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Experiment Demonstrates Possibility of Quantum Internet

Stuart Fox
TechNewsDaily
Mon, 09 Aug 2010 10:33 UTC
A new breakthrough demonstrates how quantum computers could network with each other in the same way that traditional computers connect across the Internet. Quantum computers are machines that exploit different physical properties of atoms than modern PCs for much faster computing speeds.

For the most part, connectivity has taken a back seat in quantum computing research to experiments that focus on creating reliable components for quantum processors or memory. Considering the connectivity is the main driver of traditional computing technology, this omission highlights how far quantum computers have to go before they can be as robust functionality of regular desktops.
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Display

How to Make Computers Easier on the Eyes

Leslie Meredith
TechNewsDaily
Mon, 09 Aug 2010 10:21 UTC
Computer Vision Syndrome is the official name for eye strain and other vision problems caused by hours in front of a computer, and until recently was rarely seen in anyone under 40. But now because of more frequent sessions on the computer, it is a common complaint experienced by people of all ages. Thankfully, there are some simple measures you can take to make your hours in front of the computer more comfortable.
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Magnify

A city bigger than Athens?

Sandeep Mishra
Times of India
Mon, 09 Aug 2010 10:13 UTC
Just outside Bhubaneswar, around 2,000 years ago, stood one of old India's biggest cities. When they chanced upon Sisupalgarh, excavators could only gape in astonishment at its modern ways.

Sisupalgarh sounds like a happening settlement by historic standards: a sprawling urban settlement that housed 20,000-25,000 people, street-linking gateways, pillared meeting halls, water storage systems and disposable vessels for daily use. In one of the richest hauls for archaeologists in the country in recent times, a 12-member Indo-American expert team discovered the remains of a city from the early historic period in the outskirts of Bhubaneswar two years ago.
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Info

Gene Map to Give Insight into 5,200-year-old Iceman

Wynne Parry
LiveScience
Mon, 09 Aug 2010 09:51 UTC
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© South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology.Researchers have sequenced the Iceman's genome and hope to be able to locate any living descendants.
Iceman, the Neolithic mummy found accidentally in the Eastern Alps by German hikers in 1991, has offered researchers all sorts of clues to life 5,200 years ago, from his goat-hide coat to the meat and unleavened bread in his stomach to the arrow wound in his shoulder.

Now, scientists stand poised to find out a whole lot more about Iceman, who also goes by Ötzi, Frozen Fritz and Similaun Man.
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Sun

Solar Tsunami Revealed in Stunning New Photo


SPACE.com
Fri, 06 Aug 2010 17:06 UTC
Image
© NASA/SDO/AIANASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory snapped this multi-wavelength extreme ultraviolet image of the sun, showing the Aug. 1 solar eruption that blasted charged particles toward Earth. The Class C3 solar flare triggered stunning aurora displays and geomagnetic storms on Earth that lasted about 12 hours.
A vivid new photo of the sun has revealed a new view of a solar eruption in the star's northern hemisphere that blasted charged particles in Earth's direction this week, according to NASA officials.

The solar storm, which NASA called a "solar tsunami" in a Friday statement, occurred Aug. 1. It was a Class C3 solar flare in which almost the entire Earth-facing side of the sun erupted in a wave of tumultuous activity.

The solar particles began striking Earth's magnetic field Tuesday and sparked a powerful 12-hour geomagnetic storm and spectacular aurora displays. The flare was not powerful enough to pose a radiation threat to astronauts living on the International Space Station, NASA officials have said.

This new multi-wavelength extreme ultraviolet photo from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory shows the sun in mid-eruption.
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Sherlock

Blackfeet Reservation dig unearthing 1,000-year-old history

Travis Coleman
Great Falls Tribune
Sun, 08 Aug 2010 16:48 UTC
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© Great Falls TribuneThe Blackfeet Tribe's historic preservation officer John Murray, left, and crew member Jesse Ballenger look at bison bones uncovered at the Two Medicine bison jump site on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation.
Browning, Montana - Archaeologists are teaming with Blackfeet tribal members to uncover a vast and little-known former hunting complex and bison kill site along the Two Medicine River used at least 1,000 years ago.

Researchers say the 9-mile-long project area, containing a preserved system for driving bison over a cliff, bison bones and remnants of two campsites, could become one of the largest and most significant Blackfeet heritage sites in the region.

The Two Medicine bison jump site is located in the southeastern corner of the Blackfeet Indian Reservation on a remote plateau overlooking the river. Researchers, led by Dr. Maria Nieves Zedeno of the University of Arizona in Tucson, say they're eager to study how late prehistoric and later hunters - Blackfeet and others - used the land to kill bison. They also want to expand people's knowledge about this now extinct way of life.

"We really need to preserve this site for future generations," said Zedeno, an accomplished archaeologist from the University of Arizona's School of Anthropology and Bureau of Applied Research.
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Meteor

Planets Align for the Perseid Meteor Shower

Dr. Tony Phillips
Science@NASA
Sun, 08 Aug 2010 11:15 UTC
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© NASALooking northeast around midnight on August 12th-13th. The red dot is the Perseid radiant. Although Perseid meteors can appear in any part of the sky, all of their tails will point back to the radiant.
You know it's a good night when a beautiful alignment of planets is the second best thing that's going to happen. Thursday, August 12th, is such a night.

The show begins at sundown when Venus, Saturn, Mars and the crescent Moon pop out of the western twilight in tight conjunction. All four heavenly objects will fit within a circle about 10 degrees in diameter, beaming together through the dusky colors of sunset. No telescope is required to enjoy this naked-eye event: sky map.

The planets will hang together in the western sky until 10 pm or so. When they leave, following the sun below the horizon, you should stay, because that is when the Perseid meteor shower begins. From 10 pm until dawn, meteors will flit across the starry sky in a display that's even more exciting than a planetary get-together.
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Sun

M1 Class Solar Flare Just Misses Earth August 7th


Space Weather
Sun, 08 Aug 2010 11:03 UTC
On August 7th (1825 UT), magnetic fields around sunspot 1093 became unstable and erupted, producing a strong M1-class solar flare. Several amateur astronomers caught the active region in mid-flare, while NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory recorded an extreme ultraviolet movie of the entire event:

The eruption hurled a coronal mass ejection (CME) into space, just missing a direct sun-Earth line. Forecasters expect the cloud to deliver no more than a glancing blow to our planet's magnetic field when it billows by on August 9th or 10th--not be a major space weather event.

Future eruptions could turn out differently. Active region 1093 is rotating toward Earth. By the end of this weekend, we'll be in the line of fire if its magnetic fields become unstable again.
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Telescope

How Heavens Have Affected Affairs on Earth

Ben Bova
Naples News
Sat, 07 Aug 2010 17:58 UTC
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© Don Dixon
I became interested in astronomy when I was 11 years old, on my first visit to a planetarium. When they turned out all the lights and flashed the stars onto that domed ceiling, I was hooked for life.

Astronomy is not only beautiful and exciting, it's been crucially important to our existence. It even led to the development of democracy.

Our ancestors were watching the night sky during the ice age. Paleontologists have discovered a fossilized bone some 30,000 years old that has the phases of the moon carved into it.

About 20,000 years later, when they invented agriculture, astronomy became a matter of life and death. Farming societies need to know when to plant their crops. If you plant at the wrong time of year and your crops don't grow, you starve.

In ancient Egypt, the Nile River's annual flood brought fresh, fertile silt to the parched land. It was vital to know when the Nile would rise. Stargazers determined that when the bright star Sirius rose just before dawn, the river's flood was only a few days away.
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Blackbox

Chlorine study suggests moon is dry after all?

Maggie McKee
New Scientist
Sat, 07 Aug 2010 15:36 UTC
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© NASAWater has recently been found on the lunar surface, but researchers are divided about how much water lies inside the moon - a new study suggests the moon was very dry when it formed 4.5 billion years ago
The moon's interior may not be that wet after all, despite some recent studies that have suggested otherwise. A new analysis of Apollo rocks backs the old idea of a waterless world.

For decades after the Apollo astronauts touched down on the desolate lunar surface, the moon was considered to be parched. But that view began to change in 2008, when researchers found water inside tiny spheres of lunar volcanic glass at concentrations calculated to be similar to those found in some terrestrial volcanic rocks.

Now, researchers led by Zachary Sharp at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque say measurements of chlorine in a dozen Apollo samples suggest that the moon's interior has always been extremely dry, containing 10,000 to 100,000 times less water than Earth's.
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