“…“At 2,000 feet, I had topside turn off all the lights, and it was like a star show. The phosphorescence that was naturally in the water and in most of the sea life down there started to glow,” Jackson said. “When I started to travel back up, all the lights looked like a shower of stars going down as I was coming up. It was the best ride in the world.”” Full Slice

OK, hokey puns there in the title. ~Sorry.

I’m just astonished to feed a link that SecureCare hasn’t gotten to yet. At least they mention Webb towards the bottom of the link. Mechanical counterpressure, you’ve got to like it. Now stick in all-skin haptics and give it some secreting capability, and you’ve got tele-di… well, perhaps Mr. Care has a link in that direction.

“A tumor paint developed by researchers…will help surgeons see where a tumor begins and ends more precisely by illuminating the cancerous cells…the tumor paint can help surgeons distinguish between cancer cells and normal brain tissue in the operating room. The paint is a scorpion-derived peptide called chlorotoxin…[researcher] and his team believe that Chlorotoxin:Cy5.5 has the potential to be used in the future as a non-invasive screening tool for early detection of skin, cervical, esophageal, colon and lung cancers. It is also useful in identifying positive lymph nodes which could mean a significant advancement for breast, prostate and testicular cancers.” Full Slice

“…Tandem cells are comprised of two multilayered parts that work together to gather a wider range of the spectrum of solar radiation –– at both shorter and longer wavelengths. “The result is six and a half percent efficiency,” said Heeger. “This is the highest level achieved for solar cells made from organic materials. I am confident that we can make additional improvements that will yield efficiencies sufficiently high for commercial products.” He expects this technology to be on the market in about three years…”…“Tandem solar cells, in which two solar cells with different absorption characteristics are linked to use a wider range of the solar spectrum, were fabricated with each layer processed from solution with the use of bulk heterojunction materials comprising semiconducting polymers and fullerene derivatives,”…” Full Slice

“A potential outward bound destination for astronauts: Phobos and Deimos - the two moons of Mars.

NASA is stirring up the exploration pot by co-sponsoring in early November the first international conference on sending robots and humans to Phobos and Deimos…Russia is already spearheading a multi-nation project to explore Phobos, dubbed the Phobos-Grunt mission, a sample return effort eyed for 2009…” Full Slice

“Researchers…show that inhibiting a kinase (kinases are enzymes that change proteins) called Cdk5 facilitates the extinction of fear learned in a particular context. Conversely, the learned fear persisted when the kinase’s activity was increased in the hippocampus, the brain’s center for storing memories.

Cdk5, paired with the protein p35, helps new brain cells, or neurons, form and migrate to their correct positions during early brain development.

“Remarkably, inhibiting Cdk5 facilitated extinction of learned fear in mice. This data points to a promising therapeutic avenue to treat emotional disorders and raises hope for patients suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder or phobia,”…” Full Slice

“…Right now, the iPhone is not a mature enterprise instrument. If Apple had tried to shoehorn the iPhone into the business sector, it would have added complications and defocused the product from its very large and intended audience. Remember, of those billion cell phones sold each year, only a fraction are used by Fortune 100 companies tied into MS Exchange.

So it made perfect sense for Apple to do what it does on the Macintosh side, namely, build a mobile phone for the rest of us, that demonstrates simplicity, technical restraint, and joy…” Full Slice

“…”We believe that the deposits of water-ice are juggled between Mars’ North and South Poles over a cycle that spans 51 000 years, corresponding to the time span in which the planet’s precession is inverted.”…water at the North Pole was in an unstable condition and was easily transported to the South Pole in the form of water vapour, to then re-condense and freeze on the surface…” Full Slice - Much is still to be explained about Mars such as that ~6km hemispheric slope in the MOLA data

“…Based at the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory, the optical telescope is made up from 36 separate hexagonal mirror segments which together form the 10.4m primary mirror.

Its vast size will enable it to capture some of the most distant light in the Universe, helping researchers look for information that might help to explain the evolution of the cosmos.

It will probe far-off galaxies, look into the secrets of star formation, and hunt for Earth-like planets…” Full Slice

So, if you don’t read Cosmic Variance, you probably haven’t seen this fun with curve fitting.

I keep meaning to write a post analyzing one of SecureCare’s posts in a bit more depth, seeing as I have potentially easier access to the literature; especially since the science feeds often either get things wrong or fail to address the most interesting (duh, do I have to say “from my point of view?”) aspects.

“…“You can use this technology to look at things going on inside the cell,”…“This is going to change the way that we do a lot of microbiology.”…” Full Slice

“…The new discovery about how human ES cells grow and multiply will create a paradigm shift in how scientists conduct future research, which could someday lead to new therapies for various illnesses.

“The fact that there is a niche for human ES cells, I think, changes how any regenerative medicine that starts with human ES cells would ever occur,”…”If at their most fundamental level, human embryonic stem cells themselves are producing a cell that regulates their decisions on future differentiation, one way of controlling differentiation would be to control the niche.”" Full Slice

“…Beginning in Mars’ heavily cratered southern highlands, the dust storm took roughly a week to grow large enough to encircle the planet. Dust has now drifted into the northern hemisphere as well. “This is the favorable time of the Martian year for dust storms,”…”It’s summer in the southern hemisphere,”…”That’s when Mars lies closest to the sun and solar heating is greatest.”…” Full Slice

Here is an experiment for me. Not using Google for a week. I wonder if Windows Live Search can successfully take its place. I’ve changed my installation of Firefox to use Live.com instead of Google.com. I’ll report back on how it turns out.

Google’s rerouting technology sure is pretty slick though…

“…In a study published this week…the team of scientists…shows that the spontaneous activity measured in certain parts of the brain have a direct influence over our conscious perception and our perception of the intensity of pain. ‘Our brain is never really at rest, but science does not have a good understanding of how the spontaneous and continuous activity of our neurons influences our perception of the world. Our study contributes to lifting a corner of the veil over these mechanisms’…” Full Slice