Evolving Thoughts is a cool blog from an intelligent fellow.

And click HERE for a full list of the BASIC CONCEPTS IN SCIENCE

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otherwise, your news will be like this video.

Politics is NOT about people, it’s about IDEAS. Notice how the anchor turns it into some kind of contest by asking him the same question five times after he answers her.

I like how the news anchor is taken back after the congressman gives her a piece of his mind.

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“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”

Charles Darwin

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Nanotechnology has long left the laboratory and its discoveries and products are all around us — from longer lasting tennis balls, waterproof pants and drug delivery patches to quicker and more powerful computers, and faster burning rocket fuels. Last year alone, nano-business garnered $32 billion in sales of household products in the U.S.

Using nanotechnology, scientists have found ways to manufacture molecules - - some of the smallest building blocks of nature — and put them together a few at a time. According to many experts, nanotechnology is triggering a revolution in building materials that is radically changing science and technology.

Paul Saffo teaches at Stanford University in California and has more than two decades of experience exploring long-term technological change and its impact on business and society.

Some of the most important achievements in nanoscience have been in the field of medicine. Recently, at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island, a research team led by neuroscientist John Donoghue built a device that helps paralyzed people manipulate objects, using their brains. The tiny implant was tried on a patient who was able to open email, control his television set and room lights, simply by thinking about it. more>>>

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Do you notice anything strange about the cat in the photo? At first, I didn’t believe this .. er, cat .. was alive, instead of being the product of a zit-faced basement-dwelling photoshop prankster with too much time on his hairy-palmed hands. But after poking around on the internet for a few hours, it appears that this is the real thing.

This cat, named Lil’Bit, was born to a cat named Lil’Pine. Lil’Bit is now seven months old and is living with his original family. His family prefer to remain anonymous to avoid the crush of public attention, which might stress out the cat.

Lil’Bit was born with four eyes, although the middle two eyes look like they are somewhat merged together (see below — does this/these eye/s even see?). The cat also has two mouths and two noses, but only two ears. more>>>

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The company’s new humanoid robot is called EMIEW 2, which stands for ‘Excellent Mobility and Interactive Existence as Workmate’. (AFP Photo: Yoshikazu Tsuno)

Posted Thu Nov 22, 2007 1:22am AEDT
Japanese engineering giant Hitachi Ltd has unveiled a new lightweight robot that can converse while easily scooting around people.

The company says that, in a first for a humanoid, the robot has convertible legs which allow it to walk on two legs or roll about on either two or four wheels.

In a demonstration near Tokyo, Hitachi showed how the robot, clad in a red jacket and cap, could be used to bring drinks or paperwork or guide guests at an office.

Standing 80 centimetres tall and weighing just 13 kilograms, the “EMIEW 2″ robot demonstrates a step towards production of machines that can live with and support humans, a company statement said.

Sensors on the machine enable the robot to learn the locations of objects and open spaces in an office while recognising moving people. more>>>

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Nitric oxide helps to process and organize flood of sensory information

By Abigail W. Leonard
Special to LiveScience
updated 2:16 p.m. CT, Fri., Aug. 18, 2006

As we yawn and open our eyes in the morning, the brain stem sends little puffs of nitric oxide to another part of the brain, the thalamus, which then directs it elsewhere.

Like a computer booting up its operating system before running more complicated programs, the nitric oxide triggers certain functions that set the stage for more complex brain operations, according to a new study.

In these first moments of the day, sensory information floods the system—the bright sunlight coming through the curtains, the time on the screeching alarm clock—and all of it needs to be processed and organized, so the brain can understand its surroundings and begin to perform more complex tasks. more>>>

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Arthur C. Clarke 11.12.07, 6:00 AM ET

Arthur C. Clarke

Looking back on the appalling 21st century from our vantage point, 500 years later, it sometimes seems incredible that the human race could have survived such a time of troubles. The moment of greatest danger can now be pinpointed precisely–the year 2010.

Fifty years earlier, the chief threat seemed to be from thermonuclear weapons; however, these could be manufactured only by wealthy nations possessing both vast financial resources and a high level of technology.

Then, suddenly and totally unexpectedly, the situation was transformed by the invention of the Electromagnetic Pulse Bomb. The origin of this terrifying device is unknown: Like most concepts whose time has come, it was probably invented independently in a number of places. However, the first public account appeared in the September 2001 issue of Popular Mechanics under this dramatic headline:

E-BOMB: In the blink of an eye, electromagnetic bombs could throw civilization back 200 years. And terrorists can build them for $400. more>>>

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Smaller, faster, more efficient: BASF research scientists are helping to revolutionize the future world of telecommunications – with the aid of three-dimensional photonic crystals.

In a three-year project, BASF is researching into the development of these crystals together with partners such as Hanover Laser Center, Thales Aerospace Division, Photon Design Ltd., the Technical University of Denmark and the Ecole Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications de Bretagne. By the end of 2008, the partners in the “NewTon” project expect to have developed the first functional components of this new technology. The long-term goal is to use three-dimensional photonic crystals as construction elements in telecommunication. Half of the project is being funded by the European Union.

Many times more information can be transmitted by light in the same time as has so far been possible with electricity. This is why telephone conversations, websites, photographs or music, for example, are now increasingly being transmitted in optical fibers. At present, however, this technology still has one drawback at the “network nodes”. Indeed, at these nodes the routing of the information to the end-user is still done electrically, because no competitive, compact all-optical routing processor is yet available. This costs time and energy. more>>>

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I had a chance to visit the manufacturing facilities at ILC Dover in Frederica, Delaware last week to see the new inflatable habitat that they have developed. Together, NASA, ILC Dover, and NSF will put this habitat through a one-year test at McMurdo Station in Antarctica starting in January 2008.

How this team came to chose this design - and develop it to this point of development - reaches back decades for its inspiration - also uses cutting edge technology to bring it to reality.

Inflatable technology

When you look at artist’s impressions of what a Moon base (or a Mars base) might look like, you usually see a bunch of cylinders. The cylinders are either lying on their side or standing upright and are made of metal with rocket engines underneath. Indeed, most of the new proposals NASA tosses around for the base it plans to build at the Moon’s south pole, feature variations on this same approach.

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OTTAWA — Tired of printing scientific gobbledygook that almost no one can read, one of the world’s top science journals has ordered its authors to write plain English.

If the researchers who write for the journal Science can’t manage to do this, an editor will rewrite their work as savagely as necessary, at least for the next few weeks.

This ultimatum comes from editor-in-chief Donald Kennedy, who calls it an “experiment.”

It’s his solution to a problem recognized everywhere in science: The writing becomes more and more technical, until only a few scientists in a particular niche can read any given article.

For this to make any sense, a brief explanation of science journals is necessary.

They aren’t magazines. Journals publish new discoveries by scientists. They’re a way of announcing who has learned what in a variety of fields. And they check everything: If you publish your discovery in Science, Nature or the British Medical Journal, it means independent experts have judged your research and approved. more>>>

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Fibroblast skin cells were transformed by the new technology

Scientists have discovered a way to reprogramme human skin cells so that they mimic embryonic stems with the potential to become any tissue in the body.

The breakthrough promises to have significant implications for medical research.

Scientists are very excited by the announcement of these findings, that cells that look and act like stem cells can be created from skin cells (known in science as fibroblasts).

Last year similar work was done in mice, and we were waiting with bated breath to see if it would also work in humans.

Embryonic stem cells have great potential for treating human disease because of their ability to generate almost all the cell types found in the adult body.

These stem cells are important to study many diseases, but in the future they may also be used to as a treatment in their own right.

There is potential that stem cells could help replace diseased, damaged or dying cells and contribute towards improved function of that person’s organs, possibly representing a cure for the disease from which they suffered.

If there is any hope of getting to this stage, researchers have a major hurdle to get over - preventing the immune system rejecting the new cells. more>>>

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Google Inc. made a big splash last week with its new software for cellphones. But that’s far from the limit of the Internet giant’s wireless ambitions — which could include running its own mobile network.

The company is gearing up to make a serious run at buying wireless spectrum, a chunk of the airwaves that can be used to provide mobile phone and Internet services, in a Federal Communications Commission auction in January. Google is prepared to bid on its own without any partners, say people familiar with the matter. It is working out a plan to finance its bid, which could run $4.6 billion or higher, that would rely on its own cash and possibly some borrowed money. more>>>

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In a notion taken from science fiction afficionados, University of Arizona researchers presented a robot that moves by using the brain impulses of a moth at the 37th annual Society for Neuroscience meeting in San Diego.

Charles M. Higgins, UA associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, and doctoral student Timothy Melano presented their findings and outlined the mechanics behind the robot’s movements.

The robot’s motion is guided by a tiny electrode implanted in the moth’s brain, Higgins said, specifically to a single neuron that is responsible for keeping the moth’s vision steady during flight. The neuron transmits electrical signals which are then amplified in the robot’s base and through a mathematical formula, a computer translates the signals into action, making the robot move.

The moth is immobilize inside a plastic tube mounted atop the 6-inch-tall wheeled robot. To get the moth to imitate flight, Higgins and his team placed the moth in its apparatus on a circular platform surrounded by a 14-inch-high revolving wall painted with vertical stripes. The moth’s neuron reacts to the movement of the stripes and the process begins. more>>>

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