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Events
WA: Celebrate International Year of Biodiversity
If you live in Western Australia, it’s time to celebrate the International Year of Biodiversity. Head down to the Western Australian Museum to hear Andrew Hosie, the curator of aquatic zoology, talk about what species have been discovered in Western Australia over the last ten years. Find out what lives in the Dampier Archipelago, Northwest Atolls and the Kimberley.
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When: 6 pm, Friday 7 May 2010
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Where: NWS Shipping Theatre, Western Australian Maritime Museum , Fremantle
Entry by gold coin donation. Bookings essential on (08) 9427 2845.
More information on this lecture and a range of other lectures at the Western Australian Museum’s
website.
Did you know?
Be aware of your water footprint. It can take as much as 16 000 litres of fresh water to produce one kilogram of beef.
Of all of the rubbish that makes it to the ocean, 15 per cent floats on the surface, 15 per cent remains near the shore and the rest sinks to the floor.
Science Quiz Questions
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True or false? Identical twins have the same fingerprints?
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For which of the following did Leonardo da Vinci not sketch a design? a) helicopter, b) odometer, or c) zip.
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What is the link between a chicken’s eggs and its earlobes?
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When is it hot enough to ‘fry an egg’?
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How many times can aluminium be recycled?
Quiz Questions
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Where would you find Hadley and Ferrel cells?
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How many chromosomes do human somatic cells have?
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What is the Gaia hypothesis?
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When you eat ‘hot’ foods such as chilli peppers you excite your tongue’s a) nociceptors, b) olfactory sensors or c) photoreceptors.
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What is a PHEV?
Quiz Questions
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What was the first animal to orbit Earth?
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How many people died last year in Australia from spider bites?
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How many legs do scorpions walk upon?
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Where in the human body would you find the pituitary gland?
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What is the largest national park in Australia?
Galactic Suite Space Resort on Target
The Galactic Suite Project is a unique combination of commercialization and
exploration. Directors Xavier Claramunt and Marsal Gifra have combined the
expertise of three Spanish firms and one American company to bring this project
to fruition. The Spanish firms are Equip XCL, Aerospace Research and Technology
Center, and Global Business Technologies. The American firm, 4 Frontiers
Corporation, brings with it the technology they are developing for the
exploration of Mars. Headquarters of Galactic Suite is in Barcelona.
There
are three phases which must be completed. First is the development of a
spaceport on a yet-to-be-named Caribbean Island. The spaceport will feature a
magnetic catapult to provide the initial supersonic boost to the spacecraft.
There will be a runway for landing the spacecraft as the Space Shuttle does.
Also on the island is a luxury hotel which will house the space travelers and
their guests during the 18 week training period.
The spacecraft will be powered by hybrid rocket engines in two stages. After the
catapult launch to supersonic speed, the rockets will accelerate the craft to
its orbital speed of 18,000 miles per hour. The spacecraft will then maneuver to
an orbital height of 300 miles, where the Galactic Suite module will be waiting.
Crew on the ship will be four guests and two pilot/astronauts.
The Galactic Suite orbital hotel will have four modules joined to a central
common area. Each "bedroom" module will feature a large window providing
fantastic views of the earth and the stars. Floating in weightless conditions,
the guests will enjoy 15 sunsets on each of the trip's four days. At the end of
the trip the crew and guests will board the spacecraft for the return to earth.
The spacecraft will remain docked to the orbital hotel during the entire stay to
provide an additional measure of safety and security.
The Galactic Suite Project's initial goal of first flight in 2012 has been
pushed back to 2015. The ownership continues to remain optimistic, though, and
the bulk of the financing is already in place. A three billion euro initial
investment by an undisclosed space enthusiast has the whole organization moving
briskly toward success. Prices are expected to hold steady at four million
dollars per guest, which includes the luxury accommodations at the spaceport and
the training. The future of commercial space tourism has never looked brighter
than it does today.
Cloud crystals packed with life
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Image: Willem van Image: Willem van Aken, CSIRO Land and Water |
Next time you’re outside, look up. Is there a cloud in the sky? You might know
that these clouds are made of drops of water or ice, but that’s not all.
Scientists in the US have now directly measured the biological material and
mineral dust in the ice crystals found in clouds.
When the temperature is just right, clouds form around aerosols such as dust,
smoke, salt, bacteria, plant matter and even the spores of fungi. Water and ice
in the atmosphere grow around these aerosols and eventually this leads to rain
or snow.
The scientists sampled clouds while flying at high speeds in an aircraft to find
out more about these aerosols. They had a scientific instrument onboard called a
mass spectrometer. This allowed them to measure the chemicals that make up ice
particles in the clouds.
Article and photo source: CSIRO
Science by Email
Try this: Open, shut them
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Warning: This experiment requires the use of an oven. Younger scientists should ask for an adult’s help.
You will need
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dry pine cone with open scales (rather than a heavy, closed, woody cone)
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Blu-Tack
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permanent marker
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spray bottle
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jar
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oven
News: The squeaky sounds of city living
Nature never feels further away than when you are in the middle of a city.
Growling traffic, expanses of hot concrete and the countless tall buildings seem
like another world far away from lush rainforests or tranquil mountain streams.
You’d never think of a city as an ecosystem. Yet many animals have adapted to
the hustle and bustle of the urban environment.
Birds and frogs use complicated songs to communicate with one another, usually
to mark their territory or to attract a mate. Birds of the same species will
often sing in different dialects just as we learn to speak in different
languages. A study conducted in the US city of San Francisco has found the range
of dialects sung by the white-crowned sparrow has changed over the past thirty
years, while a study conducted by the University of Melbourne has found a
similar change in frogs.
In both cases, the researchers wondered if the noise of the city influenced the
species’ calls. Traffic, building construction and the effect concrete has on
sound means the loudest noises in the city are low-pitched. Therefore
high-pitched songs can be heard much more clearly.
In the American study, three different types of sparrow dialect were studied
over three decades. The one with the lowest pitch disappeared by 1998, while the
other two not only became more common, but seemed to increase in pitch when
compared with their country cousins.
It’s unusual for bird dialects to change on their own so quickly, leading the
researchers to believe the increasing noise of the city favoured white-capped
sparrows who sang in higher pitches.
For frogs, the distance over which they can communicate can be reduced to as
little as twenty metres if there’s noisy traffic around. To compensate, the
males being studied seem to be croaking in a higher pitch to get the girls to
listen. The question now is: do the ladies like the squeakier sounds?
Cities are important landscapes not just for humans, but for the animals who
share it. While many species will adapt, and even thrive, others won’t do so
well. It’s important to remember that nature isn’t always about forests, oceans
and fields, but is often about what happens in our own backyard.
News: Dino sores wreck Rex
Tyrannosaurus rex might be well known as the ‘tyrant lizard king’, but
it seems not even this royal reptile was immune to nature’s tiniest organisms.
Once thought to be caused by the bite of a fellow T. rex, holes in the jaws of a
number of skeletons around the world are now suspected to be caused by a type of
microscopic parasite.
Modern day pigeons can suffer from mouth infections caused by a single-celled
organisms called Trichomonas gallinae. If left untreated, this microbe
can move through the body and shut down major organs, killing the bird. This
bird illness has been a major concern for pigeon racers in the past.
Serious infections caused by trichomonas parasite can often cause degeneration
of nearby bone, which has led some US and Australian palaeontologists to
question if such markings on the jaws of Tyrannosaurus rex remains
could be caused by a similar parasite. Given that birds share a branch of the
family tree with dinosaurs, this similarity could be rather significant.
This is not the first time bones have provided clues on a possible disease.
Contagious diseases such as syphilis, leprosy and even tuberculosis have left
marks on human skeletons, helping anthropologists gain a better understanding of
the lifestyle and health of people who lived during ancient times.
Discoveries such as these can tell us a lot about how dinosaurs lived and died.
As with pigeons, a T. rex with an infected jaw would find it difficult to eat
and may starve to death. No other dinosaurs have been found with similar
markings, and it has been proposed that it may have been spread via direct
contact between fighting tyrannosaurs or even through cannibalism.
When studying extinct species, scientists typically have very little to go on
other than a couple of bones or an occasional footprint. Even a tiny hole or
mark on a bone can tell an interesting story.
