Monday, June 6, 2011

PhysOrg Newsletter Week 22

Dear Reader ,

Here is your customized PHYSorg.com Newsletter for week 22:

Tunnel found under temple in Mexico
Researchers found a tunnel under the Temple of the Snake in the pre-Hispanic city of Teotihuacan, about 28 miles northeast of Mexico City.

A brain training exercise that really does work
(Medical Xpress) -- Forget about working crossword puzzles and listening to Mozart. If you want to improve your ability to reason and solve new problems, just take a few minutes every day to do a maddening little exercise called n-back training.

D-Wave sells first commercial quantum computer
(PhysOrg.com) -- Last week, Burnaby, British Columbia-based company D-Wave Systems, Inc., announced that it sold its first commercial quantum computer. Global security company Lockheed Martin, based in Bethesda, Maryland, bought the quantum computer for a rumored $10 million, which includes maintenance and other services for several years.

Quantum physics first: Researchers observe single photons in two-slit interferometer experiment
Quantum mechanics is famous for saying that a tree falling in a forest when there's no one there doesn't make a sound. Quantum mechanics also says that if anyone is listening, it interferes with and changes the tree. And so the famous paradox: how can we know reality if we cannot measure it without distorting it?

CERN physicists trap antihydrogen atoms for more than 16 minutes
Trapping antihydrogen atoms at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) has become so routine that physicists are confident that they can soon begin experiments on this rare antimatter equivalent of the hydrogen atom, according to researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

Woman can literally feel the noise
(Medical Xpress) -- A case of a 36-year-old woman who began to literally 'feel' noise about a year and a half after suffering a stroke sparked a new research project by neuroscientist Tony Ro from the City College of New York and the Graduate Center of the City University. Research and imagery of the brain revealed that a link had grown between the woman’s auditory region and the somatosensory region, essentially connecting her hearing to her touch sensation.

Homemade Danish rocket takes off
A home-made rocket built by two Danes successfully blasted off from a floating launch pad off the Danish Baltic island of Bornholm Friday, nine months after its first test flight failed due to a defective hair drier.

Physicists describe how to make time-reversed light pulses
(PhysOrg.com) -- By taking advantage of the properties of periodic systems, physicists have described how to efficiently time-reverse ultrashort electromagnetic pulses. Since a time-reversed pulse evolves as if time runs backwards, time reversal eliminates any distortions or scattering that occurred at earlier times, regardless of the medium the pulse has propagated through.

Company that transforms garbage into ethanol attracts big investors
(PhysOrg.com) -- For the past several years, Montreal-based company Enerkem has been working on a way to make ethanol from old utility poles and household garbage. Earlier this week, the company announced that they have received $60 million in new financing from the major independent oil refiner Valero and the trash-hauling company Waste Management. Total investment in Enerkem is now $130 million.

10.69 seconds: Robot Ruby breaks Rubik's record (w/ video)
(PhysOrg.com) -- The world's fastest Rubik's Cube-solving robot has been developed by students at Swinburne University of Technology.

Phase change memory-based 'moneta' system points to the future of computer storage
A University of California, San Diego faculty-student team is about to demonstrate a first-of-its kind, phase-change memory solid state storage device that provides performance thousands of times faster than a conventional hard drive and up to seven times faster than current state-of-the-art solid-state drives (SSDs).

A supernova that's super different
A researcher at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics believes that a new kind of supernova is at work in recent observations of bright but short-lasting stellar explosions that don’t appear to fit known categories.

Holographic dark information energy
Holographic Dark Information Energy gets my vote for the best mix of arcane theoretical concepts expressed in the shortest number of words – and just to keep it interesting, it’s mostly about entropy.

Hunting for transits of Super-Earth GJ 581e
(PhysOrg.com) -- An international team of astronomers has ruled out transits of a water-rich or hydrogen-helium atmosphere planet for Gliese 581e. The host star itself is relatively quiet which means good news for the potential habitability of at least one of its planets.

Nvidia shows off Kal-El -- new quad-core processing chip
(PhysOrg.com) -- Nvidia, well known for its graphics chips, has made a pretty big statement by releasing a video on Youtube showing the capabilities of its new quad-core processing chip for smartphones and tablets. In the video, a ball, lit from within, moves around a virtual environment, shining its light on the other elements in its surroundings, demonstrating a step up in visual representation of real-time light imagery. Most video games use canned lighting, which means the game only has to show what has already been calculated. With the new chip in place, currently known as the Kal-El (Superman’s real name) the light projected is calculated and displayed (on moving objects yet) as the game is in play, something that requires incredible amounts of calculation at incredible speeds. The chip accomplishes this feat via its new quad-core (four processing units in a single component) processing chip.

'Dead' galaxies are not so dead after all
(PhysOrg.com) -- University of Michigan astronomers examined old galaxies and were surprised to discover that they are still making new stars. The results provide insights into how galaxies evolve with time.

Study: Biodegradable products may be bad for the environment
Research from North Carolina State University shows that so-called biodegradable products are likely doing more harm than good in landfills, because they are releasing a powerful greenhouse gas as they break down.

Worms from hell identified far below the Earth's surface
(PhysOrg.com) -- In a study published this week in Nature, researchers Gaetan Borgonie from Ghent University in Belgium and Tullis Onstott from Princeton University announced the discovery of new nematode species living kilometers below the earth in several South African mines. Nematodes had been previously found much closer to the surface, but this discovery of deep-dwelling nematodes, or roundworms, are the first multicellular organisms to ever be found at these depths.

Twisted ring of gas orbits galactic center
The Herschel Space Observatory scanned the center of the galaxy in far-infrared and found a cool (in all senses of the word) twisting ring of rapidly orbiting gas clouds. The ring is estimated to have dimensions of 100 parsecs by 60 parsecs (or 326 by 196 light years) – with a composite mass of 30 million solar masses.

Unexpected populations in global clusters may unlock secrets of star formation
(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers at McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, are shedding new light on some of the oldest parts of the Milky Way, suggesting life in the stellar nursery wasn't quite as simple as astronomers had thought.


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