(3 Brand-New Articles)
(3 Brand-New Articles)
| WELCOME TO THE ROBOT AIR | |
| Aviation history has been made with the first flight across the Atlantic by an unpiloted aircraft. The robot plane, designed by teams in Australia and the USA, flew from Newfoundland to Scotland in just over 26 hours with no human intervention. With a wingspan of 3m and a weight of just 14kg, the new aircraft's first use will be in weather forecasting, where it will beam back information from remote areas via satellite. |
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| A FAR-FLUNG PARTICLE | |
| Scientists may have found evidence of a new kind of particle from a blast of incredibly powerful cosmic rays. The source of the rays appears to be a group of distant quasars between 150 million and 12,000 million light years ago (the latter is 80 per cent of the way to the edge of the universe). The only particle that could travel such distances without being sapped of its energy is one predicted by various unification theories. Called S-nought, it is a symmetric partner to a gluon. |
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| BEWARE RADIOACTIVE PLANTS | |
| Buried radioactive waste products can return to the surface by working their way up plant roots, according to a team at a research lab in Tennessee. Contaminated resin from the 1979 Three Mile Island accident was buried a metre below the surface, and tested to see how quickly it would leach down through the soil. But experts were startled five years later to find caesium and strontium on the surface, carried up in water absorbed by the roots of small plants. |
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| THE HUNTING OF THE TAU | |
| One of the most sought after subatomic particles predicted by physicists may finally have been spotted in data from Fermilab near Chicago. Physicists currently believe that all matter is built up from 12 particles, which include three types of neutrino, each of which causes a different reaction when it strikes an atom. The electron neutrino and muon neutrino have been detected but no-one had seen a tau neutrino. When a tau neutrino hits an atom, it causes it to eject a tau particle, which decays in an instant to produce a shower of other particles - it is these that physicists try to spot, since the tau itself decays too fast. Data from Fermilab collisions between a beam of protons and atoms now seem to have produced at least three events which experts say show the decay of a tau particle, after analysing just six per cent of their results. Ten are needed for final confirmation. |
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| INVISIBLE BATTLESHIPS | |
| A British company has patented a system which they say could make warships immune from enemy surveillance. Ships can currently be tracked by using thermal sensors to map infrared heat radiation from their funnels, engine room, or other hot spots. However, the UK system uses the ocean as a shield. A ship can screen itself away from heat sensors by pumping water into jets which then blast droplets into the air round the ship, enveloping it in a cool mist which masks heat. |
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| NOT SO QUICK DRYING CEMENT | |
| For some industries, cement setting too quickly can pose a problem that a UK company may have just solved. In the oil industry, for example, cement pumped into the ground to strengthen deep bore holes can actually block the bottom of the well if it dries too quickly. The setting of cement is linked to the crystallisation of a mineral called ettringite. But a new molecular 'retarder' developed in Cambridge can block this, doubling setting times. |
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| HELP FOR DEAF CHILDREN | |
| Deaf children in the USA may soon be able to use an Internet program to translate text into American Sign Language (ASL). Some children experience problems with English text if they have been brought up to communicate in ASL. The program, Mona, uses a computer-generated figure on a screen which takes text keyed in and articulates it in sign language. By confirming the meaning of words they have typed, Mona can help deaf children learn to read and write confidently. |
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| FISHING BY NIGHT | |
| Researchers in British Columbia have found evidence suggesting nocturnal seabirds may spot prey by following glowing trails left by fish due to the phenomenon of phosphoresence. The glowing trail begins with sea jellies and tiny shrimp, and fish can be tracked from above as they swim through the glowing clouds left by these animals. The Canadian team hit on the idea after seeing western grebe tracking fish's silvery wake before diving down. |
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| CHEMICALS IN SPACE | |
| Astronomers at the Max Planck Institute in Bonn have discovered molecules of hydrogen fluoride in space, the first sighting of fluorine molecules in interstellar space. They were found in a gas cloud that lies around 20,000 light years away in the constellation of Sagittarius. The Bonn team estimate that there is around one hydrogen fluoride molecule to each billion hydrogen ones in the cloud. |
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| WEIGHING WITH WAVES | |
| Researchers at the US Agricultural Research Service have discovered a way to measure weight using microwaves. The technique uses what are called microwave-resonant cavities which trap microwaves and make them resonate. The US team found that objects moving through these cavities created shifts in the resonating frequency that was correlated to their weight. The team believe no one has realised microwaves could be used like a scale. |
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| THE CANE THAT SEES | |
| Researchers in the USA have produced the prototype of a 'smart' cane that can be used by blind people to help find their way. The University of Michigan cane has an array of ultrasonic sensors in its base. A built-in computer interprets their data, calculates the best route to avoid objects, then steers the cane. Blind testers of the GuideCane are enthusiastic. However, the prototype can only operate on smooth surfaces and can't yet detect overhanging obstacles. |
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| PREHISTORIC PIGMENTS | |
| An Australian scientist has come up a method to tell what colour ancient fish and dinosaurs were in reality. Until now, paleontologists had made educated guesses but biophysicist Andrew Parker realised that certain cell structures found on fossils were actually responsible for colour. Called chromatophores, Parker has now used these cells to identify the colour of ancient fish. The 370 million year old placoderm, for example, was red on top and silver below. The reason that the structures which revealed colour had not been identified previously, says Australian scientist Andrew Parker, is that the people who work on animal colours don't work on fossils, and the chromatophores can be mistaken for ordinary bone cells. Having begun to identify the colour of fish that lived hundreds of millions of years ago, Parker is now confident that researchers will eventually be able to identify the colour of dinosaurs. No more grey lizard monsters?? |
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| PLATINUM TACKLES METHANE | |
| French researchers have developed a new methane gas sensor which will sound an alarm before a gas oven leak reaches explosive levels. The sensor contains a platinum-coated filament which is heated intermittently to 800C for a few milliseconds. At this temperature, platinum boosts methane combustion, so if methane is present it will combust and heat up the platinum element further - if this occurs an alarm will be triggered. |
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| 10,000 WORRYING NEIGHBOURS | |
| The first automated search for near-Earth asteroids has found more than 10,000 since March last year, of which 5693 were previously unknown. Up to seven of the asteroids are on orbits which will bring them very near to Earth and possibly on collision course. However, none will reach us during the next hundred years (the maximum time over which their orbits can be worked out) so the possible risk of mass extinction won't be ours to face... |
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| DEEP, DEEP, DEEP SPACE | |
| Astronomers in California have found a galaxy that is the most distant object in the known Universe. Using the Hubble Space Telescope, the as-yet unnamed galaxy is around 13 billion light years away, so light from it appears as it was when galaxies were first beginning to form, around a billion years after the Big Bang. The galaxy was only visible because a cluster of galaxies in front of it acted as a "gravitational lens" which magnified the image. |
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| ROBO-DOG ARRIVES! | |
| Researchers in Japan have come up with a robot pet-dog. Sony's four-legged creation will obey commands to play with a ball, cock its leg, sniff the ground or go for a walk, and is the first product to come out of the giant company's D-21 lab, set up to make playful robotic devices. "This is one of the electronic devices we think people will want in the 21st century," said a Sony spokesman. |
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| SMUGGLING NOT SO SOUND | |
| Customs officers will soon add a new weapon to their search for smugglers with a detection advice based on sonar. Unlike metal detectors, which cannot distinguish between different kinds of metal, the new system - developed in the USA - can, and can even tell what coins someone has in their pockets! A hand-held probe measures the flow of electrical currents through a metal as it is passed over it, identifying it by the amount of resistance it has. The new customs device also features a second instrument which can determine the contents of a sealed container using sonar to pick up the eddies and echoes from objectc inside. The device can also measure how full a container is, and determine whether it contains any cavities or hidden packages that might contain contraband. The device, developed by Pacific Northwest National Labs, is now being exported from the USA worldwide. |
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| GLOBAL WARMING ICE PUZZLE | |
| Researchers at the British Antarctic Survey have published findings that suggest global warming may actually cause ice in one of the world's coldest regions to thicken rather than melt. Investigations on the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf near the South Pole - the most massive on Earth, averaging 1600m thick over an area the size of Spain - turned up the puzzling evidence. The key lies in water temperature... While global warming is believed to have led to the break-up of some ice shelves in Antarctica, the data from the giant Filchner-Ronne shelf suggests that moderate warming would thicken it. Temperatures at the base of ice shelves are determined by the water beneath, and data suggests that moderate warming would alter the sea circulation to bring colder water underneath the Filcher-Ronne shelf. Ice shelves, in turn, affect global climate, already to prediction trouble. |
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| SOFTWARE PIRACY WEAPON | |
| Computer giants Microsoft and Intel have teamed up to work on a system that could help beat software counterfeiters by using imprinted codes. The idea involves imprinting programs with a unique code that links them to the first PC they were installed on, using a special chip built into PCs. When software is loaded onto a PC with the new chip, the code will be written onto the disk carrying the software, allowing investigators to trace the PCs on which the software is installed. |
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| MORE ANCIENT BRITONS | |
| Archaeologists from the University of Wales have found evidence for a village settlement around 1,000 years older than any previously known in Britain. Excavations in Wiltshire produced signs of a settlement there dating back nearly 7,000 years. From the nature of the settlement, experts believe it may have been home to up to 200 people. |
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| IO LIKES IT HOT | |
| Scientists at the University of Arizona have found that the volcanoes on Io, Jupiter's innermost large moon, are the hottest in the Solar System. Using data from the Galileo space probe the US team measured the temperature of Io's volcanoes - the only active extra-terrestrial ones known - to be at least 1800K, implying magma that is over 2000K. Earth's hottest volcanoes only reach about 1600K. |
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| A TOPSY-TURVY EARTH | |
| Geologists in California are suggesting that the Earth underwent an incredible 90 degree shift in its spin axis around 500 million years ago. Using something called a direct-current superconducting quantum interference device - a hypersensitive instrument to measure magnetic fields - the experts pinpointed the location of ancient rock at the time (the Pre-Cambrian period). They did so by measuring their weak fossil magnetism (paleomagnetics). Using the measurements of ancient rock fossil magnetism, the geologists were able to work out the geomagnetic field that existed 534 million years ago. The evidence showed that the giant continent Gondwanaland did a 90 degree counter-clockwise rotation - land that had been at the poles was pushed toward the equator - North America moved away from near the South Pole very quickly! The shift in land mass and magnetic field caused havoc with climate... The evidence of dramatic climate change 534 million years ago caused by sudden shifts in land mass and magnetic fields may explain the previously mysterious explosion of species evolution that occurred then - the Cambrian explosion. Sudden climate change would have forced old lifeforms to adapt and new ones to emerge as eco-systems fractured. The geologists blame tectonic plates shifting suddenly, forcing to Earth to re-adjust its balance by making the startling 90 degree roll. |
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| BEAM US UP - FUTURE | |
| Physicists in Paris have carried out one of the key steps towards a Star Trek style "beaming" device to move people and things through space. The process centres on "entangled" particles. These are pairs of particles that carry precise information about each other because of an interaction between them in the past. Each particle 'knows' what the other one is up to. Teleportation could work by separating entangled particles, sending one to the new location, then converting it. The French team created entangled atoms for the first time - until now only elementary particles and photons had been entangled successfully - using rubidium atoms 'tuned' by a laser so that each has a certain excitation. Using niobium mirrors, they entangled the atoms by making them exchange a photon - this formed the link so that each atom 'knew' about the other. "We certainly hope to demonstrate some form of teleportation soon," said the team leader Michel Brune. |
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| WINDOW CLEANING? | |
| Japanese scientists have invented a new coating that helps glass clean itself when exposed to sunlight. Made from titanium dioxide, the coating has the unusual property of attracting both water and oil when exposed to UV light - this means that both water and oil spread over the surface at the same time, meaning droplets cannot form. The Tokyo team found that the UV in sunlight was enough to keep the coated glass clean outside for six months - rain washed off any contaminants. |
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| USER PROFILE CHANGING | |
| Users under 18 and over 55 now represent the fasting growing groups on the Web, according to PC Meter's profile of Web users. Those over 55 spend most of their time looking at financial information. The average surfer spends less than one hour per day on the Web. Entertainment sites represent 14 percent of online time and educational sites only 1 percent. Furthermore, adult sites are accessed by more than 5 percent of users with 12 percent accesssing these sites while at work. |
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| MARS MISSION NEWS | |
| Early data from the analysis of the rock dubbed 'Barnacle Bill' suggests that Mars is more like the Earth than previously suspected by geologists. The Sojourner explorer used an alpha proton X-ray spectrometer to reveal the structure of Barnacle Bill, and found it to be 10 per cent richer in silicon than expected, and similar to an Earth rock called andesite. On Earth, andesite becomes enriched by silicon through the action of liquid water and plate tectonics... Mars now shows little sign of either plate tectonics or liquid water, so the data from the Barnacle Bill rock is further hard evidence that the planet had both in the past. As well as geological tests on rock, scientists plan to use magnets to find out just what Martian soil is like. If water had covered the planet for a long time, there would be pure iron oxide and magnetite. If the soil formed unsubmerged it would contain elements such as titanium. |
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| ROBOT RETAIL! | |
| A chain of shop has opened in Japan that is staffed entirely by robots. The Robo Shop Super 24 stores have wall shelves where shoppers can view the goods and then purchase what they want using keyboards arranged around the shop. Once the order has been paid for, stockroom robots fetch the products and deliver them on a slide down to the cash desk. The stores stock over 2000 products. |
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| DOLPHINS' SPONGY TOOLS | |
| Researchers working off Australia have found evidence that dolphins use sponges as tools. Divers noticed dolphins carrying the sponges on their snouts, and suggest they used the sponges for two things. One idea was that they protected the dolphins from the spines and stings of various seabed animals while the dolpins searched for food. The other theory is that by dragging the sponge on the seabed food was stirred up. |
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| WORMS FOR CLEANING | |
| Australian researchers have found a way of using earthworms to clean up waste contaminated wtih heavy metals. The waste is mixed with either paper or cardboard, shredded and then aerated to produce bacteria which the worms like eating. As the worms eat they also absorb the heavy metals. Their excretions have metal levels a third lower than the original waste, and this mix of soil and worm casts can be neutralised with lime and water, with the poisons being precipitated. |
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| A PISA CAKE | |
| Yet another expert has stepped into the arena with an idea to try and save the Leaning Tower of Pisa from falling. A British scientist suggests sinking a 50-metre deep wall into the ground around the tower. A second wall would then be dug around the first, and the gap between the two excavated to create a circular tunnel. The gap would then be filled, creating an artificial island. This, claims the pundit, would stop it toppling further. It's due to fall over around 2040. |
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| A BIT DIM COSMICALLY | |
| Astronomers in Australia have found the dimmest confirmed brown dwarf, an object that did not possess quite enough mass for nuclear reactions in their core to turn them into stars. These failed stars do still heat up but only due to gravity shrinkage. The dwarf, in the constellation Corvus, is only 0.005 (five thousandths) as bright as our Sun. |
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| WOMEN SURF BETTER | |
| A survey conducted by the American telecommunications company MCI found that women were more efficient at using the Internet than men. Thousands of people were asked to answer five general interest questions by searching the Web, and their scores calcula ted based on the time taken, corrected for the speed of each modem. Women aged 24-39 scored an average of 80.85 compared to the men's 80.52. Younger women did better, with under 17s scoring 78.1 to the boys' 70.6. |
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| HOT AND BOTHERED | |
| The World Energy Council has released figures showing an alarming 7.8 per cent rise in carbon dioxide emissions from the world's leading industrial nations. The data has greatly alarmed climate experts since these are the countries that agreed in 1992 to stabilise their output of CO2 - a greenhouse gas - at 1990 levels by the end of the decade. Break your promises now - pay later... |
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| COLOURING MEMORY | |
| Italian and Portuguese scientists have come up with a form of molecular memory that could be used as an alternative to silicon-based computer memory. The team, drawn from universities in Bologna and Lisbon, have used an exotic salt - 4'-methoxyflavylium perchlorate - that is colourless when a solution of it is prepared in the dark but which turns yellow when exposed to light. This effect can be used to 'write' binary data, since the solution stays yellow if kept as an acidic solution. The salt solution can be returned to its original colourless state simply by heating it or making it less acidic. The researchers say 4'-methoxyflavylium perchlorate is the first known compound that can be used in this way to store binary data simply by changing its temperature or acidity. Now, however, such 'molecular memory' needs to be transformed from aqueous solutions into solid-state forms, such as a molecular film or an ordered array of the salt molecules. |
