All Posts
2008-08-20 16:19:15
by gg in Skulls in the Stars
Physics
About a week ago, I reported on another ‘teaser’ in the media about ‘optical cloaks’, hypothetical devices which would in principle make objects contained in their core completely invisible. Such devices have gotten a lot of attention, both scientifically and in the press, since the publication of two fascinating theoretical papers in 2006. ...more
- Zhang X. (2008) Optical Negative Refraction in Bulk Metamaterials of Nanowires. Science, 321(5891), 930-930.
2008-08-19 22:01:37
by GrrlScientist in Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)
Physics
tags: cognition, behavior, self-recognition, self awareness, tool use, memory, brain architecture, birds, European magpie, Pica pica, bpr3.org/?p=52
Figure 1. European magpie, Pica pica, with yellow mark [larger view].
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.0060202.
Birds have been disparaged publicly as "bird brains" for so long that most people have lost the ability to view them as intelligent and sentient beings. However, a group of researchers in Germany have conducted a series of studies with several captive European magpies, Pica pica, that chal...more
- Waal F. d. (2008) Mirror-Induced Behavior in the Magpie (Pica pica): Evidence of Self-Recognition. PLoS Biology, 6(8), e202. DOI: 10.1371/journal.pbio.0060202
2008-08-19 16:02:40
by GrrlScientist in Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)
Physics
tags: Who Blogs, blog writing and personality, Big Five personality inventory, social psychology, technology, computers, internet, bpr3.org/?p=52
You all read blogs, and many of you write them, too. But what sort of person writes a blog? Are there certain personality traits that certain people more likely to write a blog? If so, what are those personality traits? Do you have them, too? Read the rest of this post... | Read the comments on this post......more
- ENO C. (2008) Who blogs? Personality predictors of blogging. Computers in Human Behavior, 24(5), 1993-2004. DOI: 10.1016/j.chb.2007.09.001
- He Y. (2007) Climate Change and War Frequency in Eastern China over the Last Millennium. Human Ecology, 35(4), 403-414. DOI: 10.1007/s10745-007-9115-8
2008-08-17 17:01:18
by GrrlScientist in Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)
Physics
tags: new bird species, African forest robin, Stiphrornis pyrrholaemus, Gamba Complex, Moukalaba-Doudou National Park, ornithology, birds, avian, Smithsonian, bpr3.org/?p=52
A male specimen of the newly-discovered olive-backed forest robin, Stiphrornis pyrrholaemus, is carefully examined in the hand of Brian Schmidt, the Smithsonian ornithologist who discovered the species.
Image: Brian Schmidt.
A new species of bird has been identified by ornithologists from the Smithsonian Institution. The bird, which was first discovered in Gabon...more
- Fleischer R. C. (2008) A new species of African Forest Robin from Gabon (Passeriformes: Muscicapidae: Stiphrornis). Zootaxa, 1850, 27-42.
2008-08-13 13:09:05
by gg in Skulls in the Stars
Physics
As I noted a couple of days ago, apparently there has been another significant experimental breakthrough in the development of dielectric cloaking devices. Researchers at UC Berkeley were responsible, though it is a little unclear what exactly the breakthrough is. The results will appear this week in Science and Nature. In the ...more
- Leonhardt U. (2006) Optical Conformal Mapping. Science, 312(5781), 1777-1780.
2008-08-07 15:02:17
by GrrlScientist in Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)
Physics
tags: virology, mimivirus, sputnik, virophage, microbiology, molecular biology
Now here's an astonishing discovery that's hot off the presses: a virus that infects other viruses! This amazing finding is being published tomorrow in the top-tier peer-reviewed journal, Nature. Read the rest of this post... | Read the comments on this post......more
2008-08-06 16:01:00
by GrrlScientist in Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)
Physics
tags: bpr3.org/?p=52, premature hair graying, autosomal dominant trait, genetics, horses, hair color, syntaxin-17, melanocortin-1 receptor, agouti signaling protein, cis-acting regulatory mutation, melanoma
This horse is in the process of losing its pigment.
It will end up being all white by the time it is eight years old.
Image: Horse Wallpaper [larger view].
Even though I have always been a fan of black horses, my heart did leap at the sight of the noble Shadowfax racing towards Gandalf in response to his call in the Lord ...more
- Andersson L. (2008) A cis-acting regulatory mutation causes premature hair graying and susceptibility to melanoma in the horse. Nature Genetics, 40(8), 1004-1009. DOI: 10.1038/ng.185
2008-08-05 11:02:47
by GrrlScientist in Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)
Physics
tags: bpr3.org/?p=52, begging calls, brood parasitism, coevolution, learning, social shaping, ornithology, Horsfield's Bronze-Cuckoo, Chalcites basalis, Chrysococcyx basalis
Horsfield's Bronze-Cuckoo, Chalcites (Chrysococcyx) basalis,
Capertee Valley, NSW, Australia, September 2003.
Image: Aviceda [larger view].
Brood parasites are birds, fish or insects that deceive unrelated animals of the same species or different species to care for their offspring. By doing so, the parasitic parent is relieved of the energetic demands of con...more
2008-08-04 11:02:14
by GrrlScientist in Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)
Physics
tags: bpr3.org/?p=52, Macaw Wasting Disease, myenteric ganglioneuritis, Proventricular dilatation disease, Bornaviridae, avian bornavirus, negative strand RNA viruses, pan-viral microarray, high throughput sequence analyses
One pair of the Little Blue (Spix's) Macaw, Cyanopsitta spixii.
This species is now extinct in the wild and its captive population consists of roughly 70 to 100 individuals.
Image: Sao Paolo Zoo, Brasil.
For more than 30 years, a mysterious disease, known as proventricular dilatation disease (...more
- DeRisi J. L. (2008) Recovery of divergent avian bornaviruses from cases of proventricular dilatation disease: identification of a candidate etiologic agent. Virology Journal, 5(1), 88. DOI: 10.1186/1743-422X-5-88
2008-08-01 13:01:38
by GrrlScientist in Living the Scientific Life (Scientist, Interrupted)
Physics
tags: bpr3.org/?p=52, evolution, speciation, ring species, phylogeography, landscape genetics, crimson rosella, Platycercus elegans, parrots, birds, Australia
Crimson Rosella, Platycercus elegans.
Image: Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
One of the challenges facing those who believe that evolution cannot create new species is explaining the problem of "ring species." Ring species are a group of geographically connected populations that can interbreed with nearby populations, but cannot breed with those populations that exis...more
- Bennett A. (2008) Where and when does a ring start and end? Testing the ring-species hypothesis in a species complex of Australian parrots. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, -1(-1), -1--1. DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2008.0765