AVOW: September 2013

Sunday, September 29, 2013

BBC News - 'TomTato' tomato and potato plant unveiled in UK

Thursday, September 26, 2013

First Estuary Discovered Under Antarctic Ice | LiveScience

Wednesday, September 25, 2013

The Namibian Fog Basking Beetle lives in the Namibian Desert, where water is scarce. Seeing as water is necessary for the survival of any form of life, this poses a challenge to organisms. The Namibian Fog Basking Beetle has an extremely innovative method of obtaining moisture in its harsh environment.

The Namib Desert is the site of a remarkable natural phenomenon. The cold Benguela current causes a fog to roll into the desert, serving as a source of water. This fog occurs roughly 30 days every year and in a single day can deposit up to 1 litre of water per square meter (on the mesh of an artificial fog screen).

The Fog Basking Beetles exploit this rare occurrence by climbing to the top of sand dunes and face the wind with their backs in the air. They then turn their bodies into literal water collectors. Water droplets form on their elytra* and roll down into their mouths. In some varieties of Fog Basking Beetle, it is thought that their elytra are hydrophobic surfaces. This causes the water in the fog to bead up and slide down into their mouths.

This resource exploitation is extremely successful. Other similar beetles that do not exhibit such fog basking behaviour have serious decline in population during times of drought. However, the fog-basking beetle is still present in large numbers at such periods of scarcity.

*Elytra: The forewings of the beetle

Read all about it: http://1.usa.gov/1eGK3HQ
Image URL: http://bit.ly/15sSKNv
Watch a video: http://bit.ly/11vHwKO

Edible Oils--Compositional and Trace Contaminant Analysis - 114798-Bro-LC-GC-NIR-ICP-Edible-Oil-Workflows-BR70701_E.pdf

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Scientists Discover Brain Activity Beyond A Deep Coma | Popular Science

Saturday, September 21, 2013

Physicists Discover Geometry Underlying Particle Physics | Simons Foundation

Friday, September 20, 2013

Did a hyper-black hole spawn the Universe? : Nature News & Comment

Thursday, September 19, 2013

The Big Bang May Not Have Spawned The Universe After All | Popular Science

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

A Fridge Without Using Electricity!

This is incredible idea is an extension of the pottery water cooling vessels used though the millennia.

This is Mohammed Bah Abba's Pot-in-pot invention. In northern Nigeria, where Mohammed is from, over 90% of the villages have no electricity. His invention, which he won a Rolex Award for (and $100,000), is a refrigerator than runs without electricity.

Here's how it works. You take a smaller pot and put it inside a larger pot. Fill the space in between them with wet sand, and cover the top with a wet cloth. When the water evaporates, it pulls the heat out with it, making the inside cold. It's a natural, cheap, easy-to-make refrigerator.

So, instead of perishable foods rotting after only three days, they can last up to three weeks. Obviously, this has the potential to change their lives. And it already has -- there are more girls attending school, for example, as their families no longer need them to sell food in the market.

"Brilliant ideas don't need to be difficult to execute: here's a case in point. The technology has been known for centuries, but WASN'T APPLIED TO THE PROBLEM. Notice that applying technology also has the effect of educating young people."

@[453058754785190:274:These things will blow your mind]
A Fridge Without Using Electricity!

This is incredible idea is an extension of the pottery water cooling vessels used though the millennia.

This is Mohammed Bah Abba's Pot-in-pot invention. In northern Nigeria, where Mohammed is from, over 90% of the villages have no electricity. His invention, which he won a Rolex Award for (and $100,000), is a refrigerator than runs without electricity.

Here's how it works. You take a smaller pot and put it inside a larger pot. Fill the space in between them with wet sand, and cover the top with a wet cloth. When the water evaporates, it pulls the heat out with it, making the inside cold. It's a natural, cheap, easy-to-make refrigerator.

So, instead of perishable foods rotting after only three days, they can last up to three weeks. Obviously, this has the potential to change their lives. And it already has -- there are more girls attending school, for example, as their families no longer need them to sell food in the market.

"Brilliant ideas don't need to be difficult to execute: here's a case in point. The technology has been known for centuries, but WASN'T APPLIED TO THE PROBLEM. Notice that applying technology also has the effect of educating young people."

Why Emotional Excess is Essential to Writing and Creativity | Brain Pickings

Sunday, September 15, 2013

BBN – Buddhist Broadcasting Network » Einstein on Buddhism (Part 2)

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Worrying molecule found in bottled water | Chemistry World

Walking on water. Not as crazy as it sounds.

Several creatures in the animal kingdom possess the ability to run, walk and even stand still on water. The first example is that of the basilisk lizard. It can be found in the tropical forests of Central and South America. To escape from predators, it is known to run across water bodies to safety. It is capable of moving in this fashion at an impressive speed of 1.5 meters per second. If humans wanted to match this, we would need to move our legs back and forth at over 100 kilometers per hour.

Water Striders are insects that exploit surface tension to achieve this. Their legs are spread wide apart and their bodies weigh very little. So the surface tension of the water is able to support their load, allowing the water to skate above the surface of the water

But the most amazing instance of an animal walking on water is the Pygmy Gecko (pictured). It's tiny - so small that it is smaller than even some insects. It lives in the Amazon rainforest. In such an environment, it constantly runs the risk of drowning in a puddle or being swept away by raindrops. Yet, this gecko has a hydrophobic skin. If water falls on it, it just beads up and slides off, much like rain on a newly waxed car. Coupled with its incredibly light body frame, the Pygmy Gecko is literally able to stand on water, even in the most torrential rain.

Image URL: http://bit.ly/ep3fhV
Read more: http://bbc.in/L8kk
Video of the Pygmy Gecko in action: http://bbc.in/Ki7HHU

NASA_Tech_brief.jpg (JPEG Image, 768 × 672 pixels)

Tuesday, September 10, 2013

Why Time Slows Down When We’re Afraid, Speeds Up as We Age, and Gets Warped on Vacation | Brain Pickings

Saturday, September 7, 2013

Do Scientists Pray? Einstein Answers a Little Girl's Question about Science vs. Religion | Brain Pickings

Nabokov on Inspiration and the Six Short Stories Everyone Should Read | Brain Pickings

Researchers debunk myth of right-brain and left-brain personality traits | Human World | EarthSky

Thursday, September 5, 2013

Though bats and toothed whales, who form the suborder of cetaceans, Odontoceti, that including sperm whales and dolphins have no common ancestor for approximately 80 million years, scientists have recently discover that through selective pressures, echolocation evolved convergently in both groups.

By analyzing as many sites as possible across currently mapped genomic sequence data, the scientists were able to show that convergence can be a widespread process involving multiple loci within genes that interrelate and coevolve. Close to 200 loci were identified as linked to genetic convergence and many of the identified genes that are implicated specifically to convergent evolution in echolocation are linked to hearing or deafness. This ultimately provides significant support for the convergent evolution of echolocation in both bottlenose dolphins and bats.

Also found were convergence in many genes linked to vision which were correlated with the pressure linked to the drive of natural selection. As echolocation is particularly useful in environments where visual information is impaired or limited, this link may not be such a surprise.

Ultimately the researchers noted that the process of convergent evolution is not an infrequent process that drives exclusive sections of a genome and can be examined at the molecular level by examining its widespread effects across multiple sites across the genetic code. Examining the genes with the highest levels of convergence and examining their function or functions would be the next step.

Image and educational source: http://askabiologist.asu.edu/echolocation

Sources:
Parker, J., Tsagkogeorga, G., Cotton, J. A., Liu, Y., Provero, P., Stupka, E., & Rossiter, S. J. (2013). Genome-wide signatures of convergent evolution in echolocating mammals, Nature doi:10.1038/nature12511 http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nature12511.html
http://www.nature.com/news/convergent-evolution-seen-in-hundreds-of-genes-1.13679
http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view%2FarticleNo%2F37350%2Ftitle%2FSurprising-Similarities-in-Divergent-Genomes%2F

Tuesday, September 3, 2013

When you think of squids, you normally think about swift, powerful beasts with suckers and hooks that can crush you in seconds. Grimalditeuthis bonplandi defies this stereotype. This deep-sea squid is a sluggish swimmer with a fragile, gelatinous body. Its tentacles are not the muscular, sucker-covered appendages that you might expect to see. Rather, they are long, thin and simply too weak to get prey. Furthermore, the squid lacks suckers, hooks and photophores on its tentacles. This makes it seem like a sad excuse for a squid. But not so, according to a recent paper, published by researchers from the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI).

Generally, squids have eight arms and two tentacles. The tips of the tentacles, known as clubs, are broader and are armed with suckers or hooks. These tentacles are used to capture prey. G. bonplandi, however uses a different strategy altogether. Much like how an angler fish uses bioluminescence to lure prey, it is hypothesized that G. bonplandi uses small fluttering motions of its tentacle clubs to lure its prey.

Instead of suckers and hooks, G. bonplandi possesses fin-like membranes on the clubs of their tentacles. When the membranes flap, the clubs seem to be swimming on their own. The tentacles themselves do not move by themselves. When G. bonplandi wants to extend its tentacles, it does not use the muscles in its tentacles to do so. Instead, its clubs swim away from the body, with the tentacles trailing behind them. When it wants to retract its tentacles, the squid will swim down towards its clubs, wind up the tentacles, clubs and all, and hide them within its arms.

The researchers think that this behaviour causes small shrimp and squid (which they found remnants of in the squid’s stomach) to be attracted to the fluttering motion, which emulates the movement of small swimming animals. Even though they would be invisible in the darkness of the deep-sea, the researchers postulate that the vibrations can disturb glowing micro-organisms in the water, making them visible. Alternatively, the movements might be similar to the movements used by the prey to attract mate. The movements might even mimic the movements of even smaller animals that G. bonplandi’s prey eat (A case of the predator pretending to be the prey!).

The research was done by doing close examination of videos of G. bonplandi, collected by MBARI and several oil-industry Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs). Prior to this, only dead or dying specimens of G. bonplandi had been seen. The usage of ROVs allows the scientists to observe these creatures in their natural habitat. In addition to ROVs, the researchers also carried out several dissections on preserved squid to study their anatomy.

Read all about it: http://bit.ly/15TxR17
Image URL: http://bit.ly/1fwEJ5Y
Video: http://bit.ly/18oHPpY

Planning for future events, or foresight, requires imagination that an event may or may not happen in a possible future. This ability to plan for contingencies was once thought to be a uniquely human capability, however we now know several animals have this ability as well, whether it be scrub-jays caching future meals or dolphins hording reward objects in their tanks to obtain extra rewards next time the trainer appeared. One male chimpanzee at the Furuvik Zoo in Gävle, Sweden began using his foresight for what appeared to be future “muscle flexing” to display his dominance by storing and throwing rocks at zoo visitors.

Keepers began to realize Santino was casually gathering stones from his enclosure in the morning after he and his troop were let out from their night enclosure. Carefully piling stones in strategic locations, once the zoo opened, Santino would hurl the stones in an aggressive display towards the visitors. Keepers began taking all of the stones before opening, Santino would hide the piles. Keepers took all loose stones and objects out of the enclosure, Santino began pulling plaster from the enclosure walls and hiding the piles.

Eventually Santino had to be kept indoors before he hurt someone and until something could be decided upon to quell his need to bomb spectators. Eventually it was decided it was in his best interest to neuter Santino so he could rejoin his troop and use the outdoor enclosure. He has since stopped his aggressive displays.

Image source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/72/Santino_chimp.JPG

Osvath, M. (2009). Spontaneous planning for future stone throwing by a male chimpanzee. Current Biology, 19(5), R190-R191. doi:10.1016/j.cub.2009.01.010
http://www.cell.com/current-biology/abstract/S0960-9822(09)00547-8
Osvath, M & Karvonen, E. (2012). Spontaneous Innovation for Future Deception in a Male Chimpanzee. PLoS ONE, 7(5), e36782. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0036782
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0036782
http://news.discovery.com/animals/zoo-animals/zoo-chimp-attacks-humans-120509.htm
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=chimpanzee-plans-throws-stones-zoo
http://www.livescience.com/20388-stone-throwing-chimpanzee-deception.html

Additional Reading: http://www.livescience.com/20388-stone-throwing-chimpanzee-deception.html

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Racism is a form of xenophobia. And so also a-theism is regarded as foreign to theism and therefore feared, Most, if not all, religions are xenophobic towards each other. I personally think it is a remnant behaviourism stemming from the evolutionary survival mechanism. Xenophobia/racism can only be eradicated through education. By analogy we are all instinctively scared of ALL snakes but through education we are are being taught that certain snakes are harmless and therefore not to be feared. In conclusion we can thus say that xenophobia can be both harmful and beneficial, depending on circumstances.