ü Scientists have unraveled a detailed map of the Pacific oyster genome,
shedding light on how molluscs manage to survive the harsh environment of
estuary and sea shore. According to the study, molluscs have scores of
genes that protect it from extremes of temperature and saltiness, where the
land meets the sea. The genome map gives an insight into how the oyster
became adapted to marine life, and how it formed its complex shell. The
map also reveals secrets that may help scientists breed faster-growing oysters
with a better survival rate.
ü A humanoid robot with 'common sense', designed to
work safely alongside its human co-workers on factory production lines, has
been unveiled in the US. Baxter, the robot is
priced at USD 22,000 and will go on sale in October. It could apply common
sense, adapt to its environment and be trained in less than 30 minutes to
complete specific tasks, by workers without robotic expertise. Currently
factory robots tend to work separately to humans, often in cages.
ü Researchers who wrote the rulebook for quantum teleportation are
among the 2012 Thomson Reuters tips to win Nobel prizes for
Science. Quantum teleportation transfers information between two points
without anything physical, like a radio wave, passing through space. This
means it can't be intercepted and could provide a basis for totally secure mass
communications, super-fast quantum computers and, eventually, a quantum
internet much more powerful than the one we have today. It relies on the
process of 'entanglement' between two particles, which physicists have used to
create a perfect replica of a single particle of light at some distance from
the original.
ü The Dark Energy Camera was constructed at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Fermi National
Accelerator Laboratory in Batavia, Ill., and mounted on the Victor M. Blanco telescope at the National Science Foundation’s Cerro Tololo Inter-American
Observatory in Chile, which is the southern branch of
the U.S. National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO). With this device,
roughly the size of a phone booth, astronomers and physicists will probe the
mystery of dark energy, the force they believe is causing the universe to
expand faster and faster. The Dark Energy Survey will help us understand
why the expansion of the universe is accelerating, rather than slowing due to
gravity. The Dark Energy Camera is the most powerful survey instrument of
its kind, able to see light from over 100,000 galaxies up to 8 billion
light-years away in each snapshot.
ü Dark energy, the mysterious cosmic force
thought to be the fuel behind the accelerating expansion of the universe, is
real, according to an Anglo-German team of astronomers. After a two-year
study, scientists at the University of Portsmouth in the United Kingdom and LMU
University Munich in Germany have concluded that the likelihood of dark
energy's existence stands at 99.996 per cent. A basic premise of modern
cosmology is that the visible universe of stars, planets and gases makes up
about 4 per cent of the cosmos and is sitting like flotsam in a massive sea of unknown
material referred to as dark energy. Dark energy is thought to make up 73 per
cent of the cosmos, while the slightly less mysterious dark matter comprises
the remaining 23 per cent. One of the strongest pieces of evidence for
dark energy is in the so-called Integrated Sachs Wolfe effect. In 1967, Rainer Sachs and
Arthur Wolfe theorised that light from the radiation from the heat left over
from the Big Bang, would become slightly more blue as it passed through the
gravitational fields of lumps of matter in the universe, an effect known as gravitational redshift. The existence of dark
energy would cause light from this residual radiation to gain energy as it
travels through large lumps of mass. In 1996, astronomers Robert
Crittenden and Neil Turok suggested overlaying a map of the local universe on
the picture of the residual cosmic radiation could provide clues about where to
look for the effect. In 2003, it was spotted, albeit weakly. It was seen
as supporting evidence for dark energy and hailed as the 'Discovery of the
Year' in Science magazine. But some scientists argued it could have been
caused by cosmic dust and questioned the discovery. The Anglo-German team
that carried out the latest study was led by Crittenden and Tommaso
Giannantonio. They re-examined all the arguments against the detection and have
improved the maps used in the original work. They conclude that dark
energy is almost certainly responsible for the hotter parts of the cosmic
microwave background.
ü US Army is planning to get tiny,
'backpack-size' drones that can be flown into targets up to nine kilometres
away. The new drone, called the Lethal Miniature Aerial Munition System (LMAMS) will weigh just 5 pounds and will be used for discrete targets to
minimise collateral damage.
ü Indo-French satellite "SARAL" would be launched onboard PSLV-C20 from the spaceport of Sriharikota on
12-12-2012, this year. SARAL is a small satellite mission with
payloads -- Argos and Altika -- from French space agency CNES for study of ocean parameters towards
enhancing the understanding of the ocean state conditions which are otherwise
not covered by the in-situ measurements. The satellite has been built by
ISRO, which would also take care of the launch services. SARAL will
provide data products to operational and research user communities, in support
of marine meteorology and sea state forecasting; operational oceanography;
seasonal forecasting; climate monitoring; ocean, earth system and climate
research.
ü Astronomers have discovered a new
super-earth in the habitable zone around the red dwarf star Gliese 163. The exoplanet 'Gliese 163c' has a mass of 6.9 times that of Earth
and an orbital period of 26 days. Astronomers using the European Southern
Observatory HARPS telescope (or High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher) found it orbitting a
red dwarf star 49 light years away in the Dorado constellation A super-Earth is an extrasolar planet with a mass higher than Earth's, but
substantially below the mass of the Solar System's smaller gas giants Uranus
and Neptune. The term super-Earth refers only to the mass of the planet,
and does not imply anything about the surface conditions or habitability.
ü Space probe Dawn has left the orbit
of Vesta, one of
the biggest asteroids in the solar system, and is headed for a rendezvous with
the dwarf planet Ceres
in February 2015. Dawn left behind Vesta at around 0626 GMT on September
1, after nearly a year spent circling the asteroid and mapping its previously
uncharted surface. The findings are helping scientists unlock some of the
secrets of how the solar system, including our own Earth, was
formed. Vesta and Ceres are both located between Mars and Jupiter.
