Murdoch University DNA scientists have used 30,000-year-old faecal matter known as middens to ascertain which plants and animals existed at that time in the hot, arid Pilbara region of North Western Australia.
To date, this is the oldest environmental sample from which DNA has been obtained in Australia. It had previously been considered unrealistic to extract DNA from hot, arid zone samples due to the extreme heat. |  |
Maybe Mars had 'warm' water after all
UK researchers have unearthed a new argument in the yes-but-no-but-yes scientific debate about Martian water, saying that meteorite samples suggest water on the red planet was once warm enough for life.
In research published in Earth an Planetary Science Letters (abstract here), Dr John Bridges (Leicester University) and Dr Susanne Schwenzer (Open University) say structures found in a group of meteorites of Martian origin called nakhlites.
In research published in Earth an Planetary Science Letters (abstract here), Dr John Bridges (Leicester University) and Dr Susanne Schwenzer (Open University) say structures found in a group of meteorites of Martian origin called nakhlites.
New Google Mars Has More Coverage, More Detail and More Awesome
Need a Zen break from obsessively checking the polls every 20 minutes? Maybe you should fly over an updated and ultra-detailed view of the Martian landscape in Google Mars looking for incredible formations.
Google Mars has been available since 2009 as part of the free downloadable Google Earth. It allows viewers to zoom around the Red Planet in much higher resolution than the simpler browser version and will even render certain locations in 3-D. You can reach it by clicking the little orange Saturn-shaped button at the top of the screen in Google Earth. |  |
Himalayan glaciers will shrink even if temperatures hold steady, study says
Come rain or shine, or even snow, some glaciers of the Himalayas will continue shrinking for many years to come.
The forecast by Brigham Young University geology professor Summer Rupper comes after her research on Bhutan, a region in the bull's-eye of the monsoonal Himalayas. Published in Geophysical Research Letters, Rupper's most conservative findings indicate that even if climate remained steady, almost 10 percent of Bhutan's glaciers would vanish within the next few decades. What's more, the amount of melt water coming off these glaciers could drop by 30 percent. |  |
CROWDFUNDED PLASMA JET THRUSTER FOR SPACECRAFT?
A great offshoot from commercial space companies getting a foothold in real missions to orbit is that the old entrepreneurial space spirit seems to have been revived. People are attempting to develop and build what could be breakout space technologies, sometimes in their garages or basements.
A new Kickstarter project is especially exciting, as it is looking to build a prototype electric pulsed plasma jet thruster, and the engineers behind the project say this could be used for reliable, high performance, low cost interplanetary space transportation. |  |
Sail-inspired wind turbine doubles efficiency without blades
We know that there's more than enough wind energy out there to power our entire civilization, but conventional wind turbines don't do that great of a job of harnessing it. They're expensive and inefficient, and we're looking for better technologies, one of which is a super efficient wind turbine that doesn't need blades.
It looks like some sort of flat satellite dish-thing, but this is Saphon Energy's wind non-turbine, the Saphonian. It doesn't have blades, and nothing on it spins: it just sits there, pointing into the wind, and captures energy. The design is based on sails, the kind that pull boats around, which are very efficient (and have been for thousands of years) at turning wind energy into usable mechanical energy. |  |
Efforts to mitigate climate change must target energy efficiency
Much more must be done to develop energy efficient cars, buildings and domestic appliances to address climate change – according to new research from the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia.
A report published today in Nature Climate Change shows that twice as much effort is being spent on developing energy supply technologies - such as new power stations - than is spent on improving the efficiency with which energy is used.
A report published today in Nature Climate Change shows that twice as much effort is being spent on developing energy supply technologies - such as new power stations - than is spent on improving the efficiency with which energy is used.
Dead Sea Scrolls linked with Manuscripts Found at Masada, Israel
Israeli paleographer Ada Yardeni has recently identified 50 Dead Sea scrolls found near Qumran in Israel as having been penned by the same scribe, a scribe who also penned scrolls that have been found at the Herodian mountain-top fortress of Masada, where Jewish rebel zealots made their last suicidal stand against the Romans in 73 A.D.
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A memorial for Crazy Horse 64 years in the making... so far
Lakota warrior Crazy Horse has long been a controversial figure, so perhaps it's only appropriate that his memorial follow suit.
Though he's best known for fighting against George Armstrong Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn, Crazy Horse led his tribe numerous times against settlers and miners in the Dakotas, Montana and Wyoming and elsewhere before his 1877 death at Nebraska's Fort Robinson. But forget his disputed role in that battle or the claims that he's never been photographed or the conflicting tales of how he met his end -- the real mystery is more contemporary: When is the sculpture in his honor going to be complete?. |  |
Colombian & Peruvian Governments Apologize for Amazonian Rubber Boom
A century after thousands of indigenous people died and were displaced in one of the most brutal episodes of the Amazonian rubber boom, government officials publicly apologized for the tragedy and the victims’ descendants urged them to ensure that it never happens again.
“If the lesson is learned from the death of our ancestors, their death will not have been in vain,” an association of indigenous people of La Chorrera, in Colombia’s Amazonas region, said in a statement issued on October 12. |  |
How Did the Easter Island Settlers Destroy Themselves? [Video]
Easter Island was once home to lush palm forests. Over time, however, the humans who settled there depleted the island’s resources, leading to wars among clans that doomed the population.
Their legacy, the giant stone sculptures called moai, have drawn intense interest and fascination ever since Europeans discovered them in 1722. One theory posits that the early Polynesians who settled on the island, also known as Rapa Nui, cut down trees for logs to roll the statues from their quarries to their overlook positions. Competition among clans led to ever bigger moai and, ultimately, to the destruction of the forest. |  |
Anthropologist suggests Mediterranean islands inhabited much earlier
Anthropologist Alan Simmons of the University of Nevada has published a perspective piece in the journal Science suggesting that the Mediterranean islands were inhabited far earlier than has been thought. Rather than the first inhabitation of such islands as Cypress and Crete occurring roughly 9,000 years ago, he suggests it might have been as many as 170,000.
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Revolution Brings Hard Times for Egypt's Treasures
CAIRO — Cairo’s salmon-colored Egyptian museum is a conspicuous landmark on Tahrir Square, where it stands in almost perfect condition despite the intense protests that took place on its doorstep almost two years ago.
At the height of the revolution last year, a human chain formed to protect the priceless artifacts within the museum. A few yards away, the burnt out husk of former President Hosni Mubarak’s National Democratic Party headquarters is a reminder of a different possible fate. |  |
HELP SAVE THE CULTURAL HERITAGE OF AFGHANISTAN
Brent Huffman, a documentary film-maker and professor at Northwestern University, USA, first visited the ancient Buddhist city of Mes Aynak in June of 2011 and immediately fell in love with the site. From that point onwards he has campaigned tirelessly to bring the plight of Mes Aynak into the public consciousness so that it can be saved for future generations of Afghans and the international community.
In addition to destroying one of Afghanistan’s most important archaeological findings, the copper mine that is due to start operating on the site will almost certainly devastate the environment by polluting the land and water supply in Logar province and kill all life in the area.
In addition to destroying one of Afghanistan’s most important archaeological findings, the copper mine that is due to start operating on the site will almost certainly devastate the environment by polluting the land and water supply in Logar province and kill all life in the area.
'Drunken herd' of tourists threatens Sistine Chapel's famous paintings
VATICAN CITY -- A "drunken herd" of "unruly" tourists is damaging Michelangelo’s famous Sistine Chapel paintings, one of Italy's leading arts figures claimed as the pope prepared to mark the 500th anniversary of the iconic frescoes’ creation.
Some 5 million people visit the chapel every year – sometimes as many as 20,000 in a single day -- and an increasing number of experts are now arguing that mass tourism is damaging the paintings. Despite a major, 14-year-long restoration project in the 1990s, they claim that the breath, sweat, dust and pollution brought in by visitors dramatically changes the Chapel’s humidity and temperature – factors to which frescoes are particularly sensitive. |  |
Scientists debate a license to smoke cigarettes
They do it for coal-burning power plants. So how about something for what many consider to be a walking smokestack -- the cigarette smoker?
Yes, a license to smoke. Simon Chapman, a professor of public health at the University of Sydney in Australia, offers this radical proposal to help reduce the damaging health effects of tobacco, both for the user and the recipient of second-hand smoke.
Yes, a license to smoke. Simon Chapman, a professor of public health at the University of Sydney in Australia, offers this radical proposal to help reduce the damaging health effects of tobacco, both for the user and the recipient of second-hand smoke.
Animals Get Bored, Too
It is easy to look at caged or cooped up animals and think that, like people, they must get bored with such a confined existence.
While it’s impossible to know what other creatures are thinking, a new study is the first to experimentally demonstrate signs of boredom in animals that aren't given much to do. For the study, researchers from the University of Guelph, Canada, worked with 29 captive mink. Some animals were housed in plain wire-mesh cages, where they lived for seven months before the experiments began. |  |
Yawns Also Contagious in Bonobos
For most people, witnessing a yawn -- or even thinking about yawning -- creates an irresistible urge to yawn, too. And contagious yawning, it turns out, is yet another feature we share in common with many species of primates.
To investigate hypotheses about the cause of the phenomenon, Italian researchers looked at a group of 12 captive bonobos, which are highly social animals that cultivate strong relationships. Recent research also found that bonobo brains are relatively well developed in an area that detects distress in themselves and in others. |  |
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