Super Earth!

European astronomers working with the HARPS (High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher) Telescope in Chile have announced the discovery of 3 "Super-Earths".

These are heavy planets (from 4.2 to 9.4 times the mass of the Earth), that orbit fairly close in to the star. The three planets take mush less time to orbit there parent star than the Earth does, with the quickest completing one orbit in 4 days and the slowest in 20 days (days being Earth days). The measurements are based on how much the the star wobbles as the planet's whiz round. No direct observations of the planets can be made as they are 42 light years away (that's 399 trillion kilometres!)

For more details check out the Yahoo news article.

GLAST reaches orbit.

NASA's latest orbital telescope his been launched aboard a Delta 2 rocket.

GLAST stands for Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope, and shows NASA's determination to try and make up words from the acronyms of their space craft!

Anyhow GLAST is trying to "explore the most extreme environments in the universe, searching for signs of new laws of physics, investigating the nature of dark matter, and many other things as well." The Telescope will study Gamma Ray bursts as they happen.

For more information visit the NASA News article

Into the Sun

Ever wanted to know what the Sun is like inside, well scientists are about to get one small step closer. NASA is planning to send a probe "into" the Sun to gether information on the Solar Wind and also on Magnetism. They hope that it will provide solution to two great mysteries:

1) The Corona - the outer layer of the Sun - is much hotter than the layer of gas underneath.

2) The Solar Wind - a stream of particles that come from the Sun - is felt out amongst the planets but not near the Sun.

Solar Probe+ is designed to come up with these idea, but don't hold your breath it wont be launched until 2015.

For more details see the NASA news article

New GCSE Sciences

I know I haven't posted on here for a while but I felt that I had to post something after the article in The Times (11/10/06) I would post something.

At NKS we are not going to be stopping after the basic GCSE Science course that is targetted by most of the critisim placed in the newspaper article. All students at NKS will be studying at least GCSE Additional Science, which WILL prepare them to take 'A'-Levels in all three sciences and hence go on to University to study science should they so wish. The top 60 of our students in Year 10 are studying the three separate sciences through the twenty-first century science course. As such they will be even better prepared to study science at 'A'-Level and beyond.

The comments made in the paper and on TV during the day are unfair to a course that has tried to appraoch science from a different angle, but still cover the material that is needed. If you have a son at NKS studying science, please do not panic they will receive the science education they need to continue with their science studies beyond GCSE.

If you still have questions please feel free to contact me at school.

Pluto no longer a planet

Sense has been finally come from the IAU 12 months after the debate was started the Solar System contains only 8 planets. Pluto has been classified as a "Dwarf Plant".

Now all we need to know is what the criteria is that we will be testing kids on!

Privacy does it exist?

The Internet provides a wealth of information for people to go trawling through, some of this is simple enough with information about chemical formula's. Some of it is more complex, how to build a bomb (not recommended reading given the current political climate). Some of this information is more personal in nature and is posted for a specific purpose. Some people out there abuse the information that is made available over the internet and think it is amusing to post it around the school! Some like the NSA apparently think it's a great way to see who we connect to and they have started research into looking at how to use web based information and phone links to connect the dots between individuals and black listed organisations.

Many of us have heard of degrees of separation, where you have to use some kind of connections through various people to link one person to another, say Elton John and Gerraint Jones (that's fairly easy as Elton John played at the St. Laurence ground last weekend, the St. Laurence ground is the home to Kent County Cricket Club and finally Gerraint Jones plays for Kent sometimes!) The NSA are going to play this game on a much grander scale, how many degrees of separation are there between you and let's say Al Queda?!?

Try putting your name in quote into google and see what comes out as well, you might be surprised at how much information about you is available online. Some of that information is of course intended for the general public to know, other bits of information are intended for a select few to get a hold of. When individuals think it amusing to take private information and paste it for public viewing it's called invasion of privacy.

Think carefully about what you put online and where you put it. Also think about the consequences of your actions at all times.

Baby with third arm!?!

Well I just read a new post from yahoo news and it made me wonder how many babies are born in the world with three arms. The news article (which can be found here: http://uk.news.yahoo.com/06062006/323/doctors-china-remove-baby-s-third-arm.html ) reports is as if it was a regular occurance! The third arm has been successfully removed by the surgeons in China, but how many other babies are born each year with such a deformation? On ABC's news website Dr. Larry Hollier has said that there are no reliable statistics to say how common extra limbs or extremeties are, especially since malformed fetuses are often aborted either spontaneously or surgically and therefore are not reported accurately.
(Picture from ABC News at http://abcnews.go.com/Health/story?id=2021142&page=1

Huge Storms to Collide

Two of the largest storms in the Solar System are going to collide at the beginning of next month, at least according to NASA. Thankfully these storms are to be found on Jupiter! The Great Red Spot of Jupiter is about to meet is younger and smaller rival. What's going to happen is unknown, two previous near misses between the Great Red Spot and Red Spot Jr. have failed to provide any kind of show. However things have changed for this passing as Red Spot Jr. has recently changed colour from white to red, an indication of stronger winds in the core of the storm. NASA Scientist Amy Simon-Miller of the Goddard Space Flight Center suggests that "the Great Red Spot will push Oval BA [Red Spot Jr.] toward a southern jet stream, which is blowing against the oval's counterclockwise rotation." This would slow Oval BA's spin, possibly reversing the process that reddened it in the first place.

More details and pictures at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/05jun_redperil.htm?list855910

Solar Forecast

Well it may be a sunny day tomorrow, and it may not, but it seems that the level of Solar Activity is decreasing, whatever the weather here on earth.

The Great Solar Conveyor Belt is a belt of hot plasma that controls sunspot activity on the sun. Normally it travels at 1m/s, however it has slowed down to 0.75 m/s in the Northern hemisphere and 0.35m/s in the Southern hemisphere. This change in speed has led scientist David Hathaway to forecast a lowest level of activity seen in years, when solar maximum is reached in 2020.

More details: http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/10may_longrange.htm?list855910

New Science News for March 30th

Concentrating better but at what cost?

Apparently nearly 4 million Americans (most children and young adults) are taking amphetamine like stimulants to deal with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). These stimulants doe manage to help the person concentrate more, but there are concerns that over prescription of the drugs could lead to dependency and possibly “rare but dangerous side effects”. According to New Scientist researchers and doctors are calling for a review of the way ADHD is treated.

“ADHD is a socially and educationally debilitating condition, and places children at higher risk of serious accidents. The success of stimulants such as methylphenidate in treating ADHD is unprecedented in psychiatry. Unlike antidepressants, which work well in only about half of those who take them, methylphenidate is highly effective in most children and young adults with ADHD. Against these benefits, we now have 25 cases of sudden death from heart problems, and reports of hallucinations in up to 5 per cent of those taking the drugs.” More can be found at http://www.newscientist.com/channel/opinion/mg19025451.800


Getting bored in class, might the teacher know soon!

A new piece of equipment is being developed for people with autism to let them know if the person they are talking to is getting bored. The device will be able to tell boredom by analysing the facial expressions of the listeners. At the moments students are safe as the device requires considerable computing power and a digital camera.
“If the wearer seems to be failing to engage the person listening, the computer vibrates”
More can be read at: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg19025456.500


Total Solar Eclipse

Well the solar eclipse that happened on Wednesday was pretty well blocked by clouds; however it could have been watched on line through a website partly run by NASA. Apparently some 90,000 people watched the webcast of the total eclipse that swept across the Atlantic, the Sahara and Turkey. More details and links to two video clips of the eclipse can be found at http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn8919

What killed the dinosaurs?

It has long been held that a giant asteroid that collided with the Earth was responsible for killing off these giant reptiles. However one palaeontologist claims climate change is to blame for the major extinctions that have happened during Earth’s lifetime. He even suggests that we are in the midst of an extinction now. Arguments have broken out between palaeontologists around the world. More details can be read in the New Scientist magazine.

Bleed to death and die or get burnt and live?

This might well seem to be a tough question, but it is one that has to asked in modern warfare. Soldiers serving in Iraq and Afghanistan might well have to make this decision. Gunshot wounds tend to kill the victim if the bleeding isn't stopped quickly, normal bandages can take upto 10 minutes to stop the lose of blood, however a new treatment is being carried around by US Marines and other service men in Iraq and Afghanisatan.

The treatment is a calcium based powder called QuickClot that speeds up the clotting process at the wound. The powder is poured into the wound and absorbs some of the water in the blood; this causes the concentration of clotting agents to increase. Wounds treated with QuickClot can seal wounds in less than 2 minutes. The side effect however is possible 2nd Degree burns! As the powder absorbs the water a chemical reaction happens and energy is released in the form of heat. However the burn at least has happened because your life has probably been saved. The Manufacturers, Z-Medica, claim that QuickClot has already saved over 100 lives!

More details at: http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?hbxmail=nl&id=mg18925435.800

Moon suffering from Quakes.

Research has discovered that the moon is Seismically Active after all.

Seismometers were deployed on the moon by the various Apollo missions that landed there during the 1970's and it is data from these that has shown the moon quakes. Apparently there are four types of Quake found on the moon, 1) Deep quakes caused by tidal affects (gravity pulling on the lunar rocks), 2) Vibrations caused by meteor impacts, 3) Thermal quakes, caused by sudden expansion of the rocks when the sun shines onto them and 4) Shallow quakes. I

t is these Shallow Quakes that are causing a problem, the source of them is unknown and they can apparently reach a level of 5.5 on the Richter Scale. The other problem found is the length of the moon quakes. On Earth a quakes lasts a very short period of time, on the moon quakes can last for more than 10 minutes. This is possibly long enough to cause problems in the buildings that will be used to house the astronauts when they return to the moon.

More details at: http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/15mar_moonquakes.htm?list855910

Science News for 25th February

The pick of this weeks news from New Scientist:

Hard up NASA.
As the NASA budget get cut more and more, Michael Griffin (NASA's Chief Administrator) has elected to cut the science budget, rather than those for the ISS or the replacement for the Shuttle. NASA currently gets 0.7% of the total US Federal budget.

Life off Earth.
Margaret Turnbull, of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, has combed a catalogue compiled by the Hipparcos satellite and select those that were more likely to have planets that could support a civilisation as developed as our own.

Turn the computer off, it works better!
OK this doesn't apply to your own household computer, but rather to the latest Quantum Computer. Apparently the machine works best when the photon (used to produce the data) is allowed to "flirt" with the program's components rather than actually pass through it.

Space is running out of space!
Surely not! However the room available in orbit of the Earth is getting smaller and smaller. As we have launched more and more satellites that complete one job the space available has got less and less. The chances of satellite collisions has increased recently and of course the debris that we leave up there is causing more and more problems. A small fleck of paint in orbit could quite easily punch through a sheet of aluminium a cm or so thick.

For those non-Chelsea fans!
In the Soundbites section of New Scientist, Jose Mourinho is quoted as saying "Sometime you see beautiful people with no brains. Sometimes you have ugly people who are intelligent, like scientists." This was whilst explaining that Stamford Bridge is not as bad a pitch as it looks.

A little further away from Physics, and definately for the Adults!
Sex with a partner is 400% better than masturbuation.

Water shortage

You've probabIy heard that the southeast is very short of water but did you know that we have had below arerage rainfall for 13 0ut of the last 15 months. This amounts to 70% of the normal amount 0f rain. The Environment Agency have urged the southeast water boards to enforce a hosepipe ban from March. They are also urging householders to minimise their use of water at home, by taking short showers, sharing baths etc...
This weeks New Scientist also covers the Water Shortage on a global scale. Apparently it takes 11,000 litres of water to produce a quarter pounder and 5000 litres to produce 1 kilo of cheese.

When is walking running??

Well in the Olympics running is defined as having both feet off the ground at the same time. It seems that science might have something to say about this issue.

From the January 5th issue of Nature:

"Computer optimisation of a minimal biped model discovers walking and running"

In walking we swing our body over a relatively straight leg each step. When running we bounce off a bent leg between aerial phases. Which we use when seems to depend upon the energy cost - we go for the minimum power option.

Most humans switch to running at circa 2.4 m/s. At higher speeds running exploits a mass spring like mechanism that exchanges kinetic and potential energy. Tendons and ligaments in the leg store elastic energy during the impact part of the stride, and release it through recoil in the next propulsive leg action.

In walking, its mainly gravitational energy and kinetic energy that are interchanged as we rise and fall over the 'inverted pendula' made by the relatively straight legs.