Science news

• Second EU radar satellite launches

  25-04-2016 23:43 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The European Space Agency launches a second radar satellite into the EU's new Sentinel constellation, to acquire a complete map of the Earth every six days.
  
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• New Horizons Encore? Pluto Probe's Team Proposes Extension

  25-04-2016 23:07
  
  New Horizons team members have officially submitted an extended-mission proposal for the probe, which captured the first-ever up-close looks at Pluto during a historic flyby of the dwarf planet last July. NASA is now evaluating the proposal and will decide by June or July whether to approve and fund this "Kuiper Belt Extended Mission" (KEM), said New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern.
  
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• Hunt Continues for Gravitational Waves from Black Hole Megamergers

  25-04-2016 23:07
  
  The sound of merging supermassive black holes does not saturate the universe. For the past decade, scientists with the North American Nanohertz Observatory for Gravitational Waves (NANOGrav) collaboration have been listening for a constant "hum" of low-frequency gravitational waves. Theoretical work suggests that this hum — generated by collisions involving supermassive black holes, which contain millions or billions of times more mass than the sun — should be detectable at Earth.
  
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• Hollywood pushes the reset button on video game adaptations

  25-04-2016 22:22 via cbc.ca
  
  With four films based on popular video game series set for release in 2016, could this finally be the year video game movies win over filmgoers?
  
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• Middle East Emissions On the Decline Due to Political Strife [Graphic]

  25-04-2016 22:00 via rss.sciam.com
  
  Timelines of emissions from major cities in the region show drop-offs coincide with political and economic events
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• Plants might remember with prions

  25-04-2016 21:00
  
  A plant protein has passed lab tests for prionlike powers as molecular memory.
  
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• Findings on wobbly memories questioned

  25-04-2016 21:00
  
  In contrast to older studies, new results suggest that new memories don’t interfere with older, similar ones.
  
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• British Astronaut Tim Peake Sets Off-World Record Running Marathon in Space

  25-04-2016 18:25
  
  Tim Peake of the European Space Agency completed the 2016 London Marathon on Sunday (April 24), running the 26.2 miles (42.2 km) while circling the Earth about two and half times at an altitude of 250 miles (400 km) high. Peake, who traded the traditional course around the River Thames for a treadmill on the International Space Station, crossed the finish line after three hours, 35 minutes and 21 seconds. "Running the fastest marathon in space on the only day off from his grueling schedule is a
  
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• Uncertainty is stressful, but that’s not always a bad thing

  25-04-2016 18:00
  
  Life is full of stressful, ambiguous situations. But a new study shows that the ones we can predict stress us out less, and may even help us learn.
  
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• TomTato plant makes homemade ketchup and fries a cinch

  25-04-2016 17:43 via cbc.ca
  
  U.K.-based horticulture company Thompson & Morgan has developed a plant that grows both tomatoes and potatoes – meaning you can get your homemade fries and ketchup fix from a single source.
  
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• Titanic sinking simulation a real-time hit online

  25-04-2016 17:38 via cbc.ca
  
  It's not your typical viral video. A nearly three-hour computer simulation of the Titanic sinking has drawn millions of views on YouTube since it was uploaded on April 14. It's actually a teaser for an upcoming immersive video game.
  
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• Drug Overdose Deaths Increased 70-Fold in These US Counties

  25-04-2016 17:14
  Some U.S. counties have seen a 70-fold increase in drug overdose deaths in the last few decades, a new study finds. However, the areas with the highest increases in drug overdose deaths are not always the places with the most drug trafficking, as identified by the government, the study found. This suggests that drugs are passing through some high-trafficking counties without affecting death rates of the people in those regions, but are causing problems in other parts of the country, the research
  
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• Woman's Paranoia Had an Unusual Cause

  25-04-2016 17:13
  The 43-year-old woman in Turkey had become suddenly suspicious of her husband's infidelity, and had started looking through his phone and personal belongings, the doctors who treated her wrote in their report of her case, published in March in the journal BMJ Case Reports. The woman came to see doctors in January 2015, seeking medical help for her paranoia about her husband's behavior, said Dr. C. Onur Noyan, a psychiatrist at NPIstanbul Neuropsychiatry Hospital in Istanbul who treated the woman
  
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• Why Some 'Unhealthy' Eating Behaviors Might Not Be That Bad

  25-04-2016 17:12
  Dining out or eating canned foods might not actually be so bad for your waistline, a new study from Spain suggests. People who said they ate while watching TV at least two times a week, or didn't plan how much to eat before they sat down to a meal, were more likely to gain weight, compared with people who didn't report engaging in these unhealthy eating behaviors. But many other behaviors that are typically thought of as unhealthy — including eating pre-cooked or canned foods, buying snack
  
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• 'First Night' Insomnia: Why You Don't Sleep Well in a New Place

  25-04-2016 17:10
  The study involved 35 people who spent several nights in a sleep lab while the researchers monitored their brain activity using advanced brain-imaging techniques. The results showed that during the first night, the left hemisphere of the brain was more active during deep sleep (or "slow-wave sleep") than the right hemisphere. This difference in brain activity is similar to, though not as drastic as, what is seen in marine mammals that sleep by shutting down just one half of their brain at a time
  
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• What Happens When Women Get Their Periods in Space

  25-04-2016 17:09
  
  Women here on Earth may think of their periods as monthly inconveniences, but consider what it's like for astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS). "With more women going into space, we need to ensure they have the most up-to-date information" on the options available to them, Jain said in a statement.
  
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• Rise in CO2 has 'greened Planet Earth'

  25-04-2016 17:04 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The emissions of carbon dioxide from industrial society has spurred a huge growth in trees and other plants, says a report.
  
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• Wind farms' climate impact recorded

  25-04-2016 16:22 via bbc.co.uk
  
  In the first study of its kind, scientists have been able to measure the climatic effect of a wind farm on the local environment.
  
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• How Jet-Black Metal Converts Sunlight to Steam Power

  25-04-2016 15:39
  Steam power, once a major force behind the Industrial Revolution, could be coming back into fashion, after Chinese researchers designed the world's "darkest metal" that converts sunlight to steam at roughly 90 percent efficiency. Despite being made from gold, the so-called "plasmonic absorber" is jet black as it absorbs 99 percent of light in the visible to mid-infrared spectrum. Its designers say this is a dramatic improvement over previous metal absorbers and comparable to the world's darkest
  
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• Levitating Sled Sets New World Speed Record

  25-04-2016 15:38
  
  A new magnetic levitating (maglev) sled has blasted its way to a world speed record. The lightning-fast sled is officially the fastest object of its kind, according to the U.S. Air Force. The 2,000-lb. (900 kilograms) sled, which was designed by an Air Force squadron to test the delicate instruments inside weapons systems, broke the world record for speed on March 4, eclipsing its own previous record that had been set just two days earlier.
  
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• Bizarre Ant Life Rafts Have Assigned Seating

  25-04-2016 15:35
  
  It's weird enough that some ant species can work together to build living rafts in the event of a flood. Fire ant species make similar rafts, clinging to one another with their jaws, claws and sticky leg pads.
  
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• Mammoths had lots of 'interspecies' sex, study shows

  25-04-2016 15:34 via cbc.ca
  
  A new study suggests different mammoth 'species' were open to diverse and exotic mates.
  
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• Spectacular Auroras Captured in Dramatic New Time-Lapse Video

  25-04-2016 15:31
  
  The shimmering atmospheric lighting displays known as auroras have never looked sharper than in a new ultra-high-definition video that was shot in space. The stunning time-lapse footage was captured from the International Space Station in 4K ultra high definition (UHD), a video format with a resolution of 3,840 pixels horizontal by 2,160 pixels vertical. As the space station passes overhead, the auroras' colorful, translucent light displays — mostly shades of brilliant greens with some pur
  
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• Oldest Viking Crucifix Uncovered in Denmark

  25-04-2016 15:30
  
  A solid-gold cross depicting Jesus with his arms outstretched may be Denmark's oldest crucifix, dating back more than 1,100 years. The gorgeous pendant was unearthed in March by a hobbyist with a metal detector. Found in a field on the island of Funen, Denmark, the Viking jewelry piece may have been worn by a Viking woman, according to the Viking Museum at Ladby, where the pendant was on display.
  
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• Lap Dinos? Gigantic Sauropods Started Out Chihuahua-Size

  25-04-2016 15:27
  
  Now, the discovery of the animal's fossilized bones suggests that the family of ginormous dinosaurs that this titanosaur belonged to started out small — each about the size of a Chihuahua — and were precocial, a new study finds. "Baby Rapetosaurus gives us our first in-depth look at a sauropod within just a few weeks of hatching," said study lead researcher Kristina Curry Rogers, an associate professor of biology and geology at Macalester College in Minnesota. "That's where I found t
  
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• Earth Is 'A Beautiful Planet' from an Astronaut's-Eye-View

  25-04-2016 15:25
  
  Most people will never have the experience of flying high over Earth in a spacecraft and seeing the planet's atmosphere, oceans and landmasses unspooling far below. The film uses footage shot by NASA astronauts onboard the International Space Station (ISS). "A Beautiful Planet" is the first movie to use digital technology in space to capture glimpses of Earth and scenes of daily life inside the ISS at IMAX resolution, for projecting on a large-scale theater screen in 3D.
  
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• Bizarre Ice-Forming Bacteria's Secrets Revealed

  25-04-2016 15:20
  Bacteria found everywhere from the lower atmosphere to the Amazon rainforest may help form ice by manipulating the forces between water molecules, new research suggests. The bacteria, Pseudomonas syringae, use special proteins to alternatingly repel and attract water molecules, squishing the H20 molecules into high- and low-density patches. This patchy organization sort of "confuses" the water molecules so that they form ice at much higher temperatures and under other conditions not normally ame
  
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• Canadian business uses carrot compound to act as alternative to antibiotics in livestock feed

  25-04-2016 15:16 via cbc.ca
  
  One Canadian company says it has a solution that can help keep farm animals healthy and thriving without the use of antibiotics.
  
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• U.S. accuses South Sudan sides of blocking peace, warns over support

  25-04-2016 15:01
  By Denis Dumo JUBA (Reuters) - Washington accused both sides in South Sudan's two-year conflict of blocking peace efforts and protested, rebels said, by pulling funding for a flight to return their leader Riek Machar to the capital. Underlining growing international frustration over months of delays and wrangling, the U.S. State Department said South Sudan's government had as recently as Saturday refused to give landing permission to planes carrying Machar. Machar himself, the United States said
  
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• Bear bone rewrites human history in Ireland

  25-04-2016 15:00
  
  A rediscovered bear bone puts humans in Ireland at least 12,600 years ago.
  
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• U.S. accuses both sides in South Sudan of blocking peace

  25-04-2016 14:19
  By Denis Dumo JUBA (Reuters) - Washington accused both sides in South Sudan's two-year conflict of blocking peace efforts and protested, rebels said, by pulling funding for a flight to return their leader Riek Machar to the capital. Underlining growing international frustration over months of delays and wrangling, the U.S. State Department said South Sudan's government had as recently as Saturday refused to give landing permission to planes carrying Machar. Machar himself, the United States said
  
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• Pryce: Game Of Thrones Never Appealed To Me

  25-04-2016 14:14
  
  Game of Thrones star Jonathan Pryce says that he initially never wanted to do the show but now rates it as a "great contrast" to his performances in King Lear and The Merchant of Venice. The veteran actor, who plays High Sparrow, told Sky News he was offered a part in series one but turned it down. "There's lots of blockbuster series of things to do with fantasy, space and all that that I'd never seen and didn't want to see, and Game Of Thrones initially fell into that slot, so I passed on it.
  
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• Dubai wants 25 percent of all car trips driverless by 2030

  25-04-2016 13:51
  DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Dubai, already home to the world's tallest building, is looking to get ahead by getting out of the driver's seat.
  
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• Tiny NASA Spacecraft Found Inside 50-Year-Old Time Capsule

  25-04-2016 13:39
  
  HOUSTON — The first item pulled out from the newly-unearthed time capsule was a small, conical piece of black plastic. "A Mercury capsule!" someone called out from among the several dozen spectators. In fact, it was a model of a Gemini spacecraft, the two-man capsule that NASA was flying at the time the archive was buried outside the Clear Lake Theatre in Houston on April 20, 1966.
  
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• Splash of Stars! Sparkling Globular Cluster Wows Skywatcher

  25-04-2016 13:39
  Stars appear to flow out like water from this stunning image of globular cluster M2. The image was taken by astrophotographer Ron Brecher from Guelph, Ontario in September 2013 and recently shared with Space.com. M2 is a bright globular cluster located in the constellation Aquarius. Globular clusters orbit around the main body of our host galaxy, the Milky Way and contain several hundred thousand to a million stars .
  
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• Skywatching Battle Royale: The Big Dipper vs. the Southern Cross

  25-04-2016 13:39
  
  The answer for most Northern Hemisphere residents is the famous Big Dipper, a group of seven bright stars easily visible in the northern part of the sky. At and above the latitude of New York City (41 degrees north), the Big Dipper never goes below the horizon.
  
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• Exploring the Moon by Hand with Mobile Astronomy Apps

  25-04-2016 13:39
  
  The moon. It casts its cool glow over romantic strolls, inspires poetry, catches the eye (sometimes in broad daylight) and sends some astronomers fleeing indoors until the satellite once again departs the night sky.
  
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• "Hunger Hormone" May Drive Fat Storage, Not Appetite

  25-04-2016 13:00 via rss.sciam.com
  
  A study in rats finds that increased sensitivity to ghrelin causes weight gain and increased body fat, but does not augment appetite
  -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com
  
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• Gas blasts from black holes show surprising alignment

  25-04-2016 13:00
  
  Unexpected alignment of galactic gas geysers might offer new insight into how galaxies and black holes arise from the cosmic web.
  
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• Etruscan stone could help unravel enigma of one of Italy's first civilisations

  25-04-2016 11:41
  By Isla Binnie FLORENCE, Italy (Reuters) - A rare inscription found on a stone unearthed near Florence is exciting archaeologists who say it may help reveal the secrets of the Etruscans, one of Italy's earliest and most enigmatic civilisations. The Etruscans flourished in central Italy 2,500 years ago but their culture and language were assimilated into the Roman empire. Etruscans usually wrote longer texts on perishable linen or wax, so archaeologists excavating in Tuscany's Mugello Valley were
  
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• How the solar plane pilot coped with his 62-hour non-stop flight over the Pacific

  25-04-2016 11:31
  
  The pilot could only sleep for 20 minutes at a time.
  
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• After Netflix crackdown on border-hopping, Canadians ready to return to piracy

  25-04-2016 11:00 via cbc.ca
  
  Netflix has upset many loyal customers in Canada recently by cutting off access to VPN services. But the crackdown may just reveal the 'dirty little secret' that Canadians are big pirates at heart.
  
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• Japan says China's maritime expansion making the world 'greatly worried'

  25-04-2016 10:54
  Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida, speaking ahead of a visit to Beijing, said on Monday China was making the world "worried" with its military buildup and maritime expansion in the East and South China Seas. Ties between China and Japan, the world's second- and third-largest economies, have long been plagued by a territorial dispute, regional rivalry and the legacy of Japan's World War Two aggression. China and Japan dispute sovereignty over a group of uninhabited East China Sea islets, wh
  
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• Cambodian Royal Turtle nearly extinct _ less than 10 in wild

  25-04-2016 10:30
  PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — Cambodia's Royal Turtle is nearly extinct, with fewer than 10 left in the wild, because increased sand dredging and illegal clearance of flooded forest have shrunk its habitat, a conservationist group warned Monday.
  
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• There's a possibility of spring snow as an Arctic blast blows in

  25-04-2016 08:10
  
  Despite the approach of summer, the UK will be plagued with showers and snow this week.
  
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• What scientists know -- and don't know -- about sexual orientation

  25-04-2016 06:00
  
  (Association for Psychological Science) Over the last 50 years, political rights for lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) individuals have significantly broadened in some countries, while they have narrowed in others. In many parts of the world, political and popular support for LGB rights hinges on questions about the prevalence, causes, and consequences of non-heterosexual orientations. In a new report, a team of researchers bring the latest science to bear on these issues, providing a comprehensi
  
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• Videogame addiction linked to ADHD

  25-04-2016 06:00
  
  (The University of Bergen) Young and single men are at risk of being addicted to video games. The addiction indicates an escape from ADHD and psychiatric disorder. Men are more likely to become addicted to online gaming, gambling, and cyber-pornography. Women are more likely to become addicted to social media, texting, and online shopping.
  
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• Top tobacco control experts to FDA: Studies of e-cigs suggest more benefit than harm

  25-04-2016 06:00
  
  (Georgetown University Medical Center) Seven top international tobacco control experts are prompting regulators at the US Food and Drug Administration to have a broad 'open-minded' perspective when it comes to regulating vaporized nicotine products, especially e-cigarettes.
  
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• Ties to Alaska's wild plants

  25-04-2016 06:00
  
  (University of Alaska Fairbanks) A new series of ethnobotany films produced by the University of Alaska Museum of the North explores traditional Alaskan indigenous uses of wild plants for food, medicine and construction materials.
  
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• The reliability of material simulations put to test

  25-04-2016 06:00
  
  (Aalto University) Researchers show that new generations of quantum mechanical simulation codes agree better than earlier generations.' The study appears in Science.
  
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