nettle stem to tap its host's tissues.
Researchers had done previous work that found that when the dodder first sinks its "fang" into its victim, it also begins to transport RNA - a sort-of DNA translator - between it and its host.
Comment: We've all had relationships like this! In fact, psychopaths, in today's society, operate on the same premise: speak with a silver tongue, sweet-talk the victim, lower defenses, suck the life force out, leave a mess and move on. However, once you learn to recognize the mojo, you can be the one that walks away.
© ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team
Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko imaged by Rosetta's OSIRIS narrow angle camera on 7 August from a distance of 104 km.
Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko imaged by Rosetta's OSIRIS narrow angle camera on 7 August from a distance of 104 km.
Here are three surprising facts we've already learned:
"Russia has a great space program. Currently, as a private entity, we don't have any collaboration but it doesn't mean we might not in the future," Diane Murphy of B612 told RIA Novosti on Friday. "We have not had discussions with any Russian entity, not that we might not want to."
The B612 Foundation is working towards the launch of its Sentinal Mission, a deep space telescope that will be capable of identifying asteroids that may threaten Earth. In late July, as a result of political tensions over Ukraine and Crimea, the governments of Russia and the United States called off an agreement signed last September for increased cooperation in nuclear and energy-related science research. The agreement included defense from asteroids.
© Drafthouse Films/Everett/REX
Robin Wright is turned into a digital scan in Ari Folman's The Congress.
Robin Wright is turned into a digital scan in Ari Folman's The Congress.
Princess Bride fans needn't panic just yet, though. The scene is from Ari Folman's new film The Congress - a trippy, dystopian vision of a future in which artifice has displaced reality. But it is a future that may be closer than we think.
Virtual characters in films are nothing new. The first - a computer-generated knight - appeared in The Young Sherlock in 1985, and since then we've seen everything from artificial extras in Titanic to detailed motion-capture characters such as Gollum in The Lord of the Rings. And while some virtual human faces still creep us out (Polar Express, anyone?), a few have graced our screens without us even realising. Brad Pitt's reverse-ageing process in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, for example, was created not with prosthetics but with computer-generated imagery (CGI).
© ESA/P. Carril
Now, the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space has taken a step toward combating the asteroid threat. A special U.N. action team on near-Earth objects (NEOs) has recommended the creation of an International Asteroid Warning Network (IAWN), which is designed to gather and analyze NEO data and provide timely warnings to national authorities if a potentially hazardous NEO were to threaten Earth.
A number of components of an IAWN already exist and are working together. Now, the objective is to pool together the expertise of the world's many relevant scientific organizations, to discover and track objects and generate early warnings of potential impacts.
Comment: The Five-O app is available for Android devices here.