The Science/Science News Thread.

[kreutz2112]

I dont know why this comes as a surprise.

[alpharuin]

Tell that to the millions of Americans who don't believe in evolution.

[kreutz2112]

OH...I see...the article is supposed to be propaganda.

[Jenniehoo]

The Nazis had propaganda.

[PotVsKtl]

[anti-square]

[Young blood]

That range of motion is awesome. SEGWAY WHAT!?

http://www.ted.com/talks some amazing topics.

[kreutz2112]

This will be interesting and may influence my vote. I cant wait to see Huckabees response to some of the questions he gets...if he even shows.

Date Set for Presidential Science Debate 2008

The growing movement to host a presidential debate focused on science has reached a new milestone. The organizers of Science Debate 2008 have set a date, April 18, and a venue, the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia. With the details firm, the four remaining presidential candidates Democrats Barack Obama and Hilary Clinton along with Republicans John McCain and Mike Huckabee, have received their invitations. There is no word yet on which candidates plan to attend, but we'll keep you updated as (we hope) the RSVPs come in.

Wired.com has expressed public support for Science Debate 2008, joining a long list of other institutions that believe the candidates' ability to set smart policies on scientific issues is a key component of their fitness for the presidency.

For more background on Science Debate 2008, you can check out our previous coverage here on Wired Science and a longer article from Sarah Lai Stirland, Wired.com's crack political reporter. Sarah had a great quote from Lawrence Krauss, a physics professor at Case Western, noting the host of science-based topics that have serious policy significance--stem cell research, climate change, science education, and biotechnology. (And Loretta, I'm sure, would add the future of space exploration).

UPDATE (1:50pm): I left Mike Gravel and Ron Paul off my shortened list of "the remaining" presidential candidates. They are still running, but were not invited to the debate. I'm sorry, Paul fans. I struck through the "the".

Here is a link to the Science Debate website

[jackstraw94086]

First Proof that Evolution Can Work Faster Than Genetic Engineering

For years, farmers have been growing genetically-engineered cotton plants that exude an insecticide known as Bt. But now, a pest called the bollworm moth has evolved a resistance to Bt -- and the altered bugs have already spread across part of the southern United States. This is the first-known example of bugs evolving resistance to an insecticide in the wild. It proves that natural selection can outrun genetic engineering in terms of its ability to transform a species quickly.

More here: http://io9.com/354136/first-proof-th...ic-engineering

That's a bunch of BS. All it proves is that evolution can be fast, not that it's faster than genetic engineering. Evolution can be hastened by environmental factors. The idiot author didn't think for a minute about why the bollworm moth's environment changed so fast. Genetic engineering created an essentially instant change to the cotton plant. It took the at least a little bit of time for nature to selectively procreate resistant moths. How does that make evolution faster than genetic engineering?

[kreutz2112]

I thought it was a stupid title as well. I think what the author was getting at was that the moths evolved fast enough to avoid extinction (at least local extinction).

[tricorne]

I'm not a stem cell, but I play one on TV.

[tricorne]

I can't wait until I see someone picketing against the innocent slaughter of skinbabies.

[Alchemy]

I'm not a stem cell, but I play one on TV.

I remember hearing about this last year. They are finding all these cool ways to work around the stem of stem cells, but it would be so much more productive to get those embryos crackin'.

[kreutz2112]

I'm not a stem cell, but I play one on TV.

This is really interesting. I posted an article about this subject in the articles thread when they did it with mouse cells. Now all we need to do is find out how to control the tumorogenic effects that cMyc imposes on these cells when they are injected into mice.

[kreutz2112]

SPORE

This is sort of science related. I think it's a cool idea for a game. I wish I had time for this kind of stuff.

From Spores wiki page

Spore is a multi-platform god game under development by Maxis and designed by Will Wright that allows a player to control the evolution of a species from its beginnings as a multicellular organism, through development as a sapient and social land-walking creature, to levels of interstellar exploration as a spacefaring culture. The game has drawn wide attention for its massive scope, and its use of open-ended gameplay and procedural generation.

[jonnypark]

Hooray for Eugeneics

[Blinken]

Hell yeah! Spore comes out in the U.S. on my birthday, i have been waiting for this game for a long time now.

[thefunkylama]

HEY WAIT you're not allowed to have that day as your birthday. I already called it, and so Queen Elizabeth I and Grandma Moses and Buddy Holly.

[algunz]

Last night I went to see the eels. Pretty good show, a bit of a downer at times. But, I guess you can't blame Mark for being a little "sad."

Anyway, before the music they showed a documentary that Mark made about his relationship with his father, a famous physicist who created the theory of parallel universes. It was really interesting stuff. I couldn't possibly explain it, but it seems like nobody can REALLY explain quantum physics.

[kreutz2112]

Which theory? Theres like 10. My favorite is the one comes out of string theory, or M-theory. In String Theory, Universes are created by membranes running into each other, these "branes" occur in 11 dimensions and can be infinitely small or large and are infinite in number creating the possibility for an infinite number of universes. There could be a universe infinitely close to the tip of your nose and you wouldn't even know it. It is amazing that there could be universes being both created and destroyed in infinite numbers. I can only think about this stuff for about ten minutes before I want to end my life.

[algunz]

The many-worlds interpretation or MWI -also known as relative state formulation, theory of the universal wavefunction

[kreutz2112]

cool. I want to see Eels.

[algunz]

It was a good show, but as I said a bit of a downer. He has just had his autobiography published, Things the Grandchildren Should Know, and Chet read some excerpts. Unfortunately Mark's life has been shrouded in death - his dad, his sister killed herself, his mom died of lung cancer, his cousin was a flight attendant on the plane that went in to the Pentagon. Needless to say, it was emotional.

And then we got our car towed.

[Young blood]

ima gonna dropah soma scince ona ya.

http://www.tenthdimension.com/flash2.php

wicked sweet.

[kreutz2112]

From Wired:

Scientists Scan Striking Nanoscale Images
For the first time, late last year, a team of British scientists filmed the nanoscale interaction of an attacking virus with an enzyme and a DNA strand in real time.

This was the latest breakthrough in the advancement of scanning probe microscopes -- the family of nonoptical microscopes researchers use to create striking images through raster scans of individual atoms.

The granddaddy of them all is the scanning tunneling microscope, a 1986 invention that won its creators the Nobel Prize. STMs pass an electrical probe over a substance, allowing scientists to visualize regions of high electron density and infer the position of individual atoms and molecules.

To mark the 25th anniversary of the development of STMs, an international contest -- SPMage07 -- showcasing the best STM images was founded.

This image captured in German labs by Thorsten Dziomba, shows GeSi quantum dots -- a mere 15 nanometers high and 70 nanometers in diameter.


As nanotechnology develops, scientists are finding innovative ways to build structures on the atomic level. Scott MacLaren, at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, collaborated with Fumiya Watanabe and David Cahill to create this image of a precisely crafted crater on a sapphire substrate.

The sapphire was heated by hitting the surface with a femtosecond laser pulse that ejected atoms and left a shallow crater behind in the process. The crystal was reheated and blasted again to develop the internal step structure visible here.


This E. coli bacterium displays well-preserved flagella that are just 30 nanometers long.

An atomic-force microscope was used to capture the image. Unlike scanning tunneling microscopes, the tip of an AFM comes into direct contact with the surface of the sample. The force between the tip (known as "the bend") is calculated by measuring the force exerted on a tiny cantilever. AFMs are so sensitive that they can detect forces as small as a few picoNewton (one trillionth of a Newton).


The leaves of several plants, including the lotus plant, show self-cleaning properties.

The so-called "lotus effect" that results means that every rain shower washes away dust particles that would otherwise reduce the plant's ability to photosynthesize and leave it feeling a bit untidy and depressed.

This 2 micron x 2 micron AFM image shows one man-made attempt to mimic the dust-busting properties of the lotus -- a carpetlike assembly of nanowires, created by a chemical vapor deposition process. When water droplets hit the superhydrophobic nanowires, they quickly roll off, taking those pesky dust particles with them.


This image of cyanobacteria (more commonly known as blue-green algae) was taken as part of a series of experiments designed to help scientists understand how the structure of the algae's cell walls helps it move.

Simon Connell and David Adams at the university's School of Physics are applying the latest AFM techniques to biological systems like cell division, chemotaxis and *********.

AFMs operate at incredibly fine levels of sensitivity, Connellsays , adding that one nanoNewton is "equivalent to the attractive force solely due to gravitation between two players on a tennis court." Ace!


An electrostatic force microscope was used to create this tapewormlike image of the charge emission from a carbon nanotube just 18 nanometers in diameter. EFMs leverage classical electrostatic forces to create images that could not be taken with STMs, Mariusz Zdrojeck says.

"EFM is a very easy method [by which] to observe electrostatic behavior of any (not only nanotubes) object in the nanoworld," says Zdrojek, who hopes that his research will make new electronic devices possible.

The bright halo is created by charges emitted from the nanotube cap, while the discharged nanotube appears dark.


STMs are used for more than just passively viewing individual atoms. They can be used to manipulate individual atoms by picking them up (or pushing them from side to side) using the tip of the microscope, some fine calibration and a steady hand.

"STMs are the first and best tool for manipulating atoms one at a time," says Jody (Seung Yun) Yang, a University of Toronto chemist who took this STM image to demonstrate "a new method for imprinting on the molecular scale."

The result? An up-close and personal look at 12 bromine atoms, arranged in a circle through molecular self-assembly.

Yang is currently working on the development of a nanoscale printing press.


This 13 nanometer x 13 nanometer image shows the results of layering diindenoperylene and copper-phthalocyanines on a single gold crystal by molecular beam.

These planar organic molecules exhibit semiconductive properties. The image shows how molecules self-arrange in certain conditions -- information that is vital to scientists attempting to build semiconductors of the future.


These bagel-like blood cells won second place in SPMage07, and were taken to assist research into the effects of antibiotic peptides on cell membranes.

This image shows the surface of human red blood cells after treatment with phyllomelittin, an antibiotic isolated from the skin of the monkey frog.


ARTICLE LINK

[amyzzz]

Ok, I feel totally dumb now. Thanks.

[canexplain]

Ok, I feel totally dumb now. Thanks.

me 2 ... i am not dumb, but yikes this thread makes me feel so ... and algunz.. you should have expected that from the eels or E ... but what great music eh ... x*****

[algunz]

me 2 ... i am not dumb, but yikes this thread makes me feel so ... and algunz.. you should have expected that from the eels or E ... but what great music eh ... x*****

I know, Ron. I just wasn't up for the bummers too much on Valentine's Day. Still, as you said, great music.

[theburiedlife]

Machines 'to match man by 2029'

Machines will achieve human-level artificial intelligence by 2029, a leading US inventor has predicted.

Humanity is on the brink of advances that will see tiny robots implanted in people's brains to make them more intelligent, said Ray Kurzweil.

The engineer believes machines and humans will eventually merge through devices implanted in the body to boost intelligence and health.

"It's really part of our civilisation," Mr Kurzweil explained.

"But that's not going to be an alien invasion of intelligent machines to displace us."

Machines were already doing hundreds of things humans used to do, at human levels of intelligence or better, in many different areas, he said.

Man versus machine

"I've made the case that we will have both the hardware and the software to achieve human level artificial intelligence with the broad suppleness of human intelligence including our emotional intelligence by 2029," he said.


We'll have intelligent nanobots go into our brains... to make us smarter
Ray Kurzweil

"We're already a human machine civilisation; we use our technology to expand our physical and mental horizons and this will be a further extension of that."

Humans and machines would eventually merge, by means of devices embedded in people's bodies to keep them healthy and improve their intelligence, predicted Mr Kurzweil.

"We'll have intelligent nanobots go into our brains through the capillaries and interact directly with our biological neurons," he told BBC News.


CHALLENGES FACING HUMANITY
Make solar energy affordable
Provide energy from fusion
Develop carbon sequestration
Manage the nitrogen cycle
Provide access to clean water
Reverse engineer the brain
Prevent nuclear terror
Secure cyberspace
Enhance virtual reality
Improve urban infrastructure
Advance health informatics
Engineer better medicines
Advance personalised learning
Explore natural frontiers

The nanobots, he said, would "make us smarter, remember things better and automatically go into full emergent virtual reality environments through the nervous system".

Mr Kurzweil is one of 18 influential thinkers chosen to identify the great technological challenges facing humanity in the 21st century by the US National Academy of Engineering.

The experts include Google founder Larry Page and genome pioneer Dr Craig Venter.

The 14 challenges were announced at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Boston, which concludes on Monday.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7248875.stm

[mountmccabe]

I kind of want to start a band so I can call it Broad Suppleness.