Science Special News

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The amazing truth about whales & dolphins

Jumping through watery hoops? Forget it. They can solve problems and use tools. They exhibit joy and grief. They live in complex societies. And although we have always instinctively thought that cetaceans - whales, dolphins and porpoises - are special members of the animal kingdom, scientific evidence is piling up that they are truly out of the ordinary in terms of their intelligence.A growing number of behavioural studies strongly suggest that whale and dolphin brain power is matched only by the higher primates, including man, according to a new review of the scientific literature by one of Britain's leading save-the-whale campaigners.It means that the potential impact of whaling may be far greater than it appears, and we should adopt a new approach to the conservation of these species which takes into account their intelligence, societies, culture - and potential to suffer, says Mark Simmonds, director of science for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society.In a scientific paper published this month, Mr Simmonds surveys recent cetacean research and highlights striking examples which have been observed of whale and dolphin behaviour. For instance, captive animals have been shown unequivocally to be able to recognise themselves in a mirror, which was previously known to be the domain only of humans and the great apes.

There are many other examples of intelligence, Mr Simmonds reports in his paper Into the brains of whales, being published in the journal Applied Animal Behaviour Science.Dolphins can "point" at objects with their heads to guide humans to them, and they can also manipulate objects spontaneously, despite their lack of fingers and thumbs. There is a well-documented use of tools in an Australian population of wild Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins, he says. "The animals (almost exclusively females) are often seen carrying sponges on the ends of their beaks, probably to protect them while they forage in the sediments on the sea floor where spiny sea urchins might otherwise cause puncture wounds."

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$10m prize for super genetic test

The US-based X-Prize Foundation is offering what it says is the largest medical prize in history - $10m - for the first private team that can decode 100 human genomes in 10 days. Organisers say rapid genetic sequencing is science's next great frontier, and will usher in a new era of personalised medicine, allowing doctors to determine patients' susceptibility to illness and the genetic links to diseases such as cancer and Alzheimers. The Archon X-Prize for Genomics is the second major challenge from the foundation, which in 2004 awarded $10m to the team behind the private manned spacecraft SpaceShipOne. It currently costs millions of dollars and takes many months to sequence an individual's genome, encoded in DNA. Tests of certain genes are already helping doctors select treatments and therapies for individual patients.

Yet scientists say the real benefits to mankind will only come when a much larger sampling of genetic information is available to help decipher the environmental and hereditary aspects of disease. Dr J Craig Venter - one of the scientists behind the first sequencing of the human genetic code - is on the X-Prize's scientific advisory board. "We need a database of millions of human genomes to help us fully decipher the nature and nurture aspects of human existence," he said.

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Lawyer pursues alien abduction claims

A German lawyer hopes to drum up more business by pursuing state compensation claims for people who believe they were abducted by aliens. "There's quite obviously demand for legal advice here," Jens Lorek told Reuters by telephone on Thursday. "The trouble is, people are afraid of making fools of themselves in court."Lorek, a lawyer based in the eastern city of Dresden who specializes in social and labor law, said he hoped to expand his client base by taking on the unusual work.He has yet to win any abduction claims, but says there are plenty of potential clients, noting that extra-terrestrial watchdogs report scores of alien assaults every year.

"These people could appeal for therapies or cures," he said.Lorek, 41, is pinning his hopes for success on a German law which grants kidnap victims the right to state compensation.Asked if he was worried he might look ridiculous by seeking justice for clients haunted by aliens, Lorek was unfazed."Nobody has laughed about it up until now."

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Ghost hunters gather at conference

Laura Weldon, a teacher from Cambridge, Md., has always believed in ghosts.In fact, she's sure the home in which she grew up was haunted. A firm believer in the paranormal, she's a big fan of the Sci-Fi Channel's "Ghost Hunters" show, featuring Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson as plumbers by day who investigate reports of paranormal activity in their spare time.Weldon was pretty excited when she learned about UNIV-CON, the nation's largest paranormal conference, being held through Sunday at Penn State."All my middle school students are excited for me and want to know all the details," Weldon said as she waited Thursday night to attend a talk by Chris Flemming, star of the Biography channel's "Dead Famous: Ghostly Encounters" series. "I promised a whole class-time of stories about growing up in a haunted house and details about what the ghost hunters said instead of learning about trustworthiness, respect, responsibility, fairness, caring and citizenship."The conference, held at Penn State last year, drew 700 people, and organizers earlier this year said they were expecting more than 1,200 to attend this year based on early ticket sales.Flemming opened the conference Thursday night with his presentation "Journey Into The Unknown" in the Thomas Building auditorium.Flemming said he began working as a paranormal investigator as a teen, after realizing as a child that he was sensitive to the existence of spirits. After graduating from college, he began publishing a magazine called "Unknown" and came to realize he was not alone in his experiences."That's why we're here today," he said. "We have some of the greatest people out there to present and share their stories."

"So many people have experienced paranormal phenomenon, but few come forward because they feel that they are the only ones out there who are experiencing these things," said Ryan Buell, director of the Penn State Paranormal Research Society.The highlights of the conference Friday night included a lecture by John Oliver, of the Court TV show "Haunting Evidence," a haunted carriage tour of Penn State, and a late-night ghost hunt. The latter two events will be held for a second night tonight.The carriage tours will depart every half hour from the HUB between 11 p.m. and 1 a.m.The conference gets into full swing today with various workshops and presentations being offered from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on subjects such as using paranormal equipment, the "Craft of the Occult," and psychokinesis, as well as exhibits and vendors at locations in the HUB and around campus.This evening features a presentation by Hawes and Wilson from 9 to 10:30 p.m. in 100 Thomas.

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Aztec ruins unearthed in Mexico

Archaeologists working in Mexico City have discovered an Aztec monolith, the most important ruins of the ancient civilisation to be found in decades. The monolith and an altar, dating from the 15th Century, were unearthed in the very heart of the busy capital city. The city's mayor described the discovery as the biggest in almost three decades. A figure representing the rain god Tlaloc and another unidentified figure are carved into a frieze on the altar. The discoveries were made near the ruins of the civilisation's main temple, the Templo Mayor, near the city's central Zocalo Square. "It is a very important discovery, the biggest we have made in 28 years. It will allow us to find out much more," Mexico City Major Alejandro Encinas said.

The stone slab is some 3.5m (11ft) in height and much of it remains buried beneath the surface. Archaeologists say they think it might be part of an entrance to an underground chamber. The ancient Aztecs began the construction of the Templo Mayor temple in 1375. It was discovered, by accident, in 1978 when electricity workers came across a vast carving of an Aztec goddess.

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How interesting, your threads end in science section some time in year 2005. hemm

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Sorry, I hadn't read the Aztec report yet.

[Rasputin]

First teleportation between light and matter

At long last researchers have teleported the information stored in a beam of light into a cloud of atoms, which is about as close to getting beamed up by Scotty as we're likely to come in the foreseeable future. More practically, the demonstration is key to eventually harnessing quantum effects for hyperpowerful computing or ultrasecure encryption systems. Quantum computers or cryptography networks would take advantage of entanglement, in which two distant particles share a complementary quantum state. In some conceptions of these devices, quantum states that act as units of information would have to be transferred from one group of atoms to another in the form of light. Because measuring any quantum state destroys it, that information cannot simply be measured and copied. Researchers have long known that this obstacle can be finessed by a process called teleportation, but they had only demonstrated this method between light beams or between atoms.

In taking the next step, Eugene Polzik and his colleagues at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen shined a strong laser beam onto a cloud of room-temperature cesium atoms whose spins were all pointing in the same direction and fluctuating according to their given quantum state. The laser became entangled with the collective spin of the cloud, meaning that the quantum states of laser and gas shared the same amplitude but had opposite phases. The goal was to transfer, or teleport, the quantum state of a second light beam onto the cloud.

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Mars rover photographed from orbit

Nasa's new orbiter at Mars has taken a spectacular picture of the Opportunity rover sitting on a crater's rim. The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter arrived at the Red Planet in March and has only recently moved into a prime position to begin science investigations. Its view of Victoria Crater will help US space agency researchers decide where to send Opportunity to make ground observations. Imaged from a height of 275km, the 2.3m-wide rover appears as a tiny dot. "This is a tremendous example of how our Mars missions in orbit and on the surface are designed to reinforce each other and expand our ability to explore and discover," said Doug McCuistion, the director of Nasa's Mars exploration programme in Washington. Opportunity has been making its way to Victoria Crater for the past 21 Earth months - about half the length of time the robot has spent on the Red Planet. The crater has high walls with layers of exposed rock that should reveal significant new information about the planet's geological past. Opportunity has already found strong evidence that the rocks in its region of Mars - Meridiani Planum - were in contact with liquid water many millions of years ago.

The investigation of rocks at Victoria is expected to fill out the story still further. The principal investigator on the rover programme, Steve Squyres, said Opportunity would spend a short time conducting a recce of the rim before any decision was made to go inside the crater. "We are trying to find a safe place to go in and to come out. I'm not interested in making a suicide dive into this crater," said Professor Squyres, who is based at Cornell University. "With this enormous hole in the ground, we have the capability to see what lies beneath - to see down into the sub-surface of Mars, to look at a thicker stack of rocks than we are ever going to see anywhere else; and from that see a bigger slice of Martian geologic time."

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Set of TV's "Ghost Whisperer" haunted

The set of Jennifer Love Hewitt's hit TV show Ghost Whisperer is haunted, according to the actress. Love Hewitt plays a woman who can communicate with the recently deceased in Ghost Whisperer, and the cast and crew are spooked in real life too. She tells US chat show host Megan Mullally, "We've had lights move, literally three and a half inches to the left, as you're sitting there the lights move. "We've had lights burst over actors' heads when they're playing people who don't believe in ghosts. A light will burst into a million pieces right over them.

"People are like, 'We're not guest-starring on that show!' "But for us as a crew we're kind of like, 'Awesome! Maybe they (the ghosts) are with us.'"

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Mexico pilot reports UFO

According to a report by Mexican researcher Alfonso Salazar, Captain Luis Guillermo Cruz, first officer of a Boeing 737-200, registration XA-MAR, reported a tubular unidentified flying object with a metallic appearance directly over Lake Tequesquitengo in the Mexican state of Morelos. The sighting occurred on September 16, 2006 at 14:00 hrs. during a flight from Huatulco to Mexico City along air corridor L-47. Weather conditions were clear with some clouds.According to the witness, he was alerted by an intense reflection visible four miles away from the airline, toward the right side of the cabin. At first he thought it could be a glider, but as they approached, he had a clear observation of an unknown object.

He added that the tubular flying object crossed at the same altitude the airliner was flying but in the opposite direction and with a north/south trajectory, remaining a mile and a half distant from the airliner.

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New research: "Hobbit" is not new species

What may well turn out to be the definitive work in a debate that has been raging in palaeoanthropology for two years will be published in the November 2006 issue of Anatomical Record. The new research comprehensively and convincingly makes the case that the small skull discovered in Flores, Indonesia, in 2003 does not represent a new species of hominid, as was claimed in a study published in Nature in 2004. Instead, the skull is most likely that of a small-bodied modern human who suffered from a genetic condition known as microcephaly, which is characterized by a small head. "It's no accident that this supposedly new species of hominid was dubbed the 'Hobbit;'" said Robert R. Martin, PhD, Curator of Biological Anthropology at the Field Museum and lead author of the paper. "It is simply fanciful to imagine that this fossil represents anything other than a modern human."

The new study is the most wide-ranging, multidisciplinary assessment of the problems associated with the interpretation of the 18,000-year-old Flores hominid yet to be published. This is just one of four separate research teams that have recently published evidence indicating concluding that the Flores hominid is far more likely to be a small-bodied modern human suffering from a microcephaly than a new species derived from Homo erectus, as was claimed in the original Nature paper.

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Who was Spring-Heeled Jack ?

Spring-Heeled Jack (1837-1904), mystery assailant, was first reported, though not named, in early January 1838, when the lord mayor of London made public a letter he had received, signed "A resident of Peckham": "It appears that some individuals have laid a wager with a mischievous and foolhardy companion (name as yet unknown) that he durst not take upon himself the task of visiting many of the villages near London in three disguises - a ghost, a bear and a devil; and, moreover, that he will not dare to enter gentlemen's gardens for the purpose of alarming the inmates of the house. The wager has been accepted, and the unmanly villain has succeeded in depriving seven ladies of their senses." (Times, 9 January 183 The publication of this letter elicited a host of reports of incidents dating from the previous autumn. Though the correspondents shared the belief that a malicious prankster was responsible, plainly many of their informants (frequently their servants) did not, but believed the incidents to be supernatural. They involved a mysterious figure who appeared, always after dark, chiefly in the forms of a bear, a man in armour, or the devil himself, and either frightened or attacked people by tearing at their clothing with his talons. His most usual target was young women.

By mid-February 1838 the assailant was known as Spring-Heeled Jack. A first-hand report of an attack was published: 18-year-old Jane Alsop had answered the door at Old Ford, near Bow, and been attacked by a figure who "vomited forth a quantity of blue and white flames from his mouth" and "tore at her neck and arms with his claws" before scampering away across the fields (Times, 22 February 183. The scare was at its height; there had been reports from some 30 locations around London.