Welcome to Science Saturday, where the Overnight News Digest crew, consisting of founder Magnifico, regular editors jlms qkw, maggiejean, wader, Oke, rfall, and JML9999, alumni editors palantir, Bentliberal, and ScottyUrb, guest editor annetteboardman, and current editor-in-chief Neon Vincent, along with anyone else who reads and comments, informs and entertains you with this week's news about science, space, and the environment.
This week's featured story comes from Space.com.
It's Time for Next Phase in Search for Alien Life, Scientists Say
by Mike Wall, SPACE.com Senior Writer
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 06:30 AM ET
With more and more Earth-like alien planets being discovered around the galaxy, humanity should now start planning out the next steps in its hunt for far-flung alien life, researchers say.
On Thursday (April 18), scientists announced the discovery of three more potentially habitable exoplanets — Kepler-62e, Kepler-62f and Kepler-69c — further suggesting that the cosmos is jam-packed with worlds capable of supporting life as we know it.
So the time is right to get the ball rolling beyond mere discovery to the detailed study and characterization of promising alien planets, researchers said — a task that will require new and more powerful instruments.
More stories after the jump.
Recent Science Diaries and Stories
This week in science: The far lighter side
by DarkSyde
Green diary rescue: Stopping Keystone XL with public comments
by Meteor Blades
Slideshows/Videos
LiveScience: No Duh! The 10 Most Obvious Science Findings
by LiveScience Staff
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 07:55 AM ET
For scientists, an answer to a question, or solution to a problem, is not true until proven so. And sometimes that means revealing what mere mortals already knew, like, say the fact that getting to the hospital quicker can save heart-attack victims, or, the seemingly far-fetched idea that exercise is good for you.
Here are a few of the most obvious findings in science.
Discovery News on YouTube: Gene Patents: 5 Things You Should Know
The debate over whether we can patent genes has come to a head with the US Supreme Court weighing in on two human genes linked to cancer. Laci has all the details on what you need to know about this colossal decision and the impact it could have on medicine.
Discovery News on YouTube: Why New Music Feels Amazing
Ever heard a song for the first time and fallen in love? As Trace tells us, there's a biological reason for why new music feels so good.
Discovery News on YouTube: Boston Bombings: High Tech Bomb Spotters
The bombings at the Boston Marathon brought home the challenge law enforcement faces battling smaller and smaller explosives. Trace looks at the detection methods used today, and how new technology will help make us safer in the future.
Discovery News on YouTube: Ricin Letters: What's So Dangerous?
With a suspect under arrest for the poisoned letters sent to Obama, Anthony asks, what is ricin and what makes it so deadly?
NASA Television on YouTube: Antares Anticipating Launch on This Week @ NASA
The Antares rocket remains at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport's Pad 0-A at Wallops Flight Facility -- awaiting launch on its first test flight under NASA's Commercial Orbital Transportation Services, or COTS program. Orbital Sciences Corporation canceled the countdown during Wednesday's initial launch attempt when a data umbilical connection prematurely separated from the rocket. On this demonstration flight, Antares will carry a simulated Cygnus spacecraft to orbit. The real Cygnus will deliver cargo to the International Space Station. Also, Orion's Progress , Gathering for Impact!, Three More Planets for Kepler , Station Spacewalk, Moonbuggy Preps, Hubble's Infrared Horsehead and more!
ScienceAtNASA on YouTube: ScienceCasts: Comet ISON Meteor Shower
Sungrazing Comet ISON, expected to become a bright naked-eye object later this year, might dust the Earth with meteoroids in early 2014. Researchers discuss the possibilities in this week's ScienceCast.
NASA Television on YouTube: 2014 NASA Budget Briefed on This Week @ NASA
Administrator Charles Bolden, Deputy Administrator Lori Garver, Chief Financial Officer Beth Robinson and Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot unveiled the President's Fiscal Year 2014 budget request for NASA during a town hall-style all-hands briefing at Headquarters. The proposal would leverage the agency's capabilities to make significant-yet-affordable advances for the nation while meeting the space goals set by the Obama Administration. One presidential goal, to send humans to an asteroid by 2025, is targeted by what would be the first-ever mission to identify, capture, and relocate an asteroid to a stable Earth-moon orbit. There, it could be explored by astronauts using the Orion spacecraft and the Space Launch System. Also, ANTARES AWAITS, CURIOSITY ROVER UPDATE, XOMBIE FLIES HIGH, FROZEN WINGS, EARTH MONTH TREE PLANTING, @NASA GETS SHORTY and more!
NASA Television present a more detailed presentation of the agency's budget in
NASA's Next Budget Advances US Leadership in Space and Science. It also describes more of NASA's social media outreach in
NASA Television Viewer Stats Soaring on YouTube. Both videos follow.
President Obama's Fiscal Year 2014 budget request for NASA is a $17.7 billion investment in our nation's future. NASA's budget ensures the United States will remain the world's leader in space exploration and scientific discovery for years to come, while making critical advances in aerospace and aeronautics to benefit the American people.
An upbeat animated thirty second promo video reveals astonishing numbers of YouTube viewers visiting the NASA YouTube Channel.
Purdue University on YouTube: Boiler Bytes: NEIL ARMSTRONG
Reflections on the life and legacy of famed alumnus Neil Armstrong.
Discovery News on YouTube: The Hunt For A Second Earth
NASA's Kepler telescope was launched to find other planets just like earth-- and now, scientists think they may have found not just one, but three! Trace shows us where they are in the solar system and why the discovery is so important.
Discovery News on YouTube: Hawking: We Need to Leave Earth
Renowned scientist Stephen Hawking says we have 1000 years left on Earth before all the planet's resources will be used up. Laci looks at the problems we'll face and Hawking's solution to saving humanity.
Space.com: What Does Life in Space Do To You?
From trouble sleeping to wimpy muscles, living on board the International Space Station really does a number on the human body.
Get to know how your body could react to life in orbit with these 6 fun facts:
Astronomy/Space
Space.com: Four Oddball Alien Planets Get Fingerprinted
SPACE.com Staff
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 05:00 AM ET
Scientists have collected the startling chemical fingerprints of four huge alien planets, successfully sifting through the blinding light of their parent star.
The atmospheric composition of the four warm, cloud-covered alien planets orbiting the star HR 8799 — a star five times brighter than our sun that lies 128 light-years away from Earth — took researchers by surprise.
"These warm, red planets are unlike any other known object in our universe," astronomer Ben Oppenheimer, chair of the astrophysics department at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City, said in a statement. "All four planets have different spectra, and all four are peculiar. The theorists have a lot of work to do now."
Space.com: Saturn Moon Titan's Methane May Dry Up
by Megan Gannon, News Editor
Date: 17 April 2013 Time: 03:40 PM ET
Today, methane sloshes around in pools on the surface of Titan, but the hydrocarbon may eventually vanish from Saturn's giant moon, according to a new study.
Images and data from NASA's Cassini spacecraft show that the compound doesn't seem to be getting replenished fast enough on Titan's surface to keep the methane cycle sustainable, scientists say.
Besides Earth, Titan is the only known place in our solar system to have stable liquids on its surface. The huge moon's clouds, lakes and rain are made up of hydrocarbons, or molecules composed of hydrogen and carbon, such as methane and ethane.
Space.com: World's Oldest Spacewalker: Russian Cosmonaut Makes Space History at 59
by Megan Gannon, News Editor
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 03:07 PM ET
Russian cosmonaut Pavel Vinogradov made spaceflight history high above Earth on Friday (April 19) when, at age 59, he became the oldest person ever to venture outside a spacecraft during a spacewalk that was only marred by the last-minute loss of an experiment.
Vinogradov, a veteran cosmonaut, took his seventh cosmic excursion in 16 years during Friday's spacewalk. He donned a bulky spacesuit and left the confines of the International Space Station just after 10 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT) to upgrade the orbiting lab with new experiments.
Vinogradov paired up with 41-year-old fellow cosmonaut Roman Romanenko, a first-time spacewalker but second-generation cosmonaut. Romanenko's father, former cosmonaut Yuri Romanenko, logged more than 10 spacewalking hours in his career.
Climate/Environment
Accuweather via OurAmazingPlanet: Major Flooding Continues From Missouri to Michigan
AccuWeather.com Staff
Apr 19, 2013 11:55 AM ET
Torrential rain, concentrated in two days or less, has led to major flooding in parts of the Midwest. In some areas, flooding will continue beyond the weekend.
While the rain was exiting the region at increasing speed Friday, runoff from small streams into progressively larger rivers will continue the flooding risk through the weekend and beyond in some locations.
Levels in some of the tributaries of the upper Mississippi and Ohio rivers are projected to reach, surpass or remain major flood stage over the next several days.
OurAmazingPlanet via LiveScience: Conservation Group Lists 10 Most Endangered US Rivers
Douglas Main, OurAmazingPlanet Staff Writer
Date: 17 April 2013 Time: 12:08 PM ET
The environmental group American Rivers has released its annual list of the 10 most endangered rivers in the United States, with the Colorado River topping the list. The river is threatened by outdated water-management techniques that allow an unsustainable amount of water to be taken out of the river basin, the group said.
As a result, the mighty Colorado, which carved the Grand Canyon, dries up long before it comes close to the ocean.
"This year's [report] underscores the problems that arise for communities and the environment when we drain too much water out of rivers," Bob Irvin, president of American Rivers, said in a statement.
Biodiversity
Accuweather via OurAmazingPlanet: Migrating Monarchs Face Hazardous Travel
Vickie Frantz, AccuWeather.com
Apr 15, 2013 01:52 PM ET
The Monarch butterflies migrating from Mexico to Canada will cross states that lack wildflowers and Milkweed due to wildfires, weed control and drought conditions.
This years swarm is feared to be the smallest since the winter of 2004-2005, according to learner.org. During the migration south, the butterflies were dealing with sparse areas with wildflowers due to drought and wildfires across many of the southern states. The nectar they collect from the flowers help fuel them for their journey to Mexico where they overwinter.
"This year, less than three acres of Monarchs made it into Mexico to overwinter," said Craig Wilson, Ph.D. Director USDA/HSNIP Future Scientist Program and Senior Research Associate at the Center for Mathematics and Science Education at Texas A&M University. Logging in Mexico has reduced the habitat where the butterflies overwinter, adding to their reduction in numbers.
LiveScience: Ants 'Use Math' to Find Fastest Route
Tanya Lewis, LiveScience Staff Writer
Date: 17 April 2013 Time: 01:54 PM ET
Just as light does, ants traveling through different materials follow the fastest path, not the shortest one.
A recent study found that when fire ants (Wasmannia auropunctata) crossed different surfaces, the insects chose the route that would minimize their total walking time, rather than the distance traveled. The ants' behavior offers a window into how groups of social insects self-organize, the scientists say.
In optics, a ray of light traveling between two points takes the path that requires the least amount of time, even if it's not the shortest distance — which is known as "Fermat's principle of least time." For example, imagine a lifeguard rushing to save someone in the ocean some distance down the beach. The quickest way for her to get to the victim would be to run along the beach first, in order to minimize the time she would have to spend swimming, which usually takes longer than running.
LiveScience: How Red Squirrels Are Like Tiger Moms
Megan Gannon, News Editor
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 06:16 PM ET
Red squirrel moms know how to give their offspring an early edge in a crowded forest.
New research shows the animals can speed up the growth rate of their pups to help ensure they'll be able to compete for turf when populations are dense. Surprisingly, stress, not more food, is the key to the mother's gift, scientists say.
Bigger squirrels have a better chance of staking out an exclusive territory, where they can freely feast on the seeds hidden in spruce-tree cones. Juveniles that don't manage to acquire a territory before their first winter often do not survive.
LiveScience: Sea Lion Strandings Climb, Scientists Still Stumped
Megan Gannon, News Editor
Date: 17 April 2013 Time: 03:12 PM ET
Scientists still don't know why nearly 1,300 sickly sea lions have beached themselves on the shores of southern California since the beginning of the year. However, they think some weird oceanic phenomenon may be blocking off the sea lion pups' source of food, scientists reported today (April 17).
The stranded sea lions — mostly pups born last summer — are typically turning up alive, but severely emaciated, some weighing less than 20 pounds (9 kg) when they should be well over 50 pounds (22 kg), marine officials say.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) declared an "unusual mortality event" last month in light of the spike in strandings. Since the beginning of the year, 1,293 sea lions have washed ashore from San Diego County to Santa Barbara County. That's more than five times higher than the region's historical average of 236, averaged from the same period of time (January through April) from 2008 to 2012, said Sarah Wilkin, NOAA's marine mammal stranding coordinator for California.
Biotechnology/Health
MyHealthNewsDaily via LiveScience: Who's Tired? Growing Number of People Get Too Much Sleep
Rachael Rettner, MyHealthNewsDaily Senior Writer
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 01:15 PM ET
Most people you know probably talk about not getting enough sleep, but the percentage of U.S. adults who sleep for more than nine hours a night is actually on the rise, a new study suggests.
Between 1970 and 2007, the percentage of survey participants who reported sleeping for more than nine hours over a 24-hour period increased from 28 percent in 1985 to 37 percent in 2007, the study found. The trend was seen in participants' reports of both their weekday and weekend sleep habits.
What's more, the percentage of people who slept for less than six hours a night decreased, from about 11 percent in 1985 to 9 percent in 2007, the researchers said.
MyHealthNewsDaily via LiveScience: Bird-Flu Update: Possible Cases of Human-to-Human Transmission Investigated
Karen Rowan, MyHealthNewsDaily Managing Editor
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 09:26 AM ET
Authorities in China say that members of a family infected with the H7N9 flu virus may have contracted the virus via human-to-human transmission, according to the website of the English language Chinese newspaper China Daily.
The family's 87-year-old father was the first person in China to die of H7N9, according to the paper.
The man's elder son was also infected, and his younger son may have been. Authorities are looking into how the sons may have caught the virus.
MyHealthNewsDaily via LiveScience: How the New Bird Flu Virus Evolved
Karen Rowan, MyHealthNewsDaily Managing Editor
Date: 16 April 2013 Time: 03:40 PM ET
The new bird flu virus evolved from three other influenza viruses, researchers say.
Genes from the three viruses combined in a new way to form the new H7N9 virus, which has so far sickened 60 people in China, 13 of whom have died, according to the latest update from the World Health Organization. There is no evidence that the virus can spread from person to person, but authorities are continuing to monitor people who have been in close contact with those who have become sick.
The details of how the three viruses came together to give rise to the new strain, which has never been seen before in humans, were published by Chinese researchers in a report Thursday (April 11) in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Psychology/Behavior
MyHealthNewsDaily via LiveScience: Negative Thoughts Can Be Contagious
Karen Rowan, MyHealthNewsDaily Managing Editor
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 01:21 PM ET
The way the people around us respond to stressful events — whether those people react negatively or positively — may be contagious when we are in the midst of a major life transition, a new study says.
What's more, the increased risk of depression that comes with negative thinking also seems to rub off during these times, the study found.
For the study, researchers looked at 103 pairs of college-freshmen roommates' "cognitive vulnerability," which is the tendency to think that negative events are a reflection of a person's own deficiency or that they will lead to more negative events. Those with high cognitive vulnerability are at an increased risk of depression, studies have found.
LiveScience: Discriminated Groups Strategize to Avoid Prejudice
Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 11:47 AM ET
When they think they'll be discriminated against, people do their best to put on a good face for their group, new research finds.
An obese person, for example, might focus on dressing nicely to combat stereotypes of slovenliness. A black man, used to assumptions that he's violent, might smile more.
The new study reveals both that people are well aware of stereotypes and that they try to combat them.
BusinessNewsDaily via LiveScience: Workplace Socializing Doesn’t Always Bridge Racial Divides
Chad Brooks, BusinessNewsDaily Contributor
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 09:58 AM ET
A new study finds that work events designed to build unity among workers – especially a racially diverse group of employees – don’t always work out as intended. The research found that while the those who do attend work social events report they improve relationships at work, that wasn't the case for workers who were racially dissimilar from their colleagues, such as the only African-American person in an all-white office, or vice versa.
Tracy Dumas, lead author of the study and assistant professor of management and human resources at The Ohio State University’s Fisher College of Business, said there is something about being different from your co-workers that can make socializing less effective in building closer relationships.
"We didn’t see a negative relationship — it doesn’t make things worse to socialize with your co-workers," Dumas said. "But when you’re racially dissimilar, it doesn't have the same positive impact."
LiveScience: Scent of a Man: Women Can Sniff Out a Hot Guy
Tanya Lewis, LiveScience Staff Writer
Date: 17 April 2013 Time: 05:13 PM ET
Women at their peak fertility prefer the smell of men oozing with testosterone, a new study finds.
Ovulation has been shown to impact a woman's mating preferences. For instance, women in the fertile phase of their menstrual cycle favor more masculine traits, such as a deep voice or manly face, characteristics associated with the hormone testosterone, studies have found. Other research suggests fertile women are attracted to men with high levels of the stress hormone cortisol, which may be involved in stronger immune systems.
In the new study, researchers tested how women's sexual scent preferences changed depending on men's levels of testosterone and cortisol. Male volunteers were given T-shirts to wear for two consecutive nights, during which time they were prohibited from using scented soaps or detergents; drinking or smoking; or eating garlic, onion, green chiles, strong cheeses and other pungent foods.
Archeology/Anthropology
LiveScience: The Real 'Hobbit' Had Larger Brain Than Thought
Charles Choi, LiveScience Contributor
Date: 16 April 2013 Time: 07:01 PM ET
The brain of the extinct "hobbit" was bigger than often thought, researchers say.
These findings add to evidence that the hobbit was a unique species of humans after all, not a deformed modern human, scientists added.
...
Scientists had suggested the hobbit was a unique branch of the human lineage Homo. It may have descended from Homo erectus, the earliest undisputed ancestor of modern humans, or an even more primitive extinct species of human, Homo habilis, which had a more apelike skeleton. However, other researchers have argued it was unlikely another species of human lasted so close to the present day, and that the hobbit was really a modern human with microcephaly, a condition that leads to an abnormally small head, a small body and some mental retardation.
LiveScience: Did King Richard III Undergo Painful Scoliosis Treatment?
Jeanna Bryner, LiveScience Managing Editor
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 08:35 AM ET
King Richard III may not have been a hunchback as portrayed by Shakespeare, but he did suffer from the spine-curving condition scoliosis, and he may have undergone painful medical treatments to straighten it out, scientists report today (April 19).
Archaeologists announced in February that bones excavated from underneath a parking lot in Leicester, England, belonged to the medieval king. Since this confirmation, examination has continued on the bones and historical records, which have suggested the king was a control freak who had a friendly face.
Previous work showed King Richard III likely developed severe scoliosis, a painful condition, in his teen years.
annetteboardman is taking a well-deserved night off.
Evolution/Paleontology
Nature: 'Living fossil' genome unlocked
The genes of an ancient fish, the coelacanth, have much to reveal about our distant past.
Chris Woolston
17 April 2013
The South African fisherman who pulled a prehistoric-looking blue creature out of his net in 1938 had unwittingly snagged one of the zoological finds of the century: a 1.5-metre-long coelacanth, a type of fish that had been thought to have become extinct 70 million years earlier.
Since then, scientists have identified two species of coelacanth, one African and one Indonesian. With their fleshy, lobed fins — complete with bones and joints — and round, paddle-like tails, they look strikingly similar to the coelacanths that lived during the Cretaceous period, when dinosaurs still roamed Earth.
Now, an international team of scientists has sequenced and analysed the genome of the African coelacanth, Latimeria chalumnae...
LiveScience: Dinos Sat on Nests Like Birds, Shells Reveal
Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 07:15 AM ET
Dinosaurs laid eggs, of that there is no doubt. But what scientists haven't been as clear on is whether they brooded over their eggs like birds or buried them like crocodiles.
Now, a new study finds that at least one dino took a birdlike approach to hatching eggs. Troodon was a small, meat-eating dinosaur that grew to be about 8 feet (2.4 meters) long. The dinosaurs date back to the Late Cretaceous, about 75 million years ago, and they apparently incubated their eggs much like modern birds.
Most birds sit on their eggs to warm them, but crocodiles and their relatives completely bury their nests. The difference between the two shows up in the eggshells: Croc eggs have many pores to allow for air and water exchange, lest the eggs suffocate in their closed, humid nests. Bird eggs exposed to the air have fewer pores, because their eggs would be more in danger of drying out.
Geology
OurAmazingPlanet: Earth Is 'Lazy' Along Some Earthquake Faults
Crystal Gammon, OurAmazingPlanet Contributor
Apr 19, 2013 03:09 PM ET
The Earth's crust may have something in common with a lot of people: It tends to be lazy, at least when it comes to moving along certain types of seismic faults, new research says.
Using a special clay system to model a strike-slip fault (where one tectonic plate slides past another) with a bend that restrains the fault's movement, researchers found that the crust tends to develop smaller faults around the restraining bend to minimize the fault system's overall workload.
"In other words, the faults grow to make the system more efficient," said Michele Cooke, a geophysicist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst who led the study. "Since a bend is a place where the fault is inefficient, this is an interesting area to look."
OurAmazingPlanet via LiveScience: Earthquakes Are East Coast's Biggest Tsunami Threat
Becky Oskin, OurAmazingPlanet Staff Writer
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 02:01 PM ET
The U.S. East Coast's biggest tsunami threat lurks just offshore, according to research presented today (April 19) at the Seismological Society of America's annual meeting in Salt Lake City.
Recent earthquake swarms off the Massachusetts coast highlight the threat of tsunamis from nearby earthquakes, rather than faraway islands, said John Ebel, a seismologist at Boston College.
The geologic setting of the quakes off the Northeast appears similar to that of a magnitude-7.3 earthquake that struck in the Grand Banks off Newfoundland in 1929, Ebel said. The resulting 32-foot (10 meters) tsunami swamped southern Newfoundland and triggered underwater landslides that severed transatlantic telephone cables.
OurAmazingPlanet: Volcano's 'Infrasound' Roar Is a Weather Vane
Becky Oskin, OurAmazingPlanet Staff Writer
Apr 18, 2013 06:32 PM ET
SALT LAKE CITY —The thunderous roar of Chile's Villarrica volcano carries for miles.
The active volcano's churning lava lake constantly rumbles, said Jeff Johnson, a volcanologist at Boise State University in Idaho. At deeper frequencies — the kinds that rattle human nerves but are below hearing range — Villarrica is also a prodigious source of infrasound, Johnson said.
"If it was in hearing range, it would be about 160 decibels. It would blow your eardrums," he told OurAmazingPlanet.
OurAmazingPlanet: Yellowstone's Volcano Bigger Than Thought
by Becky Oskin, OurAmazingPlanet Staff Writer
Apr 18, 2013 11:45 AM ET
SALT LAKE CITY — Yellowstone's underground volcanic plumbing is bigger and better connected than scientists thought, researchers reported here today (April 17) at the Seismological Society of America's annual meeting.
"We are getting a much better understanding of the volcanic system of Yellowstone," said Jamie Farrell, a seismology graduate student at the University of Utah. "The magma reservoir is at least 50 percent larger than previously imaged."
Knowing the volume of molten magma beneath Yellowstone is important for estimating the size of future eruptions, Farrell told OurAmazingPlanet.
OurAmazingPlanet: Rock You Like a Hurricane: Watch Sandy Shake the US
Becky Oskin, OurAmazingPlanet Staff Writer
Apr 18, 2013 06:26 PM ET
Hurricane Sandy's fateful left turn toward the mid-Atlantic Coast in October last year lit up earthquake monitors all the way to Seattle, according to results presented at the Seismological Society of America's annual meeting today (April 18).
When Hurricane Sandy veered on Oct. 29, the sudden increase in crashing ocean waves sent rumbles through the Earth detectable on seismometers. The wave-on-wave collisions created what are called standing waves, doubling the energy directed at the seafloor, scientists reported today. The ocean gave the seafloor a little shove, sending seismic waves through the Earth.
The tremors are roughly similar to a magnitude-2 or magnitude-3 earthquake, but have a unique signal on seismometers, distinct from the rapid shaking caused by earthquakes, said Oner Sufri, lead study author and a geophysics doctoral student at the University of Utah.
OurAmazingPlanet: Salt Lake City Could See Bigger Earthquakes
Becky Oskin, OurAmazingPlanet Staff Writer
Apr 17, 2013 12:15 AM ET
Two faults bounding Utah's biggest city may combine to produce especially powerful earthquakes, geologists will report in Salt Lake City today (April 17) at the annual meeting of the Seismological Society of America.
Utah's biggest earthquake fault runs east of Salt Lake City, at the base of the steep Wasatch Mountains. About 75 percent of the state's population lives near the 240-mile-long (385 kilometers) Wasatch Fault, according to the Utah Geological Survey. Its last big earthquake hit in 1600, 247 years before Mormon settlers arrived.
To the west, in urban Salt Lake City, a 4-mile-wide (6 km) zone of fault segments called the West Valley Fault Zone stretches north-northwest for 9 miles (14 km) beneath the valley.
Energy
LiveScience: Solar Cell Could Dramatically Improve Energy Harvest
Tia Ghose, LiveScience Staff Writer
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 02:00 PM ET
A special coating could dramatically improve the percentage of energy that can be harvested from solar cells by splitting photons in two, new research suggests.
For every photon (or particle of light) that hits a solar cell, the coating — called pentacene — doubles the number of electrons, and energy, that can be harvested, at least with high-energy blue or green wavelengths of light.
The findings were reported today (April 18) in the journal Science.
Physics
LiveScience: Loophole in Spooky Quantum Entanglement Theory Closed
Tia Ghose, LiveScience Staff Writer
Date: 17 April 2013 Time: 03:40 PM ET
The weird way entangled particles stay connected even when separated by large distances — a phenomenon Albert Einstein called "spooky" — has been confirmed once again, this time with a key loophole in the experiment eliminated.
The results from the new experiment confirm one of the wildest predictions of quantum mechanics: that a pair of "entangled" particles, once measured, can somehow instantly communicate with each other so that their states always match.
"Quantum mechanics is a wonderful theory that scientists use very successfully," said study co-author Marissa Giustina, a physicist at the University of Vienna. "But it makes some strange predictions."
Chemistry
LiveScience: What Causes Fertilizer Explosions?
Marc Lallanilla, Assistant Editor
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 01:01 PM ET
A fire anywhere is cause for concern, but a fire at a fertilizer plant is a potential catastrophe.
That's because ammonium nitrate, a chemical commonly used in agricultural fertilizers, is a highly explosive compound, as shown by the massive fireball at a fertilizer plant in the town of West, Texas, Wednesday (April 17).
Nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium are essential plant nutrients, and fertilizers are graded by the amounts of these elements the fertilizers contain, also called their "NPK rating" (from those elements' abbreviations on the periodic table).
Science Crime Scenes
LiveScience: Could Your Town Explode?
Marc Lallanilla, Assistant Editor
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 05:09 PM ET
The fertilizer plant explosion in West, Texas, on Wednesday (April 17) killed at least a dozen people and destroyed several blocks of the small town.
Is your neighborhood next?
Investigators have yet to determine the exact cause of the fire and powerful explosion that leveled up to 75 homes, tore the roof off a 50-unit apartment building and severely damaged a nearby nursing home and school, according to ABAJournal.com.
But the disaster is bringing increased attention to the thousands of facilities nationwide that store or manufacture fertilizer, especially ammonium nitrate, an explosive chemical often used in agricultural fertilizers.
See
Why Fertilizer Is Dangerous (Infographic) for a map of fertilizer production facilities (West was a retail storage facility).
TechNewsDaily via LiveScience: Boston Bombings Used as Malware Scam Bait
Elizabeth Palermo, TechNewsDaily Contributor
Date: 17 April 2013 Time: 05:06 PM ET
Just hours after the Boston Marathon bombings Monday (April 15), scammers were already using the tragedy to fuel their malware campaigns, according to a study by Romanian anti-virus firm Bitdefender.
The study found that the words "marathon," "Boston" and "explosion" found their way into the subject headers of one out of every five spam messages in the hours and days following the event.
The use of news events to spread malware is nothing new for scammers. Just last month, scammers used the news of the pope's installment as bait for email victims. Emailscontaining links to malware-laden sites were circulated with subject lines such as "New Pope Sued for Not Wearing Seatbelt in Popemobile."
LiveScience: Inside Twisted Terrorist Minds — Where Is the Empathy?
Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
Date: 16 April 2013 Time: 03:13 PM ET
A video of the scene from Monday's Boston Marathon bombing showed people running toward the wounded, trying to help. A flood of support and sympathy poured out all across the Internet. And Bostonians rushed to donate blood and offer spare bedrooms to those displaced by the blast.
Even though a human (or humans) caused the carnage at the finish line, such acts of kindness, as well as a sense of empathy, are actually hard to overcome — even for the terrorists, psychologists say.
"A whole industry of propaganda is aimed" at convincing potential terrorists that their intended victims are worthy of death, said Arie Kruglanski, a psychologist at the University of Maryland who has researched the roots of terrorism.
LiveScience: What Is Shrapnel?
Marc Lallanilla, Assistant Editor
Date: 16 April 2013 Time: 01:11 PM ET
The shrapnel bombs detonated near the finish line of the Boston Marathon have a long and bloody history.
Shrapnel is a general term used to describe the fragments thrown off by a bomb or other explosive device. Usually comprised of nails, ball bearings, needles or other small metal objects, these shards are the leading cause of death and injury following the explosion of a shrapnel bomb.
In the 1780s, a British lieutenant named Henry Shrapnel developed a long-range artillery shell, packed with lead shot, that used a delayed-action fuse. Shrapnel's shell was designed to explode near or above the heads of enemy soldiers, causing widespread death and injury, according to Wired.
LiveScience: Brazilian Tribe Threatened as Illegal Loggers Stay Put
Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior Writer
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 05:31 PM ET
A deadline for the removal of illegal settlers from the lands of a threatened tribe in Brazil has passed without action, according to a British-based advocacy group for indigenous people's rights.
The Awá, an indigenous group of about 450, has legal rights to their lands and a judge's order requiring the removal of illegal loggers and other settlers from the area by the end of March. But so far, no illegal settlers have been evicted. Advocates are particularly concerned about 100 or so "uncontacted" Awá, who live in the forest without interacting with the outside world.
"We are scared because the loggers could kill us and the uncontacted Indians," Awá tribe member Haikaramoka'a told the indigenous advocacy group Survival International.
Science, Space, Environment, and Energy Policy
U.S. News & World Report via LiveScience: Marijuana Majority: Americans Now Back Legalization: Op-Ed
Jeff Nesbit
Date: 19 April 2013 Time: 04:10 PM ET
This year, Weed Day enthusiasts hoping to see the tide turn (both politically and socially) on the legalization of marijuana front have more to celebrate than in years past.
A national survey by the Pew Research Center earlier this month found that, for the first time ever, a majority of Americans would now support regulating marijuana use the way that most states and federal authorities regulate alcohol use.
In fact, Pew found, the number of Baby Boomers who would support decriminalizing marijuana has gone up year after year during the 40 years it's been asking about the question —and is now more than double what it was in the early 1990s.
OurAmazingPlanet: East Coast Rebuilding, But Vulnerable to Future Sandys
by Doug Main, OurAmazingPlanet Staff Writer
Apr 17, 2013 06:34 PM ET
NEW YORK — In the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, local governments are rethinking how to best protect the U.S. coastline from storms and flooding, which appear likely to exert a larger toll as the result of sea level rise and climate change.
The coast is now much less protected for the next storm, because Sandy's storm surge and winds destroyed dunes, flood walls and other barriers, said Joe Vietri, director of coastal and storm risk management for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, at a news conference here today (April 17).
Although rebuilding efforts are moving forward in many areas, they won't come close to restoring the coast to its previous condition any time soon, according to officials from along the East Coast who gathered to discuss their communities' response to Sandy and their plans for dealing with future storms, at an event organized by the Union of Concerned Scientists, a science advocacy group.
OurAmazingPlanet via LiveScience: New US Natural Landmarks Relics of America's Past
Andrea Thompson, OurAmazingPlanet Managing Editor
Date: 17 April 2013 Time: 05:04 PM ET
The National Park Service has designated two new national natural landmarks that stand as relics of ecosystems that were once widespread in the United States.
The two new landmarks are the Wade Tract Preserve in southern Georgia, one of the last old-growth stands of longleaf pine left in the world, and the Zumwalt Prairie in Oregon, an example of bunchgrass prairie that was once more widespread.
"By designating these remarkable sites as national natural landmarks, we recognize two extraordinary examples of landscapes in America that were commonplace at one time, but are now rarely seen intact," said National Park Service director Jonathan B. Jarvis in a statement.
Science Education
Scientific American: To Attract More Girls to STEM, Bring More Storytelling to Science
By Anna Kuchment
April 16, 2013
Women and girls are historically underrepresented in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) fields and much has been written lately about why girls in school seem disinterested in these areas. As STEM becomes more important in our increasingly interconnected global society, it becomes even more imperative that educators find ways to encourage girls to participate in these fields.
A few weeks ago, researchers at the Universities of Pittsburgh and Michigan released the results of a study that reflected many girls’ antipathy toward all things STEM. The study, published in the journal Psychological Science, tracked about 1500 college-bound students over a decade and found that more women had the highest scores on both the math and the verbal portion of the SAT test than their male counterparts. These women were more likely to pursue non-STEM careers after graduation even though they excelled in those fields in school. As the principal researcher of the study, Ming-Te Wang, summarizes, “This highlights the need for educators and policy makers to shift the focus away from trying to strengthen girls’ STEM-related abilities and instead tap the potential of these girls who are highly skilled in both the math and verbal domains to go into STEM fields.” We couldn’t agree more.
As educators in a STEM-focused high school, we come in contact with intellectually gifted female scientists every day–albeit young ones. We also know there aren’t enough of them. As a school, we struggle to attract young women who want to attend an engineering-focused high school in the first place. In our time here, we’ve never had more girls than boys in any given class. Too often, our gender ratio is lopsided. We know that this is not a result of ability. As the Pittsburg-Michigan study showed, and what we experience every day in our classrooms, is that there is no shortage of girls who could successfully pursue anything they wanted. The girls in our school are brilliant and many do pursue careers in STEM-related fields. However, some choose not to, and other smart girls never even make it through our front door. Why not?
Science Writing and Reporting
Space.com: SPACE.com Named Official Webby Awards Honoree
SPACE.com Staff
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 05:41 PM ET
SPACE.com, the premier destination for innovation, technology, entertainment, astronomy and space news, announced yesterday (April 17) that it has been selected as an Official Honoree in the Science category of the 17th Annual Webby Awards.
This marks SPACE.com's second Webby Awards distinction, following their 2010 Official Honoree selection in the 14th Annual Webby Awards.
SPACE.com was one of only 11 entries afforded Official Honoree status in the Science category, sharing the honor with websites from some of the most influential technology and science organizations in the world, including NASA (Eyes on Earth by NASA) and MIT (MIT Technology Review).
Science is Cool
LiveScience: 8 Scientists Named to TIME's 100 Influential People List
Tanya Lewis, LiveScience Staff Writer
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 05:02 PM ET
Several scientists made TIME Magazine's list of the 100 most influential people in the world for 2013.
Included on TIME's list are spaceflight entrepreneur Elon Musk; breast cancer researcher Kimberly Blackwell; asteroid hunter Don Yeomans; NASA Mars rover Curiosity's project managers; and the scientists who cured an HIV-positive baby.
LiveScience: Survival of the Funniest: Celebrating Bad Evolutionary Theory
Michael Dhar, LiveScience Contributor
Date: 18 April 2013 Time: 08:13 AM ET
A beautiful scientific hypothesis can reduce the chaos of the world to a few, simple principles. Of course, it also helps if that explanation is true. A different kind of science festival that had been scheduled for April 20, however, will celebrate exquisitely argued evolutionary hypotheses — that just happen to be hopelessly, terribly wrong.
(The festival will be rescheduled for a later date.)
The first-ever BAH! (Festival of Bad Ad Hoc Hypotheses) will treat an audience at MIT to seven lectures on internally coherent, even convincing — but ultimately hilariously absurd — explanations of evolutionary adaptation.
The event was inspired by a joke in the science-obsessed Web comic "Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal" (SMBC), which is co-sponsoring the festival, along with the comic's publisher Breadpig (also behind the science-geek comic XKCD), and the MIT Lecture Series. In the comic, a scientist imagines a prehistoric advantage to punting newborns into neighboring villages.
