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Tuesday, August 25, 2015

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Sun Unleashes Medium-Strength Solar Flare (Photo)

The sun fired off a midlevel solar flare early this morning (Aug. 24) while a NASA satellite watched. The space agency's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) captured an image of the flare, which erupted at 3:33 a.m. EDT (0733 GMT) this morning from an Earth-facing sunspot known as Active Region 2403. This morning's outburst registered as an M5.6, NASA scientists said.

Farewell Dione: Cassini Snaps Last Close Photos of Saturn Moon

The Cassini spacecraft recently got its last close views of Dione, a small icy moon orbiting Saturn, and the results are astounding. Images returned from the Aug. 17 flyby show a mottled surface of craters and ice. The closest approach brought the spacecraft to within 295 miles (474 kilometers) of the moon's surface.You can see more of Cassini's amazing Dione photos in our full gallery.

'8 Days or Bust' +50: Gemini 5 Made History with 1st Crew Mission Patch

Fifty years ago on Monday (Aug. 24), two NASA astronauts were more than one-third of the way through what was destined to be the world's longest space mission at the time. Gordon Cooper and Charles "Pete" Conrad, seated snugly in the U.S. space agency's third-manned Gemini capsule, had launched atop a Titan II rocket from Cape Canaveral on Aug. 21, 1965. Cooper, who two years earlier had flown on the longest of NASA's one-man Mercury missions, was now the first person to fly into orbit twice.

Why Does Comet 67P Sing? Scientists Think They Know

The sound waves picked up by Rosetta are moving through the comet's magnetic field. In space, no one can hear you scream — that's because on Earth, sound waves move through the air, and there is no atmosphere in space. In empty space, there is no atmosphere, so the sound waves don't have a material to travel through.

Origins of 'Gospel of Jesus's Wife' Begin to Emerge

The truth may be finally emerging about the "Gospel of Jesus's Wife," a highly controversial papyrus suggesting that some people, in ancient times, believed Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene. Debate about the credibility of the "gospel" began as soon as Harvard University professor Karen King reported her discovery of the papyrus in September 2012. Written in Coptic (an Egyptian language), the papyrus fragment contains a translated line that reads, "Jesus said to them, 'My wife …'" and also refers to a "Mary," possibly Mary Magdalene.

High-Res NASA Video of Hurricane Katrina Could Improve Forecasting

Ten years after the devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina, NASA has helped scientists better understand why the storm was so devastating, and how to save lives in the future. A new video, created by scientists at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, shows a high-resolution simulation of Hurricane Katrina as the storm moved across the Atlantic Ocean, then the Gulf of Mexico, and finally collided with the southern United States. You can see watch the hurricane video here, courtesy of NASA.

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Monday, August 24, 2015

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California Wildfires: Can Burning Marijuana Fields Get You High?

In a paradoxical twist, some of the farms set ablaze in the recent conflagrations were marijuana farms, which produce plants that are meant to be burned (though not quite like this). "Unfortunately, no. Or fortunately, no, depending on your perspective," said Ryan Vandrey, an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. It's very unlikely that nonsmoking Californians will suddenly get the munchies or experience any of the other reported effects of the intoxicating plant, Vandrey told Live Science.

Do Great White Sharks Grow Forever?

How did this 20-foot-long (6 meters) great white Internet sensation become such a behemoth? Named Deep Blue, the female shark made a colossal impression in video clips shared on Facebook by shark researcher Mauricio Hoyos Padilla, director of Pelagios-Kakunjá A.C., a nonprofit organization that focuses on sharks and other open-water species. Even though great white females are typically larger than males, they average just 15 to 16 feet (just under 5 m) in length.

Chinese Cave Graffiti Tells of Ancient Droughts & Strife

An ancient cave with centuries of Chinese characters written on the walls reveals the history of severe droughts. By tying the cave graffiti to ratios of chemical elements in the stalagmites growing in the cave, a team of scientists created a snapshot of the climate over the last 500 years, said study co-author Sebastian Breitenbach, a paleoclimatologist at the University of Cambridge in England. "Even slight droughts — slight excursions in the climate regime that may be just a couple of years, like two or three years — had a drastic impact on the local population in the area," Breitenbach told Live Science.

A Day in Space? For Scott Kelly, It's Work, TV (But No Laundry!)

It's a question that never seems to get old, as demonstrated in a series of interviews this week with astronaut Scott Kelly, who is spending a year aboard the International Space Station. TV interviewers Larry King, host of the show "Larry King Now," and Katie Couric, a global news anchor for Yahoo, both spoke with Kelly this week, and both wanted to know the same thing: What's a normal day like in space? Kelly is one of two participants in NASA's One-Year Mission, the first instance of American astronauts spending almost an entire calendar year in orbit.

Japanese Cargo Ship Delivers Mice, Booze and More to Space Station

A robotic Japanese cargo ship made a special delivery to the International Space Station on Sunday (Aug. 24), ending a four-day trek to ferry tons of food, supplies — and even some mice and (experimental) liquor — to the orbiting lab. The H-II Transfer Vehicle, called HTV-5, arrived at the space station at 6:55 a.m. EDT (1055 GMT), when it was captured via a robotic arm by astronauts inside the space station. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched the HTV-5 cargo ship on Wednesday (Aug. 19).

Bend & Snap: Origami Inspires New Ways to Fold Curved Objects

A new mathematical rule explains how simple, 3D curved surfaces — such as domes or saddles — can be folded and snapped into new positions or to form different structures. As such, understanding how to bend materials smoothly or snap them quickly could enable more efficient mechanical designs, said Arthur Evans, a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Mathematics at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. "There's a lot of math behind how you can fold flat things," Evans told Live Science.

New Robotic Exoskeleton Is Controlled by Human Thoughts

The man wearing the exoskeleton in the experiment can walk on his own (he's one of the participants in the researchers' newly published study), but the scientists think their new mind-controlled device could one day be used by people who can't walk — such as those who have suffered severe spinal cord injuries, or people with neurodegenerative diseases, like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Lots of researchers are working to develop technologies that help people regain control over their movements through a combination of robotics and brainpower (formally known as brain-computer interface control systems). In 2011, a woman who suffered a stroke that left her unable to move lifted a cup with a robotic arm that she manipulated with her thoughts.

Japan delivers whiskey to space station_ for science

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Spirits have arrived at the International Space Station.

Young Woman's 'Hysteria' Turned Out to Be Deadly Heart Condition

A woman in Germany who went to the emergency room because she felt "hysterical" ended up not having a psychiatric disorder as doctors originally suspected. The 29-year-old woman was a medical student, and was taken by ambulance to the emergency room in June 2014. The woman seemed very anxious and was constantly tossing and turning on the stretcher, said Dr. Thilo Witsch, a cardiologist at the University of Freiburg Heart Center in Freiburg, Germany, and the lead author of the case report, published online Aug. 10 in The Journal of Emergency Medicine.

Free Pass! National Parks Waive Admissions Fee on Tuesday

In celebration of its 99th birthday, the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) is providing free admission to all of its sites for one day next week. Next Tuesday (Aug. 25), people can visit any of the NPS' 408 sites across the country, including popular spots such as Joshua Tree National Park in California and the Wright Brothers National Memorial in North Carolina. "The National Park Service's 99th birthday is an opportunity to reflect on and celebrate the role of national parks in the American story," National Park Service Director Jonathan Jarvis said in a statement.

Mini Frog, Bat with Freakish Tongue Found in Bolivia

A "robber frog" with beady, gold-rimmed eyes and a bizarre bat with a record-long tongue are among the menagerie of species discovered during an expedition in Bolivia. The slick, earth-hued robber frog, or big-headed frog, was spotted during the first leg of the 18-month-long expedition to explore Bolivia's Madidi National Park, considered the world's most biologically diverse park, according to the Wildlife Conservation Society. "As soon as we saw these frogs' distinctive orange inner thighs, it aroused our suspicions about a possible new species, especially because this habitat has never really been studied in detail before Identidad Madidi," which is the name of the Bolivian scientific expedition, James Aparicio, a herpetologist at the Bolivian Faunal Collection, said in a statement.

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Sunday, August 23, 2015

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See Saturn and the Moon Pair Off Tonight

If the weather is clear in your area on tonight (Aug. 22), you'll have an opportunity to see what probably are for most people, the two most popular objects to look at through a telescope: Saturn and the moon.

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Saturday, August 22, 2015

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The Great American Total Solar Eclipse Is Coming 2 Years from Today

This total solar eclipse of 2017 will be the first time in nearly four decades that such an event will be visible so close to home. Contrary to popular belief, totalsolar eclipses are not particularly rare. In recent years, for instance, assiduous eclipse chasers had to travel to remote locations such as Ellesmere Island in Nunavut, Canada (2008), Easter Island (2010) or the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard (2015).

Jimmy Carter Gets New Melanoma Treatment: Here's How It Works

To treat Jimmy Carter's cancer, doctors will use one of the newest advances in cancer therapy — a class of drugs that mobilizes a patient's own immune system against their cancer. On Thursday (Aug. 20), the former president announced that he has advanced melanoma, a type of skin cancer, and that it has spread to his liver and brain. Doctors have already removed a small tumor from his liver, and he will start a course of radiation therapy to treat the tumors in his brain, Carter said at a news conference.

German scientists find rare dinosaur tracks

By Josie Le Blond BERLIN (Reuters) - German scientists have found an unusually long trail of footprints from a 30-tonne dinosaur in an abandoned quarry in Lower Saxony, a discovery they think could be around 145 million years old. "It's very unusual how long the trail is and what great condition it's in," excavation leader Benjamin Englich told Reuters at the site, referring to 90 uninterrupted footprints stretching over 50 meters. Englich said the elephant-like tracks were stomped into the ground sometime between 135 and 145 million years ago by a sauropod - a class of heavy dinosaurs with long necks and tails.

Booze Sent to Space to Explore 'Mellow' Mechanism

Tokyo-based Suntory Global Innovation Center, which has a division called Suntory Whiskey, launched a set of alcoholic beverages toward the International Space Station on Wednesday (Aug. 19) aboard Japan's fifth H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV-5). The booze includes five different types of distilled spirits, Suntory representatives said.

Digital Calendar Shows Best Images from NASA Space Telescope

A NASA telescope celebrates 12 years in space over the weekend, and the agency has released a free digital calendar packed with gorgeous images to mark the occasion. The new calendar features a dozen of the best pictures captured by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, which blasted off on Aug. 23, 2003, and continues to observe the heavens today. "You can't fully represent Spitzer's scientific bounty in only 12 images," Spitzer project scientist Michael Werner, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, said in a statement.

Human Ancestors May Have Butchered Animals 3.4 Million Years Ago

Cut marks on two 3.4-million-year-old animal bones from Ethiopia were thought to be evidence that the beasts had been trampled by other animals long ago, but new research suggests that's not the case. The new results debunk one theory for how the bones got their marks, and support — but do not, on their own, definitively prove — the alternative hypothesis that ancient human ancestors cut the bones. Combined with recent evidence that human predecessors used stone tools about 3.3 million years ago, the new study could help change the picture of human ancestors of the genus Australopithecus, whose members include the famous "Lucy" skeleton.

California Sinking Faster Than Thought, Aquifers Could Permanently Shrink

California is sinking even faster than scientists had thought, new NASA satellite imagery shows. "Because of increased pumping, groundwater levels are reaching record lows — up to 100 feet (30 meters) lower than previous records," Mark Cowin, director of California's Department of Water Resources, said in a statement.

Gruesome Meal: Seagulls Snack on Baby Seals' Eyeballs

Hungry seagulls on the coast of Namibia have a gruesome way of snacking: they peck out and consume the eyeballs of baby seals, according to a new study. In 1998, Rowntree and several of her colleagues published their observations of the gulls' morbid feeding behavior in the journal Marine Mammal Science.

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