SciByte

Previous estimates of this Brachiosaur's weight have varied, with estimates as high as 80 tonnes

Manchester team's calculations – published in the journal Biology Letters – reduced that figure to just 23 tonnes

new technique will apply to all dinosaur weight measurements

One of the most important things palaeobiologists need to know about fossilised animals is how much they weighed

surprisingly difficult

laser scanned various large mammal skeletons, including polar bear, giraffe and elephant

This has the advantage of requiring minimal user intervention and is therefore more objective and far quicker

station astronauts filled the capsule with 1,400 pounds (635 kilograms) of old equipment

US embassy air quality Twitter feed gained a major following in Beijing, and later in Shanghai when it was introduced at the US consulate there

Beijing announced earlier this year it would change the way it measured air quality to include the smaller particles experts say make up much of the pollution in Chinese cities, after a vocal campaign

publishing of China's air quality are related to the public interests and as such are powers reserved for the government

vice minister of environment protection

did not name the US, but called on embassies to abide by China's laws

China's air quality is among the worst in the world

According to the latest Environmental Performance Index compiled by Yale University, China ranked 128th out of 132 countries for air quality.

Most Chinese cities base their air-quality information on particles of 10 micrometres or larger

China seeks to control the sources of particulates, such as coal burning and auto emissions

Mosquito tricks may also inspire engineers designing swarms of tiny flying robots, or interest physicists and mathematicians studying complex fluid dynamics at this scale

mosquitoes hit with water survived using an insect version of tai chi:

Mosquitoes hitchhiking on water experience acceleration 100 to 300 times the force of Earth’s gravity

manta rays give birth to live young, but they don't have an umbilical cord or a placenta to deliver oxygen

researchers have figured out how manta ray embryos get oxygen without a mammal's life-support equipment

uterus is closed off from the outside seawater, so the embryo has to be getting oxygen somehow, but nobody knew how

checked to see if she was pregnant using an ultrasound machine that had been modified to keep water away from the electronics

Out of more than 2,300 possible planets, only 46 fell into that category

Eleven of these were already known planets. Santerne’s team confirmed nine more

The remaining 26 candidates included 13 unknowns, two failed brown dwarf stars, and 11 members of binary star systems

not everything that darkens a star is a planet

After distributing the unknowns according to the observed ratios of objects, the team arrived at the 35 percent false-positive rate.

scientists don’t consider it a serious flaw for Kepler

percentage is very low compared to all other transit programs

Short period transiting planets are exotic objects, we don’t expect them to be everywhere

The potential billion planets are more expected to be small, long-period planets. We didn’t kill those ones, fortunately

A month later

measured the speed of neutrinos fired from CERN and found that they travel at light speed, as predicted

Some OPERA team members thought the whole episode had besmirched the collaboration's reputation, and in March, two of the team's elected leaders lost a vote of no confidence and tendered their resignations.

Gran Sasso houses four particle detectors

All four have now found that the neutrino's speed is consistent with the speed of light

strips electrons from glucose molecules to create a small electric current

The idea of a glucose fuel cell is not new

In the 1970s, scientists showed they could power a pacemaker with a glucose fuel cell, but the idea was abandoned in favor of lithium-ion batteries, which could provide significantly more power per unit area than glucose fuel cells

glucose fuel cells also utilized enzymes that proved to be impractical for long-term implantation in the body, since they eventually ceased to function efficiently

The new twist

is that it is fabricated from silicon, using the same technology used to make semiconductor electronic chips

has no biological components

consists of a platinum catalyst that strips electrons from glucose

mimicking the activity of cellular enzymes that break down glucose to generate ATP

So far, the fuel cell can generate up to hundreds of microwatts — enough to power an ultra-low-power and clinically useful neural implant.

in theory, the glucose fuel cell could get all the sugar it needs from the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) that bathes the brain and protects it from banging into the skull

are very few cells in the CSF

There is also significant glucose in the CSF, which does not generally get used by the body

only a small fraction of the available power is utilized by the glucose fuel cell, the impact on the brain’s function would likely be small.

the work is a good step toward developing implantable medical devices that don’t require external power sources.

ultra-low-power electronics, having pioneered such designs for cochlear implants and brain implants

combined with such ultra-low-power electronics, can enable brain implants or other implants to be completely self-powered

group has worked on all aspects of implantable brain-machine interfaces and neural prosthetics, including recording from nerves, stimulating nerves

decoding nerve signals and communicating wirelessly with implants

designed to record electrical activity from hundreds of neurons in the brain’s motor cortex, which is responsible for controlling movement

data is amplified and converted into a digital signal so that computers

can analyze it and determine which patterns of brain activity produce movement

returned with the prototype stretcher, which is fitted with carry handles, so its officers could suggest further practical improvements

idea is that the rolled-up RES could be strapped up alongside the firefighter's breathing apparatus

two-person team enter a building

the RES could be unrolled and secured around the injured person

product as far as I can as a degree project, fashioning it in the same heat resistant materials the fire services use

Prey is captured in specialised pitcher-shaped leaves with slippery surfaces on the upper rim and inner wall

If an insect tries to walk on the wet surface, its adhesive pads (the 'soles' of its feet) are prevented from making contact with the surface and instead slip

similar to the 'aquaplaning' effect of a car tire on a wet road.

scientists simulated 'rain' with a hospital drip and recorded its effect on a captive colony of ants that was foraging on the nectar under the lid

ants were safe before and directly after the 'rain', but when the drip was switched on about 40% of the ants got trapped.

Further research revealed that the lower lid surface of the N. gracilis pitcher is covered with highly specialised wax crystals

structure seems to provide just the right level of slipperiness to enable insects to walk on the surface under 'calm' conditions but lose their footing when the lid is disturbed (in most cases, by rain drops).

scientists also found that the lid of N. gracilis secretes larger amounts of attractive nectar than that of other pitcher plants, presumably to take advantage of this unique mechanism

counterpoint to the popularity of Mori’s essay has been the contention that the essay was an essay, after all, of limited scientific value.

observation from his original essay is what sparked conversations and interest among robotic designers

Mori maintains that humans are drawn to human-like robots with positive feelings of affinity until the robot moves or reveals itself in such a way that triggers the person’s realization that it is not human. Then it becomes “uncanny” or in popular-culture terms, creepy

Mori said that pointing out the existence of the uncanny valley was intended as advice for people who design robots rather than a scientific statement itself.

but they were never used

June 4, NASA announced its acquisition of the telescopes, and the agency's intention to use them for future astronomical research

The two telescopes have main mirrors that measure nearly 8 feet wide (2.4 meters), making them comparable to the veteran Hubble Space Telescope, which was launched into orbit 22 years ago. Grunsfeld called the donated optical hardware "very high quality."

currently being stored in Rochester, N.Y., in facilities belonging to the hardware's manufacturer,

cost to keep them in storage is about $70,000 a year

not insignificant, but it's not something that's unmanageable

One possible application for the telescopes is as a base for NASA's Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST), which is being designed to hunt for dark energy

Given budget projections for the next several years

in an extremely confined fiscal environment

NASA does not anticipate being able to dedicate any funding to the newly acquired telescopes until the James Webb Space Telescope successfully launches

In the meantime, NASA is investigating different uses for the telescopes, and hopes to have input from the scientific community to guide the decision-making process

latest data indicate that we are clearly in a new region where things are changing more quickly

data making the 16-hour-38 minute, 11.1-billion-mile (17.8-billion-kilometer), journey from Voyager 1 to antennas of NASA's Deep Space Network on Earth

These energetic particles were generated when stars in our cosmic neighborhood went supernova.

From January 2009 to January 2012, there had been a gradual increase of about 25 percent in the amount of galactic cosmic rays

Beginning on May 7, the cosmic ray hits have increased five percent in a week and nine percent in a month

The second important measure

is the intensity of energetic particles generated inside the heliosphere, the bubble of charged particles the sun blows around itself

there has been a slow decline in the measurements of these energetic particles, they have not dropped off

could be expected when Voyager breaks through the solar boundary.

The final data set that Voyager scientists believe will reveal a major change is the measurement in the direction of the magnetic field lines surrounding the spacecraft

While Voyager is still within the heliosphere, these field lines run east-west. When it passes into interstellar space, the team expects Voyager will find that the magnetic field lines orient in a more north-south direction

Such analysis will take weeks

Launched in 1977, Voyager 1 and 2 are in good health. Voyager 2 is more than 9.1 billion miles (14.7 billion kilometers) away from the sun

At first, all DeeChee could comprehend was an unsegmented stream of sounds

had been programmed to break up that stream into individual syllables and to store them in its memory

words were ranked according to how often they came up in conversation

words like "red" and "green" were prized.

designed to recognize words of encouragement, like "good" and "well done,"

That feedback helped transform the robot's babble into coherent words, sometimes in as little as two minutes.

repetition of sounds helps infants learn a language, then it's not surprising that our first words are often mainstays like "mama" and "dada."

words that form the connective tissue of our language - words like "at," "with" and "of" - are spoken in hundreds of different ways, making them difficult for newbies to recognize

more concrete words like "house" or "blue" tend to be spoken in the same way nearly every time

study relied on the human volunteers speaking naturally

DeeChee was programmed to smile when it was ready to pay attention to its teacher and to stop smiling and blink when it needed a break

designed to have a gender-neutral appearance, humans tended to treat it as a boy

During this past year, Voyager's magnetometer also detected a doubling in the intensity of the magnetic field

Like cars piling up at a clogged freeway off-ramp, the increased intensity of the magnetic field shows that inward pressure from interstellar space is compacting it.

Voyager has detected a 100-fold increase in the intensity of high-energy electrons from elsewhere in the galaxy diffusing into our solar system from outside, which is another indication of the approaching boundary.

reanalyzed the experimental data

which showed that the loss rate of very slow free neutrons appeared to depend on the direction and strength of the magnetic field applied.

oscillations between the parallel worlds could occur within a timescale of a few seconds

This isn’t the first time the existence of mirror matter has been suggested and has been predicted to be sensitive to the presence of magnetic field such as Earth’s

footprints of the Amur tiger have been discovered many times in Wangqing since 2008, this is the first time that a camera trap set up in the reserve has captured photos of the rare species

Experts will try to identify the individual tiger photographed by comparing it with photos of Amur tigers taken previously in Hunchun.

Amur tigers were once widespread in northeast China

Estimates put the current wild Amur tiger population in Northeast China

between 18-24 individuals

The adjacent forested habitat of the Russian Far East holds more, between 430-500 tigers.

strongly suggests that water has been a part of the Moon since its early existence – and perhaps since it was first created

2009 discovery of water on the moon

images show a very young lunar crater on the side of the moon that faces away from Earth

NASA's Moon Mineralogy Mapper on the Indian Space Research Organization's Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft

distribution of water-rich minerals (light blue) is shown around a small crater

2009, observations from three spacecraft showed signals of water across moon's surface

stream of charged hydrogen ions carried from the sun to the moon by the solar wind

might explain the possible presence of hydroxyl or water on the moon.

NASA's Mini-SAR instrument, which flew aboard India's Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, found more than 40 small craters with water ice. The craters range in size from 1 to 9 miles (2 to 15 km) in diameter. Although the total amount of ice depends on its thickness in each crater, it's estimated there could be at least 600 million metric tons of water ice. The red circles denote fresh craters; the green circle mark anomalous craters.

NASA's Mini-SAR instrument

aboard India's Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft

found more than 40 small craters with water ice

total amount of ice depends on its thickness in each crater

estimated there could be at least 600 million metric tons of water ice

the moon's permanently shadowed regions may hide stores of water

photo of the moon's south pole

January 2011 study suggested that water on the moon most likely came from comets that pelted the lunar surface after its formation

In October 2010, scientists reported that a frigid crater called Cabeus at the moon's south pole is jam-packed with water ice, with some spots wetter than Earth's Sahara desert

NASA's LCROSS probe discovered beds of water ice at the lunar south pole when it impacted the moon in October 2009. This visible camera image shows the ejecta plume at about 20 seconds after LCROSS's impact on the moon.

Recent studies have found vast amounts of water ice at or near the lunar surface. But the inside of the moon is bone dry, an August 2010 study found.

team studied 30 quasars with NASA’s orbiting telescopes Hubble and Spitzer

These quasars, glowing extremely bright in the infrared images

telltale sign that resident black holes are actively scooping up gas and dust into their gravitational whirlpool

formed during a time of peak black-hole growth between eight and twelve billion years

supports evidence that the creation of the most massive black holes in the early Universe was fueled not by dramatic bursts of major mergers but by smaller, long-term events

found 26 of the host galaxies

about the size of our own Milky Way Galaxy, showed no signs of collisions

Quasars that are products of galaxy collisions are very bright

the process powering the quasars and their black holes lies below the detection of Hubble

prime targets for the upcoming James Webb Space Telescope, a large infrared orbiting observatory scheduled for launch in 2018