U.S. Air Force 'close' to certifying new satellite launch provider

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	(Sponsor this newsletter) U.S. Air Force 'close' to certifying new satellite launch provider By Andrea Shalal WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Air Force said on Tuesday it was close to certifying a second company to launch military and intelligence satellites into space, and announced a review of the process used to vet new entrants. Currently, the United Launch Alliance, a joint venture of Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co, is the only company certified to launch large military and intelligence satellites. ... Read More » 8 Newfound Alien Worlds Could Potentially Support Life All eight newfound alien planets appear to orbit in their parent stars' habitable zone — that just-right range of distances that may allow liquid water to exist on a world's surface — and all of them are relatively small, researchers said. A glitch ended the spacecraft's original planet hunt in May 2013, but researchers are still combing through Kepler's huge database. Read More » Whale Genes Offer Hints to Longer Life Spans In a search for genes that fight off aging, researchers have now charted the bowhead whale genome. The scientists' search turned up several interesting genetic targets worthy of further study, said senior study author Joao Pedro de Magalhaes, a biologist and expert in aging science at the University of Liverpool in the United Kingdom. The mutations in this gene could provide protection against cancer, Magalhaes said. The gene is associated with cell growth and DNA repair, and the duplication could slow aging, Magalhaes said. Read More » Renaissance-Era Italian Warlord Was Poisoned, Mummy Reveals Forensic scientists in Italy have uncovered a mummy murder mystery. Scientists say they've found traces of digitalis, or foxglove — a beautiful but potentially heart-stopping plant — in the digestive tract of Cangrande della Scala of Verona. At the time of his death, Cangrande had a grip on an impressive chunk of northern Italy. Read More » CES 2015: New Tech Gadgets Galore, But Why Do They Matter? A seemingly endless assortment of fitness trackers, smart appliances and self-driving cars are on display at this year's Consumer Electronics Show — some 20,000 tech products in total. There's a real sense that the 3D printer in one row is somehow related to the Wi-Fi-connected dog bowl in another. In a talk here yesterday (Jan. 5), Shawn DuBravac, chief economist for the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), explained the underlying similarities between technologies that, at first glance, don't appear to have much in common. "We're taking something that's happening in the physical space and digitizing it," DuBravac said. Read More » Lake Erie Dead Zone: Don't Blame the Slime! Lake Erie's ecological calamities occur under different conditions, a new study finds. The lake's central dead zones are most strongly linked to drought years, when rivers that bring water into the lake run lower, researchers reported today (Jan. 6) in the journal Environmental Science & Toxicology. Conversely, the toxic algae blooms in west Lake Erie algae form more readily during wet years, and especially when intense spring storms wash fertilizer from farms into the lake. Last year, dangerous levels of one algal toxin shut down the drinking water supply of the city of Toledo, Ohio, for three days in August 2014. Read More » Hubble Telescope Captures Spectacular New Views of 'Pillars of Creation' A famous deep-space object imaged by the Hubble Space Telescope 20 years ago has been reborn in an amazing new photo. Scientists pointed the telescope at the iconic Eagle Nebula, also known as Messier 16 (M16), capturing the famous "Pillars of Creation" in sharper and wider view. The new and improved image was possible thanks to upgrades made to the Hubble Space Telescope over the past 25 years. You can see the new Pillars of Creation image in detail in a breathtaking new video of the Hubble views as well. Read More » Let in the Light: Ancient Roman Fort Designed for Celestial Show The gateways of an ancient Roman fort in Britain are roughly aligned with the light from the sun during the summer and winter solstices — a design that would have resulted in a striking scene on the shortest and longest days of the year, a researcher says. During the winter solstice, the sun would rise in line with the fort's southeastern and northwestern gates, and set in line with the fort's southwestern and northeastern gates. "Moreover, the four towers of the garrison seem aligned to cardinal directions," Amelia Carolina Sparavigna, a physics professor at the Politecnico di Torino (Polytechnic University of Turin) in Italy, wrote in the study, published Dec. 17 in the journal Philica. Built during the reign of Emperor Hadrian, who ruled from A.D. 117 to 138, the structure was part of a series of fortifications that once guarded the Roman frontier in Britain. Read More » What If Every Volcano on Earth Erupted at Once? Whether it's glowing lava snaking into the sea or lightning blooming in billowing ash clouds, the sight of an erupting volcano inspires awe and wonder. Not likely, said Parv Sethi, a geologist at Radford University in Virginia. The two big hazards from a worldwide volcanic cataclysm are ash and volcanic gases. The ash would linger in the atmosphere for up to 10 years, he added. Read More » Scientists find antibiotic that kills bugs without resistance By Kate Kelland LONDON (Reuters) - Scientists have discovered a new antibiotic, teixobactin, that can kill serious infections in mice without encountering any detectable resistance, offering a potential new way to get ahead of dangerous evolving superbugs. Researchers said the antibiotic, which has yet to be trialled in humans, could one day be used to treat drug-resistant infections caused by the superbug MSRA, as well as tuberculosis, which normally requires a combination of drugs that can have adverse side effects. ... Read More » Limiting global warming means forgoing vast fuel reserves - study By Kate Kelland LONDON (Reuters) - A third of the world's oil reserves, half of gas reserves and 80 percent of current coal reserves should not be used in the coming decades if global warming is to stay below an agreed 2 degree Celsius target, scientists said on Wednesday. In a study published in the journal Nature, researchers said the vast majority of coal reserves in China, Russia and the United States should stay in the ground, as well as more than 260,000 million barrels of oil reserves in the Middle East, equivalent to all of Saudi Arabia's oil reserves. ... Read More »

Panula et al., one that focused on the role of brain histamine in several disorders, including sleep, cognitive, and moto

	TRENDS IN NEUROSCIENCES
	(Sponsor this newsletter) The human histaminergic system in neuropsychiatric disorders The neuronal histaminergic system is involved in several functions, such as the sleep–wake cycle, energy and endocrine homeostasis, sensory and motor functions, cognition, and attention, all of which tend to be severely affected in neuropsychiatric disorders, such as PD, AD, HD, depression, and narcolepsy. This system has been the subject of several reviews [1–3], such as one by Haas et al., which mostly summarized animal experimental findings before 2008 [1] and two by Panula et al., one that focused on the role of brain histamine in several disorders, including sleep, cognitive, and motor disorders, and addiction, largely based upon data from animal studies [2], the other on the developmental role of brain histamine [3]. Read More »

FeedaMail: Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

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	(Sponsor this newsletter) Photographer Sees Stunning Auroras Over Swedish Mountains (Photos, Video) The northern lights dance in a breathtaking display in these stunning images from an aurora video recently sent to Space.com. Night sky photographer Chad Blakley captured these intense auroras grooving over several Swedish Lapland locations, including a small hotel high in the Swedish mountains, on Feb. 21. "This display was one of the best of the year and we are hopeful that the final four weeks of the season will continue to impress," Blakley wrote Space.com in an email. Vivid auroras like those seen in Blakley's images are caused by charged particles from the sun (the solar wind) that interact with the Earth's upper atmosphere (at altitudes above 50 miles, or 80 km), causing a glow.  Read More » Sound Machines Could Be Hurting Baby's Ears Parents-to-be may want to think twice before putting an infant sleep machine on their baby registry. Canadian researchers have found that when noise machines are used on a regular basis, they can produce sound levels that can be dangerous for infants' ears, which may lead to hearing, speech or learning problems.    "I'm not saying that these devices will cause hearing loss — I'm just saying that they could," said Dr. Blake Papsin, a study author and otolaryngologist-in-chief at The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. However, by using infant sound machines, "people are taking a noisy environment and adding more noise to it, without even thinking about the amount," Papsin told LiveScience. Read More » Wavy vs. Straight: Physics of Curly Hair Teased Out The first detailed model of a 3D strand of curly hair has been created, a development that could be a boon for the film and computer animation industries, researchers say. Now, researchers at MIT, in Cambridge, Mass., and the Université Pierre-et-Marie-Curie (UPMC), in Paris, are teasing out the physics of curly hair. "Our work doesn't deal with the collisions of all the hairs on a head, which is a very important effect for animators to control a hairstyle," study co-author Pedro Reis, an assistant professor in MIT's department of civil and environmental engineering, said in a statement. The researchers combined their lab demonstrations with computer simulations to identify several key parameters of curly hair: curvature (as a ratio of curvature to length) and weight (as a ratio of weight to stiffness). Read More » Vaccination Messages May Backfire, Study Finds Although public health researchers have worked to counter misinformation about vaccines and raise vaccination rates, a number of the methods they are using may be ineffective, according to a new study. Surveying 1,759 parents, researchers found that while they were able to teach parents that the vaccine and autism were not linked, parents who were surveyed who had initial reservations about vaccines said they were actually less likely to vaccinate their children after hearing the researchers messages. "The first message of our study is that the messaging we use to promote childhood vaccines may not be effective, and in some cases may be counterproductive," said Brendan Nyhan, an assistant professor in the department of government at Dartmouth College, who researches misconceptions about health care. "We need more evidence-based messaging about vaccines. Read More » Fitness Trackers Could Boost Kids' Health, But Face Challenges, Experts Say But few studies have looked at the best way for children to use the trackers, said Michelle Garrison, an epidemiologist at Seattle Children's Research Institute and the University of Washington School of Medicine. And the trackers out there aren't an ideal fit for the needs of children and their families, other experts say. But there are some reasons to think trackers could be effective in children. Read More » Mountain Lion Family Feast Caught on Camera With an adorably wrinkled nose, a mountain lion cub honed her hunting skills earlier this month on a dead mule deer caught by mom in California's Malibu Creek State Park. A remotely activated camera captured the nighttime feast for researchers who are tracking the cougar family at the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. Mule deer are a popular menu item for Santa Monica mountain lions. The National Park Service has tracked more than 30 mountain lions in the Santa Monica Mountains since 2002, part of a long-term study monitoring the health of the cougar population here. Read More » Ocean's Biggest Current Carries More Water Than Thought A team of oceanographers reported the results of four years of continuously monitoring the Antarctic Circumpolar Current on Monday (Feb. 24) at the 2014 Ocean Sciences Meeting of the American Geophysical Union in Honolulu. The Circumpolar Current circles Antarctica clockwise from west to east, speeding ships flowing with the current but providing resistance for those sailing in the opposite direction. The churning waters ferry heat, salt and marine life between the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific Oceans, but the current also isolates Antarctica from warmer waters to the north. Because the Circumpolar Current plays an important role in moving heat around the planet, scientists are keen to better understand how the rotating flow may respond to climate change. Read More » South African scientists map HIV antibodies in vaccine hunt Scientists in South Africa have mapped the evolution of an antibody that kills different strains of the HIV virus, which might yield a vaccine for the incurable disease, the National Institute of Communicable Diseases said on Monday. The scientists have been studying one woman's response to HIV infection from stored samples of her blood and isolated the antibodies that she developed, said Lynn Morris, head of the virology unit at the NICD. The study, by a consortium of scientists from the NICD, local universities and the U.S. Vaccine Research Centre of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, was published in the journal Nature. Humans respond to HIV by producing antibodies to fight the virus. Read More » Private Mars Flyby Mission in 2021 Needs NASA's Help, Experts Tell Congress (Video) A private manned Mars flyby mission in 2021 could be an inspiring precursor to landing astronauts on the Red Planet's surface in the not-too-distant future, but much work needs to be accomplished before that goal can become a reality, experts told Congress Thursday (Feb. 27). The Inspiration Mars Foundation, led by the world's first space tourist Dennis Tito, aims to launch a pair of adventurous space explorers on a flyby of Mars in just seven years. But to meet that window, Inspiration Mars needs NASA's help. The U.S. House of Representatives' Committee on Science, Space and Technology held the hearing Thursday to discuss how feasible such a Mars flyby in 2021 actually is. Read More » NASA, Astronauts Beam Congrats to 'Gravity' on Oscar Wins Real-life astronauts and NASA officials congratulated the "Gravity" cast and crew on their seven Oscar wins Sunday night. In a statement, NASA gave a special shout out to Alfonso Cuarón for winning best director. "We took some time from our schedule to watch the movie 'Gravity' here on the space station and were struck by the stunning visuals and stark imagery the movie depicted," Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata said in a video from NASA, as he floated inside the International Space Station alongside NASA astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Mike Hopkins. Read More » South African scientists map HIV antibodies in vaccine hunt Scientists in South Africa have mapped the evolution of an antibody that kills different strains of the HIV virus, which might yield a vaccine for the incurable disease, the National Institute of Communicable Diseases said on Monday. The scientists have been studying one woman's response to HIV infection from stored samples of her blood and isolated the antibodies that she developed, said Lynn Morris, head of the virology unit at the NICD. The study, by a consortium of scientists from the NICD, local universities and the U.S. Vaccine Research Centre of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, was published in the journal Nature. Humans respond to HIV by producing antibodies to fight the virus. Read More »
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FeedaMail: Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

	Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News
	(Sponsor this newsletter) 5 Weird Facts About the Oscars The 86th annual Academy Awards are this Sunday, March 2. Ellen DeGeneres will host, stars will schmooze, and large portions of America will tune it to see who wore it best. But whether or not this year's Oscars hold any surprises, the awards ceremony has a strange history. The first person ever presented with an Academy Award was Emil Jannings, a silent-film actor who took the Best Actor award for two films. Read More »
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