Science & TechnologyS


Key

Hubble telescope's high-tech camera shuts down


Reuters
Tue, 30 Jan 2007 07:24 UTC
The newest, most high-tech camera aboard the Hubble Space Telescope stopped working last weekend and two of its main capabilities are unlikely to recover, NASA officials said on Monday.

The telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys, meant to take images of huge swaths of the sky, shut down after an electrical short caused a power fuse to fail, the U.S. space agency's Preston Burch said on a telephone news briefing.
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Key

Hot New Mystery Surrounds Saturn

Robert Roy Britt
Space.com
Mon, 29 Jan 2007 15:28 UTC
For years astronomers have known that the upper atmospheres of Saturn and other giant planets are hotter than can be explained by absorbed sunlight. Today the mystery deepened.

The phenomenon has long been blamed on a mechanism similar to what creates the aurora, or Northern Lights on Earth. On Earth, magnetic energy in the magnetosphere drives the aurora and heats the upper atmosphere.
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Bad Guys

Why do the self-styled defenders of reason, science, progress, and civilization so often act like bullies and thugs?


Michael Prescott's Blog
Mon, 29 Jan 2007 10:06 UTC
Item: Nineteenth century physicist William Crookes, later knighted for his contributions to science, conducts a series of seances with the young medium Florence Cook and declares her to be genuine. Crookes' detractors not only allege that he has taken leave of his senses, they insinuate that he is having an illicit affair with Florence. Though there is no evidence to support these claims, they continue to this day. Crookes saves his reputation only by retreating from the study of the paranormal.
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Bizarro Earth

A New Way To Leak UFO (dis)Info?

Greg Bishop
UFOMystic.com
Mon, 29 Jan 2007 09:49 UTC
What revelations and evils await us with the forthcoming debut of "wikileaks?"

Here is the hype from the placemarker website:
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Bizarro Earth

Did humans wipe out Australia's big beasts?

Rachel Nowak
New Scientist Print Edition
Mon, 29 Jan 2007 09:43 UTC
To animals unfortunate enough to fall in, it was a death trap. To palaeontologists, it was a sensational discovery. Now the first detailed analysis of a spectacular cache of fossilised prehistoric "marsupial lions", giant wombats and kangaroos, owls and parrots discovered in a cave in Australia suggests that humans killed off the continent's megafauna.

©Clay Bryce, Western Australian Museum
First-known complete skeleton of the marsupial 'lion' Thylacoleo carnifex

The cache, found in the Nullarbor Plain in south-central Australia, contains fossils of 69 species of mammal, bird and reptile, and includes many complete skeletons, including the first of a marsupial lion (see above and artist's rendering below). There are also eight species of kangaroo that had never been recorded before.
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Bomb

Scientist Brings Caffeine Buzz to Baked Goods


Associated Press
Mon, 29 Jan 2007 09:13 UTC
A molecular scientist who moonlights as a cafe owner developed a way to add caffeine to baked goods, one that eliminates the natural, bitter taste of caffeine.

"This gives people the opportunity if they want to have a glass of milk and want to have caffeine. It will get them going," Dr. Robert Bohannon said.

The amount of caffeine in his creations can vary, but Bohannon can easily put 100 milligrams of caffeine - the equivalent of a 5-ounce (150-milliliter) cup of drip-brewed coffee - into the treats he plans to market under the "Buzz Donuts" and "Buzzed Bagels" names.
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Bizarro Earth

The Moon is a Harsh Witness

Trudy E. Bell
YubaNet.com
Sat, 27 Jan 2007 18:20 UTC
There's evidence in the fossil record that such impacts occur periodically, "once every 26 million years," says Spudis. "Not everyone agrees, but I think it is pretty convincing."
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Magic Wand

Great moments in human research: Ig Nobel Prizes

Dr Stephen Juan
The Register
Sat, 27 Jan 2007 06:40 UTC
Research you really didn't need to know

The Ig Nobel Prizes are awarded to research that is not exactly compelling. Here are some "winners" in human research.
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Book

Researcher studies science of pedestrian motion to make Hajj safer


Daily India
Fri, 26 Jan 2007 17:06 UTC
Every year hundreds of people die in stampede during the ritual stoning of the pillars at the annual Hajj pilgrimage.

In 2006, 362 people died in the crush at Mina, where pilgrims gathered to perform the ritual. However, this year's ritual, which happened in late December and early January, went off without any incident.

So what was it, pure luck? Certainly not; according to Dirk Helbing of the Dresden University of Technology, Germany, it was sound planning based on the study of crowd dynamics that helped prevent casualties during one of Islam's most holiest traditions.
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Network

Mysterious source jams satellite communications

David Shiga
AFP
Fri, 26 Jan 2007 17:03 UTC
Paris-based satellite company Eutelsat is investigating "unidentified interference" with its satellite broadcast services that temporarily knocked out several television and radio stations. The company declined to say whether it thought the interference was accidental or deliberate.

The problem began Tuesday afternoon, blocking several European, Middle East and northeast African radio and television stations, as well as Agence France-Presse's news service. All transferred their satellite transmissions to another frequency to resume operations.
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