Science Special News

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National Geographic forays in to the unknown

The National Geographic Channel will pursue its interest in exploration and expeditions into the unknown with a slate of six new specials centered on such topics as dinosaur fossils, mummies found in China and the mystery of Stonehenge. Also among the topics are an investigation of Egypt's Nefertiti and her husband, Akhenaten, and a collection of ancient human remains discovered in the Pacific Ocean that could signal a new species of humans. Steve Schiffman, the channel's acting general manager, said the network has been airing expedition-centric programming since its launch seven years ago but now is giving it even more of an emphasis. "Expeditions are very much part of our DNA," he said. "Since 1888, the National Geographic Society has funded over 8,000 research projects around the world. For the channel to embrace expedition as part of our programming approach is like breathing. It's who we are."

The specials, all of which have been or are being shot in high definition, are:

* "Nefertiti and the Lost Dynasty" (9 p.m. Monday), narrated by Alfre Woodard, which investigates what happened to Nefertiti and Akhenaten, the radical king and likely father of King Tut.

* "Explorer: China Mummies" (9 p.m. September 26), which examines human remains up to 3,000 years old that were found in Northwest China's Tarim Basin to determine where they really came from.

* "Dino Autopsy" (December), which examines a virtually intact dinosaur mummy. According to National Geographic, the paleontologists involved believe that this could be one of the most important dinosaur discoveries ever.

* "Dino Death Trap" (December), which examines hundreds of well-preserved dinosaur fossils -- many never seen before -- that were found stacked on top of one another in the Junggar Basin in western China.

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Protests over Long Man sex change

The sussex Archaeological Society has apologised to protesters after they allowed a controversial stunt by ITV to give the Long Man of Wilmington a sex change. ITV and the archaeological society caused fury among Pagans and other protesters when they allowed fashion gurus Trinny and Susannah to add breasts and pigtails to the figure many believe is sacred.As part of the programme, Trinny and Susannah Undress, ITV asked woman dressed in white to lie on the figure to create the transformation.Chief Executive Office of the organisation, John Manley, said: 'The Sussex Archaeological Society would like to apologise to representatives of the Pagan community, or any other individual or groups, who might have been offended by recent television filming on the Long Man of Wilmington.'It was not the society's intention to cause offence.'The society is proud of its curation of the Long Man.'In future the society will consult representatives of the Pagan community and other interested parties before sanctioning any significant activities.'

Newell Fisher was one of the protesters against the stunt and has now helped form a campaign group, Guardians of the Long Man.As archaeological liaison officer of that group Mr Fisher said: 'We look forward to working with the Sussex Archaeological Society to help ensure the future welfare of the site.'Our confidence in their custodianship has been restored.'He said the protesters would continue their fight to stop the footage of the stunt being aired.

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Dinosaurs' slow rise to dominance

The dinosaurs might have gone out with a sudden bang, but their rise to dominance was a gradual ascent, not a sudden takeover, a study suggests. It shows that dinosaurs co-existed with a more primitive group of reptiles for millions of years before becoming the most common land animals on Earth. Experts had thought that once dinosaurs emerged, they swiftly replaced their relatives the dinosauromorphs. But the latest study in Science journal questions this idea. Dinosaurs first appeared around 230-220 million years ago, towards the end of the Triassic Period. By the beginning of the Jurassic Period, about 200 million years ago, they had become the dominant creatures on land - and would remain so for another 135 million years. But the reasons for their success - and why the dinosauromorphs faded away - are poorly understood. This is because the fossil record leading up to the Jurassic is relatively sparse.

Some researchers had assumed that dinosaurs were quick to supplant their more primitive relatives, the dinosauromorphs. In other words, they got a "lucky break". Dinosaurs may have either outcompeted their reptilian relatives for resources, or taken advantage of some catastrophe that devastated the Dinosauromorpha. But fossils described in the latest issue of Science suggest that if competition occurred, it was over a prolonged period, according to the team that unearthed them in the south-western US. The Late Triassic cache from Hayden Quarry, New Mexico, contains primitive dinosaurs and several species of dinosauromorph - including the newly identified species Dromomeron romeri.

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Military prepping for a ray gun war

No one has quite figured out how to put together a battlefield ray gun -- yet. But that isn't stopping the U.S. military from getting ready.The Air Force Research Lab is "conducting research... to accurately predict the effects of lasers on various threat targets. Laser vulnerability assessments on space, tactical/ground, and missile, systems, subsystems, and components shall be completed to accurately predict the consequences of lasers interaction with these targets. " The Naval Surface Warfare Center is launching "scientific investigations into the effects of Laser Weapons on marine mammals." And it's looking to "leverage of existing and/or Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) items into militarily useful laser weapon systems within two to three years." The Pentagon's High Energy Laser-Joint Technology Office is taking a slightly longer view, looking to kick in $10 million a year for all kinds of ray guns... from gas-powered lasers to electric ones to free electron lasers.

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New 60th moon of Saturn discovered

A new moon of Saturn has been discovered, bringing the planet's satellite tally to 60. Initial measurements suggest the new moon, which is still unnamed, is about 1.2 miles (2 kilometers) wide, and lies between the orbits of Mehone and Pallene, two Saturnian moons discovered by NASA's Cassini spacecraft in 2004. The newfound moon is about 1.09 million miles (1.76 million kilometers) from Saturn and could be part of a larger group of still undiscovered moons around the ringed planet.The moon was observed by Cassini on May 30, 2007.Saturn has the second largest tally of moons in the solar system next to Jupiter, which has 63. However, like the definition of "planet," there is an ongoing debate about what size a satellite must be and how it must behave to qualify as a moon. If very small and as-yet unfound objects are ultimately included, the moon tallies could soar into the hundreds or even thousands.

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Sci-fi plans "UFO Hunters" series

Sci Fi Channel has announced that it has ordered UFO Hunters, a new Ghost Hunters-like reality series that will investigate sightings of unidentified flying objects and other "otherworldly experiences." UFO Hunters will air as part of the network's 2007-2008 original programming line-up. Each episode of UFO Hunters will follow a group of UFO investigators who use the latest technology to lend some credit to reports of flying saucers and space people that are often ridiculed by skeptics. The New York Strange Phenomena Investigators (NY-SPI) -- led by co-founders Oliver Kemenczky and Ted Davis, and supported by researcher/investigator Dennis Anderson -- will conduct the investigations featured on UFO Hunters, using their decades of experience to lend credibility to the different phenomena they'll attempt to explain.

If UFO Hunters' format sounds similar to that of Sci Fi Channel's Ghost Hunters reality series -- which follows paranormal "ghostbusters" and real-life plumbers Jason Hawes and Grant Wilson as they investigate hauntings and bizarre occurrences -- that's because its being produced by Pilgrim Films and Television, the same production company responsible for Ghost Hunters. Ghost Hunters executive producers Craig Piligian and Tom Thayer will also executive produce UFO Hunters.

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Ghost hunters go high-tech

When Sharon Leong conducts field work, she packs a digital camera, a thermometer and an electromagnetic field meter. She isn't a private detective or an electrician. Leong, a legal secretary by day, is an avid ghost hunter by night. With those gizmos and many others in tow, Leong treks to reputedly haunted homes, battlefields, bars and hotels, gathering what she thinks may be evidence of a world beyond this earthly one.The pursuit of ghostly evidence has been a popular pastime for centuries. Now, instead of Ouija boards, ghost hunters are increasingly turning to high tech gear to assist in their search. Such ghost hunters rely upon digital equipment to document potential signs of hauntings. Cameras and voice recorders pick up eerie sights and sounds, while handheld gadgets measure electromagnetic radiation and odd drops in temperature.

Jumpsuits like those from the movie Ghostbusters are unnecessary, but pocket-laden cargo pants and fishing jackets are handy for stashing all of the gear.Hobbyists like Leong find equipment either in pedestrian electronics shops or at custom online emporiums, such as Ghost Mart, which specializes in "discount paranormal research equipment." Although most of the equipment is built for more ordinary purposes, others, like a $30 electromagnetic field (EMF) "ghost meter," are clearly targeted at amateur ghost seekers. Complete kits can be ordered at a wide range of prices, between $250 and $2,000.

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UFO sightings bring town to a standstill

A crowd of 100 stunned stargazers brought a town centre to a standstill when five mysterious UFOs were spotted hovering in the sky. Drinkers spilled out of pubs, motorists stopped to gawp and camera phones were aimed upwards as the five orbs, in a seeming formation, hovered above Stratford-Upon-Avon for half an hour. The unidentified flying objects lit up the otherwise clear night sky above Shakespeare's birthplace in Warwickshire on Saturday. Although Air Traffic Control reported no unusual activity, some witnesses were convinced they were witnessing an extra-terrestrial spectacle. The strange episode started just after 10.30pm, when the lights were seen hovering slowly over the town before three of them formed a triangular shape with one positioned just to the right. A few minutes later a fifth came into view travelling towards the others at breakneck speed before slowing down and stopping a short distance away. Sceptics dismissed the UFOs as nothing more than hot air balloons, fireworks or even lanterns which had broken loose from a local rugby club.

Others, however, claimed the speed and agility of the objects was unlike any known aircraft and said the odd movement, lack of noise and the length of time in the air discounted any man-made explanation. Tom Hawkes, who captured these amazing images, spotted the lights during his girlfriend Kate Lyall's birthday at the One Elm pub. He and the 15 other revellers were in the bar when they spotted some commotion outside. Tom, 30, said: "We walked outside and there was at that time a growing crowd of about 60 people looking up at something in the sky. "I saw this light appear, then three others. They came over our heads in formation but then manouvered into different positions. "Three had formed a triangular shape and one was to the right. Then another one came hurtling towards the rest at what looked like a very fast speed. But as it neared them it suddenly slowed and stopped altogether.

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Gravity anomalies

You can't ever completely escape it. It influences you every moment of your life from birth to death and without it you wouldn't have evolved. Gravity. After centuries of study, you'd think we would understand it by now. Not so, gravity remains the most mysterious force in the universe today, and this seemingly mundane fact of existance is a surprisingly fruitful breeding ground for the unexplained.Pioneer 10 was launched in 1972 and would become the first human-made spacecraft to pass through the asteroid belt and visit the planet Jupiter. A year later, its sister ship Pioneer 11 was launched, it would visit the Jovian system again, and then would become the first to explore Saturn. Both spacecraft proved to be wildly successful, returning amazing images of these gas giants and greatly increasing our knowledge of them. After their historic flybys, these spacecraft continued on toward interstellar space making periodic observations of the conditions present in the empty outer regions of the solar system.Both spacecraft were designed for just a few years of operation, but happily and as a testament to their engineering, they continued to transmit their observations of deep space for decades. Pioneer 11 finally went silent at the end of 1995 when the motion of the earth made it impossible for the spacecraft's antenna to be oriented properly for a call home, and Pioneer 10 finally stopped transmitting in 2003 after its nuclear-based generators could no longer produce enough electrical power to create a signal strong enough to reach us.

In a few million years Pioneer 10 will lifelessly pass near one of the brightest stars in the night sky; Aldebaran in the constellation of Taurus, a giant star that has recently been discovered to possibly have either a large planet or brown dwarf thirteen times times the size of Jupiter orbiting around it. Pioneer 11 is headed toward Aquila the eagle, and will pass close to a star in that constellation in about four million years.In addition to what these venerable NASA spacecraft have already accomplished, the've also presented us with a mystery. Defying all of the variables that we know about the gravity of the sun and its solar system, the spacecraft have slowed down. Both Pioneers ought be a bit further out than they are, instead they are about 248,000 miles closer to the sun than they should be. The same strange effect seems to have also been at work on the Ulysses and Galileo probes. None of the simple explanations add up, the most prominent being the suggestion that heat leaking from the radioactive generators that powered the craft created a slight brake in their velocity.

This lack of a simple theory that explains their motion has lead to more exotic suggestions from scientists ranging from some interaction with dark matter, an aspect of gravity that we do not yet understand, or some mysterious unknown property of the universe that is somehow working against the probes.These theories may end up having mind-numbing implications. The effect is not consistent with what we know about gravity. It could mean that gravity works differently than we thought. The effect is so apparent over such a short distance, our solar system is very small compared to the rest of the universe, that it could force a major revision of Einstien's theory of general relativity. If its dark matter, it would toss the seemingly obscure Pioneer anomaly into a cutting edge and mysterious area of science. It could even involve string theory. Whatever is causing the anomaly remains unexplained, and has even prompted calls by scientists for NASA to explore the phenomena with a probe dedicated specifically to the phenomenon.

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Leaked "Majestic documents" proven a fraud

Top secret documents alleged to have been written by high ranking government and military officials, including three U.S. presidents, leaked to the public in the early 1980s, have been proven fraudulent by recent forensic linguistic testing. These documents, collectively named "The Majestic Documents" by researchers, contained references to the alleged crash of a flying saucer near Roswell, NM, in July of 1947. References to extraterrestrial technology and alien bodies appear in several of the documents. Dates of the documents themselves range from 1942 to the early 1990s. The Majestic Documents were allegedly authored by members of an above top secret task force (MJ-12) begun under the auspices of then President Truman to deal with the crash of an extraterrestrial space craft near Roswell. The cache of documents included memos written by President Truman; Admiral Roscoe Hillenkoetter, who would become the first Director of the CIA; Dr. Vannevar Bush, who chaired the Office of Scientific Research and Development; and General Nathan Twining, who headed the Air Materiel Command at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where the wreckage was taken, and who served as Air Force Chief of Staff (1953-1957) and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (1957-1961). Aside from President Truman, memos allegedly written by presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy are also among the Majestic Documents.

The documents were tested by Dr. Carol Chaski of Georgetown, DE, who was hired by Dr. Michael Heiser, a biblical scholar with an interest in the UFO phenomenon. Dr. Chaski is a leading expert in the linguistic science of authorship attribution, a discipline that uses computers to extract and define stylistic patterns in a given author's writings -- a "linguistic fingerprint". Dr. Chaski pioneered her own computational document authentication software program, ALIAS, for such testing, and is currently the president of ALIAS Technology, LLC. Among the stylistic patterns detected by Dr. Chaski's specially-developed computer program are patterns in sentence structure, word order in parts of speech and use of punctuation.

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