GoogleTrends: October 2013

Thursday, October 31, 2013

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Zombie Neuroscience: Inside the Brains of the Walking Dead

The rotting flesh, the shuffling walk, the unintelligible groans — it's not hard to spot a zombie at a glance even among the most gruesome of Halloween monsters. Neuroscientists Bradley Voytek, of the University of California, San Diego, and Tim Verstynen, of Carnegie Mellon University, are both avid zombie fans. "We mocked up what a zombie brain would look like," Voytek said, and "it kind of took off." Voytek calls it a way of getting people to accidentally learn something about the brain. Slow zombies shuffle in an uncoordinated manner and can't open doors, suggesting a problem with the cerebellum, Voytek said.

Private Dream Chaser Space Plane Builders Investigate Landing Gear Malfunction

A private spaceflight company is investigating the glitch that caused its space plane — designed to eventually carry astronauts to and from orbit — to skid off the runway during an unmanned test. On Saturday (Oct. 26), Sierra Nevada Corporation's Dream Chaser was carried by helicopter up to 12,500 feet (3,810 meters) and then dropped in what was its first-ever free flight test for the space plane. The private space plane prototype skidded off Runway 22L at Edwards Air Force Base in California, sustaining some damage but remaining upright, Sierra Nevada officials said. "The entire interior of the vehicle, the pressure vessel as we call it — the crew compartment — is completely untouched by the incident," Mark Sirangelo, corporate vice president and head of Sierra Nevada Corporation's Space Systems based in Louisville, Colo., told members of the press today (Oct. 29) during a news conference.

Giant Halloween Solar Storm Sparked Earth Scares 10 Years Ago (Video)

Ten years ago this week, scientists worldwide got the spooks when a Halloween solar storm disrupted communications, GPS and even a United States defense operation. While residents in Texas and Florida delighted in auroras usually not seen that far south, the storm (which was most intense between about Oct. 29 and 31, 2003) caused some spooky sun-spawned havoc both on the Earth and above it, officials with United States Geological Survey explained in a statement.

Oldest Volcano Painting Linked to Ancient Eruption

volcano erupted 8,970 years ago, plus or minus 640 years, according to a new dating technique that analyzes zircon crystals in volcanic rock, geochemist Axel Schmitt of the University of California, Los Angeles, reported here today (Oct. 30) at the Geological Society of America's annual meeting. Turkish scientists long suspected Hasan Da? was the source of the painting's dramatic scene, but never had a precise date for its volcanic rocks, Schmitt told LiveScience. The volcano is about 80 miles (130 kilometers) from the ancient village of Çatalhöyük, where the painting was discovered in 1964 during an archaeological dig.

Cyberattack Against Israeli Highway System? Maybe Not

Did a cyberattack shut down a major road system in Israel last month? The AP, citing an anonymous source, published an exclusive story yesterday (Oct. 27) that said "a Trojan horse attack targeted the security-camera system in the Carmel Tunnels toll road," causing the underground highway, near the northern city of Haifa, to be shut down for 20 minutes on Sept 8. The AP's source said the Carmel Tunnels camera system was hit by "unknown, sophisticated hackers, similar to the Anonymous hacking group that led attacks on Israeli websites in April." But was this really a cyberattack?

Dark Matter Eludes Scientists in 1st Results from Super-Sensitive Detector

But the first results from the high-tech instrument have turned up empty in its search for elusive dark matter, scientists announced today (Oct. 30). Although the powerful dark matter detector has just completed its first run, LUX has not yet found conclusive evidence of the elusive substance. "The universe's mysterious dark sector presents us with two of the most thrilling challenges in all of physics," Saul Perlmutter, of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and a winner of the 2011 Nobel Prize in physics, said in a statement. Scientists think that dark matter makes up the majority of the matter in the universe;

Smells Like … An Armpit Infection?

One man's irrepressible body odor was the result of a bacterial infection of his armpit hair, according to a new report of the case. The 40-year-old man told his doctors he'd had armpit odor and "dirty" armpit hair for the last four years. The doctors diagnosed the man with trichomycosis axillaris, which is an infection of hair shafts caused by the bacteria Corynebacterium tenuis, the researchers said. The infection can produce yellow, black or red masses around hair shafts.

Internet Both Helps & Harms Teens at Risk for Suicide

On the one hand, some studies show that Internet forums — where users post questions and comments, and interact with each other — provide support for youth who engage in self-harm or are suicidal, or help them to cope. But other studies show the Internet can have a negative influence on this vulnerable group, such as by providing information on how to self-harm, or how to hide their behavior. Overall, very few rigorous studies have explored how the Internet affects young people at risk for suicide and self-harm, so much more work is needed on the topic, the researchers said.

Studies in monkeys may be next step in search for HIV cure

By Julie Steenhuysen CHICAGO (Reuters) - A powerful infusion of HIV-fighting antibodies beat back a potent form of the virus in monkeys and kept it at bay for weeks, U.S. government scientists and a team led by Harvard University found, offering a potential next step in the battle against human HIV. The two studies, published on Wednesday in the journal Nature, involve the use of rare antibodies made by 10 percent to 20 percent of people with HIV that can neutralize a wide array of strains. Such antibodies latch on to regions of the virus that are highly "conserved," meaning they are so critical to the virus that causes AIDS that they appear in nearly every HIV strain. In the past decade, scientists have tried to make vaccines that could coax the body into making these same types of HIV-specific antibodies.

U.S. Dream Chaser space taxi soars on test flight, skids after landing

By Irene Klotz (Reuters) - A privately owned prototype space plane aced its debut test flight in California but was damaged after landing when a wheel did not drop down, developer Sierra Nevada Corp said on Tuesday. The Dream Chaser is one of three space taxis under development in partnership with NASA to fly astronauts to the International Space Station following the retirement of the space shuttles in 2011. ...

Mars Rover Curiosity Eyes Next Science Target

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity is sizing up its next scientific target — the first rocks the car-size robot will reach out and touch in more than a month. On Monday (Oct. 28), the 1-ton Curiosity rover took some scouting photos of a rocky outcrop called "Cooperstown" from about 262 feet (80 meters) away. Mission researchers plan to investigate Cooperstown with Curiosity's arm-mounted instruments soon, putting this science gear to such use for the first time since Sept. 22. Curiosity has been making tracks over the last month or so, chewing up ground as it heads from a spot near its landing site called Yellowknife Bay to the rover's main science destination, a 3.4-mile-high (5.5 kilometers) massif called Mount Sharp.

Planet hunters find Earth-like twin beyond the solar system

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - For the first time, scientists have found a planet beyond the solar system that not only is the same size as Earth, but has the same proportions of iron and rock, a key step in an ongoing quest to find potentially habitable sister worlds. Kepler-78b was discovered last year with NASA's now-idled Kepler space telescope, which detected potential planets as they circled in front of their parent stars, blocking a bit of light. That measurement not only revealed that Kepler-78b was relatively small, with a diameter just 20 percent larger than Earth's, but that it was practically orbiting on the surface of its host star. In two papers in this week's journal Nature, the teams report that not only were they successful, but that they came to the same conclusion: Kepler-78b has roughly the same density as Earth, suggesting that it also is made primarily of rock and iron.

A Bewitching History: Why Witches Ride Broomsticks

But few likely know the murky tale of how witches came to be associated with those familiar household objects. According to legend, witches used herbs with psychoactive properties like henbane in their potions, or "flying ointments." Some historical accounts suggest witches applied these ointments to their nether regions. Lady Alice Kyteler, Ireland's earliest known accused witch, was condemned to death for using sorcery to kill her husband in 1324. In his "Quaestio de Strigis" of 1470, Bergamo writes of witches who on "certain days or nights they anoint a staff and ride on it to the appointed place or anoint themselves under the arms and in other hairy places." [13 Halloween Superstitions & Traditions Explained]

Actor Tim Allen, Voice of Buzz Lightyear, Narrates New Moon Exploration Film

A new film about moon exploration enlists a heavy hitter to take viewers along for the ride — the voice of spaceman Buzz Lightyear from the "Toy Story" movies. Actor Tim Allen will narrate a new 25-minute film called "Back to the Moon for Good," which recounts the history of lunar exploration efforts and previews the coming robotic rush to Earth's nearest neighbor unleashed by the $30 million Google Lunar X Prize. "Although the benefits of going back to the moon are well known within the space community, the mission of this film — and the Google Lunar X Prize — is to re-ignite an interest in space exploration amongst people of all ages," X Prize Foundation president Robert Weiss, who is an executive producer of the movie, said in a statement. Tim Allen's illustrious career and persona make him the best fit to take our message 'to infinity and beyond,'" Weiss added, referencing Buzz Lightyear's famous catchphrase.

China's 'Airpocalypse' Tracked by NASA Satellite

It's fair to say that China isn't exactly known for good air quality. But a recent spate of air pollution in northern China that nearly shut down a city of 11 million has put a spotlight on the problem, as well as China's reliance on coal, which provides 70 percent of its energy and is a big contributor to the country's pollution woes. In mid-October, cold weather in northern China led officials and citizens to turn up their coal-powered heating systems in the city of Harbin. At the same time, at the end of harvest season, farmers burned tons of agricultural waste and crop stubble throughout the countryside, fires that were visualized as red dots in an image captured by NASA's Aqua satellite.

How 3D Printing Gets a Boost from Vitamin B2

For the first time, researchers have added a natural compound to the manufacturing chemicals usually used to create small medical implants by 3D printing. By using riboflavin, also known as vitamin B2, in 3D-printed structures such as artificial tissues or medical implants, the scientists say they could create devices that are less harmful to cells. In medicine, 3D printing is being increasingly used to create scaffolds for growing artificial tissues, or in implants such as vascular grafts. But traditional 3D printing methods involve polymers that can be toxic to living cells.

The Real Dracula: Vlad the Impaler

Few names have cast more terror into the human heart than Dracula. The legendary vampire, created by author Bram Stoker for his 1897 novel of the same name, has inspired countless horror movies, television shows and other bloodcurdling tales of vampires. Though Dracula may seem like a singular creation, Stoker in fact drew inspiration from a real-life man with an even more grotesque taste for blood: Vlad III, Prince of Wallachia or — as he is better known — Vlad the Impaler (Vlad Tepes), a name he earned for his favorite way of dispensing with his enemies. Vlad III was born in 1431 in Transylvania, a mountainous region in modern-day Romania.

Scientists fear renewed threat to white pine trees

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — A fungus targeting white pine forests has mutated and poses new threats more than a century after it first hit the United States, American and Canadian scientists said Thursday.

Beach Nourishment Works, But Should Towns Rebuild?

DENVER —Beach nourishment works, according to a detailed survey of New Jersey homes damaged by Hurricane Sandy, researchers reported here this week at the Geological Society of America's annual meeting. But protecting private property by replenishing storm-damaged beaches — projects that cost taxpayers billions of dollars — may be an exercise in futility, with the specter of sea level rise and climate change's effects on storms. "Our barrier islands and our coastal areas are coming in for a time of severe trouble," said Harold Wanless, a coastal scientist at the University of Miami. Despite beach nourishment and a seawall to offer protection from powerful waves, Hurricane Sandy destroyed 18 homes in Sea Bright, N.J., last year, where Sandy's storm surge was among the highest in the state, said Adam Griffith, a coastal research scientist at Western Carolina University's Program for the Study of Developed Shorelines, who led the beach nourishment study.

Tail-Wag Direction Matters for Dogs

For their study, a group of researchers recruited 43 pet dogs of various breeds. But right-left tail wags may not be a form of secret dog language, the researchers say. Just like the left and right sides of the brain in humans are thought to control different emotions and behaviors, the direction of wagging might match hemispheric activation, explained study researcher Giorgio Vallortigara of the Center for Mind/Brain Sciences of the University of Trento in Italy.

US Malaria Cases Reach 40-Year High

The number of malaria cases in the United States is the highest in more than 40 years, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In 2011, there were 1,925 reported malaria cases in the country, the highest since 1971, and a 14 percent increase from 2010, the CDC said. Nearly 70 percent of U.S. malaria cases in 2011 were acquired in Africa, the CDC said. "Malaria isn't something many doctors see frequently in the United States thanks to successful malaria elimination efforts in the 1940s," CDC Director Dr. Tom Frieden said in a statement.

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Wednesday, October 30, 2013

FeedaMail: Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

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Trailer Truck-Size Asteroid to Buzz Earth Inside Moon's Orbit Today

A space rock the size of a tractor-trailer is set to fly harmlessly by Earth today (Oct. 29), zipping between our planet and the moon.

Gold Rush's Poisonous Legacy: Mercury Will Linger for 10,000 Years

Even though the California Gold Rush took place more than a century ago, it left a toxic legacy of mercury pollution that will continue to be a problem for some time, scientists say.

India, U.S. preparing satellites to probe Martian atmosphere

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - Two new science satellites are being prepared to join a fleet of robotic Mars probes to help determine why the planet most like Earth in the solar system ended up so different. India's Mars Orbiter Mission, the country's first interplanetary foray, is due to blast off on November 5 from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India. ...

New Dolphin Species Identified Off Australian Coast

A new species of humpback dolphin has been identified off the northern coast of Australia, researchers have announced.

NASA's IceBridge Readies 1st Antarctica-Based Research Flights

In a few weeks, NASA's Operation IceBridge will take to the skies for another busy season of monitoring ice sheets, glaciers and sea ice from above. This year, the mission will be stationed in Antarctica for the first time, enabling scientists to conduct longer flights, and explore areas of the icy continent that were previously out of reach.

Gross! Watch a Tick Bite in Action (Video)

A tick sucking blood from a victim has been caught in action on video, in all its gory glory.

'Minicomputers' Live Inside the Human Brain

The heart of each neuron is called the soma — a single thin cablelike fiber known as the axon that sticks out of the soma carries nerve signals away from the neuron, while many shorter branches called dendrites that project from the other end of the soma carry nerve signals to the neuron. Now scientists find dendrites may be more than passive wiring; "Suddenly, it's as if the processing power of the brain is much greater than we had originally thought," study lead author Spencer Smith, a neuroscientist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill,said in a statement. However, prior research discovered many of the same molecules that support electrical spikes are also present in the dendrites, and experiments with brain tissue showed dendrites can use these molecules to generate these spikes themselves.

Autumn Skywatching: Celestial Soap Opera Wheels Across Night Sky

The most prominent character in the story can be found once darkness has fallen around 8 p.m. local daylight time, halfway up in the northeastern part of the sky: The zigzag row of bright stars that make up the constellation of Cassiopeia, Queen of Ethiopia, wife of Cepheus the king and the mother of the beautiful Princess Andromeda. In fact, when Cassiopeia is viewed sideways, it roughly mimics either the letter "E" or, as it appears now during the early evening hours, the number "3." [Night Sky: Visible Planets, Moon Phases & Events, October 2013] At around midnight, with Cassiopeia hovering high above Polaris, the North Star, the "M" shape is most recognizable. When two fainter stars are added, the seven together appear to outline Cassiopeia's chair or throne which was set close to the pole of the sky.

Chickenpox May Increases Kids' Risk of Stroke

Children who get chickenpox may be at increased risk for stroke soon after the infection, a new study from the United Kingdom suggests. The study analyzed information from 49 children who were followed for about 6.5 years, and who experienced both chickenpox and stroke at some point during the study period. However, stroke in children is rare — about 6 out of 100,000 children under 15 have a stroke each year, according to the National Stroke Association. That means that the risk that any given child will experience a stroke after chickenpox is quite small.

Can New Wristband 'Sense' What You're Eating?

A new activity tracker claims to be able to analyze what you eat using a sensor on the wrist — no food diaries needed — but experts are skeptical of the claim. But the new device, called AIRO, which launched today, is different in that it has a wristband with a spectrometer, which is an instrument that analyses light, according to the makers of the device. The device shines LED lights at different wavelengths, "to look into the bloodstream and detect metabolites as they are released while and after you eat," the company, Airo Health, said in a statement. "This allows AIRO to measure caloric intake and even the quality of meals consumed, providing recommendations on ways to improve nutrition." [5 Crazy Technologies That Are Revolutionizing Biotech]

Sneaky Ways to Make Halloween Healthy

In a Halloween nightmare of its own kind, parents can only watch as their kids collect and eat as many candies as they can on their trick-or-treat adventure. But there are sneaky steps parents can take to make Halloween a healthier day for kids — without resorting to replacing all the candy with nuts and fruits. For example, parents might host craft parties where kids can use the candy to make things. "I'm a big fan of making candy haunted houses," said Heather Mangieri, a nutrition consultant and spokeswoman for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

Giant Armadillos Create Homes for Other Animals

Like phantoms of the Amazon, giant armadillos are barely known and rarely seen, as they dig deep burrows to hide themselves during the day and only come out at night. "Giant armadillos are like 'ecosystem engineers,' providing homes for many other animals," said Arnaud Desbiez, a conservation officer with The Royal Zoological Society of Scotland who is based in southwestern Brazil's Pantanal, the world's largest freshwater wetland, where the study was conducted. The burrows provide a hiding place and home for many of these animals and shelter from the heat and cold, staying a relatively constant temperature, Desbiez told LiveScience. Little is known about giant armadillos (Priodontes maximus) because they occur in very low densities, are quite shy and are nocturnal.

Amazing Animation Shows Earthquake Ripple Across US

DENVER — An amazing new animation shows how earthquake waves travel across the United States, creating ripples over North America like a rock thrown into water. The animation was made possible by an ambitious project called USArray, which deployed a mobile network of seismometers across the country over the course of a decade. The seismometers are sensitive enough to measure the ground moving by less than the width of a human hair. "It allows us to actually image the inside of the Earth and lets us actually look at the rocks, and the interactions between these earthquake waves and the rocks that are beneath us," said Leah Pettis, an undergraduate student at the University of Arizona and a representative of EarthScope, a National Science Foundation program that co-manages the seismometers with the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS).

This Halloween, Slay Some Energy Vampires (Op-Ed)

Noah Horowitz is a senior scientist and director of the Center for Energy Efficiency at the NRDC. This Op-Ed is adapted from one that appeared on the NRDC blog Switchboard. He contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. Those ghoulish fangs — also known as plugs in the wall — suck frightening amounts of electricity all night (and day) long, even when bloodthirsty electronics and appliances are turned off or doing nothing useful.

Go Ahead, Eat the Halloween Candy (Op-Ed)

The holidays — starting with Halloween — can trip up even the most conscientious dieter. The Halloween trap caught her by surprise. She bought several bags of her favorite candy bar and began a binge that didn't end until the candy was gone — long before trick or treating even began! That brought her up a couple of pounds. With Halloween and the holidays looming, it's important to determine your strategy for dealing with the temptation of sweets — what you eat, what you bring into your home and what you serve others.

Astropumpkins! Space Photographer Carves Cosmic Pumpkins for Halloween

One space fan is getting into the Halloween spirit. Night sky photographer Victor Rogus has carved a series of spooky space pumpkins or "astropumpkins" in honor of Halloween on Thursday (Oct. 31). "I have always enjoyed art in many forms and many mediums," Rogus told SPACE.com via email. He carved the sun, moon, the potentially dazzlingly Comet ISON and a group of planets into four large Dill's Atlantic Giant pumpkins, which he grew himself in Jadwin, Mo.

Rare Hybrid Solar Eclipse May Be Visible from Eastern US Sunday

The moon will blot out the sun Sunday (Nov. 3) in an eclipse that will be visible from eastern North America to the Middle East. Sunday's celestial event is a relatively rare occurrence known as a hybrid solar eclipse. Skywatchers in the eastern United States, northeastern South America, southern Europe, the Middle East and most of Africa will be treated to a partial solar eclipse, while people along the path of totality in central Africa will see the sun totally obscured by Earth's nearest neighbor for a few dramatic moments. If you live in eastern North America, you'll have to get up early to enjoy the show.

Reindeer Eyes Turn Blue in the Winter

Neuroscientist Glen Jeffery, who investigates vision at University College London, was sent a collection of reindeer eyes from the Arctic 12 years ago, some from reindeer killed in the summer, some in the winter. "I opened the eyes up on my lab bench and almost fell off my chair," Jeffery said. "The environment can be brutal, with 24 hours light in summer and 24 hours darkness in winter," Jeffery said. "Thousands of animals would suddenly turn up, and they were all turned into meat in a couple of days, but this would go on miles from anywhere," Jeffery said.

Helix-Shaped Plankton Portrait Wins 'Small World' Contest

An up-close portrait of a corkscrew-shaped plankton, a peek into a painted turtle's eye and a magnified view of a marine worm are among this year's winners of a photography contest that honors all things microscopic. Top honors went to a stunning photo of a colonial plankton organism, Chaetoceros debilis, taken by Wim van Egmond, a freelance photographer from the Netherlands, associated with the Micropolitan Museum in Rotterdam.

Earth's Largest Dinosaur 'Walks' in New Computer Simulation

The Argentinosaurus is one of the largest known dinosaurs, but scientists were unsure how exactly the massive creature plodded across the Cretaceous Earth, until now. Using sophisticated computer models, researchers have digitally reconstructed the Argentinosaurus, enabling them to "watch" the dinosaur take its first steps in over 94 million years. A team of researchers led by Bill Sellers, a professor of computational and evolutionary biology at the University of Manchester in the United Kingdom, used lasers to scan a 131-foot-long (40 meters) skeleton of the Argentinosaurus huinculensis. The scientists then created advanced computer models to digitally recreate how the dinosaur walked and ran.

Search for dark matter comes up empty so far

LEAD, S.D. (AP) — Nearly a mile underground in an abandoned gold mine, one of the most important quests in physics has come up empty-handed in the search for the elusive substance known as dark matter, scientists announced Wednesday.

Heading Towards a Halloween Without Bats? (Op-Ed)

Jon Hoekstra is chief scientist for the World Wildlife Fund (WWF). This article is adapted from one that first appeared on Hoekstra's WWF blog, Science Driven. He contributed this article to LiveScience's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

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