A totally new and highly controversial theory on the origin of life on earth, is set to cause a storm in the science world and has implications for the existence of life on other planets
Jules Verne anticipated man’s first trip to the moon in his 1865 novel, From the Earth to the Moon. Arthur C Clarke foresaw space stations and sentient computers in his classic, 2001: A Space Odyssey. Ray Bradbury wrote about extraterrestrial civilisation in The Martian Chronicles decades before NASA’s Mars Rover surveyed the planet. These accounts, written before space travel was possible, have inspired generations of space scientists and explorers. Now, the European Space Agency hopes to recognise young writers and inspire future astrophysicists and astronauts by sponsoring the Clarke-Bradbury International Science Fiction Competition — via Wired
Brian Thomas, a PhD candidate in ecology at Stanford University, has done an ecological analysis of humans and vampires in Sunnydale, the home of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He took some initial assumptions on rates of population growth, vampire feeding, etc and plugged them into a differential equations model. What he got was an equilibrium human population of 36,346, and an vampire population of around 18, and furthermore the equilibrium is stable. His conclusion was that even though the show’s designers are not ecologists, they managed to come up with ideas that actually made ecological sense — via Slashdot
NASA is threatening to mothball the International Space Station unless Russia coughs up its share of the money for maintenance and support missions — via Slashdot
An Edinburgh University team has received a grant to research Wind-Powered rainmaking machines. As a cautionary note, there is the instance of a 1952 cloud-seeding experiment gone terribly wrong
Solar power is set for a boost with the help of a material that can soak up energy from almost all of the Sun’s spectrum. It should allow solar cells to jump in efficiency from today’s best of 30 per cent to 50 per cent or higher
According to energy regulator Callum McCarthy, Britain’s push to build new wind farms could exacerbate current problems of overcapacity in the electricity industry — or nuclear power generators could be going out of business
Australian researchers searching for extraterrestrial life are cheering at their recent elevation to associate membership of NASA and a $250,000 in-kind donation by Sun Microsystems
Scientists say the steak knife is destined for the scrap heap thanks to a new DNA test able to identify cattle carrying a tenderness gene
A study by researchers at the University of North Carolina will concern environmentalists who say planted GM crops have cross-pollinated with normal plants to create superweeds that are resistant to insect attack and could spread rapidly
A team of dermatologists think they’ve found a way of attaching skin grafts without the scarring and swelling that existing methods can cause. A new laser-activated glue that as well as treating skin burns, could one day be used to seamlessly join other tissues or seal blood vessels
Enzo Boschi, head of Italy’s Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology, has said that a volcanic island submerged off the coast of Sicily for the last 170 years could reappear in the coming weeks if furious seismic rumblings continue
Physicist Stephen Wolfram took the stage Wednesday at the Comdex Fall 2002 trade show, evangelising a computing-centric view of the universe that might sit better with the technology industry than it has with some other audiences. Wolfram believes the universe is composed not of particles and waves, but of simple tiny programs. He believes these myriad programs, or algorithms, give rise to physical phenomena as fundamental as space and as complicated as human beings
Despite the daily bombardment of news from the Middle East, Central Asia, and other world trouble spots, roughly 85% of young Americans could not find Afghanistan, Iraq, or Israel on a map. And of the internal geographic questions, 70% couldn’t find New Jersey and 11% couldn’t find the US
Millions of people world-wide may have worse eyesight and even be more likely to go blind because of a long-held but misguided idea about how to correct short-sightedness. A study intended to confirm the theory has instead been stopped because the children’s eyesight was getting worse
Eye specialists are closer than ever to developing a bionic eye to restore sight for those blinded by retinal disease
A new study, co-authored Professor Garth Nicholson, has found motor neurone disease is triggered by a sudden loss of nerve cells
Mobile phones, electronic organisers and portable DVD players would be so much less cumbersome if they were surgically implanted under your skin. Science fiction? Not any more
German prosecutors were investigating a complaint on Saturday that the brain of urban guerrilla Ulrike Meinhof was removed after her death in 1976 and examined to find a reason for her violent behaviour
A start-up company, MagiQ Technologies, plans to introduce a cryptography system that uses quantum key distribution
to thwart eavesdropping on fibre optic communication channels
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