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 story comes from CNN.
Giant Mars rover blasts off
NASA’s biggest and most advanced Mars rover blasted off Saturday from Cape Canaveral, Florida.
Curiosity is packed with 10 science experiments to determine whether Mars has ever been suitable for life and to find clues about past life forms that may have been preserved in rocks. NASA says Curiosity won’t answer the age-old questions about life on Mars, but it will provide important information that will guide future missions.
The launch was originally scheduled for Friday, but the mission team took an extra day to remove and replace a flight termination system battery, NASA said.
Curiosity is expected to spend about two years roaming Mars, hunting things researchers say are essential for life to grow: liquid water, key chemicals used by living organisms and an energy source.
For details on the mission itself, read
Mars rover aims for deep crater from the BBC.
More stories after the jump.
Recent Science Diaries and Stories
Truly Amazing: Watch How the Rover "Curiosity" Will Land on Mars
by The Troubadour
Renewable Power Now Growing Faster than Fossil Fuel Power
by FishOutofWater
The Daily Bucket - Botulism in the Bay
by enhydra lutris
This week in science: My God, it's full of stars!
by DarkSyde
Slideshows/Videos
BBC: Blast off for Nasa Mars rover mission
November 26, 2011
Nasa has launched its most ambitious rover mission to Mars - starring a 900kg robot that will look to find out whether the planet is, or ever has been, suitable for life.
An Atlas 5 launch rocket carrying the six-wheeled vehicle blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida at 10:02 local time (15:02 GMT) on Saturday.
Nicknamed Curiosity, the rover will take eight and a half months to cross the vast distance to its destination.
BBC: Close-up look at the Mars Curiosity Rover
November 25, 2011
Science correspondent David Shukman got a look at a full-scale replica of Curiosity.
BBC: 'Brinicle' ice finger of death filmed in Antarctic
By Ella Davies Reporter, BBC Nature
November 23, 2011
A bizarre underwater "icicle of death" has been filmed by a BBC crew.
With timelapse cameras, specialists recorded salt water being excluded from the sea ice and sinking.
The temperature of this sinking brine, which was well below 0C, caused the water to freeze in an icy sheath around it.
Where the so-called "brinicle" met the sea bed, a web of ice formed that froze everything it touched, including sea urchins and starfish.
The unusual phenomenon was filmed for the first time by cameramen Hugh Miller and Doug Anderson for the BBC One series Frozen Planet.
MSNBC: Solar eclipse darkens Black Friday
By Alan Boyle
Today was "Black Friday" for some folks in southern climes, and not because it's the big shopping day after Thanksgiving: A partial solar eclipse made the sky just a little bit darker in areas of New Zealand, Tasmania, South Africa and Antarctica.
Some observers spotted only a slight grazing of the sun, while others — such as Williams College astronomer Jay Pasachoff and his eclipse-chasing colleagues — could see the moon take an appreciable bite out of the sun's disk in the skies over Invercargill in southern New Zealand. "After an in-and-out, off-and-on-rain day, we are very pleased," Pasachoff said in a report from Sky & Telescope's Kelly Beatty.
MSNBC: Video: 8th grader's bat study helps scientists
MSNBC: Video: How do universes begin?
Brian Greene on the Dylan Ratigan Show.
MSNBC: Pepper spray 5x hotter than hottest pepper
Rachel Maddow describes the Scoville Scale rating of pepper spray.
MSNBC: Green is big draw at L.A. Auto Show
The Los Angeles Auto Show is in full swing and two of the cars creating buzz and getting a great deal of attention are both eco-friendly.
Astronomy/Space
Space.com via MSNBC: Space 'superbubbles' could spawn cosmic rays
Study sheds new light on the origins of mysterious rays that bombard Earth
November 25, 2011
Enigmatic cosmic rays that strike Earth with giant amounts of energy might come from hot gaseous "superbubbles" in space, a new study reveals.
Cosmic rays have perplexed scientists for a century. These electrically charged particles bombard Earth with energies dwarfing anything we are capable of, but their origins remain a mystery.
Since cosmic rays are electrically charged, they can get pushed and pulled around by interstellar magnetic fields in the gas between the stars as they zip through space, obscuring where they come from.
BBC: Most liveable alien worlds ranked
November 23, 2011
Scientists have outlined which moons and planets are most likely to harbour extra-terrestrial life.
Among the most habitable alien worlds were Saturn's moon Titan and the exoplanet Gliese 581g - thought to reside some 20.5 light-years away in the constellation Libra.
The international team devised two rating systems to assess the probability of hosting alien life.
...
In their paper, the authors propose two different indices: an Earth Similarity Index (ESI) and a Planetary Habitability Index (PHI).
BBC: Stranded Mars probe sends further signals
By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News
November 24, 2011
More attempts have been made by the European Space Agency (Esa) to contact the stricken Russian probe Phobos-Grunt - with partial success.
Communication with the craft as it passed over Australia was achieved again on Thursday, but not all of the commands prompted a response.
Phobos-Grunt was launched two weeks ago on a mission to visit one of Mars' moons, but became stuck in Earth orbit.
Engineers still hope to fix the probe and get the mission under way.
But first they need to be able to talk with it.
Evolution/Paleontology
N.Y. Times: Lynn Margulis, Evolution Theorist, Dies at 73
By BRUCE WEBER
Published: November 24, 2011
Lynn Margulis, a biologist whose work on the origin of cells helped transform the study of evolution, died on Tuesday at her home in Amherst, Mass. She was 73.
She died five days after suffering a hemorrhagic stroke, said Dorion Sagan, a son she had with her first husband, the cosmologist Carl Sagan.
Dr. Margulis had the title of distinguished university professor of geosciences at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, since 1988. She drew upon earlier, ridiculed ideas when she first promulgated her theory, in the late 1960s, that cells with nuclei, which are known as eukaryotes and include all the cells in the human body, evolved as a result of symbiotic relationships among bacteria.
LiveScience via MSNBC: Life's diversity snowballed when Earth froze
Surge of nutrients in oceans could have been cause of species 'explosion'
November 25, 2011
Ancient animals may have started their drive toward explosive diversity back when the Earth was a giant snowball, new research suggests.
A startling expansion in the diversity of life forms began about 540 million years ago, early in the Cambrian period. During this apparently sudden outburst, known as the Cambrian explosion, all the major groups of animals seemed to materialize rapidly. Scientists have debated the causes of this great flowering of life for centuries.
Now researchers have new evidence that major groups of animals actually may have existed many tens of millions of years before this seeming flurry of diversity. This early activity helped light the fuse of the later Cambrian explosion.
WESH-TV via MSNBC: Before humans, mastodon hit the beach —Dayton Beach
November 23, 2011
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Local officials said scientists at the Museum of Arts and Sciences confirmed Tuesday that the prehistoric animal bones found at a Daytona Beach construction site were that of a mastodon — a large mammal belonging to the Ice Age.
Crews working at a storm water project off Nova Road found the ancient bones Friday, and officials said they have shut down the construction site to preserve the discovery.
According to scientists, the fossilized mastodon was between 13,000 and 150,000 years old. The tusked mammal would have weighed several tons, like a prehistoric elephant.
The video is
here.
Biodiversity
BBC: EU sounds alarm for threatened freshwater species
23 November 2011
Many of Europe's freshwater fish and molluscs are now threatened species, a new EU study shows.
The European Commission called for urgent action to preserve the diversity of Europe's wildlife.
Pollution, overfishing, habitat loss and alien species are blamed for the decline in species.
The latest findings are based on a study of some 6,000 species for the European Red List - an assessment of threats to wildlife.
The list of Europe's threatened species includes 44% of all freshwater molluscs, 37% of freshwater fish, 23% of amphibians, 19% of reptiles, 15% of mammals and dragonflies and 13% of birds.
Our Amazing Planet via MSNBC: New butterfly species are identified through DNA
Previously lumped in with known varieties, genes prove otherwise in the Yucatan
November 23, 2011
New research into the particulars of butterfly DNA has unmasked as many as nine new butterfly species previously lumped together with known butterfly species.
The interloping butterflies, all found in Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, have long remained incognito in the collection of El Colegio de la Frontera Sur-Chetumal (ECOSUR), a research center in Mexico. They are known as "cryptic species," because, although their markings and body types are nearly identical to previously identified butterfly species, their genes tell a different story.
"We expect all nine cryptic species will be new to science," said lead scientist Carmen Pozo in an email.
The ECOSUR team used a technique known as DNA barcoding for their research, which is published online in the journal PLoS ONE.
MSNBC: Report: Millions of birds killed by power lines
Collisions cause power outages and can even lead to wildfires
November 26, 2011
Tens of millions of flamingos, storks, pelicans and other migratory birds are being killed across the world when they fly into power lines, according to a new study.
The AFP news agency reported that wildfires had been caused in dry areas of the United States and Eastern Europe by birds hitting power lines, then falling to the ground in flames.
The study was published at Convention on Migratory Species in Bergen, Norway, according the news agency.
MSNBC: New fishing gear sharply reduces seabird mortality
By John Roach
A breakthrough design in long line fishing gear has resulted in a nearly 90 percent drop in the number of seabirds accidentally killed.
The design by Japanese tuna boat captain Kazuhiro Yamazaki is a double-weight branch line that sinks the hooks deeper into the ocean, out of reach of seabirds such as albatrosses and petrels.
The new system also reduces injuries to boat crews as they rapidly coil in the lines.
For his design, Yamazaki won the World Wildlife Fund's Smart Gear contest, which has a $30,000 prize, and $7,500 from the International Seafood Sustainability Foundation.
BBC: Elephant and bee researcher nets green prize
By Richard Black Environment correspondent, BBC News
November 23, 2011
A British scientist has won a coveted environment research prize for showing how bees can be used to reduce conflict between people and elephants.
Lucy King's work proved that beehive "fences" can keep elephants out of African farmers' fields or compounds.
The animals are scared of bees, which can sting them inside their trunks, and flee when they hear buzzing.
Dr King received the Unep/CMS Thesis Prize at the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS) meeting in Norway.
Lucy King After five years working in the bush, Lucy King found the award "wonderful recognition"
"Her research underlines how working with, rather than against, nature can provide humanity with many of the solutions to the challenges countries and communities face," said Achim Steiner, executive director of the UN Environment Programme (Unep).
BBC: Bottlenose dolphins' maximum speed halved by pregnancy
Pregnant dolphins are not able to sweep their tails through as wide an arc
By Victoria Gill Science reporter, BBC Nature
November 24, 2011
As for many mothers-to-be, the late stages of pregnancy can be extremely awkward for dolphins, say scientists.
Gliding along beneath the ocean, it might seem that these streamlined marine mammals are unaffected by the slight swell of carrying a baby.
But a study has revealed that the females' top swimming speed is almost halved when they are close to giving birth.
The findings are published in the Journal of Experimental Biology.
Biotechnology/Health
Inside Science News Service via MSNBC: Researchers are working hard to build a better turkey
Genetic studies could lead to more resilient Thanksgiving gobblers
By Chris Gorski
November 23, 2011
The great majority of today's domesticated turkeys may not be able to fly, but their ancestors sure got around. The quintessential New World bird, Meleagris gallopavo, was already an Old World favorite by the time colonists in North America first celebrated any Thanksgiving feasts. Today's turkey researchers are investigating the big bird's genetic heritage and biology as part of an effort to improve several aspects of its cultivation.
In 2010, a team of researchers from numerous labs in the United States announced the sequencing of more than 90 percent of the turkey genome. This represented a big step in turkey research, but efforts continue.
"Once you identify genes, the next step is to figure out what they do," said Rami Dalloul, a poultry and immunology researcher at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg.
Discovery News via MSNBC: Another scoop of grasshopper? A push for us to eat more bugs
Company trying to remove 'icky, crunchy' parts to make insects more palatable in US
November 23, 2011
If you want to try something new for Thanksgiving, Matthew Krisiloff has a suggestion: add some insects to the meal.
Many Americans would respond to such a suggestion with a definite "Ew, no thanks," but not Krisiloff. The University of Chicago freshman is the president of Entom Foods, a startup encouraging people to seriously consider insects as a food source. He and four other students started the company last year.
Entom Foods aims to make Americans feel more comfortable eating bugs by removing elements that turn many people off — eyes, wings, legs and crunchy exoskeletons. Eventually, the company hopes to produce processed bug-based foods, such as insect cutlets. Krisiloff hopes marketing the insects in a familiar form will remove the "ick" factor and encourage more people to add insects to their diets.
The company plans to market insects such as crickets, mealworms and grasshoppers, which are already farmed commercially for use as animal feed.
When I was in Oaxaca, Mexico, I ate two insects that are considered to be local delicacies--grasshopper (chapulin) and mescal worm (a beetle grub). Both were actually quite tasty.
MSNBC: Wanted: 'Smart Pot' to purify water instantly, cheaply
By John Roach
Imagine a pot or jar that you could carry to any water source in the world, fill it up and be guaranteed a container full of clean and safe drinking water.
Such a pot is the goal of a new a challenge issued Nov. 17 to inventors in developing nations by the University of South Florida's Patel School of Global Sustainability.
Contaminated water causes more than half of the world's diseases such as cholera, typhoid and diarrhea, killing an estimated 1.5 million children a year, according to world health officials.
The "Smart Pot" challenge is for a technologically advanced, yet low-cost and easy-to-use water purification system that fits seamlessly with the pots and cans already used to collect water.
Climate/Environment
BBC: CO2 climate sensitivity 'overestimated'
By Jennifer Carpenter Science reporter, BBC News
November 25, 2011
Global temperatures could be less sensitive to changing atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) levels than previously thought, a study suggests.
The researchers said people should still expect to see "drastic changes" in climate worldwide, but that the risk was a little less imminent.
...
The authors stress the results do not mean threat from human-induced climate change should be treated any less seriously, explained palaeoclimatologist Antoni Rosell-Mele from the Autonomous University of Barcelona, who is a member of the team that came up with the new estimates.
But it does mean that to induce large-scale warming of the planet, leading to widespread catastrophic consequences, we would have to increase CO2 more than we are going to do in the near future, he said.
Geology
Science News: Oxygen a bit player in Earth's outer core
Sulfur and silicon may be more abundant in the planet’s heart
By Alexandra Witze
November 23, 2011
Like a virtual journey to the center of the Earth, laboratory experiments are helping resolve a decades-old mystery that even Jules Verne couldn’t explain: what Earth’s core is made of.
In particular, oxygen makes up a smaller percentage of the core than scientists had thought, suggests a study in the Nov. 24 Nature. Knowing the core’s contents helps researchers better understand how Earth clumped together 4.5 billion years ago, says coauthor Yingwei Fei, a geochemist at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington, D.C.
Arguments about the core’s chemical makeup have raged for nearly 60 years, says geophysicist Thomas Duffy of Princeton University. But “the work reported here suggests that a solution to the problem may finally be at hand," he writes in a commentary accompanying the study.
Psychology/Behavior
BBC: Dreaming 'eases painful memories’
November 23, 2011
Scientists have used scans to shed more light on how the brain deals with the memory of unpleasant or traumatic events during sleep.
The University of California, Berkeley team showed emotional images to volunteers, then scanned them several hours later as they saw them again.
Those allowed to sleep in between showed less activity in the areas of the brain linked to emotion.
Instead, the part of the brain linked to rational thought was more active.
The study, published in the journal Current Biology, said it showed the links between dreams and memory.
io9: Freedom to Riot: On the Evolution of Collective Violence
By Eric Michael Johnson
November 23, 2011
From London to the Middle East riots have shaken political stability. Are the answers to be found in human nature?
...
Collective violence, extending from riots to warfare, presents a challenge to our ordinary understanding of free will. Actions that would rarely be taken by an individual on their own seem to be embraced when supported by a larger group. This can occur in societies ranging from the communist regime of Soviet Russia to the capitalist free market of modern day England. Given this commonality, perhaps the collective violence of a riot can be best understood as a biological event in which evolved cognitive responses encounter a unique environmental threat. And if that is the case, do individuals caught up in such incidents have any choice in the matter?
...
"Collective violence," wrote Harvard primatologist Richard Wrangham in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, shows "a common human pattern evident in societies lacking effective central authority, manifested in ethnic riots, blood feuds, lethal raiding, and warfare." Such aggression, he says, is directly related to that of nonhuman primates and demonstrates a common evolutionary history. As Wrangham earlier wrote in his book Demonic Males: Apes and the Origins of Human Violence, our primate origins "preceded and paved the way for human war, making modern humans the dazed survivors of a continuous, 5-million-year habit of lethal aggression."
BBC: Grey seal personalities affect pups
November 23, 2011
Grey seals have different types of personality that affect the extent to which they guard and care for their young, according to new research.
Researchers from the universities of St Andrews and Durham found seal mothers were often unpredictable and adopted a wide variation of mothering styles.
Some were attentive to their pups while others were not, the experts found.
The study shows, for the first time, the extent of personality differences in marine mammals in the wild.
Archeology/Anthropology
BBC: 'Earliest' evidence of human violence
Maba "man" took a wallop from something, but lived to fight another day
By Paul Rincon Science editor, BBC News website
November 21, 2011
A healed fracture discovered on an ancient skull from China may be the oldest documented evidence of violence between humans, a study has shown.
The individual, who lived 150,000-200,000 years ago, suffered blunt force trauma to the right temple - possibly from being hit with a projectile.
But the ancient hunter-gatherer - whose sex is unclear - survived to tell the tale: the injury was completely healed by the time of the person's death.
BBC: Jawbones are 'shaped by diet', a study finds
By Jennifer Carpenter Science reporter, BBC News
November 23, 2011
Diet has shaped human jaw bones; a result that could help explain why many people suffer with overcrowded teeth.
The study has shown that jaws grew shorter and broader as humans took on a more pastoral lifestyle.
Before this, developing mandibles were probably strengthened to give hunter-gatherers greater bite force.
The results were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"This is a fascinating study which challenges the common perception that there has been little recent change in the morphology of humans," said anthropologist Jay Stock from the University of Cambridge.
annetteboardman is taking the Thanksgiving weekend off.
Physics
BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15830844
By Jason Palmer Science and technology reporter, BBC News
November 21, 2011
Subatomic particles called neutrinos cannot move faster than the speed of light, according to a new report.
The findings challenge a result reported in September that, if true, would undermine a century of physics.
The team at the INFN-Gran Sasso laboratory in Italy said they had measured faster-than-light speeds in neutrinos sent from Cern, 730km away.
Now a different team at the same lab reports findings that, they say, cast doubt on that surprising result.
The Icarus team at the Icarus experiment says that because the neutrinos sent from Cern do not appear to lose energy on their journey, they must not have exceeded the speed of light along the way.
Reuters via MSNBC: Search for the Higgs boson narrows: Does it exist at all?
Large Hadron Collider eliminating particle's hiding places; update due in December?
By Robert Evans
November 23, 2011
GENEVA — CERN physicists have moved the focus of their search for the Higgs boson, the particle many think gave the universe its form after the big bang 13.7 billion years ago, to a narrow band on the mass spectrum, a spokesman said Wednesday.
Science bloggers close to the research center are suggesting it might be clear by mid-December that the boson is a chimera, and some other mechanism would have to be sought to explain how matter took on mass at the birth of the cosmos.
BBC: New state of matter seen on cheap
Flashes of light can be generated by collapsing bubbles in a fluid
By Roland Pease BBC Radio Science Unit
November 24, 2011
Students and enthusiasts attending a recording for BBC Radio 4 have probably seen a new state of matter only recently discovered, an expert says.
The state of matter is a plasma like those in conventional nuclear fusion tests, but at higher densities.
And far from needing expensive apparatus, the conditions can be achieved in a simple glass tube containing a routine liquid.
Chemistry
BBC: Carbon nanotube 'space camouflage' coating invented
November 22, 2011
Tiny carbon tubes can be used to hide three-dimensional objects from view, according to a team of researchers.
The nanotubes are one-atom thick sheets of graphene wrapped into cylindrical tubes.
Engineers from University of Michigan found they could be used to obscure objects so that they appeared to be nothing more than a flat black sheet.
The team suggest "forests" of the material may one day be used to cloak spacecraft in deep space.
Energy
BBC: Nuclear power 'gets little public support worldwide'
By Richard Black Environment correspondent, BBC News
November 24, 2011
There is little public appetite across the world for building new nuclear reactors, a poll for the BBC indicates.
In countries with nuclear programmes, people are significantly more opposed than they were in 2005, with only the UK and US bucking the trend.
Most believe that boosting efficiency and renewables can meet their needs.
Just 22% agreed that "nuclear power is relatively safe and an important source of electricity, and we should build more nuclear power plants".
In contrast, 71% thought their country "could almost entirely replace coal and nuclear energy within 20 years by becoming highly energy-efficient and focusing on generating energy from the Sun and wind".
Discovery News: Geothermal Energy: Hot Times Ahead
By Tim Wall
November 21, 2011
Humans have been enjoying water heated by the Earth for millenia. Bath, England, for example, got its name from the hot springs savored by relaxing Romans.
Nowadays, geothermal power plants also take advantage of water heated by the Earth's interior to boil water into steam. The steam then turns a turbine to make energy. Geothermal is cheap to operate, less expensive to build than nuclear and produces significantly less pollution than fossil fuels.
However, the need for accessible underground heat limited the technology to places like California, the Philippines, El Salvador and Iceland. But new technologies and maps of the Earth's crust are making geothermal a renewable energy competitor to fossil fuels, even in places like coal-rich West Virginia.
In fact, a recent study suggested the United States, already the world's top geothermal energy producer according to the Geothermal Energy Association, may have geothermal resources under its feet capable of producing 10 times the capacity of all coal plants now installed.
Science, Space, Environment, and Energy Policy
MSNBC: Feds bag idea of curbing target practice on public lands
By Miguel Llanos, msnbc.com
The Obama administration on Wednesday backed off a draft policy to restrict target shooting on federal land near residential areas.
In a memo, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said he would direct his agency to "take no further action to develop or implement" the draft. U.S. News & World Report posted a copy of the memo on its website.
Rep. Denny Rehberg, R-Mont., last Friday sent Salazar a letter asking that the draft policy be canned, saying he worried it would be taken advantage of by anti-gun rights groups. "Any draft proposal regarding recreation on public lands must continue to guarantee hunting opportunities," he wrote.
In a statement issued along with a copy of the letter, Rehberg said the Obama administration "is uncomfortable with gun rights, and eager to restrict the Second Amendment at every opportunity."
"In a state like Montana, where the federal government is by far the largest land holder, preserving Second Amendment rights on public land isn’t just a question of good policy," he said. "It’s a question of protecting our way of life from big-city meddlers."
MSNBC: Judges: US wrong to lift protection for Yellowstone grizzlies
By Miguel Llanos, msnbc.com
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service on Tuesday lost a court battle in its bid to lift federal protections for grizzly bears in the Yellowstone National Park area.
The service had been arguing that a strong rebound by the local grizzly population, now estimated at around 600, warranted lifting the protections. But a federal appeals court upheld a lower court decision, ruling that the service hadn't properly weighed the impact of a declining food source: the whitepark pine.
The 9th Circuit Court judges wrote that a study used by the service "to demonstrate long-term grizzly population growth included data only until 2002, before the 'epidemic of mountain pine beetles' began to kill the region's whitebark pines."
The policy amounts to a "full-speed ahead, damn-the-torpedoes approach" to taking the bears off the Endangered Species Act, the judges ruled.
BBC: UK calls for new legal climate deal by 2015
By Richard Black Environment correspondent, BBC News
November 24, 2011
The UK's climate secretary has called on delegates at next week's UN climate summit to agree on a way to deliver a legally-binding global treaty by 2015.
It should "start to bite" into emissions by 2020, Chris Huhne said.
He embarked on a potential crash course with developing countries by suggesting each should pledge action appropriate to its level of development.
The developing world's overt line is to keep the firewall between "rich" and "poor" in the UN climate convention.
In a speech at London's Imperial College, Mr Huhne observed: "China is not, and will not be, the same as Chad or India.
BBC: Australia plans huge marine reserve in Coral Sea
November 25, 2011
The Australian government says it plans to establish the world's largest marine reserve in the Coral Sea.
Environment Minister Tony Burke said the protected zone would cover an area more than one-and-a-half times the size of France.
New fishing limits would be imposed and and exploration for oil and gas banned.
The proposal is subject to a 90-day consultation, but Mr Burke said the Coral Sea's biodiversity was at the heart of the plan.
"There is no other part of Australia's territory where so much comes together - pristine oceans, magnificent coral, a military history which has helped define us and now a clear proposal for permanent protection," he said.
Science Education
Science News: FOR KIDS: Young scientists work together and win
Broadcom MASTERS competitors qualified with individual projects, but won based on team challenges
By Jennifer Cutraro
November 23, 2011
Guests checking into the posh Palomar Hotel in Washington, D.C., recently, might have been surprised to hear pounding footsteps, shrieks and laughter pouring out of a conference room late one evening. And they would have been even more surprised to see what was behind those doors: 30 of the nation’s top middle school science students, flushed and sweaty, playing dodgeball, riding piggyback on their parents and squirting one another with water bottles.
The students were finalists in the first Broadcom Math, Applied Science, Technology and Engineering for Rising Stars — or MASTERS — challenge.
Science Writing and Reporting
BBC: Nature journal libel case continues
By Pallab Ghosh Science correspondent, BBC News
November 25, 2011
A scientist has told the High Court that an article criticising him was "scandalous" and had nothing to do with freedom of expression.
Professor Mohamed El Naschie is suing the Nature journal for libel and says the claims in the article are "despicable and defamatory".
The barrister representing Nature said the article, published in 2008, was true and in the public interest.
Judgment on the case will be reserved and is set to be announced in January.
BBC: Drugmaker Merck challenges Facebook after 'losing' page
November 25, 2011
The German drugmaker Merck KGaA has begun legal action against Facebook after discovering what its lawyer described as the "the apparent takeover of its Facebook page".
The webpage is being used by the German firm's US rival Merck & Co.
Merck KGaA said that the social network "is an important marketing device [and] the page is of great value", adding that since its competitor was benefiting from the move "time is of the essence."
A Facebook spokeswoman said: "We are looking into it."
BBC: 'New release' of climate emails
By Richard Black Environment correspondent, BBC News
November 22, 2011
A new batch of emails and other documents from the University of East Anglia's (UEA) Climatic Research Unit has been released on the internet.
There are more than 5,000 emails, while other documents include working papers relating to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
A similar release in 2009 triggered the "ClimateGate" affair and accusations of fraud that inquiries later dismissed.
Now, as then, the release comes shortly before the annual UN climate summit.
The university says it has "no evidence of a recent breach in our systems", and says that the sheer number of documents - posted on a Russian server - makes it impossible to confirm that all are genuine.
MSNBC: Scientific tales come alive in ink
By Alan Boyle
Ready to crack open some inky tales of scientific lore and levity? Check out our holiday science book roundup — and add your own selections to the list.
Science is Cool
L.A. Times: As rover's launch nears, 'space geeks' are all a-Twitter
Self-described spacetweeps from 37 states and 10 countries come to Florida for Saturday's liftoff of the Mars Science Laboratory, brought together by one of the space agency's newer marketing efforts: the NASA Tweetup. There's food, beer, bonding — and lots (!!!) of tweeting.
By Mitchell Landsberg, Los Angeles Times
November 25, 2011
Seven women and two men, most in their 20s and 30s, were sharing this three-bedroom vacation rental overlooking a canal on Merritt Island some 15 minutes south of the Kennedy Space Center. The house came fully equipped: pool, hot tub, tiki bar, wi-fi.
It was Jersey Shore, Space Coast-style. The only difference was that these people were smart, nice, modestly dressed and all got along. And they were obsessed with space.
There had come for Saturday's scheduled launch of the Mars Science Laboratory, brought together by one of NASA's newer marketing efforts: the NASA Tweetup.
MSNBC: Cast your vote for the geekiest gift
By Alan Boyle
How about a dinosaur skull for the holidays? Or a handful of glow-in-the-dark uranium marbles? Cast your vote and help us crown the geekiest gift for the holiday season.
The gift suggestions for this year's Science Geek Guide are in line with a proud tradition here at msnbc.com. You can always find guides to Black Friday tech deals, or the top 20 toys of 2011, or the hottest holiday hostess gifts. But where else can get a line on a nuclear-powered plaything, or a six-dimensional paperweight, or brains to fit your budget?
Even better, this is a geek gift guide created by geeks for geeks, with some geeky prizes thrown into the bargain. Last week I put out the call for suggestions, and it'll be up to you to select the coolest, most offbeat prize from the top 10. The geek who made the top-rated suggestion will be eligible to receive a pile of books, including "Science Ink," "The Cult of Lego," "The Physics Book" and "The Case for Pluto" (autographed by yours truly).
Here are this year's 10 finalists:
You can vote for your favorite among the following:
- Uranium marbles
- Dinosaur skulls
- Elements Vault
- Magnifying glasses
- Mars lunchbox
- USB microscope
- Plush microbes
- Wi-Fi T-shirt
- Star Trek pizza cutter
- Pi plate
Voting ends at Noon Eastern Standard Time Sunday.
