Tag: science

A new superconducting detector might supersede CCDs for astronomy

11:27 am

Good news: A new superconducting detector might supersede CCDs for large astronomical telescopes.

Ben Mazin, an astronomer at the University of California, Santa Barbara, believes that he is on the cusp of a camera breakthrough: his lab is working on a superconducting detector that could eventually replace the charge-coupled devices (CCDs) that have become de rigueur in both consumer and astronomical digital cameras. Mazin’s detectors, known as microwave kinetic inductance detectors (MKIDs), can simultaneously count photons, measure their energy and record each one’s time of arrival — something that CCDs can do only after the light is split with a prism or a grating, an extra step that adds to the loss of photons.

And you know that inevitably some variation of this technology is going to find its way into ordinary commercial products.

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It doesn’t exist

10:08 am

Fomalhaut b

In a preprint paper published today on the Los Alamos astro-ph website, astronomers have concluded that the exoplanet orbiting the star Formalhaut might not exist. This planet, the first exoplanet ever thought to be directly imaged in visible light, was first described in a paper published in 2008, and was actually tracked in its orbit over several years, as shown in the image on the right.

The new research used the Spitzer Space Telescope to see if the planet’s heat could be detected in infrared wavelengths. Unfortunately, the scientists found nothing.
» Read more

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A 33,000-year-old dog skull found in a Siberian cave, when compared with other ancient dog remains found in a Belgium cave, suggest to scientists that the domestication of dogs took place separately in many different places.

10:27 pm

A 33,000-year-old dog skull found in a Siberian cave, when compared with other ancient dog remains found in a Belgium cave, suggest to scientists that the domestication of dogs took place separately in many different places.

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The biggest solar storm to be aimed at the Earth in seven years is expected to reach us by Tuesday.

1:57 pm

The biggest coronal mass ejection to be aimed at the Earth in seven years is expected to reach us by Tuesday.

No need to panic. Not only is the storm still relatively mild compared to past eruptions, the airline and electrical industries are actually well prepared for this event. However, if you want to see the aurora, this will probably be a good opportunity.

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A group of researchers have failed to reproduce the earlier NASA result that suggested arsenic-based life was possible.

4:02 pm

A group of researchers have failed to reproduce the earlier NASA result that suggested arsenic-based life was possible.

One interesting aspect of this story is that the research results were discussed openly, with regular updates as the work was on-going, on one of the scientists blogs.

Redfield and her collaborators hope to submit their work to Science by the end of the month. She says that if Science refuses to publish the work because it has been discussed on blogs, it will become an important test case for open science.

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Scientists have agreed to a sixty day voluntary pause in their research into the transmissibility of avian influenza, commonly called bird flu.

11:01 am

In a letter published jointly [pdf] in Science and Nature today, the researchers who have discovered how to easily transmit avian influenza — commonly called bird flu — have agreed to a sixty day voluntary pause in their research.

Despite the positive public health benefits these studies sought to provide, a perceived fear that the ferret-transmissible H5 HA viruses may escape from the laboratories has generated intense public debate in the media on the benefits and potential harm of this type of research. We would like to assure the public that these experiments have been conducted with appropriate regulatory oversight in secure containment facilities by highly trained and responsible personnel to minimize any risk of accidental release. Whether the ferret-adapted influenza viruses have the ability to transmit from human to human cannot be tested. We recognize that we and the rest of the scientific community need to clearly explain the benefits of this important research and the measures taken to minimize its possible risks. We propose to do so in an international forum in which the scientific community comes together to discuss and debate these issues. We realize that organizations and governments around the world need time to find the best solutions for opportunities and challenges that stem from the work. To provide time for these discussions, we have agreed on a voluntary pause of 60 days on any research involving highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 viruses leading to the generation of viruses that are more transmissible in mammals. In addition, no experiments with live H5N1 or H5 HA reassortant viruses already shown to be transmissible in ferrets will be conducted during this time.

The situation is difficult. This research is important as it helps scientists understand how flu is transmitted. At the same time, this research is very dangerous, as it could be used by evil people to kill millions.

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Drilling in Antarctica

8:53 am

Drilling down to Lake Vostok has resumed in Antarctica.

This week, a Russian team drilling into Lake Vostok in the center of the Antarctic continent is likely to break through the ice to water. It will be the first time that a subglacial lake has been breached. These modern-day explorers hope to discover whether Vostok, which at 5000 km 3 is the third largest lake on the planet, is teeming with hidden, cold-loving life that could have evolved separately from the rest of the world for hundreds of thousands of years….

After drilling 3720 meters last February, time ran out for the team and the project was stymied just 29.5 meters from its destination as winter set in. Over the summer, they modified their drill bits and now the team is back at work with plenty of time to spare. They had left the large hole filled with antifreeze, so it was ready and waiting for them. It will remain open for years to come, Priscu says, potentially allowing other teams to sample the waters in the future.

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Skyscrapers As Spaceships

9:48 pm

Skyscrapers as spaceships.

As we spend more of our lives in cyberspace, we come to expect its primary characteristics (convenience, efficiency, abundance) to define our off-screen lives as well. And supertall, mixed-used skyscrapers are currently the most potent physical approximations of the virtual world we have. They’re environments designed for maximum convenience and efficiency, with elevators functioning like hypertext, taking you almost instantly from one mode of existence to the next. Push a button and you’re at work. Push another button, you’re at home.

There’s a lot more. Read the whole thing.

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Scientists have found that the structure of Titan’s atmosphere appears to change daily and seasonally, much like the Earth’s.

9:22 am

Scientists have found that the structure of Titan’s atmosphere appears to change daily and seasonally, much like the Earth’s.

“The most interesting point is that their model shows the presence of two different boundaries, the lower one caused by the daily heating and cooling of the surface – and varying in height during the day – and the higher one caused by the seasonal change in global air circulation,” commented Paulo Penteado from the Institute of Astronomy, Geophysics and Atmospheric Science at the University of São Paulo in Brazil. According to [Benjamin Charnay from the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Paris], this link between the lower atmosphere’s layers and the moon’s daily and seasonal cycle has never been seen on another moon or planet besides the Earth.

One caveat: the results are based upon a computer climate model. Though this model was tweaked based on actual data, that data remains slim and incomplete.

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Phobos-Grunt due to crash to Earth anytime in the next ten hours

9:00 am

path of Phobos-Grunt's reentry

Updated and bumped. An updated prediction from Aerospace now calls for Phobos-Grunt to come down sometime between 9 and 3 pm (Eastern). This puts the U.S. now out of danger, though Europe, South America, Africa, Australia, and the southern half of Asia all remain in the spacecraft’s path.

Watch your heads! Phobos-Grunt is due to crash to Earth anytime in the next ten hours. And unfortunately, this new prediction has it flying over both North America and much of Europe and Africa during that time period.

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Engineers have gone to a back up radio system on Cassini after a primary unit did not respond as expected in late December.

11:58 pm

Engineers have gone to a back up radio system on Cassini after a primary unit did not respond as expected in late December.

The cause is still under investigation, but age may be a factor. The spacecraft launched in 1997 and has orbited Saturn since 2004. Cassini completed its prime mission in 2008 and has had two additional mission extensions. This is the first time its ultra-stable oscillator has had an issue.

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X-Prize offers $10 million prize for anyone who can build McCoy’s tricorder

3:06 pm

Life imitates art: The X-Prize announced today a $10 million prize for anyone who can build McCoy’s tricorder from Star Trek.

The X PRIZE Foundation and Qualcomm Foundation said the prize, announced at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, will go to the team that “develops a mobile platform that most accurately diagnoses a set of 15 diseases across 30 consumers in three days,” a release from the the two foundations said. The device must be light enough to be portable, weighing no more than 5 pounds.

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The University of Connecticut has found the chief of its biology lab — an expert on the health benefits of drinking wine — guilty of falsifying and fabricating data on more than two dozen papers and grant applications.

9:35 am

More science fraud: The University of Connecticut has found the chief of its biology lab — an expert on the health benefits of drinking wine — guilty of falsifying and fabricating data on more than two dozen papers and grant applications.

A 60,000-page report issued yesterday (you can read a 49-page summary here) by [University of Connecticut Health Center] (UCHC) found [Dipak] Das guilty of 145 counts of fabrication and falsification of data, involving at least 23 papers and 3 grant applications. … UCHC has frozen externally funded research in Das’ lab, and it turned away $890,000 in federal grants while the investigation was underway. The university has also begun proceedings to fire Das.

Just as in the Stapel case in the Netherlands, we have here another example of the science community responding correctly to scientific fraud. Both examples stand in stark contrast to how the climate science community whitewashed the fraud and malfeasance in its own community.

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