Tag: Science & Technology

Insignificant in visible light, halo stars are big in the infrared background.

When the known galaxies and stars in the right panel are subtracted, what remains is the cosmic infrared background shown at left. Astronomers have determined much of this haze is from stars in the dark matter halos of early galaxies. The search for the earliest galaxies in the Universe is ongoing.

Since these galaxies are far removed from us in time, they are very faint and very red-shifted, making it hard to determine how many there were and where they were distributed. To find these galaxies, some astronomers are looking at the Universe’s infrared background across large patches of the sky. Fluctuations in the temperature of this infrared background are likely indicators of the first galaxies, which heated and ionized much of the gas in the Universe.

A new observation using data from the Spitzer infrared space telescope has found the expected signature of distant, faint galaxies. However, the magnitude of the fluctuations was surprisingly high: these early galaxies appeared bigger and brighter than expected from theory and observations at other wavelengths. In a new Nature paper, Asantha Cooray and colleagues suggest that much of this infrared radiation came from stars in the galactic halos, which were thought to be mostly dark matter. Typical galaxies such as the Milky Way have two basic parts: the luminous portion (which is what we usually think of as the galaxy), and a dark matter halo that envelops it and contains most of the mass. Even though most of a galaxy’s stars are in the luminous portion, the halo does contain a substantial number of stars, although they’re at a much lower density. Recent studies have shown that halo stars contribute more to the total light profile of a galaxy than we previously thought.

The mass of the dark matter halos is thought to have been instrumental in drawing atoms into the first galaxies, a process that left its mark on the early Universe. The first stable atoms formed around 400,000 years after the Big Bang. As electrons joined with protons, they emitted light we now see as the cosmic microwave background. When the first stars and galaxies formed, however, their intense radiation stripped electrons from atoms again, an event known as reionization. According to theory, that is: while the ionized gas has been seen, the stars that drove it are distant and hard to observe. However, the earliest stars and galaxies should contribute to the total infrared glow of the Universe, known as the cosmic near-infrared background (CNIB).

(“Nearinfrared” refers to wavelengths closest to visible light in the electromagnetic spectrum; in this case, the study was in the 1 to 5 micron range.) Much of the haze in the CNIB is from the Milky Way and known galaxies, but a significant portion is not associated with any obvious sources.

Astronomers have postulated it must originate in either to dwarf galaxies (which are too small to be seen at significant distances) or faint galaxies from the early Universe. Until the current study, no survey of the CNIB had sufficient resolution to distinguish between small (but relatively close) galaxies and the first to form in the Universe. The researchers decisively determined the overabundance of infrared emission was originating from an area that is too large to be dwarf galaxies.

LONDON (TIP): Nasa’s Curiosity rover on Mars is apparently littering on the Red planet. Pictures beamed back by the rover show a bright object lying in the Martian dirt, and a closer look suggests the object is a piece of plastic wrapper that has fallen from the robot. The discovery has put a twist on the rover’s current mission to scrub out its soil scoop and take its first sample of Martian dirt for analysis, the ‘New Scientist’ reported. However, more bright specks of unidentified matter in the soil – at first thought to be from Curiosity shedding – may actually be Martian in origin, although what they are is a mystery. Curiosity had been in the midst of preparing to feed soil into its Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) instrument, which bounces thin beams of X-rays off a sample to read its mineral composition. This involved taking scoopfuls of soil, shaking them vigorously and then dumping them back out, to be sure that any lingering traces of Earthly particles didn’t make it into the science equipment. After the first scoop-and-shake revealed the unexpected object, Curiosity took a quick break to examine the find. It then got back on course, taking a second scoop of soil on October 12.

LONDON (TIP): Astronomers have discovered a new intriguing exoplanet about the mass of the Earth, orbiting a star in the Alpha Centauri star system – the nearest to our planet. It is also the lightest exoplanet ever found around a star like the Sun. The planet was detected using the HARPS instrument on the 3.6-metre telescope at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile.

Alpha Centauri is one of the brightest stars in the southern skies and is the nearest stellar system to our Solar System – only 4.3 light-years away. It is actually a triple star – a system consisting of two stars similar to the Sun orbiting close to each other, designated Alpha Centauri A and B . “Our observations extended over more than four years using the HARPS instrument and have revealed a tiny, but real, signal from a planet orbiting Alpha Centauri B every 3.2 days,” says Xavier Dumusque, lead author of the paper.

“It’s an extraordinary discovery and it has pushed our technique to the limit,” Dumusque said. The European team detected the planet by picking up the tiny wobbles in the motion of the star Alpha Centauri B created by the gravitational pull of the orbiting planet. Alpha Centauri B is very similar to the Sun but slightly smaller and less bright. The newly discovered planet, with a mass of a little more than that of the Earth, is orbiting about six million kilometres away from the star. The first exoplanet around a Sun-like star was found by the same team back in 1995 and since then there have been more than 800 confirmed discoveries, but most are much bigger than the Earth, and many are as big as Jupiter.

WASHINGTON (TIP): A new research by UC Davis researchers has discovered that the key chemical process that corrects for potential visual errors in low-light conditions. Understanding this fundamental step could lead to new treatments for visual deficits, or might one day boost normal night vision to new levels. Like the mirror of a telescope pointed toward the night sky, the eye’s rod cells capture the energy of photons – the individual particles that make up light. The interaction triggers a series of chemical signals that ultimately translate the photons into the light we see. The key light receptor in rod cells is a protein called rhodopsin. Each rod cell has about 100 million rhodopsin receptors, and each one can detect a single photon at a time. Scientists had thought that the strength of rhodopsin’s signal determines how well we see in dim light. But UC Davis scientists have found instead that a second step acts as a gatekeeper to correct for rhodopsin errors. The result is a more accurate reading of light under dim conditions. Individual rhodopsin errors are relatively small in magnitude – on the order of a few hundredths of a second – but even this much biological noise can affect how well the signal gets transmitted to the rest of the brain, the researchers said. The gatekeeper protects us from “seeing” more light than is actually there – a misreading that would have endangered an ice-age hunter, as it would a driver at dusk today. The correction may prevent the photon receptor from swamping the intricate chemical apparatus that leads to accurate light perception. “The rhodopsin receptor is the site where physics meets biology – where a photon of light from the physical world must get interpreted for the nervous system,” explained Marie Burns, professor of ophthalmology and vision science at UC Davis School of Medicine and lead author of the study. “Biology is messy. Rhodopsin does a remarkable but not perfect job,” she stated. Burns and her colleagues studied rod cells in the laboratory and discovered that calcium plays the gatekeeper role. They found that rhodopsin activity changed calcium levels in the cells and that over-active rhodopsins changed calcium levels at a faster rate than normal. This faster change led calcium to trigger a series of chemical steps to counter the over-active rhodopsin signal by producing an equal and opposite signal, thereby correcting false information before it gets sent on to the rest of the visual system. They uncovered this fundamental new level of control by measuring how long individual rhodopsin receptors remained active in response to flashes of light, and then determining how much calcium’s gatekeeping function modified the rhodopsin signals. “Basic research like ours often doesn’t translate to immediate clinical treatments for known diseases, but understanding fundamental processes has long-term significance,” Burns said. “In the case of our research, this understanding can prove essential for progress on a range of vision deficits that are currently poorly understood and untreatable,” she added. HARVARD SCIENTISTS SUGGEST MOON MADE FROM EARTH Anew theory put forward by Harvard scientists suggests the moon was once part of the earth that spun off after a giant collision with another body. In a paper published on Wednesday in the journal Science, Sarah Stewart and Matija uk said their theory would explain why the earth and moon have similar composition and chemistry.

The earth was spinning much faster at the time the Moon was formed, and a day lasted only two to three hours, they said. With the Earth spinning so quickly, a giant impact could have launched enough of the Earth’s material to form a moon, the scientists said in an explanation published on a Harvard website. www.fas.harvard.edu/~planets /sstewart/Moon.html According to the new theory, the Earth later reached its current rate of spinning through gravitational interaction between its orbit around the Sun and the Moon’s orbit around Earth.

The scientists noted that their proposition differed from the current leading theory, which holds that the Moon was created from material from a giant body that struck the Earth. Stewart is a professor of earth and planetary sciences at Harvard, and UK, an astronomer and an investigator at the SETI Institute, which supports research into the search for extraterrestrial life. The latter was conducting post-doctoral research at Harvard. LONDON (TIP): Nasa’s Curiosity rover on Mars is apparently littering on the Red planet.

Pictures beamed back by the rover show a bright object lying in the Martian dirt, and a closer look suggests the object is a piece of plastic wrapper that has fallen from the robot.

The discovery has put a twist on the rover’s current mission to scrub out its soil scoop and take its first sample of Martian dirt for analysis, the ‘New Scientist’ reported. However, more bright specks of unidentified matter in the soil – at first thought to be from Curiosity shedding – may actually be Martian in origin, although what they are is a mystery.

Curiosity had been in the midst of preparing to feed soil into its Chemistry and Mineralogy (CheMin) instrument, which bounces thin beams of X-rays off a sample to read its mineral composition. This involved taking scoopfuls of soil, shaking them vigorously and then dumping them back out, to be sure that any lingering traces of Earthly particles didn’t make it into the science equipment. After the first scoop-and-shake revealed the unexpected object, Curiosity took a quick break to examine the find. It then got back on course, taking a second scoop of soil on October 12. Is Curiosity littering plastic on red planet

Anew theory put forward by Harvard scientists suggests the moon was once part of the earth that spun off after a giant collision with another body. In a paper published on Wednesday in the journal Science, Sarah Stewart and Matija uk said their theory would explain why the earth and moon have similar composition and chemistry. The earth was spinning much faster at the time the Moon was formed, and a day lasted only two to three hours, they said. With the Earth spinning so quickly, a giant impact could have launched enough of the Earth’s material to form a moon, the scientists said in an explanation published on a Harvard website. www.fas.harvard.edu/~planets /sstewart/Moon.html According to the new theory, the Earth later reached its current rate of spinning through gravitational interaction between its orbit around the Sun and the Moon’s orbit around Earth.The scientists noted that their proposition differed from the current leading theory, which holds that the Moon was created from material from a giant body that struck the Earth. Stewart is a professor of earth and planetary sciences at Harvard, and UK, an astronomer and an investigator at the SETI Institute, which supports research into the search for extraterrestrial life. The latter was conducting post-doctoral research at Harvard.

WASHINGTON (TIP): NASA’s Curiosity rover has spotted a bright object in the red soil of Mars which could have a possible impact on its sampling activity. The object was spotted just as Curiosity was using its scoop to pick up Martian soil from a sandy site known as “Rocknest”. “The rover team decided to refrain from using the rover’s robotic arm on Oct 8 due to the detection of a bright object on the ground that might be a piece from the rover,” NASA said in a statement. The best hypothesis till now is that it’s a bit of plastic that fell off the rover, ‘NBC News.com’ reported.

The plan was to shovel and shake the light soil to clear out the sample collection system mounted on the end of Curiosity’s 7-foot-long robotic arm. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) reported that Curiosity’s team refrained from using the robotic arm in order to check out the weird object. “Curiosity is acquiring additional imaging of the object to aid the team in identifying the object and assessing possible impact, if any, to sampling activities,” JPL said in its mission status report. “These cases have generally been explained as bits of fabric or metal left behind by the rover, and it seems likely that the same will be said of Curiosity’s “cigarette butt,” said Sarah Milkovich, a member of the Curiosity team. Such debris is harmless — but if even a bit of it happened to get into the rover’s sensitive chemistry labs, that could ruin the scientific readings, the report said.

LONDON (TIP): Cambridge researchers, led by an Indian-origin scientist, have discovered a new population of enormous, rapidly growing super-massive black holes ever seen in the early Universe.

The black holes were previously undetected because they sit cocooned within thick layers of dust. The new study that used cuttingedge infrared surveys of the sky has shown that they are emitting vast amounts of radiation through violent interactions with their host galaxies. The study findings are published in the journal of the Royal Astronomical Society.

The most extreme object in the study is a super-massive black hole called ULASJ1234+0907.

This object, located in the direction of the constellation of Virgo, is so far away that the light from it has taken 11 billion years to reach Earth, so we see it as it appeared in the early Universe.

The monster black hole has more than 10 billion times the mass of the Sun and 10,000 times the mass of the super-massive black hole in our own Milky Way, making it one of the most massive ever seen. The research indicates that that there may be as many as 400 such giant black holes in the part of the universe that we can observe.

“These results could have a significant impact on studies of supermassive black holes” said Dr Manda Banerji, lead author of the paper. “Most black holes of this kind are seen through the matter they drag in. As the neighboring material spirals in towards the black holes, it heats up. Astronomers are able to see this radiation and observe these systems,” she said in a statement. “Although these black holes have been studied for some time, the new results indicate that some of the most massive ones may have so far been hidden from our view,” said Banerji.

The newly discovered black holes, devouring the equivalent of several hundred Suns every year, will shed light on the physical processes governing the growth of all supermassive black holes. Super-massive black holes are now known to reside at the centres of all galaxies. In the most massive galaxies in the Universe, they are predicted to grow through violent collisions with other galaxies, which trigger the formation of stars and provides food for the black holes to devour. The team from Cambridge used infrared surveys being carried out on the UK Infrared Telescope (UKIRT) to peer through the dust and locate the giant black holes for the first time.

LONDON (TIP): Researchers have discovered that the common ancestor of modern mammals was like a small monkey in size and not tiny and shrew-like as previously thought. Fossils indicate that some larger mammals shared the dinosaurs’ world, but palaeontologists believe they all disappeared at the same time as the giant reptiles. Only tiny mammals survived, giving rise to all modern forms. Nicolas Galtier of the Institute of Evolutionary Sciences in Montpellier, France with colleagues in a genetic analysis found that the common ancestor of mammals thought to be puny like a small mouse and living unobtrusively in the shadow of dinosaurs was in fact the size of a small monkey.

Researchers used common features in the genomes of 36 modern mammals to sketch out the genome of the creature from which they descended, the New Scientist reported. Reconstructing the detailed genome is impossible, but Galtier managed to recover two of its properties.

HOUSTON (TIP): Indian-American astronaut Sunita Williams will soon enjoy delicious ‘chocolate-vanilla swirl’ on board International Space Station (ISS) after Nasa’s first contracted commercial cargo capsule was rocketed into orbit to resupply the orbiting laboratory.

SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, a commercial cargo ship, was blasted off into orbit late on Sunday, kicking off a new era of commercial resupply flights intended to restore supply chain that was crippled following the shuttle’s retirement.

The spacecraft is now chasing the International Space Station and will arrive on Wednesday morning. The cargo ship has been loaded with 450 kgs of key science experiments crew supplies – including ice cream treats and other precious gear. There was also a personal touch: chocolate-vanilla swirl ice cream tucked in a freezer for the three station residents.

The space station’s three-person crew watched SpaceX’s smooth Dragon launch live via a video feed beamed up by flight controllers. At the time of launch, the station was sailing 362 miles above Tasmania, Nasa officials said. “We are ready to grab Dragon!” the station’s commander, Sunita Williams, radioed down to mission control at Nasa’s Johnson Space Centre in Houston along with congratulations for the SpaceX team.

Though this isn’t SpaceX’s first foray to the station, it’s the first commercial resupply trip under the Commercial Resupply Services agreement between SpaceX and Nasa, announced back in 2008.

The current mission, CRS-1, is the first of 12 such expeditions specified under that contract. Which also means, as Nasa space station director Sam Scimemi put it, “a new era for spaceflight and the International Space Station.” Flights like this one, Scimemi pointed out, “are critical to the space station’s sustainment and to help begin its full utilization.” They are our newest space shuttles. “We’re very excited,” SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell told reporters. “This is the first time we are taking powered cargo up. We are taking up a GLACIER freezer, which has refrigerated science samples in it.” The mission is the first of a dozen supply flights for which Nasa is paying SpaceX $1.6 billion to fly. The brand of ice cream flying in the Dragon’s GLACIER is Blue Bell Creameries.

MELBOURNE (TIP): In an unexpected finding, astronomers have discovered two dense black holes inside an ancient cluster of stars in the Milky Way. The two black holes in the globular cluster M22 are about 10 to 20 times heavier than Sun. Black holes, so dense that even light can’t escape them, are what is left when a massive star reaches the end of its life and collapses in on itself. James Miller-Jones , from the Curtin University node of the International Center for Radio Astronomy Research ( ICRAR), said the discovery of two black holes in the same cluster was a complete surprise.

All the theory up to now says that should not happen in a globular cluster that is 12 billion years old. The black holes, according to Miller-Jones , are the first to be found in a globular cluster in our galaxy. M22 is about 10,000 lightyears from Earth but can be seen clearly with a backyard telescope . “M22 may contain as many as 100 black holes but we can’t detect them unless they’re actively feeding on nearby stars,” he said.

WASHINGTON (TIP): Nasa has made the most precise measurement yet of the Hubble constant, the rate at which our universe is expanding. The Hubble constant is named after the astronomer Edwin P Hubble, who astonished the world in the 1920s by confirming our universe has been expanding since it exploded into being 13.7 billion years ago. In the late 1990s, astronomers discovered the expansion is accelerating , or speeding up over time.

Determining the expansion rate is critical for understanding the age and size of the universe, Nasa said. Nasa’s Spitzer Telescope took advantage of longwavelength infrared light to make its new measurement. “Spitzer is yet again doing science beyond what it was designed to do,” said project scientist Michael Werner at Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. Werner has worked on the mission since its early concept phase more than 30 years ago. “First, Spitzer surprised us with its pioneering ability to study exoplanet atmospheres,” said Werner, “and now, in the mission’s later years, it has become a valuable cosmology tool,” said Werner.

Dark energy is thought to be winning a battle against gravity, pulling the fabric of the universe apart, researchers said. “This is a huge puzzle,” said lead author Wendy Freedman of the Observatories of the Carnegie Institution for Science in Pasadena. “It’s exciting that we were able to use Spitzer to tackle fundamental problems in cosmology.”

LONDON (TIP): Researchers have developed a new ‘storm-proof ‘ unflappable umbrella which they say can withstand storms as strong as blowing at 113 kph. Unlike traditional umbrellas that turn inside out by gusts of only 20 kph, this ‘cycle helmet’ style broll is unflappable on stormiest of days, thanks to the aerodynamic design which directs wind over and around, holding it in position.

Tapered at the back, rather like a cyclist’s racing helmet, it is said to be able to withstand winds of up to 113 kph, the ‘Daily Mail’ reported. The asymmetrical Senz design is also easier to hold upright, helping its carriers appear unflappable on the stormiest of days. A Dutch study that carried the tests inside a wind tunnel found that people were unable to hold a normal umbrella in galeforce winds, however, they did not struggle with the Senz design.

WASHINGTON (TIP): Scientists have discovered a bacteria that has the ability to withstand incredible amounts of toxicity and can be the key to creating 24-carat gold. Researchers from the Michigan State University have found that the metal-tolerant bacteria ‘Cupriavidus metallidurans’ can grow on massive concentrations of gold chloride or liquid gold, a toxic chemical compound found in nature. The researchers fed the bacteria unprecedented amounts of gold chloride, mimicking the process they believe happens in nature. In about a week, the bacteria transformed the toxins and produced a gold nugget. “Microbial alchemy is what we’re doing — transforming gold from something that has no value into a solid, precious metal that’s valuable ,” said Kazem Kashefi, assistant professor of microbiology and molecular genetics in a statement. In their art installation, “The Great Work of the Metal Lover”, researchers used a combination of biotechnology, art and alchemy to turn liquid gold into 24-carat gold. The artwork contained a portable laboratory made of 24-carat goldplated hardware, a glass bioreactor and the bacteria, a combination that produces gold.

The work has been put on display at the cyber art competition, Prix Ars Electronica, in Austria. Don’t get up hopes that the procedure could make gold mines out of toxic waste dumps, though. The process would be costprohibitive on a larger scale, said Adam Brown, associate professor of electronic art and intermedia at MSU. However, Brown added, the experiment’s success does raise questions about greed, the economy, environmental impacts and ethics as related to science and the engineering of nature.

LONDON (TIP): French scientists have discovered that venom from one of the world’s deadliest snakes, Black Mamba can be used to make a painkiller as powerful as morphine, but without most of the side-effects.

Researchers from the Institute of Molecular and Cellular Pharmacology looked at venom from 50 species before they found the Black Mamba’s pain-killing proteins – called mambalgins, the BBC News reported.

The predator uses neurotoxins to paralyse and kill small animals and is one of the fastest and most dangerous snakes in Africa. Tests on mice showed its venom also contained a potent painkiller. “When it was tested in mice, the analgesia was as strong as morphine, but you don’t have most of the sideeffects,” researcher Dr Eric Lingueglia, said.

Tests on human cells in the laboratory have also showed the mambalgins have similar chemical effects in people. Morphine acts on the opioid pathway in the brain.

It can cut pain, but it is also addictive and causes headaches, difficulty thinking, vomiting and muscle twitching. The researchers said mambalgins tackle pain through a completely different route, which should produce few side-effects.

LONDON (TIP): The brainchild of an India-born chef for top cyclists, a new ‘life saver’ bike helmet that connects with your phone and alerts emergency services in case of an accident is set to hit the markets soon. The potentially life-saving smart phone app, which can detect a crash and then alert the emergency services, has been designed for bike riders.

The clever application pairs through Bluetooth with a motion detector which is attached to the rider’s helmet and senses the crash. The invention has been created by Oklahoma-based software company ICEdot in the US.

The detector, named the ICEdot Crash Sensor, can even evaluate the severity of the crash depending on the force of the rider’s fall, the Daily Mail reported. Chris Zenthoefer, ICEdot’s CEO, said: “The idea came from Biju Thomas, a prominent chef for a lot of top cyclists.

He was on a solo ride and crashed and thought if the crash had been any worse, nobody would have know where he was located.” “We were then introduced and it became clear that the pairing of his idea with ICEdot existing technology were a perfect match,” Zenthoefer said.

Following an accident the app will prompt the phone to sound an alarm and a countdown, which can be set to between 15 and 60 seconds, is initiated. If the alarm is not deactivated the app will contact an SOS service and relay vital information. Using GPS coordinates the device can reveal the user’s location and the severity of their condition.

What’s more, it can even pass on crucial medical details, for example if the user has diabetes or any allergies.
If the fall is not critical, the crash victim can simply cease the countdown on their phone and cancel the process. The cost of the motion sensor device, the smart phone app and a one year membership to the ICEdot service is estimated to be about 120 pounds. The device should be on the market in April next year.

WASHINGTON (TIP): Scientists have proposed to build the first ever 4-D space-time crystal clock that they claim will keep accurate time forever, even after the heat-death of the universe.

This is the “wow” factor behind a device known as a “space-time crystal,” a four-dimensional crystal that has periodic structure in time as well as space, scientists said.

Researcher Xiang Zhang from Berkeley Lab’s Materials Sciences Division, who led this research, and his group, have come up with an experimental design to build a crystal that is discrete both in space and time – a space-time crystal.

However, there are also practical and important reasons for constructing a space-time crystal.

CHICAGO (TIP): The brain that revolutionized physics now can be downloaded as an app for $9.99. But it won’t help you win at Angry Birds. While Albert Einstein’s genius isn’t included, an exclusive iPad application launched on Tuesday promises to make detailed images of his brain more accessible to scientists than ever before. Teachers, students and anyone who’s curious also can get a look.

A medical museum under development in Chicago obtained funding to scan and digitize nearly 350 fragile and priceless slides made from slices of Einstein’s brain after his death in 1955.

The application will allow researchers and novices to peer into the eccentric Nobel winner’s brain as if they were looking through a microscope. “I can’t wait to find out what they’ll discover,” said Steve Landers, a consultant for the National Museum of Health and Medicine Chicago who designed the app. “I’d like to think Einstein would have been excited.” After Einstein died, a pathologist named Thomas Harvey performed an autopsy, removing the great man’s brain in hopes that future researchers could discover the secrets behind his genius.

LONDON (TIP): Male sex hormones may be responsible for shortening the lives of men as compared to women, a new study has claimed. Researchers in Korea found that eunuchs – castrated men living centuries ago – outlived others by a significant margin due to absence of such hormones. The evidence comes after careful study of genealogy records of noble members of the Imperial court of the Korean Chosun dynasty (AD 1392- 1910), the ‘Daily Mail’ reported. “This discovery adds an important clue for understanding why there is a difference in the expected life span between men and women,” Kyung-Jin Min, of Inha University, said. By poring over records, Min and his colleague Cheol-Koo Lee, of Korea University, found that eunuchs lived 14 to 19 years longer than other men did.

Amongst the 81 eunuchs they studied, three lived to the ripe old age of 100 or more, a feat of longevity that remains relatively rare even in developed countries today. They noted the incidence of centenarians among Korean eunuchs is at least 130 times greater than it is in developed countries, and that can’t be explained simply by the benefits of life in the palace, either.

LONDON (TIP): Bacteria fed on whiskey “leftovers” can now be used to fuel vehicles. A Scottish company has signed a ‘first of its kind deal’ in the world to turn by-products from its distillery into fuel for cars. The Tullibardine distillery in Perthshire has linked up with a spin-out company from Napier University in Edinburgh, as they plan to use bacteria to feed on the “leftovers” from the whiskey making process. This will produce butanol which can be used to fuel vehicles, the ‘BBC News’ reported. More than 90% of the stuff that comes out of a whiskey distillery is not just whiskey, but leftovers like draff and pot ales – both are produced in the early stages of the process.

They are high in sugar and are currently used for things like fertilizer and cattle feed. Napier University’s Biofuel Research Centre (BfRC) has already shown that the bacteria can feed on whiskey byproducts to produce butanol – a direct replacement for vehicle fuel. Now the spin-out company, Celtic Renewables, and independent malt whiskey producer Tullibardine have signed a memorandum of understanding. They intend to apply the process to thousands of tonnes of the distillery’s leftovers.

HOUSTON (TIP): Indian-American astronaut Sunita Williams set yet another record as she completed a triathlon in space by running, biking and ‘swimming’ along with athletes during the Nautica Malibu Triathlon held in Southern California over the weekend.”A big shout out to our astronaut strength and conditioning folks, who were really interested in this and who got this whole workout together, “Williams said, thanking those who trained her before her launch.

Williams, who is the US commander of the Expedition 33 crew aboard the space station, used exercise equipment that included a stationary bike, treadmill and strength-training machine specially formulated for weightlessness to simulate triathlon experience in space.

After ‘swimming’ 0.8km, biking28.9km, and running 6.4km, Williams finished with a time of one hour, 48minutes and 33 seconds, she reported. To simulate the swimming portion of the race, Williams used the Advanced Resistive Exercise Device to do weightlifting and resistance exercises that approximate swimming in micro-gravity.

Exercise is mandatory for all astronauts, because without it space flyers’ muscles and bones would deteriorate in weightlessness.

LONDON (TIP): Arctic sea ice may completely collapse within four years due to global warming, one of the world’s leading ice experts has warned. As the sea area freezes and melts each year, shrinking to its lowest extent ever recorded, professor Peter Wad hams of Cambridge University called it a “global disaster” now unfolding in northern latitudes, the Guardian reported. Wad hams He predicted the imminent break-up of sea ice in summer of 2007, when the previous lowest extent of 4.17 million square kilometers was set. This year, it has plunged a further 5,00,000 sq km to less than 3.5 m sq km.”The main cause is simply global warming: as the climate has warmed there has been less ice growth during the winter and more ice melt during the summer,” he said.”At first this didn’t [get] noticed; the summer ice limits slowly shrank back, at a rate which suggested that the ice would last another 50 years or so. But in the end the summer melt overtook the winter growth,” Wad hams said.”This collapse, I predicted would occur in 2015-16 at which time the summer Arctic (August to September) would become ice-free.”

LONDON (TIP): Engineers have developed a gen-next bike which can adjust the seat, depending on whether the rider is going uphill, downhill, or simply on even terrain.

The Cycling Sports Group has begun demonstrating its prototype bike at exhibitions, displaying the innovative “cockpit” that can glide back and forth without the need to make your own adjustments, the Daily Mail reported.

That means if you are going uphill, the cockpit moves backgrounds and places the rider into a more upright position, the report said.

On the other hand, if you are heading downhill, the seat will move you forward and into a lower position to give you more speed and control, it added.

The small but vital adjustments mean a rider can just keep going – and will not need different bikes for different purposes.

The cockpit moves according to a small lever by the handles, and is without the traditional fork and chains of modern bikes.

The concept was suggested by bike design firm Cannondale, which turned to a company called Priority Designs to create the working model. “Turning a sexy concept illustration into a working prototype is a tall order,” Cannondale said.

“It would require creative engineering, design sensitivity and serious fabrication capabilities. Priority Designs had all of those, along with the passion to sweat every detail … and get it done in time for Augusts’ EUROBIKE show,” they said. The bike features a dynamically adjustable headset that moves both fore-and-aft and up-and-down, engineers said.

LONDON (TIP): Engineers are developing a new technology which would allow you to ‘smack’ the screen of your mobile and silence its ringing.

Software giant Microsoft has patented the idea, suggesting it will find its way onto Windows Mobile phones soon.
The ‘whack-based audio control module’ sits at the centre of the phone, and awaits a suitable ‘whack’, to tell it to be quiet, the Daily Mail reported.

Microsoft’s method is that, when your phone rings, it will turn on the ‘accelerometer’, which tells the phone which direction it is pointing in and can spot sudden movements.

“There are a variety of circumstances under which it may be desirable to quickly control a device without having to interact with a traditional user interface,” Microsoft was quoted by the paper as stating in the patent. “For example, often mobile device users forget to set their mobile devices in a silent or vibrate mode and the device rings or makes sounds at an inopportune moment,” it added.

The feature can been used if someone’s phone starts ringing during a big presentation or the final part of the wedding vows, instead of scrambling for the ‘off’ switch or the volume button, one can simply smack the screen and silence the phone.

Microsoft said the whack could silence ringtones, an accidental button-press, which turns the music on, an alarm or a text message sound.

WASHINGTON (TIP): Scientists have found the clearest evidence yet of carbon dioxide snowfalls on Mars, based on the data provided by Nasa’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. This reveals the only known example of carbon dioxide snow falling anywhere in our solar system, Nasa said. Frozen carbon dioxide, known as “dry ice,” requires temperatures of about -125 °C, which is much colder than needed for freezing water.

“These are the first definitive detections of carbon dioxide snow clouds,” said the report’s lead author, Paul Hayne of Nasa’s jet propulsion laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California. Carbon dioxide snow reminds scientists that although some parts of Mars may look quite Earth-like, the Red Planet is very different.

“We firmly establish the clouds are composed of carbon dioxide – flakes of Martian air – and they are thick enough to result in snowfall accumulation at the surface,” Hayne said. Nasa described that as the only known example of carbon dioxide snow falling in our solar system. The snowfalls occurred from clouds around the Red Planet’s south pole in winter.

“One line of evidence for snow is that the carbon dioxide ice particles in the clouds are large enough to fall to the ground during the lifespan of the clouds,” co-author David Kass of JPL said. Just how the carbon dioxide from Mars’ atmosphere gets deposited has been in question, Nasa said

LONDON (TIP): There could be many more habitable planets in the universe than previously thought, suggest new computer models. It is believed that for water to exist in its life-giving liquid form, a planet had to be at the right distance from its sun – in the habitable zone. But a new model allows scientists to identify planets with underground water kept liquid by planetary heat, the BBC reported.

“It’s the idea of a range of distances from a star within which the surface of an Earth-like planet is not too hot or too cold for water to be liquid,” explained Sean McMahon, the PhD student from Aberdeen University who is carrying out the work. “So traditionally people have said that if a planet is in this Goldilocks zone – not too hot and not too cold – then it can have liquid water on its surface and be a habitable planet,” he stated. But researchers are starting to think that the Goldilocks theory is far too simple.

Planets can receive two sources of heat – heat direct from the star and heat generated deep inside the planet. As you descend through the crust of the Earth, the temperature gets higher and higher. Even when the surface is frozen, water can exist below ground. Prof John Parnell, also from Aberdeen University, who is leading the study, noted: “There is a significant habitat for microorganisms below the surface of the Earth, extending down several kilometres. And some workers believe that the bulk of life on Earth could even reside in this deep biosphere.”

So the Aberdeen team are developing models to predict which far-flung planets might harbour underground reservoirs of liquid water with the possibility of alien life. Explaining their rationale, McMahon said: “If you take into account the possibility of deep biospheres, then you have a problem reconciling that with the idea of a narrow habitable zone defined only by conditions at the surface.” As you move away from the star the amount of heat a planet receives from the star decreases and the surface water freezes – but any water held deep inside will stay liquid if the internal heat is high enough – and that water could support life. Even a planet so far from the star that it receives almost no solar heat could still maintain underground liquid water. So McMahon suggested, “There will be several times more [habitable] planets”.