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	(Sponsor this newsletter) Solar plane leaves Seville on penultimate leg of round-the-world flight SEVILLE, Spain (Reuters) - An airplane powered solely by energy from the sun took off from southern Spain early on Monday on the penultimate leg of the first ever fuel-free round-the-world flight. The single-seat Solar Impulse 2 lifted off from Seville at 0420 GMT (12:20 a.m. EDT) en route for Cairo, a trip expected to take 50 hours and 30 minutes. The plane has more than 17,0000 solar cells built in to its wings and travels at a cruising speed of around 70 km per hour (43 mph). ... Read More » Covered in Ash: Chinstrap Penguins Threatened by Volcanic Eruption A volcano on the northernmost island of an archipelago in the South Atlantic Ocean has been spewing ash and smoke since March, threatening one of the largest colonies of penguins in the world, according to a new study. Zavodovski Island, one of the South Sandwich Islands, is uninhabited by humans, but it is home to more than 1 million chinstrap penguins, according to the British Antarctic Survey (BAS). BAS researchers found the volcanic eruption via satellite imagery and fishermen from nearby South Georgia were able to photograph ash blowing eastward across the island over penguin-nesting grounds. Read More » Bye, Bye, Coffee Cups: Why San Francisco Banned Foam Products In one of the most extensive such bans in the U.S., San Francisco recently voted to outlaw commonly used foam products due to their environmental impact. The city's board of supervisors unanimously voted last week (June 28) to ban expanded polystyrene, the foam, petroleum-based plastic used in food packaging, packing peanuts, coffee cups and more. The ordinance, which goes into effect next year, is an extension of a 2007 ban of take-out food containers made of the foam, and is another step toward the city's goal to achieve zero waste. Read More » Rare Noah's Ark Mosaic Uncovered in Ancient Synagogue in Israel Mosaics depicting prominent Bible scenes were uncovered during annual excavations of an ancient synagogue in Israel's Lower Galilee. During the excavation in June, archaeologists found two new panels of a mosaic floor in a Late Roman (fifth-century) synagogue at Huqoq, an ancient Jewish village. One panel showed Noah's ark with pairs of animals, such as lions, leopards and bears. Read More » Is a 'Mystery Virus' Causing Former Tennis Star?s Bizarre Symptoms? Former professional tennis player Marion Bartoli says that a mysterious virus is causing her to experience bizarre symptoms, but experts say they don?t know of any virus that fits the description of her illness. Yesterday (July 7), Bartoli addressed rumors that she has an eating disorder by saying that she has been diagnosed with a virus that doctors have not been able to identify. The virus has made her sensitive to electrical devices, including her cellphone, and left her unable to eat anything but organic salad, the former Wimbledon champion said, according to The Guardian. Read More » Blaming the Victim: Science Examines Why It Happens In contrast, people who adhere more closely to values like loyalty, purity and obedience to authority are more likely to blame the victims. This difference holds after accounting for politics and demographic factors, said study researcher Laura Niemi, a postdoctoral researcher in psychology at Harvard University in Massachusetts. It's also equally true both for sex crimes, in which problems in securing convictions are often traced to victim blaming, and for crimes of a nonsexual nature. Read More » Brain Zapping May Sharpen Vision In the study, researchers used a mild electrical current to stimulate an area of people's brains that processes visual information. The people either had normal vision, or had some minor vision problems and wore glasses or contacts during the experiments in the study. The people who showed the most improvement in their vision were those who had the worst vision problems, the researchers said. Read More » Raw Food Warning: Why Uncooked Flour Can Make You Sick The Food and Drug Administration recently made a perhaps surprising recommendation: Don't eat raw flour. The FDA tracked the outbreak to a batch of General Mills flour sold under the brand names Gold Medal, Gold Medal Wondra and Signature Kitchens, triggering a recall. Most people who read the recommendation probably already knew they weren't supposed to eat cookie dough because of the raw eggs in it (though people don?t always do what they?re supposed to do). Read More » Stingray Robot Uses Light-Activated Rat Cells to Swim A new robot stingray can swim with help from an unexpected source: muscle cells that were taken from rat hearts, a new study finds. Understanding how to build machines from heart cells could lead to scientists being able to build entire living artificial hearts from muscle cells that would act more like natural hearts, the researchers said. Read More » Hidden Fault Could Trigger Cataclysmic Megaquake in Asia A massive fault could trigger a cataclysmic earthquake beneath Bangladesh, parts of east India and Myanmar, new research suggests. The hidden fault, which has been buried under miles of river sediment, could release an earthquake of magnitude 8.2 to 9.0 in one of the most densely populated regions of the world, the study found. "We don't know if it's tomorrow or if it's not going to be for another 500 years," said study co-author Michael Steckler, a geophysicist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia University in New York City. Read More »
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