Science & TechnologyS


Coffee

Milestone for unique bionic hand


BBC News
Wed, 18 Jul 2007 17:14 UTC
A highly functional bionic hand which was invented by a Scottish NHS worker has gone on the market.

The thumb and fingers can move and grip just like a human hand and are controlled by the patient's mind and muscles.

©BBC
The hand is controlled by the user's mind and muscles.

It was invented by David Gow and was designed and built by Touch Bionics, which is based in Livingston.
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Magnify

All pharaohs to be DNA tested

Michelle Nichols
ABC News in Science
Wed, 18 Jul 2007 07:23 UTC
All of Egypt's royal mummies will get identity checks after scientists found one was wrongly identified as a pharaoh, Egypt's chief archaeologist says.

Dr Zahi Hawass, secretary-general of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, says he will use computed tomography, or CT scanning, and DNA to test more than 40 royal mummies at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

In June, the mummy long thought to have been King Tuthmosis I was found to be a young man who died from an arrow wound, Hawass says. History shows Tuthmosis I died in his 60s.

"I am now questioning all the mummies," he says. "We have to check them all again.

"The new technology now will reconfirm or identify anything for us."
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Key

3,000 year old rare Mycenaean grave unearthed in southern Greece


Reuters
Mon, 16 Jul 2007 06:52 UTC
ATHENS - Roadworks in southern Greece have unearthed a rare Mycenaean grave thought to be well over 3,000 years old and containing important burial offerings including a gold chalice, the culture ministry said on Monday.
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Ark

130-Year-Old Outhouses Yield Treasures


Associated Press
Tue, 17 Jul 2007 23:13 UTC
VENTURA, Calif. - The spot where a pair of outhouses stood 130 years ago is proving to be a treasure trove for archaeologists who braved the lingering smell in the dirt to uncover some 19th Century artifacts _ and a mystery.
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Display

Amazing! Puzzle expert takes a crack at Stonehenge riddle

Chris Hooper
Salisbury Journal
Thu, 12 Jul 2007 17:34 UTC
Through painstaking analysis of the structural properties of Stonehenge, Mr Bedlam has come up with a theory that the stones we now see standing alone on the site were once the foundation blocks of a giant wooden structure.

©Bruce Bedlam, 2007
Bruce Bedlam: Most people believe that Stonehenge is a free standing structure with alignment's to the sun, moon and stars. I think it was a building! I can not imagine the people who built Stonehenge standing in the rain!

A puzzle expert believes he may have solved one of the greatest mysteries in the history of mankind by coming up with a computer programme showing how Stonehenge was built.
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Coffee

Ancient settlement discovered in Egypt


AFP
Tue, 17 Jul 2007 17:01 UTC
A settlement dating back to the time of the pyramid builders was discovered in Egypt's western desert, the first find of its kind there, Egypt's Supreme Council for Antiquities (SCA) said on Monday.

"A joint Egypt-Czech archaeological mission found a city dating to the Old Kingdom (2687-2191 BC) in the Garat al-Abyad region in Bahariya," SCA chief Zahi Hawass said, referring to an isolated oasis 400km south-west of Cairo.
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Telescope

Debris from meteorite that hit Sudbury found in Minnesota

Denis St. Pierre
The Sudbury Star
Tue, 17 Jul 2007 12:36 UTC
A Laurentian University geologist says he is intrigued, but skeptical of a report that rock from the meteorite that created the Sudbury basin has been found 700 kilometres away in the United States.
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Ark

Archaeologists Find Old Mask in Bulgaria


Associated Press
Mon, 16 Jul 2007 23:20 UTC


©AP Photo/Petar Petrov
A Bulgarian archeologist holds up an ancient Thracian gold artifact at a Thracian tomb near the village of Topolchane

SOFIA, Bulgaria - A 2,400-year-old golden mask that once belonged to a Thracian king was unearthed in a timber-lined tomb in southeastern Bulgaria, archaeologists said Monday.
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Telescope

August Meteor Shower Will Be 'A Great Show'

Robert Roy Britt
Space.com
Thu, 12 Jul 2007 15:01 UTC
The annual Perseid meteor shower is expected to put on a great show this year, peaking in mid-August with a display of dozens of shooting stars each hour.

The Moon will be out of the way, leaving dark skies for good viewing as Earth plunges through an ancient stream of comet debris. Little bits, most no larger than sand grains, will vaporize in Earth's atmosphere, creating sometimes-dramatic "shooting stars."

Comment: See also:

Perseids to Storm August 11?

Science and History of the Perseid Meteor Shower

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Magic Wand

Forest Fire Leads to Ancient Meteorite Discovery


Space.com / AP
Mon, 16 Jul 2007 13:03 UTC
A forest fire has led to a chance discovery of debris from the impact of a meteorite 1.85 billion years ago, more than 450 miles away at Sudbury, Ontario.

Geologists had scheduled a field trip in May along the Gunflint Trail in northeastern Minnesota, but most areas they wanted to explore were closed because of a wildfire that charred more than 118 square miles.

Geologist Mark Jirsa of the Minnesota Geological Survey went up the trail to scout new locations and, in a spot he had never visited before, stumbled across debris now linked to the Sudbury impact.

That impact created a crater more than 150 miles across, scattering rock and dust over nearly a million square miles.

"It's fairly dark rock,'' Jirsa said. "They look like concrete, but in this concrete you would throw pieces of rock of all sizes and shapes and in all possible orientations.''
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