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First Direct Recording Made of Mirror Neurons in Human Brain


Science Daily
Tue, 13 Apr 2010 14:57 UTC
Mirror Neuron
© University of California - Los AngelesMirror neurons, many say, are what make us human.
Mirror neurons, many say, are what make us human. They are the cells in the brain that fire not only when we perform a particular action but also when we watch someone else perform that same action.

Neuroscientists believe this "mirroring" is the mechanism by which we can "read" the minds of others and empathize with them. It's how we "feel" someone's pain, how we discern a grimace from a grin, a smirk from a smile.

Problem was, there was no proof that mirror neurons existed -- only suspicion and indirect evidence. Now, reporting in the April edition of the journal Current Biology, Dr. Itzhak Fried, a UCLA professor of neurosurgery and of psychiatry and biobehavioral sciences, Roy Mukamel, a postdoctoral fellow in Fried's lab, and their colleagues have for the first time made a direct recording of mirror neurons in the human brain.
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Telescope

Baby stars in the Rosette cloud


European Space Agency
Mon, 12 Apr 2010 18:50 UTC
Image
© ESA/PACS & SPIRE Consortium/HOBYS Key Programme ConsortiaThe Rosette molecular cloud, seen by Herschel.
Herschel's latest image reveals the formation of previously unseen large stars, each one up to ten times the mass of our Sun. These are the stars that will influence where and how the next generation of stars are formed. The image is a new release of 'OSHI', ESA's Online Showcase of Herschel Images.

The Rosette Nebula resides some 5,000 light years from Earth and is associated with a larger cloud that contains enough dust and gas to make the equivalent of 10,000 Sun-like stars. The Herschel image shows half of the nebula and most of the Rosette cloud. The massive stars powering the nebula lie to the right of the image but are invisible at these wavelengths. Each colour represents a different temperature of dust, from - 263ºC (only 10ºC above absolute zero) in the red emission to - 233ºC in the blue.
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Magnify

Deciphering the mysteries of an ancient seafloor goliath

Kristin Ludwig
Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Management International
Mon, 12 Apr 2010 18:40 UTC
Image
© John Beck, IODP/TAMUCurator Chad Broyles (IODP-USIO/Texas A&M University; back to camera), Expedition Project Manager and Staff Scientist Jörg Geldmacher (IODP-USIO/Texas A&M University), Co-Chief Scientist Takashi Sano (National Museum of Nature and Science, Tokyo, Japan), and Co-Chief Scientist Will Sager (Texas A&M University, USA) discuss a core recovered from Shatsky Rise.
The eruptions of "supervolcanoes" on Earth's surface have been blamed for causing mass extinctions, belching large amounts of gases and particles into the atmosphere, and re-paving the ocean floor. The result? Loss of species, increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and changes in ocean circulation. Despite their global impact, the origin and triggering mechanism of these eruptions remain poorly understood. New data collected during a recent Integrated Ocean Drilling Program (IODP) scientific research expedition in the Pacific Ocean may provide clues to unlocking this unsolved mystery in Earth's geologic record.

In fall 2009, an international team of scientists participating in IODP Expedition 324 "Shatsky Rise Formation," drilled five sites in the ocean floor to study the origin of the 145 million-year-old Shatsky Rise volcanic mountain chain. Located approximately 1500 kilometers (930 miles) east of Japan, Shatsky Rise measures roughly the size of California. This underwater mountain chain represents one of the largest supervolcanoes in the world: the top of Shatsky Rise lies three and a half kilometers (about two miles) below the sea surface, while its base plunges to nearly six kilometers (four miles) below the surface. Shatsky Rise is composed of layers of hardened lava, with individual lava flows that are up to 23 meters (75 feet) thick
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Pistol

New Technique Turns T-Shirts into Body Armor

Michelle Bryner
TechNewsDaily
Mon, 12 Apr 2010 18:33 UTC
Those bulky, bulletproof vests could become a thing of the past. Their replacement: Your T-shirt, but with a special coating.

Bulletproofing can be done in one of two ways. The first, old-school approach relies on hard plates of metal or ceramic, which deflect oncoming bullets. A more elegant way, perhaps, is the use of a network of fibers - the approach taken by Kevlar - to "catch" the bullet, much like a hockey goalie catches a flying puck.

Kevlar has made its mark in body armor, as the technology is used in vests, helmets, and other gear for law enforcement, corrections officers and the military. However, it's expensive, which limits its use to those who can drop hundreds of dollars for protection.
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Cloud Lightning

Sun Rules Earth's Mysterious "Night Shining" Clouds


New Scientist
Mon, 12 Apr 2010 06:00 UTC
Noctilucent CLouds
© FLPAMysterious 'night shining' clouds have a solar controller.
The comings and goings of noctilucent or "night shining" clouds in the extreme upper atmosphere may be linked to the sun's rotation.

Noctilucent clouds appear about 80 kilometres above the Earth in each hemisphere's summer. Their extent and brightness varies over days, weeks and years, but no one knows why.

Now Charles Robert of the University of Bremen, Germany, and colleagues think they have an answer. By measuring changes in the light reflected from the clouds, they found that the clouds appear to wax and wane in prevalence over a 27-day cycle. As the sun takes 27 days to rotate around its axis, the team suggest a link (Journal of Geophysical Research, DOI: 10.1029/2009jd012359).
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Info

Magnetic poles may once have been at equator

Jeff Hecht
New Scientist
Mon, 12 Apr 2010 17:07 UTC
Magnetic Poles
© Los Alamos National LaboratoryMagnetic poles haven't always been here.
Did the Earth's magnetic poles once lie near the equator? That could explain puzzling changes in the magnetism of rocks millions of years ago.

The Earth's magnetic poles are aligned along roughly the same axis as its rotational poles. Geologists have assumed this was also true in the past, so they use volcanic rocks, which when they formed took on an imprint of the direction and strength of the Earth's magnetic field, to infer the rocks' original latitude and to trace continental motions over the past billion years.

But doing this for rocks in North America and eastern Europe is turning up a conundrum. In both regions, there appear to be rocks that were at the equator at some points between 550 and 600 million years ago and near the poles for other parts of this time period.
There appear to be rocks that moved from the poles to the equator several times in 50 million years.
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Sherlock

Greco-Roman Mummy, Tombs Uncovered in Egypt Oasis


Reuters
Mon, 12 Apr 2010 10:16 UTC
Image
© Agence France-PresseThe one metre long gypsum sarcophagus portrays a woman dressed in Roman robes and contains a mummified woman or girl
Egyptian archaeologists carrying out excavations at the site of a planned youth center have found 14 tombs dating back to the third century BC, including one with a female mummy adorned with jewelry.

The Greco-Roman tombs, in Bahariya Oasis, 300 km (190 miles) southwest of Cairo, were discovered during probes that indicated they may be part of a much larger necropolis, Egypt's Culture Ministry said in a statement Monday.

A 97-cm (38-inch) tall female mummy, found in the stair-lined interior of one of the rock-hewn tombs, was cast in colored plaster inlaid with jewelry and eyes.

Archaeologists, who dug at the site ahead of the planned construction of a youth center, found the tombs contained other treasures as well. The area has now been turned over to Egypt's antiquities authority.
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Battery Breakthrough Technology Could Power Homes for Pennies Per Kilowatt Hour

David Gutierrez
NaturalNews
Mon, 12 Apr 2010 00:00 UTC
Image
© Ashley FranscellCeramatec President Ashok V. Joshi and his team John Gordon (from left to right), John Watkins, Grover Coors and Anthony Nickens at Ceramatec in Salt Lake City.
Scientists with Ceramatec, the research and development arm of CoorsTek, say that they have developed a new kind of deep-storage battery that, when coupled with on-site power generation mechanisms like wind and solar electricity, could power an entire home for only pennies per kilowatt hour.

Most wind and solar-powered homes remain connected to the national electric grid, largely because it is difficult and expensive to install batteries large enough to keep the house powered through low wind or sun periods. Ceramatec's new battery, however, uses solid materials to store between 20 and 40 kilowatt hours of electricity at temperatures of only 90 degrees Celsius. In contrast, most high-density batteries use liquids heated to dangerous temperatures of roughly 600 degrees.

The batteries are currently being tested to see how many charge-discharge cycles they can support throughout their lifetimes. Currently the batteries have made it through 200 and are still going strong, and the scientists estimate a lifespan of 3,650 cycles -- or one cycle every day for 10 years. Since each battery costs approximately $2,000, this would translate into a cost of only three cents per kilowatt hour -- in contrast to the eight cents per kilowatt hour charged by the typical electric company.
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Pharoah

Scientists Discover 'Blue' Mystery of Ancient Egypt

Helena Zhu
Epoch Times
Sun, 11 Apr 2010 17:13 UTC
Egyptian Pottery
© Colin A. Hope/Monash UniversityPottery decorated in a distinctive pale blue color was in vogue in New Kingdom Egypt, particularly during the reign of Amenhotep III and Ramesses II.
While most Egyptian pottery was undecorated, during the New Kingdom - Egypt's Golden Age - a variety of pottery was elegantly decorated in a distinctive pale blue.

The pottery has been found at many sites in Egypt, the Middle East, and Sudan, with most of it being in Egypt. Given the restricted use of the blue paint, it probably was available only to artisans associated with major royal residences.

To obtain an uncontaminated sample of the blue paint for chemical analysis, Dr. Jennifer Smith, who is an associate professor at Washington University in St. Louis (WUSTL), Dr. Colin Hope, associate professor and director of the Center for Archaeology and Ancient History at Monash University in Australia, and Paul Kucera, a doctoral student at Monash University, belly-crawled through a long, narrow tunnel at a desert oasis. The tunnel was carved in the rock by Egyptians at the time of the pharaohs.

Although some Egyptian sculptures were colored by adding ground copper to ground quartz, the pale blue pottery was thought to be decorated by cobalt.
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Camera

Shuttle Cloud


Space Weather
Sat, 10 Apr 2010 21:51 UTC
Image
© Howard CohenPhoto details: Canon EOS 5D Mark II, 190 seconds, ISO 800
On April 5th, space shuttle Discovery blasted off from Cape Canaveral at the crack of dawn. The shuttle began its journey in darkness--the sun was still below the horizon--but moments after it left the pad, Discovery burst into high altitude sunlight and proceeded to put on an extraordinary show. University of Florida astronomy professor Howard Cohen describes what he saw from his home in Gainesville, more than 130 miles from the Cape.

"The launch began in typical fashion- a brilliant, yellowish glow rising out of the southwest gradually morphing into a white contrail. Impatient observes might have thought that was it. But then an amazing contrail, the likes of which I have never seen before, rapidly appeared around and following the shuttle's path. For a short time it resembled a comet streaking across the dawn sky." He took this picture using his Canon EOS 5D.

Comment: For more information, see SOTT's Best of the Web Article: Cosmic Climate Change: Space Shuttle Discovery - STS 131 leaves spectacular dragon trails in the sky

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