Welcome to Science Saturday, where the Overnight News Digest crew informs and entertains you with this week's news about science, space, and the environment.
This week's featured stories come from the Philadelphia Inquirer, Discovery News on YouTube, MSNBC, and Wired.
Five Philadelphia CSI team members relive their time at ground zero
By Maria Panaritis, Inquirer Staff Writer
September 09, 2011
They are the eyes and ears of death.
A small team of Philadelphia Police Department investigators who possess uncommon curiosity, extraordinary patience - and strong stomachs.
For that, they were sent to ground zero a decade ago to help at the largest crime scene in American history.
And for that, they are left, a decade after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, full of memories that refuse to be tamed.
Hat/Tip to annetteboardman for this story.
This week we've shared some of our personal 9/11 stories with you. Feel free to share yours with us.
MSNBC: Crime lab stays on the 9/11 case
By Alan Boyle
Forensic scientists are continuing to identify remains from 9/11 victims, and they could still be working on the case 10 years from now. Ten years after the terror attacks, thousands of bits of bone found where the World Trade Center's twin towers fell are unidentified, and 1,124 of the 2,753 known victims have not yet been matched up with any remains.
Mark Desire, who heads up the identification effort for the New York City Medical Examiner's Office, notes that the crime lab handles about 500 homicides and 2,000 sexual-assault cases a year, and thousands of other investigations. But the 9/11 case is special.
"As a forensic scientist, you're taught not to get emotionally involved," he told me today. "But the World Trade Center ... that's the exception."
This weekend, he and his colleagues will be meeting with the families of the victims, going over everything that's been accomplished over the past year and everything they hope to do over the next year. It's what he's done on every anniversary since the attacks.
How U.S. Learned the Wrong Health Lessons From 9/11
By Brandon Keim
September 9, 2011
In the fall of 2001, the United States was confronted by two major public health challenges: the anthrax mailings and threat of a biological attack, and the subtler but ultimately more harmful plume of toxic dust that that rose from Ground Zero. The country was prepared for neither.
In the months and years that followed, bioterror proved to be the easier threat to confront, or at least to spend money on. The plume’s damage was harder to address, not least because government officials prematurely insisted on its safety. In both cases, one theme is universal: The wrong decisions were made, and lessons have been incompletely learned.
“I keep getting asked: Are we safer today than on 9/11?” says Laurie Garrett, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of I Heard the Sirens Scream, a new book on 9/11 and its public health aftermath. “My answer is that we’ve spent an enormous amount of money, but I’m not at all convinced that the expenses have made us safer.”
Wired.com talked to Garrett about biodefense, the Ground Zero plume and what can be learned.
More science, space, and environment stories after the jump.
Recent Science Diaries and Stories
Watch this space!
Rick Perry: "There is no proof of climate change" & "Climate programs cost trillions"
by Steven D
Did Hurricane Irene live up to the hype? Nate Silver's numbers say yes
by Neon Vincent
Why "High-Functioning" Psychopaths Rule The World
by Ray Pensador
You Don't Sleep on a Pebble Bed
by Isabella Baumfree
NASA heads back to the moon
by blue aardvark
The Daily Bucket - termite wings and a moth ID
by bwren
Storm
by mem from somerville
This week in science
by Mark Sumner
Slideshows/Videos
The Maddow Blog on MSNBC: The Week in Geek
By Summer Ash
Fri Sep 9, 2011 2:07 PM EDT
The Big Bang as time-lapse graffiti art. This is not new, but totally worth a revisit in my opinion.
The Maddow Blog on MSNBC: We came in peace for all mankind
By Summer Ash
Wed Sep 7, 2011 10:10 AM EDT
NASA has released images taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) of three Apollo landing sites. Not only can you see the lunar modules for Apollo 12, 14 and 17, but also visible are the tracks made by the lunar rover and the astronauts themselves. What amazes me most is the distance covered on foot by Apollo 12 astronauts, Pete Conrad and Alan Bean, as the lunar rover wasn't available until Apollo 15.
The Maddow Blog on MSNBC: Like chimps discovering the sun
By Laura Conaway
Tue Sep 6, 2011 10:22 AM EDT
Kicking around the intertweets this weekend, a German report about laboratory chimpanzees seeing the sun for the first time.
Wired: Super Space: Royal Observatory’s Astronomy Photo Winners
By Adam Mann
September 9, 2011
Breathtaking images of the Vela supernova remnant, Saturn's Dragon Storm, and an aurora borealis over Norway won their photographers top honors at this year’s Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition.
On Sept. 8, the Royal Observatory Greenwich, home of Greenwich Mean Time and the Prime Meridian, announced winners from the third annual contest, which drew more than 700 entries. Prizes went to participants from four main categories — Deep Space, Our Solar System, Earth and Space, and Young Astronomy Photographer of the Year — as well as three special awards.
Wired UK: High-Speed Videos Show How Hummingbirds Hum
By Mark Brown
September 9, 2011
A Yale University zoologist has used a laser vibrometer and high speed videos from a wind tunnel to work out how the hummingbird makes its famous hum, and found that the males of each species have their own signature sound.
Wired: Attacks of the Brain-Controlling Parasites
By Brandon Keim
September 8, 2011
Once upon a time, parasites were thought to live relatively simple lives: They hitched a ride on a host, sapping nutrients and energy but otherwise leaving it alone. But that was only part of the story. Many parasites actually take control, causing their hosts to act in self-destructive ways that further their invaders' interests.
The Lymantria dispar baculovirus, for example, causes caterpillars to climb into treetops rather than hiding in bark. When those that go uneaten by birds finally die and decompose (as pictured above), viral particles rain onto foliage below, infecting a new generation of caterpillars.
"I think the reason people are a little creeped out by seeing pathogens control behavior is that we have examples of it around us all the time," said chemical ecologist Kelli Hoover of Pennsylvania State University, who describes L. dispar's gene target in a Sept. 9 Science study.
The following pages show more examples of parasites that spread by controlling their hosts.
Wired: Wing Secrets That Help Insects Rule the World
By Danielle Venton
September 6, 2011
The quest of insects to achieve total world domination is wing-powered.
Insects, the only invertebrates that have learned how to fly, use their wings as key assets in their global colonization. Their wings can be protective shells, musical instruments (grasshoppers), camouflage, signals to recognize each other, a means of attracting mates or warning predators, even tools to fly.
Insects are our greatest competitor for food. They also keep the earth clean and productive. These ecosystem workhorses could easily manage without us, but we could never manage without them.
In celebration of these chitin-made wonders, we’ve collected images to take you on a tour of the insect wing world.
Astronomy/Space
Wired: Help Astronomers Study a Newly Discovered Supernova
By Danielle Venton
September 10, 2011
SN 2011fe, the brightest supernova to be seen from Earth in nearly 20 years, was first discovered by astronomers with the Palomar Transient Factory on Aug. 24 and is estimated to have reached peak brightness on Sep. 9. The exploding white dwarf star, a type Ia supernova, is now nearly a thousand times brighter than when it was first spotted, and can be seen by modest-sized backyard telescopes.
Amateur astronomers, using 6-inch or larger aperture telescopes, can help researchers study the supernova by submitting their observations to the American Association of Variable Star Observers. Tutorials are included on the AAVSO website.
Wired: Help Astronomers Build a Movie of the 2017 Eclipse
By Danielle Venton
September 7, 2011
Early planning is underway for a massive crowdsourced movie of the 2017 solar eclipse. And astronomers want your help.
The project, currently titled “The Eclipse Megamovie,” will compile stills submitted by amateur astronomers, allowing solar researchers an unprecedented look at the wavings and warpings of the corona, as the eclipse traverses the width of the United States for an hour and a half.
...
Parts of 14 states from Oregon to South Carolina will see a full eclipse. If skies are clear on Aug. 21, 2017, Hudson estimates they could receive as many as a million still images.
Wired: Moon Satellite Gives New Glimpse of Lunar North Pole
By Dave Mosher
September 9, 2011
NASA has combined nearly 1,000 photos of the moon to build the crispest view yet of the crater-pocked lunar north pole.
The space agency created the new image by stitching together slices of 983 wide-angle photographs taken by a camera on the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO. The image contains a psychedelic spiral in the center because the LRO collected the images from different angles over the course of a month.
Wired: Swirly Moon Markings Remain Mysterious
By Adam Mann
September 8, 2011
Peppered around lava flats and mountaintops all over the moon are strange sinuous shapes known as lunar swirls. Their winding, dusty curves are brighter than the surrounding area and, so far, their formation remains a mystery to scientists.
“They look like someone took a white paintbrush and painted across the moon,” says Catherine Neish, a planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland. She helped organize the 2011 Lunar Swirls Workshop Without Walls, an online conference dedicated to these puzzling features. At the meeting Sept. 7, scientists presented new data that may help finally determine the cause of the swirls.
Known about since the Renaissance, lunar swirls came under increased scrutiny after orbiting satellites in the 1960s noticed that they tended to be associated with magnetic fields. Unlike the Earth’s large global magnetic field, these lunar magnetic fields are small local phenomena that are strewn more or less randomly on its surface. Wherever researchers find lunar swirls, they find these magnetic fields.
Evolution/Paleontology
Institute of Vertebrae Paleontology and Paleoanthropology via physorg.com: Early cretaceous birds with crops found in China
September 6, 2011
The crop is characteristic of seed-eating birds today, yet little is known about its early history despite remarkable discoveries of many Mesozoic seed-eating birds in the past decade. Scientists from Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology (IVPP), Chinese Academy of Sciences, Tianyu Museum of Nature in Shandong Province, China, and University of Kansas reported the discovery of some early fossil evidence for the presence of a crop in birds in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences online today. Two Early Cretaceous birds, the basal ornithurine Hongshanornis and a basal avian Sapeornis, demonstrate that an essentially modern avian digestive system formed early in avian evolution.
Hat/Tip to annetteboardman for this story.
Wired: Transatlantic Terror Birds
By Brian Switek
September 7, 2011
After the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs about 65 million years ago, the terror birds were the closest the world has ever come to seeing the imposing, predatory “raptors” of the Mesozoic return. One of the most recently-described species, the approximately 15 million year old Kelenken guillermoi, was a roughly ten-foot-tall carnivore with a two-foot skull tipped in a long beak well-suited to tearing flesh. Not every species grew quite so large, but, as a whole, these flightless, hatchet-headed avians came in a variety of sizes and were among the chief predators in prehistoric South America before the coalescence of the Panama land bridge allowed the formidable dogs, bears, and cats of the north to extend their reach. But this peculiar group of birds – technically known as phorusrhacids – was not wholly left in “splendid isolation.” At least one branch of the terror bird family tree, the appropriately-named Titanis, made it northward to stalk the grasslands of prehistoric Texas and Florida, and now a new paper suggests that these imposing birds gained a toe-hold in Africa, as well.
Wired: Female Orgasm Remains an Evolutionary Mystery
By Brandon Keim
September 6, 2011
After baffling biologists for decades, the female orgasm has resisted yet another attempt to explain its elusive evolutionary origins.
A survey of orgasmic function in thousands of twins found none of the statistical patterns expected if female orgasm is just a coincidental byproduct of natural selection on its male counterpart, as has been suggested.
“The evolutionary basis of human female orgasm has been subject to furious scientific debate, which has recently intensified,” wrote University of Queensland geneticist Brendan Zietsch and Pekka Santtila of Finland’s Abo Akedemi University in a Sept. 3 Animal Behavior article. “These results challenge the byproduct theory of female orgasm.”
While the male orgasm is, in evolutionary and practical terms, a fairly straightforward thing — it makes men want to have sex more often, thus continuing their lineage, and is achieved with ease — the female orgasm is a far trickier beast.
The byproduct hypotheisis was one of Stephen J. Gould's favorite ideas. My advisor thought that Gould was full of it on this one and that female orgasm was under its own selective pressures.
Biodiversity
Reuters via Yahoo! News: Tiger in "love triangle" kills mate at Texas zoo
By Patricia Giovine
EL PASO, Texas (Reuters) - A female tiger has killed her mate at a West Texas zoo, authorities said on Friday, in a rare attack that came after months of simmering jealousy in a feline love triangle.
Three-year-old Malayan tiger Seri killed 6-year-old Wzui at about 4 p.m. on Thursday in an enclosure at El Paso Zoo, zoo spokeswoman Karla Martinez said on Friday,
As soon as the incident was reported, zookeepers closed the tiger exhibit and veterinary staff were called. They examined Wzui, and found he was dead.
Hat/Tip to annetteboardman for this story.
Wired: Digitized Deep-Ocean Expedition Discovers Surprising Oasis of Life
By Dave Mosher
September 8, 2011
Marine biologists have discovered a never-before-seen duo of organisms colonizing a deep-sea hydrothermal vent in the Atlantic Ocean.
“[T]he iconic symbol of Pacific vents is the tubeworm, while the iconic symbol of Atlantic vents is the vent shrimp … To find both together has important implications for the evolution of vent communities in the Caribbean as the Atlantic became separated from the Pacific some 5 million years ago,” said marine biologist Paul Tyler of the University of Southampton in a press release Sep. 7.
Wired: Rare Kingfishers Hatch at the Smithsonian
By Danielle Venton
September 8, 2011
Two critically endangered Micronesian kingfishers, among the rarest animals in the world, hatched recently at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute.
These new chicks, a female hatched July 25 and a male hatched Aug. 20, boost the total world population to 131. The chicks are hand-reared, fed at two hour intervals, seven to eight times a day.
Extinct in the wild for more than 20 years, Micronesian kingfishers are difficult to breed in captivity. Male and female birds can be reluctant to bond. Not all parents are able to successfully rear their offspring, and their health can be delicate. A third chick hatched at the Institute’s Bird House on Sept. 3 died two days later of unknown causes.
Wired: Endangered Persian Onager Born at the Smithsonian
By Danielle Venton
September 9, 2011
Though resembling donkeys, onagers are desert-dwelling members of the horse family. Originally native to Syria, Iran, Pakistan, India, Israel and Tibet, they’re now restricted to two protected areas in Iran. Poaching, drought and grazing competition from domestic livestock have reduced their population to just 600.
Wired UK: Dolphins May ‘Talk’ Like Humans
By Katie Scott
September 8, 2011
A study in which recordings of dolphins made in the 1970s were re-analyzed has revealed that dolphins talk to each other in a manner very similar to human speech, using tissue vibrations.
The study by biologists at Aarhus University in Denmark concentrated on the dolphin’s whistle, which was believed to be produced by the resonance of air in the dolphin’s nasal air cavities. This would have implications for how dolphins communicate at depth — increased air pressure would affect the size of the nasal air cavities and therefore the pitch of the sounds they can make. Instead, the team discovered that the dolphin’s whistle isn’t in fact a whistle at all; but a sound produced by tissue vibrations.
Biotechnology/Health
Wired: Dangerous and Sad: Rising Suicides by Chemical Fumes
By Maryn McKenna
September 9, 2011
There’s a lot of debate among journalists regarding whether we should publish stories about suicide. On the one hand, not publishing them is viewed as following an outdated taboo and depriving families of public attention to a loved one’s memory. On the other, there’s worry that seeing a story about suicide may give dark inspiration to someone whose emotional state is already on the brink.
So I confess, I have some hesitancy in talking about a bulletin published Thursday evening by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. They did it, not only to document a public health trend, but to highlight a real danger to first responders. That seems to me a legitimate concern — and since first responders have been a big part of stories I have covered over years, I’m going to publish it too.
So here’s the story: The CDC has observed a small trend of people in the United States copying a practice widely followed in Japan, in which people seal themselves in an enclosed space such as a car, mix household chemicals in an open container, and die from that exposure. Between 2006 and 2010, in data from 15 states that participate in a hazardous-events registry, the CDC found 10 such suicide attempts in six states: one each in 2006 and 2007, and four each in 2009 and 2010. Nine of the 10 were successful, and the person died. (A different database recorded two in 2008, 10 in 2009 and 18 in 2010.)
Wired: Tick-Borne Infections Infiltrate U.S. Blood Supply
By Maryn McKenna
September 6, 2011
Allow me a tiny I Told You So. In February, I wrote a story for SELF Magazine about the rising incidence of diseases other than Lyme that are caused by tick bites. (And told you about it here, of course.) The story highlighted one particular tick-borne parasite, Babesia, and a serious problem with the infection it causes, babesiosis: that it was moving into the blood supply. We dug through FDA transcripts and CDC field reports in order to reveal that federal health authorities were very concerned about this prospect, and that more than 100 babesiosis infections caused by transfusions had already occurred — not just in the few states where the tick species carrying Babesia are found, but throughout the United States because blood products are shipped nationwide.
Ours was the first reporting we could find about babesiosis in the blood supply, and it didn’t get the attention it should have, probably because women’s magazines tend to be dismissed as not-serious — even though SELF’s health and medical reporting has won prizes and been turned into books. But based on research released this morning, our story at SELF wasn’t hyping the problem. If anything, we understated it.
OK, enough infomercial. Here’s the news: In a paper released ahead-of-print by the Annals of Internal Medicine, researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Rhode Island and New York State report that 159 cases of babesiosis were caused by transfusions in the past 30 years and “the risk may be increasing.” Twenty-seven of the patients died.
Climate/Environment
The World on Public Radio International: Ancient Incan agriculture revived due to climate change
Ancient Andean crops and farming methods are revived as Peruvians struggle to deal with the effects of climate change.
Published 09 September, 2011 11:25:00
To get to some of Peru's most remote Andean communities, you head out over pockmarked dirt roads from a small town already 10,000 feet up. Up – up – up — past llamas and alpacas and sheep and cows. The vegetation thins out and the air becomes even thinner. Your lungs clamor for oxygen and you're offered coca leaves to help adjust to the altitude.
And then, after four hypnotic hours, you've arrived – at a patch of sparse farmland near the town of Pomacocha, at 13,000 feet an outpost at pretty much the upper limits of agriculture.
For centuries, Pomacocha's thousand or so residents have grown corn in the fertile valleys below the town and potatoes on slopes that push against the sky above, fed by seasonal rains and glacial streams.
But climate change is hitting the high Andes hard. Temperature and precipitation swings are becoming more extreme, the glaciers are shrinking fast, and a tough place to farm is becoming even tougher.
So to help them deal with an uncertain future, residents are looking back in time—to before the arrival of Europeans.
Hat/Tip to annetteboardman for this story.
The Maddow Blog on MSNBC: The Yellow Flames of Texas
By Tricia McKinney
Fri Sep 9, 2011 10:40 AM EDT
Texas just suffered through its hottest summer on record and its driest year in more than a century, which sparked wildfires that have burned nearly 1,400 homes to date.
Now that firefighters say they're finally getting the upper hand, Texas has gotten some bad news from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration: La Niña is back.
Here's the story from NOAA.
NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center: La Niña is back
September 8, 2011
La Niña, which contributed to extreme weather around the globe during the first half of 2011, has re-emerged in the tropical Pacific Ocean and is forecast to gradually strengthen and continue into winter. Today, forecasters with NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center upgraded last month’s La Niña Watch to a La Niña Advisory.
NOAA will issue its official winter outlook in mid-October, but La Niña winters often see drier than normal conditions across the southern tier of the United States and wetter than normal conditions in the Pacific Northwest and Ohio Valley.
“This means drought is likely to continue in the drought-stricken states of Texas, Oklahoma and New Mexico,” said Mike Halpert, deputy director of the Climate Prediction Center. “La Niña also often brings colder winters to the Pacific Northwest and the northern Plains, and warmer temperatures to the southern states.”
Geology
Discovery News: Meteorites Pummeled Earth, Delivering Gold
A slew of meteorites pelted Earth some 3.9 billion years ago -- delivering that gold you may be wearing on your finger.
By Jessica Marshall
Wed Sep 7, 2011 01:06 PM ET
Your wedding ring, the gold chain around your neck… even the platinum in your catalytic converter. For all of these you can thank a slew of meteorites that pelted Earth around 3.9 billion years ago, says new research.
Certain metals like gold, platinum, nickel, tungsten and iridium are attracted to iron, which comprises the Earth's core. So when the Earth first formed as a molten mass, all of these elements should have migrated to the core, leaving the outer layers of Earth stripped of its precious metals.
Yet as hopeful '49-ers knew, Earth's crust is laced with these enticing elements. Geologists have posed several theories to explain this puzzle, but one suggests that Earth was bombarded with meteorites between 3.8 and 4 billion years ago, studding the early crust with our favorite shiny metals. These metals then became incorporated into the modern mantle over time.
Discovery News: Ancient Acidic Ocean a Killer
The great die off 250 million years ago may have been due to a change in the pH level of the oceans.
By Emily Sohn
Wed Sep 7, 2011 10:52 AM ET
Earth experienced its most dramatic extinction crisis of all time 250 million years ago when about 90 percent of ocean-dwelling species and 70 percent of land-dwellers disappeared. Exactly what caused the massive die-off, however, has long been a matter of debate.
Now, a new study offers new clues.
Ocean acidification caused by rising levels of carbon dioxide in the air, the study suggests, may have played a major role in the ancient extinction event, which was particularly hard on marine creatures that make calcium carbonate shells -- a process that's much harder for them to do in acidic conditions.
Psychology/Behavior
Wired: The Neuroscience of Groupon
By Jonah Lehrer
September 8, 2011
While I’ve enjoyed my few Groupon forays – and appreciate the crafted wit of their sales pitches – I think their business model is best understood as a logical extension of what online retailers are already good at: selling us stuff at slightly cheaper prices. This is a lovely thing, but it’s not exactly revolutionary. Physical stores, after all, have been putting crap on sale for as long as there’s been crap to sell. The internet has just made these sales more transparent, easier to search and compare. As a result, we buy more stuff.
To understand how this process works, it helps to know a bit about what happens in the brain when we shop. At the moment, our understanding of retail neuroscience remains rather crude, a scientific cartoon of what is undoubtedly an extremely complex mental process. Nevertheless, I think this rough draft of research can still help us better understand both the current limitations and future opportunities for online retailers. The science also helps me understand why, even in this age of online everything, I still insist on schlepping to a 3-dimensional store for certain product categories.
The Wall Street Journal via Wired: Focusing On Focus
By Jonah Lehrer
September 6, 2011
For most of human history, the progress of knowledge was constrained by a shortage of information. Books were expensive and rare, libraries were reserved for elite scholars and communication was extremely slow. Mail moved at the speed of horses.
Now, of course, we live in the age of Google and Amazon Prime, a time when nearly everything ever written can be accessed within seconds or delivered within days. Facts are cheap and easy; the cellphone has become an infinite library.
So what’s holding us back? Why does this surfeit of information so often feel overwhelming instead of enlightening? The answer returns us to the stubborn limitations of the human mind, especially when it comes to the ability to focus properly. As the psychologist Herbert Simon famously declared, “A wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.”
Archeology/Anthropology
European Synchrotron Radiation Facility via physorg.com: Human brain evolution, new insight through X-rays
September 8, 2011
A paper published today in Science reveals the highest resolution and most accurate X-ray scan ever made of the brain case of an early human ancestor. The insight derived from this data is like a powerful beacon on the hazy landscape of brain evolution across the transition from Australopithecus to Homo.
The publication is part of a series of five papers based on new evidence pertaining to various aspects of the anatomy of the species Australopithecus sediba (announced in April 2010 by Berger et al.) published in Science on 9 September 2011. Led by the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg (South Africa), over 80 scientists from numerous institutes in Germany, the U.S., UK, Australia, Germany South Africa and Switzerland worked on the project. The work on the brain includes a scientist from the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility (ESRF) in Grenoble (France), where the X-ray micro-tomography scan was performed.
Max Planck Institute via physorg.com: Handier than Homo habilis?
September 8, 2011
The versatile hand of Australopithecus sediba makes a better candidate for an early tool-making hominin than the hand of Homo habilis.
Hand bones from a single individual with a clear taxonomic affiliation are scarce in the hominin fossil record, which has hampered understanding of the evolution of manipulative abilities in hominins. An international team of researchers including Tracy Kivell of the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany has now published a study that describes the earliest, most complete fossil hominin hand post-dating the appearance of stone tools in the archaeological record, the hand of a 1.98-million-year-old Australopithecus sediba from Malapa, South Africa. The researchers found that Au. sediba used its hand for arboreal locomotion but was also capable of human-like precision grips, a prerequisite for tool-making. Furthermore, the Au. sediba hand makes a better candidate for an early tool-making hominin hand than the Homo habilis hand, and may well have been a predecessor from which the later Homo hand evolved.
The Atlantic: Ancient Humans Had Sex with Other Hominids
Adam Clark Estes
Sep 06, 2011
Scientists have collected evidence for years that modern humans interbred with our ridge-browed Neanderthal ancestors in Eurasia. But in Africa, where the Homo sapiens species is said to have emerged, a lack of genetic evidence has left researchers scratching their heads about exactly how we came to beat out not only the Neanderthals, or Homo neanderthalis, but also the other archaic species like Homo erectus and Homo habilis. A new paper published by Michael Hammer from the University of Arizona, however, provides new evidence that Homo sapiens not only interbred with Neanderthals in Eurasia, they also had sex with several species of our ancestors across the African continent. And they did it often. "We think there were probably thousands of interbreeding events," said Hammer. "It happened relatively extensively and regularly."
University of Cambridge (UK) via physorg.com: Mother tongue comes from your prehistoric father
September 9, 2011
Language change among our prehistoric ancestors came about via the arrival of immigrant men - rather than women - into new settlements, according to new research.
The claim is made by two University of Cambridge academics, Peter Forster and Colin Renfrew, in a report to be published in Science on September 9.
They studied the instances of genetic markers (the male Y chromosome and female mtDNA) from several thousand individuals in communities around the world that seem to show the emergence globally of sex-specific transmission of language.
From Scandinavian Vikings who ferried kidnapped British women to Iceland – to African, Indian and Polynesian tribes, a pattern has emerged which appears to show that the arrival of men to particular geographic locations – through either agricultural dispersal or the arrival of military forces – can have a significant impact on what language is spoken there.
Business Standard (India): Under the beach
Gireesh Babu
Chennai September 04, 2011, 0:58 IST
The 2004 tsunami revealed ancient sites along the coast near Mahabalipuram. Archaeologists are still busy with the finds.
At the end of 2004, in the aftermath of the killer tsunami that struck India’s coast and claimed many lives, there was one bit of good news from Tamil Nadu. The news, which caught the attention of historians and archaeologists, came from Mahabalipuram (also known as Mamallapuram), a coastal town in Kancheepuram district. Just before the tsunami hit, the sea receded far out. Observers on the beach reported that in an area otherwise permanently under water, the receding sea laid bare a long, straight row of large rocks. This triggered talk of the mythical Seven Pagodas, the seven temples said to have been built there by the Kancheepuram’s rulers close to 2,000 years ago.
Belleville News-Democrat: Artifacts found at metro-east site might solve prehistoric mystery: Where did everyone go?
BY GEORGE PAWLACZYK - News-Democrat
NATIONAL STOCKYARDS -- The largest excavation of a prehistoric site in the country is poised to solve a riddle about Illinois prehistory that has lingered for a century -- where did the Mississippians go?
And why?
An enormous dig of a village site first inhabited about 1050 A.D. on 78 acres of what used to be the National Stockyards is providing so much data and so many artifacts that archaeologists are daring to speculate that basic questions about the Mississippians will finally be answered.
The Mississippians, or Native Americans, whose pottery and building styles identify them as a single cultural group, lived in or near the Mississippi Valley more than 1,000 years ago. They erected complex cities, built enormous mounds for ritualistic purposes and disappeared in the space of about 200-300 years.
Oxford University (UK) via physorg.com: Oxford research 'recreates' Henry VIII's Nonsuch Palace
September 7, 2011
"That which no equal has in Art or Fame, Britons deservedly do Nonesuch name," translates the comment of a German visitor to Nonsuch in 1568. Nonsuch Palace in Surrey was the greatest piece of dynastic propaganda erected by the English crown before the 19th century. Built by Henry VIII to rival the palaces of the French King, Francis I, Nonsuch no longer survives as it was demolished by a mistress of King Charles II in 1682-90. However, thanks to research carried out over decades by an Oxford professor, a huge model has been unveilied that provides an accurate recreation of the palace that once symbolized the power and the grandeur of the Tudor dynasty.
Professor Martin Biddle, Emeritus Professor of Medieval Archaeology at Oxford University, who is now in his 70s, was an undergraduate when he directed the excavation of the site of the palace in 1959. Since then, he has spent years analysing all the available contemporary illustrations, archaeological evidence, written sources, and surviving fragments of stucco and slate from Nonsuch. He has pieced together how it once looked and the huge challenge it posed for craftsman in a contribution to a book The Anglo-Florentine Renaissance to be published in November. This research has provided the basis for the model, measuring 2.2 m by 1.2 m made by Ben Taggart, which will be publicly unveiled in the Friends of Nonsuch Museum on 6 September.
Public Radio International: Archeological surprises uncovered after BP oil spill
After the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, archaeologists are finding artifacts that shed new light on the Native American tribes that once lived on the Gulf Coast.
Archaeologists who have been required to go along with BP cleanup workers have come across important finds in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster. "They've been finding native American artifacts, fragments of clay pots, animal bones, bone tools," Chip McGimsey, Louisiana State Archaeologist and Director of the state’s Division of Archaeology, told Here and Now. Archaeologists are now exploring historic American sites, ship wreck material, a plantation site that used to exist along the coast, and even a US military fort in the 1830s.
The Daily Telegraph (UK): Conditions in Nelson's navy uncovered by scientists
Sailors in Admiral Nelson's navy were plagued by scurvy, ridden with syphilis and often mutilated by amputations but only a minority were from lowest social class, Oxford University archaeologists have found.
By Nick Collins, Science Correspondent
8:30AM BST 03 Sep 2011
An examination of 340 skeletons from three 18th and 19th century Royal Navy graveyards found that a "surprisingly high" proportion suffered from scurvy and infected wounds.
The bones, excavated from sites in Greenwich, Gosport and Plymouth, also found that more than six per cent of sailors in Nelson's navy, were amputees, many of whom died as a result of operations that went wrong.
But despite uncovering evidence of syphilis, ulcers, serious tooth infections and possible malaria among the remains of the seamen, researchers said evidence indicated that only a minority came from the lowest rung of the social ladder.
BBC: Franklin expedition: Will we ever know what happened?
By Kate Dailey BBC News Magazine
Canadian explorers have drawn a blank in the latest hunt for the remains of Captain Sir John Franklin's fatal expedition, 160 years after he took 129 men deep into the Arctic. But will the mystery of the doomed crew ever be unravelled?
In 1845, Capt Franklin, an officer in the British Royal Navy, took two ships and 129 men towards the Northwest Territories in an attempt to map the Northwest Passage, a route that would allow sailors to travel from the Atlantic to the Pacific via the icy Arctic circle.
Stocked with provisions that could last for seven years, and outfitted with the latest technology and experienced men, the two ships - HMS Erebus and HMS Terror - were some of the biggest, strongest, vessels ever to make the journey.
But the men vanished into the frozen Arctic, leaving a few clues but no explanation as to what went wrong.
Dorset Echo (UK): Archaeologists unearth historic cycle track on Portland
1:00pm Tuesday 6th September 2011
ARCHAEOLOGISTS believe they have unearthed a historic cycle track on Portland.
Mystery surrounds the origins of the site on New Ground which was discovered by members of the Isle of Slingers Archaeology Society (ISAS).
The society is now calling on residents to help unravel the mystery and piece together the story surrounding the track.
It is believed the velodrome could have been of a world class standard when constructed but the identity of the people who built it remains uncertain.
Members of ISAS believe the track pre-dates the First World War and may have been used by military personnel based at the Verne before it became a prison.
Hat/Tip to annetteboardman, who sent in the above articles.
Physics
Ars Technica via Wired: Weird Quantum Effect Can Make Materials Transparent
By Chris Lee, Ars Technica
September 7, 2011
When you shine light on a substance, part of the light is reflected, part is transmitted and part is absorbed. If you choose the color of light and the substance sensibly, you can arrange things so that all the light is absorbed. Nothing special about that, right? OK, but what if you could shine a second light on the substance and make it transparent for the first light field? That would be a bit strange, wouldn’t it?
Electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT), as it is called, is a bizarre phenomenon all by itself. But there is nothing like taking the bizarre and making it even more so. A group of researchers has shown that, under the right conditions, this second light field doesn’t have to hit the substance to make EIT work—it only has to have the potential to be there. My response: OMFG, that is too cool to be true.
Chemistry
Science News: Explosive goes boom, but not too soon
Leavening a volatile new material with TNT yields safer substance
By Rachel Ehrenberg
Web edition : Tuesday, September 6th, 2011
Look out, Road Runner: There’s a new explosive for Wile E. Coyote’s arsenal. By reining in a supersensitive explosive with good old-fashioned TNT, chemists have created a new compound that can be stored and transported safely and then quickly converted to an activated, superexplosive form.
The new “cocrystal” comprises a zigzagging chain of CL-20 and TNT that, after heating, detonates more readily than either explosive alone, researchers report online August 25 in Angewandte Chemie International Edition.
Energy
The Maddow Blog on MSNBC: It's not the market, it's the industry
By Will Femia
Fri Sep 9, 2011 3:58 PM EDT
I went down a bit of a rabbit hole last night trying to understand the nature of competitiveness in the solar industry between the U.S. and China (or really, China and the rest of the world). I know from past posts about alternative energy that the MaddowBlog enjoys a readership with a lot of expertise in this field, so I appreciate your contributions to helping me understand what's going on.
First, for the tl;dr crowd, here's the money quote that was a real revelation to me:
"Instead of subsidizing the purchase and use of solar power, China has focused on building the competitiveness of the country’s manufacturers."
Now, this way to the rabbit hole:
Science, Space, Environment, and Energy Policy
CNN: Libya's other wealth: Archaeological treasures
By Libby Lewis, CNN
September 7, 2011 -- Updated 0300 GMT (1100 HKT)
(CNN) -- Before Moammar Gadhafi, there were the Phoenicians. And the Greeks. The Romans. The first Arabs. They're a reminder that no civilization -- and no leader -- is forever.
The Libyan transitional leaders have a lot to deal with once they stop being rebels, and begin shaping a new Libya: Keeping law and order, setting up a rudimentary government, dealing with money -- and oil.
But what about Libya's other wealth? Its archaeological treasures?
They are all over the country.
Hat/Tip to annetteboardman for this story.
Grist: Chris Christie met with Koch brother before pulling out of climate pact
by Joseph Romm, Stephen Lacey
8 Sep 2011 7:39 PM
Chris Christie has been palling around with the Kochs.Photo: Bob JagendorfIn late May, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) announced he was pulling his state out of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), explaining that it was "not working." Now a stunning tape of a secret meeting between Christie and David Koch sheds light on the governor's inexplicable decision to abandon a program that was not only cutting pollution, but was funding clean energy and, as it turns out, reducing New Jersey's budget gap.
Science Education
News Wales: Experience a Medieval mass at St Teilo's
Section Education | Published on 9 Sep 2011
Step into the Medieval Church of St Teilo’s next week (Tuesday 13th and Thursday 15th 11.30 & 4.00) and you will experience, as closely as possible, the sights and sounds that accompanied our Medieval ancestors at prayer. The rare and unusual services take place at the reconstructed medieval decorated church of St Teilo at St Fagans: National History Museum of Wales.
In the morning, a medieval Mass and Procession with authentic music, will be celebrated by people in period dress and using recreated religious artefacts. Compline, the final church service of the day, and a short related devotion in honour of the Holy Name of Jesus will also be celebrated at 4pm. All of these services will be sung to Latin plainchant, with some polyphonic music for choir or organ.
Members of the public are also welcome to attend.
Hat/Tip to annetteboardman for this story.
Science Writing and Reporting
The Salt Lake Tribune: Tribune wins records fight over firing of archaeologists
By Erin Alberty
First published Sep 08 2011 05:30PM
Updated Sep 9, 2011 12:04PM
The state has been ordered to release records to The Salt Lake Tribune about the controversial firing of its archaeologists.
On Thursday, the State Records Committee ruled that the state Department of Community and Culture must provide records of communications about the discontinued positions of the state archaeologist, the archaeologist’s assistant and a physical anthropologist.
Tribune reporter Judy Fahys asked for those records shortly after the three employees were fired in June, but the department claimed her request was too vague to fulfill.
Hat/Tip to annetteboardman for this story.
Science is Cool
Wired: Q&A With CONTAGION’s Science Advisor (Plus Spoilers!)
By Maryn McKenna Email Author
September 10, 201
If you are a disease geek, then yes, you will love Contagion, the all-star Oh God Oh God We’re All Going To Die movie that opened last night. Paramyxovirus! R-nought! BSL-4! And, bonus, so many insider references to the CDC that the script could double as an epidemiology drinking game. (Go to the end of this post for my fact-check of CDC references. They’re spoilery and thus hidden on the next page.)
To me, the fascinating thing about Contagion is how seriously it takes its epidemiology, its virology and even its sober sense of how unprepared most Americans are for a mass-casualty disaster (as captured in this April report from the National Biosurveillance Advisory Committee).
To find out where those came from, I asked its chief science advisor: Dr. W. Ian Lipkin, who is the John Snow Professor of Epidemiology, and Director of the Center for Infection and Immunity, at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, dubbed a “master virus-hunter” by master science-writer Carl Zimmer in the New York Times. Here’s our email Q & A.
The Maddow Blog on MSNBC: The nerdiest catchiest song of the day so far
AHHH!!! Get out of my head!