Due to technical difficulties Friday's Headlines were not posted,
our sincerest apologies... here they are now:
our sincerest apologies... here they are now:
Moon formation: New spins put on old questions
Scientists have put a new turn on the theory of how the Moon was created.
It has long been thought that the lunar body resulted from an impact between the early Earth and another planet-sized object 4.5 billion years ago. But this theory predicts Earth and its satellite should have a quite different chemical make-up - and the data shows in fact they are very similar. Now, new modelling reveals that if the Earth had a much faster spin before the impact, the theory fits the chemistry. |  |
Science Festival Event Addresses Doomsday Scenarios
Is the world destined to end before New Year’s? Will some catastrophic cosmic event terminate life on our planet? Some people say “yes,” making reference to a widely publicized interpretation of an ancient Maya calendar.
But what’s the truth? The Maya prophesy is doubtful, but our planet does face some truly existential dangers. We explore these threats, and how we might forestall them.
But what’s the truth? The Maya prophesy is doubtful, but our planet does face some truly existential dangers. We explore these threats, and how we might forestall them.
World's biggest geoengineering experiment 'violates' UN rules
A controversial American businessman dumped around 100 tonnes of iron sulphate into the Pacific Ocean as part of a geoengineering scheme off the west coast of Canada in July, a Guardian investigation can reveal.
Lawyers, environmentalists and civil society groups are calling it a "blatant violation" of two international moratoria and the news is likely to spark outrage at a United Nations environmental summit taking place in India this week. |  |
Ice sheets may stabilise for centuries, regardless of warming
Ice sheets retreating due to global warming often suddenly stabilise for "decades to centuries" no matter that the warming is still going on, scientists have found. The new research would seem likely to have an impact on forecasts seeking to predict sea-level rise in coming times.
Boffins at Cambridge, Durham and Sheffield universities and others at the British Antarctic Survey came together to produce the new investigation, which sought to examine the way in which fast-moving "ice streams" move from major ice sheets - such as the Greenland and Western Antarctic ones - to the sea. The streams are very important, as they carry 90 per cent of the ice moving into the ocean.
Boffins at Cambridge, Durham and Sheffield universities and others at the British Antarctic Survey came together to produce the new investigation, which sought to examine the way in which fast-moving "ice streams" move from major ice sheets - such as the Greenland and Western Antarctic ones - to the sea. The streams are very important, as they carry 90 per cent of the ice moving into the ocean.
'Time-capsule' Japanese lake sediment will improve radiocarbon dating
A new series of radiocarbon measurements from Japan's Lake Suigetsu will give scientists a more accurate benchmark for dating materials, especially for older objects, according to a research team that included Oxford University's Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit.
The research team extracted cores of beautifully preserved layers of sediment, containing organic material (such as tree leaf and twig fossils), from the bottom of the Japanese lake where they had lain undisturbed for tens of thousands of years.
The research team extracted cores of beautifully preserved layers of sediment, containing organic material (such as tree leaf and twig fossils), from the bottom of the Japanese lake where they had lain undisturbed for tens of thousands of years.
96-year-old claims to be world’s oldest father
Most people can only dream of living for 100 years, let alone fathering a child nearly a century after being born themselves. But that is apparently a reality today, as a 96-year-old Indian man claims to have fathered a child, his second in recent years.
Ramajit Raghav and his 52-year-old wife, Shakuntala Devi, reportedly gave birth to a healthy baby boy, Ranjeet, on Oct. 5, according to the Times of India. Just two years ago, Raghav set the world record when he and Devi gave birth to their first son, Vikramajeet. "I didn't take any performance enhancers. … I just prayed to God to complete my family, either a boy or a girl," Raghav told the paper. |  |
Gary McKinnon will not be extradited to US, Theresa May announces
The home secretary, Theresa May, defied the American authorities on Tuesday by halting the extradition of British computer hacker Gary McKinnon, a decision criticised by the US state department but welcomed with delight by campaigners and politicians across parties in the UK.
In a dramatic House of Commons statement, May told MPs she had taken the quasi-judicial decision on human rights grounds because of medical reports warning that McKinnon, 46, who has Asperger's syndrome and suffers from depressive illness, could kill himself if sent to stand trial in the US.
In a dramatic House of Commons statement, May told MPs she had taken the quasi-judicial decision on human rights grounds because of medical reports warning that McKinnon, 46, who has Asperger's syndrome and suffers from depressive illness, could kill himself if sent to stand trial in the US.
The Man Who Volunteered for Auschwitz
WARSAW -- There are very few places that can accurately be described as hell on Earth. One of these is the Auschwitz concentration camp during World War II, where as many as 1.5 million people died during the five years the camp was in operation.
The Polish resistance had been hearing horrific first- or second-hand accounts about the conditions inside Auschwitz. These early accounts came primarily from released prisoners, but also from casual observers like railway employees and residents of the nearby village of Oswiecim. The resistance decided they needed someone on the inside. |  |
Quantam research will yield 'super-computers': Nobel winner
David Wineland, who won the Nobel Prize for work in quantum physics with Serge Haroche of France, said our limited computers will "eventually" give way to super-fast, revolutionary ones.
The pair, both 68, were honored for pioneering optical experiments in "measuring and manipulation of individual quantum systems," the Nobel Physics jury said in its citation on Tuesday. "Most science progresses very slowly," Wineland told AFP. "On the computing side, we are able to think about applying these quantum systems to solve other problems that we try to do on computer now but our computers are limited. |  |
Future of computing has Schrödinger's cat inside
Scientists like to think that the true measure of our understanding is our ability to predict something, and, in experimental physics, control something. This year's Nobel prize in physics has been awarded to Serge Haroche and David Wineland for controlling the quantum world in ways that, not so long ago, were simply unthinkable. When I say, “controlling the quantum world,” I mean controlling not just the physical motion of a single atom, but also the internal state of the atom. It is the difference between being able to set off an avalanche, and control where every snowflake goes once the avalanche is in motion.
|  |
Archaeologists Explore Prehistoric Foundations of Angkor in Southeast Asia
Ban Non Wat, or "Village of the Temple Mound", is a village in central Thailand located near the city of Phimai. The countryside is dotted with villages much like it, and rice fields dominate the landscape, interspersed with groves of trees. A broad range of bird species, from bee-eaters, to hawks, to water birds, inhabit the area. Throughout the area are richly decorated Buddhist temples from which attending monks make their rounds among the villages for alms early in the morning, and during January and February many of the temples host public festivals open to the locals and visiting public. In many ways, it is a typical rural landscape in Thailand.
|  |
Visiting Ancient Egypt, Virtually
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — What do the pyramids of Giza in Ancient Egypt have in common with protesters using Twitter in modern-day Cairo? How did the writings of Thomas Aquinas inspire a field that now uses the motion-capture software of films like“Avatar”?
The answers to these questions lie in a relatively new discipline known as the digital humanities — in which long-lost civilizations can be recreated as virtual interfaces, and personal testimony from wars, disasters and revolutions can come together in interactive databases.
The answers to these questions lie in a relatively new discipline known as the digital humanities — in which long-lost civilizations can be recreated as virtual interfaces, and personal testimony from wars, disasters and revolutions can come together in interactive databases.
Ancient Nile Delta City in Egypt Reveals its Secrets
A team of archaeologists and students are excavating a site in the Nile Delta region of Egypt where, set within desert desolation, ruins still bespeak an important port city that flourished by the 2nd and 1st centuries B.C. Near the present-day city of El-Mansoura, a clearly human-made rise with visible ruins mark the spot of Tel Timai, what remains of the city of Thmuis, an ancient port city and capital of the Ptolemies.
|  |
Salafists destroy ancient Morocco carvings: NGO
RABAT — Stone carvings in Morocco's High Atlas mountains dating back more than 8,000 years and depicting the sun as a pagan divinity have been destroyed by Salafists, a local rights group said on Wednesday.
"These stone carvings of the sun are more than 8,000 years old. They were destroyed several days ago," Aboubakr Anghir, a member of the Amazigh (Berber) League for Human Rights, told AFP. "One of the carvings, called 'the plaque of the sun,' predates the arrival of the Phoenicians in Morocco," Anghir said. |  |
Prehistoric fish the first to grow a set of teeth
Scientists have found fossil evidence of the first animal to grow a set of pearly whites — a prehistoric fish that lived more than 380 million years ago.
An international research team discovered teeth in several specimens of an ancient fish species, known as placoderms, a finding that likely represents the origins of teeth and jaws in animals. A full set of chompers has been key to the success of most top predators. |  |
Who Mastered Fire, which hominids first started cooking?
Richard Wrangham, an anthropologist at Harvard, claims that hominids became people—that is, acquired traits like big brains and dainty jaws—by mastering fire. He places this development at about 1.8 million years ago. This is an appealing premise no matter who you are. For those who see cooking as morally, culturally, and socially superior to not cooking, it is scientific validation of a worldview: proof that cooking is literally what makes us human. For the rest of us, it means we have a clever retort the next time one of those annoying raw-food faddists starts going on about how natural it is never to eat anything heated above 115 degrees Fahrenheit.
|  |
No comments:
Post a Comment