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Mars Express reveals the Red Planet's volcanic past


ESA
Fri, 14 Mar 2008 15:31 UTC
A new analysis of impact cratering data from Mars reveals that the planet has undergone a series of global volcanic upheavals. These violent episodes spewed lava and water onto the surface, sculpting the landscape that ESA's Mars Express looks down on today.

Using images from the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on Mars Express, Gerhard Neukum, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany, and colleagues are discovering the history of the Red Planet's geological activity. "We can now determine the ages of large regions and resurfacing events on the planet," says Neukum. Resurfacing occurs when volcanic eruptions spread lava across the planet's surface.

Image
©ESA/ DLR/ FU Berlin (G. Neukum)
This is an image of Daedalia Planum, located 1000 km south of Arsia Mons, a southern volcano of the Tharsis Montes. The image was taken on 19 July 2005, from a distance of 302 km from the surface.

The image is centred at 235.4° east and 26.2° south. The scene spans a width of 100 km and the ground resolution is 25 m/pixel.
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Bulb

Mathematicians find new solutions to an ancient puzzle


University of Arizona
Sun, 16 Mar 2008 15:28 UTC
Many people find complex math puzzling, including some mathematicians.

Recently, mathematician Daniel J. Madden and retired physicist, Lee W. Jacobi, found solutions to a puzzle that has been around for centuries.

Jacobi and Madden have found a way to generate an infinite number of solutions for a puzzle known as 'Euler's Equation of degree four.'

The equation is part of a branch of mathematics called number theory. Number theory deals with the properties of numbers and the way they relate to each other. It is filled with problems that can be likened to numerical puzzles.
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Info

Post Brain Injury: New Nerve Cells Originate From Neural Stem Cells


sciencedaily.com
Sun, 16 Mar 2008 15:04 UTC
Most cells in the human brain are not nerve cells, but supporting cells (glial cells). They serve as a framework for nerve cells and play an important role in the wound reaction that occurs with injuries to the brain. However, what these 'reactive glial cells' in the brains of mice and men originate from, and which cells they evolve into was unknown until now.

Prof. Magdalena Goetz.
©German Research Center for Environmental Health
Prof. Magdalena Goetz
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Stormtrooper

Killer Bee UAV First Look: Raytheon Fights Boeing in Drone Race

Joe Pappalardo
Popular Mechanics
Sun, 16 Mar 2008 14:55 UTC
And you thought the Air Force's bidding war on tankers was ugly. As the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps look to increase their fleets of small, unmanned aircraft that can serve as communication relays and sensor platforms, they're seeing contenders in the fight over which company gets to build them.

Boeing, which is protesting its $35 billion loss to Airbus parent EADS on a refueling plane contract, currently has a lock on small, portable Marine and Navy UAVs used for recon missions. The company's ScanEagle first placed into Marine hands four years ago, when the Pentagon decided that they were vital for combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. A year later the Navy purchased more to provide over-the-horizon monitoring of oil platforms and suspicious ships. (A nearly identical ScanEagle model is making its way into U.S. police departments.) To cover these purchases, the Pentagon crafted a non-competitive order - permitted when an item is designated as an "urgent operational requirement" - with Boeing and aerospace design firm Insitu, in July 2004.

Image
©Raytheon Co
Killer Bee UAV
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Telescope

Update: NASA spacecraft fails to probe Saturn's moon's geysers


newKerala.com
Sat, 15 Mar 2008 21:56 UTC
NASA's Cassini spacecraft, which made an unprecedented flyby of Saturn's moon Enceladus on March 12, has failed in an experiment that scientists had hoped would help reveal the origin of the plumes on the moon.
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Telescope

NASA telescope discovers organics and water in a possible planet-forming region


newKerala.com
Sat, 15 Mar 2008 21:49 UTC
Researchers using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope have discovered large amounts of simple organic gases and water vapor in a possible planet-forming region around an infant star, along with evidence that these molecules were created there.

In their project, John Carr of the Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, and Joan Najita of the National Optical Astronomy Observatory, Tucson, Arizona, took an in-depth look at the gases in the planet-forming region in the disk around the star AA Tauri.
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Einstein

Two-Dimensional High-Temperature Superconductor Discovered


sciencedaily.com
Sat, 15 Mar 2008 09:41 UTC
Scientists at Brookhaven Lab have discovered a state of two-dimensional (2D) fluctuating superconductivity in a high-temperature superconductor with a particular arrangement of electrical charges known as "stripes."

superconductor
©DOE/Brookhaven National Laboratory
A superconductor, like the one shown above, conducts electricity with no resistance.
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Butterfly

Bird Brains Suggest How Vocal Learning Evolved


sciencedaily.com
Sat, 15 Mar 2008 09:36 UTC
Though they perch far apart on the avian family tree, birds with the ability to learn songs use similar brain structures to sing their tunes. Neurobiologists at Duke University Medical Center now have an explanation for this puzzling likeness.

humminbird
©iStockphoto
Hummingbird. In all three groups of birds with vocal learning abilities -- songbirds, parrots and hummingbirds -- the brain structures for singing and learning to sing are embedded in areas controlling movement.
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House

Exploring A 'Lost' City Of The Mycenaeans


sciencedaily.com
Sat, 15 Mar 2008 09:33 UTC
Along an isolated, rocky stretch of Greek shoreline, a Florida State University researcher and his students are unlocking the secrets of a partially submerged, "lost" harbor town believed to have been built by the ancient Mycenaeans nearly 3,500 years ago.

orphos-Kalamianos
©Saronic Harbors Archaeological Research Project
A Google Earth image, modified by Saronic Harbors Archaeological Research Project (SHARP) co-director Thomas Tartaron, shows the location of the Korphos-Kalamianos site.
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Telescope

Winking Star: First Step Of Earth-Like Planet Formation Observed


sciencedaily.com
Sat, 15 Mar 2008 09:23 UTC
For the first time, astronomers have observed the initial phase in the formation of an earth-like planet. The discovery, highlighted in the March 13th issue of Nature, was documented by a team of astronomers led by William Herbst, the Van Vleck Professor of Astronomy professor at Wesleyan, and Catrina Hamilton PhD '03, professor of physics and astronomy at Dickinson College.

protoplanetary disk
©Wesleyan University
The binary stars orbit inside a protoplanetary disk or ring that extends out to roughly the size of Jupiter's orbit.
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