April 30,
2002 -
Hubble’s new camera wows
astronomers - By Alan
Boyle, MSNBC, Even
veteran astronomers say they are
stunned by the first pictures
from the Hubble Space
Telescope’s month-old Advanced
Camera for Surveys — images of
unprecedented detail that reveal
crashing galaxies, colorful
nebulas and new cosmic depths...
April
27, 2001 - Science
Paper Describes Oldest City in the New World - The
ancient Peruvian site of Caral may have been one of the
first urban centers in the Americas, thriving more than a
thousand years before other known cities, according to a
study in the 27 April issue of the international journal,
Science. New radiocarbon dates indicate that Caral's
immense stone structures were built between 2600 and 2000
B.C. This inland metropolis is therefore roughly the same
age as smaller maritime-based societies on the coast,
previously thought to precede more complex societies...
April
3, 2001 - A
Supernova Sheds Light on Dark Energy - NASA,
A discovery by astronomers using the Hubble Space
Telescope supports the notion that the Universe is filled
with a mysterious form of energy pushing galaxies apart at
an ever-increasing rate. - NASA's Hubble Space Telescope
has spotted a burst of light from an exploding star
located much farther from Earth than any previously seen -
a supernova blast in the early Universe that is casting
light on a mystery of truly cosmic scale. This stellar
explosion is extraordinary not only because of its
tremendous distance -- 10 billion light-years from our
planet -- but also because it greatly bolsters the case
for the existence of a mysterious form of "dark
energy" pervading the cosmos. The concept of dark
energy, which shoves galaxies away from each other at an
ever-increasing speed, was first proposed, then discarded,
by Albert Einstein early in the last century...
April
05, 2001 - Was
Johnny Appleseed a Comet?
- NASA Science News, A new experiment suggests
that comet impacts could have sowed the seeds of life
on Earth billions of years ago. Four billion years ago
Earth was bombarded by a hail of comets and asteroids.
The shattering collisions rendered our planet
uninhabitable during a period scientists call the Late
Heavy Bombardment (LHB)...
April
30, 2001 - Visualizing
the Web - By Paul Heltzel, Technology
Review, Web browsers have changed little since the
first versions of Mosaic came out of the University of
Illinois, way back in 1993. To put a visual face on
the job, a company called WebMap Technologies has
developed a new way of browsing that provides a sense
of location on the Web. The technology requires a
connection to a server-side application, which
categorizes documents based on the Web page's text and
metadata entered by Web developers. On the client
side, WebMap is a free browser plug-in for Microsoft
Internet Explorer, which connects to the WebMap server
and displays pages as icons on a map. The map is
divided into oddly shaped, interconnecting regions,
like territories on a chart. To look more closely at a
region, you click to zoom in, which displays more
sites from that region and then individual pages. You
can see a demo
at the WebMap site...
April 13, 2001 -
Life
As We Didn't Know It - NASA SCIENCE NEWS,
Biologists always thought life required the Sun's
energy, until they found an ecosystem that thrives in
complete darkness. Dr. Cindy Van Dover maneuvers her
robotic craft closer to the strange, rocky landscape
below. It's totally dark, except for lonely circles of
light where she points her flood lamps. Back on the
mother ship her monitor reveals tall, thin towers of
craggy rock billowing black smoke from their peaks.
Very strange! ...
April 26, 2001 -
IBM
breakthrough: Nanotubes - By John G.
Spooner, ZDNet News, IBM researchers have achieved
a breakthrough the company says will help pave the way
for the next era in the evolution of the
microprocessor--beyond silicon. The development in
nanotechnology, the manipulation of molecular
structures, will allow IBM (NYSE: IBM) to more easily
create groups of transistors from tiny cylinders
called carbon nanotubes. IBM believes that nanotubes,
which measure 5 atoms to 10 atoms wide and are 10,000
times narrower than a human hair, are the most
promising replacement material for silicon to develop
advanced chips in the coming decades...
April 25, 2001 -
20,000
Leagues Under the Sea: The Webcast! -
"Astrobiologists are visiting the Indian Ocean to
explore a bizarre undersea ecosystem that doesn't need
sunlight to flourish. You can join them via a live webcast
on April 26th!"
December 19, 1997 -
You,
Robot - "The high-tech world is littered with failed
attempts to make computers that seem like people. What
makes a linguist think she can succeed where the techies
haven't? ..."
April 24, 2001 -
Dietary
Supplement Series and Survey - NPR.ORG,
There has been extraordinary growth in recent years of
dietary supplements such as vitamins, minerals, herbal
medicines and hormones. A national
survey by National Public Radio, The Kaiser
Family Foundation and Harvard's Kennedy School of
Government finds that half of all Americans believe
that dietary supplements other than standard minerals
and vitamins are generally good for their health and
well-being. Eighteen percent say they use these
products regularly. Listen to the first part of a
series on dietary supplements as NPR's Richard Harris
reports for Morning Edition...
April 13, 2001 -
Ultraviolet
Keeps Moore's Law In The Limelight - By David
M. Ewalt, InformationWeek, In 1965, Intel co-founder
Gordon Moore said that the speed and power of computer
chips would double every 18 months. Thirty-six years
later, “Moore's Law” is still widely accepted, but
chipmakers have been rapidly approaching the point where
it has looked like the law may not hold up. Now government
scientists have given it new life by building a machine
that can fit more circuits onto a microchip—and as a
result, radically increase the chip's computing power...
April 18, 2001 -
The
Amazing Canadarm2 - NASA, "Crawling around the
International Space Station like
an agile worm, the newest Canadian
robotic arm will be essential for
building and maintaining the ISS..."
Building a brand new space station
is a big job. Just ask the
assembly crews of the
International Space Station (ISS).
They have to attach modules
weighing tons, extend solar panels
longer than a bus, and haul
equipment to and from the space
shuttle. It sounds like these
hardworking astronauts could use a
hand! ...
April 02, 2001 -
Biggest
Solar Flare on Record -
"At 21:51 UT, Monday 2 April 2001, active region 9393
unleashed a major solar flare. Now reclassified as at
least an X20, it appears to be the biggest flare on
record, most likely bigger than the one on 16 August 1989,
also an X20 flare, and definitely more powerful that the
famous 6 March 1989 flare which was related to the
disruption of the power grids in Canada..." Fantastic
photos!
April 03, 2001 -
In
Germany, Plasticized Corpse Exhibit Proves Shocking but
Educational -
By EDMUND L. ANDREWS, Shul.org, "MANNHEIM, Germany - Until recently, this
mid-sized industrial city wasn't known for much more than
its ice-hockey team. But that was before the Runner, the
Muscleman and the Expanded Body..."
April 02, 2001 -
Bringing
out your dead - Feedmag, Jefferson Chase
on the human corpses displayed as art in Berlin.
Staged in a converted postal railway station (Postbahnhof
am Ostbahnhof) and supported by heavier-then-usual
corporate sponsorship, Body Worlds uniquely straddles
the line between pop science and pop art...
