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Thursday, December 3, 2015

FeedaMail: Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

Europe's prototype gravity wave detector reset for Thursday launch

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - The launch of a prototype satellite to look for ripples in space and across time is back on track for Thursday following a day's delay to review a potential technical concern with Europe's Vega rocket, officials said on Wednesday. The spacecraft, known as LISA Pathfinder, is scheduled for liftoff at 0404 GMT from the European Space Agency's launch site at Kourou, French Guiana. The rocket is designed to deliver the 1,900 kg (4,200-pound) satellite into an orbit 1.5 million km (930,000 miles ) from Earth.

Cygnus Spacecraft Hauling Science to Space Station on Return-to-Flight Mission

The first launch of the private Cygnus cargo spacecraft since an October 2014 rocket explosion aims to deliver a wealth of science equipment and experiments to the International Space Station. The uncrewed Cygnus, which is built by the aerospace company Orbital ATK, is scheduled to blast off Thursday (Dec. 3) at 5:55 p.m. EST (2255 GMT) atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. You can watch the broadcast of the launch here on Space.com, courtesy of NASA TV.

Modern science detects disease in 400-year-old embalmed hearts

By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - In the ruins of a medieval convent in the French city of Rennes, archaeologists discovered five heart-shaped urns made of lead, each containing an embalmed human heart. It turns out three of them bore tell-tale signs of a heart disease very common today. "Every heart was different and revealed its share of surprises," anthropologist Rozenn Colleter of the French National Institute for Preventive Archaeological Research said on Wednesday.

Modern science detects disease in 400-year-old embalmed hearts

Too early to use gene editing in embryos: scientist

By Julie Steenhuysen WASHINGTON (Reuters) - One of the scientists who discovered powerful tools for altering genes is not convinced the case has been made for using the technology on human sperm, eggs and embryos. "The tools are not ready," biologist Emmanuelle Charpentier said in an interview on Wednesday during a global meeting on the technology. Changes made in the genes of human reproductive cells, known as germline cells, would be passed along to future generations.

Weird prehistoric beast conjures up images of 'Star Wars' queen

By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - What does a strange giraffe-like animal with three horns atop its head and a set of fangs that roamed Europe about 15 million years ago have in common with a pretty young queen from the "Star Wars" movies? Plenty, according to the scientists who on Wednesday announced the discovery in Spain's Cuenca province of beautifully preserved fossils of this creature. They gave it the scientific name Xenokeryx amidalae, meaning "strange horn of Amidala," referring to the "Star Wars" character Queen Amidala, played by actress Natalie Portman. ...

Vega rocket blasts off with gravity-hunting satellite

A Vega rocket bearing a European prototype satellite blasted into space early on Thursday on a mission to search for ripples in space and across time, a phenomenon predicted but never proven by physicist Albert Einstein 100 years ago. The launch lit up the night sky at the launch site in French Guiana, just north of the Equator in South America, before the rocket disappeared into the clouds, the European Space Agency (ESA) said. The trailblazing Laser Interferometer Space Antenna, or LISA, spacecraft will spend about six months testing a technique to detect ripples in space and across time.

Weather satellite startup will launch on Indian rocket

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - A Maryland-based startup developing a satellite network to predict weather using radio signals will launch its first two spacecraft on an Indian rocket, the company said on Thursday. Privately owned PlanetiQ signed a contract with Antrix Corp Limited, the commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organization, to launch the pair of satellites in late 2016. PlanetiQ plans to build and operate a constellation of 12 miniature satellites that monitor GPS and other navigational radio signals passing through Earth's atmosphere.

Ancient Tiny Whale Hunted with Pointy Teeth, Oversize Gums

Before baleen whales developed their iconic bristled filter-feeding structures, they relied on their pointy teeth and a suctioning method to nab and gulp down prey, a new study finds. The findings are based on the fossilized remains of a newfound species of early baleen whale. Paleontologists Jim Goedert and Bruce Crowley, both researchers at the Burke Museum at the University of Washington in Seattle, discovered the fossilized whale off the northern tip of Washington's Olympic Peninsula.

Clever Cuttlefish 'Freeze' Bioelectric Fields to Avoid Predators

Cuttlefish are known for their ability to change colors, but these clever cephalopods have a problem: Sharks, rays and other predators hunt not only by sight, but by sensing the bioelectric fields emanating from their prey. Now, new research reveals that cuttlefish have a solution to this problem: They turn down their natural electric fields by freezing in place and holding their breath. This freeze response has not been studied as extensively as cephalopod color camouflage, or cuttlefish's response of releasing ink and jetting away from danger, said study researcher Christine Bedore, a biologist at Georgia Southern University.

Paleo Campouts Depicted in Cave Etchings

The world's oldest depiction of a campsite may have been unearthed outside a cave in Spain. The findings suggest that the ancient people may have lived in dwellings similar to those of modern-day hunter-gatherers, and could shed light on the lifestyle of these elusive people.

Why So Blue? Tarantula's Cool Color Is Still a Mystery

Known as photonic nanostructures, the itsy-bitsy structures reflect blue light, turning a creepy-crawly arachnid into something resembling an eight-legged Cookie Monster. Scientists have known about the tarantula'slight-scattering hairs for some time, but a recent study took a closer look at the nanostructures that make so many spiders in the family Theraphosidae appear blue. The study found that the blue-reflecting nanostructures are unlikely to have evolved as a result of sexual selection, which is often responsible for the bright colors that distinguish closely related species.

Sir Butterfly! New Species Named for David Attenborough

A rare Amazonian butterfly was recently named for a man who has spent much of his time surrounded by these winged critters (as well as a whole host of other animals): Sir David Attenborough. The butterfly's namesake, Sir David Attenborough, is best known as the narrator and host of many popular nature-themed television series, including the BBC's "Life" and "Planet Earth." He's also president of the United Kingdom's Butterfly Conservation, one of the largest insect conservation organizations in the world. Attenborough's black-eyed satyr stands out from its closest relatives because of its atypical wings, which have a peculiar pattern and shape.

World's first sonic tractor beam

By Jim Drury British researchers have built the world's first sonic tractor beams that lift and move objects using soundwaves. A team from the universities of Bristol and Sussex, in conjunction with Ultrahaptics, a spin-off set up by Sussex Professor of Informatics, Sriram Subramanian, used high-amplitude soundwaves to generate an acoustic hologram that can pick up and move small objects. The device allows the manipulation of small spherical objects in mid-air by individually controlling 64 miniature loudspeakers to generate the acoustic hologram without physical contact.

What Triggered the Big Bang? It's Complicated (Op-Ed)

Paul Sutter is a visiting scholar at The Ohio State University's Center for Cosmology and AstroParticle Physics (CCAPP). We've all heard of the Big Bang theory (I'm talking about the cosmological model, not the TV show), but it's important to understand what that theory is and what it's not. Let me take this opportunity to be precisely, abundantly, emphatically, ridiculously, fantastically clear: The Big Bang theory is not a theory of the creation of the universe.

Orbital heading back to International Space Station on hired rocket

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - A year after its Antares rocket exploded during launch, Orbital ATK is poised to resume cargo runs to the International Space Station, this time using a hired ride from United Launch Alliance, a Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co joint venture. Liftoff of the ULA Atlas 5 rocket is slated for 5:55 p.m. EST (2255 GMT) on Thursday from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. "This is step one in the return-to-flight plan," said Mike Pinkston, Orbital's Antares program manager.

To See Deep into Space, Start Deep Underground (Op-Ed)

Constance Walter is the communications director for the Sanford Underground Research Facility. She explores the stars vicariously through the physics experiments running nearly a mile underground in the former Homestake Gold Mine. She contributed this article to Space.com's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.

Plastics Recycling is Working: Here's Why (Op-Ed)

Steve Alexander is executive director of the Association of Postconsumer Plastic Recyclers, Steve Russell is vice president of the American Chemistry Council's Plastics Division and Steve Sikra is section head for corporate R&D at The Procter & Gamble Company. The authors contributed this article to Live Science's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights. Take plastic bottles: In 2014, U.S. consumers recycled a record high of more than 3 billion pounds of plastic bottles — generating an estimated $730 million in revenue from selling bales of plastic material — and the recycling rate climbed to an all-time high of 32 percent .

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Wednesday, December 2, 2015

FeedaMail: Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

Science News Headlines - Yahoo! News

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'Dinosaur disco' footprints reveal lifestyle of Jurassic giants

By Will Dunham WASHINGTON (Reuters) - On a platform of rock jutting into the Atlantic on Scotland's Isle of Skye, hundreds of newly discovered dinosaur tracks are changing the way scientists view the lifestyle of some of the largest creatures ever to walk the Earth. Scientists on Tuesday said they found the vast collection of Jurassic Period footprints, some reaching 28 inches (70 cm) in diameter, made when dinosaurs called sauropods waded through shallow water in a brackish lagoon 170 million years ago. "There were clearly lots of sauropods moving all around this lagoon.

Diagnosing malaria with a cell phone

By Ben Gruber COLLEGE STATION, TX (Reuters) - New technology that transforms a cell phone into a mobile polarized microscope can diagnose malaria in a Rwandan village with the same level of accuracy as a hi-tech lab in a major Western city, according to Texas A&M University biomedical engineers developing the device. "The way they diagnose malaria now is with a microscope but it is with a big bench top microscope that is relatively complicated to use, takes a trained technician, and you have to have the facility for that scope in a centralized lab somewhere. The device images a blood sample using polarized light that can detect a malaria parasite byproduct called Hemozoin crystals which appear as very bright dots in the image and are an accurate indicator of infection.

Amid Controversy, Japanese Whaling Ships Return to Antarctic Ocean

Japan sent two whaling ships back to Antarctica's Southern Ocean today (Dec. 1) after a one-year hiatus, resuming seasonal whale hunts that have come under increasing scrutiny and censure from the international community. Under a revised whaling plan, Japan proposes to kill 333 minke whales this year for research purposes — significantly fewer than past years' annual kill limit of 935 whales. Japan's Institute of Cetacean Research (ICR), which oversees the country's whaling program, stated on its website that researchers will study the whales' fish consumption and measure their competition with fisheries, creating ecosystem models for managing marine resources.

U.S. bill ends legal quandary over mining rights in space

By Irene Klotz CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (Reuters) - - A new law clears U.S. companies to own what they mine from asteroids and other celestial bodies, ending a legal quandary that had overshadowed technical and financial issues facing the startups, industry officials said on Tuesday. The Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act, signed by President Barack Obama last week, includes provisions that authorize and promote exploration and recovery of space resources by U.S. citizens, although no one can claim ownership of a celestial body. "It's not unlike fishing vessels in international waters," said Bob Richards, chief executive of Moon Express, a lunar transportation and mining company.

Ethicists square off over editing genes in human embryos

By Julie Steenhuysen WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Debate over the use of powerful new gene editing tools in human eggs, sperm and embryos grew heated on Tuesday as scientists and ethicists gathered at an international summit to discuss the technology, which has the power to change the DNA of unborn children. Several groups have already called for restrictions on use of the technology known as CRISPR-Cas9, which has opened up new frontiers in genetic medicine because of its ability to modify genes quickly and efficiently. Hille Haker, chair of Catholic Moral Theology at Loyola University Chicago, argued on Tuesday in favor of a two-year international ban on research that involves changing human reproductive cells, also known as germline cells.

Growing push to expose more students to computer science

Moving her finger over the laptop trackpad, 6-year-old Lauren Meek drags and drops a block of code to build a set of instructions. She clicks the "run" button and watches as the character moves ...

Scientists, ethicists tackle gene editing's ethics, promise

WASHINGTON (AP) — A hot new tool to edit the human genetic code has a big wow factor: the promise of long-sought cures for intractable diseases. But depending on how it's used, that same tool could also alter human heredity.

One for the road: Breakthrough claimed with pot-booze breathalyzer

An Oakland company working with scientists from the University of California at Berkeley is claiming a breakthrough in the race to develop an instant roadside marijuana breathalyzer. Hound Labs Inc, whose device is also uniquely designed to double up as an alcohol breathalyzer, is among a handful of companies and researchers hoping to capitalize on increasingly relaxed marijuana laws in the United States. Hound Labs said on Wednesday it had found an accurate way to measure THC - the psychoactive component in cannabis - within one or two blows.

Global soil loss a rising threat to food production: scientists

By Chris Arsenault TORONTO (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - One third of the world's arable land has been lost to soil erosion or pollution in the last 40 years, and preserving topsoil is crucial for feeding a growing population, scientists said in research published during climate change talks in Paris. It takes about 500 years to generate 2.5 cm (one inch) of topsoil under normal agricultural conditions, and soil loss has accelerated as demand for food rises, biologists from Britain's Sheffield University said in a report published on Wednesday. "Soil is lost rapidly but replaced over millennia, and this represents one of the greatest global threats to agriculture," Sheffield University biology Professor Duncan Cameron said in a statement with the report.

Oh Snap: Trap-Jaw Ants Jump with Their Legs, Too

Trap-jaw ants are known for using their powerful jaws to launch themselves into the air, somersaulting several times their own body length to evade predators. Scientists recently discovered a trap-jaw species that leaps with its legs, a behavior that is extremely rare in ants and previously unknown in the trap-jaw family. Magdalena Sorger of North Carolina State University and author of the study describing this unusual behavior, was collecting trap-jaw ants in Borneo with a field assistant in 2012, when they noticed something "extremely strange," she told Live Science.

Huge Geometric Shapes in Middle East May Be Prehistoric

Thousands of stone structures that form geometric patterns in the Middle East are coming into clearer view, with archaeologists finding two wheel-shaped patterns date back some 8,500 years. And some of these giant designs located in Jordan's Azraq Oasis seem to have an astronomical significance, built to align with the sunrise on the winter solstice.

An Ancient Nessie? Long-Neck Dinos Once Prowled Scottish Lagoon

Hundreds of dinosaur footprints and handprints dating to 170 million years ago adorn the shore on the Isle of Skye, making it the largest dinosaur site ever discovered in Scotland, a new study finds. The discovery proves that dinosaurs — likely long-necked, four-legged, herbivorous sauropods — splashed around Scotland during the Middle Jurassic period, the researchers said. "These footprints were made in a lagoon, which is a pretty interesting environment for dinosaurs," said study lead researcher Steve Brusatte, a paleontologist at the University of Edinburgh.

World's Oldest Peach Pits Reveal Juicy Secrets

The world's oldest peach fossils have been discovered in southwestern China, according to a new report. "If you imagine the smallest commercial peach today, that's what these would look like," Peter Wilf, a professor of paleobotany at Pennsylvania State University, said in a statement. In 2010, Wilf's colleague Tao Su, an associate professor at Xishuangbanna Tropical Botanical Garden in China's Yunnan province, collected eight peach fossils that were exposed during the construction of a new road near the North Terminal Bus Station in Kunming, the capital of the province.

Doctors Could 3D-Print Micro-Organs with New Technique

Gone are the days when 3D printers merely built plastic trinkets — scientists say 3D-printed structures loaded with embryonic stem cells could one day help doctors print out micro-organs for transplant patients. Embryonic stem cells, obtained from human embryos, can develop into any kind of cell in the body, such as brain tissue, heart cells or bone. Scientists typically experiment with embryonic stem cells by dosing them with biological cues that guide them toward developing into specific tissue types — a process called differentiation.

Safe Sleeping Is Just 1 Part of Preventing SIDS

A safe sleeping environment is crucial for preventing sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), but it is not the only factor that determines the risk of the syndrome in babies, according to a new study. The rates of SIDS in the United States have decreased dramatically since 1992, when the American Academy of Pediatrics first recommended placing babies on their backs to sleep, instead of on their tummies, and since the importance of reducing suffocation hazards, such as soft bedding in cribs, has been recognized, the researchers said. "I work with a lot of parents whose children have died from SIDS, and the general climate is one where, because of the success of controlling the sleep environment, the parents often feel that they are responsible for the deaths of their children," said study author Dr. Richard Goldstein, of Dana-Farber/Boston Children's Cancer and Blood Disorders Center.

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