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Here is your customized Phys.org Newsletter for week 27:
A chimp-pig hybrid origin for humans?
(Phys.org) �These days, getting a Ph.D. is probably the last thing you want to do if you are out to revolutionize the world. If, however, what you propose is an idea, rather than a technology, it can still be a valuable asset to have. Dr. Eugene McCarthy is a Ph.D. geneticist who has made a career out of studying hybridization in animals. He now curates a biological information website called Macroevolution.net where he has amassed an impressive body of evidence suggesting that human origins can be best explained by hybridization between pigs and chimpanzees. Extraordinary theories require extraordinary evidence and McCarthy does not disappoint. Rather than relying on genetic sequence comparisons, he instead offers extensive anatomical comparisons, each of which may be individually assailable, but startling when taken together. Why weren't these conclusions arrived at much sooner? McCarthy suggests it is because of an over-dependence on genetic data among biologists. He ar! gues that humans are probably the result of multiple generations of backcrossing to chimpanzees, which in nucleotide sequence data comparisons would effectively mask any contribution from pig.
Did Andromeda crash into the Milky Way 10 billion years ago?
(Phys.org) �For many years scientists have believed that our Galaxy, the Milky Way, is set to crash into its larger neighbour, the Andromeda Galaxy, in about 3 billion years' time and that this will be the first time such a collision has taken place. But now a European team of astronomers led by Hongsheng Zhao of the University of St Andrews propose a very different idea; that the two star systems collided once before, some 10 billion years ago and that our understanding of gravity is fundamentally wrong. Remarkably, this would neatly explain the observed structure of the two galaxies and their satellites, something that has been difficult to account for until now.� Dr Zhao will present the new work at the RAS National Astronomy Meeting in St Andrews on Thursday 4 July.
Student's flashlight works by body heat, not batteries
(Phys.org) �Ann Makosinski from Victoria, British Columbia, has an LED flashlight powered by body heat. This inventor has a flashlight that glows when she holds it. The story gets more interesting, though. She is 15 years old and her flashlight has got her into the finalist ranks for the Google Science Fair. Her work is a result of a general interest in alternative energy. She said that she is "really interested in harvesting surplus energy, energy that surrounds but we never really use." Enter the Hollow Flashlight, which works according to the thermoelectric effect�creating electric voltage out of temperature difference. As a Grade 10 student at St. Michaels University School in Victoria, she was deciding on a topic for a science project when she discovered the Peltier tile, producing electricity when one side of the tile is heated while the other side is cooled.
New material holds big energy hope
(Phys.org) �A new material that can store large amounts of energy with very little energy loss has been developed by researchers at the Australian National University.
Superconductor from solvent created: Study opens up new understanding of phenomenon
A study led by Washington State University researchers has turned a fairly common non-metallic solvent into a superconductor capable of transmitting electrical current with none of the resistance seen in conventional conductors.
Climate change deniers using dirty tricks from 'tobacco wars'
Fossil fuel companies have been funding smear campaigns that raise doubts about climate change, writes John Sauven in the latest issue of Index on Censorship magazine.
White man's skull has Australians scratching heads
The centuries-old skull of a white man found in Australia is raising questions about whether Captain James Cook really was the first European to land on the country's east coast.
MIT researchers build an all-optical transistor
Optical computing�using light rather than electricity to perform calculations�could pay dividends for both conventional computers and quantum computers, largely hypothetical devices that could perform some types of computations exponentially faster than classical computers.
Cosmic radio bursts point to cataclysmic origins
Mysterious bursts of radio waves originating from billions of light years away have left the scientists who detected them speculating about their origins.
Revolutionary instrument delivers a sharper universe to astronomers
A unique new instrument at Gemini South in Chile takes the removal of atmospheric distortions (using adaptive optics technology) to a new level. Today's release of seven ultrasharp, large-field images from the instrument's first science observations demonstrate its remarkable discovery potential.
UN says 2001-2010 decade shows faster warming trend
Global warming accelerated since the 1970s and broke more countries' temperature records than ever before in the first decade of the new millennium, U.N. climate experts said Wednesday.
Past decade saw unprecedented warming in the deep ocean
From 1975 on, the global surface ocean has shown a pronounced-though wavering-warming trend. Starting in 2004, however, that warming seemed to stall. Researchers measuring the Earth's total energy budget-the balance of sunlight streaming in compared to the amount of light and heat leaving from the top of the atmosphere-saw that the planet was still holding on to more heat than it was letting out. But with that energy not going into warming the surface ocean-a traditionally important energy sink-scientists weren't sure where it went. It became known, in some circles, as a case of "missing heat."
Deserts 'greening' from rising CO2
Increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) have helped boost green foliage across the world's arid regions over the past 30 years through a process called CO2 fertilisation, according to CSIRO research.
For better batteries, just add water
Lithium-ion batteries are now found everywhere in devices such as cellular phones and laptop computers, where they perform well. In automotive applications, however, engineers face the challenge of squeezing enough lithium-ion batteries onto a vehicle to provide the desired power and range without introducing storage and weight issues. Hye Ryung Byon, Yu Zhao and Lina Wang from the RIKEN Byon Initiative Research Unit have now developed a lithium-iodine battery system with twice the energy density of conventional lithium-ion batteries.
Animal master-burglars: Cockatoos 'pick' puzzle box locks (w/ Video)
A species of Indonesian parrot can solve complex mechanical problems that involve undoing a series of locks one after another, revealing new depths to physical intelligence in birds.
China hit by largest-ever algae bloom
The seas off China have been hit by their largest ever growth of algae, ocean officials said, with vast waves of green growth washing onto the shores of the Yellow Sea.
White dwarf star throws light on possible variability of a constant of Nature
An international team led by the University of New South Wales has studied a distant star where gravity is more than 30,000 times greater than on Earth to test its controversial theory that one of the constants of Nature is not a constant.
Hybrid nanostructure with extreme light absorption looks promising for photovoltaics
(Phys.org) �In photovoltaics, there is generally a trade-off in terms of semiconductor thickness, with thicker semiconductors offering better photon absorption and thinner ones offering higher charge carrier extraction efficiency. In recent years, scientists have begun investigating semiconductor nanowire solar cells, which tackle this tradeoff through morphology-dependent resonances that significantly enhance the absorption compared to a planar film.
New book finds Gaia Hypothesis implausible
A new book presents the first detailed and comprehensive analysis of the famous Gaia Hypothesis, and finds it to be inconsistent with modern evidence.
UK launches Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence Research Network
(Phys.org) �A network has been launched to promote academic research in the UK relating to the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligence (SETI). The UK SETI Research Network (UKSRN) brings together academics from 11 institutions across the country. The network's Patron is the Astronomer Royal, Professor Martin Rees. UKSRN will present current activity and consider future strategy in a session and panel discussion at the National Astronomy Meeting in St Andrews on Friday 5 July.
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