GoogleTrends

Thursday, October 29, 2015

FeedaMail: Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

(Sponsor this newsletter)

Rookie Spacewalkers Perform Critical Space Station Work

NASA astronauts Scott Kelly and Kjell Lindgren successfully completed their first-ever spacewalks today (Oct. 28), completing a handful of tasks vital to the International Space Station's longterm endurance. NASA's 32nd International Space Station (ISS) spacewalk officially started at 8:03 a.m. ET (1203 GMT) and lasted for 7 hours and 16 minutes as Kelly and Lindgren performed a handful of important maintenance tasks, including putting additional shielding over a science experiment, lubricating the station's robotic arm and rerouting cables to a future docking site for commercial spacecraft.

Modern Mystery: Ancient Comet Is Spewing Oxygen

The Rosetta spacecraft has detected molecular oxygen in the gas streaming off comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, a curious finding that has scientists rethinking the ingredients that were present in the early solar system. What's mystifying astronomers about the new find is why the oxygen wasn't annihilated during the solar system's formation. Molecular oxygen is extremely reactive with hydrogen, which was swirling in abundance as the sun and planets were created.

Spacecraft to sample water plumes from Saturn moon

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla (REUTERS) - A U.S. spacecraft was poised to make a deep dive into plumes of water, ice and organic matter blasting from Saturn's small, ocean-bearing moon Enceladus, in an effort to learn if it could support life, NASA said on Wednesday. Only a drop of water will be collected during the 19,000 mph (30,600 kph) flyby, which is scheduled to take place about 1 p.m. EDT. Scientists say that will be enough to answer some key questions about Enceladus, which has a global ocean sealed beneath its icy surface.

Zap happy: electric eels innovative in subduing hapless prey

By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - When it comes to unleashing their trademark zaps, electric eels employ an impressive and sophisticated set of tactics. A study unveiled on Wednesday detailed how these dangerous denizens of the muddy waterways of South America's Amazon and Orinoco basins can double the voltage of their jolts by curling their serpentine bodies to adjust the position of the positive and negative poles of their electric organ. The scientist who conducted the research also described how the eels use electrical pulses as a radar system to track prey as well as to immobilize prey by causing strong, involuntary muscle contractions in an electrifying form of remote control.

22 Ancient Shipwrecks Discovered Near Greek Island

Shipwrecks were the stuff of lore around the craggy coasts of Fourni, a Greek archipelago close to Turkey in the eastern Aegean Sea. By day 5, the researchers had discovered evidence of nine more sunken ships. "I think we were all shocked," said Peter Campbell, co-director of the project from the U.S.-based RPM Nautical Foundation.

Electric Embrace: Eels Curl Up to Supercharge Shocks

It's kind of like walking straight into an electric fence, or getting shot with a stun gun. "You wouldn't voluntarily do it over and over again," said Kenneth Catania, a professor of biological sciences at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, and author of a new study about the electric eels' shocking behavior. Catania has been zapped a few times since he began studying the electric eel (Electrophorus electricus), a fish that's indigenous to the murky waters of the Amazon.

Omm…MG! Rare Yoga Injury Breaks Man's Leg

A man in Ireland broke his leg and spent 10 days in the hospital after injuring himself in a surprising way — while practicing yoga. The 38-year-old yoga enthusiast fractured the thighbone on his right leg while doing a difficult seated yoga pose known as Marichyasana posture B in his morning yoga class, according to a new report of the man's case, which was published online Oct. 9 in the journal BMJ Case Reports. When the man got into the position, he heard a loud cracking sound and felt enormous pain in his right femur (thighbone).

Marriage Linked to Better Outcomes After Heart Surgery

People who are married may be more likely to survive heart surgery than people who are divorced, separated or widowed, according to a new study. In the study, researchers looked at health and survival rates in 1,576 adults ages 50 or older who underwent cardiac surgery. The new findings suggest that "marital status is a predictor of survival and functional recovery after cardiac surgery," the authors,from the University of Pennsylvania, wrote in their study published today (Oct. 28) in the journal JAMA Surgery.

Oh Baby! The Science of Identical Triplets and Quadruplets

For two Baltimore parents, their three new bundles of joy may make them feel like one in a million, and statistics show they're not far off: Parents Thomas and Kristen Hewitt welcomed a rare set of identical triplets earlier this month, The Baltimore Sun reports. The Hewitts' three boys were born more than six weeks early, on Oct. 6, the Sun reported. Statistics help tell the story: Without the help of fertility treatments, and according to a mathematical rule that doctors use called Hellin's law, about one in 90 births is twins, one in 8,100 births (90 squared) is triplets and one in 729,000 births (90 cubed) is quadruplets, Herman said.

Snakebite Victims in Africa Lack Needed Antivenom, Researcher Says

There is an urgent need for better and more accessible snakebite treatments in Africa, which cause thousands of deaths each year, researchers argue. Recently, the antivenom manufacturer Sanofi-Pasteur made headlines when it said it would stop producing the snakebite treatment. "The reality is that for the vast majority of Africa's snakebite victims, the loss of Sanofi's antivenom will mean little, if anything at all," Williams wrote.

'1st Hardware Store in Space': Commercial 3D Printer Launching in 2016

California-based startup Made In Space is partnering with home-improvement giant Lowe's to launch a commercial 3D printer to the International Space Station (ISS) early next year, representatives of both companies announced today (Oct. 29). Made In Space built the 3D printer, which is called the Additive Manufacturing Facility (AMF), and will retain ownership of the machine.

Scientists announce progress toward better battery to power cars

By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Scientists have created a battery whose technology in principle could power electric cars and other energy-hungry devices far better than current lithium-ion batteries, but it remains years away from commercial use. Researchers at the University of Cambridge on Thursday announced the creation of a laboratory demonstration model of a lithium-oxygen battery that overcomes many of the barriers that have held back the development of this technology. Clare Grey, a Cambridge professor of materials chemistry who led the research, called it "a step towards a practical battery, albeit with many hurdles ahead." The researchers said it could be more than a decade before a practical lithium-oxygen battery is ready, in part because the battery's ability to charge and discharge is too low.

(Sponsor this newsletter)

Delievered to you by Feedamail.
Unsubscribe

Wednesday, October 28, 2015

FeedaMail: Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

(Sponsor this newsletter)

Tractor beams of science fiction becoming a reality

By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The tractor beam, a staple of science fiction including "Star Wars" and "Star Trek" that is employed to grab spaceships and other things remotely, is entering the realm of reality. Researchers on Tuesday said they have developed a tractor beam that uses high-amplitude sound waves to levitate, move and rotate small objects without making contact with them. "As a mechanical wave, sound can exert significant forces on objects.

Private Spaceflight Industry Aims to Shake Off a Rough Year

Over the past 12 months, robotic resupply missions to the International Space Station (ISS) launched by both Orbital ATK and SpaceX failed, and Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo broke apart during a test flight, killing the vehicle's co-pilot and seriously wounding its pilot. Orbital ATK and SpaceX plan to be flying again before the year is out, for example, and Virgin Galactic is nearly finished building SpaceShipTwo number two.

Falling Space Junk Will Burn Up In Earth's Atmosphere Next Month

A piece of space junk will fall back to Earth next month, giving researchers a chance to study how incoming objects behave when they hit the planet's atmosphere. The object, which is known as WT1190F, is expected to enter Earth's atmosphere on Nov. 13 above the Indian Ocean, about 62 miles (100 kilometers) south of Sri Lanka. "The object is quite small, at most a couple of meters in diameter, and a significant fraction if not all of it can be expected to completely burn up in the atmosphere," Tim Flohrer, of the European Space Agency's (ESA) Space Debris Office at the European Space Operations Center in Germany, said in a statement.

'Let's Go Mets!' Astronaut Mike Massimino Roots for His Home Team

Attention, sports fans! Game 1 of the 2015 World Series between the New York Mets and the Kansas City Royals launches tonight (Oct. 27), and not even astronauts are immune to baseball fever. "The Mets are about to begin the World Series and I want to wish them the best of luck," Massimino says in the 21-second video.

Real-Life 'Tractor Beam' Can Levitate Objects Using Sound Waves

It may seem straight out of "Star Trek," but it's real: Scientists have created a sonic "tractor beam" that can pull, push and pirouette objects that levitate in thin air. The sonic tractor beam relies on a precisely timed sequence of sound waves that create a region of low pressure that traps tiny objects that can then be manipulated solely by sound waves, the scientists said in a new study. Though the new demonstration was just a proof of concept, the same technique could be adapted to remotely manipulate cells inside the human body or target the release of medicine locked in acoustically activated drug capsules, said study co-author Bruce Drinkwater, a mechanical engineer at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom.

Cutting Sugar Made Obese Kids Healthier in 10 Days

There can be no more dancing around the fact that, for children, consuming added sugar contributes to a litany of chronic diseases, particularly obesity, Type 2 diabetes and heart disease, scientists concluded in new research published today (Oct. 27). In the study, researchers closely monitored 43 obese children and found that reducing the consumption of added sugar — even while maintaining the same number of calories, and the same amount of non-sugary junk food such as potato chips — led to a dramatic improvement in a cluster of health measures in just 10 days. The kids lowered their cholesterol, blood pressure and blood sugar and lost a little weight, too, despite no change in their calorie intake or physical activity.

Leading Causes of Death in the US: What's Changed Since 1969?

Five of the six top causes of death in America — including stroke, cancer and diabetes — now have lower death rates than they have in past years, according to a new report. To investigate the deadliest conditions in the United States, researchers pulled national mortality data from death certificates, looking at the period from 1969 to 2013. Deaths from stroke had the most substantial decrease, falling 77 percent (from 156 deaths per 100,000 people to 36 deaths per 100,000 people) during the study period, and heart disease was close behind, down by about two-thirds (from 520 deaths per 100,000 people to 169 deaths per 100,000 people), the researchers found.

Tractor beams of science fiction becoming a reality

NASA Astronauts Making Spacewalk Debut at Space Station Today: Watch Live

American astronauts Scott Kelly and Kjell Lindgren plan to spend nearly six-and-a-half hours working outside the International Space Station during their spacewalk, which will be dedicated to "station upgrades and maintenance tasks," according to NASA. Both Kelly and Lindgren have said they are excited for today's spacewalk, which will include (among other tasks) the installation of a protective cover on the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, a $2 billion particle physics detector that has been performing science on the station's exterior since 2011.

Einstein Is Right About General Relativity — Again

Albert Einstein's theory of general relativity has been proven right again — and this time, physicists have pinned down just how precise it is: Any deviations from his theory of general relativity are so small that they would change calculations by just one part in 10,000 to one part in 100,000. Time after time, experiments have proved that Einstein's theory of general relativity, which describes the way gravity behaves, especially when dealing with high speeds and large masses. In the new study, physicists looked at gobs of data on planetary orbits to look for tiny anomalies that couldn't be explained by either Isaac Newton's theory of gravity — in which gravity is a force between objects that depends on their masses — or Einstein's general relativity theory, which says gravity is a warping of space-time itself.

Gem-Filled Warrior's Tomb Discovered in Ancient Greek City

Archaeologists who thought they were excavating the site of an ancient house in Greece recently uncovered something much more rare: a wealthy Bronze Age warrior's tomb, chock-full of precious metals and colorful gemstones. The tomb, which dates back some 3,500 years to 1500 B.C., was found by an international group of researchers led by archaeologists from the University of Cincinnati. Gold cups and jewelry, as well as hundreds of beads made from precious stones like amethyst and jasper, also surrounded the remains of the deceased Mycenaean warrior, who once lived near what is now the city of Pylos, on the southwest coast of Greece.

Record-Breaking 408 Earthquakes Hit Bay Area City Over Past 2 Weeks

A whopping 408 earthquakes have hit San Ramon, California, in the past two weeks, including 11 in one 24-hour stretch. This record-breaking earthquake swarm is nothing to fear, however, according to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). Periods of tectonic unrest are common in the area and probably don't presage a larger quake, the USGS said.

What Would an Alien Megastructure Look Like? Sci-Fi Authors Weigh In

Researchers aren't sure what's going on, and they have posited that some sort of light-blocking "alien megastructure" is a possible — though unlikely — explanation. "We are the most skeptical people on the planet," Robert J. Sawyer, a Canadian sci-fi writer who regularly discusses alien life in his novels, told Space.com. Sawyer added that journalists, by contrast, often pump up the news because they "smell front page." And while Sawyer supports the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) because it is so cheap to listen for radio signals, he said it's meaningful that, in five decades of searching, nothing has come up so far.

For 'The Ordinary Spaceman' Clayton Anderson, Astronaut Life Is Anything But

When Clayton Anderson began to write about his 30-year NASA career, he was warned that astronaut memoirs are "a dime a dozen, and all the same." But that didn't deter him — and his new book is far from an "ordinary" space narrative. In "The Ordinary Spaceman: From Boyhood Dreams to Astronaut" (University of Nebraska Press, 2015), Anderson traces his childhood, career, 15 applications to the astronaut training program and, finally, his training and two flights to space (one of which was a long-duration flight), Anderson covers his daily activities and unusual experiences with detailed and humorous observations. In a recent interview, Space.com caught up with Anderson to hear more about his new memoir, the challenges of being an astronaut and unusual space pastimes.

290-Million-Year-Old Creature Could Sprout New Limbs

If an ancient amphibian lost a limb or a tail, it could simply sprout a new one, according to researchers who found fossil evidence of limb regeneration dating back 290 million years. The finding shows that some Carboniferous and Permian period animals had regenerative abilities a full 80 million years before salamanders, one of the few modern-day animal groups that can fully regenerate their limbs and tail, existed in the fossil record. The fact that other tetrapods — a group comprised of four-legged vertebrates, including amphibians, reptiles, mammals and birds — had regenerative abilities suggests there are multiple ways to regrow limbs, said study lead researcher Nadia Fröbisch, a paleontologist at the Natural History Museum in Berlin.

Google Can Help You Find the Perfect Halloween Costume

Not sure what to be for Halloween? Google may be able to help. A new Google Trends tool shows you what costumes are popular right now in your area and around the country, so you can be sure to wear something more original than, say, a Stormtrooper costume to this weekend's festivities.

DIY Halloween Costumes: 7 Geeky Getups for Any Party

With Halloween less than a week away, science nerds everywhere are scrambling to put the finishing touches on their costumes. A Halloween costume depicting dark matter can pretty much look however you want it to look, because no one knows what dark matter really is. Adorn yourself in these articles of clothing, and then slink around the party, saying mysterious things like, "Are my axions showing?" Also, be sure to do a lot of unpredictable things, like grab people and hold them in one place (explain that dark matter was once believed to be a sort of "glue" that held galaxies in place) and then push them away (explain that astronomers are no longer sure that dark matter actually serves as an anchor for anything).

Dog robot copes with tough terrain

By Jim Drury Swiss researchers have built an electrically actuated, walking, climbing, running four-legged robot that can handle difficult terrain. The 'dog' robot is called StarlETH - its name pronounced 'Starlet' and featuring the acronym for the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH). According to lead researcher Marco Hutter, "it's meant to be a robot that can climb over obstacles, so being very versatile.

Watch This Amazing World View Test Flight for Balloon-Based Space Tourism

Arizona-based World View Enterprises, which aims to loft paying customers to the stratosphere beneath a giant balloon, launched an uncrewed test flight Saturday (Oct. 26). "This test flight is symbolic of a major step towards a new era of accessible space travel for us all," World View CEO and co-founder Jane Poynter said in a statement. Saturday's trial demonstrated that World View's system can lift off gently, successfully transition from balloon floating to aerodynamic parafoil flight at high altitudes, and descend and land smoothly, company representatives said.

New Disk of Young Stars Found in Milky Way

A group of young stars has been caught loitering near the center of the Milky Way galaxy, a region previously thought to be dominated by a more mature population. Astronomers say the stars form a disk (previously unknown to scientists) that passes through the outer part of the dusty, peanut-shaped bulge at the galactic center. The thick forest of dust located at the Milky Way's galactic center is a place where even the bright flame of a burning star can be nearly impossible for astronomers to see.

Spacewalkers prep station for space taxi parking spots

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - Two U.S. astronauts wrapped up nearly seven hours of electrical work and maintenance chores outside the International Space Station on Wednesday, part of an ongoing upgrade to prepare the outpost for new commercial space taxis. Station commander Scott Kelly and flight engineer Kjell Lindgren left the station's airlock around 8:30 a.m. Eastern time (1230 GMT), the first spacewalk for both astronauts. NASA had hoped to have the station outfitted with two new berthing slips before the end of the year so that commercial space taxis under development by Boeing and privately owned Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, would have places to park.

(Sponsor this newsletter)

Delievered to you by Feedamail.
Unsubscribe