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Australian farmer finds mystery space junk
CANBERRA (Reuters) – A cattle farmer in Australia’s remote northern outback on Friday said he had found a giant ball of twisted metal, which he believes is space junk from a rocket used to launch communications satellites.
Farmer James Stirton found the odd-shaped ball last year on his 40,000 hectare property, about 800 kilometers (500 miles) west of the northern Queensland state capital of Brisbane.
Scientists find that squid beak is both hard and soft, a material that engineers want to copy
(Santa Barbara, Calif.) —— How did nature make the squid’s beak super hard and sharp —— allowing it, without harm to its soft body —— to capture its prey?
The question has captivated those interested in creating new materials that mimic biological materials. The results are published in this week’s issue of the journal Science.
The end of the silicon chip : carbon nanotubes
The future of computing is under the spotlight at the Institute of Physics’ Condensed Matter and Materials Physics conference at the Royal Holloway College of the University of London on 26-28 March.The end of the silicon chip
The silicon chip, which has supplied several decades’ worth of remarkable increases in computing power and speed, looks unlikely to be capable of sustaining this pace for more than another decade — in fact, in a plenary talk at the conference, Suman Datta of Pennsylvania State University, USA, gives the conventional silicon chip no longer than four years left to run.
Tropical forest changes ‘explained by multiple factors’
Changes in the growth and species composition of tropical forests cannot be fully explained by global environmental changes, say researchers.
Recent studies in the Amazon rainforest have suggested that changes such as the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide (see Carbon emissions ‘may alter forest growth patterns’) and other factors such as nutrient deposition, temperature, drought frequency and irradiance are increasing the productivity and biomass of forests.
Tiny buckyballs squeeze hydrogen like giant Jupiter
HOUSTON, March 20, 2008 — Hydrogen could be a clean, abundant energy source, but it’s difficult to store in bulk. In new research, materials scientists at Rice University have made the surprising discovery that tiny carbon capsules called buckyballs are so strong they can hold volumes of hydrogen nearly as dense as those at the center of Jupiter.
The research appears on the March 2008 cover of the American Chemical Society’s journal Nano Letters.
X Prize offers $10 mln for fuel-efficient car
NEW YORK (Reuters) – More than 60 teams from nine countries have lined up to chase a $10 million prize for making a green supercar that smashes records for fuel efficiency, organizers of the competition said on Thursday,
The initial list of teams signed on for the Automotive X Prize competition range from California-based electric car start-up Tesla Motors to Cornell University in New York.
Gas-belching volcanoes may have killed dinosaurs
LONDON (Reuters) – Gas-belching volcanoes may be to blame for a series of mass extinctions over the last 545 million years, including that of the dinosaurs, new evidence suggested on Thursday.
A series of eruptions that formed the Deccan Traps in what is now India pumped huge amounts of sulfur into the atmosphere 65 million years ago, with likely devastating repercussions for the Earth’s climate, scientists said.
Colourful idea sparks renewable electricity from paint
Dr Dave Worsley (pictured), a Reader in the Materials Research Centre at the University’s School of Engineering, is investigating ways of painting solar cells onto the flexible steel surfaces commonly used for cladding buildings.
“We have been collaborating with the steel industry for decades,” explains Dr Worsely, “but have tended to focus our attention on improving the long-term durability and corrosion-resistance of the steel. We haven’t really paid much attention to how we can make the outside of the steel capable of doing something other than looking good.
Shutting Down for Earth Hour
I love my computer(s) and internet…no doubt about it. But I’m looking forward to powering down my life, and turning off my house for Earth Hour.
Last year, Sydney Australia turned off its lights for an hour in order to, I guess, save some energy. Mostly, however, it was a statement. To see the combined effect of a lot of people agreeing that something needs to be done. The event was such a success that the World Wildlife Fund decided to take it global in 2008.
So on March 29th, whenever 8pm rolls around, over 350 cities in 35 countries, millions of individuals, the Sears Tower, the Golden Gate Bridge, and 2,100 corporations including HP, Coca Cola and McDonald’s, are all turning off their lights.
As an EcoGeek, I can’t help but point out that all of these people who will be burning candles to light their houses during Earth Hour actually aren’t doing any good. Candles produce significantly more CO2 and other pollutants per lumen than incandescent bulbs. But that’s really not what this is about.
Organizing mass action to recognize the treat of climate change is certainly something that I can get behind. And I’m sure there are going to be lots of pretty pictures of dark skylines to share on the morning of the 30th which I will excitedly write about.
I’ve signed myself up for Earth Hour, and will be having a quiet evening playing cards with my wife in the dark. I encourage all you EcoGeeks to participate as well. Take some time to remember what darkness is, it’s good for you.
Florida City Will Soon be Powered by its Own Poo
With a logo like that, one might not expect MaxWest Energy to be in the business of converting human waste sludge into energy…but that’s what they do.
MaxWest has just partnered with the city of Sanford in Central Florida to create a sludge to energy plant. The plant will convert the sludge that comes out of Sanford’s water treatment plant into carbon monoxide and hydrogen, which can both be combusted. So the waste will be taken care of, and as the sludge ultimately came from biologics (the corn and cows that Sanfordites eat) it’s pretty much carbon neutral.
And, of course, there’s a financial benefit as well. Over the life of the MaxWest contract, the city of Sanford will save about $9 million over the cost of burning natural gas for the same energy.
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