Okay, this might seem like it belongs in the same dark vault of impossible philosophical conundrums as “How much wood would a wood chuck chuck” but hear the hot IT nerd out:
A new laser is to be built that is as powerful as “concentrating the rays of the sun for the entire earth onto the tip of a pen”. Scientists claim it could allow them boil the very fabric of space, AKA the vacuum. Because that’s a fantastic idea. It is official, mankind has a death-wish.
There are other products on the market that deliver short bursts of energy, but for those that really like their coffee; there is a new way for you to ingest it, without the hassle. Harvard biomedical engineering professor, David Edwards, has invented AeroShot: caffeine delivered to your body faster than coffee. Cue the coffee inhaler.
When reversing genetics in an attempt to create a real, live, man-eating dinosaur, it pays to know what the consequences may be. In this case, being the paleontologist who advised Steven Spielberg on the making of four Jurassic Park movies and decades of children’s nightmares about killer lizards should just about cover it.
Okay, not quite X-Ray specs, but definitely a leap forward in covert surveillance technology. Watch these hot science geeks show off a new type of radar they’ve cooked up that can detect objects moving through 20 cm thick concrete walls.
In a rare intersection of Science #FAIL and “Crap, that was close!”, scientists have re-analysed the findings of Mexican astronomer, José Bonilla, who, in 1883, spotted over 450 fuzzy looking objects passing in front of the sun. Turns out it was a trillion tonnes of comet debris!
Neuroscientists have discovered that using Facebook has a measurable impact on the size of particular areas of the brain. The results of a recent study show that the more Facebook friends you have, the bigger and denser become the three parts of your brain which are associated with the power to socialise. It’s unclear whether by ‘socialise’ they mean really, in real life. But maybe.
‘Quantum Levitation’ even sounds cool. The guys from the University of Tel-Aviv’s School of Physics Superconductivity Group recently demonstrated ‘quantum locking,’ at the Association of Science – Technology Centers Annual Conference by getting a supercooled magnet to levitate above a locked track. The science is clunky, the video looks very cool.
A young fashion designer from Germany has produced the first man-made synthetic fibre entirely without chemicals. And she did it with a staple you can find in your fridge — milk! The fabric is called QMilch, and is made from high concentrations of the milk protein, casein. The best part is that it looks and feels like silk but doesn’t smell.
Ian Neale holds the world record for growing the heaviest swede, weighing in at 38kg. Last week, the 68-year-old from Newport in South Wales, received a special video message from Snoop Dogg. The rapper wanted specific cultivation advice in return for some VIP passes for one of his gigs. The record-breaking vegetable grower accepted Snoop’s invitation.
The Japanese have proved that they are some of the most resilient people on earth. With the earthquake and tsunami that struck earlier this year, numerous acts of heroism emerged. Now they’ve invented the Noah Disaster Shelter as a very probable device for protection when particular natural disasters strike.
How do you wake a deaf person, especially if the building that they are in is on fire? You squirt a puff of wasabi at them, obviously. Seven Japanese researchers were awarded the Ig Nobel prize for chemistry in the 21st annual Ig Nobel awards, a spoof of the real Nobel awards, at Harvard University last night for their invention.
NASA have meekly announced that their 6.5 tonne Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS), which shut down in 2005 due to its batteries dying, will come crashing down to earth sometime today, somewhere.
Do you remember the old adverts that pitted the Duracell bunny against other batteries at massive distances? Well, Panasonic is actually doing this now. They’ve designed robots, and entered them into a rather large triathlon taking place in Hawaii next month, in which homo sapiens will compete.
Sir David Attenborough is one of the world’s most well-known scientists and natural history film-makers. He has now thrown his weight behind a campaign in the UK to have the teaching of creationism and intelligent design banned outright from school curricula. He is joined by 30 other leading scientists and campaign groups, including the British Science Association.
Joshua and Jacob Spates are twins who were delivered by emergency caesarian in January this year, six weeks before they were due. They were also conjoined at the base of their spines. The two brothers have now been separated by life-saving surgery and introduced to each other – face to face – for the first time in their lives.
So they say this kind of thing is “new”, but I think what they really mean is that it’s “new” to public knowledge. It uses thermal imaging technology, something that’s been around for a while already, and it just seems impossible to believe that “scientists” wouldn’t have thought of it before.
This really has nothing to do with making your pet cat fluorescent so that you can see it in the dark and not stand on it when you get up to go the toilet at night. It has, however, everything to do with the similarities between human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV).
In the aftermath of last Friday’s plane crash off the island of Robinson Crusoe, Chile, officials have stated that no effort would be spared in the rescue/recovery of the 17 passengers. This apparently includes using the Find My iPhone app to isolate the coordinates of one of the passenger’s last known whereabouts before the crash.
Researchers in Gothenburg, Sweden, met this week to launch a new “meat without slaughter” initiative – with plans on being able to release bio-sausages in the next six months. Bio-sausages made from exotic animal cells, too, because vat-grown tiger meat isn’t any less ethical than vat-grown bacon.
No, not Season 4 of Jersey Shore, this is some truly traumatic Tuesday Science! Last weekend, a 16-year old girl in Florida died due to a rare species of amoeba infecting her brain cavity and eating her brain!
And in good news: researchers at the University of Cambridge re-examined the results of seven existing studies and concluded that high levels of chocolate consumption might be associated with a reduction in the risk of developing heart disease. The research was presented at Europe’s biggest medical meeting in Paris yesterday.
Scientists have made a unique discovery in the Brazilian rainforests of the Amazon: a subterranean river that flows underneath the Amazon River, some four thousand metres below the actual Amazon River. It’s also roughly the same length of the Amazon River, according to the scientists.
What did you do today? New York elementary school student Aidan Dwyer has designed and constructed a solar array based on the Fibonacci sequence that stores and generates energy between 20% and 50% more effectively than existing setups. He got the idea after noticing growth patterns in oak trees.
Google has begun to map parts of the Amazon and Rio Negro Rivers, as well as small areas of northwestern Brazil, in an attempt to capture panoramic images of the remote region and its communities for the world to see. Google enlisted the help of locals and will use camera-equipped tricycles as well as boats to capture the imagery.
Here’s some crunchy biology for your Tuesday! Our bodies are covered in vestigial traces of biological functions we’ve long left behind us. Once, we were able to move our ears like monkeys and cats, had tails, and may have even had a third eyelid, much like most reptiles do today.
Bad cellphone reception and weak signal strength might be caused by the sun, according to new research. Solar flares emanating from the sun could be to blame for telecommunications customers’ slow internet, signal reception issues and GPS problems, thus taking some the pressure off the network providers, for now.
Finally, science has validated what those posters have been telling us for years. Apparently, beer goggles do turn ‘bow’ into ‘wow’. A team of scientists at London’s Roehampton University have killed a considerable bar tab investigating why people who are intoxicated by alcohol seem less critically receptive to the physical appearance of others, or for the rest of us: “Beer goggles – why?”
Dave MacKay, 53-year-old British pilot, will be the first captain of Virgin Galactic‘s commercial space fleet, taking up the role first with the maiden voyage of SpaceShipTwo, scheduled for 2013. MacKay has over 30 years of regular flying experience, but like pretty much everybody, he’s wanted to fly spaceships since he was a kid.
The future is officially nuts. It’s getting to a point where stuff like this probably won’t shock you anymore. It should. Be shocked. These robo-seals, called ‘Paro’, not only bring comfort to recovering Japanese tsunami patients, they also sing, clap, and even take part in the residents daily exercise routines.