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BP unveils new oil spill plan as shares tumble

Scientific American Online - Mon, 2010-06-14 20:59

By Steve Holland and Chris Baltimore

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FBI files reveal Ted Kennedy death threats, plots

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 20:56
WASHINGTON/BOSTON (Reuters) - Late Senator Edward Kennedy was subject to scores of death threats before and after the assassinations of his brothers, according to FBI files released on Monday that also revealed efforts by the Kennedy family to fight rumors that he had links to Communists.


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The brain thinks hands are wider and stubbier than they actually are

Scientific American Online - Mon, 2010-06-14 20:01

To function well in the world, people need a good sense of where their body is in space and how it's postured . This " position sense " helps us coordinate high-fives, boot a soccer ball or pick up the remote. But that doesn't seem to mean that our brains have an accurate sense of our body's precise proportions. A new study found that people tend to have rather inaccurate mental models of their own hands. [More]

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Brain Holds Hand at Arm's Length from Reality

Scientific American Online - Mon, 2010-06-14 19:57

It’s probably happened to you: a friend says, “I know this place like the back of my hand,” and then proceeds to get you hopelessly lost. Well, it could be that they really did know it like the back of their hand. Because researchers have found that people don’t actually know their hands as well as they think they do. The study appears in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . [Matthew Longo and Patrick Haggard, URL to be posted shortly.] [More]

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Squid studies: How does one get ready for an expedition?

Scientific American Online - Mon, 2010-06-14 19:45

Editor's Note: Marine biologist William Gilly is on an expedition to study Humboldt squid on the University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System research vessel New Horizon in the Gulf of California. He and other scientists will spend the coming weeks learning about the giant squid, their biology and ecology on this National Science Foundation-funded expedition. This is his first blog post about the trip. [More]

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BP took shortcuts on blown-out well: lawmakers

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 18:54
HOUSTON (Reuters) - BP Plc took risky shortcuts in drilling its Macondo well that "increased the danger of a catastrophic well failure," two U.S. lawmakers probing the well's blow-out and the worst U.S. oil spill said on Monday.


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Greenhouse Gas Emission Offsets May Be Fraudulent

Scientific American Online - Mon, 2010-06-14 18:45

A broad coalition of activists are charging that as much as a third of all Kyoto Protocol carbon offset credits ever sold to banks and governments could be illegitimate because they were generated by firms manipulating the marketplace.

Companies, the activists allege, are deliberately generating greenhouse gas pollution in order to snag millions of dollars worth of carbon credits when they then mitigate the emissions. Many chemical manufacturers also seem to be tweaking their systems to generate as much emissions as possible, only reverting to normal pollution levels once they've hit their maximum annual offset credit allowance.

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How to find a habitable exoplanet: Don't look for one

Scientific American Online - Mon, 2010-06-14 17:30

Most planetary scientists will tell you that the objects they study are more complex and harder to categorize than almost anything else out there in the universe. That assertion is surprising and interesting, and it's a point that is gradually sinking in for astronomers. Much of the past 400 years of telescopic exploration has been about stellar taxonomy, pinning objects into their respective display cases. Despite the glorious wealth of 200 billion stars in our galaxy, the physics underlying their fundamental properties is remarkably uniform , and most can be readily described with only a few parameters--mass, age, elemental abundance. Individuals may be having particularly bad millennia, covered in spots, twisting their magnetic fields into knots, and throwing off flares, but their overall place in the cosmic zoo can be well defined.

Not true for planets, especially the smaller ones that just might be suitable for harboring life in a recognizable form. Mass, age and composition are just the start of a lengthy list of important characteristics. How far does it orbit from its parent star? What type of star does it orbit? Is the orbit elliptical ? Does the planet have an atmosphere, and if so what is the composition? Is there an axial tilt? Are there other planets in the system, exerting their gravitational might and forcing the orbit to shift over time? Are there gravitational tides at work, flexing and molding the planet? Is there volcanism or tectonic activity? How is the interior of a world layered? Is there a global magnetic field, cocooning the world? How did the planet assemble, does it have surface water? Did the planet get washed by rich organic chemistry in its youth? Does it have moons, and if so, what are the conditions on those? How often are they pelted by asteroids and comets?

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Fact or Fiction: The Days (and Nights) Are Getting Longer

Scientific American Online - Mon, 2010-06-14 15:55

The summer solstice that falls this year on June 21 marks the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere, sunlight-wise. Almost imperceptibly, however, Earth's day–night cycle --one rotation on its axis--is growing longer year by year, and has been for most of the planet's history.

Forces from afar conspire to put the brakes on our spinning world--ocean tides generated by both the moon and sun's gravity add 1.7 milliseconds to the length of a day each century, although that figure changes on geologic timescales. The moon is slowly spiraling away from Earth as it drives day-stretching tides, a phenomenon recorded in rocks and fossils that provides clues to the satellite's origin and ultimate fate. "You're putting energy into the moon's orbit and taking it out of the Earth's spin," says James Williams , a senior research scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

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Iraq's new parliament convenes

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 14:28
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's parliament convened on Monday for the first time since a March election, cloaked by heavy security a day after gunmen and suicide bombers raided the central bank in a sign of continued lawlessness and instability.


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North Korea face Brazil in daunting return

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 13:51
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Secretive North Korea make a first return to the World Cup since 1966 on Tuesday but could hardly face a bigger challenge than five-times champions Brazil.


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North, South Korea address U.N. over ship sinking

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 13:19
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - South and North Korea addressed the U.N. Security Council separately on Monday over the deadly sinking of a South Korean naval ship in March that has raised tension on the Korean peninsula.


Categories: Science News

Fake Botox, Real Threat (preview)

Scientific American Online - Mon, 2010-06-14 13:00

In early 2006 a self-styled “naturopathic” doctor, Chad Livdahl, pleaded guilty in Arizona to mail fraud and conspiracy to engage in mail and wire fraud, to misbrand a drug and to defraud the U.S. He was sentenced to nine years in prison. His wife and business partner in Toxin Research International, Inc., in Tucson, Zarah Karim, pleaded guilty to the same charges and received a six-year sentence. Both also paid heavy fines and restitution because, according to prosecutors, the couple had made at least $1.5 million in just more than a year by peddling tiny vials of fake Botox to doctors across the U.S. 

Botox, which is injected in minute amounts to smooth frown lines or relax muscle spasms, is far from the only medical product that inspires illicit manufacture and trade. The world market in counterfeit pharmaceuticals is estimated to be worth some $75 billion annually. But the active ingredient in Botox and related products differs from the constituents of other pharmaceuticals in a profound way: in its pure form, it is the deadliest substance known to science. In fact, botulinum neurotoxin (BoNT) is grouped with the world’s most lethal potential biological weapons agents, sharing “Select Agent” status with the pathogens that cause smallpox, anthrax and plague. This biowarfare potential puts the existence of illicit laboratories churning out the toxin and of shady distributors selling it worldwide through the Internet into a more disturbing light than most pharmaceutical fraud.

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Special Report: After euro zone crisis, what next?

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 11:58
By Noah Barkin, Paul Taylor, Tim Heritage, Emmanuel Jarry, Andreas Rinke and James Mackenzie


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Iraq's new parliament convenes

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 10:04
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's parliament convened on Monday for the first time since a March election, cloaked by heavy security a day after gunmen and suicide bombers raided the central bank in a sign of continued lawlessness and instability.


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Israel sets up inquiry into deadly Gaza ship raid

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 07:31
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel's cabinet approved on Monday an Israeli inquiry into a deadly raid on a Gaza aid flotilla, responding to international demands for impartiality by putting two foreign observers on the panel.


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Moscow-led bloc may try to quell Kyrgyz clashes

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 07:28
OSH, Kyrgyzstan (Reuters) - A group of ex-Soviet states Monday proposed sending helicopters and equipment to help Kyrgyzstan's government stop ethnic violence that has killed at least 124 people, and suggested troops could follow.


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Japanese space probe finds unique asteroid dust

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 06:17
SYDNEY (Reuters) - A Japanese space probe has landed in the Australian outback after a seven-year voyage to an asteroid, safely returning a capsule containing a unique sample of dust, Japanese mission controllers said on Monday.


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Mars' missing water

Science A GoGo - Mon, 2010-06-14 05:10
Scientists have uncovered fresh evidence for a massive ocean that once covered a third of Mars' surface. But the big question is where did all the water go?
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Gunmen, bombs target Iraq central bank

Reuters - Mon, 2010-06-14 04:45
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Fifteen people were killed and dozens wounded Sunday when suicide bombers detonated at least one bomb at Iraq's central bank and gunmen battled troops in what officials said may have been a raid on the vaults.


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