If we had a second Earth, we could experiment with its atmosphere to see how increased levels of greenhouse gases would change it, without the risks that come with performing such an experiment. Since we don’t, scientists use global climate models.
In the virtual Earths of the models, interlocking mathematical equations take the place of our planet’s atmosphere, water, land and ice. Supercomputers do the math that keeps these virtual worlds turning — as many as 100 billion calculations for one modeled year in a typical experiment. Groups that project the future of our planet use input from about 30 such climate models, run by governments and organizations worldwide. (more…)
ForscherInnen an den Max F. Perutz Laboratories (MFPL) der Universität Wien und der Medizinischen Universität Wien ist ein Durchbruch für das Platynereis-Modellsystem gelungen: Zum ersten Mal beschreiben sie eine Methode, mit der spezifische und vererbbare Mutationen in dieser Spezies erzeugt werden können. Damit rückt dieser marine Wurm in eine exzellente Position, um die Forschung in den Bereichen Neurobiologie, Chronobiologie, evolutionäre Entwicklungsbiologie und Meeresbiologie voranzutreiben. Die Studie sowie ein Überblicksartikel zu den genetischen Methoden, die für Platynereis dumerilii zur Verfügung stehen, sind nicht nur Mai-Highlights des renommierten Fachjournals Genetics, ihnen wurde auch das Titelbild der aktuellen Ausgabe gewidmet.
Auf molekularer Ebene wissen wir von vielen faszinierenden biologischen Phänomenen noch viel zu wenig. Der unscheinbare marine Borstenwurm Platynereis dumerilii stellt für die Erforschung dieser Phänomene einen interessanten Modellorganismus dar: Evolutionär gesehen entwickelte er sich sehr langsam und ist so bestens geeignet, um Vorläufergene und Zelltypen zu analysieren. Er besitzt ein Hormonsystem, das mit jenem der Wirbeltiere vergleichbar ist und er kann große Teile seines Körpers regenerieren. Zudem wird seine Fortpflanzungszeit durch mehrere Uhren gesteuert – ein Merkmal, das wahrscheinlich auch viele andere Organismen aufweisen. Diese Charakteristika machen den Borstenwurm ideal für die Evolutionsforschung, die Chronobiologie und für viele weitere Forschungsgebiete. Da es jedoch bislang keine geeigneten molekularbiologischen Werkzeuge gab, war es sehr schwierig, die Funktionen der Platynereis-Gene in vivo zu analysieren. (more…)
It should be just as easy to use a robotic arm as it is to use your own hand. That’s the thinking behind University of Washington startup BluHaptics, which is taking telerobotics — controlling robots from a distance — to a new level: underwater.
Using technology developed by Howard Chizeck’s lab in the Department of Electrical Engineering, a team of UW scientists and engineers working at the Applied Physics Laboratory is creating a control system for underwater remotely operated vehicles, or ROVs. (more…)
Don’t think media shapes how you behave? Think again, says Hope Schau, a UA associate professor of marketing.
Are you a Homer Simpson or a Dexter? How about a Clair Huxtable or a Carrie Bradshaw? Chances are you don’t think of yourself as a doughnut-loving oaf, a brilliant serial killer, an unflappable power-mom/lawyer nor a lovelorn fashionista.
But when you watch these characters on television, your brain is doing something you may not even realize, says University of Arizona associate professor of marketing Hope Jensen Schau: figuring out who you are. (more…)
Today’s modeling and simulation (M&S) software provides indispensible tools for systems engineering challenges. Such programs allow investigators to experiment with “what-ifs” by adjusting design parameters and examining potential outcomes.
A team from the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) has produced an advanced web-based tool that lets physically separated participants collaborate on model-based systems engineering projects. Known as the Framework for Assessing Cost and Technology (FACT), the program utilizes open-source software components to allow users to visualize a system’s potential expense alongside its performance, reliability and other factors. (more…)
North Carolina State University researchers have used silver nanowires to develop wearable, multifunctional sensors that could be used in biomedical, military or athletic applications, including new prosthetics, robotic systems and flexible touch panels. The sensors can measure strain, pressure, human touch and bioelectronic signals such as electrocardiograms.
“The technology is based on either physical deformation or “fringing” electric field changes. The latter is very similar to the mechanism used in smartphone touch screens, but the sensors we’ve developed are stretchable and can be mounted on a variety of curvilinear surfaces such as human skin,” says Shanshan Yao, a Ph.D. student at NC State and lead author of a paper on the work. (more…)
Geologic time is shorthand for slow-paced. But new measurements from steep mountaintops in New Zealand shows that rock can transform into soil more than twice as fast as previously believed possible.
The findings were published Jan. 16 in the early online edition of Science. (more…)
In our life, technology is an essential part in our life, which we will never ignore it. Nevertheless, one thing is sure that sometimes technology comes as a wall in our relationship. Therefore, we fall on it and make our life more miserable as well. Particularly, it is felt very much in our sex relationship as well. The reason is that the technology comes as an intruder in our privacy time. Therefore, that, if we could not immediately avoid it during our privacy time, then our relationship will be suffered also. When we are in any kind of sexual activity, then we should be careful about it. Therefore, that it can hamper our high time in our personal physical journey as well.
Phone call
When you are engaged in sexual activity, then if you get the phone call, you should immediately ignore it. Otherwise, your exploration in the sexual world will be incomplete. Therefore, you should make yourself stubborn in your conviction that you will never receive any phone call during your sexual journey as well. Actually, what happens is that when you will receive the phone call during sexual activity, your partner will be upset most. Therefore, you should be careful in this matter. Otherwise, your relationship with your partner will never see the reality as well. (more…)
