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CU-Boulder team develops new water splitting technique that could produce hydrogen

By Guest PostAugust 3, 2013Sciencealan weimer, biological engineering, boulder, brian evanko, charles musgrave, christopher muhich, contraction, holy grail, hydrogen, hydrogen molecules, janna martinek, kayla weston, metal oxides, mirror system, new, oxygen, oxygen atoms, produce hydrogen, solar thermal reactor, solar thermal system, sunlight, sustainable hydrogen economy, thermal expansion, university of colorado, water splitting technique, xinhua liang

A University of Colorado Boulder team has developed a radically new technique that uses the power of sunlight to efficiently split water into its components of hydrogen and oxygen, paving the way for the broad use of hydrogen as a clean, green fuel.

The CU-Boulder team has devised a solar-thermal system in which sunlight could be concentrated by a vast array of mirrors onto a single point atop a central tower up to several hundred feet tall. The tower would gather heat generated by the mirror system to roughly 2,500 degrees Fahrenheit (1,350 Celsius), then deliver it into a reactor containing chemical compounds known as metal oxides, said CU-Boulder Professor Alan Weimer, research group leader. (more…)

How Did Earth’s Primitive Chemistry Get Kick Started?

By Guest PostAugust 2, 2013Scienceacetate, alkaline hydrothermal fluids, alkaline hydrothermal vents, ancient enzymes, atlantic ocean, bottom of oceans, chemical signature, distribution, earliest oceans, earth, enceladus, evolution, floor, future of life, hypothesis, icy worlds, jupiter, lauren white, laws of thermodynamics, mike russell, moon europa, nano engines, NASA, organic carbon, origin, polymers, primitive chemistry, saturn

How did life on Earth get started? Three new papers co-authored by Mike Russell, a research scientist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., strengthen the case that Earth’s first life began at alkaline hydrothermal vents at the bottom of oceans. Scientists are interested in understanding early life on Earth because if we ever hope to find life on other worlds — especially icy worlds with subsurface oceans such as Jupiter’s moon Europa and Saturn’s Enceladus — we need to know what chemical signatures to look for.

Two papers published recently in the journal Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B provide more detail on the chemical and precursor metabolic reactions that have to take place to pave the pathway for life. Russell and his co-authors describe how the interactions between the earliest oceans and alkaline hydrothermal fluids likely produced acetate (comparable to vinegar). The acetate is a product of methane and hydrogen from the alkaline hydrothermal vents and carbon dioxide dissolved in the surrounding ocean. Once this early chemical pathway was forged, acetate could become the basis of other biological molecules. They also describe how two kinds of “nano-engines” that create organic carbon and polymers — energy currency of the first cells — could have been assembled from inorganic minerals. (more…)

Mini golf as art

By Guest PostAugust 2, 2013Educationames room, art, brainstormed words, chris larson, creation of art, geometric, jordan rosenow, mega golf, mini golf, minnesota artists, sara nichol, sculpture course, walker art center

Students in U of M assistant professor Chris Larson’s sculpture course, “Site, Environment, Community,” probably weren’t expecting mathematics and power tools to play such an important role in their creation of art.

But then, it’s not every class that gets to design and build two holes of mini golf for a world-renowned museum like The Walker Art Center.

This year marks the 25th anniversary of the Walker’s outdoor sculpture garden, and the 6th year the museum has hosted its summer treat, the 15-hole Artist-Designed Mini Golf course. (more…)

Of Aging Bones and Sunshine

By Guest PostAugust 2, 2013Healthaging bones, aging of bones, bone quality, fracture risk, human bone, sunshine vitamin

Study at Berkeley Lab’s Advanced Light Source Links Vitamin D Deficiency to Accelerated Aging of Bones

Everyone knows that as we grow older our bones become more fragile. Now a team of U.S. and German scientists led by researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) and the University of California (UC) Berkeley has shown that this bone-aging process can be significantly accelerated through deficiency of vitamin D – the sunshine vitamin. (more…)

Blind(fold)ed by Science: Study Shows the Strategy Humans Use to Chase Objects

By Guest PostAugust 2, 2013Sciencearizona state university, blindfolded, brain, charles swank, dennis shaffer, eric mcmanama, motion capture equipment, moving object, polymodal

Vision and Hearing Work Together in the Brain to Help Us Catch a Moving Target

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A new study has found that chasing down a moving object is not only a matter of sight or of sound, but of mind.

The study found that people who are blindfolded employ the same strategy to intercept a running ball carrier as people who can see, which suggests that multiple areas of the brain cooperate to accomplish the task.

Regardless of whether they could see or not, the study participants seemed to aim ahead of the ball carrier’s trajectory and then run to the spot where they expected him or her to be in the near future. Researchers call this a “constant target-heading angle” strategy, similar to strategies used by dogs catching Frisbees and baseball players catching fly balls. (more…)

Is sexual addiction the real deal?

By Guest PostAugust 1, 2013Health, Science, SexBible, brain, criteria, diagnosing mental disorders, dsm 5, economic ruin, hypersexual disorder, hypersexual people, hypersexual problems, hypersexuality, mental health experts, nicole prause, p300 reaction, p300 response, psychology, romantic images, sex addiction, sexual addiction, sexual compulsions, sexual desire, sexual images, timothy fong, ucla

Controversy exists over what some mental health experts call “hypersexuality,” or sexual “addiction.” Namely, is it a mental disorder at all, or something else? It failed to make the cut in the recently updated Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, or DSM-5, considered the bible for diagnosing mental disorders. Yet sex addiction has been blamed for ruining relationships, lives and careers.

Now, for the first time, UCLA researchers have measured how the brain behaves in so-called hypersexual people who have problems regulating their viewing of sexual images. The study found that the brain response of these individuals to sexual images was not related in any way to the severity of their hypersexuality but was instead tied only to their level of sexual desire. (more…)

Study investigates extraordinary trout with tolerance to heavily polluted water

By Guest PostAugust 1, 2013Environmentaccumulation of metals, contaminated waters, metal pollution, metal tolerance, mining activity, river hayle trout

New research from the University of Exeter and King’s College London has shown how a population of brown trout can survive in the contaminated waters of the River Hayle in Cornwall where metal concentrations are so high they would be lethal to fish from unpolluted sites. (more…)

Zoo Polar Bear Sports High-Tech Neckwear for Conservation

By Guest PostAugust 1, 2013Natureaccelerometer, climate change mystery, digital fingerprint, high tech collar, high tech neckwear, polar bear, polar bear behavior

Study will help biologists track wild polar bears’ response to climate change

PORTLAND, Ore. — Tasul, an Oregon Zoo polar bear, recently landed her first white-collar job: research assistant for the U.S. Geological Survey. Her assignment: wearing a high-tech collar to help solve a climate change mystery. (more…)

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