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Tuesday, November 17, 2015

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El Niño Expected to Strengthen, Bring Wild Weather Across US

El Niño is likely to strengthen by the end of the year, potentially bringing more precipitation than usual to much of the United States. This year's El Niño is among the strongest since 1950, according to meteorologists. Already, the atmospheric pattern is among the top three since that time, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).

Face Transplants Move Forward with Most Extensive Operation Yet

The man recently underwent the most extensive facial transplant done to date, said the doctors who treated him. "The amount of tissue that was transplanted [in this surgery] had not been transplanted before," Rodriguez said. Prior to this surgery, Rodriguez told the patient, Patrick Hardison, that the surgery had a 50/50 chance of success, Rodriguez said.

UNESCO Celebrates 70th Anniversary with High-Tech Light Show

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year with some very high-tech decorations. Today (Nov. 16), a slew of superpowerful projectors will turn the many facades of the organization's headquarters in Paris into a giant digital photo album. The live projection show will literally reflect the accomplishments that the multinational agency has achieved over the past seven decades, displaying never-before-seen photos from the UNESCO archives.

Lockheed-Boeing venture says will not bid for U.S. GPS satellite launch

United Launch Alliance, a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co, on Monday said it would not bid for the next U.S. Air Force global positioning system (GPS) satellite launch, effectively ceding the competition to privately held SpaceX. ULA, the monopoly provider of such launches since its creation in 2006, said it was unable to submit a compliant bid because of the way the competition was structured, and because it lacked Russian-built RD-180 engines for its Atlas 5 rocket. The Pentagon last month declined to issue a waiver from a U.S. law that last year banned use of the Russian engines for military and spy satellite launches.

Famous Leonid Meteor Shower Peaks This Week

One of the year's most anticipated meteor showers peaks this week. The Leonid meteor shower will reach its maximum overnight Tuesday into Wednesday (Nov. 17 to Nov. 18), giving skywatchers the chance to see some brilliant "shooting stars." However, though the Leonids have put on some amazing displays in the past, this year's show will likely be on the subdued side. The Leonids are so named because the meteors appear to originate from the constellation Leo (the Lion).

Going batty: secrets behind upside-down flight landings revealed

By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - It is an aerial maneuver far beyond the capabilities of even the most sophisticated modern aircraft: landing upside down on a ceiling. Brown University scientists observed two species: Seba's short-tailed bat and the lesser dog-faced fruit bat. "Flying animals all maneuver constantly as they negotiate a three-dimensional environment," Brown biology and engineering professor Sharon Swartz said.

Genetic sleuthing helps sort out ancestry of modern Europeans

By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - DNA extracted from a skull and a molar tooth of ancient human remains discovered in the southern Caucasus region of Georgia is helping sort out the multifaceted ancestry of modern Europeans. Scientists said on Monday they sequenced the genomes of two individuals, one from 13,300 years ago and the other from 9,700 years ago, and found they represented a previously unknown lineage that contributed significantly to the genetics of almost all modern Europeans. At the time, Europe was populated by Neanderthals.

Going batty: secrets behind upside-down flight landings revealed

U.S. firefighter gets world's most extensive face transplant

A volunteer firefighter from Mississippi whose face was burned off during a home fire rescue received the world's most extensive face transplant, New York University Langone Medical Center said on Monday. After a 26-hour surgery performed at the New York hospital in August, 41-year-old Patrick Hardison is living with the face of 26-year-old David Rodebaugh, a BMX extreme bicycling enthusiast from Brooklyn who was pronounced brain dead after a cycling accident. Now, for the first time since that raging fire in Senatobia, Mississippi in 2001, Hardison can blink and even sleep with his eyes closed - key steps to sparing his blue eyes from blindness that previously seemed all but inevitable, said Dr. Eduardo Rodriguez, the plastic surgeon who led the 150-person medical team that performed the procedure.

Ancient Board Game Found in Looted China Tomb

Pieces from a mysterious board game that hasn't been played for 1,500 years were discovered in a heavily looted 2,300-year-old tomb near Qingzhou City in China. There, archaeologists found a 14-face die made of animal tooth, 21 rectangular game pieces with numbers painted on them and a broken tile which was once part of a game board. The tile when reconstructed was "decorated with two eyes, which are surrounded by cloud-and-thunder patterns," wrote the archaeologists in a report published recently in the journal Chinese Cultural Relics.

Wild, History-Making Comet Landing By Philae Probe Recreated in Video

The new video, which the European Space Agency (ESA) released last week, reconstructs history's first-ever touchdown on a comet, which was performed by the Rosetta mission's Philae lander on Nov. 12, 2014. Things didn't go entirely according to plan that day: Philae's anchoring harpoons failed to fire, and the lander bounced twice, at one point drifting in space near Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko for about 2 hours. The new video animation is based on data collected by Philae's instruments, as well as those onboard the Rosetta mothership, which has been orbiting Comet 67P since August 2014, ESA officials said.

Bulova to Sell Replica of Astronaut's Watch Worn on the Moon

Bulova, the American watchmaker that made the unofficial — and by some accounts, "unauthorized" — backup watch that Apollo 15 commander David Scott wore on the third of his three moonwalks in 1971, has announced it will begin selling a modern edition of the astronaut's chronograph in January 2016. An unnamed Florida businessman bid on and won the original flown watch for a record $1.625 million in October, when it was offered by RR Auction of Boston on Scott's behalf. As such, Scott retrieved his personal backup, a watch he later said no one but his supervisor and his two crewmates knew was aboard at the time, to wear for the remainder of the mission.

Leonid Meteor Shower Peaks Overnight Tonight: What to Expect

You can see the famous Leonids this year even if clouds or bright city lights spoil your skies: The online Slooh Community Observatory will air a free Leonids webcast Tuesday at 8 p.m. EST (0100 GMT Wednesday) featuring live views from locations on four continents. You can watch this broadcast by joining Slooh and also gain access to the observatory's archive of past shows. You can also watch the Leonid meteor shower webcast on Space.com, courtesy of Slooh.

8-Hour Sleepers More Likely to Be Heart Healthy

In the study, researchers compared groups of people who slept for different average lengths of time, looking at how well each group met the seven criteria from the American Heart Association for "ideal" heart health. Although previous studies have linked people's sleep duration to negative outcomes, such as their risk of heart disease, few studies have looked at sleep duration and good outcomes, such as ideal heart health, said the researchers.

Polar Ice May Hold Secrets of Futuristic Materials (Video)

For a few curious birds, it's been mathematician Ken Golden drilling cores from Antarctic sea ice. "Sea ice is a very complicated system," said Golden, who has been studying it firsthand since his first expedition to Antarctica, in 1980. The interactions between the sea ice and its environment dramatically change the ice and how it behaves.

Moon Over Mars: Why US Needs a Lunar Mission First (Op-Ed)

Elliot Pulham is the CEO of the Space Foundation. A 30-year veteran space leader, he served as spokesman at the Kennedy Space Center for the Magellan, Galileo and Ulysses interplanetary missions, as well as for numerous space shuttle and U.S. Department of Defense missions. Wanting to send astronauts to Mars seems all the rage these days, and the popularity of Andy Weir's "The Martian" has certainly enlivened the discussions.

Mystery Extinct Cavemen Were More Diverse Than Neanderthals

A mysterious extinct branch of the human family tree that once interbred with modern humans was more genetically diverse than Neanderthals, a finding that also suggests many of these early humans called Denisovans existed in what is now southern Siberia, researchers say. In 2008, scientists unearthed a finger bone and teeth in Denisova cave in Siberia's Altai Mountains that belonged to lost relatives now known as the Denisovans (dee-NEE-soh-vens). Analysis of DNA extracted from a finger bone from a young Denisovan girl suggested they shared a common origin with Neanderthals, but were nearly as genetically distinct from Neanderthals as Neanderthals were from living people.

Einstein's True Biggest Blunder (Op-Ed)

Don Lincoln is a senior scientist at the U.S. Department of Energy's Fermilab, America's largest Large Hadron Collider research institution. Lincoln contributed this article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. It has been a century since Albert Einstein published his first papers laying out his crowning intellectual achievement, the theory of general relativity.

8 Baby Turtles and Tortoises: Cute, and Critically Endangered (Photos)

Avi Shuter is a wild-animal keeper at the Wildlife Conservation Society's (WCS) Bronx Zoo Herpetology Department. Julie Larsen Maher is staff photographer for WCS. In addition to documenting WCS field work, Maher photographs the animals at WCS's five New York-based wildlife parks: the Bronx Zoo, Central Park Zoo, New York Aquarium, Prospect Park Zoo and Queens Zoo.

Hunger Games: How to Avoid Real Food Riots (Op-Ed)

The global food system is heavily networked and complex, making it vulnerable to a variety of risks. In 2007 and 2008, the world watched how a modern-era food crisis erupted from the complex interplay of several drivers: droughts in major grain- and cereal-producing regions, increased biofuel production consuming grain supplies, and a range of long-evolving structural policy failures. The International Food Policy Research Institute's "Reflections on the Global Food Crisis" report highlights how significant price spikes for rice (224 percent), wheat (108 percent) and corn (89 percent) — beginning as early as January 2004 — eroded global food security and prompted food aid requests from 36 nations.

Birth Control Lawsuit: What Happens When You Skip a Few Pills?

Exactly what can happen if a woman misses one or more days of her birth control pills is highlighted by a new lawsuit: A company that allegedly mislabeled its birth control pills is being sued by more than 100 women who say they became pregnant because of the error. Pregnancy is especially possible for women who miss birth control pills while using these pills as their only form of birth control, doctors said. The women involved in the lawsuit reportedly took their birth control pills as instructed on the packaging.

Aha Moment! Art & Science Converge to Inspire Creative Solutions

In our first public event, Space.com featured the art of mathematician and cosmologist Ed Belbruno in a gallery showing at New York's Café Minerva — and, next door, hosted a panel discussion probing science, art and the origin of inspiration with a problem-solving artist, an artistic scientist and Belbruno himself, who mingles the two. Although his professional art and scientific careers do not overlap consciously, Belbruno says, he often finds elements of his scientific work reflected in his paintings: the whorls of orbital mechanics or strange time, and dimensions of cosmology and the origin of the universe. Next door, at Hamilton's Soda Fountain and Luncheonette, Belbruno met with his friends Robert Vanderbei and Rob Mars, a Princeton mathematician and a New York-based contemporary pop artist, respectively, to dig into the connections and differences between creating artistically and forging ahead in mathematics and science.

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Monday, November 16, 2015

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How Ebola Spread: Map Could Aid Outbreak Responses

A new map reveals the path that the Ebola virus took during the outbreak in Sierra Leone, giving a detailed picture of how and where the disease spread, a new study said. "For a future outbreak, this is something that can be readily applied to help identify the regions that need intervention most critically," said study author Jeffrey Shaman, an associate professor of environmental health sciences at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health. To chart the course of the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone, the researchers looked at data from the Sierra Leone Ministry of Health and Sanitation.

US Uterus Transplants: 6 Things to Know

Ten women in the United States will soon be chosen to undergo the nation's first uterus transplants, as part of a study at the Cleveland Clinic. Doctors at the hospital hope to perform the first uterus transplant in the next few months, according to the New York Times. Who needs a uterus transplant?

Firefighters Face Highest Heart Attack Risk Among Responders

Firefighters may face a higher risk of heart disease than do other emergency responders, a small new study finds. In the study, the researchers looked at heart disease risk factors such as blood pressure and body fat levels in firefighters, paramedics and police officers, and found that firefighters had the highest risk. The firefighters had, on average, a 2.9 percent chance of having a heart attack in the next 10 years, based on their risk factors, the researchers said.

The Great Salt Debate: How Much Sodium Is Too Much for Your Diet?

There's no doubt that eating too much sodium can cause high blood pressure, said Dr. Paul Whelton, a professor of global public health at Tulane University. Whelton was the principal investigator on the recent Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial (SPRINT), which made news when it was abruptly cut short because the results were so significant. In the trial, the researchers found that reducing people's blood pressure with medication to 120 mm Hg or below, rather than aiming to reduce blood pressure to 140 mm Hg, significantly reduced people's risk of death during the study period.

Lego Spaceport Set Is Out of This World: Q&A with Its Designers

We finally got our hands on Lego's new Spaceport set, and it was awesome — so we reached out to the kit's designers to hear more about it. After two hours of construction (and a video!), Space.com was impressed by the Spaceport's scale and all the different little parts: a robotic arm bearing a satellite that extended from the shuttle, seating room for two astronaut minifigs, and even a mobile platform to drive the space shuttle out to the Launchpad. We talked with Lego City designer Andrew Butler Coghill and design director Ricco Krog by email to learn about the making of the new sets and what Lego has in store for space fans.

Got Milky Way? Cows Surprise Skywatcher During Night Sky Photo Shoot

This image of the Milky Way over some friendly cows was taken in New Hampshire on Sept. 11. "In order to get this shot I had to focus stack 2 images, one in order to try to get the cows in focus and another focused at infinity to try to get the Milky Way in the sky," Ippolito added. The Milky Way, our own galaxy containing the solar syatem is a barred spiral galaxy with roughly 400 billion stars.

Earth's Oldest Water May Have Come from Ancient H2O-Filled Dust

Earth is the only planet in the solar system that boasts a surface abundantly covered with liquid water. Planetary scientists at the University of Hawaii questioned whether some of the ancient minerals lurking in the deep mantle — 1,800 miles (2,900 kilometers) below Earth's surface — might have held the planet's first water molecules. "We needed an undisturbed source of mantle from the Earth's formation," Lydia Hallis, lead author of the study and a planetary scientist with the University of Glasgow in the United Kingdom, told Live Science.

Shy Eel Glows Bright Green, Possibly As a 'Sexy Charm'

But now, after hours spent studying the fluorescent proteins of two eels, the researchers have solved the mystery. "It started as a brain protein and then became this fluorescent protein in muscle," said study lead researcher David Gruber, an associate professor of biology at Baruch College in New York City. Once the protein made its switch from a neural to a fluorescent protein, it spread like crazy throughout the eel population.

Dinos & X-Ray Probes? Photos Show Playful Side of Particle Physics

The photographer, Daniele Fanelli, is one of the finalists in this year's Physics Photowalk, an annual contest hosted by Stanford University, home to the U.S. Department of Energy's high-tech accelerator lab. On Sept. 25, Fanelli joined other photographers on a tour of SLAC, snapping pictures of the laboratory's ultrabright lasers, its nearly 2-mile-long (3.2 kilometers) particle accelerator and its plethora of unusually placed toys and doodads.

Earthquakes Could Trigger Massive Supervolcano Eruptions, Study Suggests

Supervolcanoes, such as the one dormant under Yellowstone National Park, may erupt when cracks form in the roofs of the chambers holding their molten rock, according to a new study. If scientists want to monitor supervolcanoes to see which ones are likely to erupt, this finding suggests they should look for telltale signs, such as earthquakes and other factors that might crack the magma chambers of these giant volcanoes. Supervolcanoes are capable of eruptions overshadowing anything in recorded human history — ones in the past could spew more than 500 times more magma and ash than Mount St. Helens did in 1980, the researchers said.

500-Year-Old Church Discovered in Slave Trade Settlement

Deformed by floods and possibly visited by famed naturalist Charles Darwin, the church had been built by Portuguese colonizers in Cidade Velha, the former capital of the Cape Verde Islands off the coast of West Africa. The historic settlement was recently made a UNESCO World Heritage Site. For hundreds of years, Cape Verde was a place where African slaves were held and sold before being sent to Portugal and the Americas.

Triassic Reptile Skewered Clams with Teeth on Roof of Its Mouth

The two thalattosaurs, discovered by separate groups of scientists, are from different sides of the world — one from central Oregon and the other from China's southwestern Guizhou province. "They're kind of known for being weird," said Eric Metz, a graduate student in the geosciences department at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. For instance, some thalattosaurs had no teeth, while others, including the new species in Oregon, sported teeth on the roofs of their mouths, which likely helped them crush mollusks, Metz told Live Science.

Kids' Drug-Resistant Bacteria Blamed on Farm Antibiotic Use

Children's health is suffering due to the excessive use of antibiotics in farm animals, according to a new report. Kids are becoming infected with bacteria that are resistant to treatment with the same antibiotics that are commonly used in raising farm animals, and it is difficult to treat children who are infected with the drug-resistant bacteria, the report said. "Children can come into contact with these organisms that are resistant, and if that contact results in an infection, then those infections are extremely difficult to treat," said the report's lead author, Dr. Jerome A. Paulson, the American Academy of Pediatrics' immediate past chairman of the executive committee of the Council on Environmental Health.

Google's New AI System Could Be 'Machine Learning' Breakthrough

Whether you're trying to translate something into a different language, turn your spoken words into text or sift through thousands of saved photos for that one special snapshot, Google has built a "smarter" artificial intelligence system to help, company representatives announced this week. "TensorFlow is faster, smarter and more flexible than our old system, so it can be adapted much more easily to new products and research," Google representatives said in the company's blog post announcing the new system. The tool is an exciting development for artificial-intelligence enthusiasts and researchers.

Space Tech Meets Earth-Based Industry in SpaceCom Conference

Leaders and innovators of the commercial space industry will descend on Houston this week for a meeting aimed at demonstrating how technologies developed in space can help build business on Earth. The first annual Space Commerce Conference and Exposition (SpaceCom) will "showcase the real, viable links between space technology and Houston's major industries," according to a statement released by the event organizers. The five industries targeted by the conference organizers are advanced manufacturing, communications, energy, medical and transportation.

Pluto Goes Psychedelic in Brilliant New Photo

Pluto's the prettiest dwarf planet at the party in this new, brilliantly colored image recently released by NASA. Researchers used a process called principal component analysis to create the false-colored photo of Pluto, which highlights the subtle color differences among the different regions, NASA officials said in a statement. The original image was captured by the Ralph/MVIC color camera on NASA's New Horizons spacecraft as it passed within about 22,000 miles (35,000 kilometers) from Pluto during its flyby in July.

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Sunday, November 15, 2015

Awesome Lego Star Wars Photo Book Stages Scenes from a Galaxy Far, Far Away

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Awesome Lego Star Wars Photo Book Stages Scenes from a Galaxy Far, Far Away

Lego Star Wars kits, and especially its minifigures, pack a lot of personality into a few pieces of plastic. "Lego Star Wars: Small Scenes from a Big Galaxy" (DK Publishing, 2015), available Nov. 10, is full of classic Star Wars views with quirky twists: snowball-fighting snowtroopers (captioned "Ha! Ha! Missed again!"), storytelling Ewoks and series mainstays under attack. Lehtimäki's project started when he was photographing his son's toys, but he soon realized that the little Star Wars Legos were worth a larger-scale project.

US Navy Missile Test Sparks Surprise … and an Awesome Sky View (Video)

An amateur photographer thought the world was ending when she caught pictures of a Trident missile in action near Los Angeles. The series of pictures captured by Porter Tinsley, who posted them on her blog Less Than Amateur, show a white halo backdropped by the Milky Way. You can see a time-lapse video of the missile test here made from Tinsley's amazing photos.