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Fascinating scientific stuff

This time a real Siren Fossil ! :)
Sirenia is the order of placental mammals which comprise modern "sea cows" (manatees and the Dugong) and their extinct relatives. Sirenians are thought to have a 50-million-year-old fossil record (early Eocene-recent). They attained modest diversity during the Oligocene and Miocene, but have since declined as a result of climatic cooling, oceanographic changes, and human interference .
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A new fossil sirenian (Mammalia, Dugonginae) from the Miocene of India - Neues Jahrbuch für Geologie und Paläontologie - Abhandlungen Band 258 — E. Schweizerbart science publishers
 
Prehistoric Colors Preserved in Near-Perfect Beetle Fossils

In a study published Sept. 27 in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, researchers led by Yale University paleogeologist Maria McNamara analyzed 10 of these spectacular beetle fossils, ranging from 15 million to 47 million years old, which owe their enduring shades to the phenomenon of structural coloration. Unlike pigments, which generate color from light bouncing off a chemical, structural colors are produced by the interaction of light with nanometer-scale surface geometries.

If especially fine-grained sediments replace a dead beetle’s decomposing body, the resulting fossil should replicate its hues, too. “Structural colors don’t need chemicals at all,” said McNamara. “What we wanted to find out was, what kind of structures in the fossils make the color? And are the colors we’re seeing today in the fossils the same as when beetles were alive millions of year ago?”

awww.wired.com_wiredscience_wp_content_gallery_beetle_fossil_colors_pe_200_636_1h.jpg
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Well, this year's Nobel Prizes in the "actually useful" categories have been announced:

The 2011 Nobel Prize in Chemistry is awarded to Daniel Shechtman "for the discovery of quasicrystals".

The 2011 Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded "for the discovery of the accelerating expansion of the Universe through observations of distant supernovae" with one half to Saul Perlmutter and the other half jointly to Brian P. Schmidt and Adam G. Riess.

The 2011 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was divided, one half jointly to Bruce A. Beutler and Jules A. Hoffmann "for their discoveries concerning the activation of innate immunity" and the other half to Ralph M. Steinman "for his discovery of the dendritic cell and its role in adaptive immunity".

(One small problem: Dr Steinman died of cancer on Friday, and the Nobel assembly didn't find out until after announcing him as the winner the following Monday... the Nobel cannot, technically, be awarded posthumously, but apparently there's a loophole specifying that winners remain winners if they die between the decision and the actual award ceremony in December.)
 
beer good said:
One small problem: Dr Steinman died of cancer on Friday, and the Nobel assembly didn't find out until after announcing him as the winner the following Monday... the Nobel cannot, technically, be awarded posthumously, but apparently there's a loophole specifying that winners remain winners if they die between the decision and the actual award ceremony in December.
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I still remember our great discussion about the Nobel Prize for Mathematics :whistling::lol: So, I hope the assembly award him under a coherent exception .
 
Cosimah2o said:
I still remember our great discussion about the Nobel Prize for Mathematics :whistling::lol: So, I hope the assembly award him under a coherent exception .
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Well, you can judge the coherence of the exception yourself at the link I posted. :)
 
beer good said:
Well, you can judge the coherence of the exception yourself at the link I posted. :)
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Ok, I am reading now ;) I will try to be an equitable judge as Salomon :innocent: . Wow, the Nobel assembly has been fair !! :D
However, the decision to award the Nobel Prize to Ralph Steinman was made in good faith, based on the assumption that the Nobel Laureate was alive.
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Yes, I was referring to this kind of Coherence in the exception .
 
Yeti found?

"I know they exist – I see them every day," a conference participant, Robin Lynn, said by telephone from Kemerovo. She says she has a family of 10 yeti-like creatures living on her land in the US state of Michigan.
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If only there were some magical way of preserving their image so she could prove it to the world.
 
The SNAILS can FLY !
Researchers have shown that gastropods have managed to cross the isthmus of Panama. As they found that these small snails could survive in the digestive system of birds, they suggest that it is on this means of locomotion, the journey has taken place, and that it even occurred on two occasions, once in each direction.
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A visual explanation that helps to understand this journey .
Snails Can Fly Too - YouTube

BBC Nature - Tiny snails survive digestion by birds
Snails travel… by bird – All the news about health & medecine
 
I was in a "Science" center with my daughter yesterday. She wanted to see the Titanic relic exhibit, and we were browsing the rest of the offerings afterward when I noticed the Periodic Table display stopped at 109.

Science Center, frozen in time.
 
My reminder for Professor Konrad Lorenz, a great Friend of Birds !! :)

- DO BIRDS GET HEADACHES ?
Owl crashes into window and leaves imprint because it probably suffering from a headache .
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Owl crashes into window and leaves imprint - mirror.co.uk

Then, Why Woodpeckers Don't Get Headaches ?

The bird has a thick skull with spongy cartilage at the base of its beak to absorb the force of all that hammering. The mandibles—the upper and lower jaws—are attached to the skull by strong muscles that contract a millisecond before each blow, creating further cushioning .
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Do Woodpeckers Get Headaches? If Not, Why Not?. Category: Home & Garden Columns from The Berkeley Daily Planet
 
Sneezy said:
I was in a "Science" center with my daughter yesterday. She wanted to see the Titanic relic exhibit, and we were browsing the rest of the offerings afterward when I noticed the Periodic Table display stopped at 109.

Science Center, frozen in time.
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ai5.photobucket.com_albums_y187_sparkchaser1998_smileys_rofl.gif ai5.photobucket.com_albums_y187_sparkchaser1998_smileys_rofl.gif ai5.photobucket.com_albums_y187_sparkchaser1998_smileys_rofl.gif
 
Discovering a New DINOSAUR in Northern ALASKA !!

The newly discovered Alaska dinosaur, Pachyrhinosaurus perotorum, on what was Alaska’s North Slope about 70 million years ago .
Its bones, long turned to stone, are part of a cliff in northern Alaska. That’s where dinosaur-hunter Tony Fiorillo brushed dirt away from a portion of its massive skull – something that most of us would mistake for a rock.....The dinosaur, which lived in northern Alaska about 70 million years ago, is a plant eater with a massive shielded head that looked something like a Triceratops, only without a horn extending from its nose. Its mouth resembled a giant parrot’s beak .
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Very interesting this part :
The Alaska dinosaur discoveries have caused scientists to re-evaluate theories about the animals being cold-blooded and about how they went extinct about 65 million years ago. The North Slope findings support the theory that at least some dinosaurs were warm-blooded and thus able to survive in cold climates .
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New dinosaur species discovered in Alaska, named in honor of Ross Perot | Alaska Dispatch
 
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