General science advances thread

[ScienceRocks]

Stainless magnesium could be mass produced and it would weigh half as much as aluminum

Researchers led by a team at UNSW Australia have used the Australian Synchrotron to turn the discovery of an ultra-low density and corrosion-resistant magnesium alloy into the first step toward mass-producing ‘stainless magnesium’, a new high-strength, lightweight metal, paving the way for cars, trucks and aeroplanes that can travel further...

 

[ScienceRocks]

China to build a particle collider twice the size of the Large Hadron Collider

• Lynda Delacey
• November 27, 2015

China is planning to enter the Europe- and US-dominated world of experimental physics with (wait for it …) a bang. It has formally announced that it will begin the first phase of construction of an enormous particle accelerator around 2020, which will be twice the size and seven times more powerful than CERN's Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

China understands the value of science towards becoming a great world power. Too bad our loserterians don't.



Fast growing AquAdvantage Atlantic Salmon approved by FDA for human consumption after 20 years of review

Genetically engineered AquAdvantage Atlantic salmon grow to twice the size of an normal Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) over the same time. The FDA approved the AquAdvantage as the first genetically engineered animal to be approved for human consumption in the United States. AquaBounty’s driving force is the belief that modern genetics, married...

 

[ScienceRocks]

 

[ScienceRocks]

Hyperloop one mile test track targets mid-2016 and hyperloop pod competition

SpaceX will construct a one-mile test track adjacent to their Hawthorne, California headquarters. They have invited teams will to test their human-scale pods during a competition weekend at the track, currently targeted for June 2016. The knowledge gained here will continue to be open-sourced. The hyperloop test track will be 1-mile long,...

 

[ScienceRocks]

 

[ScienceRocks]

Tesla wants to make fully self-driving cars happen way ahead of schedule

A week and a half ago, we learned that Tesla is on a quest to hire more engineers to accelerate the development of its self-driving car technologies.
Tesla was already no slouch in the autonomous-vehicle world, having released its Autopilot feature into the wild just over a month ago.
We sampled Autopilot as soon as it hit the streets and were quite impressed, to put it mildly.
But evidently, Tesla's CEO isn't impressed enough. So he put out a call via Twitter for "hardcore" software engineers to take Autopilot from where it is now — semiautonomous driving under certain circumstances, such as on highways — to the mythical full autonomy of the "Minority Report" type: cars that can drive themselves 100% of the time.
This is a hugely important development for Tesla and the auto industry. Regardless of how one feels about how Tesla got to where it is now and where it may wind up in the future, the company has provided tremendous leadership for startup automakers, electric vehicles, and autonomous driving.
But while Tesla was actually a bit late to the game, it has caught up rapidly. It now sits squarely in the middle of an industry consensus about self-driving vehicles. The view is that autonomy will evolve over the next 10 years, with major carmakers gradually adding features to their fleets. Consumers will move slowly and steadily from the "super" cruise-control features that are now appearing in cars to full autonomy.

 

[ScienceRocks]

New process allows inkjet printers to produce rainbow holograms

• Ben Coxworth
• November 30, 2015

Credit card and banknote-style security holograms are an effective form of anti-counterfeiting technology, as they're very difficult to replicate. Every time a new batch is made, however, a "master hologram" has to be created first, to act as a template. These masters can take days to produce, using complex, expensive equipment. That could be about to change, however, as scientists at Russia's ITMO University have developed a quick-and-easy hologram production method that utilizes a regular inkjet printer.

 

[ScienceRocks]

 

[ScienceRocks]

80 million-year-old dinosaur fossil has original blood vessels

December 2, 2015

Woah: 80 million-year-old dinosaur fossil has original blood vessels

by Susanna Pilny

Researchers from North Carolina State University have determined that the structures found within an 80-million-year-old fossil are, in fact, the dinosaur’s preserved blood vessels—findings that add to the growing pile of evidence showing that certain soft tissue structures can actually survive millions of years.

Molecular paleontologist Tim Cleland was the one who began the experiment, by demineralizing (stripping the bone from) a fossil. This bone came from the leg of a Brachylophosaurus canadensis—a 30-foot-long hadrosaur (duckbilled dinosaur) that pottered about what is now known as Montana.
According to the paper published in the Journal of Proteome Research, after the bone was stripped away, what was left were structures, which resembled blood vessels in their location, morphology, flexibility, and transparency. However, researchers weren’t certain whether these structures were blood vessels, or something left behind by bacteria, slime molds, or fungi—until they were examined using high resolution mass spectroscopy.

Using this technology, the scientists discovered the structures contained multiple proteins that are specific to blood vessels, including myosin, or the protein found in the type of muscle within blood vessel walls.

Read more at Woah: 80 million-year-old dinosaur fossil has original blood vessels - Redorbit

 

[ScienceRocks]

 

[ScienceRocks]

Hyperloop Technologies to start testing high-speed transport system next month

• Nick Lavars
• December 8, 2015

The race to get us racing through near-vacuum tubes close to the speed of sound is heating up. Hyperloop Technologies, one of the startups looking to commercialize Elon Musk's futuristic transport concept, has announced plans to commence testing on an open-air track in Nevada next month, with a view to hitting speeds of 700 mph (1,126 km/h) by the end of 2016.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Revolutionary steel treatment paves the way for radically lighter, stronger, cheaper cars

• Loz Blain
• December 10, 2015
• 10 PICTURES

Back in 2011, we wrote about a fascinating new way to heat-treat regular, cheap steel to endow it with an almost miraculous blend of characteristics. Radically cheaper, quicker and less energy-intensive to produce, Flash Bainite is stronger than titanium by weight, and ductile enough to be pressed into shape while cold without thinning or cracking. It's now being tested by three of the world's five largest car manufacturers, who are finding they can produce thinner structural car components that are between 30-50 percent lighter and cheaper than the steel they've been using, while maintaining the same performance is crash tests. Those are revolutionary numbers in the auto space.

 

[ScienceRocks]

New catalyst paves way for bio-based plastics, chemicals

Washington State University researchers have developed a catalyst that easily converts bio-based ethanol to a widely used industrial chemical, paving the way for more environmentally friendly, bio-based plastics and products.

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Rocket-powered car steers towards world speed record
Local speedsters are keen to prove it's possible to become the best—and fastest—in the world with determination, skill, and a whole lot of science.

Quantum physics problem proved unsolvable: Godel and Turing enter quantum physics
A mathematical problem underlying fundamental questions in particle and quantum physics is provably unsolvable, according to scientists at UCL, Universidad Complutense de Madrid - ICMAT and Technical University of Munich.

Using ocean plastic, Adidas concept shows shoe rethink
In an interesting lemons-to-lemonade development, plastic ocean waste has served as material for a 3D-printed shoe. The makers are Adidas. Together with Parley for the Oceans, a group fighting ocean pollution, the shoe concept ...

 

[RWS]

Have you ever thought about WHY gravity "attracts"?

Jus asking! Let's talk some stuff. instead of posting links.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Have you ever thought about WHY gravity "attracts"?

Jus asking! Let's talk some stuff. instead of posting links.

Gravity is most accurately described by the general theory of relativity which describes gravity, not as a force, but as a consequence of the curvature of spacetime caused by the uneven distribution of mass/energy; and resulting in time dilation, where time lapses more slowly in strong gravitation.

However, for most applications, gravity is well approximated by Newton's law of universal gravitation, which postulates that gravity is a force where two bodies of mass are directly drawn (or 'attracted') to each other according to a mathematical relationship, where the attractive force is proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. This is considered to occur over an infinite range, such that all bodies (with mass) in the universe are drawn to each other no matter how far they are apart.

I enjoy posting links

 

[RWS]

why does it attract? Matter just warps space-time. It does not attract. see the thread i started.

 

[ScienceRocks]

 

[ScienceRocks]

Physicists in Europe Find Tantalizing Hints of a Mysterious New Particle

Two teams of physicists working independently at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN reported that they had seen traces of what could be a new fundamental particle of nature

Does the Higgs boson have a cousin?
Two teams of physicists working independently at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research,reported on Tuesday that they had seen traces of what could be a new fundamental particle of nature.
One possibility, out of a gaggle of wild and not-so-wild ideas springing to life as the day went on, is that the particle — assuming it is real — is a heavier version of the Higgs boson, a particle that explains why other particles have mass. Another is that it is a graviton, the supposed quantum carrier of gravity, whose discovery could imply the existence of extra dimensions of space-time.
At the end of a long chain of “ifs” could be a revolution, the first clues to a theory of nature that goes beyond the so-called Standard Model, which has ruled physics for the last quarter-century.

 

[ScienceRocks]

 

[ScienceRocks]

New material is super water-resistant, cheap and safe

• Eric Mack
• December 16, 2015

Scientists at Rice University, the University of Swansea, the University of Bristol and the University of Nice - Sophia Antipolis have developed a new class of hydrocarbon-based material that they say could be "greener" substitute for fluorocarbon-based materials currently used to repel water.

SpaceX selects 124 engineering teams to do battle in Hyperloop pod design competition

• Nick Lavars
• December 16, 2015
• 3 PICTURES

SpaceX itself might not be building Elon Musk's Hyperloop, but it is making every effort to push things along. Earlier this year it announced the construction of a 1-mile (1.6-km) test track and it has now invited over 120 engineering teams to show off design concepts for a Hyperloop pod to a panel of judges in January. The most promising will then put their human-scale prototypes through their paces at SpaceX HQ the following US summer.

New species of 'sail-backed' dinosaur found in Spain

Scientists describe a 'sail-backed' dinosaur species named Morelladon beltrani, which inhabited the Iberian landmass ~125 million years ago, according to a study published Dec. 16, 2015 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE ...

New metamaterial manipulates sound to improve acoustic imaging

Researchers from North Carolina State University and Duke University have developed a metamaterial made of paper and aluminum that can manipulate acoustic waves to more than double the resolution of acoustic imaging, focus ...

Plants crawled onto land earlier than we give them credit, genetic evidence suggests

Plant biologists agree that it all began with green algae. At some point in our planet's history, the common ancestor of trees, ferns, and flowers developed an alternating life cycle—presumably allowing their offspring ..