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Saving Lives Worldwide by Training International Volcano Scientists

By Guest PostJuly 20, 2013Environment, Scienceandy lockhart, canada, cascades volcano observatory, celina kattan, Colombia, costa rica, csav, domenico mangione, don thomas, ecuador, el salvador, hilo, hvo, indonesia, international volcano scientists, italy, john pallister, mount st helens, papua new guinea, peru, syegi kunrat, telemetry station, type of volcano, U.S. Geological Survey, university of hawaii, usaid, volcanic hazard assessment, volcano hazards monitoring, volcano observatories, volcano science center, volcano scientist

VANCOUVER, Wash. – Scientists and technicians who work at volcano observatories in nine countries are visiting Mount St. Helens and the U.S. Geological Survey Volcano Science Center’s Cascades Volcano Observatory this week to learn techniques for monitoring active volcanoes. Organized by the Center for the Study of Active Volcanoes at the University of Hawaiʻi, Hilo, with support from the VSC-managed joint USGS-USAID Volcano Disaster Assistance Program, the annual program has been training foreign scientists for 22 years. This year’s class includes volcano scientists from Ecuador, Colombia, Peru, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Canada, Indonesia, Italy, and Papua New Guinea.

The International Training Program in Volcano Hazards Monitoring is designed to assist other nations in attaining self-sufficiency in monitoring volcanoes and reducing the risks from eruptions. Through in-class instruction at two USGS volcano observatories, and field exercises in Hawaiʻi and at Mount St. Helens, U.S. scientists are providing training on monitoring methods, data analysis and interpretation, and volcanic hazard assessment, and participants are taught about the use and maintenance of volcano monitoring instruments. Additionally, participants learn about focusing on forecasting and rapid response during volcanic crises, and how to work with governing officials and the news media to save lives and property. (more…)

Companies Look at Wrong Things When Using Facebook to Screen Job Applicants

By Guest PostJuly 19, 2013Economy, Technologyadam meade, alcohol, badmouth, companies, corporate human resources, drug use, extroverts, Facebook, facebook behavior, facebook profile, fundamental misunderstanding, job candidates, lori foster thompson, marketing positions, north Carolina, online behavior, online indicator, screen job applicants, state university, will stoughton, wrong things

Employers are increasingly using Facebook to screen job applicants and weed out candidates they think have undesirable traits. But a new study from North Carolina State University shows that those companies may have a fundamental misunderstanding of online behavior and, as a result, may be eliminating desirable job candidates.

Researchers tested 175 study participants to measure the personality traits that companies look for in job candidates, including conscientiousness, agreeableness and extraversion. The participants were then surveyed on their Facebook behavior, allowing researchers to see which Facebook behaviors were linked to specific personality traits. (more…)

Good Vibrations: Mediating Mood Through Brain Ultrasound

By Guest PostJuly 19, 2013Health, Scienceairport code, analog, anatomical structures, anesthesiology, anxiety, blood vessels, brain stimulation, brain ultrasound, clinical trial, depression, good vibrations, high frequency vibrations, human brains, jamie tyler, jay sanguinetti, john allen, mediating mood, megahertz frequencies, microtubules, mood scale, neurotrek, organs, placebo, protein structure, psychiatric disorders, psychological, silicon valley, stuart hameroff, tms, transcranial magnetic stimulation, tucson, ultrasound machine, ultrasound vibrations, university of arizona, vams, virginia polytechnic institute, visual, womb

Ultrasound vibrations applied to the brain may affect mood, UA researchers have discovered. The finding potentially could lead to new treatments for psychological and psychiatric disorders.

University of Arizona researchers have found in a recent study that ultrasound waves applied to specific areas of the brain appear able to alter patients’ moods. The discovery has led the scientists to conduct further investigations with the hope that this technique could one day be used to treat conditions such as depression and anxiety.

Dr. Stuart Hameroff, professor emeritus of the UA’s departments of anesthesiology and psychology and director of the UA’s Center for Consciousness Studies, is lead author on the first clinical study of brain ultrasound, which was published in the journal Brain Stimulation. (more…)

Outsmarting hackers

By Guest PostJuly 19, 2013Science, Technologyainiah floyd, andrew hobbs, barnegat, battlefield, billy bednar, capture the flag, chase cotton, cloud security, coding theory, competition, cryptography, cyber minds, cyber space, ethical hacking, generation of americans, kenneth barner, landsdale, outsmarting hackers, outwitting hackers, pjm interconnect, stem, Technology, tom carper, university of delaware, us cyber challenge, Washington

US Cyber Challenge puts UD student on fast track to outwitting hackers

“Cryptography enables you to send secret code and hide information within a network to keep it secure,” Billy Bednar, a University of Delaware senior, told U.S. Sen. Tom Carper during a conference call Wednesday, July 18.

Carper, who is chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, is working to help safeguard the nation’s cyber space. To accomplish this he will need to rely on today’s leading experts, but also ensure that future cyber sleuths currently in the pipeline have the proper training to meet emerging cyber challenges. (more…)

Microsoft and LEGO Education demonstrate development possibilities on Windows 8.1 with SentryBot

By Guest PostJuly 18, 2013Technologylego education, lego mindstorms robot, microsoft team, microsoft vision, sentrybot

Through a shared commitment to STEM education, Microsoft and LEGO Education team up to create hands-on opportunities for the next generation to be inspired by and engage with technology in new ways

SAN FRANCISCO — Ever wonder what it takes to inspire and prepare the next generation to fill the pipeline of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) jobs of the future? For Microsoft and LEGO, the answer is simple: Make STEM fun, accessible and engaging. At Microsoft’s recent developer conference, BUILD, Microsoft revealed the SentryBot — a small, yet powerful, robot featuring unique interactive scenarios only possible on the Windows platform. SentryBot demonstrates just how fun STEM can be regardless of your technical background. (more…)

In the Zone: How Scientists Search for Habitable Planets

By Guest PostJuly 18, 2013Scienceatmosphere, exoplanets, goldilocks planets, habitable planets, habitable zone, kepler 69c, kepler mission, liquid water, lucianne walkowicz, NASA, penn state university, radiation, ravi kumar kopparapu, scientists, search, solar system, star, stephen kane, super earth, super venus planet, total energy output, venus like planet

There is only one planet we know of, so far, that is drenched with life. That planet is Earth, as you may have guessed, and it has all the right conditions for critters to thrive on its surface. Do other planets beyond our solar system, called exoplanets, also host life forms?

Astronomers still don’t know the answer, but they search for potentially habitable planets using a handful of criteria. Ideally, they want to find planets just like Earth, since we know without a doubt that life took root here. The hunt is on for planets about the size of Earth that orbit at just the right distance from their star – in a region termed the habitable zone. (more…)

Mind over mechanics

By Guest PostJuly 17, 2013Sciencebrain computer interfaces, brain waves, control flying objects, flying robot, invasive chip

How thoughts can control a flying robot

It’s a staple of science fiction: people who can control objects with their minds. (more…)

Pistil leads pollen in life-and-death dance

By Guest PostJuly 17, 2013Nature, Sciencealexander leydon, biomolecular tango, brown university, cross breeding, female ovule, fertilization, flowers, karolina woroniecka, kristin beale, life on earth, male pollen tube, mark johnson, pistil, pollination, protein, reproduce, reproductive system, sex lives, sperm carrying pollen, stigma, thionin

Pollination, essential to much of life on earth, requires the explosive death of the male pollen tube in the female ovule. In new research, Brown University scientists describe the genetic and regulatory factors that compel the male’s role in the process. Finding a way to tweak that performance could expand crop cross-breeding possibilities.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Millions of times on a spring day there is a dramatic biomolecular tango where the flower, rather than adorning a dancer’s teeth, is the performer. In this dance, the female pistil leads, the male pollen tubes follow, and at the finish, the tubes explode and die. A new paper in Current Biology describes the genetically prescribed dance steps of the pollen tube and how their expression destines the tube for self-sacrifice, allowing flowering plants to reproduce. (more…)

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