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Monday, May 20, 2013

Get an online sneak peek at Comet ISON, potential 'comet of the century'

Watch Slooh Space Camera's live show about Comet ISON and other comets.

By Tariq Malik, Space.com

The much-anticipated incoming Comet ISON, which some scientists hope will become the "comet of the century" later this year, may not be visible to the naked eye yet, but you don't have to wait months to see this icy wanderer. The comet takes center stage in an online telescope webcast on Sunday.

Comet ISON was first discovered last year and is currently expected to swing extremely close by the sun in late November, when it will be at its best and brightest of the year. In anticipation of the comet's arrival, the online Slooh Space Camera will offer live telescope views of the object beginning at 4:45 p.m. ET.

You can watch the Comet ISON webcast live on Space.com,?courtesy of Slooh Space Camera. [See more amazing photos of Comet ISON]

The webcast marks Slooh's fourth monthly webcast dedicated to tracking Comet ISON's progress through the solar system. During Sunday's 30-minute live show, Slooh officials will provide views of Comet ISON from the firm's remotely operated telescopes in the Canary Islands, off the west coast of Africa.

Senior space scientist Padma Yanamandra-Fisher of the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo., will join Slooh producer Paul Cox in the comet webcast. Yanamandra-Fisher is helping coordinate NASA's Comet ISON Observing Campaign to track the comet. The international campaign is bringing together scientists around the world to plan out observations of ISON.

NASA has already used several spacecraft, including sun-watching Stereo probes and the Hubble Space Telescope, to observe ISON. An unmanned balloon mission is also among the expeditions planned to observe ISON.

J.-Y. Li (PSI) / NASA / ESA

Comet ISON glows in a picture from the Hubble Space Telescope, captured in April.

Comet ISON has drawn worldwide attention from stargazers and scientists, including NASA, because of its close approach to the sun on Nov. 28, when it will be just 730,000 miles (1.2 million kilometers) from the sun. During that close encounter with the sun,?Comet ISON could become one of the brightest comets?in decades. However, the comet could also fizzle out.

Comet ISON was discovered last September by Russian amateur astronomers Artyom Novichonok and Vitali Nevski using the International Scientific Optical Network (ISON) of remotely operated telescopes. The comet is officially known by the identification C/2012 S1 (ISON).

On April 10, scientists used the Hubble Space Telescope to observe Comet ISON. At the time it was about 386 million miles (621 million kilometers) from the sun and 394 million miles (634 million kilometers) from Earth.

When observed by Hubble, the comet's nucleus was about 3 miles (5 kilometers) across with a dusty tail that stretched more than 57,000 miles (92,000 kilometers) long.

If you have an amazing picture of Comet ISON or any other night sky view that you'd like to share for a possible story or image gallery, send photos, comments and your name and location to managing editor Tariq Malik at?spacephotos@space.com.

To follow the Slooh webcast directly using Slooh's iPad app or the Slooh website, visit:?http://www.slooh.com.

Email Tariq Malik at tmalik@space.com or follow him @tariqjmalik?and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653377/s/2c21cc4c/l/0Lscience0Bnbcnews0N0C0Inews0C20A130C0A50C190C183582950Eget0Ean0Eonline0Esneak0Epeek0Eat0Ecomet0Eison0Epotential0Ecomet0Eof0Ethe0Ecentury0Dlite/story01.htm

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Crazy ants vs. Fire ants: Who's winning? (+video)

Crazy ants are taking over areas once occupied by fire ants in the South. The sting of Crazy ants isn't as painful and migrate slowly. But Crazy ants multiply faster.

By Douglas Main,?LiveScience / May 18, 2013

Invasive fire ants have been a thorn in the sides of Southerners for years. But another invasive species, the so-called "crazy" ant ? that many describe as being worse ? has arrived and is displacing fire ants in several places.

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"When you talk to folks who live in the invaded areas, they tell you they want their fire ants back," said Edward LeBrun, a researcher at the University of Texas at Austin, in a statement from the school. "Fire ants are in many ways very polite. They live in your yard. They form mounds and stay there, and they only interact with you if you step on their mound."

Crazy ants, on the other hand, "go everywhere," invading homes and nesting in walls and crawlspaces, even damaging electrical equipment by swarming inside appliances. [Image Gallery: Ants of the World]

A study published in the April issue of the journal Biological Invasions found that in areas infested with crazy ants, few to no fire ants were present. Exactly how they are able to outcompete fire ants is so far unknown. In areas with crazy ants, the researchers also found greatly diminished numbers of native ant species, according to the study.

Fire ants are known for their painful stings and have spread through the Southeast since arriving from South America in the 1930s. Crazy ants were first discovered in Houston in 2002, and they have already spread to coastal areas from Texas to Florida, according to the researchers. Although the "crazies" don't have as painful a sting as fire ants, they multiply in even greater numbers. They are also difficult to control since they don't eat the same poison baits as fire ants do, the statement noted.

Last year, the crazy ant species was identified as Nylanderia fulva, which hails from northern Argentina and southern Brazil, according to a 2012 study in PLOS ONE. It's also known as the tawny crazy ant and was previously named the Rasberry crazy ant after the exterminator Tom Rasberry, who first discovered it. The "crazy" moniker comes from the ant's quick, seemingly random movements.

Luckily, the crazy ant doesn't spread as quickly as the fire ant, advancing only 650 feet (200 meters) per year on its own, the release noted. Therefore, it's vital that people don't accidentally transport the ant, the prime method by which it has spread, according to the release.

Email?Douglas Main?or follow him on?Twitter?or?Google+. Follow us @livescience, ?Facebook?or ?Google+. Article originally on LiveScience.com.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/3FwH4s3kfNU/Crazy-ants-vs.-Fire-ants-Who-s-winning-video

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How Cheap Genetic Testing Complicates Cancer Screening For Us ...

Sometimes, more medical information is a bad thing. The influential United States Preventive Services Task Force recommends against most women getting genetic screenings for their susceptibility to breast cancer. Why? Because the tests are imperfect: for every woman who gets tested for genes associated with onset breast cancer, even more will falsely test positive, leading spooked patients into needless surgery or psychological trauma. Super cheap genetic testing from enterprising health startups, such as 23andMe, have complicated cancer detection for us all by increasing the accessibility of imperfect medical information.

After discovering a mutated BRCA1 gene, known to increase the?likelihood?of breast cancer 60 to 80 percent, actress Angelina Jolie underwent a radical preventive double mastectomy. Her brave confession in the New York Times brought much needed attention to breast cancer awareness, but it?s dangerous in the hands of a statistically illiterate population.

For instance, as New York Times statistical guru, Nate Silver, once reminded me, while breast cancer mammograms are 75 percent accurate, a woman who tests positive only has about a 10 percent chance of actually getting cancer. Since the vast majority of women don?t have cancer, there are far more women who will falsely test positive (here is a helpful blog post with the numbers worked out). Most importantly, surveys reveal that many people don?t understand the math behind false positives in cancer testing, and may make uninformed decisions as a result.

The same math holds true for the mutated BRCA1/2 gene of Jolie?s confession: researchers estimate that a tiny 0.11 to 0.12 of women have the faulty gene. ?I believe in doing genetic testing for BRCA1/2 with appropriate counseling,? writes University of Southern California?s David Agus, one of Steve Jobs? cancer doctors. The answers are not simple in this case and require experienced professionals to discuss with the patient.?

Traditionally hundreds of thousands of dollars to test, a cottage industry of cheap genetic testing has sprung up. 23andMe, one of the most popular, offers the service for as little at $99, and has even dared to weigh in on the BRCA controversy on the company blog.

Citing a new study that found no negative emotional consequences from patients after learning about their BRCA1 mutation, 23andMe concludes, ?The findings are important given that a frequent criticism of direct-to-consumer testing is based on the assumption that it causes either serious emotional distress or triggers deleterious actions on the part of consumers.?

Given the absence of evidence for serious emotional distress or inappropriate actions in this subset of mutation-positive customers who agreed to be interviewed for this study, ?broader screening of Ashkenazi Jewish women for these three BRCA mutations should be considered.?

Sometimes, however, voluntary surveys don?t tell the whole story. In its cover story on Jolie?s decision, TIME magazine recounts the tale of one woman who likely had unnecessary preventative surgery after learning about a genetic defect. ?She freaked out and had a bilateral mastectomy,? said Otis Brawley, chief medical officer for the American Cancer Society, who worried that this patient?s particular mutation was not as troubling as she worried it was.

Interestingly, TIME?s author, Kate Pickart, argues the financial costs of genetic testing has stall mass run on genetic tests. Even a new provision under the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare) only mandates 100 percent insurance coverage for patients with a family history of genetic flaws.

But, at just $99 (and probably far less in the future), financial barriers are crumbling. This isn?t to say that genetic screening is bad, it just complicates things for the rest of us, especially those who don?t understand statistics. The more women get tested, the more false positives exist, the less confident patients and physicians become in a course of action.

Maybe our only hope out of this cheaper testing spiral is technology that makes detection more accurate and more predictive. One promising solution is a new bra that constantly monitors deep tissue for cancerous signs (below).

So, perhaps, before long, we will innovate our way out of this dilemma.

Source: http://techcrunch.com/2013/05/19/how-cheap-genetic-testing-complicates-cancer-screening-for-us-all/

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Sunday, May 19, 2013

What Sets The Google Cloud Platform Apart From The Rest

There is a misperception about the new Google Cloud Platform that the company put into general availability last week at Google I/O. It's not a brand new platform. It's what Google has used for years. It is Google's foundation. It is what makes Google, Google. And now it's open for the first time to developers and businesses. Google Platform is new in the sense that anyone can now use it. But until now only a relative few number of people have had access to the platform.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/GrtEGJ2X3Bo/

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It Takes An Earworm To Memorize The Periodic Table

Fair warning, this video is an illustrated version of the periodic table set to The Can-Can. There are consequences to watching. But hopefully one of them is that you learn all the chemical elements in order without even trying. Which would be a convenient, if incredibly nerdy, bar trick to bust out sometime.

Even if Asap SCIENCE doesn't succeed in committing the whole table to your memory, you can at least be reminded of some classic favorites from high school chemistry. And the visuals are a helpful mnemonic aid. But if you really hate The Can-Can you might want to steer clear of this. If you forgot how the periodic table works a long time ago and it hasn't been an issue so far you're probably in the clear. [Asap SCIENCE]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/it-takes-an-earworm-to-memorize-the-periodic-table-508770804

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Movie Review + Trailer: The English Teacher - AARP

Enter Jason Sherwood (Michael Angarano of Almost Famous and Haywire), some years earlier a brilliant student of Sinclair's who has returned home to small-town Pennsylvania after supposedly failing as a playwright in New York City. Sinclair reads Sherwood's play, a dark family drama called The Chrysalis, and falls in love with it. (Start counting the minutes until the transference occurs.) She shares the manuscript with her colleague, drama teacher Carl Kapinas (more than once a joke is made about the pronunciation of his last name), played by the overly fey Nathan Lane.

Sinclair and Kapinas then join forces to convince their principal and vice principal (the very physically humorous Jessica Hecht of Sideways, and Norbert Leo Butz, who appeared recently in Disconnect) to allow them to make The Chrysalis into the next student theatrical production. Unbeknownst to Sherwood, who already is reluctant about the proposition, Sinclair and Kapinas agree to alter the play's violent ending on the ultimatum of their superiors.

My biggest problem (and there were several) with the film is that what we see of the play ? the supposed work of a genius student ? is utterly preposterous. A complete bomb! Couldn't the filmmaker come up with something better than nonsensical melodrama?

Meanwhile, I sort of enjoyed the main subplot, during which Sinclair enters into a sparring feud with Sherwood's dad, a physician played by the affable Greg Kinnear. Sinclair's got it in her mind that Dr. Sherwood is the model for the abusive father character in his son's play, and that now he's quashing Jason's creativity and forcing him to go to law school. As we all know, appearances are deceiving, and Moore and Kinnear actually create a sizzling on-screen chemistry.

Source: http://www.aarp.org/entertainment/movies-for-grownups/info-05-2013/the-english-teacher-movie-review.html

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Sippican Historical Society News - The Wanderer

Sippican Historical Society is delighted to join forces with author Josh Chalmers to remind children that they, too, are history makers who have the power to change the world ? and it?s easier than they think! On May 18 at 11:00 am, SHS will host a reading of the popular new children?s book, Change the World Before Bedtime, a gold medal recipient of the Mom?s Choice Award honoring excellence in family-friendly media, products and services. Co-authored by Mark Kimball Moulton and Karen Good, the book uses simple, engaging rhyme and colorful illustrations (created from recycled materials) to reinforce its influential message: that children can create powerful changes through simple actions.

Designed for children Pre-K through Grade 2, Change the World Before Bedtime explores how the little things in life ? a smile, a kind word, a simple deed ? can help change the world in a big way, showing readers that even an ordinary kid can be a superhero before bedtime! In addition to reading the book with the children and having a conversation about the many ways young people can make the world a better place, Chalmers will bring a hands-on art activity. Kids can make ?How I?d Change the World? banners, posters, flags and signs using construction paper, craft elements, recycled materials, and lots of imagination.

This event will take place at the Marion Music Hall at 164 Front Street (ample parking is available across the street at Island Wharf) and is free to the public. No reservations are required.

Later in May, the public is cordially invited to attend a special lecture presentation, ?Frances Perkins: First Female Cabinet Secretary,? co-sponsored by the Sippican Historical Society and Elizabeth Taber Library. To be held on May 24 at the Marion Music Hall at 7:00 pm, the presentation will feature a lecture by David Prentiss, Adjunct Professor of Political Science for UMass-Dartmouth and President/CEO of the New Bedford Symphony. Mr. Prentiss received a B.A. in Philosophy at Assumption College, a J.D. from New England School of Law and the Thomas P. O?Neill Fellowship for graduate studies in political science at Boston College. A popular speaker, he has given talks on Abraham Lincoln and other presidential leadership topics at the New Bedford Civil War Roundtable, the Lincoln Study Group of Boston, the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth, and the Zeiterion Performing Arts Center. Prentiss is currently writing a book on presidential leadership and the nature of democratic politics.

The Marion Music Hall is located at 164 Front Street. Ample parking is available across the street at Island Wharf. The presentation will be offered free of charge, though donations are gratefully accepted. No reservations are necessary. Light refreshments will be provided. For more information, please call the SHS at 508-748-1116.

Source: https://www.wanderer.com/happenings/sippican-historical-society-news/

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