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As gay couples race to the altar in California this week, scientists may have found an answer to the so-called gay paradox. Studies suggest that homosexuality is at least partly genetic. And although homosexuals have far fewer children than heterosexuals, so-called gay genes apparently survive in the population. A new study bolsters support for an intriguing idea: These same genes may increase fertility in women.
Particles called excitons that emit a flash of light as they decay could be used for a new form of computing better suited to fast communication, physicists at UC San Diego have demonstrated.
Integrated circuits, assemblies of transistors that are the building blocks for all electronic devices, currently use electrons to ferry the signals needed for computation. But almost all communications devices use light, or photons, to send signals. The need to convert the signalling language from electrons to photons limits the speed of electronic devices.
Leonid Butov, a professor of physics at UCSD, and his colleagues at UCSD and UC Santa Barbara have built several exciton-based transistors that could be the basis of a new type of computer, they report this week in an advance online version of the journal Science. The circuits they have assembled are the first computing devices to use excitons.
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| ©Leonid Butov/UCSD |
| An circuit that uses excitons for computing flashes light as the particles decay to release photons. |
Integrated circuits, assemblies of transistors that are the building blocks for all electronic devices, currently use electrons to ferry the signals needed for computation. But almost all communications devices use light, or photons, to send signals. The need to convert the signalling language from electrons to photons limits the speed of electronic devices.
Leonid Butov, a professor of physics at UCSD, and his colleagues at UCSD and UC Santa Barbara have built several exciton-based transistors that could be the basis of a new type of computer, they report this week in an advance online version of the journal Science. The circuits they have assembled are the first computing devices to use excitons.
A battle over science education could soon spill into the courts in Louisiana, where looming legislation would allow teachers to bring up scientific criticisms of evolution, global warming and other hot-button topics.
The state House approved the bill Wednesday on a 94-3 vote. Because the Senate already approved a near-identical measure, supporters expect the upper chamber to pass this bill also.
A spokeswoman for Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal would not say whether he will sign the bill, saying only that he will review it when it gets to his desk.
The state House approved the bill Wednesday on a 94-3 vote. Because the Senate already approved a near-identical measure, supporters expect the upper chamber to pass this bill also.
A spokeswoman for Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal would not say whether he will sign the bill, saying only that he will review it when it gets to his desk.
Summer Solstice: Northern summer and southern winter begin today, June 20th, at precisely 23:59 UT (7:59 pm EDT) when the sun ascends to its highest latitude on the celestial sphere: +23.5o. In the Northern Hemisphere, we have the longest day and shortest night of the year, and the reverse in the Southern Hemisphere. The seasons are changing--Happy Solstice!
Intense NLCs: Summer is the season for noctilucent clouds and this morning, right on cue, a wave of bright NLCs rolled over the British Isles. "The display appeared quite suddenly ... probably the brightest I've ever seen," reports Paul Evans of Larne, Northern Ireland. Nearby Maghaberry resident John C McConnell snapped this picture of the clouds at daybreak:
Intense NLCs: Summer is the season for noctilucent clouds and this morning, right on cue, a wave of bright NLCs rolled over the British Isles. "The display appeared quite suddenly ... probably the brightest I've ever seen," reports Paul Evans of Larne, Northern Ireland. Nearby Maghaberry resident John C McConnell snapped this picture of the clouds at daybreak:
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| ©John C McConnell |
Meet MIT professor of physics Maria Zuber. She's dynamic, intelligent, intense, and she's on a quest for the Grail.
No, not that Grail.
Zuber is the principal investigator of the Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory - "GRAIL" for short. It's a new NASA mission slated for launch in 2011 that will probe the moon's quirky gravity field. Data from GRAIL will help scientists understand forces at play beneath the lunar surface and learn how the moon, Earth and other terrestrial planets evolved.
"We're going to study the moon's interior from crust to core," says Zuber. "It's very exciting."
No, not that Grail.
Zuber is the principal investigator of the Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory - "GRAIL" for short. It's a new NASA mission slated for launch in 2011 that will probe the moon's quirky gravity field. Data from GRAIL will help scientists understand forces at play beneath the lunar surface and learn how the moon, Earth and other terrestrial planets evolved.
"We're going to study the moon's interior from crust to core," says Zuber. "It's very exciting."
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| ©NASA |
Hikers visiting the Kilauea Iki crater in Hawaii today walk along a mostly flat surface of sparsely vegetated basalt. It looks like parking lot asphalt, but in November and December 1959, it emitted the orange glow of newly erupted lava.
Now, a precision analysis of lava samples taken from the crater is giving scientists a new tool for reconstructing planetary origins. The results of the analysis, by the University of Chicago's Nicolas Dauphas and his associates, will be published in the June 20 issue of the journal Science.
A close examination of iron isotopes--the slight variations the element displays at the subatomic level--can tell planetary scientists more about the formation of crust than they previously thought, according to Dauphas and co-authors Fang-Zhen Teng of the University of Arkansas and Rosalind T. Helz of the U.S. Geological Survey.
Now, a precision analysis of lava samples taken from the crater is giving scientists a new tool for reconstructing planetary origins. The results of the analysis, by the University of Chicago's Nicolas Dauphas and his associates, will be published in the June 20 issue of the journal Science.
A close examination of iron isotopes--the slight variations the element displays at the subatomic level--can tell planetary scientists more about the formation of crust than they previously thought, according to Dauphas and co-authors Fang-Zhen Teng of the University of Arkansas and Rosalind T. Helz of the U.S. Geological Survey.
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| ©Steve Koppes |
| The sparsely vegetated Kilauea Iki Trail crosses the floor of a volcanic crater that was filled with molten lava in in late 1959. Today the University of Chicago's Nicolas Dauphas and his associates use samples collected from the crater to learn how minerals and elements separate as magma cools and hardens. |
The movements in the liquid part of the Earth's core are changing surprisingly quickly, and this affects the Earth's magnetic field, according to new research from DTU Space.
The Ørsted satellite's very precise measurements of the Earth's magnetic field over the past nine years have made it possible for Nils Olsen, Senior Scientist with DTU Space, and several German scientists, to map surprisingly rapid changes in the movements in the Earth's core. The results have just been published in the scientific journal Nature Geoscience.
The Ørsted satellite's very precise measurements of the Earth's magnetic field over the past nine years have made it possible for Nils Olsen, Senior Scientist with DTU Space, and several German scientists, to map surprisingly rapid changes in the movements in the Earth's core. The results have just been published in the scientific journal Nature Geoscience.
The sun's surface has been fairly blank for the last couple of years, and that has some worried that it may be entering another Maunder minimum, the sun's 50-year abstinence from sunspots, which some scientists have linked to the Little Ice Age of the 17th century.
A zebra's stripes, a seashell's spirals, a butterfly's wings: these are all examples of patterns in nature. The formation of patterns is a puzzle for mathematicians and biologists alike. How does the delicate design of a butterfly's wings come from a single fertilized egg? How does pattern emerge out of no pattern?
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| ©iStockphoto/Ismael Montero Verdu |
An analysis of meteor fragments that fell in Australia have revealed that DNA's ancestor probably formed in space and fell to earth.
Some of the raw materials for life, it seems, come from space, according to a new analysis of an Australian meteorite, writes National Geographic.
Some of the raw materials for life, it seems, come from space, according to a new analysis of an Australian meteorite, writes National Geographic.
