Making a better invisibility cloak
The first functional "cloaking" device reported by Duke University electrical engineers in 2006 worked like a charm, but it wasn't perfect. Now a member of that laboratory has developed a new design that ties up one of the major loose ends from the original device.
These new findings could be important in transforming how light or other waves can be controlled or transmitted. Just as traditional wires gave way to fiber optics, the new meta-material could revolutionize the transmission of light and waves. Because the goal of this type of research involves taming light, a new field of transformational optics has emerged. |  |
10th Century B.C.E. Egyptian Scarab, Ritual Baths Unearthed in Jerusalem
Archaeologists discovered an Egyptian scarab dated to the 10th century B.C.E. during ongoing excavations in the Ophel area just south of the Jewish Temple Mount (or Islamic Haram-Ash Sharif).
Under the direction of Dr. Eilat Mazar of the Hebrew University, a team of Israeli archaeologists, along with a group of archaeologists, students and volunteers from the Herbert W. Armstrong College in the U.S., uncovered the small but telling artifact, shedding additional light on ancient Jerusalem and the Ophel, an area adjacent to the Temple Mount that was central during the Judahite kingships described in the Biblical accounts. |  |
Body, soul and gold: quests for perfection in English alchemy
“We are often told that ‘balance’ is the key to life – work/family balance, a balanced diet, and so on. But in early modern England, the quest for the perfect balance was thought to lead to prolonged life, more gold than could be dreamed of, and even the possibility of surviving the apocalypse.
Alchemy was the science that made these goals seem possible. We think of alchemists as fixated on precious metals, but alchemy overlapped with a field with which we are all familiar – medicine, and the fight to stay alive. |  |
Wadi El-Hitan, the realm of the Lizard King
“Wadi El-Hitan is the most important site in the world to demonstrate one of the iconic changes that make up the record of life on Earth: the evolution of the whales. It portrays vividly their form and mode of life during their transition from land animals to a marine existence” – The World Heritage Committee
Pigs cannot fly, but whales can walk, or better said, could walk, and they once roamed parts of present-day Egypt until, one day, something happened … something that can be understood better today thanks to the fossils at Wadi El-Hitan (Valley of the Whales)... |  |
NASA & ESA successfully test ‘interplanetary Internet’ connection
In what could be a scene from a science-fiction film, NASA and the European Space Agency have tested an “interplanetary Internet” connection by having an astronaut on the International Space Station control a small robot on Earth.
Space-focused missions and experiments have gotten hot once again in the wake of the Curiosity Mars rover, SpaceX’s private spaceflights, and Felix Baumgartner’s epic free-fall from space to Earth. Adding to the list, the U.K. government just announced it would increased its funding to the ESA by about $95 million. |  |
Microsoft demos instant English-Chinese translation
Software that can translate spoken English into spoken Chinese almost instantly has been demonstrated by Microsoft.
The software preserves intonation and cadence so the translated speech still sounds like the original speaker. Microsoft said research breakthroughs had reduced the number of errors made by the instant translation system. It said it modelled the system on the way brains work to improve its accuracy. |  |
Marine 'treasure trove' could bring revolution in medicine and industry
Scientists have pinpointed a new treasure trove in our oceans: micro-organisms that contain millions of previously unknown genes and thousands of new families of proteins.
These tiny marine wonders offer a chance to exploit a vast pool of material that could be used to create innovative medicines, industrial solvents, chemical treatments and other processes, scientists say. Researchers have already created new enzymes for treating sewage and chemicals for making soaps from material they have found in ocean organisms. |  |
Chemical warfare on the reef
There are lots of organisms that don't have a brain, but can still communicate. Bacteria coordinate their growth, plants signal distress and lure insects in with scents and coloring. Now, researchers have listened in on some of the communication going on in a coral reef, and found that the organisms are saying the equivalent of things like "help me!" and "die!" Finding Nemo, this isn't.
At the root of these communications is a competition between corals and an algae called Chlorodesmis fastigiata. In the wild, the algae can start growing on reefs, where it is able to send a simple message to nearby coral: die. |  |
Diver braves the waters to swim with deadly 26-foot anaconda
It lurks just inches below the surface coiled and ready to strike - and yet you wouldn't know it was there.
These remarkable images show the enormous 26-foot (eight metre) anacondas of Mato Grosso in Brazil searching for prey in the murky depths. They were captured by brave diver and snake enthusiast Franco Banfi, 53, who joined the beasts in their natural habitat armed only with a camera. In another shot, Banfi gets up close to a huge anaconda that is lying on the riverbank and glistening in the ferocious tropical heat. |  |
Mysterious bear figurines baffle archaeologists
Small bear figurines have led researchers on the trail of hitherto unknown pre-Inuit rituals, indicating that these people practiced a bear cult.
In the 1950s, the now deceased Danish archaeologist Jørgen Meldgaard made a mysterious discovery in northeastern Canada: A small, headless bear figurine, carved from a walrus tusk, was lying leaning up against the back wall of a stone fireplace in an old settlement. The bear had been positioned in a way that made it look as though it was ‘diving’ into the fireplace. |  |
Mali Islamists destroy tombs in Timbuktu
Al Qaeda-linked rebels in northern Mali destroyed historic and religious landmarks in Timbuktu on Thursday, claiming the relics are idolatrous, residents told CNN.
Three four-wheel-drive trucks carrying at least 30 armed fighters arrived Thursday morning at three mausolea -- all U.N. World Heritage sites -- in the southern Timbuktu neighborhood of Kabara, two residents told CNN by phone.
Three four-wheel-drive trucks carrying at least 30 armed fighters arrived Thursday morning at three mausolea -- all U.N. World Heritage sites -- in the southern Timbuktu neighborhood of Kabara, two residents told CNN by phone.
UPDATE: The Reaction to Karen King’s Gospel Discovery
Up a cobblestone driveway in the heart of Rome, across from the soaring Tuscan columns of St. Peter’s Square, juts a narrow building watched over by a heavy-lidded statue of Saint Augustine. The Institutum Patristicum Augustinianum was founded in 1970, in the shadow of the Vatican, to renew the teachings of Church fathers. On most days, its glinting marble halls echo with the footsteps of theology students immersing themselves in doctrine, canon law and sacred Scripture.
On September 18, however, the building played host to a secular gathering that some would soon see as profane: the International Congress of Coptic Studies, a quadrennial academic conference that this year drew more than 300 scholaars from 27 countries. |  |
Boy's miracle cure makes 'Lily of the Mohawks' first Native American saint
VATICAN CITY — Jake Finkbonner was so close to death after flesh-eating bacteria infected him through a cut on his lip that his parents had last rites performed and were discussing donating the 5-year-old's tiny organs.
Jake's 2006 cure from the infection was deemed medically inexplicable by the Vatican, the "miracle" needed to propel a 17th century Native American, Kateri Tekakwitha, on to sainthood. Kateri will be canonized on Sunday along with six other people, the first Native American to receive the honor. |  |
Native American Ancestors' Diet Part of Study and Challenge
Martin Reinhardt is taking the "eat local" movement to a whole new level that is rooted in history. In an effort to closely replicate his Native American ancestors' way of life prior to colonization, he and a diverse group of volunteers are adhering to a diet consisting of foods indigenous to the Great Lakes region and a complementary exercise regimen They are more than halfway through the one-year Decolonizing Diet Project (DDP). Recognizing that others might be curious to try it, but unable to commit for an extended period, Reinhardt invites the general public to follow the list of DDP-eligible foods for one week, Nov. 2-9.
Human blood types have deep evolutionary roots
Chimps, gibbons and other primates are not just humans’ evolutionary cousins; a new analysis suggests they are also our blood brothers. The A, B and O blood types in people evolved at least 20 million years ago in a common ancestor of humans and other primates, new research suggests.
The analysis deepens a mystery surrounding the evolutionary history of the ABO blood system, and should prompt further research into why the different blood groups have persisted over time, Laure Ségurel of the University of Chicago and colleagues report online October 22 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
The analysis deepens a mystery surrounding the evolutionary history of the ABO blood system, and should prompt further research into why the different blood groups have persisted over time, Laure Ségurel of the University of Chicago and colleagues report online October 22 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Iceman Mummy Finds His Closest Relatives
SAN FRANCISCO — Ötzi the Iceman, an astonishingly well-preserved Neolithic mummy found in the Italian Alps in 1991, was a native of Central Europe, not a first-generation émigré from Sardinia, new research shows. And genetically, he looked a lot like other Stone Age farmers throughout Europe.
The new findings, reported Thursday (Nov. 8) here at the American Society of Human Genetics conference, support the theory that farmers, and not just the technology of farming, spread during prehistoric times from the Middle East all the way to Finland. |  |
The Speech That Saved Teddy Roosevelt’s Life
On October 14, 1912, just after eight o’clock in the evening, Theodore Roosevelt stepped out of the Hotel Gilpatrick in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and into an open car waiting to take him to an auditorium where he would deliver a campaign speech. Although he was worn out and his voice nearly gone, he was still pushing hard to win an unprecedented third term in the White House. He had left politics in 1909, when his presidency ended. But his disappointment in the performance of William Howard Taft, his chosen successor, was so great that in 1912 he formed the National Progressive Party (better known as the Bull Moose Party). He was running against Taft and the Republicans, the Democrats’ Woodrow Wilson and the Socialist ticket headed by Eugene Debs.
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At Afghan shrine, ancient treatment for mental illness
JALALABAD, Afghanistan — No one here knows the man whose left leg is shackled to the wall of cell No. 5. Last week, he finished tearing his mattress to shreds and then moved onto his clothes, ripping his shirt and pants off before falling asleep naked.
The man’s brothers drove him here from southern Kandahar province two weeks ago, drawn by the same belief that has attracted families from across Afghanistan for more than two centuries. Legend has it that those with mental disorders will be healed after spending 40 days in one of the shrine’s 16 tiny concrete cells. |  |
Tracking deadly space radiation could protect future astronauts
Massive waves of energetic particles pose a serious hazard to astronauts in space. To help understand the radiation around Earth, the moon and Mars, a team of scientists has developed a program to characterize the dangerous particles in near-real time.
Known as PREDICCS, the program relies on measurements taken by a wide variety of space-based telescopes to characterize radiation at regions in the solar system likely to be frequented by astronauts in the not-too-distant future. |  |
Earth's magnetic field made quick flip-flop
Earth's magnetic field reversed extremely rapidly soon after modern humans first arrived in Europe, completely flip-flopping in less than a thousand years, new research suggests.
These findings, detailed Oct. 15 in the journal Earth and Planetary Science Letters, could shed light on how and why magnetic field reversals happen, and how they leave Earth vulnerable to solar and space radiation, the study scientists said. |  |
Newly Discovered Seafloor Bacteria Are Living Electrical Cables
Anyone who has made it through an 8th grade science class can tell you that electricity and water don’t mix very well, which is why Spider-Man always whoops Electro’s butt with a water gun. It’s also why researchers from Aarhus University in Denmark were baffled three years ago when they discovered areas of the seafloor conduct an electric current. Today, the same research team announced that they’ve discovered the cause behind the current: A never before seen species of multicellular bacteria that lives in the mud of the seafloor and acts like living electrical cables.
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National Archives & citizen-scientists to reconstruct historical climate of Arctic
Before there were satellites or weather data transmitters or computer databases, there were Arctic sea voyages and sailors dutifully recording weather observations in ship logs. Now a new crowdsourcing effort could soon make a wealth of weather data from these ship logs available to climate scientists worldwide.
NOAA, National Archives and Records Administration, Zooniverse — a citizen science web portal — and other partners are seeking volunteers to transcribe a newly digitized set of ship logs dating to 1850. The ship logs, preserved by NARA, are from U.S. Navy, Coast Guard and Revenue Cutter voyages in the Arctic between 1850 and the World War II era. |  |
Can Andrea Rossi's Infinite-Energy Black Box Power The World, or Scam It?
On January 14, 2011, a 61-year-old Italian inventor named Andrea Rossi staged a spectacular demonstration.
In a warehouse in Bologna, he switched on a strange contraption that looked like a leg of lamb wrapped in aluminum foil. He called it the “E-Cat,” short for “energy catalyzer.” It contained a pinch of powdered nickel, a puff of hydrogen gas, and a dash of a secret catalyst. When the mixture was heated with an electrical current, a mysterious reaction occurred, generating large amounts of excess heat—far more than any known chemical reaction could produce. The heat boiled water into steam. The steam could be used to spin a turbine to make electricity. |  |
As US states legalise marijuana, is this the end of the drugs war?
Last week was a momentous week, the beginning of the end, perhaps, of a national depravity – the "war on drugs". The voters of Colorado and Washington passed measures to legalise marijuana, amounting to local shifts, for the moment. So we shouldn't delude ourselves that the country will be transformed overnight, but the public thinking, the public spirit is being transformed. Finally, there is a growing realisation that this "war" has produced nothing but a legacy of failure. And who wants to be associated with failure?
Note: See White House petition to Remove marijuana from the federal Controlled Substance Act and allow the states to decide how they want to regulate it. |  |
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