A Welsh View

Researchers - Astrology Is Bunk

A 50-year-study nstudy of 2,000 people born minutes apart has proved what may people have thought for a long time - astrology is rubbish!

The babies were originally recruited as part of a medical study begun in London in 1958 into how the circumstances of birth can affect future health. More than 2,000 babies born in early March that year were registered and their development monitored at regular intervals.

Researchers looked at more than 100 different characteristics, including occupation, anxiety levels, marital status, aggressiveness, sociability, IQ levels and ability in art, sport, mathematics and reading - all of which astrologers claim can be gauged from birth charts.

The scientists failed to find any evidence of similarities between the "time twins", however. They reported in the current issue of the Journal of Consciousness Studies: "The test conditions could hardly have been more conducive to success . . . but the results are uniformly negative."

19-Year-Old Is World's Youngest Professor

A 19-year-old woman who was appointed as a full-time faculty Professor at Konkuk University in Seoul, South Korea has been recognised as the world's youngest professor.

Alia Sabur was enrolled at a university at age 10 and played clarinet with a symphony orchestra at 11.

Sabur was three days shy of her 19th birthday in February when she became a professor at Konkuk University, in Seoul. The previous record was held by a student of physicist Isaac Newton, Colin Maclaurin, who set the mark in 1717.

"He's in every calculus textbook there is," she said. "When I found out about it, I thought, 'I can't replace him.' But it's been 300 years and someone had to replace him, so why not me?"

She will be doing some classroom instruction, but mostly will focus on research into developing nanotubes for use as cellular probes, which could help discover cures for diseases such as cancer, she said.

Down the road, she would like to develop a noninvasive blood-glucose meter for people with diabetes, she said. Her mother, Julia, and her father, Mark, both have diabetes.

Sabur said classroom teaching in Seoul will be challenging because she doesn't speak Korean. "I can speak math and music," she said.

Link

Space Junk Map

The European Space Agency (ESA) has released a computer-generated picture that shows Earth surrounded by thousands and perhaps millions of pieces of space junk.

ESA says the number of objects in Earth's atmosphere has risen steadily increasing by 200 per year on average and that there are now 600 working satellites.

Collisions, explosions and lost or discarded material from space flights and rockets has resulted in the atmosphere resembling a junk yard with potentially millions of pieces of metal travelling in permanent orbit 20,000 miles above the Earth.

Link

How The Space Shuttle Is Assmebled

A BMW forum has posted a great set of photos showing the Space Shuttle gets assembled and makes its way to the launch pad. [via]

Japanese Scientists, Origami Masters Hope to Launch Paper Airplane From Space

Japanese scientists and origami masters are hoping to launch a paper airplane from space and learn from its trip back to Earth.

Shinji Suzuki, a professor at Tokyo University's Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics, believes that a successful flight from space by an origami plane could have far-reaching implications for the design of re-entry vehicles or space probes for upper atmospheric exploration.

In a test outside Tokyo in early February, a prototype about 2.8 inches long and 2 inches wide survived Mach 7 speeds and broiling temperatures up to 446 degrees Fahrenheit in a hypersonic wind tunnel — conditions meant to approximate what the plane would face entering Earth's atmosphere.

Having survived the 12-second test with no major damage or burns, the tiny plane theoretically could get back to Earth because re-entry from outer space involves passing through several layers that last only a few seconds each, said Osamu Imamura, a scientist who works with Suzuki.

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, accepted it Wednesday for three years of feasibility studies and promised up to $300,000 in funding per year.

[via]

Video: Take A Ride On A Space Shuttle

Dino-Era Feathers Found Encased in Amber

Seven 100-million-year-old feathers have been found perfectly preserved in amber in western France.

The feathers have features of both feather-like fibers found with some two-legged dinosaurs known as theropods and of modern bird feathers and they could fill in a key gap in the puzzle of how dinosaurs gave rise to birds.

The find provides a clear example "of the passage between primitive filamentous down and a modern feather," said team member Didier Néraudeau of the University of Rennes in France.

The study team isn't sure yet whether the feathers belonged to a dino or a bird.

But fossil teeth from two dino families thought to have been feathered were excavated from rocks just above the layer that contained the amber, Perrichot said.

"It is entirely plausible that the feathers come from a dinosaur rather than from a bird," he said.

Link

The Earth and Moon as Seen From Mars

This photograph of the Earth and Moon was taken by the HiRISE telescope from a distance of 142 million kilometres. The HiRISE camera is the most powerful telescope to have left Earth orbit. [via]

The White Glove Tracking Project

"On May 4th, 2007, we asked internet users to help isolate Michael Jackson's white glove in all 10,060 frames of his nationally televised landmark performance of Billy Jean. 72 hours later 125,000 gloves had been located."

One of the results of this project is the Giant White Glove video in which Michael Jackson's glove has been enlarged. For most of the video it does actually look like he is wearing a giant glove. Read more about the project here.

Top 10 Amazing Chemistry Videos

Wired has posted 10 amazing chemistry videos.

Video: Lunar Eclipse Time Lapse

Stunning! [via]

50ft Reptile Is Biggest Found

A 50ft reptilee that ruled the sea 150million years ago has been found on the Nowegian island of Spitsbergen. The pliosaur — whose giant teeth could have crunched a car in half — is the biggest marine reptile ever found. Pliosaurs had short necks, massive jaws and two sets of powerful 10ft flippers. Link

Giant "Frog From Hell" Fossil Found in Madagascar

An illustration depicts the ancient frog species Beelzebufo, or "devil frog," staring down the largest frog species living in Madagascar today. A pencil is included for scale.

Scientists recently identified Beelzebufo from a 70-million-year-old fossil found in Madagascar, and experts think it may have been the largest frog that ever lived. Link [via]

Hubble May Have Found Farthest Galaxy

Astronomers have glimpsed what may be the farthest galaxy we've ever seen.

Images taken with the Hubble Space Telescope have revealed the galaxy at almost 13 billion light-years away, making it the strongest candidate for the most distant galaxy ever seen.

The young galaxy, called A1689-zD1, was born about 700 million years after the Big Bang that scientists think created the universe. For most of its early life, the universe languished in "dark ages" when matter in the expanding universe cooled and formed clouds of hydrogen. Eventually matter began to clump into stars and galaxies that radiated light, heating up the universe and clearing the fog.

Scientists think this newly discovered galaxy may have been one of the first to form and help end the dark ages. Link

All Blue-Eyed People Can Be Traced To One Person

According to a team of researchers from, appropriately enough, Copenhagen University, a single mutation which arose as recently as 6-10,000 years ago was responsible for all the blue eyed people alive on Earth today. Link

Life On Mars?

Life on Mars? Or just a pile of rocks. [via]

NASA's MESSENGER Rendezouses With Mercury

Launched on August 3rd 2004, NASA's MESSENGER (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging probe) is the first probe to visit Mercury in over 30 years. It has just beamed back images of the planet that can be viewed here. The probe will have two more flybys of Mercury before going into permanent orbit in 2011. Read more at Wikipedia.

The World’s Coolest Solar Collecting Building?

This building in Japan has been constructed by Sanyo and contains over 5,000 solar panels generating over 500,000 KWh of environmentally friendly energy. The 'Solar Ark' contains nearly 500 multi-colored lighting units placed between the various solar panels can be activated to create a variety of shapes and letters on the sides of this enormous structure. Inside the structure is a solar museum with interactive exhibits as well as a solar lab and various meeting rooms for global environmental programs. More pics here.

World's Smallest Explosions?

Could these be the world's smallest explosions? The photo was taken with an electron scanning micrograph by Fanny Beron from the École Polytechnique de Montréal and has won first prize in the "Science as Art" competition. [via]

Japan Opens 'Tallest Lift Tower'

Mitsubishi Electric Corporation has opened what it says is the world's tallest elevator testing tower. The 173m-high (567ft) structure is called Solae and dominates the skyline of Inazawa City. The company says it will use the tower to conduct research into high-speed elevators to serve the next generation of super-tall buildings. Link

Bible Printed Onto Silicon Chip

Israeli scientists have printed the entire Old Testament onto a silicon chip that is only 1/1000th of an inch square—tinier than a pinhead. Scientists wrote the Bible by utilizing a focused ion beam (FIB) generator shooting tiny Gallium ions that etched the manuscript onto a gold surface. View a closeup of the bible here.

Are Whales Related To This Deer-Like Creature?

Is this a long-lost relative of whales, dolphins and porpoises? Professor Hans Thewissen of the Department of Anatomy at Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine in Ohio, US thinks so.

The 48 million-year-old deer-like animal, Indonyus, shares certain anatomical features.

The structures of its skull and ear are similar to those of early whales, and like other animals that spend a lot of time in water, it had thickened bones that provided ballast to keep its feet anchored in shallow water.

"We've found the closest extinct relative to whales and it is closer than any living relative

Link [Image via]

Top Ten Astronomy Pictures of 2007

10 stunning astronomy photographs taken in the past year. [via]

NASA Shuttle Attcked By Giant Spider

Whilst NASA are trying to convince people that a fuel sensor glitch has postponed a shuttle launch, Local6 has the real truth. It was attacked by a giant spider!

Watch the shocking video here. [via]

Dinosaur 'Mummy' Reveals Secrets

A dinosaur 'mummy' that is one of the most complete ever has revealed invaluable information about muscle mass and the look of its scales.

The fossilized duckbilled hadrosaur is so well preserved that scientists have been able to calculate it's muscle mass and discover it was much more muscular than previously thought.

The dinoasaur, a calculated 3.5tons and up to 40ft, might have even been able to outrun predators like the tyrannosaurus rex.

Study of the mummy - which is 65 to 67 million years old - reveals that it was quick and flexible and had skin with scales that might have been striped.

The fossil was found in 1999 in the US state of North Dakota and now is nicknamed “Dakota.”

While called a mummy, the dinosaur body is in fact fossilized into stone - meaning it comes with skin, ligaments, tendons and possibly some internal organs, researchers say.

It's unlikely that you'll be seeing one of these in a 'Jurassic Park' anytime soon as its extremely unlikely that the DNA will have been preserved. Link

Fossilised Scorpion Was Bigger Than A Human

Paleontologists have discovered a giant fossilised claw that once belonged to an 8 foot long sea scorpion. Discovered in Germany by University of Bristol scientists, the 390 mya scorpion is half a yard longer than previous estimates and the largest one ever to have evolved.

The discovery in 390-million-year-old rocks suggests that spiders, insects, crabs and similar creatures were far larger in the past than previously thought, said Simon Braddy, a University of Bristol paleontologist and one of the study's three authors.

"This is an amazing discovery," he said Tuesday.

"We have known for some time that the fossil record yields monster millipedes, super-sized scorpions, colossal cockroaches, and jumbo dragonflies. But we never realized until now just how big some of these ancient creepy-crawlies were," he said.

Link

Moon Probe Captures 'Earth-Rise' In High Definition

A Japanese moon probe has taken some stunning high-definition images of the Earth 'rising' and 'setting'.

The Kaguya spacecraft, also called Selene, has been orbiting 62 miles (100 kilometers) above the moon since Oct. 18.

The new Earth-rise image shows our blue world floating in the blackness of space. Released today, it is a still shot taken from video made by the craft's high-definition television (HDTV) for space.

A second image, taken from a different location in the lunar orbit, has been dubbed Earth-set. A related series of still images shows our planet setting beyond the lunar horizon.

In the Earth-set image, Earth appears upside-down; visible are Australia and Asia. A region near the moon's south pole is seen in the foreground.

Space.com has more images.

Top 10 Strangest Things In Space

From miniature black holes to distortions in the fabric of space-time, from galaxies that are eating each other to matter that can neither be seen nor detected directly...space is full of many strange things. And here are ten of the strangest. Link

10 Bizarre Scientific Papers

10 bizarre scientific papers including "The Effect of Country Music on Suicide", "Pressures Produced When Penguins Poo -- Calculations on Avian Defecation" and "Safe and Painless Manipulation of Penile Zipper Entrapment". [via]

Cassini-Huygens: 10 Years and Going Strong

Ten years ago today, NASA and the European Space Agency launched the Cassini-Huygens spacecraft from Cape Canaveral, Florida. It was the beginning of a 15-year mission to explore Saturn and its moons.

Seven years later in 2004, Cassini entered Saturn's orbit and began delivering stunning images of the planet and its moons.

In December 2004, Cassini jettisoned the Huygens probe, which arrived at Saturn's largest moon, Titan, 22 days later. After orbiting Titan, Huygens landed in January 2005, sending scientists the most-detailed images of Titan's surface.

Ever since, the probe has continued to deliver breathtaking images such as these.

T Rex F Footprint Discovered

Fossil hunter Dr Phil Manning poses next to what he believes is the first tyrannosaurus rex footprint ever discovered.

Dr Manning, from the University of Manchester, found the metre-square impression in Hells Creek, Montana — famed for relics of the seven-ton flesh-eater.

He said: “It could only have been made by a smaller relative or a T Rex.

“The size suggests that it’s more likely to have been the latter.” Link

The First Photo From Space

The image above was taken on October 24th, 1946 by a US-built V2 missile and was the first time Earth had been photographed from space. The missile was launched from the White Sands Missile Range and snapped a new frame every second and a half as the rocket-borne camera climbed straight up. It then fell back to Earth minutes later, slamming into the ground at 500 feet per second. The camera itself was smashed, but the film, protected in a steel cassette, was unharmed.

Air & Space magazine has more images as well as a video.

50 Years Of Space

Popular Science has an interactive chart that shows every space launch ever - all 6,039 of them.

Atlas Of The Visible Universe

This is an atlas of the visible universe (within 14 billion light years). You can zoom in the map all the way down to galaxies within 12.5 light years of Earth.

Eight-Million-Year-Old Bug Is Alive And Growing

An 8-million-year-old bacterium that was extracted from the oldest known ice on Earth is now growing in a laboratory, claim researchers. Taken from ice found between 3 and 5 metres beneath the surface of a glacier in the Beacon and Mullins valleys of Antarctica, the bacterium is not likely to cause human disease. Link

Astronomers Find Largest Exoplanet

A team of astronomers has discovered the largest known planet orbiting another star.

The "transiting" planet - meaning one that passes in front of its parent star as seen from Earth - is about 70% larger than Jupiter.

But the presumed "gas giant" has a much lower mass than Jupiter - the biggest planet in our Solar System - making it of extremely low density.

The planet lies 1,435 light-years away from Earth and is only 4.5 million miles from its parent star which means that the planet is very hot (about 1,327C).

Scientists Breed World’s First Mentally Ill Mouse

Scientists have created the world’s first schizophrenic mice in an attempt to gain a better understanding of the illness. It is believed to be the first time an animal has been genetically engineered to have a mental illness. Animal rights activists have obviously condemned the research.

Megaflood 'Made Island Britain'

New research has suggested that a megaflood some 200,000 years ago caused Britain to become an island.

Britain became separated from mainland Europe after a catastrophic flood some time before 200,000 years ago, a sonar study of the English Channel confirms.

The images reveal deep scars on the Channel bed that must have been cut by a sudden, massive discharge of water.

Scientists tell the journal Nature that the torrent probably came from a giant lake in what is now the North Sea.

Some event - perhaps an earthquake - caused the lake's rim to breach at the Dover Strait, they believe.

Dr Sanjeev Gupta, from Imperial College London, and colleagues say the discharge would have been one of the most significant megafloods in recent Earth history, and provides an explanation for Britain's island status.

13-Gigapixel Photo Of Harlem

An incredibly detailed panorama of Harlem, NY. The image is a composite of 2,045 individual photographs taken on August 13, 2006 over a duration of 2 hours 10 minutes (4:43pm – 6:53pm). It's amazing how far you can zoom in. [via]

Frozen Baby Mammoth

One of the best preserved specimens of frozen mammoth ever discovered is heading it's way to a Japanese university.

The nearly complete body of the female calf is estimated to have been less than one year old before it was preserved in ice about 10,000 years ago.

According to the Russian Tass news agency, a reindeer herder stumbled upon the 130 cm (4 ft 3 in) tall, 50 kg (110 lbs) frozen mammoth in May in an area of permafrost in northwestern Siberia, near the Yuribey River on the Yamal Peninsula, which extends into the Kara Sea. The mammoth, whose trunk and eyes remain intact and which still has some fur on its body.

“This is the first opportunity for anyone to perform an analysis on a complete mammoth body,” says Jikei University professor Naoki Suzuki, “and it should provide a more complete picture of its anatomy and how it lived.”

How Big Is The NCC-1701-D USS Enterprise?

The USS Enterprise is superimposed over US cities and landmarks to show how big it is.

A Dark Sky Over Death Valley

This 360-degree full sky panorama was taken in Death Valley - one of the darkest places left in the continental USA. As well as the stunning view of the night sky, also featured in the photo is one of the 'mysterious sliding rocks of Racetrack Playa'.

Diagram Of Solar System Objects Over 200 Miles In Diameter

An interesting diagram showing all known objects in the solar system that are over 200 miles in diameter. [via]

Japanese Spacecraft Reveals New Details About The Sun

NASA has released never-before-seen photos showing the sun's magnetic field to be more turbulent and dynamic than previously known. The images were recorded by Japan's Hinode spacecraft.

The spacecraft was launched in Sept. 2006 from the Uchinoura Space Center in Japan on a mission to study sunspots and solar flares. Hinode's Solar Optical Telescope, which some astronomers liken to "a Hubble for the Sun," produces crystal-clear images with 0.2 arc-second resolution. (Comparison: 0.2 arc-second is a tiny angle approximately equal to the width of a human hair held about 100 meters away.) "We're getting movies like these all the time now," he says.

This particular movie is visually stunning, but the most amazing thing about it, notes Davis, is where the scene unfolded--in the sun's chromosphere. "We used to think the chromosphere was a fairly uneventful place, but Hinode is shattering those misconceptions."

View more images and a video here. [via]

Snow Doughnuts

Whilst conducting avalanche-control work in Washington Pass, Mike Stanford, an avalanche-control expert with the state Department of Transportation (WSDOT) found doughnuts made from snow.

At first he couldn't believe his eyes: Perfectly shaped doughnuts had rolled down the mountainside and frozen in place.

He said it's only the second time in his 30 years of working in the snow that he's seen anything like it.

The larger of the snow rollers, as they are commonly called, was about 24 inches tall, he said, large enough for him to put his head through the hole.

Stanford said snow rollers form when there is a hard layer on the snow, covered by several more inches of dense snow. "Then you add a steep slope and a trigger such as a clump of snow falling out of a tree or off of a rock face."

As gravity pulls a clump down, it usually rolls down the hill and collapses, creating what the WSDOT calls a pinwheel. Or it will not roll at all, and come down in an avalanche of snow. But if the snow is the perfect density and temperature, it rolls down leaving a hole in the center, Stanford said.

Scientists Erase Specific Memories

Scientists have successfully erased a single memory from the brains of rats without damaging other memories. Science is getting scary!

Video: The Great Global Warming Swindle

Is global warming caused by humans or is it a natural occurence out of our control? The Great Global Warming Swindle was broadcast on UK TV last week and discusses why climate change is not a man-made phenomenon. [Thanks Steve]

Video: Lightning vs Car

Are you safe in a car that is struck by lightning? Top Gear finds out.

Divers Discover Huge Underground River

A British diver and his German partner have discovered what they claim is the world's largest submerged cave system - effectively an underground river - beneath Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula.

Stephen Bogaerts and Robbie Schmittner had spent four years exploring whether the Sac Actun system links to other cave networks before they made the final connection that revealed a single system that is 95 miles long. Link

Lunar Eclipse Set For Saturday Night

I'm hoping that tonight I will be able to take a picture similar to the one above. Providing skies are clear tonight (currently it is forecast to be clear in south Wales), practically all of the UK will be able to observe the first lunar eclipse sine 2001.

The phenomenon occurs when the Earth passes directly between the Moon and the Sun. Light scattering through the Earth's atmosphere is reduced to predominantly-red wavelengths, which reflect off the lunar surface.

According to the Metro...

a partial eclipse will begin at 8.16pm as the Moon enters the Earth's penumbra, the twilight zone between shadow and illumination.

At this stage its effects will be difficult to see.

The Moon will be fully immersed in the Earth's shadow by 10.44pm. Mid-eclipse will occur at 11.21pm with the Moon 44 degrees above the southern horizon.