Scientists give artificial fingers ‘extra feeling’
Published on Fri, Sep 26, 2008 at 00:22 in Health section
COURTESY: www.ibnlive.com
ARTIFICIAL SENSATION : Scientists give artificial hands and fingertips the power of touch.
London: People fitted with artificial hands will not only be able to sense touch, but would "instinctively" stop objects slipping from their grasp, all thanks to a group of researchers, who have developed sensitive limbs and fingers for making artificial limbs more and more life-like.
Scientists at University of Southern California, Los Angeles, have developed artificial hands and fingertips that have the power of touch and can "instinctively" stop objects slipping from their grasp.
Human hands make use of a built-in reflex that automatically estimate the minimum force needed to hold on to an object.
The reflex works by responding to tiny vibrations in the skin as an object starts to slip through our fingers.
However, the reflex mechanism is missing in existing artificial hands, thus operators have to consciously estimate the required force.
"It’s very mentally taxing," Telegraph quoted Jeremy Fishel, a member of the research team, as telling New Scientist.
The researchers have developed a system in which the finger tip consists of a rubber skin, filled with thick silicon gel.
If an object begins to slip, the vibrations in the finger’s elastic skin transmit through the silicon gel to sensors attached to a central acrylic "bone".
The vibration provides instant feedback, telling the motors in the hand to tighten their grip before the vibrations stop.
The bone of the finger is also covered with tiny electrodes, across which a small voltage is applied.
The deformations in the elastic skin caused by holding an object alter the distribution of gel in the fingertip, which changes the amount of electricity that is conducted between the electrodes.
The information could then be transmitted to a pressure device worn on a patch of the hand-operator’s healthy skin, helping them to "feel" what their prosthetic hand is touching.
A prototype of the finger will be presented at the BioRob conference in Scottsdale, Arizona
Friday, September 26, 2008
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Scientists start world's biggest physics experiment
Scientists start world's biggest physics experiment
Courtesy: Yahoo NEWS.
Wed, Sep 10 06:51 PM
By Robert Evans
GENEVA (Reuters) - International scientists celebrated the successful start of a huge particle-smashing machine on Wednesday aiming to recreate the conditions of the "Big Bang" that created the universe.
Experiments using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the biggest and most complex machine ever made, could revamp modern physics and unlock secrets about the universe and its origins.
The project has had to work hard to deny suggestions by some critics that the experiment could create tiny black holes of intense gravity that could suck in the whole planet.
Such fears, fanned by doomsday writers, have spurred huge interest in particle physics before the machine's start-up. Leading scientists have dismissed such concerns as "nonsense."
The debut of the machine that cost 10 billion Swiss francs ($9 billion) registered as a blip on a control room screen at CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, at about 9:30 a.m. (0730 GMT).
"We've got a beam on the LHC," project leader Lyn Evans told his colleagues, who burst into applause at the news.
The physicists and technicians huddled in the control room cheered loudly again an hour later when the particle beam completed a clockwise trajectory of the accelerator, successfully completing the machine's first major task.
Eventually, the scientists want to send beams in both directions to create tiny collisions at nearly the speed of light, an attempt to recreate on a miniature scale the heat and energy of the Big Bang, a concept of the origin of the universe that dominates scientific thinking.
The Big Bang is thought to have occurred 15 billion years ago when an unimaginably dense and hot object the size of a small coin exploded in a void, spewing out matter that expanded rapidly to create stars, planets and eventually life on Earth.
SLIGHT HICCUP
Problems with the LHC's magnets caused its temperature -- which is kept at minus 271.3 degrees Celsius -- to fluctuate slightly, delaying efforts to send a particle beam in the counter-clockwise direction. The beam started its progression and then was halted.
"This is a hiccup, not a major thing," Rudiger Schmidt, CERN's head of hardware commissioning, told reporters, adding the second rotation should be completed on Wednesday afternoon.
Evans, who wore jeans and running shoes to the start-up, declined to say when those high-energy clashes would begin.
"I don't know how long it will take," he said. "I think what has happened this morning bodes very well that it will go quickly ... This is a machine of enormous complexity. Things can go wrong at any time. But this morning we had a great start."
Once the particle-smashing experiment gets to full speed, data measuring the location of particles to a few millionths of a metre, and the passage of time to billionths of a second, will show how the particles come together, fly apart, or dissolve.
It is in these conditions that scientists hope to find fairly quickly a theoretical particle known as the Higgs Boson, named after Scottish scientist Peter Higgs who first proposed it in 1964, as the answer to the mystery of how matter gains mass.
Without mass, the stars and planets in the universe could never have taken shape in the aeons after the Big Bang, and life could never have begun -- on Earth or, if it exists as many cosmologists believe, on other worlds either.
cOURTESY: YAHOO NEWS
Courtesy: Yahoo NEWS.
Wed, Sep 10 06:51 PM
By Robert Evans
GENEVA (Reuters) - International scientists celebrated the successful start of a huge particle-smashing machine on Wednesday aiming to recreate the conditions of the "Big Bang" that created the universe.
Experiments using the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the biggest and most complex machine ever made, could revamp modern physics and unlock secrets about the universe and its origins.
The project has had to work hard to deny suggestions by some critics that the experiment could create tiny black holes of intense gravity that could suck in the whole planet.
Such fears, fanned by doomsday writers, have spurred huge interest in particle physics before the machine's start-up. Leading scientists have dismissed such concerns as "nonsense."
The debut of the machine that cost 10 billion Swiss francs ($9 billion) registered as a blip on a control room screen at CERN, the European Organisation for Nuclear Research, at about 9:30 a.m. (0730 GMT).
"We've got a beam on the LHC," project leader Lyn Evans told his colleagues, who burst into applause at the news.
The physicists and technicians huddled in the control room cheered loudly again an hour later when the particle beam completed a clockwise trajectory of the accelerator, successfully completing the machine's first major task.
Eventually, the scientists want to send beams in both directions to create tiny collisions at nearly the speed of light, an attempt to recreate on a miniature scale the heat and energy of the Big Bang, a concept of the origin of the universe that dominates scientific thinking.
The Big Bang is thought to have occurred 15 billion years ago when an unimaginably dense and hot object the size of a small coin exploded in a void, spewing out matter that expanded rapidly to create stars, planets and eventually life on Earth.
SLIGHT HICCUP
Problems with the LHC's magnets caused its temperature -- which is kept at minus 271.3 degrees Celsius -- to fluctuate slightly, delaying efforts to send a particle beam in the counter-clockwise direction. The beam started its progression and then was halted.
"This is a hiccup, not a major thing," Rudiger Schmidt, CERN's head of hardware commissioning, told reporters, adding the second rotation should be completed on Wednesday afternoon.
Evans, who wore jeans and running shoes to the start-up, declined to say when those high-energy clashes would begin.
"I don't know how long it will take," he said. "I think what has happened this morning bodes very well that it will go quickly ... This is a machine of enormous complexity. Things can go wrong at any time. But this morning we had a great start."
Once the particle-smashing experiment gets to full speed, data measuring the location of particles to a few millionths of a metre, and the passage of time to billionths of a second, will show how the particles come together, fly apart, or dissolve.
It is in these conditions that scientists hope to find fairly quickly a theoretical particle known as the Higgs Boson, named after Scottish scientist Peter Higgs who first proposed it in 1964, as the answer to the mystery of how matter gains mass.
Without mass, the stars and planets in the universe could never have taken shape in the aeons after the Big Bang, and life could never have begun -- on Earth or, if it exists as many cosmologists believe, on other worlds either.
cOURTESY: YAHOO NEWS
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
A kid's first hand report to her friend on her experiences at Washington D.C.
Dear Sunny B.,
Today I returned from Washington D.C. {Well, basically "today" because 12:37 a.m. is supposed to be the first hour of the day}.
Now I'll tell you a little about my visit.
As was planned, we started from New Jersey on Saturday at 9:45 a.m. We reached the Baltimore Aquarium at 1:something p.m. We still hadn't eaten lunch. Then when we got up to one of the ticket counters, we got all of our tickets except Simmi(my sister) because she doesn't need a ticket. Then the trouble starts.
Suddenly, as we are heading towards the door of the aquarium, the person that gave us the tickets suddenly shouts that because of the crowd of people in the aquarium, we can't go to the aquarium until 4:45. p.m. Disgusting, and we still hadn't eaten lunch. Then, my mom realized that we had forgotten to bring lunch. Then she remembered that restaurants at tourist places make their food much more costly. Then my dad suggested that we go to P.F. Chang's because that is usually less costly. Then my mom says that grandpa might not like noodles, noodles and more noodles. Then my grandpa throws a tantrum that he can eat noodles anywhere and at anytime.
Finally, after about an hour or so, we find ourselves a normally priced Asian restaurant. After some while, my mom throws a tantrum because we didn't bring food from home and the food at the restaurant was horrible and that we were wasting our money. Then she said that she wouldn't eat this "uncooked" food. A bad start to a good day.
Then we got busy taking pictures and drinking lemonade and water. That took about up to 3:45. Then we lazied around the park until 4:25 and then headed out to the line forming at the speed of light at the door of the aquarium. At long last, {at 4:45}, we were allowed inside of the aquarium.
We see little sharks and stingrays on top of a high pier {balcony}. Then we went and explored fish, octopuses, sea lilies, anemones, clams, and last of all, real sharks. After seeing all of those animals, we went to the dolphin show. The dolphins leaped, jumped, and played when their trainers signaled them to. One dolphin jumped 25 feet off the water and touched it's nose to the exact target. The most enjoyable of all, the dolphins copied whatever the trainers were doing. For instance, when the trainers were waving to the people, the dolphins were waving too.
After seeing all of this, we drove ourselves to the hotel 4 blocks away from the White House. Before going to sleep, I turned on the Olympics channel {NBC at 8:30}. Michael Phelps won his first gold medal in swimming! His target is 6 more. In case you're confused, Michael Phelps is a 20 year-old swimmer swimming for America in the Olympics.
Next morning, on Sunday, we headed out to the Capitol building were laws are made. Then we drove to the White House about 2 minutes away from the Capitol Building. After that, we entered the NASA Museum. I saw the command module of Apollo something which was actually once in space! Then we went to the hands-on section of the museum. I got to see many things such as what is pressure, and why airplanes have wings shaped like they do. When I walked a little farther, there was this chunk of an airplane that people had cut out for the museum. There was the seats, the racks up head for storing luggage, food on the trays, and sculptures of people on the seats. Wow! In one part of the museum, there was this actual dead monkey that had once been launched into space. Disgusting, but cool. After that we went into a building that was once a portable house launched to the moon. In there, there was a bag for going to the bathroom, beds with straps so that you wouldn't float out of bed while sleeping, and a magnetic dining table with magnetic dishware so they don't float of the table also. Very interesting. Also, there was this real plane where Simmi went into the cockpit and the plane actually started moving! Good thing no one was around and that she hadn't stepped on the gas pedal or she would've taken off! {Just kidding about the taking off part}. There were many other things that we did see, but they are too hard to express in words. They will be easier to express when you come back to New Jersey and we can talk on the phone or meet each other.
Next, we went to the National History museum where we saw whale fossils, dinosaur fossils, butterflies, priceless diamonds, priceless gems and a gift shop. From the gift shop, all my mom allowed me to buy was a souvenir penny.
Anyways, after that, we got stuck in a big car jam that lasted for two hours and finally reached home at 12:37 a.m. How sad. Tell me something about your visits. Bye for now!
From your sleepy BFF,
Debby M.
(Debby M is a friend of my granddaughter Sanchitha. Both are friends.)
Today I returned from Washington D.C. {Well, basically "today" because 12:37 a.m. is supposed to be the first hour of the day}.
Now I'll tell you a little about my visit.
As was planned, we started from New Jersey on Saturday at 9:45 a.m. We reached the Baltimore Aquarium at 1:something p.m. We still hadn't eaten lunch. Then when we got up to one of the ticket counters, we got all of our tickets except Simmi(my sister) because she doesn't need a ticket. Then the trouble starts.
Suddenly, as we are heading towards the door of the aquarium, the person that gave us the tickets suddenly shouts that because of the crowd of people in the aquarium, we can't go to the aquarium until 4:45. p.m. Disgusting, and we still hadn't eaten lunch. Then, my mom realized that we had forgotten to bring lunch. Then she remembered that restaurants at tourist places make their food much more costly. Then my dad suggested that we go to P.F. Chang's because that is usually less costly. Then my mom says that grandpa might not like noodles, noodles and more noodles. Then my grandpa throws a tantrum that he can eat noodles anywhere and at anytime.
Finally, after about an hour or so, we find ourselves a normally priced Asian restaurant. After some while, my mom throws a tantrum because we didn't bring food from home and the food at the restaurant was horrible and that we were wasting our money. Then she said that she wouldn't eat this "uncooked" food. A bad start to a good day.
Then we got busy taking pictures and drinking lemonade and water. That took about up to 3:45. Then we lazied around the park until 4:25 and then headed out to the line forming at the speed of light at the door of the aquarium. At long last, {at 4:45}, we were allowed inside of the aquarium.
We see little sharks and stingrays on top of a high pier {balcony}. Then we went and explored fish, octopuses, sea lilies, anemones, clams, and last of all, real sharks. After seeing all of those animals, we went to the dolphin show. The dolphins leaped, jumped, and played when their trainers signaled them to. One dolphin jumped 25 feet off the water and touched it's nose to the exact target. The most enjoyable of all, the dolphins copied whatever the trainers were doing. For instance, when the trainers were waving to the people, the dolphins were waving too.
After seeing all of this, we drove ourselves to the hotel 4 blocks away from the White House. Before going to sleep, I turned on the Olympics channel {NBC at 8:30}. Michael Phelps won his first gold medal in swimming! His target is 6 more. In case you're confused, Michael Phelps is a 20 year-old swimmer swimming for America in the Olympics.
Next morning, on Sunday, we headed out to the Capitol building were laws are made. Then we drove to the White House about 2 minutes away from the Capitol Building. After that, we entered the NASA Museum. I saw the command module of Apollo something which was actually once in space! Then we went to the hands-on section of the museum. I got to see many things such as what is pressure, and why airplanes have wings shaped like they do. When I walked a little farther, there was this chunk of an airplane that people had cut out for the museum. There was the seats, the racks up head for storing luggage, food on the trays, and sculptures of people on the seats. Wow! In one part of the museum, there was this actual dead monkey that had once been launched into space. Disgusting, but cool. After that we went into a building that was once a portable house launched to the moon. In there, there was a bag for going to the bathroom, beds with straps so that you wouldn't float out of bed while sleeping, and a magnetic dining table with magnetic dishware so they don't float of the table also. Very interesting. Also, there was this real plane where Simmi went into the cockpit and the plane actually started moving! Good thing no one was around and that she hadn't stepped on the gas pedal or she would've taken off! {Just kidding about the taking off part}. There were many other things that we did see, but they are too hard to express in words. They will be easier to express when you come back to New Jersey and we can talk on the phone or meet each other.
Next, we went to the National History museum where we saw whale fossils, dinosaur fossils, butterflies, priceless diamonds, priceless gems and a gift shop. From the gift shop, all my mom allowed me to buy was a souvenir penny.
Anyways, after that, we got stuck in a big car jam that lasted for two hours and finally reached home at 12:37 a.m. How sad. Tell me something about your visits. Bye for now!
From your sleepy BFF,
Debby M.
(Debby M is a friend of my granddaughter Sanchitha. Both are friends.)
Thursday, July 31, 2008
The Cat's Eye Nebula Redux
The Cat's Eye Nebula Redux
This composite of data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope is a new look for NGC 6543, better known as the Cat's Eye nebula. This famous object is a so-called planetary nebula that represents a phase of stellar evolution that the Sun should experience several billion years from now. When a star like the Sun begins to run out of fuel, it becomes what is known as a red giant. In this phase, a star sheds some of its outer layers, eventually leaving behind a hot core that collapses to form a dense white dwarf star. A fast wind emanating from the hot core rams into the ejected atmosphere, pushes it outward, and creates the graceful filamentary structures seen with optical telescopes.
Courtesy:
http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2008/catseye/
Saturday, July 12, 2008
3-Stage hybrid HEART SURGERY
MIOT HOSPITAL AT MADRAS MAKES HISTORY.
READ THE ARTICLE IN FULL
IN THE HINDU
PUBLISHED ON 11TH JULY 2008.
Umiwana Chrisine, a 24 year old woman from Rwanda may not understand the procedures of this
epoch making surgery but the medical world does.
What a marvellous feat by the Cardiac thoracic surgeons at Miot Hospital, Chennai !
Monday, May 26, 2008
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Cancer vaccine target pinpointed
Cancer vaccine target pinpointed
Read more by clicking HERE
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7415423.stm
Dendritic cell
Dendritic cells tell the immune system what to attack
Scientists may be one step closer to producing a specific targeted vaccine for killing cancer cells.
UK researchers have pinpointed a protein on immune cells which they hope will help them harness the body's defences to attack a tumour.
A vaccine designed to "home in" on the protein would deliver a message to the immune system to attack the invading cancer, they said.
The research is published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
The protein is unique to a type of immune cell called a dendritic cell, which is responsible for triggering the body's defence system.
The results of this research are an important step towards understanding how to create targeted cancer vaccines in the future
Dr Lesley Walker, Cancer Research UK
Its job is to present pathogens or foreign molecules to other cells of the immune system, which in turn eliminate them.
The team at Cancer Research UK's London Research Institute said scientists have been searching for proteins or "tags" on dendritic cells for over 30 years.
In theory a vaccine carrying a foreign molecule from a cancer cell could be targeted to the dendritic cells, which would then prompt the immune system to attack the "invading" cancer. The same approach could be used for treating HIV or malaria, the researchers said.
T cell army
Study leader Dr Caetano Reis e Sousa said the team had found a unique protein called DNGR-1, which could be used to deliver such a vaccine to the door of the dendritic cell.
"Vaccines work by triggering an army of immune cells, called T cells, to attack potentially dangerous foreign molecules, like those found on pathogens.
"Dendritic cells are the messengers, telling the T cells who to attack.
"Vaccines will carry a sample of the offending molecule and deliver it to DNGR-1 on the dendritic cells, which in turn will present the molecule to the armies of T cells and instruct them to attack."
Cancer Research UK's director of cancer information, Dr Lesley Walker, said: "Developing treatments that accurately target cancer and have few serious side-effects is one of Cancer Research UK's top goals.
"The results of this research are an important step towards understanding how to create targeted cancer vaccines in the future."
Read more by clicking HERE
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7415423.stm
Dendritic cell
Dendritic cells tell the immune system what to attack
Scientists may be one step closer to producing a specific targeted vaccine for killing cancer cells.
UK researchers have pinpointed a protein on immune cells which they hope will help them harness the body's defences to attack a tumour.
A vaccine designed to "home in" on the protein would deliver a message to the immune system to attack the invading cancer, they said.
The research is published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.
The protein is unique to a type of immune cell called a dendritic cell, which is responsible for triggering the body's defence system.
The results of this research are an important step towards understanding how to create targeted cancer vaccines in the future
Dr Lesley Walker, Cancer Research UK
Its job is to present pathogens or foreign molecules to other cells of the immune system, which in turn eliminate them.
The team at Cancer Research UK's London Research Institute said scientists have been searching for proteins or "tags" on dendritic cells for over 30 years.
In theory a vaccine carrying a foreign molecule from a cancer cell could be targeted to the dendritic cells, which would then prompt the immune system to attack the "invading" cancer. The same approach could be used for treating HIV or malaria, the researchers said.
T cell army
Study leader Dr Caetano Reis e Sousa said the team had found a unique protein called DNGR-1, which could be used to deliver such a vaccine to the door of the dendritic cell.
"Vaccines work by triggering an army of immune cells, called T cells, to attack potentially dangerous foreign molecules, like those found on pathogens.
"Dendritic cells are the messengers, telling the T cells who to attack.
"Vaccines will carry a sample of the offending molecule and deliver it to DNGR-1 on the dendritic cells, which in turn will present the molecule to the armies of T cells and instruct them to attack."
Cancer Research UK's director of cancer information, Dr Lesley Walker, said: "Developing treatments that accurately target cancer and have few serious side-effects is one of Cancer Research UK's top goals.
"The results of this research are an important step towards understanding how to create targeted cancer vaccines in the future."
Sunday, May 11, 2008
How secondhand smoking affects your family and environment!
Passive Smoking Effects
Read More by clicking HERE
http://www.chantixhome.com/passive_smoking_effects.html
How secondhand smoking affects your family and environment!
Passive smoking means the smoke in the ambience exhaled from the lungs of the smoker or the smoke that comes from a person’s burning end of cigarette, cigar or pipe and that inhaled by others. This is also known as involuntary smoking, secondhand smoking and Environmental Tobacco Smoke (ETS).
There are 4000 chemicals in tobacco having 100 identified poisons and 63 components that cause cancer. When the smokers are directly taking these poisons in, they are, at the same time, polluting the environment with the dangerous chemicals. Environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) causes death of an estimated 3,000 nonsmoking Americans per year due to lung cancer and 300,000 children undergo lower respiratory tract infections.
Worldwide research institutes have established the facts of short term and long term effects of environmental tobacco smoke. Let us understand these one by one;
Short Term Effects: It depends upon the susceptibility of a person to nicotine. Some can stay in a room with smokers for quite a long time apparently without being effected. Others may feel ill within a few minutes or an hour of exposure to environmental smoke.
* Asthma patients may experience attacks due to ETS exposure.
* Allergy patients experience all types of allergic symptoms like stuffy nose, watery eyes, runny nose, sneezing, wheezing etc.
* Coughing
* Headache
* Nausea
* Lethargy
* People who are trying to quit feel cravings for a smoke
Long Term Effects: There are quite a number of dangerous long term effects of environmental smoke depending upon the frequency of exposure to involuntery smoking. The likelihood of below mentioned diseases are increased by frequent exposure to passive smoking.
* Risk of lung cancer
* Risk of heart disease
* Risk of miscarriages and birth defects
* Risk of developing asthma in children and adults
* Risk of ear infections
* Aggravated asthma, allergies, and other conditions
* Learning difficulty in children
* Risk of lung infection
California Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and a review by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) identify the consequences of passive smoking
r e a d m o r e and
s p r e a d this
m e s s a g e.
AVOID BEING FACE TO FACE WITH CHRONIC SMOKERS
AT DISTANCES LESS THAN 12 INCHES.
SEND A MESSAGE THROUGH BODY LANGUAGE THAT YOU WANT THEM TO SAVE LIVES OF NON-SMOKERS
ONLY BY QUITTING SMOKING.
YES.
WHEN YOU QUIT SMOKING, YOU SAVE NOT YOUR LIFE ALONE
BUT SAVE THE LUNGS OF OTHERS TOO !!
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Plants and flowers can grow in Moon rocks
Plants and flowers can grow in Moon rocks
http://in.news.yahoo.com/ani/20080417/r_t_ani_sc/tsc-plants-and-flowers-can-grow-in-moon-f32bc39_1.html
Thu, Apr 17 01:05 PM
London, April 17 (ANI): Scientists with the European Space Agency (ESA) have shown that plants and flowers can be grown on the Moon by demonstrating that marigolds can grow in crushed rock very much like the lunar surface, with no need for plant food.
According to a report by BBC News, the new research was presented at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) meeting in Vienna.
"We would bring a system of water circulation and recovery, which is also the type of system that in any case you want to develop when you are going to manufacture a primitive sort of life support system," said Bernard Foing, a senior scientist with the European Space Research and Technology Centre (Estec) in the Netherlands.
"So it is also a kind of 'technological breadboard' for maintaining a simple life form in an extreme environment," he added.
The new step, taken in the experiments reported at the EGU, is to remove the need for bringing nutrients and soil from Earth.
A team led by Natasha Kozyrovska and Iryna Zaetz from the National Academy of Sciences in Kiev planted marigolds in crushed anorthosite, a type of rock found on Earth, which is very similar to much of the lunar surface.
In neat anorthosite, the plants fared very badly. But adding different types of bacteria made them thrive; the bacteria appeared to draw elements from the rock that the plants needed, such as potassium.
Dr Foing, who presented the study at the EGU meeting, said there was no reason in principle why the same idea could not bear fruit on the Moon itself. Tools could crush lunar rock and add bacteria and seeds.
"But, scientists could look to go further, by selecting plants or bacteria that are especially well adapted to lunar conditions, or even by genetically engineering new strains," he added.
According to Foing, growing plants on the Moon would be a useful as a tool to learn how life adapts to lunar conditions, and as a practical aid to establishing manned bases. (ANI)
http://in.news.yahoo.com/ani/20080417/r_t_ani_sc/tsc-plants-and-flowers-can-grow-in-moon-f32bc39_1.html
Thu, Apr 17 01:05 PM
London, April 17 (ANI): Scientists with the European Space Agency (ESA) have shown that plants and flowers can be grown on the Moon by demonstrating that marigolds can grow in crushed rock very much like the lunar surface, with no need for plant food.
According to a report by BBC News, the new research was presented at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) meeting in Vienna.
"We would bring a system of water circulation and recovery, which is also the type of system that in any case you want to develop when you are going to manufacture a primitive sort of life support system," said Bernard Foing, a senior scientist with the European Space Research and Technology Centre (Estec) in the Netherlands.
"So it is also a kind of 'technological breadboard' for maintaining a simple life form in an extreme environment," he added.
The new step, taken in the experiments reported at the EGU, is to remove the need for bringing nutrients and soil from Earth.
A team led by Natasha Kozyrovska and Iryna Zaetz from the National Academy of Sciences in Kiev planted marigolds in crushed anorthosite, a type of rock found on Earth, which is very similar to much of the lunar surface.
In neat anorthosite, the plants fared very badly. But adding different types of bacteria made them thrive; the bacteria appeared to draw elements from the rock that the plants needed, such as potassium.
Dr Foing, who presented the study at the EGU meeting, said there was no reason in principle why the same idea could not bear fruit on the Moon itself. Tools could crush lunar rock and add bacteria and seeds.
"But, scientists could look to go further, by selecting plants or bacteria that are especially well adapted to lunar conditions, or even by genetically engineering new strains," he added.
According to Foing, growing plants on the Moon would be a useful as a tool to learn how life adapts to lunar conditions, and as a practical aid to establishing manned bases. (ANI)
Friday, April 18, 2008
Evolition ! or Just a Deviation or a Birth Genetic Defect ?
Miracle baby' is feted in India
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7340091.stm
By Sanjoy Majumder
BBC News, Delhi
Mother Sushma holds her daughter Lali
There's even talk of a temple being built in Lali's honour.
They're calling her the miracle baby.
Barely a month old, baby Lali was born with a rare condition which has given her two faces.
It's called Craniofacial Duplication and she has two sets of eyes, noses and lips.
In the village where she was born, close to the edge of Delhi, her condition has made her an object of fascination and reverence.
'Blessed'
"When I first saw her, I was scared. It's natural," her father, Vinod Singh, tells me.
"But now I feel I'm blessed."
Doctors have told him them that despite having two faces Lali is healthy and normal.
She is able to drink milk through either mouth and breathe normally.
Mr Singh is a poor farm worker. At his mud and brick house at the end of a narrow dusty lane, a neighbour applies a fresh coat of paint to his front door.
Vinod Singh
We just want to enjoy time with our first born child
Vinod Singh
Inside, he stands surrounded by villagers, some sitting on sturdy hessian cots, others smoking pipes.
For the past few days, people have been lining up to see his daughter.
Many of them bring offerings of money, believing that Lali has special powers.
"When you see something unnatural, it can only be the miracle of God," says Jatinder Nagar, a neighbour who's taken on the self-appointed role of tour guide.
"It's something so magical that we believe that she's a goddess. We regard her as one."
Uncomfortable
Eighty-year-old Ballabh Saini is a grandmother and respected as a village elder.
But even she bows her head in reverence.
"She has brought us fame and she is blessed," she tells me.
"So many people have been coming to see her - travelling long distances on cars, motorbikes, horse-drawn carts."
But all this is making Vinod Singh increasingly uncomfortable and upset.
"She's my daughter. I don't want any more of this. I'm fed up," he says, throwing up his hands in despair.
But he's up against centuries of superstition.
Faced with something they're unable to comprehend, the villagers believe she is the reincarnation of a Hindu goddess.
There's even talk of a temple being built in her honour.
Her new found status is lost on Lali, as she lies cradled in her grandfather's arms.
Doctors in Delhi say there is no possibility of separating her head.
But they do want to carry out more medical tests to determine if her internal organs are normal.
But her parents won't allow them.
"What is the need? As far as we are concerned she's like any other child," says Vinod Singh.
"We just want to enjoy time with our first-born child."
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