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Romantics and astronomy aficionados alike (much of the same aren’t they?) will rejoice as this Saturday a rare spectacle of the moon will occur when it will come around closest its been to the Earth in 18 years! Much like planetary movement, Earth natural satellite movement is an ellipse, meaning it has points where its […]
Evan Michael O’Dorney, only aged 17, a gifted math whiz-kid was awarded by $100,000 from the Intel Foundation for placing 1st at the Intel hosted Science Talent Search, for a project in which he compared two ways to estimate the square root of an integer, discovering which one was the quickest. His research could provide […]
In a recent remarkable find in the war-torn country of Angola, archeologists have uncovered the fossil of what’s considered a new, up till now unknown, dinosaur. The dinosaur has been appropriately been dubbed Angolatitan adamastor – Angolatitan means ”Angolan giant”, while the adamastor is a sea giant from Portuguese sailing myths. A paper published on […]
On Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, precipitations under the form of methane has scientists staggered. NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, through the use of its infrared camera, detected signs of heavy spring rain of the highly flammable liquefied natural gas sprinkling across vast fields of dunes near Titan’s equator. “They see for the very first time evidence of […]
NASA’s Inspector General’s Office says an investigation is under way after a white powdery substance found at the Kennedy Space Center tested positive for cocaine. I wanted to insert some puns somewhere in this post about astronauts, cocaine, high and outer space, but by the time I finished researching for this post I remembered that […]
While a dog’s psychological value to its owner is very much attested, helping cure loneliness and such, a recent study published in the Journal of Physical Activity and Health, finds that people who own and walk a dog are 34 percent more likely to meet federal benchmarks for physical activity. “Walking is the most accessible […]
A National Geographic documentary is on the lookout for the mysterious lost city of Atlantic.
As a consequence of last Friday’s devastating earthquake near the coast of Japan, the nation’s most powerful recorded earthquake to date actually since it began archiving results in the late 1800, scientists have assessed that the Earth axis has tilted by a few inches and that the chronological day has been shortened by a millionth […]
Tom Hardwidge is an exceptional English artist who loves to sculpture insects, he calls arthrobots, from… ammunition. Don’t be alarmed though, it’s deactivated ammunition. Besides various ammunition of different calibers, he ornaments his steampunk art with old gears and sprockets from broken pocket watches, along with sheet copper, brass and aluminum to make it easier […]
Girls like pink, boys like blue. Girls have long hair, boys have short hair. And so on, so on – my mom says this is all common sense, I say this is social programming that propagates stereotypes, and the latest research relating to this is a study called Math–Gender Stereotypes in Elementary-School Children recently published […]
We now know that pre-modern human tool use dates back far beyond we previously might have thought, each discovery proving that our early ancestors showed sign of intelligence and early social evolution. A recent finding in central China of a prehistoric tool mill dating back 600,000 years ago used by Homo Erectus in the Lushi […]
Besides their evident telecommunications value, satellites also pose enormous benefits when synchronization and navigation are concerned, available and more and more used to the common public through GNSS (global navigation satellite system) or the US based GPS (global positioning system). However, a report published by the Royal Academy of Engineering in the UK warns that […]
Dr. Allison Harvey, professor of clinical psychology at the University of California Berkeley, said there are two main reasons why the use of electronics may affect our sleep.
In a paper presented at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC) in San Francisco, researchers from Michigan University unveiled one of the most exiting electronic-based prototype I’ve been grated to see in a very long time. Pictured above is an implantable eye pressure monitor which can be used to watch for signs of glaucoma in […]
On Monday the sun fired up an X class solar flare, the most powerful of its kind, the effects of which are expected to be felt by us today (Thursday) and tomorrow (Friday), and are expected to last somewhere between 24 and 48 hours. This may lead to disruptions in radio communications, interfere with satellites […]
I’ve seen and heard of a lot of crazy apps for the iPhone in my day, some can be classified more like stupid than innovative, but it seems one of AppStore’s recent best sellers, called “Confession: A Roman Catholic App” might take the cake. The official application description reads “Designed to be used in the […]
International ski resort and one of the most popular mountain resorts in Japan, Mount Zao is host to a myriad of feasts for eyes and a haven for winter sports enthusiasts. It’s peculiar location of lush natural beauty and manifold hot springs gives it a unique feel, but what makes it really special are the […]
In a recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, scientists have shown that our closest relatives behave very similarly to humans when put in a situation where close cooperation is needed for maximizing results. The research, conducted by a team of scientists from Georgia State University, was tested on three […]
Nairobi, Kenya is home to one of the world’s biggest slums, more than one million people living in subhuman conditions in the African state capital. I’ve seen and read a lot of reports from there, and other African states alike, and the situation is indeed dire. Imagine having nothing to eat – now imagine having […]
What’s maybe China’s most prominent symbol, the Giant Panda has been for decades now on the endangered species list, with an estimate wildlife population of circa. 2000-3000 individuals. Conservation efforts and breeding projects have been in the works for a very long time, efforts which even proved to render diplomatic benefits (In the late 70’s […]
When Al Gore’s famous documentary film “An Inconvenient Truth” was released it was intended to sensify the public towards the impeding danger of global warming. What it did in turn was to sprout panic and institute panic worldwide by stating that only an immediate, draconian response will save our planet from almost certain doom. Of […]
I recently finished reading The Generous Man by Tor Nørretranders in which the author tries to explain the awkward act of giving away, charity, by invoking social mechanics – sex to be more accurate. People are generous, and by giving they prove they posses enough resources and skill to make it in the world with […]
In a remarkable discovery, reported Friday in the journal Science by a team of paleontologists headed by Robert Reisz of the University of Toronto, archeologists unveiled detailed photos and insights of the world’s oldest dinosaur embryo found to date. In the past years, archelogists have managed to find true dinosaur relics, unveiling dinosaur eggs containing […]
The bubonic plague, known to history as The Black Death or simply The Plague, was responsible for marking one of Europe’s most darkest hours, twice decimating the continent’s population, killing off two thirds. The disease is caused by a Gram-negative bacterium called Yersinia pestis, of zoonotic nature, especially carried by rodents – more exactly rats. […]
Tuesday at 6:51 a.m. EDT (1051 GMT) a small asteroid dubbed TD54 passed the Earth dangerously close, above a section of Southeast Asia by Singapore, being at its closest 28,000 miles from our blue planet. The asteroid, 2010 TD54 was first discovered on October 9th, by scientists in Arizona at a NASA-sponsored lab. A few […]
One of the most intense Cold War fronts, and probably the only one to actually provide mankind a monumental legacy, was the so called space race. Each of the behemoth nations battled each other for space supremacy for decades raising hopes for millions of people as to someday the stars may belong to man and […]
Pictured above is an exquisite Roman helmet and mask, dating from the late first to second century AD, was discovered in May 2010 by a treasure hunter who used a simple metal detector in Cumbria, a county in northwestern England. Of extraordinary taste, this art piece dubbed Crosby Garrett was sold for $3,6 million, eight […]
I recently came across a very interesting piece in the NY Post which cites a study that shows that while it was well known that a difference in size between male and female brains exists, there is now evidence that there are significant differences in the size of certain structural parts of the brain, according […]
According to a newly published study, it seems that rubbing your hands together in a hand dryer actually leaves them coated with more bacteria than immediately after washing. “When you rub your hands, you bring a lot of bacteria to the surface from the pores of your skin,” says Anna Snelling of the University of […]
Commercial space flight is starting to promise to become a very lucrative market since an ever growing interested is harnessed by the big corporations of the world. Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic in cooperation with Scaled Composites (Mojave, CA), announced their sincere intentions of entering the commercial space travel market, after recently the giant Boeing also […]
The San Andreas fault is notorious for its unstable seismic nature, being the center stage for America’s most devastating earthquakes as well as the object of imagination for different artists. We’ve all marveled and even laughed at movies, magazines or comic books depicting scenes like a earthquake ravaged L.A. or a newly formed island state […]
Now, that’s not Sauron’s eye. Pictured above is the most highly detailed photo of a sunspot ever taken at present date, captured and recently released by the Big Bear Solar Observatory, CA. The whole event was captured by Big Bear’s New Solar Telescope (NST), which has a resolution covering about 50 miles on the Sun’s […]
And no, I’m not taking the piss. Urine, a very versatile waste among other things, has been found useful in all sorts of fields, from curing jellyfish stings, to saving ones life in the desert by soiling a turban to cool the head, or more commonly used as a fertilizer. Most of us, however, just dump […]
Alzheimer’s is one of the most common, yet devastating, form of dementia which currently accounts for more than 5 million patients in the US alone, most of which are elderly. By now, I’m sure most of you know how this terrible disease manifests itself, enough to make a sexagenarian forget his children and nephews. What’s […]
Although the oldest sexual toy may have dated from the stone age, a newly published discovery of two fossils bearing the mark of tool used to scrub off the meat dating back 3.39 million years could be enough to make anthropologists revise their current text books. What makes this study potentially monumental is the fact […]
Last week at the latest TEDGlobal conference in Oxford, astronomer Dimitar Sassilov, professor of astronomy at Harvard University and a distinguished member of the Kepler space telescope science team, unveiled some incredible results gathered by our eyes and ears in the galaxy. Kepler’s most recent reported downloaded conferred some incredible statistics, among which most importantly the discovery of: […]
Mice have been used for research in nearly every field, be it medicine, psychology or genetics. In one recent finding regarding genetics study on mice published in the BMC Genetics journal, scientists have managed to turn mice gay by simply altering their genome structure. How so? Well, it seems a group of scientists from Korea’s […]
I’m not sure if most of you are aware of this, but consider this: there are only 3,200 tigers left in the world! Almost three times fewer than there were 10 years ago and more than 30 times fewer than 100 years ago (back then 100.000 tigers roamed freely through Asian jungles. This includes the […]
A group of scientists from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center discovered a new chemical compound that helps newborn neurons grow into mature brain cells called P7C3. This particular chemical makes new neurons grow in the part of the brain that is integral to learning and memory! This means the research, funded in part […]
The above photo was captured by the Hubble Space Telescope around mid last year, proving excellent practice for Hubble’s newly installed Wide Field Camera 3. Captioned is the by now famous NGC 3603 nebula, located in the Carina spiral arm – it’s by far one of the most spectacular star forming regions in the Milky […]
The leading architectural firm Foster + Partners has recently won an international competition in which companies where supposed to come up with schemes towards developing the Incheon Free Economic Zone. Foster’s plan, the winning plan, is incredibly bold, encompassing the islands of KangHwa and OnJin-gun, to the north west of Seoul, basically connecting the the […]
It sounds like something pinned off a SciFi novel, but it seems like new developments in space exploration technology might make an Earth to Mars journey last as less as 39 days. The distance between Mars and Earth varies because of the different Sun revolution periods (365.25 days for Earth, and 686 days for Mars), […]
A recent study conducted by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that obesity related disorders account for ~10% of the total medical spending in the U.S. or, money-wise, approximately a whooping $147 billion. The study continues on stipulating that obese individuals spend 40% more on medical treatment than those of normal weight, […]
A few days ago, something remarkable has been captured by NASA’s telescopes, as an unusual set of Gamma rays were picked up by the Swifst satellite. What’s so remarkable about the find is that the respective burst of Gamma rays is the farthest such discovered, and, according to NASA’s specialists, originated from an explosion near […]
Photo by Firentzesca Recently, attempts to make “cloaking technology” possible have reached a great level, with major break throws. Among mentionable achievements, more notable are the work of Oleg Gadomsky, a Russian professor that managed to redirect light around objects and that of the people from the University of Maryland, who reported the successful cloaking […]
