Science

Sorry, the video's a fantasy; they lived about 5 million years apart

How Titanoboa, the 40-Foot-Long Snake, Was Found

In Colombia, the fossil of a gargantuan snake has stunned scientists, forcing them to rethink the nature of prehistoric life

White Killer Whale Spotted—Only One in the World?

Christine Dell'Amore

The headline-grabbing all-white adult killer whale spotted off Russia this month may well be one of a kind. But the sighting may not be the first time he's been caught on camera.

Trompe-l'œil (deception of the eye)

Video: Making a Stream of Water Flow Up, Using Trickery

If you only watch one optical illusion today in which a stream of water appears to have droplets freeze in mid-air or inch their way backwards back into the tube from whence they came, make it this one.

The entire periodic table, as narrated by a three-year-old

After learning the names of the elements when she was two, three-year-old Rose from Seattle has now memorized Tom Lehrer's classic paean to the periodic table. Who knew somebody could make Yttrium totally adorable?

James Hansen at a recent TED Talk

Evaluating a 1981 temperature projection

Sometimes it helps to take a step back from the everyday pressures of research (falling ill helps). It was in this way we stumbled across Hansen et al (1981) (pdf).

In Search of Moon Trees

Scattered around our planet are hundreds of creatures that have been to the Moon and back again. None of them are human. They outnumber active astronauts 3:1. And most are missing.

They're trees. "Moon Trees."

NASA scientist Dave Williams has found 40 of them and he's looking for more. "They were just seeds when they left Earth in 1971 onboard Apollo 14," explains Williams. "Now they're fully grown. They look like ordinary trees--but they're special because they've been to the Moon."

How they got there and back is a curious tale.

70% of all Ground Beef Contains “Pink Slime” … and USDA Bought 7 Million Pounds of the Stuff for School Lunches

ABC news notes:
“Pink slime,” a cheap meat filler, is in 70 percent of the ground beef sold at supermarkets and up to 25 percent of each American hamburger patty, by some estimates.

The USDA just bought 7 million pounds of pink slime to add to school lunches (up from 5.5 million pounds in 2009).

Warp Drives May Come With a Killer Downside

by Jason Major on February 29, 2012

Planning a little space travel to see some friends on Kepler 22b? Thinking of trying out your newly-installed FTL3000 Alcubierre Warp Drive to get you there in no time? Better not make it a surprise visit — your arrival may end up disintegrating anyone there when you show up.

I think this is probably a good video for those of us who aren't doctors or medical researchers to understand what pre and probiotics are

Effect of dietary honey on intestinal microflora and toxicity of mycotoxins in mice

Substituting sugars with honey in processed food can inhibit the harmful and genotoxic effects of mycotoxins, and improve the gut microflora.

For the first time ever the elusive Shepherd’s Beaked Whale has been caught on film. This secretive creature has only been spotted a handful of time since its discovery, so catching it on film is a pretty big deal. The beasts were spotted off the coast of southern Australia by a teach of researchers who jumped at the chance to record. “These animals are practically entirely known from stranded dead whales, and there haven’t been many of them,” Michael Double of the Australian Antarctic Division team told AFP.

The Boy Who Played With Fusion

Zebra Stripes: Fashion Statement or Fly Repellant?

Why’d the zebra evolve its stripes? Perhaps because stripes seem to keep off horseflies, a new study suggests.

San Andreas Fault May Look Like a Propeller, Scientists Find

by Crystal Gammon, OurAmazingPlanet Contributor - Feb 02, 2012 12:32 AM ET

Last October more than 8.6 million Californians practiced the "Drop, Cover and Hold On" drill in the Great California ShakeOut. The exercise was designed to help residents prepare for the next "big one," a potential magnitude-7.8 earthquake along the southern San Andreas Fault.

All of the Great ShakeOut scenarios are based on everything scientists think they know about the San Andreas Fault — a so-called strike-slip boundary between the North American and Pacific plates that, geologists assumed, is very near vertical.

But what if it's not vertical? A team recently took a new look at the San Andreas Fault and found that its geometry isn't that simple.