Which is better: coffee or an electric shock to the head?
I just poured my third cup of coffee today. It’s mid-afternoon, so I do this knowing that it means I will lie in bed tonight staring at the ceiling entirely unable to sleep after I have fully annoyed...
View ArticleWhy astronauts fall
If you’ve ever watched this video, you might wonder whether an astronaut’s suit is too ungainly to be graceful, or alternatively, if astronauts might just lack coordination. A study out this week in...
View ArticlePeople more likely to vote based on how healthy a candidate looks rather than...
This week we started the This Week in Science podcast on a low note talking about the climate, or as we like to call it on TWIS, 'Climytia.' The IPCC is done futzing about with its most recent report,...
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How to control mice with your mind
Photo courtesy of Shutterstock Science fiction author Iain M. Banks wrote of a society in his Culture series in which individuals were physiologically enhanced or altered by implanting a...
View ArticleBlack hole power in a lightning bolt
Have you ever been on a plane during a thunderstorm that experienced a direct lightning strike? While most commercial airliner will do their best to avoid thunderclouds delivering the wrath of the...
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Air pollution: the holy Hajj's health threat
Dr. Azhar Siddique Reporting this week at the annual American Geophysical Union, scientists from UC Irvine discussed air quality results from samples taken during the 2012 and 2013 Hajj. The annual...
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Watching the climate-cholera connection from orbit
Researchers reported at the American Geophysical Union annual meeting in San Francisco, CA on a satellite-based cholera outbreak prediction model in which specific environmental factors are correlated...
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The issue with arsenic
Arsenic. Hearing the word in America usually brings up black and white mental images of the film "Arsenic and Old Lace." Yet, it is not an old issue. People around the world are exposed to dangerous...
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Why is Arctic ice melting so fast?
Right now, it's cold in the Arctic. Days are dark, and ice grows to cover the dark sea. Come summer, lengthening days and warming temperatures will reverse that process. This is the ebb and flow of...
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Humanity at night
You might recall an image release in 2012 of the Earth’s lights at night. Called Black Marble, the popular image was generated as a composite image from the best images by the taken over several...
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Mars burps methane. Scientists want to know why.
Nasa's Curiosity rover found methane at about 1 part per billion in the atmosphere of Mars. That's 4,000 times less than in the air on our own planet. Gotta be all the farts. Photograph:...
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Scientists track water locked hundreds of miles underground
The Earth is full of water. Not just lakes, river, streams, and oceans on the crustal surface, or even aquifers close to the surface—the planet literally holds water inside itself. Deep inside the...
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Adventurers can help science by sharing their data
"K2 8611" by Kogo - Own work. Licensed under GFDL via Wikimedia Commons By adding a little sampling to their adventures out in the wild, explorers in hard-to-reach locations could lend a big hand to...
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The day I met a creationist at the science conference
The last place you expect to meet a creationist is at the annual American Geophysical Union conference. I don't know how I got so lucky. Yesterday morning, I wandered through the posters presented at...
View ArticleFrank Drake thinks it’s silly to send messages to ET
Making contact with aliens: the subject of many a sci-fi story, and a variety of imagined outcomes. Though no one knows what will happen if we encounter intelligent extra-terrestrial life, scientists...
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Which water technology will save California from its long, dry death?
Solar receivers at the WaterFX demonstration plant in the Panoche Water and Drainage District in California. Water is complicated—especially in the West. For years, willful ignorance has prevailed....
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