coondoggie writes "NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter this week sent back high-resolution images of about 30 proposed landing sites for the Mars Science Laboratory, a mission launching in 2009 to deploy a long-distance rover carrying sophisticated science instruments on Mars. The orbiter's high-resolution camera has taken more than 3,500 huge, sharp images released in black-and-white since it began science operations in November 2006. The images show features as small as a desk. The orbiter has sent back some 26 terabytes of data, equivalent to about 5,000 CD-ROMs."Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  eldavojohn writes "Former US Vice President Al Gore has been announced as a co-recipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his work on environmental awareness & climate change. He shares his award with the the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 'Speaking in Washington, Mr Gore praised the IPCC, "whose members have worked tirelessly and selflessly for many years". "We face a true planetary emergency," Mr Gore warned. "It is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity." He said he would donate his half of the $1.5m prize money to the Alliance for Climate Protection, reported the news agency Reuters.'"Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  lousyd writes "CNN Money reports that DARPA and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency have given $4.9 million to Lockheed Martin to develop an image recognition system that will be used to scan satellite images and photographs for familiar objects. Called Object Recognition via Brain-Inspired Technology (ORBIT), the system will fuse commercial airborne EO and LIDAR sensor data into a three-dimensional, photo-realistic model of the landscape. The brains of the system, so to speak, will be Numenta's Hierarchical Temporal Memory technology, modeled on the technology growing inside human heads. The system is expected to increase image analysts' productivity by 100 times."Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  twilight30 writes "Discovery News is reporting that 'One of the most famous and scrutinized heavenly objects is 10 to 20 percent closer than we thought, say two teams of radio astronomers who have made some of the most precise cosmic distance measurements ever, with a telescope nearly as big as Earth. The Orion Nebula is the closest major stellar nursery to Earth, so it has been heavily studied to learn about the lives of stars. Its distance from Earth, however, has long been a matter of uncertainty, with an estimate made about 25 years ago in need of revision.'"Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  angelaelle writes "The current issue of Popular Mechanics is featuring their Breakthrough Awards program for inventors. Some of the winning inventions help improve the living conditions for people in third world countries using low-tech materials and assembly methods. Technologies like this cookstove for people in Darfur, and in the case of this Windbelt developed by Shawn Frayne, could be used to provide cheap, clean energy alternatives. The website features fascinating, inspiring videos talking about the inventor's 'eureka moment', focusing on the inventor as well as the technology."Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  The Skinny writes "Today is a historic day for the SETI program. The New York Times reports that astronomers are flipping the switch today on the Allen Telescope Array — 350 antennas, each 20 feet in diameter — which will, among other things, extend the search for extraterrestrial life a thousandfold. From the article: ' There are some 200 billion stars in the galaxy, and a significant fraction of them have planets. Estimates of the number of intelligent civilizations in the galaxy have ranged from one (or none, if you are particularly discouraged about human affairs) into the millions. Dr. Shostak calculated that the full Allen array would be able to detect a signal from as far as 500 light years that is only a few times more powerful than what can now be sent by the Arecibo radio telescope, a 1,000-foot-diameter dish in Puerto Rico that is the world's largest (although it is in danger of being shut down to save money). That translates to about a million stars, which he said was getting into a promising number. Dr. Shostak described the expanded search as looking for the needle in the proverbial haystack with a shovel instead of a spoon.'"Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  mrcgran writes "Space.com reports, "Almost one month after Japan's successful launch of the Kaguya lunar probe, the unmanned observatory has begun its first major activities in orbit around the moon. In addition to snapping its first lunar images, the probe jettisoned one of two 110-pound (50-kilogram) "baby" satellites that will help create a detailed gravity map of the moon." The major objectives of the "KAGUYA" mission are to obtain scientific data of the lunar origin and evolution and to develop the technology for the future lunar exploration. "KAGUYA" consists of a main orbiting satellite at about 100km altitude and two small satellites (Relay Satellite and VRAD Satellite) in polar orbit."Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  TaeKwonDood writes "We all know language has evolved but mathematicians are trying to take how it has changed in the past to predict what it will be like in the future." From the article: "Mathematical analysis of this linguistic evolution reveals that irregular verb conjugations behave in an extremely regular way -- one that can yield predictions and insights into the future stages of a verb's evolutionary trajectory," says Lieberman, a graduate student in applied mathematics in Harvard's School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and in the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology, and an affiliate of Harvard's Program for Evolutionary Dynamics. "We measured something no one really thought could be measured, and got a striking and beautiful result.""Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  apsmith writes "About a year ago some of the people at the US National Security Space Office began looking into space-based solar power (SBSP) as a technology in the near-term strategic interests of the United States. At first the participants were skeptical, and the "phase 0 study" went along with no official funding. In a rather innovative move, they organized the study as a series of internet-based (bulletin-board and email) discussions, with the wordpress site open to the public, and a closed experts-only discussion using Google Groups. Initially expecting only a dozen or so interested parties, the discussion grew to include over 170 people with past expertise and interest in the issues. The final report was released Wednesday morning; it provides an excellent broad-brush review of the status of SBSP, showing immense potential, but also a number of challenges that appear only surmountable with a strong government commitment to the project. The big question is where it goes from here — NASA? DARPA? The new ARPA-E? Or something new? I was able to attend the press conference, which included Buzz Aldrin in an announcement of a new alliance to push for implementing the recommendations of the report."Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  Riding with Robots writes "No, it's not an accident due to a metric-to-English-units error. In February, the New Horizons probe passed through the Jupiter system on its way to Pluto, and we saw some spectacular pictures. Now, the science teams have published detailed scientific results, along with new images and movies. The probe's instruments saw clouds form from ammonia welling up from Jupiter's lower atmosphere, and heat-induced lighting strikes in the polar regions, and fresh eruptions on the volcanic moon Io. New Horizons also captured the clearest images ever of the tenuous Jovian ring system, where scientists spotted clumps of debris that may indicate a recent impact inside the rings, or some more exotic phenomenon." I bet Neil DeGrasse Tyson will be on 7 Discovery channel specials talking about these new discoveries inside of the week. Hope he's nicer than he was to poor Pluto :)Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  hhavensteincw writes "Scientists at Tufts University are researching the use of light aimed at the forehead to measure the stress, work overload, or distraction a computer user may be feeling, as a way to adjust the UI to adapt to a user's emotional state. The research combines biomedical engineering and machine learning to adjust the UI. The project, which requires users to wear a futuristic head band, uses light to measure the flow of oxygenated blood to the brain that signals a user's rising stress levels typically associated with increasingly difficult tasks."Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  URSpider alerts us to two separate research reports published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences pointing to the rapid breakdown of nitric oxide in donated blood as a reason why such blood loses its ability to transfer oxygen, and is sometime implicated in problems such as strokes and heart attacks. Nitric oxide depletion is significant after 3 hours of storage; yet current guidelines allow for storing donated blood for up to 42 days. The article notes: "Several of the researchers, including Stamler, have consulting and/or equity relationships with Nitrox/N30, a company developing nitric oxide based therapies."Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  An anonymous reader writes "Cosmos Magazine reports on a design for a lunar habitat that is 90 to 95 percent self-sufficient. The proposed habitat uses a closed-loop life support system that recycles and regenerates air, water, and food, reducing the need for costly supply trips. The north pole of the moon is chosen as a location because of its access to sunlight and useful resources. About 11 astronauts could live and work in the habitat for 2 to 3 years. The project would also help the environment on Earth with recycling and other sustainable practices." The designers say it could be 20 to 30 years before such a habitat could be up and running on the moon.Read more of this storyat Slashdot.

  A number of readers made sure we are aware that the 2007 Nobel Prize in physics has been awarded to Albert Fert and Peter Grunberg for simultaneously and independently discovering giant magnetoresistance. This property has allowed the explosion of disk-space growth and is cited as being one of the first nanotechnology breakthroughs. From the announcement: "Very weak magnetic changes give rise to major differences in electrical resistance in a GMR system. A system of this kind is the perfect tool for reading data from hard disks when information registered magnetically has to be converted to electric current."Read more of this storyat Slashdot.