Science

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General science topics, the following items should get sorted into sub-categories at some time.

2010-Nov-27: The global seed vault. [9439]
2010-Oct-20: Squarehead Technology's AudioScope is a 300 microphone phased array that uses computer control to "zoom in" on particular sound sources, allowing conversations to be isolated from within a crowd. The spooks must have been doing this for years by now. This sort of thing was done in a very crude sense, by analogue means, in the film The Conversation, which is a great watch for those into spy themes. Discussed here on Slashdot. [9406]
2010-Oct-20: A cautionary take of some of the US nuclear disasters, discussed here on Slashdot. [9403]
2010-Sep-26: Progress in Alzheimer's research is being made due to large-scale sharing of data between researchers. [9393] [1]
2010-Sep-24: Quantum refrigeration, perhaps this will be the way to the "reverse microwave oven", imagine being able to chill a beer in a minute. [9382]
2010-Sep-23: Scott McNealy the co-founder of SUN is looking into the problem of expensive math text books. [9377]
2010-Sep-02: Darwin may have run the first terra-forming experiment at Ascension Island. [9364]
2010-Sep-02: These strange exploding lakes trap volcanic gasses (including methane and CO2) and occasionally release them in large bursts (smothering life nearby). One in Rwanda might get tapped as a source of methane. [9361]
2010-Jul-29: A room temperature superconductor might have been discovered. [9334]
2010-Jul-06: The Bureau 42 Summer School and the Khan Academy are interesting places to go for some science lectures. [9281]
2010-Jun-25: Sticky rice is the secret ingredient to strong Chinese mortar. [9253]
2010-Jun-22: The quantum world may violate the principle of equivalence of gravitational and inertial masses. [9234]
2010-Jun-20: A wave-powered desalination plant is to be built in the Gulf of Mexico. [9210]
2010-Jun-16: Some strange shapes (like channels and holes) in clouds are being formed by aircraft. Sounds like there is a neat science fair project lurking in here. [9203]
2010-Jun-11: Scientists rebel against journals, and about time too! Scientists quit from the editorial board of a journal.. Nature debates the issue of electronic access to scientific literature, discussed here on Slashdot. Apparently the US Congress is considering having all government funded research published in an open way. Mar'05 the IEEE wonders who will pay the costs of open access. Now some open access journals are being funded by accepting a payment from the author for publication. The Royal Society wants to keep papers off the web. The Association of American Publishers is trying to work against scientists publishing freely. The European Commission may be providing some funding towards making a free scientific library. Nature is going to allow open online access to pre-publication works in Nature Proceedings, something similar to arXiv.org. The physics journal Physical Review may reconsider its position on copyright now that some scientists are writing to tell it that they are unhappy with the current restrictions that will be placed on republication of their works. In Are Academic Journals Obsolete Slashdot discusses the journal issue - perhaps they are only useful for evaluation of professorial job performance? In Oct'08 the arXiv system reached 500,000 publications. Current science publishing methods are being called problematic. The MIT faculty have voted in favor of making all their publications open access. Perhaps the final solution to this problem would be to abolish copyright protection on academic works. Now the University of California faculty might boycott the publisher of Nature, seems to me all they would need to do is self-publish their own papers in a peer-reviewed section of Wikipedia. [1655]
2010-May-07: Organic Light Emitting Transistors (OLETs) might out perform OLEDs. [9110]
2010-Apr-22: Apparently the Japanese have developed enzymes that help them digest seaweed. [9084]
2010-Apr-07: Photosynthetic man-made material that is based on frog-foam that can capture carbon dioxide. [9056]
2010-Mar-12: A large reserve of methane hydrates has been discovered in China in the tundra of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. This reserve contains enough energy to supply China for about 90 years (equivalent to about 35 billion tons of oil). Discussed here on Slashdot. [9016]
2010-Mar-09: Popular Science has placed their entire 137-year archive of back issues online for free browsing, neato! [9003]
2010-Feb-24: The presence of interstellar hydrogen may limit the maximum safe speed of space travel. [8981]
2010-Feb-24: Global warming can mean more snow (and rain). [8980]
2010-Feb-08: Spray-On Liquid Glass would this work on a BBQ grill? [8959] [1]
2010-Jan-20: Faster than light currents (in which the particles don't more faster than light) may be the source of pulsar beams. [8932] [1]
2010-Jan-20: Small explosions are being used to generate shock waves to stun people at a distance of up to 100m. Really sounds like the same idea as a stun grenade, and these are also capable of killing at close distances. [8928]
2010-Jan-16: It might be possible to construct a cannon to fire payloads into space by submerging it in the ocean. [8924]
2010-Jan-16: EMP (electromagnetic pulse) technology has already been used to shape soft metals like copper and aluminum, now it is being applied to steel. [8923]
2010-Jan-12: A new kind of spill cleanup filter called Obsorb (developed by Absorbent Materials) is a sponge-like swelling glass that can be dropped into water and as it absorbs toxins it gradually swells up and rises to the surface for collection. [8911]
2009-Dec-25: An Alaskan beetle has been found to use a new type of antifreeze, perhaps this beetle-juice will bring us colder, smoother, ice cream or maybe it will be useful in deep freezing space travelers? I'll go with the ice cream. [8872]
2009-Dec-16: If the supervolcano in Yellowstone park ever blows we're not going to have to worry about green house gasses. [8851]
2009-Dec-11: Could quantum forces be used for propulsion? [8832]
2009-Nov-26: A new theory of space-time is being proposed that would allow the coupling of space and time to vary with scale. [8805]
2009-Nov-24: A new (2009) study is forecasting a 6 degrees Celsius increase in global temperature by 2100. [8794]
2009-Nov-22: DNA Bar Coding has been used to check the contents of sushi - and has uncovered a few sly practices in New york. This would make an interesting science fair project. And fake sushi replacements for tuna can be rather bad for you. [6735]
2009-Nov-20: Lightning may produce some antimatter. [8766]
2009-Nov-13: Saltworks is a company working on a brine-driven primary desalination process. [8747]
2009-Nov-12: Tracking the movements of great white sharks near the California coast reveals that they like to visit between August and February each year and may even enter San Francisco Bay. [8732]
2009-Nov-06: Guido attends a meeting on Python in science and sees lots of neat toys. [8721]
2009-Nov-05: A listing of 100 open courses for computer geeks. [8707]
2009-Nov-03: High temperature superconductors are going to be used to interconnect some power grids in Texas. [8694]
2009-Oct-23: Dense plasma focus might be able to achieve nuclear fusion. [8651]
2009-Sep-22: E. Coli can be tricked into cleaning up nuclear waste, but are they going to mutate into something wonderful? [8545]
2009-Sep-19: Gravitational currents can be used to reduce fuel requirements for interplanetary space travel. The downside of this is that travel times get much longer, though this technique could be used for freight shipments instead of human travel. [8530]
2009-Sep-19: It is thought that gravitational waves may stretch and squeeze space as they travel through it, if this is true then this effect might cause distant pulsars to shimmer. [8527]
2009-Sep-11: Very powerful magnets can actually levitate small living creatures based on their water content. [8511]
2009-Sep-04: Researchers are playing with Lego to learn how arrays of nanoscopic objects could be used to sort cells. Or so they claim, really its all about accumulating a massive pile of Lego blocks in the rare colours. I just wish I had tought about using Lego in my thesis. [8468] [1]
2009-Sep-04: It looks like some magnetic monopoles may have been found. [8454]
2009-Aug-24: Lightning also shoots up into the high atmosphere. [8419]
2009-Aug-24: DNA evidence can now be fabricated. And there is now a way to detect the fake DNA. [8408]
2009-Aug-21: Gravity waves, we just can't find them - though gravity still appears to be holding things down. [8412]
2009-Aug-12: The Geek Atlas is a web site that tries to document places of significance to geeks. [8394]
2009-Aug-08: Piston-powered nuclear fusion is another possible approach. [8386]
2009-Aug-07: Peer review does not guarantee quality research, it appears that Merek went as far as creating a phony journal to "publish" findings in support of some drugs. It appears that Elsevier, the publisher of this fake journal, are also publishing a number of other fake journals. So much for peer review in refereed journals. The New York Times reported on a similar issue where ghostwriters were employed to publish papers in a number of journals to develop "consensus support" for hormone replacement therapy, discussed here on Slashdot. [7934] [1]
2009-Jul-28: The DHS is wanting to move the bio-hazard labs that study such nasties as foot-and-mouth disease and Japanese encephalitis from a somewhat isolated island in the north east to Kansas. Doing so is going to act as a tornado magnet, as what self-respecting tornado is going to go after a trainer park when there's a class 4 bio-safety lab to destroy? Of course, they'll probably want to house the researchers in temporary housing nearby. [8341]
2009-Jul-27: Slashdot discusses the issue of Copyright of thermodynamic properties (data for equations of state). [8334] [1]
2009-Jul-15: Bill Gates has bought and put the Feynman physics lectures on line. [8266]
2009-Jul-15: Light has been found to exhibit both attractive and repulsive forces. These are separate from the long-known radiation pressure force and act at a right angle to the direction that the light is traveling. [8260]
2009-Jul-13: The Science of Composting is a good introduction to what is happening in your compost pile and who its inhabitants are likely to be. [8259]
2009-Jul-13: Not content with breeding fat mice scientists are now introducing genes from bacteria into mouse livers to convert fat to carbon dioxide. These genes have also been introduced into cultured human cells and found to do the same thing. What happens is an alternate metabolic pathway is introduced which prevents fats from being converted to sugars (for possible storage), rather they are converted directly to CO2. Now what happens to the energy produced by this? Do the cells get hot? Do Eskimos have this ability? [8258]
2009-Jul-08: The VX-200 plasma rocket engine (which is a VASMIR propulsion system) has passed some initial tests. [8245]
2009-Jun-25: It looks like there are three basic human groups after all. However, it looks like the genetic changes that differentiate us are not simple as previously thought. [8192]
2009-Jun-22: Slashdot discusses DIY biology, the next plague could come from your neighbor's garage lab. [8174]
2009-Jun-09: An inflatable tower could reach the edge of space. Don't forget your puncture repair kit and those micro-meteoroids. [8102]
2009-May-25: Perhaps dog breeds should be considered different species. [8034] [1]
2009-May-11: Soy-based toner cartridges, maybe you just eat them afterwards? [7965]
2009-May-11: A lot more ancient texts are being digitized by new scanning techniques. Talk about dumpster diving. [7962]
2009-May-07: So warp drives might just work, but only if done at absolute zero. Perhaps warp drives are not impossible, some models of the time following the big bang suggest that sections of space-time were moving faster that light (hence carrying matter within them at speed greater than light). [7826]
2009-May-06: How to prove that vampires can not exist and other amusing tales of research. The reference to "Cycles of Fear: Periodic Bloodsucking Rates for Vampires" (Journal of Optimization Theory and Application, December 1992) is great. [7948] [1]
2009-May-02: Adding titanium to artificial materials can greatly increase their strength. [7930]
2009-Apr-28: What is the shape of the Earth? The oblate spheroid approximation improves accuracy greatly. [7915]
2009-Apr-28: The cost of selection and administration of research grants can be more than the grants being given out, so why bother reviewing applications from qualified scientists? [7914] [1]
2009-Apr-27: A Spanish team have managed to identify a parasite that is wiping out honeybees and they have successfully treated infected hives. [7908]
2009-Apr-12: Wired writes about the many civilian uses that nuclear bombs have been put to. [7863]
2009-Mar-26: From the "dog ate my homework" department comes the tale of how shrimp ate the climate change experiment. Discussed here on Slashdot. [7794]
2009-Mar-26: Apparently methane trapping hydrate formations will absorb CO2 and the CO2 will replace the methane allowing the methane to be extracted. [7795]
2009-Mar-24: Gravity waves might be reflected by superconducting sheets. [7777]
2009-Mar-13: tappy is a program for analysis of tidal water level changes. [7729]
2009-Mar-13: A magnetic spin battery effect has been discovered. Currently this is at a very small scale. [7728]
2009-Mar-11: The National Ignition Facility has fired a 192-beam laser pulse that provided 80 KJ of energy to their fusion target. So working fusion must be about 20 years away. Still. [7714]
2009-Mar-09: Monitoring Earth's climate from the ground level by a large sensor network. What other uses will this be extended to? [7710]
2009-Mar-09: At last, a leisure suit that will never get wet (no matter how many drinks get split on it), well currently just the fabric has been made and its based on nanotech. Another company is going to produce swim-wear that does not get wet. [7260]
2009-Mar-09: Timetric is a web site that provides time series analysis and recording of data. [7709]
2009-Feb-22: The Science Commons project is trying to publish raw scientific data for all to use. [7620]
2009-Feb-02: A proposal for a fusion-powered, interstellar probe. [7520]
2009-Feb-02: Were early humans in Malaysia 1.8 million years ago? [7516]
2009-Jan-21: A USB digital microscope from Brando, for about $75. [7463] [1]
2009-Jan-17: From the "yummy" department: future astronauts may survive on eating silkworms. [7449]
2008-Dec-23: From the "Jurassic Park" department: DNA matching blood from inside a mosquito that was found in a stolen car has been used to trap the car thief. [7381] [1]
2008-Dec-19: The Journal of RNA Biology is going to require that authors submit a Wikipedia page that summarizes their work, which will be peer-reviewed prior to publication on Wikipedia. An interesting approach to getting more peer-reviewed content onto Wikipedia. [7371]
2008-Dec-18: Drillers looking for geothermal energy in Hawaii have hit an active magma chamber. Good bye Hawaii. [7365] [1]
2008-Dec-11: A research group in Japan claims to have produced images received directly from the brain, next step would be to apply this to border crossings... [7332] [1]
2008-Dec-08: Another molecule has been found that could function like DNA and RNA, this is called PNA - peptide nucleic acid. [7306]
2008-Nov-21: It is starting to look like we might be able to recreate the woolly mammoth through DNA extracted from remaining tissues. [7248]
2008-Nov-20: New eyes have been regrown from stem cells in frogs, a long way from mammals but its a start. [7247]
2008-Nov-18: A new technique has been found to create anti-matter positrons using a laser. [7226]
2008-Nov-13: Research into research findings has found that many published findings are false. [7210]
2008-Nov-13: Proteins that control the evolution of organisms have been discovered. How long before athletes start taking these in the search for better performance? [7206]
2008-Nov-12: Genes many work differently than currently thought, they might be a lot more complex. [7200]
2008-Nov-12: The Maldives are preparing to be flooded by global warming. [7199]
2008-Nov-11: The Hyperion Power Module is a micro nuclear reactor capable of powering 10,000 homes for 10 years on a single supply of fuel. That works out at $250 per home per year which is a lot less than most people pay of electricity these days. So what's the catch, do they charge you $250 million at the end to dispose of it? Or is their idea of a single home something like 100kWh per month? [7193]
2008-Nov-05: Frozen mice have been cloned. [7156]
2008-Oct-26: The bar-tailed godwit has been found to migrate (between Alaska and New Zealand) 11200km in non-stop flight, something the Arctic Tern also does. It is thought that the godwit does not feed during this flight, but that seems rather far-fetched to me. [7097]
2008-Oct-22: Geoengineering to cool the Earth, if we cannot reduce global warming by cutting back can we control it by more active means? Seems to me that building large solar power plants would achieve a lot of cooling by capturing solar energy and converting it to electricity rather than letting that sunlight warm the planet. If some of the electricity were used to facilitate processes that need energy input (such as CO2 extraction from the atmosphere) then there should be an overall net reduction in the heating of the Earth. [7070]
2008-Oct-14: Black silicon, formed by adding sulfur atoms into silicon could bring us photo sensors that are 100 to 500 times more sensitive. It may also improve solar cells in the future. [7019]
2008-Oct-01: A new device that actively removes C02 from the atmosphere has been developed in Canada. This will remove about a ton of C02 for every 100kW hour of energy input. [6956]
2008-Sep-30: Sea bed methane emissions on the Siberian shelf are thought to come from hydrates. These might be a serious global warming issue. [6951]
2008-Sep-28: Einstein once designed a refrigeration cycle that needed no moving parts. There is some work underway now to search for a better set of fluids for it to use to improve its efficiency. [6940]
2008-Sep-24: From the Red Dwarf Science lab ancient yeast used to brew beer, now who would want to be the first to drink beer brewed from yeast extracted from a 45 million year old weevil? This sounds like something Kryton would have prepared for Lister's dinner (remember the space weevils served as jumbo king prawns?). [6915]
2008-Sep-18: Stanford is going to offer some free courses in Computer Science and Robotics. [6873]
2008-Sep-13: Magnetic field refrigeration (here on Slashdot and here on Engadget) uses a fero-polymer that becomes ordered when a magnetic field is applied (thus releasing heat) and getting cooler, then when the field is released the polymer can pick up more heat from its surroundings, cooling them. The same sort of thing should be possible with polar molecules that align in an electric field, like those found in LCDs. [6849]
2008-Sep-03: Perhaps monogamy could be genetic? [6788]
2008-Aug-29: Nuclear Decay May Vary With Earth-Sun Distance, a new force at work or just a new role for a known force being recognized at last? And what about all those atomic clocks, are they beating at different rates as we spin round the sun? [6765]
2008-Aug-22: 2008 is the coldest year yet this century. [6726]
2008-Aug-21: An Australian has developed a way to make solar cells in a pizza oven, to provide third world countries with access to less expensive solar power. Of course she should have developed a technique to use a tandoori oven or a clay pot kiln as not may third world countries have masses of pizza ovens installed - just joking! [6716] [1]
2008-Aug-13: A new loop in the carbon cycle has been uncovered, turns out the deserts of the world have a significant role in reclaiming carbon from the atmosphere. Perhaps there is some catalytic system like the air purifying concrete or pollution-cutting asphalt taking place here? [6643]
2008-Aug-13: In the evolution of humans, did the discovery of cooking cause our brains to grow or did a bigger brain cause us to crave BBQ? [6674]
2008-Aug-11: The measures being put into place in Beijing for the 2008 Olympics to improve air quality may be the subject of some interesting future research around global warming. [6666]
2008-Aug-10: A new refrigeration system based on polar polymers that change their state from disorganized to organized on the application of an electric field has been demonstrated. [6660]
2008-Jul-28: OpenWetWare a site for sharing information amongst workers in the biology and biological engineering fields. [6595]
2008-Jul-26: NASA has opened its space image libraries to the public as a single site called NASA Images. [6583] [1]
2008-Jul-23: A 37 year long experiment has solved the problem of toxic algae blooms. The cause of these is elevated phosphorus. The effect of nitrogen levels has also been investigated and found not to be a cause, so attempts to control nitrogen levels will not help. [6564]
2008-Jul-20: Another blow has been dealt against cold fusion. [6551]
2008-Jul-01: The Federation of American Scientists have released a video game that is intended to teach immunology to high school students. [6458]
2008-Jun-20: All trees around the world [6382]
2008-Jun-15: Genetic building blocks have been found in meteorites which, because of the isotopes of carbon used in them, must have an extraterrestrial origin. [6343]
2008-Jun-10: A new process that keeps the fibers in paper small can result in it having a tensile strength greater than cast iron. [6310]
2008-Jun-06: The Illustrated Guide to Home Chemistry Experiments from MAKE Magazine (ISBN: 978-0596514921, discussed here on Slashdot. [6298]
2008-Jun-04: Does antimatter fall up or down? My bet is on it falling up (being repelled by the gravity of regular matter). [6276]
2008-May-27: Focus Fusion which is based on an electric field containment system is getting some funding for its next phase of research. [6236]
2008-May-26: Talk of a successful cold fusion experiment by Yoshiaki Arata in Japan. A bit more here on Engadget. The source article includes some comments, one of which links back to this video (which though sensationalist, might be worth a watch). [6218]
2008-May-24: Danel Burd a 16 year old Waterloo Collegiate Institute student has discovered two bacteria that can eat some plastics. The end of the world is neigh. [6219]
2008-May-20: Jurassic Park is taking its first baby steps, parts of the Tasmanian Tiger have been expressed in a mouse embryo. [6196]
2008-May-13: Lectures on the Frontiers of Physics are provided online by the Outreach Department of Canada's Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics. [6146]
2008-May-04: High-strength magnetic ball bearings (from TheNeoCube.com) could make for a fascinating toy. [6045] [1]
2008-Apr-28: The free text book market is developing slowly, this article mentions some of the players. [5985]
2008-Apr-26: A new super lens has been developed that allows microwaves to be focused to a point 20 times smaller than a conventional lens (i.e. past the diffraction limit). This technology could make microwave power and information transfer feasible in a small device. It might also be something that could be scaled up for applications like weapons or even space to ground applications. [5977] [1]
2008-Apr-22: Some scientists are using wikis to publish or pre-publish and review papers. [5947]
2008-Apr-18: Birds may be exploiting the quantum Zeno effect in their magnetic navigation sense. If this is true, then a new way of controlling certain chemical reactions might just have been invented. [5848]
2008-Apr-17: Darwin's Private Papers get released to the net. [5843]
2008-Apr-15: Using high power lasers to trigger the formation of lightning strikes within clouds. [5805]
2008-Mar-24: A study of scientists in the Czech Republic found that scientific work output (papers) was inversely proportional to beer input (drinking). This has been analyzed by another scientist and found to be severely flawed. [5305] [1]
2008-Mar-20: A room-temperature superconductor made out of compressed silicon and hydrogen has been found. [5312]
2008-Mar-16: A new wheat fungus has spread from Uganda in 1999 to Iran in 2007, as it affects 80% of wheat varieties it could prove a serious hunger problem. Now why is wheat being grown in Uganda, sounds like a good way of making new diseases? [5294]
2008-Mar-06: JoVE, the Journal of Visualized Experiments is a YouTube for bio-science. [5229]
2008-Mar-04: Finally a study that finds that daylight savings time wastes energy. In this study they are looking at home electric meters for the state of Indiana and they don't even include the cost of replacing older VCRs that don't understand the new DST dates. [5216]
2008-Mar-03: Wired Science picks the 10 best chemistry videos from YouTube. [5207]
2008-Feb-25: Phun is a 2D physics simulator, it gets some mention here including some YouTube references. [5153] [1]
2008-Feb-09: The Thor Shield is a form of body armor designed to stop Taser bolts, I guess the idea is to prevent the bolt from reaching the skin and, probably, to short it out. A layer or two of corrugated cardboard covered in tin foil might do the trick as well. [5069]
2008-Jan-28: The US Navy now has a 32MJ rail gun in test. They hope to place larger weapons with a 64MJ capacity on board ships in the future. This is capable of firing rounds at speeds of up to Mach 8. [5006]
2007-Nov-11: The toy called Bindeez was recalled because its beads (which are coated in a compound that becomes a glue when wetted) are toxic if ingested. The really odd thing about this is that the glue changes to a toxic compound through a chemical reaction in the digestive system. [4062]
2007-Oct-16: A new plastic that can be used as a membrane to allow CO2 to be extracted from air or water to be purified. [3446]
2007-Oct-05: Researchers have developed a super-strong transparent plastic that incorporates clay nanosheets for the strength of steel. [2601]
2007-Oct-03: Improved leak detection for space ships, this detects the propagation of vibrations along the surface of the craft. [2434]
2007-Oct-03: UC Berkeley is now posing video taped course lectures to YouTube. [2433]
2007-Sep-30: Flash Evaporation, a process by which a liquid is turned into vapour by reducing its pressure suddenly. [2414]
2007-Sep-30: An experimental test of a tethered descent from space failed after the rope got stuck part way through unwinding. [2405]
2007-Sep-26: A meteorite stuck the ground in Peru on 15-Sept-2007 creating a 100 foot wide crater and now local villagers are reporting headaches and vomiting. Apparently these symptoms were from arsenic which was released from the underground water that got exposed and vapourized. [2223] [1]
2007-Sep-21: The nuclear powered Orion spaceship design from 1958 has been revised after 49 years. [2233]
2007-Sep-21: The Heinlein archives have been scanned and are being put online here. This is a commercial venture, but at least it means you can actually get some of the harder to find works. [2231]
2007-Sep-19: A journalist has been given the chance to test the new Pain Ray Gun, pity they only it on a finger. [2219]
2007-Sep-17: Someday a photonic engine may propel space craft, a prototype that is powerful enough to do some maneuvering has now been developed. [2144]
2007-Sep-13: The Starship estimation method for the generalized lambda distribution. There's not a lot on the web about the generalized lambda distribution and this is about the only code I've been able to find (apart from some written for use in the "R" environment). [1883] [1]
2007-Sep-09: Research libraries in the US are defending the case for open access to scientific research. [1858]
The bacterium Caulobacter crescentus may make the world's strongest glue, and it works on wet surfaces. [5928]
Plastics with magnetic properties [5927]
Sam Barros' PowerLabs! Has some odd science experiments... [5893]
Methane hydrates, this time off Vancouver Island [5594]
The Encyclopedia of Life is a project to catalog all species of life on Earth. It went online in Feb 2008. [2278] [1]
A good introduction to the discrete Fourier transform (and the discrete sine and cosine transforms). This also includes code for the the classic FFT which is much faster. I would guess the same general (but slow as its NxN) algorithm could be used with other orthogonal basis functions to implement other transforms. [1857]
Some moray eels have two sets of jaws, rather like the classic Alien. [1856]
Slashdot discusses numerically approximating the wave equation. [1855]
A new kind of liquid crystal display that only uses reflected light has been invented (Aug'07) [1854]
The Stellarator is a new design for fusion reactors that aims to improve the essential containment of plasma [1853]
Aug'07, by using a special lens to reverse the Casmir force scientists have created a way of levitating objects, initial application might be to make nano machine parts move without friction. Discussed here on Slashdot. [1852]
The Science Videos search engine called Science Hack, specializes in videos on science that have been reviewed. Another attempt at doing this sort of thing is being sponsored by the National Science Foundation, this the www.scivee.tv. [1851]
The wandering rubber ducks escape their frozen bondage to finally complete their journey [1850]
Carbon capture technology, to directly extract carbon dioxide from the air. [1849]
The US Navy is supporting some fusion research by Dr. Bussard (who gave a presentation about this at Google) [1848]
A high school science fair project examined vitamin C content in some drinks and discovered that some which were advertised as being high in vitamin C contained none. [1847]
Using a 2kW laser (helium neon laser) to heat coffee [1846]
A material tougher than diamond has been developed [1845]
MIT's OpenCourseWare program makes lectures, assignments and exams available to the public on the web [1844]
Advances in detection of civilizations in space by looking for radio emmisions [1843]
Slashdot discusses traffic jams, in particular the self-sustaining, standing wave type that will spontaneously form on freeways for no apparent reason. In a later article researchers in Japan set up an experiment where they reproduced this sort of effect on a test track with real cars and drivers. [1842] [1]
Light has been slowed to about 6km/s [1841]
Future ships could float on bubbles to reduce their drag [1840]
Using wave power to desalinate salt water [1839]
A South African bacteria that lives without sunlight in its eco system - this ecosystem is powered by nuclear fission. [1838]
Obtaining thrust from microwaves, could be a way of driving space craft in the future without needing to carry any reaction mass, sounds improbable but who knows... [1837]
Space on a shoestring, plus a discussion of how well cell phones work (or don't work) at high altitudes [1836]
Cleaning up uranium waste with the bacterium Shewanella Oneidensis [1835]
liquid armor will be added to improve bulletproof vests [1834]
radioactive half lives may be modified by encasing the radioactive isotope in metal and then cooling to cryogenic temperatures [1833]
A synthetic fluid with a 58F boiling point is being considered for low-temperature solar powered applications (like air conditioning) [1832]
A second code has been discovered in DNA that might control access to the DNA [1831]
Gold Mining Bacteria, they can produce tiny grains of gold [1830]
Some of the fundamental constants of physics (such as the speed of light) are now being seen to change with time. [1829]
Using an EEG cap to link a human brain with a computer, and to enable the human to act as a "visual data front end processor" for the computer, thereby allowing a human to solve the hardest part of image processing and recognition. [1828]
String Theory, the current "one theory that explains everything, but which we cannot experimentally verify or explain" is being called a disaster for physics. [1827]
Accidential discoveries [1826]
Global warming and Al Gore's new film: An Inconvenient Truth, discussed on Slashdot. [1825]
Using nanotech to reduce the cost of water desalination. [1824]
A better process for extracting titanium may reduce the price of this material by a factor of 10. [1823]
Spinning a bucket of water quickly can produce a vortex that has unusual structure, such as 3, 4, or 5 sides. [1822]
Artificial gravity, produced by a spinning superconductor [1821]
Using Google to search for impact craters [1820]
Powering a glider via a laser, the objective would be to make a permanently airborne platform possible. Of course if this could be done with a commercial aircraft then the cost of flying could be reduced by not needing to carry such a large fuel payload for thousands of miles. [1819]
Could travel at near the speed of light actually be possible? [1818]
Could a meteor have rained extraterrestrial microbes on Kerala India in 2001? This gets some more discussion here, and there might actually be samples of this. [1817]
Warp engines might be for real, the idea being that it might be possible to generate gravitational fields with intense magnetism. [1816]
Genetically modified crops are cross polinating with weeds and transferring herbicide resistance to them, making new strains of super weeds - has the Day of the Triffids arrived? [1815]
The European Space Agency is looking at a better plasma drive unit. [1814]
Creating artificial tornadoes and then collecting energy from them [1813]
The ocean currents in the North Atlantic are changing rapidly, could this be the beginings of Europe's next ice age? [1812]
More on global warming [1811]
A rail gun that fires nails, assembled from a glass tube and the parts of several disposable cameras. Another that is a lot more substantial [1810]
An alternative to the Tokamak Fusion Reactor, this is based on a hydrogen-boron fusion reaction [1809]
Large storms (like huricanes) can be likened to partical accelerators [1808]
New developments in plasma propulsion systems using a magnetic nozzle may cut fuel costs for space travel by 90% [1807]
Resilin, a super-elastic material used by insects has now been synthesised [1806]
Detection of explosives now down to the picogram level [1805]
How we got here, by Andy Kessler [1804]
Fusion, fusion, everywhere, in Sept'05 it was reported that deuterium fusion could be taking place in lightning bolts. [1803]
Creating artificial proteins [1802]
Trigonometry without the sines and cosines [1801]
Making ice without electricity using the Ranque-Hilsch vortex tube (which is also used for uranium enrichment) [1800]
A nanotech coating that prevents fogging of glass [1799]
Aggregated diamond nanorods form a new material harder than diamond [1798]
The human brain is still evolving [1797]
Could Oregon be about to sprout another volcano? [1796]
Maybe Aliens was not too far fetched afterall... how about a parasite that controls the mind of an insect? Maybe this is what's behind the lemmings and cliffs? [1795]
A potential new test for Mad Cow disease [1794]
The technology behind the plasma display [1793]
Another odd way to achieve nuclear fusion. [1792]
How to build a wimshurst electrostatic machine [1791]
Build a very low power solar cell in your kitchen out of copper sheet, this would be a good science fair type project. Here is another, easier to make, variation. [1790]
Build your own hovercraft, suitable for use over a smooth floor [1789]
An article claiming that light has actually been sped up beyond the speed of light, but mainly discussing recent advances in slowing it down. [1788]
Sheets created out of nanotubes [1787]
Apparently the digits of PI are not as random as was once thought. [1786]
Obtaining fusion through intense electric fields that strip the electrons from deuterium atoms allowing them to fuse at near room temperature. Cold fusion again? [1785]
Why some popcorn does not pop - leaky kernels [1784]
Possibly the first lab-made nano black-hole [1783]
The big earthquake of Dec 26, 2004. India seems to have been hit but news is sparse. Missing villages. Mainly fishermen. Lonely planet. Scotland on Sunday. The European Space Agency has some satelite pictures of this. And there are some very good before/after comparisons here. This map shows that most of the Indian east coast is 2000km from the epicentre, while Shrilanka is about 1600-1800km away, so the potential for damage along the Indian east coast is still very high. Here are some before/after shots of a few points on the Indian coast. Locating the earthquake by listening to sound waves in the ocean. In Aug'06 satellite data was used to see gravity changes caused by this quake. [1782]
A new mag-beam propulsion system may bring faster interplanetary space travel. [1781]
How about a liquid that turns into a solid when heated? [1780]
Laser-guided, self-assembling, nano-structures could be one way of making new super materials, 7nm at a time. [1779]
The NIH in the USA is proposing that all research results from work it funds must be freely distributed [1778]
Cold Fusion is making some progress. [1777]
The science of word recognition [1776]
The first pratical magnet made of plastic [1775]
Betting on Science, so what are the odds? [1774]
Something's wrong with gravity [1773]
A way to make coral reefs grow faster [1772]
At last, transparent aluminum, this is being called a new state of matter. [1771]
Should SETI be looking for Lasers instead? [1770]
Nuclear power cleanups can be very expensive. [1769]
Is the earth's magnetic field about to flip? [1768]
Deep sea drilling gets a new drill ship. [1767]
Could an end to aging be in sight? [1766]
Blimps in Space, maybe Jules Verne had the right idea after all [1765]
Now the first real use of stem-cells is at hand: growing relacement teeth. Once this procedure starts happening in public the politics of stem cell research are going to change dramatically as there will be the very real possibility of growing replacement organs and even limbs. [1764]
An MIT Engineering text on Heat Transfer has been made available for free download. It's called A Heat Transfer Textbook, by John H. Lienhard. [1763]
Global dimming, perhaps a more pressing problem than global warming? [1762]
Slashdot discusses an anti-virus to HIV, the UNAIDS 2003 report on the epidemic. In summary its estimated that 40 million people have it world wide, and more than half of those are in the sub-Saharan Africa region. But now south and south-east Asia could have up to 20% of the cases. [1761]
Fun with really large Fresnel lenses [1760]
A Slashdot article on making science and math kid-friendly [1759]
Mining gold with plants, well extracting trace amounts of gold from mine waste actually [1758]
The UK has done a study on the flooding effects of global warming, but will all this actually lead to a new ice age? [1757]
New satellite data shows earth's temperature as rising 0.43C per decade recently [1756]
Liquid self-hardening body armor [1755]
Removing the boom from supersonic flight [1754]
Da Vinci designed a clockwork car, and now its being built [1753]
Slashdot discusses the return of cold fusion in 2004 it seems that there really is some new effect out there [1752]
A liquid that will not get things wet, application could be in fire extinguishing systems [1751]
Fusion in a Jar, this time by Sonoluminescence [1750]
Free Calculus text books, plus MIT's OpenCourseWare, and CMU's Open Learning Initiative [1749]
Experimenting with kilovolts and kiloamps [1748]
The air-submarine, a new approach to lighter than air transport [1747]
Powering fluorescent lights from the electromagnetic fields under power transmission lines, makes for a form of art. [1746]
Science is in the eyes of the beholder, the Bush adminsitration is rewriting things [1745]
Exposure to low level magnetic fields may cause cell DNA damage (abstract here) [1744]
Ten technologies that refuse to die. Perhaps there are some lessons to be learned here? [1743]
Stephen Wolfram's A New Kind of Science is now online [1742]
A Slashdot review of a book called The Golden Ratio, by Mario Livio, ISBN 0767908155. [1741]
How to make anti-bubbles, that is bubbles with the air on the outside [1740]
Pulse jet engines, lots of different designs [1739]
The strange relationships between sun spots, flares and the magnetic skin of the sun [1738]
The Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) is another "intrinsically safe" design for nuclear power. More on intrinsically safe reactor designs. [1737]
The Strouhal Number, and what it has to do with the air speed of an unladened swallow [1736]
testing the Starship Enterprise in a window tunnel, at Mach 5 no less! [1735]
Methane bubbles could sink ships, the real Bermuda Triangle theory? [1734]
NASA has demonstrated a model airplane powered by a beam of laser light [1733]
The Ig Nodel Awards for 2003 have been published [1732]
fly through the universe, to the earth, and then to an atom in a tree [1731]
How long is it safe to leave food on the floor? [1730]
How much does the water in a cloud weigh? [1729]
True synthetic silk may soon be possible [1728]
How to make diamonds, and what will become of this monopoly [1727]
How water striders run on water [1726]
Enginerring from Science Fiction [1725]
Pulsed power driven fusion reactions [1724]
The Murchison Meteorite contains a lot of strange amino acids [1723]
The speed of gravity has been measured, confirming Einstein's assumption that it would be the same as the speed of light [1722]
Fusion in you basement? The Farnsworth Fusor (see the site: www.fusor.net). This gets some coverage from the Wall Street Journal and discussion here on Slashdot. [1721]
High frequency electrical fields used to melt snow and ice have a number of interesting applications, including airplaine de-icing [1720]
The Creative Commons project, Copyright protection made simple? Now if there was only a way to do this for patents... [1719]
Just who owns Science anyway? [1718]
The hydrino rocket, sounds like more cold fusion [1717]
Life at extreme depths and in frozen ice [1716]
Has Quark Matter struck earth? Sounds like something from the book "Artifact" by Gregory Benford [1715]
Could there be life in the clouds of Venus? [1714]
Science Toys, fun and easy to build experiments [1713]
A Slashdot article on science demos, the suggestion of using a corn starch solution to demonstrate a rheopectic fluid is interesting, especially the idea that you could pour it from a height (5 foot) onto a table and it would bounce off the surface like a solid. [1712]
Chemistry demos, for all ages [1711]
Underwater gliders, when will this become an sport? [1710]
There's a large lake under the Antarctic ice cap, what ancient microbes await us in its depths (this is getting to sound like a Dr. Who episode) [1709]
Perhaps the new ice age will fall from the sky (on a clear day yet)? [1708]
Are we on the brink of a new ice age? [1707]
West Nile virus is showing up in breast milk [1706]
Why do some people live for a long time with AIDs? [1705]
Liquid Metal, a new approach to alloys results in something superstrong [1704]
Microwave oven madness, using one to melt silver and iron [1703]
T-Ray imaging - sometimes called sub-optics [1702]
Can superconductors block gravity? [1701]
The least dense solids are aerogels, which date back to the 1930's. Here are some pictures taken at NASA. And here is Aerogel Super Insulation from Aspen Aerogels Inc. [1700]
The Periodic Table in its true form [1699]
Fresh sushi, NASA style? [1698]
Carbon foam used as a great heat conductor [1697]
ARDA EHD/EAD projects, the idea being to propel an airplane by electrostatic field effects [1696]
Here's how some real neutron generators work [1695]
Fusion Fun with Collapsing Bubbles? Another take on it here. I wonder if this will work with Champagne? Certainly sounds like the return of "cold fusion", only time will tell. [1694]
Science fun with magnets, including a rail gun [1693]
The Niels Bohr Archive [1692]
The Second Law of Thermodynamics now has a web site. But the first law does not, even the domain name is not squatted! (as of 24 Jan 02). [1691]
The biosphere project and a new successor called Eden. [1690]
Star Trek must have some influence at NASA, now they have an anti-matter drive project, of course the big problem is to collect enough to do something useful with [1689]
This NIST standard resolves the issue of what kB, MB and GB mean in the computer world. In a nut shell, they mean just what they should according to the S.I. unit system (1,000 bytes, 1,000,000 bytes and 1,000,000,000 bytes) and they go on to define KiB, MiB and GiB to mean 1024 bytes, 1024*1024 bytes and 1024*1024*1024 bytes. [1688]
a new twist on game preserves? [1687]
building your own oscilloscope, based on a PC [1686]
Cloning hs been making the news, but this (mixed species cloning) will be the last straw for many. [1685]
Thermoelectric converters, still need a pretty hot heat source but they are now down to the 200C to 450C range [1684]
Tiny gas turbines, eventually to replace batteries? [1683]
Physics for Game Developers, an O'Reilly book [1682]
Find dinosaurs (and their bones) at the Royal Tyrrell Museum in Alberta [1681]
A satellite made from parts found at Radio Shack? [1680]
Eric Weisstein's World of Mathematics, this resource has a lot of math on-line with links to relevant references [1679]
Did a meteor end a number of ancient civilizations in the Middle East? [1678]
How to fly to mars, according to NASA [1677]
Bat wings for your sailboat [1676]
Make a rocket car from old plastic pop bottles [1675]
How fast can a man on a bike go? [1674]
will the British be the first to working Fusion? [1673]
some cold fusion info [1672]
ZZZ online has all sorts of odd technology links [1671]
The University of Florida's Lightning Research Group, uses rockets to direct lightning. [1670]
high speed photography site [1669]
fun with chemistry, or maybe just pyromania, and movies of more fun. [1668]
how telescopes work [1667]
anti-gravity in a super conductor experiment? [1666]
home built pulse jet engined go cart [1665]
wild one man flying machine from SoloTrek [1664]
pyro.com likes to play with fireworks. [1663]
a baseball pitching robot, but does it chew tobacco and spit? [1662]
how the Super Soaker type water guns work [1661]
unit of measure conversion web page [1660]
go fly a kite, Egyptian style, the pyramidiots now have their own web site [1659]
anti matter propulsion system being developed [1658]
Gravity is not working? Aparently the Pioneer 10 and 11 probes are also being affected in an unexpected way. [1657]
long distance model airplane (11 pounds and 1 horse power peak, plus a gallon of fuel to cross the Atlantic ocean) [1656]
very host (2 billon Kelvin) plasma has been produced by the Z machine. Much hotter than expected, plus there are signs that it output more energy than was input - perhaps a sign of "hot fusion" this time? [1654]
house-sized nuclear reactors? And the tale of the radioactive boy scout (which simply has to be an urban legend), which also appears here [1653]
The US Navy has been researching cold fusion, they have detected emission of energetic charged particles from a palladium-deuterium coated wire that is subjected to an electric or magnetic field. [1652]
Perhaps Cold Fusion in a Breadbox? Tabletop Fusion has been confirmed. [1651]
more evidence for tabletop fusion [1650]
Excess Heat a book on cold fusion [1649]
archive of electronic scientific journals [1648]
Mathematics made simple ? "A Century of Controversy Over the Foundations of Mathematics" and the Omega number (a Pi for the new century) [1647]
build your own X-Ray machine [1646]
physics for the amateur pool player [1645]
DIY Rail Gun project, and here is another one. [1644]
Matches , and how they work [1643]

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