Science & TechnologyS


Telescope

Mysterious New Aurora On Saturn


Science Daily
Thu, 13 Nov 2008 17:32 UTC
Saturn has its own unique brand of aurora that lights up the polar cap, unlike any other planetary aurora known in our solar system. This odd aurora revealed itself to one of the infrared instruments on NASA's Cassini spacecraft.
aurora on Saturn
© NASA/JPL/University of ArizonaThis image of the northern polar region of Saturn shows both the aurora and underlying atmosphere, seen at two different wavelengths of infrared light as captured by NASA's Cassini spacecraft.

"We've never seen an aurora like this elsewhere," said Tom Stallard, a scientist working with Cassini data at the University of Leicester, England. Stallard is lead author of a paper that appears in the Nov. 13 issue of the journal Nature. "It's not just a ring of auroras like those we've seen at Jupiter or Earth. This aurora covers an enormous area across the pole. Our current ideas on what forms Saturn's aurora predict that this region should be empty, so finding such a bright aurora here is a fantastic surprise."
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Bizarro Earth

Simulation Shows What Would Happen If Magnitude 7.8 Earthquake Hit California


Science Daily
Thu, 13 Nov 2008 17:36 UTC
What would happen in California was hit by the Big One? New 3-D animations of a magnitude 7.8 earthquake scenario are now available to the public.*
San Andreas fault
© USGSStill image from a movie showing a view of southern California with the seismic waves radiating outward from the fault as the rupture propagates towards the northwest along the San Andreas fault.

Fourteen animations can be downloaded from the site in high definition format. The 3-D animations show, from the perspective of a several different Southern California locations, how intensely the ground would shake and shift during a very strong 7.8 earthquake with an epicenter on the southern end of the San Andreas Fault.

The science-based earthquake scenario, developed by USGS scientists and partners, is used for both the Great Southern California ShakeOut drill on November 13 and the statewide Golden Guardian 2008 emergency response exercise from November 13 - 18.
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Sun

Light Triggers New Code For Brain Cells


Science Daily
Thu, 13 Nov 2008 13:51 UTC
Brain cells can adopt a new chemical code in response to cues from the outside world, scientists working with tadpoles at the University of California, San Diego report in the journal Nature.
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Hourglass

Mysterious changes seen on distant dwarf planet

Rachel Courtland
New Scientist
Mon, 10 Nov 2008 23:20 UTC
The surface of the largest known 'plutoid' appears to have changed in recent years, according to new measurements of how elements are layered on its icy surface. But astronomers cannot explain the cause of the apparent change.

Eris is the largest known object beyond the orbit of Neptune, weighing nearly a third more than Pluto. It travels on an elongated path around the Sun that takes about 560 years to complete.

Astronomers think the distant world is covered by a layer of frozen methane and small amounts of nitrogen ice. When it comes near the Sun, these ices are thought to vaporise from sunlit portions of the surface and condense onto regions in shadow.

Eris is now near its farthest point from the Sun, so it is expected to be cold and inactive. But a new study suggests the dwarf planet's surface may have changed in the last few years.

"We're really scratching our heads," says author Stephen Tegler of Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff.
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Calculator

DOE's Jaguar Supercomputer Achieves Sustained Petaflop Performance

Shane McGlaun
DailyTech
Wed, 12 Nov 2008 20:49 UTC
Supercomputers are used in science and research to perform very complex calculations and simulations that are needed in scientific research. Research often involves modeling climate change and other projects.

The Cray XT Jaguar supercomputer installed at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) was upgraded recently to increase its performance significantly. The supercomputer is now capable of 1.64 petaflops per second. A petaflop is quadrillion mathematical calculations per second.

The upgrade makes the XT Jaguar the first petaflop system in the world dedicated to open research. One of the first calculations achieved a sustained performance of more than 1.3 petaflops.
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Info

Google Uses Searches to Track Flu's Spread

Miguel Helft
The New York Times
Tue, 11 Nov 2008 16:47 UTC
There is a new common symptom of the flu, in addition to the usual aches, coughs, fevers and sore throats. Turns out a lot of ailing Americans enter phrases like "flu symptoms" into Google and other search engines before they call their doctors.

That simple act, multiplied across millions of keyboards in homes around the country, has given rise to a new early warning system for fast-spreading flu outbreaks, called Google Flu Trends.

Tests of the new Web tool from Google.org, the company's philanthropic unit, suggest that it may be able to detect regional outbreaks of the flu a week to 10 days before they are reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In early February, for example, the C.D.C. reported that the flu cases had recently spiked in the mid-Atlantic states. But Google says its search data show a spike in queries about flu symptoms two weeks before that report was released. Its new service at google.org/flutrends analyzes those searches as they come in, creating graphs and maps of the country that, ideally, will show where the flu is spreading.
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Bulb

'Odourprinting' could be used to identify people

Matthew Moore
PLoS ONE
Mon, 10 Nov 2008 16:44 UTC
Human beings could one day be identified by our smells, according to research that shows individual "odourprints" cannot be masked by diet.

Every person has a unique fragrance, similar to a fingerprint or DNA sample, which could be used to create a database of human scents, scientists said.

Eating powerful foods such as chili or garlic may change how we smell, but it does not disguise our underlying genetically-determined aroma, tests on mice have shown. Creatures who were given strong-smelling foods were still recognised by their peers.

The signature smells may have evolved to help in choosing mates and marking out territories.

Jae Kwak, lead author of the study at Monell Chemical Senses Center in Philadelphia, said that the research suggested that "odourprinting" could soon have a practical use.
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Telescope

Meteor showers appearing back-to-back next week


The China Post
Wed, 12 Nov 2008 09:16 UTC
People in many areas of Taiwan will have the opportunity of witnessing two waves of rare and spectacular meteor showers are set to appear next week.

Astronomers at the Taipei Astronomical Museum said people will be able to see the upcoming meteor showers with naked eyes under fair weather conditions.
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Info

Researchers harvest energy from heart beat, open potential for active implanted devices

Rick Merritt
EETimes
Tue, 11 Nov 2008 02:42 UTC
A group of researchers has conducted a successful test of a tiny generator that can power an implanted device using energy from a heartbeat. Details of the test were presented in New Orleans at Scientific Sessions 2008, an event sponsored by the American Heart Association.

The generator showed the potential to act as an adjunct to traditional batteries to extend the life of implanted devices. In the test, it produced one-third of the energy required to power a conventional cardiac pacemaker.

The device was designed by the Self-Energizing Implantable Medical Microsystem (SIMM) project, a partnership launched in late 2006. Members include Zarlink Semiconductor, InVivo Technology Ltd., Perpetuum Ltd., Finsbury Orthopaedics and Odstock Medical.
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Info

Forced Evolution: Can We Mutate Viruses To Death?


Science Daily
Tue, 11 Nov 2008 23:23 UTC
It sounds like a science fiction movie: A killer contagion threatens the Earth, but scientists save the day with a designer drug that forces the virus to mutate itself out of existence. The killer disease? Still a fiction. The drug? It could become a reality thanks to a new study by Rice University bioengineers.
Computer-generated image of a virus
© iStockphoto/Chris DascherComputer-generated image of a virus.

The study, which is available online and slated for publication in the journal Physical Review E, offers the most comprehensive mathematical analysis to date of the mechanisms that drive evolution in viruses and bacteria. Rather than focusing solely on random genetic mutations, as past analyses have, the study predicts exactly how evolution is affected by the exchange of entire genes and sets of genes.
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