Category Archives: Science

Voyager 1 Has Now Left The Solar System 22x

Posted by on March 22, 2013 Comments Off

On the heels of the latest news that Voyager 1 – the farthest man-made object in the universe — has left the solar system, xkcd decided to tally up how many times this has happened before:

The hover text reads:

So far Voyager 1 has ‘left the Solar System’ by passing through the termination shock three times, the heliopause twice, and once each through the heliosheath, heliosphere, heliodrome, auroral discontinuity, Heaviside layer, trans-Neptunian panic zone, magnetogap, US Census Bureau Solar System statistical boundary, Kuiper gauntlet, Oort void, and crystal sphere holding the fixed stars.

Note that some of those aren’t actually at the edge of the solar system, or even real things.

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From xkcd

Get Drunk More Quickly With Diet Soda

Posted by on March 5, 2013 Comments Off

Finally, a study that tells you how to save money at the bar: people who used diet sodas as mixers, as opposed to sugary ones, got 18% more drunk. The researchers gave two groups of eight people the same amount of alcohol, but one group had diet mixers. That group’s peak breath alcohol level was 0.091, whereas the sugary group’s was only .0.077. Which, if they decided to drive, that diet soda would’ve been the difference between a DUI and not — the legal limit is 0.08 in all 50 states.

 

The scientists’ explanation is that sugar helps your body absorb the alcohol more slowly — the same reason you get drunk more slowly on a full stomach than an empty one. So, drink regular Coke if you wanna be more sober, but diet Coke otherwise. (Though, keep in mind that diet soda is not particularly good for you. Soda water probably works just as well, since it has no sugar.) And if you’re driving, get a breathalyzer, because none of the study subjects felt impaired. They even make ones for the iPhone now.

The study will be out in the April issue of Alcoholism.

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Via NPR

An Egg Inside An Egg

Posted by on February 26, 2013 Comments Off

It’s like a Russian egg doll: a chicken farmer apparently found an egg that was really big, so he cracked it open, only to find another egg inside. And lest you think this is a hoax, it’s not: eggsperts call the phenomenon ovum in ovo.

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From YouTube, via FAIL Blog

 

 

Commander Gives A Great Tour Of The Space Station

Posted by on February 23, 2013 Comments Off

Sunita Williams was the commander of the International Space Station from September to November of 2012, and the first person to do a triathlon in space (she lifted weights to simulate the swimming portion). A few hours before leaving the station to head back to Earth, she shot this great 25 minute video tour of the various capsules and showed how they do everything in space, from working out to going to the bathroom:

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From YouTube, via Laughing Squid

Biology + Computing = Designer Bioweapons

Posted by on November 6, 2012 Comments Off

Over the past couple of decades, biologists have succeeded in cataloging the genetic makeup of all kinds of species, including humans. For a few thousand dollars, anyone can now get their genome sequenced. Technology has also advanced to the point where biological molecules can be created: simply create a blueprint, send it to a lab, and they send back a live version. And if you create some DNA, insert it into an bacterium cell that’s been emptied of its own DNA, it will start reading your new DNA and follow the instructions encoded within it — just like a biological version of a computer. Put all of this together and what it means is that in the not-too-distant future, biosynthesis — the creation of biological material — will explode, based on the promise of medicine made just for you: a virus that will attack just your cancer cells and leave the others alone, a vaccine for the particular strain of flu going around your town, or an injection that will help your body digest your food better in order to lose weight.

Swine Flu (H1N1) Virus

 

But, as The Atlantic points out, with great power, comes great responsibility: people smart enough to make a virus that will attack a specific cancer cell will also be able to make one that will kill the President, and only the President, leaving little, if any, trace. The scenario they flesh out is this:

  1. Someone gets a hold of the President’s DNA
  2. They create a virus that targets only cells with his particular DNA and causes flu-like symptoms that quickly lead to death
  3. They infect a student at Harvard University with the virus, a couple of days before the President visits
  4. The student passes the virus along to others, and by the time of the visit, half the student body is a carrier, possibly experiencing flu-like symptoms
  5. The President catches the virus while there, then a few days later dies, apparently from the flu
  6. Since the virus is unique, there’s no test to detect its presence in the President’s blood. His relatives, who share much of his DNA, may also get sick

That’s just one very specific scenario, but it can be tweaked in countless different ways: perhaps the virus is designed to lie dormant for several months; perhaps the virus doesn’t kill, but rather affects the President’s brain chemistry to make him forgetful, aggressive, or to appear insane. It doesn’t even have to be designed for one person: it can be made to kill everyone that has red hair or is related to bin Laden. It also doesn’t have to be a virus: it could be sperm, used to create children as proof of an affair. Or it could be a new designer lifeform, like a gryphon or a dragon. And all of this will be within the power of a new breed of engineers that will essentially program biological software. Says The Atlantic:

“Bill Gates, in a recent interview, told a reporter that if he were a kid today, forget about hacking computers: he’d be hacking biology.”

The benefits of the technology as a cancer cure alone means that it will become reality as soon as humanly feasible. The nature of the technology also means that it will be difficult to control domestically, and impossible to control within the borders of countries like Iran and North Korea. Therefore, the main apocalyptic threat for the 21st century will no longer be nuclear weapons, but rather biological ones.

 

The Secret Service already tries to keep the President’s DNA from falling into the wrong hands, and the FBI has a Biological Countermeasures Unit that works with biosynthesis companies to ensure that their nascent systems are built with security in mind. In the near future, limits will likely be imposed on who can place an order for biological material to be synthesized and effects may be simulated by a computer before it is created — although, intentions can probably be obscured. Eventually, we may build a gigantic network of sensors sampling the air all over the country and analyzing it for any molecules out of the ordinary. If a new virus is discovered, an antidote will be synthesized and released in the same areas. In effect, it will be a nation-sized anti-virus system.

From The Atlantic

If There Are So Many Stars, Why Is The Sky Dark At Night?

Posted by on October 12, 2012 Comments Off

It might sound like a stupid question at first, because of all the black darkness in between the stars, but the answer is actually evidence of one of the fundamental properties of our universe. The problem comes in when you realize there shouldn’t be any darkness at night: there are trillions of trillions of stars in the universe, and their light should literally be filling up the sky all the time. So then why is it mostly dark? Some stars are really far away and their light hasn’t gotten here yet, but there are still plenty of stars whose light should be flooding our tiny planet. Which it is — we just can’t see it, because by the time the light gets here, it’s infrared.

Night Sky. Photo by Scott Wylie

 

If the universe were constant and stars stayed in the same position, the night sky would be indeed be filled with light. But because the universe is expanding, stars are constantly moving away from each other, and therefore away from us, too. That motion causes redshift, which is what happens to light from an object that is moving away: the wavelength increases due to the Doppler effect, and since color is dictated by the wavelength of light, it first appears more and more red and then infrared, which we can’t see anymore. So the sky is dark because most of the light that we would normally see — from all the countless stars — has been shifted to infrared on its way to Earth — because the universe is expanding.

Via NPR

Scientists Discover New Monkey That You’ll Never Hear About Again

Posted by on September 17, 2012 1 comment

Last week, it was widely reported that a new species of monkey was discovered, as if it actually mattered to anyone that’s not a biologist. The other 99.86% of the population was also informed that this was only the second discovery of a new species of monkey since 1984, prompting many to wonder why scientists are still discovering monkeys in the 21st century. “I was pretty sure they already bagged and tagged all the animals like in the 1800s, and then this happened,” said someone, probably.

The "new" monkey looks just like a regular old monkey

 

But the let-downs didn’t end there: according to science, the discovery is a type of Old World Monkey, of which there are over a hundred different species with names like Allen’s swamp monkey, Grivet, and Mandrill. Great apes and New World Monkeys are not part of this grouping. When informed of the primate taxonomy, many of the population of a dinner table complained about there being far too many species of monkeys and briefly wondered how they managed to not be extinct by now, followed by whether or not the new one was tasty. However, the final blow in the supposed news item came out of nowhere: the discovery was actually made in 2007; the scientists in question required five years to publish the discovery, claiming that it took that long to make sure it really was a new species. “It’s just not that different than its hundred other cousins, but… it’ll get us published,” thought everyone involved.

Via NPR

Good News: Being An Ass To Your Infants Won’t Scar Them For Life

Posted by on September 10, 2012 Comments Off

A new study from Australia shows that parents possessing the lack of empathy required to let their babies cry themselves to sleep without so much as touching them, have nothing to worry about regarding the child’s psychological development. Behavioral sleeping techniques such as Ferberizing and the “camping out” method were tested on unwitting infants, who were revisited at age 6 and who, to some surprise, showed no psychological effects from the emotional abandonment — neither harm nor benefit.

 

Photo by Josh Lewis

 

For those unfamiliar with the German methods of sleep training:

  • Ferberizing refers to a method in which the infant is classically conditioned to fall asleep when put in the crib. This starts by putting the awake child in and sitting patiently nearby while he cries — no doubt due to the agony of feeling alone, unloved and abandoned — until either you win and he falls asleep or you lose because you can’t take it anymore. At that point, you note how much time has passed and pick him up; the next time, repeat the process but wait a little longer before picking him up. After a while, the infant will realize you have the emotional depth of a pine tree, and will cope by rendering himself unconscious, in hope of a better tomorrow.
  • Camping out is almost the exact same thing, but sounds less toxic.

And now science is pretty sure that both of them leave the child unharmed, even if they do hint at your own hollowness.

Note: if you mention the term “to Ferberize” to someone unfamiliar with the method, they would probably guess the definition had to do with applying chemical treatment to carpet so as to make it stain proof. In fact, they would be surprised to learn that the term is quite closely the equivalent of emotional infant care to that definition.

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From The Journal Of The American Academy of Pediatrics, via NPR

Pregnancies Last Only 9 Months So As To Not Exhaust The Mother

Posted by on September 4, 2012 Comments Off

Normal people don’t really think about stuff like this, but babies should really be born ready to walk, or at least crawl around. What other species bears helpless little creatures that can’t even run away from an angry snail? All manner of vegetation, sure; but mammals — not so much. (Incidentally, this observation led ethicists from Oxford to deduce that there’s no moral difference between abortion and infanticide: a fetus and a newborn are the same, except for which side of the birth canal they’re on; both are helpless, unaware, and fully dependent on others for their existence. But that’s a whole other issue.)  Up until now, the going theory as to why human gestation isn’t 18 months, like it should be, has been that the mom couldn’t give birth to such a large baby — at least not without her pelvis being left somewhat crippled.

Ok, that baby might actually be a good candidate for C-section

 

That didn’t sound quite right to some academics, so they did what academics do best: research. Long story short, they figured out that women give birth to babies that large all the time — to deliver a baby the size of a 9-month old, they would only need an inch bigger than average dilation of the birth canal. So the pelvis thing couldn’t be the problem.

Enter the alternate theory: pregnant women burn a lot more calories, because making a person apparently takes some elbow grease. In fact, six months into the process, their metabolism burns twice as high as normal and stays there until birth. So the new theory is that metabolism turbo-charged to that level can only be sustained for so long, not to mention that it would have to go even higher for an 18-month fetus. Mom’s body would probably call it quits long before the baby’s ready to crawl upon delivery. But once science figures out how to give men uteruses (uteri?)… watch out, diaper industry!

From National Academy of Sciences, via NPR

Ladies, Try To Have As Few Abortions As Possible

Posted by on August 30, 2012 Comments Off

Don’t worry: it’s only if you may actually want to give live birth someday. This, according to a new Finnish study which warns that things start getting hairy after the third abortion: that fifth-time’s-a-charm baby has a decent chance of being born prematurely, and of being underweight. If you’re still one of the pedestrians that has only had one or two abortions though, you don’t have that much to worry about. However, once your life choices and/or understanding of the stork’s role in childbirth  have brought your smushmorshin count up into plural territory, the well-being of future fetuses may be put at risk. The study makes no recommendations for those who could care less about childbirth.

 

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From Oxford Journals, via NPR