Gas may be to blame for extinction
Nature: Contrarian theory argues against meteorite killing dinosaurs.
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October 31, 2007Gas may be to blame for extinctionNature: Contrarian theory argues against meteorite killing dinosaurs. U.S. team to help North Korea nuclear disablingReuters: A team of U.S. experts is heading to North Korea to help ready steps to disable a key nuclear complex, senior U.S. envoy Christopher Hill said in Beijing, where he was due to meet his Pyongyang counterpart. Big little black hole baffles astronomersMSNBC: Collapsed star is too massive to be explained using current theories Nuclear Renaissance In Russia?Forbes: Russia, the world's second nuclear power, has long had an active nuclear-energy industry, including exporting reactors to countries such as India and Iran. Yet until recently, the Kremlin devoted far less attention to nuclear energy than to the country's massive and profitable oil and natural-gas industries. In 2005, President Vladimir Putin indicated his interest in the sector by appointing former Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko to head Russia's Federal Atomic Energy Agency (Rosatom). October 30, 2007Why They Called It the Manhattan ProjectThe New York Times: By nature, code names and cover stories are meant to give no indication of the secrets concealed. “Magic” was the name for intelligence gleaned from Japanese ciphers in World War II, and “Overlord” stood for the Allied plan to invade Europe. Panel Urges Bush to Drop Nuke Waste PlanThe San Francisco Examiner: A panel of the National Academy of Sciences urged President Bush on Monday to abandon an ambitious plan to resume nuclear waste reprocessing that is the heart of the administration's push to expand the civilian use of nuclear power. The climate change censorThe Boston Globe: It is a race against the eraser. By the end of the Bush administration, we could all be rubbed out. Utterly unashamed, the White House heavily deleted yet another major document on global warming. It blanched out the Senate testimony of Julie Gerberding, director for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Comet Holmes brightens, taking it from obscurity to high visibilityThe Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: A comet that until recently was invisible to the naked eye has become a shining star in the night sky, easily seen even through the bright lights of the Pittsburgh region. October 29, 2007New paper proposes that dark matter doesn't existSpace.com: Two Canadian astronomers think there is a good reason dark matter, a mysterious substance thought to make up the bulk of matter in the universe, has never been directly detected: It doesn't exist. More questions arise over suspected nuclear site in SyriaThe New York Times: The mystery surrounding the construction of what might have been a nuclear reactor in Syria deepened yesterday, when a company released a satellite photo showing that the main building was well under way in September 2003 — four years before Israeli jets bombed it. A space for inspirationIndianapolis Star: The grainy black-and-white TV images were hard to make out, but the scenes beamed from the moon of Neil Armstrong taking "one small step" have stayed with Ivana Hrbud since her childhood in Croatia. Terabyte Thumb Drives Made Possible by Nanotech MemoryWired: Researchers have developed a low-cost, low-power computer memory that could put terabyte-sized thumb drives in consumers' pockets within a few years. October 26, 2007Pulsars 40 Years On
Science: It has been 40 years since neutron stars, in the guise of pulsating radio stars (pulsars), were discovered (2). My colleagues and I at Cambridge University had built a radio telescope by stringing hundreds of kilometers of wire over a thousand wooden poles says Jocelyn Bell Burnell. Our goal was to detect quasars (quasistellar sources) that had been recognized as the most distant detectable objects in the universe and also extremely powerful sources of radio waves. Several months into the data collection, I noticed a series of regular radio pulses in the midst of a lot of receiver noise. After initial anxieties that there was radio interference or a fault with the equipment, it became clear that we were dealing with neutron stars, which are small in radius but large in mass (and therefore also large in density). The significance of the discovery dawned gradually and, indeed, is still developing.
How many neutrons can an atom hold?Nature news: Atoms can be more overweight than we thought, a team of scientists in the United States has discovered. They have sent atoms crashing into one another in a particle accelerator to create bloated versions of the elements aluminium and magnesium. The new, artificial forms of these metals have many more neutrons in their atomic nuclei than do the everyday versions1 What's behind Asia's moon race
Christian Science Monitor: China launched its first lunar probe Wednesday. Japan sent an orbiter up last month. India is close behind. It's an economic competition with military undertones.
Nuclear Power to Explode in India, but China Prefers CoalWired.com: To curb greenhouse gas emissions, India is poised to dramatically increase its reliance on nuclear energy -- but there'll be no overall benefit to the planet if China's coal binge continues. A new report by the International Atomic Energy Agency forecasts India will increase nuclear production eight-fold by 2030 to account for 26 percent of its power grid. October 25, 2007Time to ditch KyotoNature: Climate policy after 2012, when the Kyoto treaty expires, needs a radical rethink. More of the same won't do, argue Gwyn Prins and Steve Rayner. ITER, the $11 billion fusion project gets final go aheadXinhua: The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), a landmark multinational fusion energy project involving the European Union (EU), got started on Wednesday, the European Commission announced here. Climate Change Testimony Was Edited by White HouseThe New York Times: The White House made deep cuts in written testimony given to a Senate committee this week by the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on health risks posed by global warming, but the director agreed yesterday with administration officials who said the cuts were part of a normal review process and not aimed at minimizing the issue. Chunks of smashed moon detected in Saturn's ringsReuters: Big chunks of a moon that was smashed long ago perhaps by a comet have been detected in Saturn's outermost ring, shedding light on the formation of the planet's grand ring system, scientists said on Wednesday. October 24, 2007US: Missile shield 'deactivated' until Iran tools upThe Register: US defence secretary Robert Gates, seeking to allay Russian concerns, has suggested that European elements of the planned American missile shield might be built but not "activated" unless a threat from Iran developed. Chinese lunar orbiter on its wayThe Register: China this morning sucessfully sent on its way the Chang'e One lunar orbiter from the southwestern province of Sichuan, amid much patriotic trumpeting of the country's technological prowess. Virtual computers bring lower price to data crunching researchersNature: 'Cloud computing' is being pitched as a new nirvana for scientists drowning in data. But can it deliver? Eric Hand investigates. Scientists map near-Earth space bubblesMSNBC: Further observations could be used to monitor violent solar outbursts October 23, 2007In nuclear chief, Iran signals harder lineThe Christian Science Monitor: Iran's abrupt change of nuclear negotiators spotlights internal power struggles, too. NC State Nuclear Reactor Program Celebrates Scientific BreakthroughNC State University: Successes like this at a university reactor are actually starting to drive big ideas and big thoughts around the country and around the world. China to Launch Lunar Probe This WeekWired: China will launch its first lunar probe this week, an official said Monday - weeks after regional rival Japan put one in high orbit over the moon in a big leap forward in Asia's undeclared space race. Seven of UK's 16 reactors closedBBC: Nearly half of Britain's nuclear power reactors have been out of action due to breakdowns and maintenance. October 22, 2007The Future Is Drying UpThe New York Times: Scientists sometimes refer to the effect a hotter world will have on this country’s fresh water as the other water problem, because global warming more commonly evokes the specter of rising oceans submerging our great coastal cities. By comparison, the steady decrease in mountain snowpack — the loss of the deep accumulation of high-altitude winter snow that melts each spring to provide the American West with most of its water — seems to be a more modest worry. But not all researchers agree with this ranking of dangers. Last May, for instance, Steven Chu, a Nobel laureate and the director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, one of the United States government’s pre-eminent research facilities, remarked that diminished supplies of fresh water might prove a far more serious problem than slowly rising seas. When I met with Chu last summer in Berkeley, the snowpack in the Sierra Nevada, which provides most of the water for Northern California, was at its lowest level in 20 years. Chu noted that even the most optimistic climate models for the second half of this century suggest that 30 to 70 percent of the snowpack will disappear. “There’s a two-thirds chance there will be a disaster,” Chu said, “and that’s in the best scenario.” Scientists Race to Detect First Gravitational WavesWired: The race is on to detect ripples from the most massive events in the universe: spinning, orbiting, exploding or colliding ultra-dense objects like black holes and neutron stars. Do super-Earths have geology suited to life?Nature: Debate erupts over whether alien planets have active plate tectonics. Teams prep for Australian solar raceMSNBC: Course for Panasonic World Solar Challenge runs 1,863 miles October 19, 2007Putin confirms development of new nuclear warheads
Various: Russian President Vladimir Putin confirmed on state-run television yesterday that Russia is developing a new generation of nuclear weapons in order to combat the US missile defense shield. According to the Guardian and an analyst at a Russian forces blog, the new design is likely to be based on a solid propellant ICBM whose warhead detaches in space into multiple warheads that can maneuver on a final approach to a target to avoid interceptors.
There is also a complete absence of discussion in Russia at the moment of the idea of nuclear disarmament writes Pavel Podvig in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, "Even President Vladimir Putin's opponents are more likely to criticize him for not doing enough to enhance strategic forces rather than question the growing reliance on nuclear weapons," he says. Experts Urge Exchange of Scientific TalentThe New York Times: The federal government should create a commission to promote the free flow of scientific knowledge and researchers from other countries while balancing the threat from enemies, an expert panel said Thursday. Accelerated progressThe Economist: A new way of testing drugs without hurting anybody Space Sighting Suggests Stardust Doesn't Have to Come From StarsScience: Astronomers have spotted the telltale spectroscopic fingerprints of microscopic rubies and sapphires in space near a supermassive black hole, which may help explain the abundance of dust particles in the very early universe. How can you predict global warming if you can't predict rain?The Christian Science Monitor: Some say climate change is part of a complex natural cycle – so complex, in fact, that it can't be forecast. Are current climate models reliable? October 18, 2007Nano Electronics Researcher Decodes Radio Signals Using Atom-Sized ComponentWired: A scientist has unveiled a working radio built from carbon nanotubes that are only a few atoms across, or almost 1,000 times smaller than today's radio technology. Hayward Fault is our deadliest - a 'tectonic time bomb'San Francisco Chronicle: The last time a major earthquake ripped along the Hayward Fault, San Leandro and Hayward were nearly leveled, but, in a shock to seismologists, the most populated stretch of the East Bay was relatively unscathed, according to a new map released Wednesday Premier galactic map updatedMSNBC: Boosts the astrometric database's accuracy by up to five times Speedy continental collision explainedNature: India's crash into Asia was driven by plate thickness. October 17, 2007Global warming: Too late to implement many mitigation strategiesAmerican Institute of Physics: Governments have wasted too much time to successfully implement some of the easiest strategies to reduce carbon dioxide emissions says Rosina Bierbaum of the University of Michigan. Bierbaum was speaking at the American Institute of Physics Industrial Physics Forum held in Seattle, Wahsington. Nor will simply relying on adaptation strategies be sufficient to deal with the impending impacts of climate change. "Any measures are only going to get more costly and difficult to implement" as time goes on, she said, quoting an old proverb: "It is easier to close the jaws of an alligator when they are small....Our alligator is entering its rebellious adolescence." Astrophysicist Replaces Supercomputer with Eight PlayStation 3sWired: Suffering from its exorbitant price point and a dearth of titles, Sony's PlayStation 3 isn't exactly the most popular gaming platform on the block. But while the console flounders in the commercial space, the PS3 may be finding a new calling in the realm of science and research. UT professor gets fuel from industry byproduct, rays from sunToledo Blade: Process with iron oxide, steam works like rust
Europe set for major space campaignBBC: Europe is on the cusp of a renaissance in space, with its first permanently tended orbital laboratory, a cargo transporter and other gear about to make their debuts. October 16, 2007Kyoto approach on climate is "bad policy": BushEnvironmental News Network: President George W. Bush said on Monday his administration's approach of emphasizing voluntary approaches to address climate change was working and he denounced Kyoto-style mandatory caps as "bad policy." Case Study: Data storage at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear ResearchPublicTechnology.net: Smashing protons together is very hard to do and, when it is done, 15 petabytes of data will be generated annually and stored on tape. CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is the world's largest high-energy physics research establishment and approximately half of the world's particle physicists use its facilities. It has embarked on a multi-year effort to find and observe some of the most elusive particles in sub-atomic physics. To find them, CERN is building the largest and highest-energy particle accelerator in the world at its Geneva headquarters. This is the LHC, the Large Hadron Collider (protons belong to a class of subatomic particles called hadrons). Volcanic moon’s gassy mystery solvedMSNBC: Scientists figure out how eons of eruptions contribute to Io’s atmosphere Amateur stargazers map a 'lopsided' universeTelegraph: A legion of amateur stargazers has posed a profound challenge to cosmological theories: our universe appears to be lopsided. Why the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize is good for science
Various: The award of last week's Nobel Peace Prize in two equal parts, between the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and Albert Arnold (Al) Gore Jr. for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change is a profoundly positive influence for science says physicist Clifford V. Johnson of the University of Southern California. IPCC chairman Rajendra K. Pachauri agrees and says science has won over skepticism.
Slate's Stephen Faris looks more closely at whether there are links between climate change and conflict, "Indications of changes in the earth's future climate must be treated with the utmost seriousness," said Ole Danbolt Mjøs, the Nobel Prize committee chairman. "There may be increased danger of violent conflicts and wars, within and between states." The New York Times looks at the different styles and substance between the two award winners, with the IPCC issuing reports and former Vice President Al Gore, delivers brimstone-laden warnings of an unfolding “planetary emergency.” says correspondent Andrew C. Revkin. “It’s every scientist's dream to win a Nobel Prize, so this is great for myself and the hundreds that worked on their reports over the years. It is perhaps a little deflating though - that one man and his PowerPoint show has as much influence as the decades of dedicated work by so many scientists,” says Piers Forster, of the University of Leeds School of Earth and Environment. More than 2,500 researchers from more than 130 nations provide input into the IPCC reports. The IPCC was set up in 1988 to assess the issue of climate change. "This must be the most maligned institution on earth, in that it’s a very conservative scientific panel which chooses only the science which is rock-solid, and yet it’s often portrayed as an insane radical organization trying to overthrow civilization as we know it," says environmentalist George Monbiot speaking to DemocracyNow's Amy Goodman, "And it’s fought a long, hard battle for the science to be heard, and that battle is now being rewarded." In fact, as a New York Times editorial points out, "What the citation didn’t mention but needs to be said is that it shouldn’t have to be left to a private citizen — even one so well known as Mr. Gore — or a panel of scientists to raise that alarm or prove what is now clearly an undeniable link or champion solutions to a problem that endangers the entire planet." "That should be, and must be the job of governments. And governments — above all the Bush administration — have failed miserably..." In February, the IPCC issued a report increasing the likelihood that human activity is the cause of a global-warming trend in recent decades at 90%, up from 66% in 2001. "The Nobel committee's recognition affirms that policymakers need to listen to the best available science and act upon it to avoid dangerous climate change," says Peter Frumhoff, a lead author of the IPCC's fourth assessment report on mitigation. "The IPCC's exceptionally sober appraisal of the threat posed by global warming makes clear how serious this issue is," says Frumhoff, who is science and policy director at the Union of Concerned Scientists. "The Nobel peace prize committee is giving climate change the attention that it deserves and Congress and the administration should do the same." In attempt to combat climate change the European Union imposed greenhouse-gas caps in 2005 and is considering toughening them. Because of the large Republican minority in the Senate, Congress is not expected to pass any cap emission legislation until 2009. According to the Wall Street Journal, "While President Bush campaigned in 2000 on a pledge to seek limits on greenhouse gases, he dropped that after his election. President Clinton signed the Kyoto treaty for the U.S., but President Bush withdrew from participation." Instead "the administration is negotiating with major developing nations -- India, China and Indonesia -- about joining a successor treaty to Kyoto, whose caps expire in 2012. Also, prodded by the Supreme Court, the Environmental Protection Agency is weighing regulations to curb carbon-dioxide emissions." However, many corporations, including the Detroit automakers and energy utilities companies are joining the U.S. Climate Action Partnership which calls for a mandatory federal emissions limit in order to have some say on the final legislation that passes the hill, and avoid the situation of U.S. states such as California introducing their own legislation. Asked Friday if the Nobel award will pressure the administration to adopt more of a more pro-active approach similar to the former Vice President's campaign, White House spokesman Tony Fratto replied: "No."
Related News Stories
Related Physics Today News Pick October 15, 2007The Energy Challenge
American Institute of Physics: Over the next few days Physics Today contributing editor Jennifer Oullette will be blogging the Industrial Physics Forum from Seattle, Washington. This year's forum, appropriately enough after last week's Nobel Peace prize award to Al Gore and the IPCC, is devoted to the energy challenge of reducing mankind's carbon dioxide emissions. MIT's Mildred Dresselhaus gave an introductory talk that called for "a Moore's Law" for energy efficiency, e.g. dramatic improvements in energy efficiency every 18 months. In one of her first postings, Oullette looks at the energy costs of transportation, and what manufacturers will have to build to wean consumers away from the gasoline engine.
Humans Consume Nearly a Quarter of Earth's Natural ProductivityScience News: One species—Homo sapiens—consumes nearly a quarter of Earth's natural productivity A private view of Phoenix and MarsThe Register: Peter Smith is counting down to the white-knuckle day of his life. On May 25 next year, the Phoenix Mars lander is due to touch down on the Mars surface. If all goes well, over the following 24 to 48 hours the lander's solar panels will extend and the lander will start the science experiments it's there to conduct. As the mission's principal investigator, Smith has everything invested in a safe landing. |