BORGZA'S Science & Technology UPDATES

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Saturn's ring mystery is solved
Scientists have made a significant step forward in understanding the dynamics of Saturn's magnificent and mysterious system of rings.
The behaviour of one ring in particular - the G ring - has baffled experts.

Its dust particles should ebb away because there are no nearby moons to hold them in place or replenish them.

But the Cassini probe has shed new light on the faint, narrow ring; showing that it interacts with a much more distant Saturnian satellite.

The work, published in Science, also unveiled the ring's odd structure.

The G ring is one of Saturn's outermost rings: it is more than 168,000km from the centre of the planet and more than 15,000km from the nearest moon.

"It's a dusty ring," explained Matthew Hedman, a research associate at Cornell University and lead author of the study. "Like the E ring and F ring, it is primarily composed of tiny grains of ice just a few microns across."

However, these minute specks can be easily dispersed or eroded as they whizz around the planet. For the rings to remain in place, they either need something to serve them with a constant supply of new dust and ice, or for a large object such as a moon to confine the particles in the band through its gravitational interactions.

The moon Enceladus directly supplies new material to the nearby E ring. While for the F ring, satellites Prometheus and Pandora may help to keep the particles within this narrow region.

"But the G ring is not near a moon, and that's the thing that makes it odd," explained Dr Hedman.

Arc of debris

Data from the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn, a collaboration between the US space agency (Nasa), the European Space Agency (Esa) and the Italian Space Agency (ASI), has enabled scientists to examine the G ring in more detail than ever before.

Instruments from the Cassini probe revealed that the G ring's structure was unusual.

In addition to the tiny grains of dust spread evenly around the ring, there was also a bright arc across one sixth of the band, that contained larger icy solids. These ranged in size from a few centimetres to a few metres.

Dr Hedman explained: "You would expect this material to shear out, but it was clumped together. So the question was 'how did that work?'"

The team discovered that the ring's orbit was linked to that of the major moon Mimas. For every seven times the arc orbited Saturn, Mimas, which is about 15,000km away, completed six orbits.

"When you get this kind of whole number ratio, there can be some strange things called resonances that occur. These can have interesting influences and can actually confine material within the ring," said Dr Hedman.

The scientists believe the bright arc of material is being held in place through an interaction with Mimas.

Micrometeorites, which litter space, are constantly colliding into the bodies within the arc, generating dust that subsequently spreads out to populate the rest of the G ring.

"The entire G ring could be derived from an arc of debris held in resonance with Mimas," the scientists write in the journal Science.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6927965.stm

Published: 2007/08/03 07:58:52 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

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Saturn rings have own atmosphere
By Paul Rincon
BBC News science reporter
Saturn's vast and majestic ring system has its own atmosphere - separate from that of the planet itself, according to data from the Cassini spacecraft.
And Saturn is rotating seven minutes more slowly than when probes measured its spin in the 70s and 80s - an observation experts cannot yet explain.

Cassini-Huygens mission scientists are celebrating the spacecraft's first year in orbit around the ringed planet.

Details were unveiled at the British Festival of Space 2005 in Birmingham.

By making close flybys of the ring system, Cassini has been able to determine that the atmosphere around the rings is composed principally of molecular oxygen (O2).

Welcome confirmation

The finding was made by two experiments on Cassini: the Ion and Neutral Mass Spectrometer (INMS) and Cassini Plasma Science (Caps) instrument.

"The INMS sees the neutral oxygen gas, Caps sees the ionised products of that oxygen and the electrons associated with it. There is an enhancement over the rings," said Dr Andrew Coates, co-investigator for the Caps instrument, told the BBC News website.

Dr Coates, from the Mullard Space Science Laboratory (MSSL) at University College London, said the atmosphere was very similar to that of Jupiter's moons Europa and Ganymede.

"As water comes off the rings, the hydrogen is lost from it, leaving the oxygen," he explained.

Saturn's rings consist largely of water-ice mixed with smaller amounts of rocky matter. Dr Coates said the ring atmosphere was probably kept in check by gravitational forces and a balance between loss of material from the ring system and a re-supply of material from elsewhere.

Scientists admitted they were surprised by the finding that Saturn's rotation was slowing.

"The rotation seems to have slowed down by about seven minutes compared with what was inferred from the Pioneer and Voyager data, but we don't actually understand why," said Professor Michele Dougherty, principal investigator for Cassini's magnetometer instrument.

Surprise finding

Data from the magnetometer and Cassini's Radio and Plasma Wave Science (RPWS) instrument both seem to show the slow down in Saturn's rotation.

"You would expect the rotation of the planet to slow down if its internal dynamo had stopped, but that does not seem to be the case with Saturn," Professor Dougherty, from Imperial College London, told the BBC News website.

The internal dynamo is the source of a planet's magnetic field and requires rotation and a fluid core. Professor Dougherty said it was possible the instruments were observing "rotational regions" closer to the surface of Saturn rather than anything to do with the dynamo itself.

"If you sit down and think about it, it's very difficult to come up with a scenario where the interior of the planet is slowing down," she said.

UK science and innovation minister Lord Sainsbury, who was at the briefing in Birmingham, praised UK scientists involved in Cassini-Huygens as the orbiter celebrated its first year in orbit around Saturn.

"The scientists and engineers in this country have played an integral role, making it the biggest British success story in space of the last 12 months," Lord Sainsbury said.

Cassini performed its Saturn Orbit Insertion (SOI) on 1 July 2004 after a six-year, three-billion-kilometre trek.

In December 2004, it released its piggybacked Huygens probe, which performed a successful touchdown on Saturn's moon Titan in January this year.

The mission is a co-operative venture between the US space agency (Nasa), the European Space Agency (Esa) and the Italian Space Agency (Asi).


Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/4640641.stm

Published: 2005/07/01 14:43:37 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

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A MUST SEE FOR SCIENCE LOVERS

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/sci_nat/04/cassini/html/introduction.stm

 

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Phoenix diary: Mission to Mars
On 4 August, the US space agency (Nasa) is due to launch a mission to the surface of Mars called Phoenix.
Dr Tom Pike, from Imperial College London, is writing a diary of his experiences as a team member working on the Phoenix project in America.

FRIDAY 3 AUGUST: COUNTDOWN TO LAUNCH

On Thursday I travelled to Florida for the launch to Mars. I'll be joining Hanna and Sanjay, the other two members of the Imperial College London team.


Tomorrow, the Phoenix lander is scheduled to be launched to the northern plains of Mars.

Inside the microscope station on the lander are some ten discs of silicon, substrates from Imperial that have been carefully etched to hold Martian dust and soil.

These substrates are already well travelled.

From their birth in April last year in the microfabrication laboratory at Imperial, they first were flown over to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California to be mounted in the Phoenix microscope station.

The station then went to Colorado to be bolted onto the deck of the Phoenix lander.

The substrates' last trip on Earth was to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where they now sit on top of a Delta II rocket.

My journey on this mission has been even further, and taken much longer.

Intense search

Ten years ago, at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Mike Hecht and I were kicking around the idea of how to image Mars at the microscopic scale.

Both our backgrounds were in studying semiconductors - we were used to looking right down to the size of atoms to understand the sensors we were developing.


PHOENIX MARS LANDER
Will land in Mars' frigid northern latitudes
Is to investigate whether ice sometimes melts enough to support life
Launch is from Cape Canaveral on Delta II rocket
Robotic arm digs through the soil to the water-ice underneath
Arm to deliver soil, ice samples to mission's experiments

The previous year, the world had been stunned by microscopic images of what looked like microfossils within a meteorite known to have come from Mars.

We knew just how to get these images on Earth, but could we come up with an instrument that would work on Mars?

We sketched up some designs and realised that if we combined an optical microscope with a much higher resolution imager we'd be able to get an overall picture and then zoom in to take a close-up to reveal all the detail.

We would be able to see the individual tiny grains of the dust and soil that cloak Mars. We could even image any microfossils.

But normally, zooming in to this high magnification takes a bench of equipment, and we needed something much lighter and smaller.

The atomic force microscope had been invented just 10 years ago then, but we were using it regularly to image the surfaces of our semiconductors. These microscopes looked like they could be adapted for use on Mars.

Fortunately Nasa agreed and we were asked to produce a microscope station to launch to Mars in 2001.

We needed help with the atomic force microscope, and we travelled across the US and Europe visiting companies and groups that might be able to provide one.

After a long search we ended up on the shores of a lake in Switzerland at the University of Neuchatel where Urs Staufer promised to lead a Swiss team in making an atomic force microscope to fit into our station.

The next couple of years of frenetic activity in Pasadena and Switzerland turned our sketches into reality.

Nervous launch

But just as we completed the microscope station, we heard that our mission was cancelled.


A lander identical to our 2001 version had just crashed into Mars, and we weren't going to fly until Nasa was sure we'd avoid the same fate.

It could have been a long wait, and I moved back to the UK partly to take my mind off all the effort that had brought us no closer to Mars.

But now, the wait is nearly over.

The Phoenix mission that arose from the ashes of the crashed and cancelled instruments of the last decade now sits on the launch pad in Florida.

On it, the Imperial College substrates are just one of the changes that the extra time has made possible.

Of course, the critical improvement must be to the landing system that apparently failed in 1999.

For now, though, the butterflies in the stomach will be quelled once we see the Delta II arc across the Atlantic on the start of its journey to Mars.

WEDNESDAY 1 AUGUST: FOLLOW THE WATER

The first dress rehearsal for the Phoenix mission to Mars was deemed a success - but, to put it bluntly, we fluffed quite a few of our lines. We'll have to know the script better by next May when we land.


The pace was crushing - by Friday, the stress of keeping the communication flow going between Earth and simulated Mars was getting to Hanna, one of the members of our team.
She's studying at Imperial College London for a doctorate - her PhD thesis will be on the microscope station currently sitting on top of a rocket in Florida.

Next week, the microscopes should start their nine-month journey as part of the Phoenix instruments sent by Nasa to Mars. At the test facility in Tucson, Arizona, she was working on commanding a clone of the microscope station during the dress rehearsal.

This meant writing computer code that should work for the first time on Mars. This was a tall order, but we deserved some tall drinks on Friday evening to help with decompression at the end of our week of tests.

Watering hole

We were up at six for a hike the next morning, before the Arizonan desert sun climbed above the canyon walls. We joined Morten Madsen, the world's expert on the magnetic properties of Mars dust.

Morten's group in Copenhagen has designed magnets for every lander sent to Mars in the last 10 years. We climb though desert terrain, but evidence of water was everywhere. This is what Phoenix will be searching for on Mars - the mantra of the mission is "follow the water".

As we trekked up the canyon, we could properly appreciate the mantra's significance.

Even though the riverbed at the base of the canyon was dry, the vegetation there was surprisingly lush. Much of life on Earth can readily survive long periods without water, if it sees moisture once in a while.

Compared with Tucson, the northern plains of Mars where Phoenix will land are extreme desert. We don't know when rain last fell there - it might be billions of years ago. But here is where spacecraft currently orbiting Mars have seen what looks like ice just under the surface.

A tale of two planets

The northern plains could hold the last remains of the lakes from an earlier, much wetter Mars. The two Mars rovers currently hunkered down under the dust storms enveloping the planet have seen direct evidence of Mars' watery history.

The ice could also be from a dusting of more recent snow that's worked itself into the Martian soil. If it occasionally melts, this ice could be the last desperate refuge of life that developed when Mars was a much more hospitable planet.

Last week, we returned briefly from the deserts of Arizona to the Thames river in London racing to drain last week's storms. The floods are devastating, but they're at one end of the range of conditions on a wet Earth that can nurture life.

Mars, by comparison, is now a wizened remnant of its former self. But if water once soaked the surface of Mars, we are hoping that Phoenix will land in just the right region to look at the frozen puddles that are left.

WEDNESDAY 25 JULY: RACE AGAINST TIME

Last week, my son was part of a chaotic dress rehearsal of his primary school's production of "Fame".

This week, I heard the performance was a great success. But I missed it - I'm in Arizona as part of the first dress rehearsal of a mission to the surface of Mars.


In just over two weeks, the Phoenix mission will be launching from Florida, heading to the polar regions of Mars.
It will land there to look for the water that should be present as ice just below the surface of the bleak northern plains. I'm part of the science team that will be looking closely, very closely, at what a robot arm will dig up as it cuts through the soil and ice.

But Phoenix will not land until next May, and, meanwhile, we've got a copy of the lander to understudy the rehearsal.

We're not staring from scratch. The lander and all the instruments on board have learnt most of their lines - we've already tested that they do what we want when they're commanded directly.

But this is the first time that Phoenix and the close to one hundred members of the science team are getting together to see how this might all work on Mars.

Twenty-five-hour day

We're all sitting in the Science Operations Center in Tucson - the science team is in a maze of operations rooms, the lander behind locked doors in a hanger on the other side of the building.

Just as during real operations on Mars, we get a chance to send commands to Phoenix once every Martian morning, and at the end of its Martian work day the lander sends back its data, images and readings from all it has done during the day.

As the Martian day lasts nearly 25 hours, we'll slowly lose synch with Earth time; but for this rehearsal we're starting gently at 0800, and finish close to midnight.

Operations for a Mars mission are a race against time. We have to work during the Martian night.

There's just a little more than 12 hours to look at what has come down from the last day's operations on the Red Planet before we have to send our final script for the following day to Phoenix.

With seven instruments on board the lander, all of the science team ends up having a critical job to do.

Today we've reached Sol Two, the second day of operations of Phoenix on the surface of Mars after a successful landing.

There have been some moments of chaos, but we've got back the first images of the Martian surface to help us choose where to start digging.

It almost feels like the real thing - there's even a fly-on-the-wall film crew. A clue that this is only a dress rehearsal - a corner of a tarpaulin is poking out from underneath the foot of the Phoenix lander.


Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6914836.stm

Published: 2007/08/03 09:30:22 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

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Russia plants flag under N Pole

LINK

http://news.bbc.co.uk/player/nol/newsid_6920000/newsid_6927900/6927971.stm?bw=nb&mp=rm&asb=1&news=1

 

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Concern over Nepal wildlife seizures
By Navin Singh Khadka
BBC Nepali Service
Conservationist in Nepal say they are concerned that former Maoist rebels have not yet returned wildlife products they had seized during the nation's 10-year conflict.

Wildlife officials are calling for any items taken off poachers and traffickers to be handed over, especially as a number of the Maoist Party leaders are now members of the coalition government.

No official records exist of the confiscated animal products, but a number of conservationists say they have documents listing seizures.

The Maoist forestry minister said he was not aware of any wrongdoing by party members, but added he would launch an investigation if information was presented of goods being withheld.

Lack of records

Wildlife Conservation Nepal (WCN), which has been involved in undercover operations to identify poachers and wildlife traffickers, said it has records of an incident that took place in April 2006.

"Three people with two tiger skins and three leopard pelts were caught by locals in the southern town of Birgunj, bordering India," said Prasanna Yonjan, the head of WCN.

"The three were then handed over to the Maoists' People's Liberation Army, which seized the wildlife contrabands from them but has never returned them to the government."

Mr Yonjan added that the three traffickers were freed after lobbying by a poacher who himself was later arrested.


Another conservationist working for an international organisation in western Nepal said two people that were caught with tiger bones were taken away by Maoists in June 2004.

"The two, one of them a retired policeman, were taken to the mountain district Jumla by the Maoists," the conservationist added.

"The Maoists later freed the two but the tiger bones were never returned."

The Bardia incident was confirmed by a Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation official, who asked not to be named.

"Many such incidents took place during the 10-year conflict," said Mangal Man Shakya, head of Wildlife Watch Group, an organisation affiliated to the World Conservation Union (IUCN).

"But the Maoists have never returned to the state the wildlife products they had seized.

"We have been asking the Maoist leaders to do so but there has been no response."


Our party never had the policy of making income through such means
Matrika Prasad Yadav,
Nepal's forestry minister

Forestry Minister Matrika Prasad Yadav, a Maoist leader, told the BBC that he was not aware of any wildlife products seized by party members.
"If any organisation or individual provides us information in this regard, I can launch an investigation within our party," he said.

Conservation groups suggested that Mr Yadav may not have be aware of the problem because he spent the majority of the decade-long conflict in prison.

'Transit post'

One of the Maoist army's deputy commanders, Nanda Kishor Pun, also known as Pasang, acknowledged that seizures had taken place within lower levels of the party.

"But that was clearly against our party policy and we hope that this BBC report will help us probe into such issues," he said.

Wildlife groups are concerned that an increase in poaching and trafficking has led to a decline in the population of a number of endangered species.

Figures from the Department of National Parks show that 150 rhinos have been killed by poachers in the past eight years.

Department officials were able to record these deaths because the animals' carcasses were left behind after the horns had been removed.

The level of poaching of other endangered species, such as tigers, leopards and red pandas, is much more difficult to track because poachers remove the whole animal.

Although there has been no detailed study into the number of animals killed, officials say initial reports show animal sightings in some national parks have gone significantly down.

Nepal has 16 protected zones that cover almost 20% of the country's land area.

These areas had been protected by the government's army but the Maoist insurgency, which began in 1996, saw many soldiers being redeployed elsewhere to fight the rebels.

Maoist leaders have denied any involvement in wildlife poaching or trafficking.

"Our party never had the policy of making income through such means," said Minister Yadav.

The Maoist Party's youth wing, the Young Communist League, recently won praise from conservationists after its members seized huge amount of red sandal wood that was being smuggled from India to Chinese controlled Tibet via Nepal.

Several reports have suggested that Nepal is increasingly becoming a transit point for wildlife trafficking, particularly between India and China.


Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6924813.stm

Published: 2007/08/03 08:18:59 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

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Under Montserrat's volcano
By Orin Gordon
BBC News, Montserrat
Twelve years ago, after lying dormant for centuries, the volcano on the island of Montserrat erupted. Two years later, two-thirds of the island was devastated by a further eruption. Now, over half of the population has left and those who remain still have much work to do to restore their country.



As the small propeller aircraft descended towards Montserrat's airstrip, Jasmine, sitting next to me, closed her eyes tightly and appeared to be saying a silent prayer.
The plane touched down, none too gently, and immediately the pilot started braking because the runway - even for an aircraft that seats 19 people - is not that long.

A few days later I was looking down on the airport from one of Montserrat's highest hills. I had been taken there by the head of the local government, chief minister Lowell Lewis, who also puts in time as a medical doctor.

Dr Lewis does not do fancy chauffer-driven cars. He himself wrestled his old Toyota up the boulder-strewn road to the top of the hill. From there, a perfect view of the north, but also a full appreciation of the size of the task rebuilding the country.


There is on Montserrat an airport that would serve the island's needs perfectly. The problem is that it sits abandoned near the volcano in the evacuated zone in the south.


Those who remained have had to uproot families and livelihoods


What was once the main harbour in the old capital Plymouth also lies deserted under volcanic dust and other debris.

The rough waters of the north make docking ships a tricky and even dangerous business and the ferry service from the nearby island of Antigua, which had been a lifeline with the patchy air service, no longer operates.

Flat land is scarce and the new airport is built on a low hill, the top of which has been flattened. But its size restricts the number of tourists, goods and material that can be brought into Montserrat.

The only way to lengthen the airstrip would be to build an elevated runway across a valley. That would take a lot of money. As would carving out a proper harbour in the safe zone.

Moving away

Before the eruption, Montserrat had been doing fine financially, the majority of its income coming from tourism.


At that time most islanders lived in the south, which had tremendous views of one of the Caribbean's natural wonders, the Soufriere Hills volcano. But those majestic views came at a price. The steepness of it became clear once the sleeping giant awoke.

After the eruption most of the original population left for Britain, the United States and other parts of the Caribbean. Those who remained had to uproot families and livelihoods, and restart in the part of the island designated safe for habitation.

Daniel used to be a windsurfing instructor at one of Montserrat's upmarket hotels. Today he runs a restaurant with his English wife Margaret in the safe zone.

The restaurant is in their living room. Danny is a prize fisherman and the sea is in his blood. If he is unhappy about not being on the beach, he does not show it.

He is chatty and full of stories about the famous people he taught to windsurf in the old days.

He and his wife have had to move several times, when there have been flows from the volcano, so he understands the deep frustration others feel about having to start all over again.

Overseas aid

Many people in Montserrat think that the authorities are too strict in interpreting the data that the scientists give to them and are far too cautious in deciding how much of the island should be designated unsafe.


We have been living with this volcano for many years, they tell me, and there is no way - and here they mention one of the areas just inside the unsafe zone - there is no way that place is in danger.
Jasmine, whom I met on the plane, has taken advantage of her British citizenship to come to live in the UK.

But when it comes to the question of how much the mother country is doing to help, many of those back in Montserrat feel that Britain can do far more than they have done so far.

"Montserrat can pay its own way," Dr Lewis told me. But first they need the money to pay for the things - a bigger airport and a new harbour for a start - that will give them a fighting chance. It will cost about $200m (£100m).

Debra Barnes Jones, who has just finished her tour of duty as governor, told me much of that money will have to come from private sector investment.

Britain cannot fund it in full. "Not even the chief minister expects that," she said.

More disruption

The whole thing was brought home to me as I prepared to leave.

Normal service had been disrupted and a smaller plane, with only seven seats, had been despatched to do the job.

The pilot took one look at my equipment case and ordered it off the plane. I asked him why.

"Every kilo counts," he said. "We have a short distance to get this up and if we don't..."

"We go into the sea?" I asked him softly. "No," he said "we slam into another hill."

I saw the look on the other passengers' faces and shut up for duration of the half-hour hop to Antigua.

From Our Own Correspondent was broadcast on Monday 30 July, 2007 on the BBC World Service. Please check the programme schedules for World Service transmission times.


Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/6924215.stm

Published: 2007/08/01 08:16:41 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

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Ice caves grow despite warming
By Bethany Bell
BBC News, Werfen, Austria
Deep inside the Tennengebirge mountains lies a frozen world.
The Eisriesenwelt ice caves at Werfen near the Austrian city of Salzburg are said to be the largest in the world.
Warmer temperatures in the Alps have been causing concern about the future of glaciers and of the ski industry in the region.

But the ice in the Eisriesenwelt ("World of the Ice Giants") has actually grown by a third since the 1920s.


And there has been a marked increase in the growth of ice over the past 15 to 20 years.
Earlier melting
The mild winter this year did not damage the caves' frozen sculptures.
In fact the warmer temperatures on top of the mountains may be helping the formations to develop earlier than usual.
The ice is formed by water seeping through crevices into the freezing caverns below.
The sooner the snow melts, the earlier water starts dripping into the caves.
One of the first ice structures you see after entering the cave did not exist 10 years ago.
The huge pillar was formed by tiny drops of melted snow water trickling through fissures in the rock.
Even in the height of summer, temperatures in the caves usually stay below freezing - something that surprises many visitors.
"I was thinking maybe in summer that it would get a bit warmer in the cave so that the ice might melt so it was actually surprising to hear that it was still building up," one woman visiting from the Netherlands said.
Her companion agreed. "The ice keeps on growing and that's surprising," he said. "You start to wonder actually what happens when the ice seems to grow so fast and so far that you can't actually enter the cave any more. So it is really interesting. "
'Short-term advantage'
There are thousands of caves in the Alps - but only a handful of them are filled with ice. Ice caves require special conditions, with at least two different openings at different levels.
Most of them are found at a height between 1,300 and 2,000 metres (4,290-6,600 ft) above sea level.
So far it seems that warmer temperatures outside have been beneficial for the ice caves. But that could change over time, according to Alois Rettenbacher, a cave guide at the Eisriesenwelt.
"If the climate gets warmer, it could be an advantage in the short term," he said.
"The question is how much warmer it will get. If the temperature increases by five, six or seven degrees, that could be a disadvantage - because the base temperature inside the cave wouldn't then be cold enough for the formation of ice."
In the heart of the ice cave, a row of icicles forms a sculpture known as Frigga's Veil, named after the ancient Norse goddess of the heavens.
Whether it grows or shrinks, this delicate structure is likely to look very different in the years to come.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/6227842.stm

Published: 2007/08/03 12:15:52 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

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Nasa to replace Endeavour valve
The US space agency believes it has traced the source of an air leak in space shuttle Endeavour's cabin.
Engineers are working against the clock to remove and replace the suspect pressure-relief valve in order to prevent delay to the 7 August launch.

Endeavour's faulty valve is to be substituted with one taken from its sister spacecraft Atlantis.

Nasa said it expected the extra work would be completed by Tuesday, but admitted the timing would be tight.

The leak was discovered at the weekend. An initial attempt to fix it by tightening a loose bolt appeared to have worked, but tests on Monday showed that air was still escaping from the shuttle cabin.

Cabin pressure

Nasa engineers finally traced the source of the leak on Wednesday by testing the valves that control cabin pressure.

John Yembrick, a Nasa spokesman, said: "The leak has been isolated. It's a pressure-relief valve behind the toilet in the crew cabin."

Nasa said the valve would be replaced with an Atlantis equivalent on Thursday; the cabin will then needed to be tested again to check that it is air-tight.

If air is still escaping, the launch may need to be delayed.

"You can't launch with a cabin leak," said Nasa spokesman Kyle Herring.

Seven crew will fly on the mission to continue expansion of the International Space Station.

Endeavour will launch from Kennedy Space Center in Florida on its first flight in five years.

The countdown for the launch is due to begin Saturday at 2302 GMT.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6926351.stm

Published: 2007/08/02 10:50:30 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

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A MUST SEE

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/07/sci_nat_enl_1186045434/html/1.stm

 

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Kew timelapse month by month
By Pia Harold
BBC News
Moon crosses the sky

A timelapse camera fixed high up in the Pagoda at Kew Gardens has been recording the changing seasons.
It takes a digital image of the same spot every five minutes, then those are pasted together to form a short video.

The device is being used to mark what the Met Office had predicted would be the warmest ever year.

Thus far, 2007 has proved to be full of extremes.

Here is what it has looked like so far, starting with the most recent month:

JULY 2007: WASH OUT


Flooding killed three people in Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire
July timelapse

Another month of heavy rain brought tragedy and despair.
Gloucestershire was hardest hit - at least three people died and thousands of homes had no running water after a treatment works was submerged.

Kew Gardens was spared such horrors, but it was very wet for the time of year.

Climate change scientists believe that extremes of weather will become more common.

And a lead researcher at Kew thinks plant life cycles are being greatly affected.

"Almost all the flowers we've been studying are flowering substantially earlier than they did less than 30 years ago. That's a change that we firmly believe is due to climate change," says Sandra Bell.


JUNE 2007: WETTEST ON RECORD


Olive trees have been cultivated since ancient times and can live hundreds of years
June timelapse


At least four people died when torrential rain caused flooding in much of the UK.

South Yorkshire, Humberside and Lincolnshire were among those struck by extreme flooding.

Londoners were also deluged, but without such serious consequences.

Kew Gardens held its Mediterranean Year Festival, and replanted the gardens according to changing climate.

The organisation said it included species that could not have thrived in the UK 50 years ago.

MAY 2007: CATS AND DOGS


The camera is fixed high up on the Pagoda's fourth floor
May timelapse

It was hardly picnic weather for much of May.

Hopes of an early summer were dashed with the arrival of heavy rain at the end of the month.

Raincoats and umbrellas were brought back out of the cupboards.

And the British straightened their stiff upper lips after what had been a rather lovely April.

APRIL 2007: HOTTEST ON RECORD


Children playing on Folkestone beach in April
April timelapse

This month had shown some signs the Met Office's predictions might come true.

City-dwellers enjoyed the sunshine, basking in parks.

And while children played in the surf, gardeners missed the rain.

The average temperature was 10.2C (50.4F), beating the previous April high of 9.2C (48.6F), recorded in 1943.

MARCH 2007: FOLIAGE FOOTAGE


This daffodil in Wales flowered in December 2006
March timelapse

In the early 1960s daffodils ( Narcissus pseudonarcissus ) in Kew's Woodland Garden were only thought to begin flowering in March.

But researchers at Kew Gardens have found that that has advanced by about 10 days per decade.

This year the first one opened on 23rd January.


FEBRUARY 2007: SNOW WORRIES


Snow in February, as seen from the Pagoda
February timelapse

The camera point in the Pagoda has only failed a couple of times - and one of those times was when the snow came down.
"We recovered it that day and got the snow melting away, but it was a real disappointment," said BBC location engineer Alan Murdey.

He thought it could have failed because of power outages - although he had set up a back-up supply which was meant to kick in if there was a cut.


JANUARY 2007: EARLY STARTS


Snowdrops are always among the first bulbs to flower
January timelapse

On 25 January the first snowdrop ( Galanthus nivalis ) opened under the hornbeams in the Queen's Garden.

During the 1950s snowdrops opened on average at around 25 February, according to Kew's records.

But the average since 2000 has been 30 January, meaning that flowering has advanced by 26 days.

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/6923600.stm

Published: 2007/08/01 15:01:29 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

[genmirajborgza786]

Shark tag's cross-country journey
Marine scientists are offering a reward for the return of a £3,000 shark tag which has been tracked across Scotland's central belt.
The device is believed to have come off a basking shark in the Firth of Clyde.

Scientists believe it was picked up by someone who lives in Ayrshire and is being kept in a bag.

They want it returned as it contains crucial data about the movements of a shark between the Isle of Man and the West Coast of Scotland.

Dr Mauvis Gore, who is part of a project run by Marine Conservation International, said the purpose of tagging was to track the sharks once they headed north from the Manx coast.

She said: "This one seems to have chosen to go into the Clyde, then the tag has come off. Now it's a bit of a mystery.


If we can get it back then we can trace what the shark has been doing since it left the Isle of Man
Dr Mauvis Gore
Marine Conservation International

"It seems to be moving back and forth between Ardrossan and Troon and we think it's based in Irvine.

"But it has also gone on 'holiday', one day to Edinburgh and back."

Dr Gore said she believed that someone had the tag in a bag or possibly the boot of a car.

"We have a reward as the tag is valuable from a data point of view," she said.

"If we can get it back then we can trace what the shark has been doing since it left the Isle of Man.


"We want to know how deep it has gone, what area it needs to be in, so that we can see what type of water these basking sharks prefer.

"For a big animal like that, we actually know more about its tiny food (plankton) than we do about the shark itself."

Dr Gore said the project was "desperate" to recover the tag, which she described as being "like an ice-cream cone".

She said the cone part would look grey with the ice-cream part being bright red. It also had an antennae sticking out the top "like a 99".

Dr Gore asked anyone who finds the tag to send it to the University Marine Biological Station at Millport.


Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/glasgow_and_west/6929378.stm

Published: 2007/08/03 10:40:56 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

[genmirajborgza786]

Focus on carbon 'missing the point'

VIEWPOINT
Eamon O'Hara


The focus on reducing carbon emissions has blinded us to the real problem - unsustainable lifestyles, says Eamon O'Hara. In this week's Green Room, he argues that bigger problems await us unless we shift our efforts.


Focusing on the need to reduce CO2 emissions has reduced the problem to one of carbon dioxide rather than on the unsustainable ways we live

Is it not time to recognise that climate change is yet another symptom of our unsustainable lifestyles, which must now become the focus our efforts?

Yet governments, and those organisations who have now assumed the role of combating climate change, subscribe to the notion that climate change is our central problem and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions is the cause of this problem.

Undeniably, climate change is a serious problem but it is only one of a growing list of problems that arise from a fundamental global issue.

For many decades, the symptoms of unsustainable human exploitation of the natural environment have been mounting: species extinction, the loss of biodiversity, air and water pollution, soil erosion, acid rain, destruction of rainforests, ozone depletion - the list goes on.

Common cause

These problems all clearly have a common origin, yet the search for solutions has invariably focused on targeted treatments rather than addressing the root cause.

Success has, at best, been patchy. In general, none of these problems have completely disappeared and many have continued to worsen.


Renewable resources might provide a safer alternative to oil and gas and other finite resources, but it will not remove our energy and resource dependency


Global warming - the latest in this list of environmental woes - is a particularly worrying development, not only because it is potentially catastrophic, but because it is going to be incredibly difficult to control.

The solutions currently being put forward, such as those being championed by the European Union, focus almost exclusively on reducing carbon emissions.

However, by focusing on the need to reduce CO2 emissions has reduced the problem to one of carbon dioxide rather than on the unsustainable ways we live our lives.

This oversight has led to the assumption that if we reduce emissions then our problems are solved, hence the focus on carbon sequestration, renewable energies and environmental technologies.

This approach to curing our problems is a bit like relying on methadone to cure an addiction to heroin.

The large-scale transition to renewable resources might provide a safer alternative to oil and gas and other finite resources, but it will not remove our energy and resource dependency, which will continue to expand in line with economic growth.

Before long, we will discover that even renewables have their limits. We are already being warned about the dangers of excessive demand for biofuels, which is reportedly leading to the clearing of rainforests and increasing competition for land between food and energy production.


The world simply does not have the resources, renewable or otherwise, to sustain Western lifestyles across the globe


Ultimately, our problem is consumption, and the environment is not the only casualty.

The modern Western lifestyle also has an inbuilt dependency on the cheap resources and the low carbon footprint of developing countries, which has compounded global injustice.

Worse still, maintaining our relatively wealthy, comfortable and unsustainable lifestyles is now dependant on maintaining this imbalance.

Seventy-five percent of the world's population - more than 4.5bn people - live on just 15% of the world's resources, while we in the West gorge on the remaining 85%.

The world simply does not have the resources, renewable or otherwise, to sustain Western lifestyles across the globe.

Change of direction

So, what can we do? Obviously, the first thing we need to do is act, and act fast.

Every day we wait, another 30,000 children needlessly die; between 100-150 plant and animal species become extinct; 70,000 hectares of rainforest is destroyed and another 150m tonnes of CO2 is released into the atmosphere.

Meanwhile, another $3.0bn (£1.5bn) is spent on arms and weapons of mass destruction.

We urgently need to think about the more fundamental concept of sustainability and how our lifestyles are threatening not only the environment, but developing countries and global peace and stability.

In my view, we need to embrace this as an opportunity and not see it as a responsibility. Living a more sustainable lifestyle does not have to be a burden, as some people fear.

It could be a liberating and rewarding experience to participate in creating a better world. After all, how good do we really have it at the moment?

How many people are tired and weary of modern living? The endless cycle of earning and consumption can be exhausting and does not necessarily bring happiness and fulfillment. Can we do things differently, and better?

If we don't, then we are heading for certain disaster, regardless of whether or not we manage to reduce our emissions.


Eamon O'Hara is a Brussels-based policy adviser for the Irish Regions Office, which represents Irish interests in the European Union

The Green Room is a series of opinion pieces on environmental topics running weekly on the BBC News website
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6922065.stm

 

[genmirajborgza786]

Tougher carbon targets law urged
The government's proposals to tackle climate change need to be tougher and legally enforceable, say MPs and peers.
Their report said the target of a minimum 60% cut in carbon emissions by 2050 may not be adequate.

International aviation emissions should be included in targets and there should be a cap on the use of "carbon credits" to meet them, the joint committee said.

The government said it was on track to beat its targets and the aim of a 60% cut was being kept under review.

The report backed the government's five-yearly carbon targets, but said there should be annual "milestones" and reports. Both the Tories and the Lib Dems have called for annual carbon targets.

No limit


READ THE FINDINGS

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The joint committee on climate change was examining the government's draft Climate Change Bill - which ministers say shows Britain is "leading by example".

It sets out plans to reduce carbon emissions by a minimum of 60%, from the 1990 base level, by 2050 - and sets an interim target of "at least 26% but not more than 32%" by 2020.


The committee said that the 32% upper limit on carbon reductions should be removed, as there was no "compelling reason" for it.

And it expressed "surprise" that the government intended to buy foreign carbon credits to meet 70% of its emission savings under the EU emissions trading scheme.


If Britain is prepared to step up and set an example to the rest of the world, you will be surprised how quickly the rest of the world might follow
Lord Puttnam
Committee chairman

It says there should be an "absolute cap" on their use, saying: "The bill as currently drafted would still theoretically allow all the savings to be made externally to the UK, notably in developing countries, and thereby postponing the decarbonisation of the UK economy."

The joint committee said it was a "serious weakness" that emissions from international aviation were not included in the targets and says the government is not taking sufficient account of predicted growth in aviation emissions.

'Groundbreaking bill'

"Further thinking" on legal enforceability of targets and budgets was needed, it said, and it stressed the need for sufficient powers, resources and independence for the proposed oversight body, the Committee on Climate Change.

And the report says the government must give a higher priority to changing the behaviour of individuals with major public information campaigns.


The government must include international aviation in the emissions reductions targets and it must set a higher target to cut emissions
Mike Childs
Friends of the Earth

The committee's chairman, Labour's Lord Puttnam, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme there would have to be a "quite significant shift in behaviour change".

But he welcomed the "groundbreaking" draft bill and dismissed arguments that Britain's contribution mattered little, when other, larger countries continued to pollute.

Tougher targets

Friends of the Earth campaigns director Mike Childs said the draft bill had to be strengthened.

"The government must listen, it must include international aviation in the emissions reductions targets and it must set a higher target to cut emissions based on the latest scientific evidence," he said.


Government must rightly lead in combating climate change, and that's why we will put this ambitious legislation in place
Environment Secretary Hilary Benn

Martin Harper, head of sustainable development at conservation charity the RSPB, said the target should be 80% not 60% to stop temperatures rising too quickly.

But Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said the UK should be proud of its record on tackling climate change and that it was on track to go beyond its targets.

"Government must rightly lead in combating climate change, and that's why we will put this ambitious legislation in place," he said.

Mr Benn added he would reflect on the committee's comments but a 60% commitment was "ambitious by any standard and consistent with our leading position internationally".

However, the 60% goal would be under review in the light of emerging scientific evidence, he said.



Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/politics/6928084.stm

Published: 2007/08/03 17:25:30 GMT

© BBC MMVII

 

[genmirajborgza786]

Shamed scientist's 'breakthrough'
A scientist who faked his research may have actually made a groundbreaking advance - without even realising it.
South Korean Woo Suk Hwang became famous after claiming to have extracted the world's first stem cells from a cloned embryo.

It emerged he had lied about his work, and the source of the cells.

But analysis in the journal Cell Stem Cell reveals he may have produced stem cells from human eggs alone - potentially even more useful.


I've always promoted the idea that efforts should be made to produce embryos from human eggs
Professor Azim Surani, Cambridge University

The Hwang episode, uncovered in 2005, is one of the most notorious scientific scandals of recent times.

His work at Seoul National University earned him the status of national hero, and even led to his face appearing on a set of commemorative stamps.

Unethical eggs

Hwang said that he had created cloned human embryos by placing the nucleus from the cell to be cloned into a "hollowed out" human egg, then managed to extract stem cells from the resulting embryos.

Scientists are excited about the potential of stem cells because they are the body's "master cells", with the potential to become any cell type in the body, perhaps replacing those lost through ageing or disease.

However, it later became clear that he had used eggs from young female researchers at his laboratory to create the embryos, itself a major ethical breach - and that the resulting stem cells did not come from cloned embryos.

With his research discredited, he was dismissed from his post at the university, and charged with fraud and embezzlement.

The latest twist came from the Harvard Stem Cell Institute in the US, who looked closely at his data, and found the cells were actually from a different type of embryo.

'Virgin birth'

Researchers said that the distinct "genetic fingerprint" of the stem cells means they may be the first in the world to be extracted from embryos produced by the so-called "virgin birth" method, or parthenogenesis.

This happens when eggs are stimulated into becoming embryos without ever being fertilised by sperm, and has been achieved in animals.

However, before Hwang, no one had managed to produce a human embryo using parthenogenesis which lived long enough to allow the extraction of viable stem cells.

Dr George Daley, who led the analysis, told the BBC's Science In Action programme: "Unfortunately at the time they published their work they did not know what they had done so they had mistakenly isolated these parthenogenic embryonic stem cells, and yet misrepresented them as true clones.

"In fact they had produced the world's first patient-specific embryonic stem cell, and that is very valuable.

"Scientists interested in modelling complex diseases would like to be able to move a patient's own cells into a petri dish in their embryonic form."

'More useful'

Professor Azim Surani, from the University of Cambridge, has carried out years of experiments to produce parthenogenetic stem cells from mice.

He said Hwang had probably inadvertently stimulated the human eggs to begin dividing while trying to produce cloned embryos.

Professor Surani said Hwang's unwitting step forward might actually prove more useful than efforts to clone human embryos, which he had claimed fraudulently.

"I've always promoted the idea that efforts should be made to produce embryos from human eggs - it is far less ethically challenging, and the efficiency of these cell lines is likely to be higher than those produced from cloned embryos," he said.

However, scientists do not know how significant the lack of contribution from the father's DNA will be.


Hear more about the new analysis on Science In Action on the BBC World Service. (Check World Service schedules for broadcast times)

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/6929203.stm

Published: 2007/08/03 09:58:57 GMT

© BBC MMVII