http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. (PhysOrg.com) -- Scientists once thought that life could originate only within a solar system's "habitable zone," where a planet would be neither too hot nor too cold for liquid water to exist on its surface. But according to planetary scientist Francis Nimmo, evidence from recent NASA missions suggests that conditions necessary for life may exist on the icy satellites of Saturn and Jupiter. http://www.physorg.com/news180112635.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 18:55:19 EST news180112635 An experimental device that uses the tongue instead of the eyes to "see" could be on the market next year, and a blind Fresno, Calif., teen hopes to be among the first to take one home. http://www.physorg.com/news180125418.html Technology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 18:51:11 EST news180125418 For the first time, a piezoelectric harvesting device fabricated by MEMS technology generates a record of 85μW electrical power from vibrations. A wafer level packaging method was developed for robustness. The packaged MEMS-based harvester is used to power a wireless sensor node. Within the Holst Centre program on Micropower Generation and Storage, imec researchers developed a temperature sensor that can wirelessly transmit data in a fully autonomous way. http://www.physorg.com/news180120643.html Technology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:40:05 EST news180120643 (PhysOrg.com) -- Diagnostic tests were run on Spirit's right-rear wheel and right-front wheel on Sol 2013 (Dec. 12, 2009). http://www.physorg.com/news180119338.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:20:04 EST news180119338 (PhysOrg.com) -- Archaeologists from the Universities of Glasgow and Aberdeen have found proof that pre-historic people laid flowers at the graves of their dead. http://www.physorg.com/news180119116.html Other Sciences Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:05:55 EST news180119116 (AP) -- Ten years ago, we would have been blown away by a cell phone with far more computing power and memory than the average PC had in 1999, along with a built-in camera and programs to manage every aspect of our lives. Ten years from now, the iPhone and its ilk will be antiques. http://www.physorg.com/news180117034.html Electronics Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:46:34 EST news180117034 Toshiba Corporation today announced the launch of a 64 gigabyte (GB) embedded NAND flash memory module, the highest capacity yet achieved in the industry. http://www.physorg.com/news180115490.html Technology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:30:14 EST news180115490 Johns Hopkins biomedical engineers, working with colleagues in Korea, have produced a laboratory chip with nanoscopic grooves and ridges capable of growing cardiac tissue that more closely resembles natural heart muscle. http://www.physorg.com/news180116595.html Nanotechnology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:24:23 EST news180116595 (PhysOrg.com) -- Lead levels that are "off the scale" have been confirmed after tests were done this morning on the lid of a soup can dating back more than 150 years. The findings reopen the mystery surrounding the cause of death of Sir John Franklin and his doomed crew as they searched for the Northwest Passage. http://www.physorg.com/news180115596.html Other Sciences Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:07:28 EST news180115596 (PhysOrg.com) -- Bacteria dance the electric slide, officially named electrokinesis by the USC geobiologists who discovered the phenomenon. http://www.physorg.com/news180112213.html Biology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:00:01 EST news180112213 (PhysOrg.com) -- NASA's MESSENGER mission team and cartographic experts from the U. S. Geological Survey have created a critical tool for planning the first orbital observations of the planet Mercury - a global mosaic of the planet that will help scientists pinpoint craters, faults and other features for observation. The map was created from images taken during the MESSENGER spacecraft's three flybys of the planet and those of Mariner 10 in the 1970s. A presentation on the new global mosaic is being given today at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco. http://www.physorg.com/news180114935.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 15:56:12 EST news180114935 New climate research reveals how wind shear -- the same atmospheric conditions that cause bumpy airplane rides -- affects how pollution contributes to isolated thunderstorm clouds. Under strong wind shear conditions, pollution hampers thunderhead formation. But with weak wind shear, pollution does the opposite and makes storms stronger. http://www.physorg.com/news180111002.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:51:08 EST news180111002 Experts on prehistoric man are rethinking their dates after a find in a southern French valley suggested our ancestors may have reached Europe 1.57 million years ago: 200,000 years earlier than we thought. http://www.physorg.com/news180110953.html Other Sciences Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:50:41 EST news180110953 (AP) -- Federal regulators are seeking to close a loophole that allows cable TV operators to withhold sporting events and other popular programming that they own from rival providers such as satellite TV. http://www.physorg.com/news180110779.html Technology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:47:06 EST news180110779 (PhysOrg.com) -- The Early Cretaceous sauropod Paluxysaurus jonesi weighed 20 tons, was 60 feet long and had a neck 26 feet long, according to scientists who prepared the world's first full skeletal mount of the dinosaur. http://www.physorg.com/news180109544.html Other Sciences Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:28:01 EST news180109544 (PhysOrg.com) -- Always on the cutting edge of new computing technologies, Google has recently announced that it is investigating the use of quantum computing schemes to achieve faster image recognition rates. Last week, at the Neural Information Processing Systems conference (NIPS 2009) in Vancouver, Canada, the company demonstrated that their new search technology outperforms the algorithms used on the computers running in its data centers today. http://www.physorg.com/news180107947.html Physics Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:00:29 EST news180107947 (PhysOrg.com) -- A team of astronomers from The Graduate University for Advanced Studies, the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, and other universities have captured the first direct image of a young binary star system. Using the Coronagraphic Imager with Adaptive Optics (CIAO) mounted on the Subaru Telescope, the team observed the young binary star SR24, which is located in the constellation Ophiuchus, 520 light years away. http://www.physorg.com/news180107005.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 13:44:28 EST news180107005 (PhysOrg.com) -- With its flamboyantly decorated plumage, the peacock is a classic example of how males among many bird species are more visually eye-catching than their female partners. But new research, led by Columbia biologist Dustin Rubenstein, shows that, in some cases, females living in family groups are just as showy as males. The findings, which appear in the Dec. 10 issue of the journal Nature, shed new light on Darwin`s theory of sexual selection. http://www.physorg.com/news180104802.html Biology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 13:17:51 EST news180104802 (PhysOrg.com) -- For most of a decade, scientists have documented unfelt and slow-moving seismic events, called episodic tremor and slip, showing up in regular cycles under the Olympic Peninsula of Washington state and Vancouver Island in British Columbia. They last three weeks on average and release as much energy as a magnitude 6.5 earthquake. http://www.physorg.com/news180103695.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:48:55 EST news180103695 The analysis of microfossils found in ocean sediment cores is illuminating the environmental conditions that prevailed at high latitudes during a critical period of Earth history. http://www.physorg.com/news180096839.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:30:01 EST news180096839 (PhysOrg.com) -- About 550 light-years from Earth, a star like our Sun is writhing in its death throes. Chi Cygni has swollen in size to become a red giant star so large that it would swallow every planet out to Mars in our solar system. Moreover, it has begun to pulse dramatically in and out, beating like a giant heart. New close-up photos of the surface of this distant star show its throbbing motions in unprecedented detail. http://www.physorg.com/news180098305.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:10:01 EST news180098305 Do good-looking people really benefit from their looks, and in what ways? A team of researchers from the University of Georgia and the University of Kansas found that yes; attractive people do tend to have more social relationships and therefore an increased sense of psychological well-being. This seems like common sense, and might be why we spend billions of dollars each year trying to become more attractive. However, the study, published in this month's issue of Personal Relationships, also determines that the importance of attractiveness is not universal; rather, it is determined by where we live. http://www.physorg.com/news180098203.html Medicine & Health Tue, 15 Dec 2009 11:30:07 EST news180098203 Scientists seeking to understand how to make an AIDS vaccine have found the cause of a major roadblock. It turns out that the immune system can indeed produce cells with the potential to manufacture powerful HIV-blocking antibodies - but at the same time, the immune system works equally hard to make sure these cells are eliminated before they have a chance to mature. http://www.physorg.com/news180095962.html Medicine & Health Tue, 15 Dec 2009 11:30:02 EST news180095962 Extinct woolly mammoths and ancient American horses may have been grazing the North American steppe for several thousand years longer than previously thought. After plucking ancient DNA from frozen soil in central Alaska, a team of researchers used cutting-edge techniques to uncover "genetic fossils" of both species locked in permafrost samples dated to between 7,600 and 10,500 calendar years. This new evidence suggests that at least one population of these now-extinct mammals endured longer in the continental interior, challenging the conventional view that these and other large species, or megafauna, disappeared from the Americas about 12,000 years ago. http://www.physorg.com/news180095166.html Biology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 11:20:01 EST news180095166 (PhysOrg.com) -- Adding cerium oxide to phosphate glass rather than the commonly used silicate glass may make glasses that block ultraviolet light and have increased radiation damage resistance while remaining colorless, according to Penn State researchers. These cerium-containing phosphate glasses have many commercial applications for use in windows, sunglasses and solar cells. http://www.physorg.com/news180098054.html Physics Tue, 15 Dec 2009 11:15:06 EST news180098054 (AP) -- Imagine not being able to use a mouse to open a Web browser or a keyboard to type an e-mail. What if you couldn't distinguish colors on a computer screen or type the distorted letters in order to buy concert tickets or enroll in a class? http://www.physorg.com/news180095002.html Electronics Tue, 15 Dec 2009 11:10:06 EST news180095002 A new study of Pacific Ocean sediments off the coast of Chile has found that offshore waters experienced systematic oxygen depletion during the rapid warming of the Antarctic following the last "glacial maximum" period 20,000 years ago. http://www.physorg.com/news180096546.html Space & Earth Tue, 15 Dec 2009 10:49:40 EST news180096546 (PhysOrg.com) -- The first paper on proton collisions in the CERN Large Hadron Collider (LHC) - designed to provide the highest energy ever explored with particle accelerators - is published online this week in the European Physical Journal C. http://www.physorg.com/news180094677.html Physics Tue, 15 Dec 2009 10:18:22 EST news180094677 (PhysOrg.com) -- Sports fans may be interested in a new system that ranks NFL and college football teams in a simple, straightforward way, similar to how Google PageRank ranks webpages. The new sports algorithm, called the Power Rank, is being developed by Ed Feng, a researcher in statistical mechanics at Sandia National Laboratory, although this project is independent of his work at Sandia. http://www.physorg.com/news180094320.html Technology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 10:12:40 EST news180094320 (PhysOrg.com) -- Scientists have known for 40 years that even though it takes longer to use sign language to sign individual words, sentences can be signed, on average, in the same time it takes to say them, but until now they have never understood how this could be possible. http://www.physorg.com/news180085938.html Technology Tue, 15 Dec 2009 10:00:01 EST news180085938