Deadly plastic ocean.
Discovery brings up the grim possibility that we’re all doomed to die in an invisible toxic wave: Patterns in ocean currents create conglomerations of swirling […]
Science
Walk, don’t crawl.
Scientific American resets my priorities (or at least my metaphors) with anthropological research. You think in order to walk, you gotta crawl first? Not really: […]
Science Art: Pioneer F/G Jupiter Missions, 1970.
Click to embiggen. A gorgeous vintage diagram of NASA’s deep space probe’s trajectory. The NASA image archive page says: This image, drawn in 1970, is […]
By definition, a crush must hurt…
The Telegraph provides insight into the genuine pain of a broken heart: Psychologists at the University of California, Los Angeles say the human body has […]
We found the seeds.
Reuters carries the story of the first seed of life to be discovered on a comet: The latest findings add credence to the notion that […]
DNA evidence, made to order.
New York Times brings up the unsettling possibility that future biochemically savvy crooks will be capable of fudging DNA evidence: The scientists fabricated blood and […]
Smell of death.
Science Daily is hard boiled. As hard boiled as death. And death, they say, has a smell all its own: Speaking at the 238th National […]
Exposing the Seat of Wisdom.
The Times somewhat recently took a close look at our brains, particularly the parts that UC San Diego neurologists say are responsible for what we […]
Science Art: Baender der Hand, Meyers Blitz-Lexikon, 1932
These are the volumes of the hand, Babelfish tells me… although “baender” also means “bands” (like the FM radio band), or ligaments. Image found in […]
Monkey music.
OK, not monkeys, but apes, New Scientist says, have been caught making musical instruments: The orang-utan’s music, if you can call it that, is actually […]
Walking in the trees.
New Scientist goes out on a limb with a new study that hints that humans may have learned to walk up in the branches before […]
Wooden bones.
DiscoveryNews leaves me rooted to the spot with a sprouting fascination in the latest medical implant – bones made from wood: The researchers chose wood […]
Fixing Prisons.
PhysOrg has some advice from the American Psychological Association on how to make prisons actually work – by punishing less and keeping convicts from coming […]
Listen with your eyes closed.
New Scientist tells us the less you see, the more impact spooky music has: Sure enough, volunteers rated the eerie-sounding music – laced with staccato […]
Science Art: Some NACA Muroc personnel with snowman, 1949.
Click to embiggen In the good old days, computers looked like this. “Computer” was a job, not a tool, and it was often done by […]