Newsdesk Archive
When it comes to cars, Toyota thinks hydrogen fuel cells are one of the technologies of the future. And the company isn't alone.Offering the promise of a clean ride with long range, it's a technology automakers are racing to perfect, and one they're betting will catch on.
Tensions are rising in Japan over radioactive water leaking into the Pacific Ocean from Japan's crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, a breach that has defied the plant operator's effort to gain control.Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Wednesday called the matter
Even the tiniest mistake during an operation to extract over 1,300 fuel rods at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan could lead to a series of cascading failures with an apocalyptic outcome, fallout researcher Christina Consolo told RT.
It's time to recognize that New York City's misguided war on marijuana has failed.Instead of spending millions on low-level drug prosecutions that disproportionally affect communities of color, why not regulate the city's $1.65bn marijuana market
Australian mining company OM Manganese has been prosecuted and fined nearly $134,000 for desecrating an important Aboriginal site. The company was allowed to mine in the area if it steered clear of sacred landmarks, a task at which it failed spectacularly, damaging the most important features of a revered structure.
A ground-breaking scheme that would have preserved swathes of Ecuador
Macaque monkeys that have developed the ability to use stone tools to open shellfish are in danger of losing the skill because of human development.Scientists found that illegal palm oil and rubber plantations in Thailand are disrupting the monkeys' feeding behaviour.Dogs brought in to protect the farms are repelling the macaques from the shoreline, which inhibits their tool-using activities.
Decades of research have shown that writing down your emotions has concrete health benefits - even helping wounds heal. But as more and more people publish their intimate feelings online, could they be doing themselves more harm than good?High-profile coverage of cyberbullying might make sharing your deepest emotions online sound like a bad idea, but when it comes to the risks and benefits of writing online, advice is mixed.
High-level League of Legends players can now be awarded the same visas as more traditional pro athletes, says publisher Riot Games. On July 11th, Riot e-sports manager Nick Allen told GameSpot that the company had convinced US immigration services to recognize League of Legends as a professional sport and simplify the visa process accordingly.Related: 'League of Legends' gamer granted US visa recognizing him as professional athlete
NASA is getting closer to taking 3D printing to the final frontier. Along with manufacturer Made in Space, the space agency has been developing a zero-gravity printing model for the International Space Station. The finished product could produce its first part as early as next year. The 3D Print Experiment performed well during microgravity flight tests this summer, but one last battery of tests remains. The printer must go through vibration, environmental, and vacuum trials to make sure it can withstand fluctuating pressure levels. If all goes as planned, the ISS should get its first 3D printer in the fall of 2014.
In quite an eerie feat, physicists have floated microscopic diamonds in midair using laser beams.Researchers have already used lasers to levitate extremely small particles, such as individual atoms, but this is the first time that the technique has worked on a nanodiamond, which, in this case, measures just 100 nanometers (3.9 x 10-8 inches) across, or more than 1,000 times thinner than a fingernail.
Drones are most often associated with assassinations in remote regions of Pakistan and Yemen but in Peru, unmanned aircraft are being used to monitor crops and study ancient ruins.Forget Reapers and Predators -- the drones used here are hand-held contraptions that look like they were assembled in a garage with gear from a hardware store.
Pull apart any electrical device and you will find a riot of right angles, straight lines and flat, uncompromising silicon wafers. John Rogers is changing that. The 45-year-old materials scientist has spent more than 15 years developing electronics that can bend and stretch without breaking. His devices, from surgical sutures that monitor skin temperature to biodegradable sensors that dissolve when their useful life is done, share a unifying quality: They can slip seamlessly into the soft, moist, moving conditions of the living world.
Using a Japanese super-computer, a team of scientists have carried out the largest ever imitation of the way a brain's cells connect with each other. This will pave the way for a better understanding of the extremely complex human brain, they say.
When it comes to cars, Toyota thinks hydrogen fuel cells are one of the technologies of the future. And the company isn't alone.Offering the promise of a clean ride with long range, it's a technology automakers are racing to perfect, and one they're betting will catch on.
Australian mining company OM Manganese has been prosecuted and fined nearly $134,000 for desecrating an important Aboriginal site. The company was allowed to mine in the area if it steered clear of sacred landmarks, a task at which it failed spectacularly, damaging the most important features of a revered structure.
Macaque monkeys that have developed the ability to use stone tools to open shellfish are in danger of losing the skill because of human development.Scientists found that illegal palm oil and rubber plantations in Thailand are disrupting the monkeys' feeding behaviour.Dogs brought in to protect the farms are repelling the macaques from the shoreline, which inhibits their tool-using activities.
A recent study of microblade stone tool finds in India implies that modern humans entered the subcontinent of India from Africa later than some scholars have theorized, suggesting that more ancient modern humans journeyed north of India to get to East and Southeast Asia. The conclusions are central in the ongoing debate about how, where and when early modern humans left their African homeland and began inhabiting West and East Asia during the Late Pleistocene (126,000 - 11,700 years ago).
For the first time, the iconic hominid (early pre-human) fossil finds of the famous Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site (COHWHS) in South Africa will belong, in a very literal way, to the world's public beginning Friday, July 26, 2013.Up until now, access to the originals and casts of the fossils were the sole prerogative of select scientists and scholars involved in researching them. Now, casts, or replicas, of the original fossils, made by specially trained members of the local communities, will be sold and distributed to members of the interested public.
Eight thousand years ago, Minnesota looked like another world.Prairie grasses covered the land, with trees sparse except in the extreme northeast. The landscape was extremely dry, with lakes reduced to waterholes and rivers withered to streams. Small groups of native people roamed the wild, hunting bison that were 50 percent larger than the species we know today. They camped in the river bottoms, close to water, fish and game.
Archaeologists in Spain are busy excavating the Gran Dolonia portion of the Atapuerca archaeological site for clues to the first humans that arrived in Europe.Many archaeological treasures have come from this northern Spain location known as the caves of the Sierra de Atapuerca. In 2007 human remains were found that date back one and a half million years, considered the oldest Europeans remains ever found. Human remains have also been found from the
A badger has reportedly proved to be a talented archaeologist after helping to discover the tombs of two medieval lords in Germany.The 12th century burial site, which has been hailed as a
Long-necked dinosaurs such as Diplodocus probably had less-flexible necks than previously thought, new research suggests.For the study, published Wednesday (Aug. 14) in the journal PLOS ONE, researchers analyzed the movements of ostrich necks in order to gain insight into how long-necked dinosaurs may have moved.
On the geological timescale, humans
A small, wide-eyed beast with luxuriant orange fur has been identified as a new species more than 100 years after it first went on display in the world's museums.The discovery brings to an end one of the longest zoological cases of mistaken identity and establishes the "olinguito" (which rhymes with mojito) as the first new carnivore recorded in the western hemisphere for 35 years.
As part of an effort to improve treatments for life-threatening illnesses, a team of scientists have created rabbits that glow in the dark.Their efforts produced two rabbits out of a litter of eight that went from being a normal, fluffy white to glowing green in the dark. The rabbits were born at the University of Istanbul as part of a collaboration between scientists from universities in Turkey and Hawaii.
Workers at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant have told the ABC that contaminated water has most likely been seeping into the sea since the disaster two-and-a-half years ago.Japan's nuclear watchdog has described the leaks as a "state of emergency".Workers have told ABC's AM program that they do not have much faith in Tokyo Electric Power Company's (TEPCO) ability to handle the situation and they claim another accident is inevitable.
Thinking about the vastness of space can either be profound or depressing, but a new image released by Nasa makes the place feel positively crowded. The map shows the orbital paths of the more than 1,400 earth-threatening asteroids in the solar system."These are the asteroids considered hazardous because they are fairly large (at least 460 feet or 140 meters in size), and because they follow orbits that pass close to the Earth's orbit (within 4.7 million miles or 7.5 million kilometers)." Nasa explained in the image
With the catchy name S/2004 N 1, a tiny 20 kilometer (12.4 mile) wide chunk of rock became the 14th moon to be identified in orbit around the giant planet Neptune. A little closer to home, however, the debate continues as to exactly how many moons Earth has, but there is one whose identity cannot be mistaken.It has been seen by nearly every human being who has ever lived and its often mystical appearance has inspired artists and musicians over the centuries. Without it, our planet and lives would be very different indeed.
A consortium of companies will try to establish the business case for a reusable space plane in a new European Space Agency (Esa) funded study.The concept under investigation is Skylon, a vehicle proposed by the UK firm Reaction Engines Ltd (REL).Skylon would be powered by an air-breathing rocket engine that could enable it to take off and land at a standard runway.
For decades, the names given to newly discovered planets have almost always failed to live up to the excitement these celestial finds represent. (Take for example forgettable monikers such as CFBDSIR2149, HD 189733b, 55 Cancri e, and Kepler-69c.) The organization that oversee's the naming of new planets, the International Astronomical Union (IAU), knows that these titles are the opposite of cool and catchy. And thankfully, something is being done about it
We've seen holograms in Star Wars and Star Trek and other Hollywood cinema. But now, life-size holograms could eventually be a reality in your own living room.Los Angeles-based Provision 3D Media is trying to raise $950,000 on Kickstarter to make its hologram technology life-size, as conceptualized in the above image. Right now the company has successfully developed its "HoloVision" displays in sizes as small as 3 inches and ranging up to as large as 52 inches.
Singing, rather than saying, phrases in a foreign language makes them easier to remember, and can make learning a second language easier, according to new research.A new study published in the journal in Memory and Cognition, has found that adults learning phrases in Hungarian were better able to match the words with their English counterparts when they learned the phrase by singing it.
There seems to be a simple way to instantly increase a person
For more than 300 years, thousands of people have been buried just below the stone flooring of Bath Abbey. It is estimated that up to 6,000 bodies have been "jammed in" to shallow graves under the church's grave ledger stones.Now as the floor of the 500-year-old building begins to lift and collapse, the abbey has discovered "huge great voids everywhere" beneath its flooring. "It's where previous burials and graves have settled down and left voids," said Charles Curnook, from the abbey."We were quite surprised the floor hadn't collapsed already on us."
A recent study of microblade stone tool finds in India implies that modern humans entered the subcontinent of India from Africa later than some scholars have theorized, suggesting that more ancient modern humans journeyed north of India to get to East and Southeast Asia. The conclusions are central in the ongoing debate about how, where and when early modern humans left their African homeland and began inhabiting West and East Asia during the Late Pleistocene (126,000 - 11,700 years ago).
For the first time, the iconic hominid (early pre-human) fossil finds of the famous Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site (COHWHS) in South Africa will belong, in a very literal way, to the world's public beginning Friday, July 26, 2013.Up until now, access to the originals and casts of the fossils were the sole prerogative of select scientists and scholars involved in researching them. Now, casts, or replicas, of the original fossils, made by specially trained members of the local communities, will be sold and distributed to members of the interested public.
Eight thousand years ago, Minnesota looked like another world.Prairie grasses covered the land, with trees sparse except in the extreme northeast. The landscape was extremely dry, with lakes reduced to waterholes and rivers withered to streams. Small groups of native people roamed the wild, hunting bison that were 50 percent larger than the species we know today. They camped in the river bottoms, close to water, fish and game.
Archaeologists in Spain are busy excavating the Gran Dolonia portion of the Atapuerca archaeological site for clues to the first humans that arrived in Europe.Many archaeological treasures have come from this northern Spain location known as the caves of the Sierra de Atapuerca. In 2007 human remains were found that date back one and a half million years, considered the oldest Europeans remains ever found. Human remains have also been found from the
A badger has reportedly proved to be a talented archaeologist after helping to discover the tombs of two medieval lords in Germany.The 12th century burial site, which has been hailed as a
Long-necked dinosaurs such as Diplodocus probably had less-flexible necks than previously thought, new research suggests.For the study, published Wednesday (Aug. 14) in the journal PLOS ONE, researchers analyzed the movements of ostrich necks in order to gain insight into how long-necked dinosaurs may have moved.
On the geological timescale, humans
A small, wide-eyed beast with luxuriant orange fur has been identified as a new species more than 100 years after it first went on display in the world's museums.The discovery brings to an end one of the longest zoological cases of mistaken identity and establishes the "olinguito" (which rhymes with mojito) as the first new carnivore recorded in the western hemisphere for 35 years.
As part of an effort to improve treatments for life-threatening illnesses, a team of scientists have created rabbits that glow in the dark.Their efforts produced two rabbits out of a litter of eight that went from being a normal, fluffy white to glowing green in the dark. The rabbits were born at the University of Istanbul as part of a collaboration between scientists from universities in Turkey and Hawaii.
Workers at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant have told the ABC that contaminated water has most likely been seeping into the sea since the disaster two-and-a-half years ago.Japan's nuclear watchdog has described the leaks as a "state of emergency".Workers have told ABC's AM program that they do not have much faith in Tokyo Electric Power Company's (TEPCO) ability to handle the situation and they claim another accident is inevitable.
Thinking about the vastness of space can either be profound or depressing, but a new image released by Nasa makes the place feel positively crowded. The map shows the orbital paths of the more than 1,400 earth-threatening asteroids in the solar system."These are the asteroids considered hazardous because they are fairly large (at least 460 feet or 140 meters in size), and because they follow orbits that pass close to the Earth's orbit (within 4.7 million miles or 7.5 million kilometers)." Nasa explained in the image
With the catchy name S/2004 N 1, a tiny 20 kilometer (12.4 mile) wide chunk of rock became the 14th moon to be identified in orbit around the giant planet Neptune. A little closer to home, however, the debate continues as to exactly how many moons Earth has, but there is one whose identity cannot be mistaken.It has been seen by nearly every human being who has ever lived and its often mystical appearance has inspired artists and musicians over the centuries. Without it, our planet and lives would be very different indeed.
A consortium of companies will try to establish the business case for a reusable space plane in a new European Space Agency (Esa) funded study.The concept under investigation is Skylon, a vehicle proposed by the UK firm Reaction Engines Ltd (REL).Skylon would be powered by an air-breathing rocket engine that could enable it to take off and land at a standard runway.
For decades, the names given to newly discovered planets have almost always failed to live up to the excitement these celestial finds represent. (Take for example forgettable monikers such as CFBDSIR2149, HD 189733b, 55 Cancri e, and Kepler-69c.) The organization that oversee's the naming of new planets, the International Astronomical Union (IAU), knows that these titles are the opposite of cool and catchy. And thankfully, something is being done about it
We've seen holograms in Star Wars and Star Trek and other Hollywood cinema. But now, life-size holograms could eventually be a reality in your own living room.Los Angeles-based Provision 3D Media is trying to raise $950,000 on Kickstarter to make its hologram technology life-size, as conceptualized in the above image. Right now the company has successfully developed its "HoloVision" displays in sizes as small as 3 inches and ranging up to as large as 52 inches.
Singing, rather than saying, phrases in a foreign language makes them easier to remember, and can make learning a second language easier, according to new research.A new study published in the journal in Memory and Cognition, has found that adults learning phrases in Hungarian were better able to match the words with their English counterparts when they learned the phrase by singing it.
There seems to be a simple way to instantly increase a person
For more than 300 years, thousands of people have been buried just below the stone flooring of Bath Abbey. It is estimated that up to 6,000 bodies have been "jammed in" to shallow graves under the church's grave ledger stones.Now as the floor of the 500-year-old building begins to lift and collapse, the abbey has discovered "huge great voids everywhere" beneath its flooring. "It's where previous burials and graves have settled down and left voids," said Charles Curnook, from the abbey."We were quite surprised the floor hadn't collapsed already on us."
A recent study of microblade stone tool finds in India implies that modern humans entered the subcontinent of India from Africa later than some scholars have theorized, suggesting that more ancient modern humans journeyed north of India to get to East and Southeast Asia. The conclusions are central in the ongoing debate about how, where and when early modern humans left their African homeland and began inhabiting West and East Asia during the Late Pleistocene (126,000 - 11,700 years ago).
For the first time, the iconic hominid (early pre-human) fossil finds of the famous Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site (COHWHS) in South Africa will belong, in a very literal way, to the world's public beginning Friday, July 26, 2013.Up until now, access to the originals and casts of the fossils were the sole prerogative of select scientists and scholars involved in researching them. Now, casts, or replicas, of the original fossils, made by specially trained members of the local communities, will be sold and distributed to members of the interested public.
Eight thousand years ago, Minnesota looked like another world.Prairie grasses covered the land, with trees sparse except in the extreme northeast. The landscape was extremely dry, with lakes reduced to waterholes and rivers withered to streams. Small groups of native people roamed the wild, hunting bison that were 50 percent larger than the species we know today. They camped in the river bottoms, close to water, fish and game.
Archaeologists in Spain are busy excavating the Gran Dolonia portion of the Atapuerca archaeological site for clues to the first humans that arrived in Europe.Many archaeological treasures have come from this northern Spain location known as the caves of the Sierra de Atapuerca. In 2007 human remains were found that date back one and a half million years, considered the oldest Europeans remains ever found. Human remains have also been found from the
A badger has reportedly proved to be a talented archaeologist after helping to discover the tombs of two medieval lords in Germany.The 12th century burial site, which has been hailed as a
Long-necked dinosaurs such as Diplodocus probably had less-flexible necks than previously thought, new research suggests.For the study, published Wednesday (Aug. 14) in the journal PLOS ONE, researchers analyzed the movements of ostrich necks in order to gain insight into how long-necked dinosaurs may have moved.
On the geological timescale, humans
A small, wide-eyed beast with luxuriant orange fur has been identified as a new species more than 100 years after it first went on display in the world's museums.The discovery brings to an end one of the longest zoological cases of mistaken identity and establishes the "olinguito" (which rhymes with mojito) as the first new carnivore recorded in the western hemisphere for 35 years.
As part of an effort to improve treatments for life-threatening illnesses, a team of scientists have created rabbits that glow in the dark.Their efforts produced two rabbits out of a litter of eight that went from being a normal, fluffy white to glowing green in the dark. The rabbits were born at the University of Istanbul as part of a collaboration between scientists from universities in Turkey and Hawaii.
Workers at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant have told the ABC that contaminated water has most likely been seeping into the sea since the disaster two-and-a-half years ago.Japan's nuclear watchdog has described the leaks as a "state of emergency".Workers have told ABC's AM program that they do not have much faith in Tokyo Electric Power Company's (TEPCO) ability to handle the situation and they claim another accident is inevitable.
Thinking about the vastness of space can either be profound or depressing, but a new image released by Nasa makes the place feel positively crowded. The map shows the orbital paths of the more than 1,400 earth-threatening asteroids in the solar system."These are the asteroids considered hazardous because they are fairly large (at least 460 feet or 140 meters in size), and because they follow orbits that pass close to the Earth's orbit (within 4.7 million miles or 7.5 million kilometers)." Nasa explained in the image
With the catchy name S/2004 N 1, a tiny 20 kilometer (12.4 mile) wide chunk of rock became the 14th moon to be identified in orbit around the giant planet Neptune. A little closer to home, however, the debate continues as to exactly how many moons Earth has, but there is one whose identity cannot be mistaken.It has been seen by nearly every human being who has ever lived and its often mystical appearance has inspired artists and musicians over the centuries. Without it, our planet and lives would be very different indeed.
A consortium of companies will try to establish the business case for a reusable space plane in a new European Space Agency (Esa) funded study.The concept under investigation is Skylon, a vehicle proposed by the UK firm Reaction Engines Ltd (REL).Skylon would be powered by an air-breathing rocket engine that could enable it to take off and land at a standard runway.
For decades, the names given to newly discovered planets have almost always failed to live up to the excitement these celestial finds represent. (Take for example forgettable monikers such as CFBDSIR2149, HD 189733b, 55 Cancri e, and Kepler-69c.) The organization that oversee's the naming of new planets, the International Astronomical Union (IAU), knows that these titles are the opposite of cool and catchy. And thankfully, something is being done about it
We've seen holograms in Star Wars and Star Trek and other Hollywood cinema. But now, life-size holograms could eventually be a reality in your own living room.Los Angeles-based Provision 3D Media is trying to raise $950,000 on Kickstarter to make its hologram technology life-size, as conceptualized in the above image. Right now the company has successfully developed its "HoloVision" displays in sizes as small as 3 inches and ranging up to as large as 52 inches.
Singing, rather than saying, phrases in a foreign language makes them easier to remember, and can make learning a second language easier, according to new research.A new study published in the journal in Memory and Cognition, has found that adults learning phrases in Hungarian were better able to match the words with their English counterparts when they learned the phrase by singing it.
There seems to be a simple way to instantly increase a person
For more than 300 years, thousands of people have been buried just below the stone flooring of Bath Abbey. It is estimated that up to 6,000 bodies have been "jammed in" to shallow graves under the church's grave ledger stones.Now as the floor of the 500-year-old building begins to lift and collapse, the abbey has discovered "huge great voids everywhere" beneath its flooring. "It's where previous burials and graves have settled down and left voids," said Charles Curnook, from the abbey."We were quite surprised the floor hadn't collapsed already on us."
A recent study of microblade stone tool finds in India implies that modern humans entered the subcontinent of India from Africa later than some scholars have theorized, suggesting that more ancient modern humans journeyed north of India to get to East and Southeast Asia. The conclusions are central in the ongoing debate about how, where and when early modern humans left their African homeland and began inhabiting West and East Asia during the Late Pleistocene (126,000 - 11,700 years ago).
For the first time, the iconic hominid (early pre-human) fossil finds of the famous Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site (COHWHS) in South Africa will belong, in a very literal way, to the world's public beginning Friday, July 26, 2013.Up until now, access to the originals and casts of the fossils were the sole prerogative of select scientists and scholars involved in researching them. Now, casts, or replicas, of the original fossils, made by specially trained members of the local communities, will be sold and distributed to members of the interested public.
Eight thousand years ago, Minnesota looked like another world.Prairie grasses covered the land, with trees sparse except in the extreme northeast. The landscape was extremely dry, with lakes reduced to waterholes and rivers withered to streams. Small groups of native people roamed the wild, hunting bison that were 50 percent larger than the species we know today. They camped in the river bottoms, close to water, fish and game.
Long-necked dinosaurs such as Diplodocus probably had less-flexible necks than previously thought, new research suggests.For the study, published Wednesday (Aug. 14) in the journal PLOS ONE, researchers analyzed the movements of ostrich necks in order to gain insight into how long-necked dinosaurs may have moved.
A small, wide-eyed beast with luxuriant orange fur has been identified as a new species more than 100 years after it first went on display in the world's museums.The discovery brings to an end one of the longest zoological cases of mistaken identity and establishes the "olinguito" (which rhymes with mojito) as the first new carnivore recorded in the western hemisphere for 35 years.
As part of an effort to improve treatments for life-threatening illnesses, a team of scientists have created rabbits that glow in the dark.Their efforts produced two rabbits out of a litter of eight that went from being a normal, fluffy white to glowing green in the dark. The rabbits were born at the University of Istanbul as part of a collaboration between scientists from universities in Turkey and Hawaii.
Workers at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant have told the ABC that contaminated water has most likely been seeping into the sea since the disaster two-and-a-half years ago.Japan's nuclear watchdog has described the leaks as a "state of emergency".Workers have told ABC's AM program that they do not have much faith in Tokyo Electric Power Company's (TEPCO) ability to handle the situation and they claim another accident is inevitable.
With the catchy name S/2004 N 1, a tiny 20 kilometer (12.4 mile) wide chunk of rock became the 14th moon to be identified in orbit around the giant planet Neptune. A little closer to home, however, the debate continues as to exactly how many moons Earth has, but there is one whose identity cannot be mistaken.It has been seen by nearly every human being who has ever lived and its often mystical appearance has inspired artists and musicians over the centuries. Without it, our planet and lives would be very different indeed.
A consortium of companies will try to establish the business case for a reusable space plane in a new European Space Agency (Esa) funded study.The concept under investigation is Skylon, a vehicle proposed by the UK firm Reaction Engines Ltd (REL).Skylon would be powered by an air-breathing rocket engine that could enable it to take off and land at a standard runway.
We've seen holograms in Star Wars and Star Trek and other Hollywood cinema. But now, life-size holograms could eventually be a reality in your own living room.Los Angeles-based Provision 3D Media is trying to raise $950,000 on Kickstarter to make its hologram technology life-size, as conceptualized in the above image. Right now the company has successfully developed its "HoloVision" displays in sizes as small as 3 inches and ranging up to as large as 52 inches.
Singing, rather than saying, phrases in a foreign language makes them easier to remember, and can make learning a second language easier, according to new research.A new study published in the journal in Memory and Cognition, has found that adults learning phrases in Hungarian were better able to match the words with their English counterparts when they learned the phrase by singing it.
For more than 300 years, thousands of people have been buried just below the stone flooring of Bath Abbey. It is estimated that up to 6,000 bodies have been "jammed in" to shallow graves under the church's grave ledger stones.Now as the floor of the 500-year-old building begins to lift and collapse, the abbey has discovered "huge great voids everywhere" beneath its flooring. "It's where previous burials and graves have settled down and left voids," said Charles Curnook, from the abbey."We were quite surprised the floor hadn't collapsed already on us."
There was considerable fallout, both positive and negative, from our first story covering the radical pig-chimp hybrid theory put forth by Dr. Eugene McCarthy, a geneticist who's proposing that humans first arose from an ancient hybrid cross between pigs and chimpanzees. Despite the large number of comments, here at Phys.org, on macroevolution.net, and on several other discussion forums, little in the way of a scientific consensus has emerged. By and large, those coming out against the theory had surprisingly little science to offer in their sometimes personal attacks against McCarthy.
Hundreds of thousands of years ago
THE "Garden of Eden" has been saved, even as chaos grows all around. Last week, amid a wave of bombings on the streets of Baghdad, Iraq's Council of Ministers found time to approve the creation of the country's first national park
The discovery of an "early modern human" dating from 40,000 years ago in a cave outside Beijing, and a comparison of the individual's DNA with that of populations around the globe, are providing new pieces in the puzzle of how Homo sapiens left their African origins to expand across the continents.
Artists and craftsmen more than 2,000 years ago developed thin-film coating technology unrivaled even by today's standards for producing DVDs, solar cells, electronic devices and other products. Understanding these sophisticated metal-plating techniques from ancient times, described in the ACS journal Accounts of Chemical Research, could help preserve priceless artistic and other treasures from the past.
Phrases like
The year is
Archaeologists from the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) recently found the decapitated skull of an individual still lying in the offering bowl, dating back 500 years ago at the Tlatelolco temple site in Mexico City.Tlatelolco is a site in Mexico City where remains of the pre-Columbian city-state of the same name have been found centred on the Plaza de las Tres Culturas, which is a large square surrounded on three sides by a excavated Aztec monuments and a seventeenth-century church called the Templo de Santiago.
Had James Watson not been quite so chauvinistic, Rosalind Franklin might today be remembered mainly as a scientist, and not as a victim.But that wasn't to be. In Dr. Watson's memoir, "The Double Helix," which recounts the two years the molecular biologist spent at the University of Cambridge's Cavendish Laboratory attempting, with his colleague Francis Crick, to discover the structure of DNA, here is how he described Dr. Franklin, whom he called "Rosy".
Different strokes for different folks? Not when it comes to the aquatic ape: the first detailed observations of swimming chimpanzees and orang-utans suggest that they, like us, tend to swim using a form of breaststroke. The findings imply that we may owe our swimming style to our evolutionary past.Apart from humans, great apes usually avoid deep water for fear of unseen predators that might be lurking there, but anecdotal evidence shows that they will go for a dip if they feel safe enough.