November 6, 2006, 9:21 PM CT

Mars Science Laboratory Shakedown in the High Arctic

Members of the AMASE team (AMASE stands for Arctic Mars Analog Svalbard Expedition) last month completed their fourth field season on the Arctic island of Spitsbergen. They went to test out instruments similar to those that will fly on an upcoming mission to Mars, and to perform a field test of a prototype rover, Cliff-bot, that is capable of climbing up and down 80-degree slopes.

Spitsbergen is the largest island in the Norwegian Svalbard archipelago, which lies between the northern tip of Norway and the northern polar ice cap. It is an inviting destination for astrobiology scientists because it contains several Mars analog sites: geologic formations that resemble, in various ways, ones on Mars.

One such site contains Devonian-age redbeds, formed between 408 and 360 million years ago. Such red-rock formations are a familiar sight in the American southwest, eventhough there they are typically older. The redbeds in Svalbard, composed of rust-colored fluvial sandstones and mudstones, which contain the iron-bearing mineral hematite, are reminiscent of regions of layered terrain seen on Mars in images taken by orbiting spacecraft.

Svalbard's "blueberry site" was selected because sulfate-bearing sandstones there contain small spherical concretions similar to the "blueberries" found by NASA's Opportunity rover in Meridiani Planum. The martian concretions, which contain hematite, helped researchers confirm the former presence of liquid water on Mars. The Svalbard concretions do not contain hematite; they are rich in sulfate and carbonate minerals that also form in the presence of liquid water. Interestingly these concretions contain evidence of cryptoendolithic communities.........

Posted by: Tyler      Permalink         Source

November 6, 2006, 9:17 PM CT

Monstrous Black Hole Blast in the Core of a Galaxy Cluster

This is a composite image of galaxy cluster MS0735.6+7421, located about 2.6 billion light-years away in the constellation Camelopardus. The image represents three views of the region that astronomers have combined into one photograph. The optical view of the galaxy cluster, taken by the Hubble Space Telescope's Advanced Camera for Surveys in February 2006, shows dozens of galaxies bound together by gravity.

Diffuse, hot gas with a temperature of nearly 50 million degrees permeates the space between the galaxies. The gas emits X-rays, seen as blue in the image taken with the Chandra X-ray Observatory in November 2003. The X-ray portion of the image shows enormous holes or cavities in the gas, each roughly 640,000 light-years in diameter -- nearly seven times the diameter of the Milky Way.

The cavities are filled with charged particles gyrating around magnetic field lines and emitting radio waves shown in the red portion of image taken with the Very Large Array telescope in New Mexico in June 1993. The cavities were created by jets of charged particles ejected at nearly light speed from a supermassive black hole weighing nearly a billion times the mass of our Sun lurking in the nucleus of the bright central galaxy. The jets displaced more than one trillion solar masses worth of gas. The power required to displace the gas exceeded the power output of the Sun by nearly ten trillion times in the past 100 million years.........

Posted by: Brooke      Permalink         Source

November 6, 2006, 7:43 PM CT

Pounding Heart And Sweaty Palms

People who get scared when they experience a pounding heart, sweaty palms or dizziness -- even if the cause is something as mundane as stress, exercise or caffeine -- are more likely to develop a clinical case of anxiety or panic disorder, according to a Florida State University researcher in Tallahassee, Fla.

While other researchers have proposed a connection between this so-called "anxiety sensitivity" and a range of anxiety problems, the study by FSU psychology professors N. Brad Schmidt and Jon Maner and University of Vermont Professor Michael Zvolensky provides the first evidence that anxiety sensitivity is a risk factor in the development of anxiety disorders. The study would be published in the recent issue of the Journal of Psychiatric Research.

"The findings offer an exciting possibility for prevention of anxiety and panic reactions among high-risk individuals," Schmidt said, explaining that the key is to teach people cognitive and behavioral skills to reduce their anxiety sensitivity so that it does not lead to a serious problem.

People with anxiety sensitivity perceive their physical responses to certain triggers as a sign of imminent personal harm. They not only fear their reactions, they also fear that other people will detect their anxiety, which only serves to increase their anxiety and puts them at risk for a panic attack, according to Schmidt.........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

November 6, 2006, 7:31 PM CT

Silent Eco-friendly Plane

MIT and Cambridge University scientists will unveil the conceptual design for a silent, environmentally friendly passenger plane at a press conference Monday, Nov. 6, at the Royal Aeronautical Society in London.

"Public concern about noise is a major constraint on expansion of aircraft operations. The 'silent aircraft' can help address this concern and thus aid in meeting the increasing passenger demand for air transport," said Edward M. Greitzer, the H.N. Slater Professor of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT.

Greitzer and Professor Ann P. Dowling of Cambridge University are the lead principal researchers on the Silent Aircraft Initiative. This collaboration of 40 scientists from MIT and Cambridge, plus a number of others from more than 30 companies, was launched three years ago "to develop a conceptual design for an aircraft whose noise was almost imperceptible outside the perimeter of an airfield in an urban environment".

While originally conceived to make a huge reduction in airplane noise, the team's ultimate design also has the potential to be more fuel-efficient. In a typical flight, the proposed plane, which is designed to carry 215 passengers, is predicted to achieve 124 passenger-miles per gallon, almost 25 percent more than current aircraft, as per Greitzer. (For a down-to-earth comparison, the Toyota Prius hybrid car carrying two passengers achieves 120 passenger-miles per gallon.).........

Posted by: Kevin      Permalink         Source

November 6, 2006, 7:25 PM CT

Accurate Climate Change Predictions

Current climate change impact models that consider only one weather variable, such as increasing temperature, sometimes spawn unsubstantiated doomsday predictions, as per scientists at Purdue and North Carolina universities.

Climate change studies that assess the full range of interactions among temperature, radiation, precipitation and land use can better aid humans to prepare for extreme shifts in weather patterns, the researchers report in a special issue of the journal Global and Planetary Change.

Climate change impact models often don't consider whether shifting weather will allow for sustainable agriculture, said Dev Niyogi, corresponding author of the journal article and Purdue agronomy, and earth and atmospheric sciences assistant professor.

Niyogi's team looked at weather factor interactions and their impact on two different crop plants by using data for weather and field conditions that occurred in a year considered normal for the test area. By designing a study that changed many variables simultaneously, the scientists observed that the complex interactions of precipitation with other weather factors had the most impact on the overall health of crops and regional agricultural productivity. They concluded that lack of precipitation will have the most dramatic effect on living conditions in the future.........

Posted by: Tyler      Permalink         Source

November 6, 2006, 5:10 AM CT

Inspired By The Soles Of Beetles' Feet

Mushroom-shaped microhairs are the secret of a new adhesive material which researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Metals Research in Stuttgart have developed. Inspired by the soles of beetles' feet, and therefore biomimetic, the special surface structure of the material allows it to stick to smooth walls without any adhesives. Potential applications range from reusable adhesive tape to shoe soles for climbing robots and are therefore of considerable relevance to technology (Journal of the Royal Society Interface, 17 October 2006).

It has been known for some time how insects, spiders and geckos have such a remarkable talent for walking on walls and ceilings. Extremely thin hairs literally stick their feet to the wall and the larger the animal, the finer the hairs. Geckos, which are heavy in comparison to a fly, have been using nanotechnology for this purpose for millions of years (cf. MPS press releases [1-4]). As per findings made by researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Metals Research in Stuttgart, the shape of the fibres is also significant; for example, spatula-shaped ends on the hairs provide especially strong adhesion.

These discoveries aroused great expectations. Is it possible to simply copy the structure of the soles of insects' feet and before long find equivalent biomimetic, i.e. nature-inspired, adhesive materials in everyday use? The scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Metals Research and their colleauges at Gottlieb Binder GmbH in Holzgerlingen, a specialist company for fastener systems, needed plenty of staying power themselves, because the first generations of the surfaces they created with a variety of methods were not effective adhesives.........

Posted by: Kevin      Permalink         Source

November 6, 2006, 5:03 AM CT

Fossils From Ancient Sea Monster

A fossil-hunting trip to celebrate a son's homecoming resulted in the recent discovery of an ancient sea monster in central Montana.

Thought to beapproximately 70 million years old, its skull and lower jaw represent the first complete skull of a long-necked plesiosaur found in Montana, as per Montana State University experts. The skull is said to be one of the best specimens of its kind in North America.

"It's a very important specimen," MSU paleontologist Jack Horner said at the Museum of the Rockies where the fossil rests in boxes. "We have been looking for it for a long, long time".

Ken Olson of Lewistown said he and his son, Garrett, found the fossils in mid-August about 75 miles northeast of Lewistown. Since Horner was in Mongolia, Olson said he prepared the fossils himself and delivered them to Horner about three weeks later. Olson, a retired Lutheran pastor, has long collected fossils for the museum. Two of his best finds are the large Torosaurus skulls displayed there.

Horner said the head of a short-necked plesiosaur was found previously in Montana, but he had been waiting for the discovery of a complete long-necked plesiosaur skull. Both were ancient sea reptiles that lived during the time of the dinosaurs.

"This critter is one of the long, ridiculously long-necked plesiosaurs," said Pat Druckenmiller, an MSU expert in marine reptile fossils. Druckenmiller, who described a new plesiosaur called Edgarosaurus from southern Montana in 2002, was part of a Norwegian expedition in August that mapped the location of several giant fossils in the Arctic. He is now an adjunct instructor in the Department of Earth Sciences at MSU.........

Posted by: William      Permalink         Source

November 6, 2006, 4:57 AM CT

The LouseBuster

University of Utah biologists invented a chemical-free, hairdryer-like device the LouseBuster and conducted a study showing it eradicates head lice infestations on children by exterminating the eggs or "nits" and killing enough lice to prevent them from reproducing.

The study reported in the November 2006 issue of the journal Pediatrics "shows our invention has considerable promise for curing head lice," says Dale Clayton, a University of Utah biology professor who led the research and co-invented the machine.

"It is especially effective because it kills louse eggs, which chemical therapys have never done very well," he says. "It also kills hatched lice well enough to eliminate entire infestations. It works in one 30-minute therapy. The chemical therapys require multiple applications one to two weeks apart".

The LouseBuster now is in early stages of commercial development by a University of Utah spinoff company, Larada Sciences, for which Clayton is chief scientific officer. Patents are pending on the LouseBuster technology, which Clayton hopes will be on the market within two years for use in schools and clinics.

"Each year, millions of children are infested with head lice, a condition known as pediculosis, which is responsible for tens of millions of lost school days," the study's authors write. "Head lice have evolved resistance to a number of of the currently used pediculicides [insecticide shampoos]. Hot air is an effective, safe therapy and one to which lice are unlikely to evolve resistance".........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

November 5, 2006, 9:11 PM CT

Smoking, Radiation And Prostate Cancer

Smoking has been found to contribute to poorer outcomes for people treated for a number of kinds of cancer and now, scientists at Fox Chase Cancer Center have associated smoking and acute side-effects following radiation treatment for prostate cancer. The study was presented today at the 48th Annual Meeting of the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology in Philadelphia.

Smoking is linked to an increased risk of radiation-related side effects in cancers of the head and neck, cervix, lung and breast. For this study, scientists analyzed the impact of smoking on gastrointestinal (GI) and genitourinary (GU) side effects for 1,194 prostate cancer patients treated at Fox Chase Cancer Center with 3D conformal radiation treatment between 1991 and 2001. Smoking information collected previous to therapy included status as a current smoker, ex-smoker or non-smoker. Patients treated with androgen deprivation previous to or during therapy were excluded.

"Our patients who smoked during therapy reported having more acute gastrointestinal side-effects such as diarrhea," said Niraj Pahlajani, M.D., lead author on the study and a resident in the radiation oncology department at Fox Chase.

"Fortunately, smoking didn't appear to impact long-term GI side effects or genitourinary side-effects. These results underscore the importance of smoking cessation previous to radiation treatment".........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source

November 5, 2006, 8:44 PM CT

Six Months Of Hormone Therapy Enough For Prostate Cancer

Prostate cancer patients treated with either radiation or surgery who use hormone therapy for longer than six months do not survive any longer than patients who use the treatment for a shorter amount of time, according to a study presented November 5, 2006, at the American Society for Therapeutic Radiology and Oncology's 48th Annual Meeting in Philadelphia.

"Many patients with high risk prostate cancer are treated with two or more years of hormone therapy based on studies performed over a decade ago," said Cliff Robinson, M.D., lead author of the study and a radiation oncologist at Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, Ohio. "Our study's findings suggest that treating current patients with shorter-term hormone therapy may not only be equally effective, but also improve their quality of life, due to a lesser degree of treatment side effects".

The authors also found that patients receiving longer than six months of hormone therapy were twice as likely to die as patients who use the treatment for a shorter amount of time. "The reasons why patients receiving longer term hormone therapy may do worse are unclear," said Dr. Robinson, who also cautions, "A number of factors could complicate the issue, and this area needs further investigation before any conclusions can be drawn".........

Posted by: Sean      Permalink         Source