Slashdot Mirror
Domain: nature.com
Stories and comments across the archive that link to nature.com.
Stories · 1,757
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Another Form of Carbon: Magnetic Nanofoam
mhh5 writes "Researchers publishing in Nature have discovered yet another form of carbon. Apparently, this stuff is temporarily magnetic after it is made (at temperatures of ~10,000 C) and is a spongy solid. So that's five (give or take one?) allotropes for carbon: amorphous, graphite, diamond, fullerenes, and nanofoam. Collect them all!" -
Mice Get Human Breasts
cavehobbit writes "Nature.com reports: Lab mice have grown tissue more usually confined to a bra - lumps of human breast. The growths should help researchers work out how cancer develops. My only question is: Will Logitech or Microsoft be first to market...." -
The ROBOlympic Games
Roland Piquepaille writes "The first International Robot Games, or ROBOlympics, organized by the Robotics Society of America, will take place on March 20th and 21st, 2004 in San Francisco, California. There will be competition for combat and non-combat robots, a World Cup Soccer game, and even a robo-triathlon. More than 400 robots are registered for this robotics competition. And the winners will receive hard cash. Nature tells us the story in 'Robolympics contestants shoot for gold.' More details and references are available in this overview which also includes a very nice photo of two robots, the larger one either fixing or rocking the smaller one. And for your information, ROBOlympics is not sold out. So if you are near San Francisco, it's still time to buy tickets. They cost $15 to $25. Entrance is free for children under 7." -
Stretchy Wires to Create Artificial Nerves
Roland Piquepaille writes "Researchers from the Johns Hopkins University have built electronic circuits which exhibit a rubbery behavior. The flexible circuits, built by using gold springs, can stretch like rubber. And Nature says that these stretchy wires can be used to create artificial nerves bending inside our bodies or wearable electronics. 'Wiring like this could be woven into stretchy sports clothing and used to connect up sensors that monitor athletic performance. Rubbery electrodes made from biocompatible materials might be attached to a beating heart and used to sense impending problems.' This overview contains more details and references about these flexible wires." -
Yarn Spun from Nanotubes
jabberjaw writes "Nature is reporting that Professor Alan H Windle has spun nanotube yarn by twisting nanotubes onto spinning rods as they come out of the furnace from which they are made. Professor Windle's team used ethanol (carbon source) with ferrocene (catalyst) and thiopene (for thread assembly) to create the structure. To create the tubes a mix of the above chemicals is inserted into a furnace in a jet of hydrogen gas. However, do not get your hopes up yet, the press release also indicates that the yarn has a strength comparable to that of most modern textiles but the groups does state that there is room for improvement. Yes, for those of you wondering, there is mention of a space elevator." -
New Method of Spam Filtering
Alephcat writes "A simple and easily implemented scheme for combating e-mail spam has been devised by two researchers in the United States. P. Oscar Boykin and Vwani Roychowdhury of the University of California, Los Angeles use their method to exploit the structure of social networks to quickly determine whether a given message comes from a friend or a spammer. The method works for only about half of all e-mails received - but in all of those cases, it sorts the mail into the right category. The article was published on Nature magazines website earlier today." -
Oldest Fossilised Winged Insect Yet Discovered
tr0llb4rt0 writes "The Scientific American reports on an article in Nature (paid subscription required for full text) on how the fossilised mouth parts of an insect discovered in Scotland in 1928 has turned out to be the oldest winged insect yet discovered, pushing back the age of the earliest appearance of winged insects nearly 80 million years. Previos fossils of winged insects have dated to around 330 million years and scientist believe this new discovery lived between 408 and 438 million years ago. " -
Reduce CO2 With Phytoplankton Seeding
JediJeremy writes "Nature has this article on a team of scientists who want to reduce the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere by increasing the amount of phytoplankton in the oceans. Phytoplankton thrive on iron, so the scientists are going to conduct a study to better grap the affect of an increase of iron in the water will be. They plan to dissolve an iron sulphate solution in a 150-200 square-kilometer patch of the Southern Ocean, near Antarctica to maximize the containment of the iron. The major flaw in the plan is it will only work if the phytoplankton die and sink to the bottom of the ocean, taking the CO2 with them, otherwise, the carbon will be reintroduced into the ecosystem. Interesting idea, but big design flaw." -
Do Plants Practice Grid Computing?
Roland Piquepaille writes "According to Nature, plants appear to 'think' and seem to optimize their 'breathing' by conducting simple calculations through a distributed computing scheme. "David Peak and co-workers at Utah State University in Logan say that plants may regulate their uptake and loss of gases by 'distributed computation' -- a kind of information processing that involves communication between many interacting units." Nature adds this is similar to signals exchanged by ants to find the best source of food for an ant community. In their paper, the researchers added that their results were "consistent with the proposition that a plant solves its optimal gas exchange problem through an emergent, distributed computation performed by its leaves." This overview contains more details and references. It also includes a picture of the tiny pores on the surface of a cactus leaf, called stomata, which permit the plant to breathe when they're opened." -
Scientists Create Supersolid From Helium
jabberjaw writes "Nature is reporting that Pennsylvania State University researchers Eun-Seong Kim and Moses Chan have created a 'supersolid' from helium-4. Although a crystalline solid, the supersolid can flow much like a liquid. This is due to the fact that the empty compartments in the crystal move coherently, thus waves can progress through the lattice. The supersolid state can be compared to the superfluid state. Perhaps a condensed matter physicist can dumb the article down for layfolk such as myself?" -
Nanoparticles Enter One's Brain Via Olfactory Bulb
MO-411 writes "An article in Nature News briefly looks at nanoparticles' entry into the brains of lab rats. The fascinating point is that the 35-nanometer particles entered via the olfactory passageways. Scientist confirmed this via plugging one side of the a rats nose. This is significant, as Ken Donaldson, a toxicologist at the University of Edinburgh, UK says. 'I would never have thought of looking for inhaled nanoparticles in the brain.' Think about it -- everything from kitty litter to wallboard dust is likely ending up inside the one's brain, circumventing the blood/brain barrier and all its protections. It also makes for an interesting delivery mechanism for other substances..." -
Alzheimer's Cause Identified?
JediJeremy writes "Naturehas this article on the possibility that researchers have identified the cause of Alzheimers. Their research says that amyloid beta, a protein in the brain, may cause plaques and makes an enzyme -BACE1-that causes dimentia. In the study mice, those without BACE1 did not get dimentia, while the others did. The article also says that there are current market drugs that can stop BACE1 production and all that needs to be done is for a human trial to begin. Looks like there is hope for those that suffer." -
Double Pulsar Discovered
jabberjaw writes "Nature is reporting that a set of two pulsars could be emitting gravitational waves. Einstein predicted the existence of gravitational waves in his general theory of relativity, but a gravitational wave has yet to be detected. Find out more about gravitational waves and pulsars at Eric Weisstein's World of Physics." -
Extinctions Due to Global Warming Predicted
PizzaFace writes "A study being published today in Nature predicts that global warming will doom 15 to 37 percent of plants and animals to extinction by 2050, according to various news sources. The study looked at how predicted warming would affect the suitability of the areas that particular species inhabit, and whether displaced species would be able to migrate to suitable habitat. Many of the unlucky species are being caught between the hammer of global warming and the anvil of habitation destruction." The BBC has a story about climate engineering: long-range planning on making major changes in order to reduce the effects of global warming. -
Making The Case That Voynich Is A Hoax
DeadVulcan writes "The Voynich Manuscript, a mysterious book of uncertain age, is widely believed to be written either in an unknown language or a long-lost encryption scheme. Nature reports that computer scientist Gordon Rugg has demonstrated that it's possible to generate a text like the Voynich manuscript -- containing language-like regularities, despite being potentially meaningless -- using cryptographic techniques of the time. This lends some support to those who claim that the book is a hoax." -
Speculation on SARS Origins
JediJeremy writes "Nature has this article on the possibility that the SARS virus is a cross between mammal and bird viruses. The article does go on to say that this is totally speculation and that a mammal virus could have mutated. But it raises some interesting points, such as a possible new bio-terror weapon." -
Scientists Contribute to Greenhouse Gas Emissions
dus writes "Many of the 10,000 scientists attending this week's annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) study climate change. Collecting them all in San Francisco undoubtedly increases our understanding of global warming, but it releases more than 12,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, pointed out one of this year's delegates." -
The Beetle That Thought It Was A Precious Stone
circletimessquare writes "Queensland, Australia is well-known as one of the most important sources for opal in the world. Apparently Queensland has another untapped source of opal recently discovered in its backyard, except this source is not the providence of geology, but biology. A native weevil of Queensland grows opal on it's back shell! Implications for research into nanotechnology, biotechnology, and photonic computing are implied in the article. The journal Nature is publishing the more rigorous scientific write-up of the findings." -
The Beetle That Thought It Was A Precious Stone
circletimessquare writes "Queensland, Australia is well-known as one of the most important sources for opal in the world. Apparently Queensland has another untapped source of opal recently discovered in its backyard, except this source is not the providence of geology, but biology. A native weevil of Queensland grows opal on it's back shell! Implications for research into nanotechnology, biotechnology, and photonic computing are implied in the article. The journal Nature is publishing the more rigorous scientific write-up of the findings." -
Chimpanzee Genome Sequenced
dharash writes "Nature reports 'Researchers today released a draft version of the genetic sequence of our closest relative, the chimpanzee Pan troglodytes..The differences between the chimp's genetic code and ours should reveal what makes us human...' Click here for the entire article." -
Chimpanzee Genome Sequenced
dharash writes "Nature reports 'Researchers today released a draft version of the genetic sequence of our closest relative, the chimpanzee Pan troglodytes..The differences between the chimp's genetic code and ours should reveal what makes us human...' Click here for the entire article." -
Anti-static Polymer Stores Data, Too
Tau Zero writes "The BBC reports that a group of scientists (including Stephen Forrest) have discovered a new use for the anti-static plastic film polyethylenedioxythiophene: storing up to a gigabyte per cubic centimeter. The storage technology resembles an old fuse-link PROM; a bit of polymer between two electrodes conducts electricity when new, but a strong pulse turns it into an open circuit. The polymer is already cheap, and read/write speeds are claimed to be good. The researchers predict that this could be made into working devices in a few years (no word on whether this means devices in the laboratory or retail packages)." Update: 11/29 16:34 GMT by CN : Whoops, we already reported this earlier, and I was fooled into thinking it new by the BBC. Given the slump of news due to the holiday weekend, it's still worth mulling over, though. -
Earth's Asteroid Risk Downgraded
xanthines-R-yummy writes "Relax, everyone - the risk of a gigantic asteroid colliding with Earth just got smaller! Nature reports: "A new survey revises down the likelihood of a massive asteroid hitting the Earth by 20-30%. We're only due to collide with rocks larger than one kilometre across roughly once every 600,000 years, it concludes." Whew! What a relief!" -
CD-R Lifespan - Is It The Label?
sysadmn writes "Slashdot has discussed archival lifespan of CD-R media before. Fred Langa revisits the issue with a new twist: Are glue-on labels causing premature failure? Much more common than rain forest fungus! From Fred's informative LangaList newsletter." -
Voyager 1 Reaches Interstellar Space
letxa2000 writes "CNN is reporting that Voyager 1, now some 8.4 billion miles (90 AUs) from the sun, has left the solar system and entered interstellar space by reaching the heliopause. However, whether the probe has reached the heliopause or is just coming close is the subject of two papers to be published in Thursday's Nature Magazine. The probe supposedly has enough nuclear fuel to last until 2020. Will it be able to find anything interesting outside the solar system in the next 17 years?" -
Duck-Billed Dinosaurs Suffered From Cancer
Polyploid Pimp writes "Nature reports a study by Bruce Rothschild of NEOUCOM about cancer in dinosaurs. Rothschild's group X-rayed 10,000 bones of over 700 museum specimens across North America. They found that only one group, the hadrosaurs or duck-billed dinosaurs got cancer. They hypothesize the cancer may be due to the dinosaurs presumed diet of conifers, which contain a number of known carcinogens. Additionally, this group of dinosaurs is thought (by some people) to have been warm blooded, which may have increased their cancer risk. They cite as support for conducting their study that understanding the causes and rates of cancer in other animals may provide insight into human cancers. I find it an interesting story as it demonstrates another use for museum specimens outside of their original collection purposes, and represents (to me at least) one reason to keep funding them, since you never know how the material may be used in the future." -
Happy Birthday, Atom
Shipud writes "200 years ago today (Oct. 21) John Dalton revolutionized chemistry by starting the process of turning it into an exact science. He presented the Table of Atomic Weights, at the Manchester literary and Philosophical Society. Dalton's work proposed atoms exist: and not just as an explanatory or philosophical tool. His theory laid the foundations for the periodic table of the elements (1869, Mendeleev), and indeed to all modern chemistry. The molecular weight of compounds is today measured in Daltons, the weight of a hydrogen atom. Read more about Mr. Dalton in today's Nature: a man of many interests, whose atomic theory preceded experimental evidence by a century. Read also about Daltonism -- and why it is named after him." -
Uranium Eating Bacteria Help Cold War Cleanup
Shipud writes "Scientists from UMA have used metal-metablozing bacteria, Geobacter, to "eat" uranium. The uranium is converted from a soluble form to an insoluble one, thus preventing water contamination. Cold-war era uranium processing has left many contaminated sites in the US, and worldwide. Details are here." -
Femtosecond Lasers for Nanosurgery
Roland Piquepaille writes "In "Lasers operate inside single cells," Nature writes that nanosurgery can be achieved by vaporizing some components of living cells without killing the cells themselves. "With pulses of intense laser light a millionth of a billionth of a second long, US researchers are vaporizing tiny structures inside living cells without killing them. The technique could help probe how cells work, and perform super-precise surgery." This was developed by Eric Mazur of Harvard University and his colleagues. This summary contains more details and references about the process and these microexplosions. Please note that it's a very different technique from the one described six months ago in a previous Slashdot reference, Surgery with Femtosecond Lasers." -
Scientists Discover Why the Cookie Crumbles
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Schrodinger's Cat Closer To Reality?
Shipud writes "A group from the University of Oxford is proposing a scheme to achieve quantum superposition in a large object, according to Nature - not as large as Schrodinger's cat, but about ten-thousandth of a square millimiter, some 10^14 atoms. Quantum superposition is the phenomenon in which a photon passing through a beam splitter to takes two paths at once, inconceivable in the macroscopic world. William Marshall and co-workers suggest to mount a tiny mirror on a springy arm, so that the power of a single photon will be enough to oscillate it. When that photon is superposed, it transfers its superposition to the mirror, which will be quantum superposed: at two places at once. Wave particle duality has already been shown in Buckminster fullerenes, a 60 atom compound. Are we getting closer to quantum computers?" -
Schrodinger's Cat Closer To Reality?
Shipud writes "A group from the University of Oxford is proposing a scheme to achieve quantum superposition in a large object, according to Nature - not as large as Schrodinger's cat, but about ten-thousandth of a square millimiter, some 10^14 atoms. Quantum superposition is the phenomenon in which a photon passing through a beam splitter to takes two paths at once, inconceivable in the macroscopic world. William Marshall and co-workers suggest to mount a tiny mirror on a springy arm, so that the power of a single photon will be enough to oscillate it. When that photon is superposed, it transfers its superposition to the mirror, which will be quantum superposed: at two places at once. Wave particle duality has already been shown in Buckminster fullerenes, a 60 atom compound. Are we getting closer to quantum computers?" -
Schrodinger's Cat Closer To Reality?
Shipud writes "A group from the University of Oxford is proposing a scheme to achieve quantum superposition in a large object, according to Nature - not as large as Schrodinger's cat, but about ten-thousandth of a square millimiter, some 10^14 atoms. Quantum superposition is the phenomenon in which a photon passing through a beam splitter to takes two paths at once, inconceivable in the macroscopic world. William Marshall and co-workers suggest to mount a tiny mirror on a springy arm, so that the power of a single photon will be enough to oscillate it. When that photon is superposed, it transfers its superposition to the mirror, which will be quantum superposed: at two places at once. Wave particle duality has already been shown in Buckminster fullerenes, a 60 atom compound. Are we getting closer to quantum computers?" -
Think Airports Are Chaotic? You Are Right.
jonfromspace writes "Nature is running a brief, but interesting article on Chaos Theory, (as opposed to KAOS) and how it relates to that damn airport shutle service. I knew there was no way to predict arrival times with any degree of certainty. >Also worth a read is this paper on applying Chaos Theory to fisheries management." -
Think Airports Are Chaotic? You Are Right.
jonfromspace writes "Nature is running a brief, but interesting article on Chaos Theory, (as opposed to KAOS) and how it relates to that damn airport shutle service. I knew there was no way to predict arrival times with any degree of certainty. >Also worth a read is this paper on applying Chaos Theory to fisheries management." -
Switchable Net Woven from DNA
virtualXTC writes "A team of US researchers have managed to make a woven DNA mesh that expands and contracts. By coating the net in silver they can make nano-wire lattice in which individual wires can be lengthened or shortened using a short snippet of ssDNA to create a nano-switch." -
Dog Genome Sequenced
virtualXTC writes "There is an article in Nature today about Shadow's (Craig Venter's dog) sequence being released and freely available to the public (a rare trend in biotech). Craig Venter is generally regarded as the person responsible for getting the human genome sequenced years ahead of schedule using his own DNA and shotgun sequencing approach." -
Dog Genome Sequenced
virtualXTC writes "There is an article in Nature today about Shadow's (Craig Venter's dog) sequence being released and freely available to the public (a rare trend in biotech). Craig Venter is generally regarded as the person responsible for getting the human genome sequenced years ahead of schedule using his own DNA and shotgun sequencing approach." -
Paper Capable Of Playing Videos Developed
Makarand writes "Nature has posted an article describing paper capable of displaying video using rearrangeable electronic ink, being produced by Philips Research Labs (in the Netherlands). The paper-display draws power from a lightweight battery, and displays data stored in a portable chip. The display consists of pixels containing a drop of colored ink that can spread over a reflective white background under electrical control to create colors. With fast switching times and lower switching voltages, these paper-displays are capable of displaying video images." -
New Material for Spintronics Discovered
Cpt_Corelli writes "Researchers at Uppsala University and the Swedish Royal Institute of Technology have discovered a new material with properties suitable for creating spintronic devices at room temperature. Previously this was only believed to be available at very low temperatures. The material is a combination of zinc oxide and manganite. The breakthrough is the cover item of the October issue of Nature Materials. If this new material proves viable for production there is an enormous potential for smaller and faster processors. Could this be the beginning of a new era in processor development?" -
The Oldest Mouse Contest
Shipud writes "Nature reports a contest that was launched in Britain today, to produce the oldest laboratory mouse. Current record in 5 years -- 150 in human years. From the page : ``Researchers can use any technique to boost longevity, including genetic manipulation and stem-cell therapy''. Winners will receive cash for every day beyond the current record. The Methuselah Mouse contest was created in an effort to boost research into human longevity." -
The Oldest Mouse Contest
Shipud writes "Nature reports a contest that was launched in Britain today, to produce the oldest laboratory mouse. Current record in 5 years -- 150 in human years. From the page : ``Researchers can use any technique to boost longevity, including genetic manipulation and stem-cell therapy''. Winners will receive cash for every day beyond the current record. The Methuselah Mouse contest was created in an effort to boost research into human longevity." -
Can You Raed Tihs?
An aoynmnuos raeedr sumbtis: "An interesting tidbit from Bisso's blog site: Scrambled words are legible as long as first and last letters are in place. Word of mouth has spread to other blogs, and articles as well. From the languagehat site: 'Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by it slef but the wrod as a wlohe. ceehiro.' Jamie Zawinski has also written a perl script to convert normal text into text where letters excluding the first and last are scrambled." -
Nano Power for Nano Devices Patented
lperdue writes "Scientists at the Univ. Oklahoma at Tulsa have come up with a microscopic battery just a thousandth of a millimetre across ... and rated at a millionth of a milliamp. It's still a lab experiment, but then so was the semiconductor at one time." -
Man Learns To See Again After 40 Years Of Blindness
MonTemplar writes "BBC News Online reports the story of Mike May, from California, who lost one eye and was blinded in the other at the age of three after an accident. Now, doctors have been able to restore the sight to his remaining eye by transplanting corneal and limbal stem cells. The operation, and their subsequent work with Mr May to monitor his recovery, in an attempt to better understand how the brain learns to interpret the signals from the eyes, have been published in the journal Nature Neuroscience. Ironically, being able to see again has meant Mr May has had to re-learn some activities, such as skiing or crossing the road, where he had become proficient when blind." -
Chemical Element 110 To Be Named
An anonymous reader writes "According to Nature Magazine, chemists will vote in Ottawa, Canada this week, and are expected to approve the chemical element 110's informal moniker, 'darmstadtium', and give it the chemical symbol Ds. The title honors the Laboratory for Heavy Ion Research (called GSI) in Darmstadt, Germany, where the substance was first made. It seems that 'disputes over claimed sightings of new elements have [previously] led to acrimonious and nationalistic battles over naming', but not in this case." -
Galactic Cannibalism Photographed
fuqqer writes "What does a galaxy do when it gets hungry? It eats another...Check out the story of intergalactic cannibalism on space.com, or on cnn.com. There's a oldie but goodie nature article too! This ain't no pygmy Thanksgiving in Borneo!" -
Scientists Say Cosmic Rays May Cause Global Warming
Saint Aardvark writes "Researchers in Israel and Germany suggest that variations in cosmic radiation as the sun orbits the galactic core may be responsible for changes in the Earth's climate -- including more than half of the change in the 20th century. A PDF of their article is available from GSA Today or read the abstract for their Physical Review Letters article." -
Renaissance Potters Were Nanotechnologists
Roland Piquepaille writes "In this article, Nature says that "tiny metal particles give 15th century Italian ceramics lustre." Nature adds that iridescent glazes -- changing colour when viewed from different perspectives -- were achieved by using "particles of copper and silver of between 5 and 100 billionths of a metre across." And the story becomes even more interesting. Nanotechnology meets alchemy! "The ability to change colour was regarded as an alchemical property, making iridescence magic too." Read this summary for more details. And for more information, you can read the abstract of this research paper, "Copper in glazes of Renaissance luster pottery: Nanoparticles, ions, and local environment," published by the Journal of Applied Physics." -
Swimming Cockroach Robot Developed
Onnimikki writes "The Ambulatory Robotics Lab at McGill University has made a six-legged swimming cockroach robot as part of Project Aqua. The robot is a waterproof version of the RHex robot, whose inspiration is the biomimetic work by Bob Full of Gecko glue fame. Other cool stuff from the ARL page includes a waddling bipedal RHex, and the world's first galloping robot."