Leibniz’s “SuperMUC” named Europe’s fastest supercomputer
MUNICH – 18 Jun 2012: The Leibniz Supercomputing Centre (LRZ), in collaboration with IBM, today announced the world’s first commercially available hot-water cooled supercomputer, a powerful, high-performance system designed to help researchers and industrial institutions across Europe investigate and solve some of the world’s most daunting scientific challenges.(more…)
As recreational fishing activity has reduced predators in many of Cape Cod’s salt marsh ecosystems, Sesarma crabs have feasted on grasses, causing dramatic die-offs of the marshes, according to a new study. The researchers assessed the “trophic cascade” in several experiments that also ruled out alternative explanations for the problem.
PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University] — Recreational fishing is a major contributor to the rapid decline of important salt marshes along Cape Cod because it strips top predators such as striped bass, blue crabs, and smooth dogfish out of the ecosystem, according to new research by Brown University ecologists.(more…)
Children who are skilled in understanding how shapes fit together to make recognizable objects also have an advantage when it comes to learning the number line and solving math problems, research at the University of Chicago shows.
The work is further evidence of the value of providing young children with early opportunities in spatial learning, which contributes to their ability to mentally manipulate objects and understand spatial relationships, which are important in a wide range of tasks, including reading maps and graphs and understanding diagrams showing how to put things together. Those skills also have been shown to be important in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) fields. (more…)
ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Even small telescopes can make big discoveries.
Though the KELT North telescope in southern Arizona carries a lens no more powerful than a high-end digital camera, it’s just revealed the existence of two very unusual faraway planets.(more…)
Small town girl Sherrie and city boy Drew meet on the Sunset Strip while pursuing their Hollywood dreams. Their rock ‘n’ roll romance is told through the hits of Def Leppard, Joan Jett, Journey, Foreigner, Bon Jovi, Night Ranger, REO Speedwagon, Pat Benatar, Twisted Sister, Poison, Whitesnake, and more.(more…)
Unique UCLA program that teaches social skills proves effective over long term
Teenagers with autism spectrum disorder are in a bind. The disorder is characterized by impairments in communication and social interaction, but it’s a continuum, so some teens diagnosed with ASD are considered high functioning and healthy enough to be “mainstreamed” in school.
But without the proper social skills, even mainstreamed teens don’t quite fit into the general social milieu of middle school or high school. As a result, they suffer from all the slings and arrows of that world.
Since 2006, however, the UCLA PEERS (Program for the Education and Enrichment of Relational Skills) clinic has assisted high-functioning teens with ASD by literally teaching them the strategies they need to fit in better with their peers. And while previous research demonstrated that the program was effective, it wasn’t known whether the new skills “stuck” with these teens after they completed the PEERS classes. (more…)
If your father and grandfather waited until they were older before having children, you might experience life-extending benefits. Biologists assume that a slow pace of aging requires that the body invest more resources in repairing cells and tissues. (more…)
Berkeley Lab scientists develop new method for evaluating short-lived pollutants.
New research from Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) has found that levels of methane—a potent greenhouse gas emitted from many man-made sources, such as coal mines, landfills and livestock ranches—are at least one-and-a-half times higher in California than previously estimated.
Working with scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Berkeley Lab scientists Marc L. Fischer and Seongeun Jeong combined highly accurate methane measurements from a tower with model predictions of expected methane signals to revise estimated methane emissions from central California. They found that annually averaged methane emissions in California were 1.5 to 1.8 times greater than previous estimates, depending on the spatial distribution of the methane emissions. (more…)
