Goldilocks Earth size Exoplanet Found

NASA’s Kepler satellite has found an Earth size planet in its star’s Goldilocks Zone. This is the first habitable zone Earth size planet found so far; all the previous ones were much larger than Earth. Kepler-186f orbits a star about 500 light years away in the constellation Cygnus. The star (Kepler-186) is an M class red dwarf. The planet is on the outside of the habitable zone, so it’s probably fairly cold, but that really depends on the atmosphere. So far all we really know about the planet is that it’s just a little larger than Earth, and is probably rocky (not a gas giant). Due to its orbit close to the star, it probably has a long day, as long as our week or month.

Kepler186f-ComparisonGraphic-20140417_improved

Kepler-186f orbital characteristics

Update 21 April 2014

This link on How close are we to finding extraterrestrial life? has some good notes on the types of planets Kepler has found and how new telescopes will help the search.

Does Tamiflu really work?

An article on The Scientist highlights a study by the British Medical Journal that casts doubt on the efficacy of Tamiflu. It seems that the best Tamiflu can really give you is shortening symptoms by about half a day, which doesn’t seem worth it given the side effects of nausea and vomiting.

As expected, the manufacturer, Roche, denies the conclusions.

Given how much money is spent stockpiling the drug, studies like this should have been done and fully analyzed before using it in such quantities.

Why does water get air bubbles?

Have you ever just let a glass of water sit? After a while air bubbles start to form on the inside of the glass. Why?

What is happening is that the cold water is warming up. Cold water (or water at high pressure) can hold more dissolved gas than warm water (or water at low pressure). Your glass of water started out cold. You let it sit, and it warmed up to room temperature. The water now can’t hold as much dissolved gas as it used to. If it had more gas than it can now hold, the gas will come out of solution as air bubbles, which will form on the inside surface of the glass.

This is also what causes “the bends” for divers. Blood plasma is 95% water. Under high pressures blood can hold more dissolved gases. Over time nitrogen (~80% of air) dissolved in the blood. When the diver returns to the surface, the lower pressure causes the nitrogen to come out of solution in the blood, causing the bends.

8 bit computers floating around inside living things?

Scientists have made DNA based robotsnanobots – to carry medicine to diseases and release drugs when the diseases are reached. By using DNA folding, drugs can be stored inside cages of DNA molecules. The DNA will unfold when it touches the right protein. They have made the DNA unfold when it touches certain disease molecules. These have been injected into cockroaches. These robots can behave like nanocomputers, and while we will soon be making them about as powerful as a Commodore 64 from the 1980s, how long until we have 64 bit computers traveling our bloodstreams, repairing damaged cells, transmitting information on our health at a cellular level?

US Navy making fuel from seawater

The US Navy has come up with a process that manages to take Hydrogen and Carbon Dioxide out of seawater and convert them into long chain hydrocarbons, such as jet fuel or gasoline. The process uses electrical energy to drive the reaction, and obviously requires more energy than they get out of it in fuel. But if the electricity is generated from reactors or some other carbon neutral method, then this will be one method to get fuel. Their production ship can produce fuel at about $6 / gallon, but since about half of that cost is for the ship itself, a shoreline based system should cost about $3 / gallon.

Hopefully the process doesn’t involve releasing the CO2 from the seawater into the atmosphere. Since the process needs the carbon atoms, I expect they use almost all of the carbon they get from CO2.

Other sources:

  1. NavyTimes

New Tech for Gunshot Wounds

Not to cause wounds, but to treat them. Gunshot wounds can get deep and affect arteries. When this happens, it is important to stop the bleeding as quickly as possible. The current treatment is to shove gauze deep inside the wound.The FDA has approved a new technology that uses a syringe filled with sponges to stop the flow of blood. These sponges absorb blood and expand. They are coated with a chemical to trigger clotting. They also have an “X” imprinted on them that shows up in X-Rays so it’s easy to find them and get them all out. They supposedly can stop arterial bleeding in 15 seconds. Very useful for military medics. I’m sure this would have been useful in M*A*S*H at the aid stations.

The first custom built chromosome

Biologists have created the first artificial chromosome. While previous work was done on bacteria and viruses, this time it’s a full chromosome from a single-celled eukaryotic organism — baker’s yeast. The new chromosome is 272,871 base pairs long and includes improved genes. They inserted the chromosome in an existing yeast cell and it replicated correctly.

They expect to have a yeast cell made of fully artificial chromosomes in 5 years.

Hubble Telescope Reveals Deepest View of the Universe Yet

The Hubble Space Telescope is doing some more deep field exposures. In January they made one that lasted over 50 hours. This is letting them see objects that are over 12 billion light years away (the universe is about 13.7 billion years old).

These new deep fields (they’re calling them Frontier Fields)  are using gravitational lensing to augment the cameras on the Hubble. This first exposure will be improved in May, for over 100 hours of total light collecting time.

Because these frontier fields use gravitational lensing, with galaxy clusters acting as the lens, they can help map the various amounts of mass in the clusters. This will also help map out dark matter.

3D printed cranial skull

3 months ago, doctors in the Netherlands used 3D printing to replace a woman’s skull. Not the whole skull, just the part around the brain. The unnamed woman had a rare condition that caused her skull to thicken. It had grown thick enough to press on the brain causing loss of vision and harming motor functions. She would have died without this operation.

Doctors have done similar transplants using a material like cement, but it doesn’t fit well. This is the first time a 3D printed prosthetic has been used to replace part of the skull (sorry, second time). After 3 months, the woman’s vision is back, and she’s back to her job. You can hardly tell that she has had the operation. The new skull prosthetic is transparent, but is covered by the woman’s scalp, so she looks normal.

3D printing is becoming more and more useful in medicine. From bone replacement, to custom built guides to help make operations more effective, this technology is helping more and more doctors. Just a couple of years ago these things would have been impossible. We’re living in the future.