UPIWed, 23 May 2007 12:49 UTC
U.S. astronomers have determined flares seen after a gamma-ray burst are apparently a continuation of the burst itself.
Gamma-ray bursts release in seconds the same amount of energy the sun will emit during its expected 10 billion-year lifetime. That energy comes from the core of a massive star collapsing to form a black hole or neutron star.
There's no big countdown billboard or sign in Times Square to denote it, but Wednesday, May 23, 2007, represents a major demographic shift, according to scientists from North Carolina State University and the University of Georgia: For the first time in human history, the earth's population will be more urban than rural.
Working with United Nations estimates that predict the world will be 51.3 percent urban by 2010, the researchers projected the May 23, 2007, transition day based on the average daily rural and urban population increases from 2005 to 2010. On that day, a predicted global urban population of 3,303,992,253 will exceed that of 3,303,866,404 rural people.
Though the date is highly symbolic, the researchers - Dr. Ron Wimberley, Distinguished Professor of Sociology at NC State; Dr. Libby Morris, director of the Institute of Higher Education at the University of Georgia; and Dr. Gregory Fulkerson, a sociologist at NC State - advise avoiding the urge to interpret this demographic transition to mean that the urban population has greater importance than the rural.
Rebecca Morelle
BBCThu, 24 May 2007 09:47 UTC
A genetic study has shed light on the mystery of how fish made the move from water to land millions of years ago.
Previous research had suggested that fish had made an abrupt genetic jump to acquire land-friendly limbs.
But a US team has now shown this event was not an evolutionary novelty and the transition was far more gradual.
The study, published in the journal Nature, follows the recent discovery of a fossil described as showing the "missing link" between fins and limbs.
With gas prices tipping the $3-a-gallon mark, many are looking at other ways to fill the tank. Ethanol made from corn is one promising substitute. Another idea is to use the inedible parts of corn plants-called biomass.
Comment: Though ethanol may be able to reduce the price at the pump, it will also mean the death of millions
due to hunger.
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| ©AP Photo/Greek Culture Ministry
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| Miniature pottery vases and statuettes are seen buried in a ritual pit at an ancient shrine discovered in Orchomenos..
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ATHENS, Greece - Archaeologists in central Greece have discovered thousands of miniature clay pots and statuettes in the ruins of an ancient sanctuary possibly dedicated to the Three Graces, officials said on Wednesday. In volume, it is one of the richest finds in recent years.
Florida Gov. Charlie Crist Monday signed into law a bill requiring that all voting districts in the state replace most touch-screen electronic voting machines with optical scan machines.
Washington is a city of lies, so perhaps it is no surprise that those in the nation's capital wishing to expose the truth have been fooled by lies about a polygraph's usefulness.
According to White House spokesman Tony Snow, earlier this month, the White House will consider administering a polygraph to Clinton-era National Security Adviser Sandy Berger, who pleaded guilty to lifting documents from the National Archives in 2002 and 2003. Some say the documents, now nowhere to be found, might point to failures of the Clinton administration to uncover the 9/11 terrorist plot.
Politics aside (it was 18 Republican congressmen who wrote to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales in January requesting that Berger take a polygraph, but that was before allegations of certain falsehoods on Gonzales' part made the request a little awkward), the polygraph is no way to get to the truth.
Dave Mosher
Space.comWed, 23 May 2007 06:58 UTC
Physicists are now foretelling the death of cosmology, or the study of our universe, as we know it. Thankfully, cosmologists won't be jobless for a couple trillion years.
The universe is rapidly expanding--perhaps not rapidly enough to rip to shreds, but enough that distant galaxies will eventually be moving away faster than the speed of light. This much has been known for decades.
Once all these galaxies blink out of existence, scientists ask in an upcoming issue of The Journal of Relativity and Gravitation, how will future intelligent beings study space if the human race's knowledge is long gone? Will they be able to figure out if the Big Bang happened? Or rediscover relativity?
Rainbows may be the key to identifying habitable planets around nearby stars, according to a researcher who says light scattering could indicate the presence of liquid water.
Associate Professor Jeremy Bailey of the Australian Centre for Astrobiology at Macquarie University says looking at the way light bounces off droplets in a planet's atmosphere would be a sensitive indicator of liquid water in its clouds.
Bailey presents his case for using polarisation, the same property of light that produces rainbows, to look for liquid water in the latest issue of the journal Astrobiology.
"A rainbow is caused by light that is reflected in a water droplet that is scattered at a particular angle," he says.
"This is about Wall Street, this is about making the electric grid for the financial capital of the world ... more defensible against potential problems," including a terrorist attack, Jay M. Cohen, the agency's undersecretary for science and technology, told The Associated Press.
The agency last week signed a $1.7 million contract with American Superconductor Corp. to make high temperature cables, which will be used by New York utility Consolidated Edison Inc. under the terms of a separate contract.
Financial terms of the deal between the two companies were not disclosed, but Con Ed and American Superconductor are together providing one third of the funding for the project, according to the government.
The "secure super grids" use high-temperature superconductor wires and power cables to increase power while maintaining the ability to suppress surges, American Superconductor said.
Comment: Though ethanol may be able to reduce the price at the pump, it will also mean the death of millions due to hunger.