Maps of magnesium/silicon (left) and thermal neutron absorption (right) across Mercury's surface (red indicates high values, blue low). These maps, together with maps of other elemental abundances, reveal the presence of distinct geochemical terranes. Volcanic smooth plains deposits are outlined in white. Two new papers from members...

Selengkapnya »»  

Saturn moon's ocean may harbor hydrothermal activity, spacecraft data suggest

This cutaway view of Saturn's moon Enceladus is an artist's rendering that depicts possible hydrothermal activity that may be taking place on and under the seafloor of the moon's subsurface ocean, based on recently published results from NASA's Cassini mission. NASA's Cassini spacecraft has provided scientists the first clear evidence...

Selengkapnya »»  

Engineers create chameleon-like artificial 'skin' that shifts color on demand

Developed by engineers from the University of California at Berkeley, this chameleon-like artificial "skin" changes color as a minute amount of force is applied. Borrowing a trick from nature, engineers from the University of California at Berkeley have created an incredibly thin, chameleon-like material that can be made to change...

Selengkapnya »»  

Underground ocean on Jupiter's largest moon, Ganymede

Observation of Aurorae on Ganymede. NASA's Hubble Space Telescope observed a pair of auroral belts encircling the Jovian moon Ganymede. The belts were observed in ultraviolet light by the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph and are colored blue in this illustration. They are overlaid on a visible-light image of Ganymede taken by NASA's...

Selengkapnya »»  

Diabetes, depression predict dementia risk in people with slowing minds

People with mild cognitive impairment are at higher risk of developing dementia if they have diabetes or psychiatric symptoms such as depression, finds a new review led by UCL researchers. Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a state between normal ageing and dementia, where someone's mind is functioning less well than would be expected for their age. It affects 19% of people aged 65 and over, and around 46% of people with...

Selengkapnya »»  

Ancient and modern cities aren't so different

Despite notable differences in appearance and governance, ancient human settlements function in much the same way as modern cities, according to new findings by researchers at the Santa Fe Institute and the University of Colorado Boulder. Previous research has shown that as modern cities grow in population, so do their efficiencies and productivity. A city’s population outpaces its development of urban infrastructure,...

Selengkapnya »»  

Greenland is melting: The past might tell what the future holds

A team of scientists lead by Danish geologist Nicolaj Krog Larsen have managed to quantify how the Greenland Ice Sheet reacted to a warm period 8,000-5,000 years ago. Back then temperatures were 2-4 degrees C warmer than they are in the present. Their results have just been published in the scientific journal Geology, and are important...

Selengkapnya »»  

Key indicator for successful treatment of infertile couples

Couples have choices in infertility treatments. A recent finding by Marlene Goldman, MS, ScD of the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth and colleagues, published in Fertility and Sterility, gives doctors and couples a new tool to determine which technique may be more effective for their situation. "As a woman approaches menopause, her level of follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) rises," explained Goldman. "A higher...

Selengkapnya »»  

Mars exploration: NASA's MAVEN spacecraft completes first deep dip campaign

This image shows an artist concept of NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) mission. NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution has completed the first of five deep-dip maneuvers designed to gather measurements closer to the lower end of the Martian upper atmosphere. "During normal science mapping, we make measurements...

Selengkapnya »»  

Brain's iconic seat of speech goes silent when we actually talk

New findings will better help map out the brain's speech regions. For 150 years, the iconic Broca's area of the brain has been recognized as the command center for human speech, including vocalization. Now, scientists at UC Berkeley and Johns Hopkins University in Maryland are challenging this long-held assumption with new evidence...

Selengkapnya »»  

Hubble gets best view of a circumstellar debris disk distorted by a planet

The photo at the bottom is the most detailed picture to date of a large, edge-on, gas-and-dust disk encircling the 20-million-year-old star Beta Pictoris. The new visible-light Hubble image traces the disk in closer to the star to within about 650 million miles of the star (which is inside the radius of Saturn's orbit about the Sun)....

Selengkapnya »»  

For the first time, spacecraft catch solar shockwave in the act: 'Ultrarelativistic, killer electrons' made in 60 seconds

Earth's magnetosphere is depicted with the high-energy particles of the Van Allen radiation belts (shown in red) and various processes responsible for accelerating these particles to relativistic energies indicated. The effects of an interplanetary shock penetrate deep into this system, energizing electrons to ultra-relativistic energies...

Selengkapnya »»  

First glimpse of a chemical bond being born

This illustration shows atoms forming a tentative bond, a moment captured for the first time in experiments with an X-ray laser at SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. The reactants are a carbon monoxide molecule, left, made of a carbon atom (black) and an oxygen atom (red), and a single atom of oxygen, just to the right of it. They...

Selengkapnya »»  

Application of laser microprobe technology to Apollo samples refines lunar impact history

This is a photomicrograph of a petrographic thin section of a piece of a coherent, crystalline impact melt breccia collected from landslide material at the base of the South Massif, Apollo 17 (sample 73217, 84). Different mineral and lithic clasts, as well as impact melt phases are evident. Determining the ages of different melt components...

Selengkapnya »»  

Magnitude of plastic waste going into the ocean calculated: 8 million metric tons of plastic enter the oceans per year

The 192 countries with a coast bordering the Atlanta, Pacific and Indian oceans, Mediterranean and Black seas produced a total of 2.5 billion metric tons of solid waste. Of that, 275 million metric tons was plastic, and an estimated 8 million metric tons of mismanaged plastic waste entered the ocean in 2010. A plastic grocery bag...

Selengkapnya »»  

Warming pushes Western U.S. toward driest period in 1,000 years: Unprecedented risk of drought in 21st century

Soil moisture 30 cm below ground projected through 2100 for high emissions scenario RCP 8.5. The soil moisture data are standardized to the Palmer Drought Severity Index and are deviations from the 20th century average. During the second half of the 21st century, the U.S. Southwest and Great Plains will face persistent drought worse...

Selengkapnya »»  

Cosmology: First stars were born much later than thought

New maps from ESA's Planck satellite uncover the 'polarised' light from the early Universe across the entire sky, revealing that the first stars formed much later than previously thought. The history of our Universe is a 13.8 billion-year tale that scientists endeavour to read by studying the planets, asteroids, comets and other objects in our Solar System, and gathering light emitted by distant stars, galaxies and the...

Selengkapnya »»