12 August, 2015 – Episode 527 – This Week in Science

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Dying Light, Neutrinos Caught Oscillating, Octopus Genes!, T.Gondii Check, Lettuce In Spaaaace…, Tapeworm Memory, Venomous Frog, Zebra Stripes, Bionic Eye Limits, Wind Power!, Reviving Ancient Viruses, Standard Model Upheld, Brown Fat Burn, And More…

Disclaimer Disclaimer Disclaimer!
The following hour of programming is constantly on the
lookout for new science stories…
Stories that let us have peeks into our past
Stories that let us have glimpses into the future of technology
Stories that let us better know the biological foundations of life
Stories that let us grow in our understanding of space
And sometimes, just stories about lettuce…
Like the following words recently uttered aboard the
international space station…
“That’s awesome!” said one
“Tastes Good…” said another
“Kind of like arugula”
And with these words mankind enters the Space age of Farming…
Or is it the Farming age of Space?
Thanks to red romaine lettuce grown from seed to table in space,
fresh veggies on long manned missions has now become viable
Ready or not, the breakthrough age of transformative
scientific advances is upon us…
And our current research has growing implications for how far we can go
The path ahead is filled with stories like this one…
Let us be your guide
here on this week in science
coming up next

Dying Light
An analysis of light energy from over 200,000 galaxies by the GAMA project has determined that galaxies are giving off less energy now than they did 2 billion years ago. This finding suggests that the universe is on its way to a cold, lightless end.

Neutrinos Caught Oscillating
The NOvA experiment at FermiLab has detected the oscillation of neutrinos, which suggests that the experiment may succeed in measuring the mass of neutrinos where others have not.

Octopus Genes!
The octopus genome has been sequenced, and octopuses have lots of different and expanded genes that researchers think are related to camophlage and intelligence.

Lettuce in Spaaaace…
Astronauts aboard the International Space Station enjoyed a meal of fresh lettuce leaves that were actually grown in space.

T.Gondii gets the check
The Achilles heel of T. gondii may have been discovered. Scientists now have a molecular target that could result in the development of drugs to treat infection by the parasite.

World’s first venomous frog discovered, and we should be terrified…
Scientists discovered the first venomous (not poisonous) frog, amidst agonizing pain, in Brazil

Tapeworms may help with memory loss
Tapeworms may prepare your body for other threats, essentially safeguarding your precious memories (or at least, it did with rats).

Stripes may not be as dazzling as we thought
A study using videogames found that stripes were not effective in confusing the player amongst targets without them.

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Bionic Eye Limits
An analysis of possible vision scenarios for people getting bionic eye implants suggests that vision will not be anywhere near normal, and that much work needs to be done to achieve even normal vision.

Wind Power to the people…
Wind power is up and the cost is down in the US.

Bird migration mystery
Radio tracking of birds has discovered that they fly a more complicated path through the night sky than had been thought. Understanding how birds move through the sky can help us plan more bird-safe constructions and activities.

Reviving Ancient Viruses
It’s not sci-fi, it’s science. Researchers computationally derived an ancient adenovirus ancestor that could be used to infect body cells for therapeutic retroviral reprogramming.

Woodpecker lookalikes not relatives
Biologists discover certain woodpecker species that appear very similar to others are actually very distant relatives, simply mimicking their cousins so as to avoid being bullied.

Research finds new way to study species
Just ask the locals… When a species lacks the mass appeal of a tiger or a panda, the IUCN may be able to assess their population by careful surveying of the local population.

Standard Model Upheld… Again
A comparison of antiprotons and protons finds that they have the same mass just as predicted by the standard model.

Brown Fat Burn
White fat cells from burn victims are more likely to convert into fat burning brown fat cells, which makes us wonder why trauma is necessary.

PERSEIDS

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