Three-dimensional moving holograms breakthrough

A team led by University of Arizona (UA) optical sciences professor Nasser Peyghambarian has developed a new type of “holographic telepresence” that allows remote projection of a three-dimensional, moving image without the need for special eyewear such as 3D glasses or other auxiliary devices. The technology is likely to take applications ranging from telemedicine, advertising, updatable 3D maps and entertainment to a new level. The journal Nature chose the technology to feature on the cover of its Nov. 4 issue. “Holographic telepresence means we can record a three-dimensional image in one location and show it in another location, in real-time, anywhere in the world,” said Peyghambarian, who led the research effort. “Holographic...

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Pope's astronomer says he would baptise an alien if it asked him

An alien – 'no matter how many tentacles it has' – could have a soul, says pope's astronomer Aliens might have souls and could choose to be baptised if humans ever met them, a Vatican scientist said today. The official also dismissed intelligent design as "bad theology" that had been "hijacked" by American creationist fundamentalists. Guy Consolmagno, who is one of the pope's astronomers, said he would be "delighted" if intelligent life was found among the stars. "But the odds of us finding it, of it being intelligent and us being able to communicate with it – when you add them up it's probably not a practical question." Speaking ahead of a talk at the British Science Festival in Birmingham tomorrow, he said that the traditional definition...

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Homer Simpson 'is a true Catholic'

The long-running cartoon series explores issues such as family, community, education and religion in a way that few other popular television programmes can match, according to L'Osservatore Romano, the Vatican's daily broadsheet. The newspaper acknowledged that Homer snores through the sermons of the Reverend Lovejoy and inflicts "never-ending humiliation" on his evangelical neighbour, Ned Flanders. But in an article headlined "Homer and Bart are Catholics", the newspaper said: "The Simpsons are among the few TV programmes for children in which Christian faith, religion, and questions about God are recurrent themes." The family "recites prayers before meals and, in their own peculiar way, believes in the life thereafter". It quoted...

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OLDEST MAN-MADE STRUCTURE FOUND IN GREEK CAVE

The oldest known example of a man-made structure was found within a prehistoric cave in central Greece, according to the Greek culture ministry. The structure is a stone wall that blocked two-thirds of the entrance to the Theopetra cave near Kalambaka on the north edge of the Thessalian plain. It was constructed 23,000 years ago, probably as a barrier to cold winds. “An optical dating test, known as Optically Stimulated Luminescence, was applied on quartz grains nested within the stones. We dated four different samples from the sediment and soil materials, and all provided identical dates,” Nikolaos Zacharias, director of the laboratory of archaeometry at the University of Peloponnese, told Discovery News. According to a statement by the...

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British Library posts Greek manuscripts to Web

By RAPHAEL G. SATTER  LONDON — One of the world's most important caches of Greek manuscripts is going online, part of a growing number of ancient documents to hit the Web in recent years. The British Library said Monday that it was making more than a quarter of its 1,000 volume-strong collection of handwritten Greek texts available online free of charge, something curators there hope will be a boon to historians, biblical scholars and students of classical Greece alike. Although the manuscripts — highlights of which include a famous collection of Aesopic fables discovered on Mount Athos in 1842 — have long been available to scholars who made the trip to the British Library's reading rooms, curator Scot McKendrick said their...

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Mona Lisa's Childhood Home Found

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Forever young: Secret of eternal life revealed by Russian science?

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Halley's comet 'was spotted by the ancient Greeks'

A celestial event seen by the ancient Greeks may be the earliest sighting of Halley's comet, new evidence suggests. According to ancient writers, a large meteorite smacked into northern Greece between 466BC and 467BC. The writers also described a comet in the sky at the time the meteorite fell to Earth, but this detail has received little attention, say the researchers. Comet Halley would have been visible for about 80 days in 466BC, researchers write in the Journal of Cosmology. New Scientist magazine reports that, until now, the earliest probable sighting of the comet was an orbit in 240BC, an event recorded by Chinese astronomers. If the new findings are confirmed, the researchers will have pushed back the date of the first observation...

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Highest Paid Athlete of All Time

Last fall, Forbes magazine was all atwitter as Tiger Woods closed in on becoming “the first athlete to earn over $1 billion” in the course of his career. Presumably his fortunes will now start to droop, but Forbes missed the mark—taking the long view, Tiger was never all that well paid to begin with when compared with the charioteers of ancient Rome. rivers were drawn from the lower orders of society.They affiliated with teams supported by large businesses that invested heavily in training and upkeep of the horses and equipment. The colors of the team jerseys provided them with names, and fans would often hurl violent enthusiasms, as well as lead curse amulets punctured with nails, at the Reds, Blues, Whites, and Greens. The equipment consisted...

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Diamonds Are a Supercomputer’s Best Friend

Diamond sheets filled with holes could be the key to the next generation of supercomputers. Scientists in California have used commercially available technology to pattern large sheets of diamonds with tiny, nitrogen-filled holes. The nitrogen-vacancy diamonds, as the sheets are called by scientists, could store millions of times more information than current silicon-based systems and process that information dozens of times faster. Exactly how diamond-based computing would be used has yet to be determined, but applications could range from designing more efficient silicon-based computers to drug development and cryptography. Nitrogen has been in diamonds for as long as their have been diamonds; it’s why some diamonds have a yellow hue....

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Greeks 'discover Odysseus' palace in Ithaca, proving Homer's hero was real'

An 8th BC century palace which Greek archaeologists claim was the home of Odysseus has been discovered in Ithaca, fuelling theories that the hero of Homer's epic poem was real. Odysseus – known to the ancient Romans as Ulysses – famously took 10 years to return home to Ithaca after the fall of Troy. On his journey, he was twice shipwrecked and encountered a cyclops, the spirit of his mother and tempting Sirens before returning to Ithaca, where he found his wife, Penelope, under pressure to remarry from a host of suitors who had invaded the royal palace. With the help of his father, Laertes, and his son, Telemachus, he slaughtered his rivals and re-established his rule. But despite the fantastical details in the Greek epic, a team of...

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Solar toothbrush doesn't need toothpaste

Canadian researchers have designed a toothbrush that cleans teeth by creating a solar-powered chemical reaction in the mouth, doing away with the need for toothpaste, said physorg.com. Dr Kunio Komiyama, a dentistry professor emeritus at the University of Saskatchewan, designed the first model of the unconventional toothbrush 15 years ago. Today, Komiyama and his colleague Dr Gerry Uswak are seeking recruits to test their newest model, the Soladey-J3X. The toothbrush, which is manufactured by the Shiken company of Japan, will soon be tested by 120 teenagers to see how it compares to a normal toothbrush. The Soladey-J3X has a solar panel at its base that transmits electrons to the top of the toothbrush through a lead wire. The electrons...

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New Solar System Discovered

European astronomers on Tuesday said they had found a distant star orbited by at least five planets in the biggest discovery of so-called exoplanets since the first was logged 15 years ago. The star is similar to our sun and its planetary lineup has an intriguing parallel with own solar system, although no clue has so far been found to suggest it could be a home from home, they said. The star they studied, HD 10180, is located 127 light-years away in the southern constellation of Hydrus, the male water snake, the European Southern Observatory (ESO) said in a press release. The planets were detected over six years using the world's most powerful spectograph, an instrument to capture and analyze light signatures, at ESO's telescope at La...

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Did Churchill and Eisenhower cover up UFO encounter?

With a civilian population haunted by the Blitz and the Second World War still in the balance, it was one development Winston Churchill could have done without – an incursion into British airspace by an arrow-shaped metallic object feared to contain an invasion force of little green men. Such was the sensitivity of an alleged UFO sighting by an RAF bomber crew returning to England from a mission over Germany that Churchill ordered it to be covered up with the words: "This event should be immediately classified since it would create mass panic amongst the general population and destroy one's belief in the Church." This at least was the allegation put to the Ministry of Defence by relatives of a senior British military aide who claimed to have witnessed the cigar-chomping Prime Minister discuss...

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Shrinking moon may explain lunar quakes

The moon has shrunk in the past billion years, and may still be shrinking today, triggering moonquakes and making the moon a more active body than previously thought. The shrinkage has wrinkled parts of the moon's surface like a raisin, creating pinched formations called lobate scarps. Apollo astronauts imaged some of these wrinkles near the moon's equator 40 years ago. Now, new images from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) have revealed 14 more. Some of these lie near the poles, showing that the scarps occur all over the moon's surface. Thomas Watters of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC, and colleagues say the wrinkles likely formed as the moon cooled and contracted. The features are surprisingly recent, having formed...

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Recurring UFO hides behind Weather Balloons, Irwin, PA (20th May, 2010)

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Daytime black UFO over Pennsylvania - 25 May 2010

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UFO Spiral Sighting In Australia - 7 News (5th June 2010)

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A Car for the Modern Fred Flintstone

Fred Flintstone could only dream of such a car. The HumanCar Imagine PS, a four-seater vehicle that uses hand cranks, can take on hills at 30 miles per hour, exceed 60 mph on flat terrain and is expected to hit the market next year. The vehicle has electric plug-in capabilities, so it can still run if only one person is operating the hand-crank in a rowing-like motion (see the video showing the action, below). When four people are all rowing, it can run on human power alone. This thing is truly a "human-electric" hybrid. The chassis is adaptable, and can work with different kinds of batteries and technology in the future without requiring an entirely new vehicle. Getting it going looks a little bit like those wind-up toys: a few front-to-back pulls on the two-hand crank and it's ready...

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Invisibility Cloak Made From Silk

For thousands of years people have worn shimmering silk to stand out in a crowd. Within the next few years people could wear silk to become invisible in a a crowd. For the first time ever, scientists have created an invisibility cloak made from silk, and coated in gold. The new metamaterial, as invisibility cloaks and their kin are technically called, only works on relatively long terahertz waves (a region of the electromagnetic spectrum between radio and infrared light), but the Boston-area scientists who developed the technology think that silk could work as an invisibility cloak at much smaller wavelengths, even in the visible range. The research could lead to a wide range of optically unique materials for use in biomedicine or defense. "This...

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Brazil air force to record UFO sightings

Brazil's government has ordered its air force to officially record any sighting of unidentified flying objects.A government decree said all military and civilian pilots as well as air traffic controllers should register any UFO sightings with the national aerospace defence command. The information will be stored in the national archives in Rio de Janeiro.It will be made available to researchers, including those seeking evidence of extraterrestrial life.Anything unusual that is seen, photographed or video filmed in Brazil's air space will now have to be reported and catalogued. But the air force said it would limit itself to collecting information, and would not be chasing UFOs."Air force command does not have a specialized structure to carry...

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Gasoline from Thin Air?

An enzyme found in the roots of soybeans could be the key to cars that run on air. Vanadium nitrogenase, an enzyme that normally produces ammonia from nitrogen gas, can also convert carbon monoxide (CO), a common industrial byproduct, into propane, the blue-flamed gas found on stoves across America. While scientists caution the research is still at an early stage, they say that this study could eventually lead to new, environmentally friendly ways to produce fuel -- and eventually gasoline -- from thin air. "This organism is a very common soil bacteria that is very well understood and has been studied for a long time," said Markus Ribbe, a scientist at the University of California, Irvine, and a co-author of the new paper that appears in...

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World's largest flower

The flower with the world's largest bloom is the Rafflesia arnoldii. This rare flower is found in the rainforests of Indonesia. It can grow to be 3 feet across and weigh up to 15 pounds! It is a parasitic plant, with no visible leaves, roots, or stem. It attaches itself to a host plant to obtain water and nutrients. When in bloom, the Rafflesia emits a repulsive odor, similar to that of rotting meat. This odor attracts insects that pollinate the plant. Source <www.loc.gov&...

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Clownfish Change Size And Sex To Move Up The Ranks

What the movie "Finding Nemo" doesn't tell you about clownfish is that they're all transsexuals. In a study published in the journal Nature, evolutionary biologist Peter Buston and colleagues report that clownfish in Papua New Guinea reefs can change their sex at will for social reasons. Clownfish live in strict hierarchical communities. Each neighborhood is dominated by a top-ranking female breeder. Her male partner is next, followed by up to four progressively smaller, non-breeding fish. When the dominant female dies, her mate changes sex and becomes female. The top-ranking non-breeder becomes a sexually active male, and all the other fish shift up a rank. Clownfish also appear to regulate their size in order to remain part of the group....

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World's smallest flowering plant

The world's smallest fruit is naturally created by the world's smallest flowering plant, genus Wolffia, a part of the duckweed family., the smallest of which are the Australian Wolffia angusta and the Asian/African Wolffia globosa. The plant itself measures about 1 mm long and the fruit is no bigger than a grain of salt. A Bouquet on the Head of a Pin! I can't overemphasize how tiny these little guys are, as a dozen Wolffia blooms could be arranged tastefully on the head of a pin. While they are flowering plants capable of producing seeds, Wolffia reproduces most commonly by vegetative means. A mature plant will produce a bud which will grow into an individual plant and separate off from the parent. Their capacity for vegetative reproduction...

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Lipstick Contains fish scales

The ingredient under discussion is called pearl essence. (Some sources give this as "pearlescence.") It's the silvery stuff found in fish scales that's used in some lipsticks, nail polishes, ceramic glazes, etc., to make them shimmery. Pearl essence is obtained primarily from herring and is one of many by-products of large-scale commercial fish processing. Synthetic versions have been developed, but to what extent they've supplanted the natural variety I hesitate to say. The cosmetics companies were not forthcoming and I got contrary stories from different industry observers. Fishermen still collect the stuff, though, and one presumes it's being put to good u...

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Huge Diamond in Space

When choosing a Valentine's Day gift for a wife or girlfriend, you can't go wrong with diamonds. If you really want to impress your favorite lady this Valentine's Day, get her the galaxy's largest diamond. But you'd better carry a deep wallet, because this 10 billion trillion trillion carat monster has a cost that's literally astronomical! "You would need a jeweler's loupe the size of the Sun to grade this diamond!" says astronomer Travis Metcalfe (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics), who leads a team of researchers that discovered the giant gem. "Bill Gates and Donald Trump together couldn't begin to afford it." When asked to estimate the value of the cosmic jewel, Ronald Winston, CEO of Harry Winston Inc., indicated that such...

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Bermuda Triangle Mystery Solved

Computer studies of ocean floors around the world, particularly the area known as The Bermuda Triangle, reveal evidence of massive methane explosions in the past. For years, believers in the paranormal, aliens, and other outlandish theories pointed to the the disappearance of ships and aircraft as an indicator of mysterious forces at work in the “Devil’s triangle.” Scientists have finally pointed the rest of us to a more plausible cause.The presence of methane hydrates indicates enormous eruptions of methane bubbles that would swamp a ship, and projected high into the air- take out flying airplanes, as well. Any ships caught within the methane mega-bubble immediately lose all buoyancy and sink to the bottom of the ocean. If the bubbles are...

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The Earth is Growing!

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Chocolate is HEALTHY !!!!!

Chocolate is made from plants, which means it contains many of the health benefits of dark vegetables. These benefits are from flavonoids, which act as antioxidants. Antioxidants protect the body from aging caused by free radicals, which can cause damage that leads to heart disease. Dark chocolate contains a large number of antioxidants (nearly 8 times the number found in strawberries). Flavonoids also help relax blood pressure through the production of nitric oxide, and balance certain hormones in the body. Heart Health Benefits of Dark Chocolate:Dark chocolate is good for your heart. A small bar of it everyday can help keep your heart and cardiovascular system running well. Two heart health benefits of dark chocolate are: Lower Blood...

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Solar plane completes maiden flight

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Natural Viagra: Brazilian Spider Bite Causes Hours-Long Erection

A Brazilian spider delivers more than a painful bite that sends most victims to the hospital. Its venom stimulates an hours-long erection. Now scientists have figured out the chemical that seems to be responsible for the penis boost. In Brazil, emergency room staff can immediately spot the victims of a bite from the Brazilian wandering spider (Phoneutria nigriventer). Patients not only experience overall pain and an increase in blood pressure, they also sport an uncomfortable erection. "The erection is a side effect that everybody who gets stung by this spider will experience along with the pain and discomfort," said study team member Romulo Leite of the Medical College of Georgia, presumably speaking only about male bite victims. "We're...

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No more fillings? Gel regenerates teeth

Dentists could soon hang up their drills. A new peptide, embedded in a soft gel or a thin, flexible film and placed next to a cavity, encourages cells inside teeth to regenerate in about a month, according to a new study in the journal ACS Nano. This technology is the first of its kind. The new gel or thin film could eliminate the need to fill painful cavities or drill deep into the root canal of an infected tooth. "It's not like toothpaste," which prevent cavities, said Nadia Benkirane-Jessel, a scientist at the Institut National de la Sante et de la Recherche Medicale and a co-author of a recent paper. "Here we are really trying to control cavities (after they develop)." Drilling teeth and filling them is safe...

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China hosts first Robot Olympics

The World’s first International Humanoid Robots Olympic Games kicked off on June 21, in China’s Harbin’s Institute of Technology. Two years after hosting a memorable edition of the human Olympic Games, China becomes the first country to host an Olympics dedicated to humanoid robots. Nineteen teams, from China, United States, Japan, South Korea or Germany have brought their best robots to compete in this historic three-day event. To enter the competition, robots had to be less than 60 cm long, and have a human shape, with a head, two arms and two legs. Just like in the real Olympic Games, the sporty robots had to compete in multiple challenges, 24 to be exact, ranging from boxing, to weight-lifting, dancing, or sprint. But there are also some unusual domestic events, like cleaning or...

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How to hold your new iPhone 4

Apple has released official advice for iPhone 4 owners to overcome the problem of the device losing signal when held by the lower left corner.Steve Jobs responded to a query about the problem from one owner by saying: "Just avoid holding it in that way." Except that it seems that Apple themselves have got it wrong and have gotten to grips with how to hold the new phone.Well it seems that while us mere mortals will have to settle for buying a rubber outer casing in order to ensure that we can continue to have a reasonable signal, one Intergalactic user has figured it out....I wonder what price plan he has got? Source <www.geeksaresexy.com&...

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Make your own micro SIM

We've finally found ourselves a solid, confirmed shot of a micro SIM in the wild, thanks to an FCC filing from Lok8u -- the company that just inked a deal with T-Mobile -- that shows the innards of its GPS watch torn asunder. Over on the right there is one of the micro SIMs in question, and as you can clearly make out, the contact pad is identical to the one you'd find on a traditional SIM. In other words, if you were really hard up to get that iPad or iPhone up and running on a network that isn't providing micros, you could probably shoehorn a traditional SIM in there with a little elbow grease and handiwork, which happily matches up with information we've been hearing from several contacts of ours. Who knew Lok8u would be so important in...

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Rome gets hotel made from rubbish

Environmental campaigners have built a temporary hotel largely from rubbish in the Italian capital, Rome, to raise awareness of European beach pollution.Save the Beach Hotel, taking guests for four days only, is adorned with debris from the world's beaches.Its five rooms and reception are lined with 12 tonnes of rubbish, including toys, cans, car exhaust pipes.Danish supermodel Helena Christensen, who has stayed at the hotel, said it was a striking work of art."When you're inside the house, there are walls as there would be in a normal house, but they are all made of inorganic waste," Ms Christensen, who is also an environmental campaigner, told the BBC.A man looks out from a bedroom at Save the Beach hotel in Rome, 4 June 2010 The hotel will...

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World's Biggest Burger

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The Earth and Moon formed later than previously thought

The Earth and Moon were created as the result of a giant collision between two planets the size of Mars and Venus. Until now it was thought to have happened when the solar system was 30 million years old or approx. 4,537 million years ago. But new research from the Niels Bohr Institute shows that the Earth and Moon must have formed much later – perhaps up to 150 million years after the formation of the solar system. The research results have been published in the scientific journal, Earth and Planetary Science Letters. "We have determined the ages of the Earth and the Moon using tungsten isotopes, which can reveal whether the iron cores and their stone surfaces have been mixed together during the collision”, explains Tais W. Dahl, who did...

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