SciTech News Articles Archive Page 11 from Thu 13 Oct 2011 to Mon 31 Oct 2011

Those pesky bacteria

Posted Mon, 31 Oct 2011 19:39:00 GMT by Ines Morales

New research on marine life and ship maintenance. If you have ever gone for a walk on the intertidal zone at low tide, you have surely noticed how slimy the rocks are. All sorts of little things grow on them, from seaweed and barnacles to even more diminutive critters like algae and bacteria.

Those pesky bacteria

Asteroids the size of a small house and aircraft carrier passing the Earth

Posted Mon, 31 Oct 2011 15:02:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

An asteroid the size of a house is passing by on Monday evening (31st October). 2011MD's very nature - probably carbon or an iron/nickel mixture-is fairly obvious, similar to another visitor in February. Asteroid 2005 YU55 passes Earth next Tuesday, November 8th and is the size of an aircraft carrier.

Asteroids the size of a small house and aircraft carrier passing the Earth

Ice Warms in Antarctica

Posted Fri, 28 Oct 2011 15:44:01 GMT by Dave Armstrong

The wild west of Antarctica has many thinning glaciers such as the huge Getz Ice Shelf, the Pine Island Glacier, and the Thwaites Glacier. NASA's Ice Bridge Project is now in full production there, showing how this strategic locked-up water is liable to be released quicker than we thought, causing higher sea levels worldwide.

Ice Warms in Antarctica

We don't need no trees

Posted Fri, 28 Oct 2011 13:33:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

Trees could be redundant as far as carbon debts are concerned. Together with his artificial tree, Professor Klaus Lackner has been working on carbon absorption for many years. After trying artificial carbonates and storing liquid CO2, he has brought his latest ideas to the Institution of Mechanical Engineers' Air Capture Week in London.

We don't need no trees

Mystery Object and Three New Planets Found

Posted Fri, 28 Oct 2011 12:21:00 GMT by James Mathews

A discovery of three new planets and a mystery object orbiting with them has been discovered. A international research team have discovered a group of three new planets that are all in orbit around their own dying giant stars. The Hobby-Eberly Telescope was used by the team that is led by an astronomer from Penn state University; they have named the three planets HD 240237, BD +48 738 and HD 96127.

Mystery Object and Three New Planets Found

Supernova RCW 86 Mystery Solved with Spitzer and WISE

Posted Wed, 26 Oct 2011 00:37:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

In AD185, a guest star amused the Chinese astronomers of the time for an eight month spell. One of several supernovae that the advanced civilisation peered at over their history had illuminated their erudite books with heavenly light. In fact, we have known for a while it was RCW 86, but now we have an idea about how far the explosion spread and how a white dwarf was involved.

Supernova RCW 86 Mystery Solved with Spitzer and WISE

Thermo-learning from Nest Labs

Posted Tue, 25 Oct 2011 22:17:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

Nest Laboratories at Palo Alto have furthered the Californian ambition to be ahead in all technology. As far as your home comforts are concerned, the learning thermostat has the potential to keep you at your most comfortable when you're there and preserve your bank balance when you're not.

Thermo-learning from Nest Labs

Americans hunted Mastodon

Posted Fri, 21 Oct 2011 17:20:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

North Americans will be pleased to find that their history has been backdated by 800 years. Texas A&M University researched in Washington State with the help of universities from Colorado, Washington and, of course, Denmark. The research is published in the journal, Science. A mastodon is the original star of the show, found in a pond at the Manis site on the Olympic peninsula.

Americans hunted Mastodon

Low Flying Objects

Posted Fri, 21 Oct 2011 11:04:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

DASH, short for Dynamic Autonomous Sprawled Hexapod was a robot investigating stability. Designing a 25 g, 10 cm robot was easy, but they couldn't decide whether it should be a bird or an insect. There was a clue though - it had six legs.

Low Flying Objects

Glass is half full for nano disease diagnosis

Posted Thu, 20 Oct 2011 15:43:01 GMT by Colin Ricketts

Nanotechnology is a potentially exciting future medical tool but it remains prohibitively expensive. An MIT scientist sought inspiration in glass blowing to find a way to mass produce these super tiny diagnostic tools.

Glass is half full for nano disease diagnosis

New star clusters unveiled by ESO telescope

Posted Thu, 20 Oct 2011 15:07:00 GMT by Dale Kiefer

Astronomers from the European Southern Observatory in Chile have announced the discovery of two new rare globular clusters of stars in the heart of our Milky Way galaxy. The discoveries represent the fruits of an ambitious project to survey the center of the galaxy in infrared light.

New star clusters unveiled by ESO telescope

Mystery of dark matter deepens

Posted Wed, 19 Oct 2011 07:34:00 GMT by Dale Kiefer

A new study shows that mysterious dark matter is even more mysterious than cosmologists thought. Now scientists will need to come up with new theories regarding the nature of the strange stuff that astrophysicists believe makes up the bulk of the universe.

Mystery of dark matter deepens

'Minibeasts' rule the world, it seems

Posted Tue, 18 Oct 2011 22:12:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

We look down on it. We trample all over it. We very rarely give it a thought, but, ''most of Earth's biodiversity is found in soil,'' NSF program director Matt Kane states! The NSF (National Science Foundation) in the US are aided and abetted in this study by Colorado State University, riding to the rescue of the unloved soil denizens.

'Minibeasts' rule the world, it seems

Middle Stone Age ochre toolkit and workshop found in Blombos Cave

Posted Sun, 16 Oct 2011 10:05:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

Cape Town has been the focus of many ethnic groups over the years. 100,000 years ago, during the Middle Stone Age, a processing workshop was set up 300 km east of the modern settlement. The journal Science published the results of Professor Christopher Henshilwood's investigation of this workshop on Friday. It consists of two abalone shells, filled with an ochre rich mix, found in the Blombos Cave. Ochre is basically a red rock, rich in iron oxides.

Middle Stone Age ochre toolkit and workshop found in Blombos Cave

Mars Carbs.

Posted Thu, 13 Oct 2011 15:18:01 GMT by Dave Armstrong

The oldest rocks known include the Martian meteorite ALH84001, from the Allen Hills in Antarctica. Geologists believe it started life, 4 billion years ago, tens of metres below the Martian surface and was 'snookered' off the planet by another meteorite when it struck that area, a mere 16 million years ago.

Mars Carbs.

ESO travel through time with VLT

Posted Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:11:00 GMT by Dave Armstrong

Very Large Telescope (VLT) researchers time-travel back to 1 billion years after the Big Bang. Up to that time neutral hydrogen fogged the view of early events in the young galaxies as they 'reionised'. This age of reionisation now has a timeline, after a three year search with the VLT for distant galaxies at this stage of development.

ESO travel through time with VLT

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