Eerie Cloud Created by NASA Rocket Experiment

Reports of UFOs skyrocketed last weekend along the east coast of the US after a NASA launched an experiment to study an unusual phenomenon called noctilucent clouds, or ‘night shining’ clouds. The Charged Aerosol Release Experiment (CARE) was conducted by the Naval Research Laboratory and the Department of Defense Space Test Program, created artificial noctilucent cloud using the exhaust particles of the rocket’s fourth stage at about 173 miles altitude. It created a bright object with a fan-shaped tail, prompting calls of concern from residents in Virginia and Massachusetts to local authorities. But this object was definitely identified. – universetoday

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An eerie cloud that glowed briefly in the night sky Saturday was no UFO. It was created by humans – more specifically a NASA rocket built to make clouds that shine at night.

The rocket launched as part of an experiment to artificially create so-called noctilucent – or night-shining – clouds, the highest clouds on Earth. They naturally appear around 50 miles (80 km) above Earth’s high latitudes and are also known as polar mesospheric clouds.

Saturday night’s rocket experiment lifted off at 7:46 p.m. EDT (2346 GMT) from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island, Va. It created a brief light show that was visible across the United States’ East Coast and sparked calls from curious skywatchers as far away as Boston, according to the Associated Press.

“It was very impressive … albeit short-lived,” said Joe Rao, an instructor and guest lecturer at New York’s Hayden Planetarium, who witnessed the event. Rao is also SPACE.com’s skywatching columnist.

The experiment created a man-made noctilucent cloud using the fourth stage of a NASA Black Brant XII suborbital sounding rocket that spewed exhaust particles 173 miles (278 km) above Earth. Ground-based radar and camera stations recorded the resulting cloud’s formation and illumination. The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory and Department of Defense’s Space Test Program oversaw the launch, which it called the Charged Aerosol Release Experiment.

NASA has observed naturally occurring night-shining clouds using its AIM satellite. The Naval Research Laboratory and Space Test Program also uses a satellite called STPSat-1 to observe the phenomena and also used the spacecraft to observe Saturday night’s man-made cloud.

“We weren’t exactly sure what we were going to see, as this was the very first time that a noctilucent cloud experiment was attempted,” Rao said. “Would it be something obvious to the eye, or something rather faint?”

The result, he added, was spectacular.

Rao described the cloud as “a brilliant object” that displayed a wide, fan-shaped tail shortly after it was created. But the artificial phenomenon was over in just a few minutes.

via SPACE.com — Eerie Cloud Created by NASA Rocket Experiment.

Britain’s X Files: RAF suspected aliens of “tourist” visits to Earth

In 1993, an RAF Wing Commander lobbied MoD officials about the need for a properly funded study.

He told them: “The national security implications (of UFOs) are considerable. We have many reports of strange objects in the skies and have never investigated them.”

He added: “If the sightings are of devices not of earth then their purpose needs to be established as a matter of priority. There has been no apparently hostile intent and other possibilities are: (1) military reconnaissance, (2) scientific, (3) tourism.”

The Wing Commander, whose name is blanked out in the documents, said the MoD could learn from the craft.

“If the reports are taken at face value then devices exist that do not use conventional reaction propulsion systems, they have a very wide range of speeds and are stealthy. I suggest we could use the technology, if it exists.” …

The internal debate in the MoD came to a head in 1995, when documents were made public revealing that UFO reports were routinely copied to specialist “Defence Intelligence” branches.

An exasperated intelligence office wrote to the UFO Desk: “I see no reason for continuing to deny that (Defence Intelligence) has an interest in UFOs.

“However, if the association is formally made public, then the MoD will no doubt be pressurised to state what the intelligence role/interest is.

“This could lead to disbelief and embarrassment since few people are likely to believe the truth that lack of funds and higher priorities have prevented any study of the thousands of reports received.”

Dr Clarke said: “Some of these officials, like the Wing Commander, obviously believed in some pretty weird stuff. He doesn’t seem to have any evidence for his theories, but seems to have just been watching the X Files, like everyone else at the time.

“These are senior officials and yet they believe some pretty bizarre things.”

An inquiry, Project Condign, was eventually launched in 1996, apparently without the knowledge of then defence secretary Michael Portillo. It was completed in 2000 under Geoff Hoon.

The report found: “That (UFOs) exist is indisputable. Credited with the ability to hover, land, take-off, accelerate to exceptional velocities and vanish, they can reportedly alter their direction of flight suddenly and clearly can exhibit aerodynamic characteristics well beyond those of any known aircraft of missile – either manned or unmanned.”

It went on that, although they existed, UFOs presented no threat to defence.

It found that many sightings of UFOs were in fact “plasmas” of gas caused by charges of electricity in the atmosphere.

The author even suggested that exposure to plasmas could cause responses in parts of the brain that lead to elaborate hallucinations that might be interpreted as supernatural experiences of encounters with aliens.

The inquiry examined seven “near misses” involving RAF aircraft and “unexplained aerial phenomenon”.

The unnamed author concluded that “the possibility exists that a fatal accident might have occurred in the past” as a result of aircrew avoiding a UFO.

The study recommended that pilots should make “no attempt. to out manoeuvre a UAP during interception”.

via Britain’s X Files: RAF suspected aliens of “tourist” visits to Earth – Telegraph.

Giant Star Blows a Glowing Space Bubble

Called the Bubble Nebula, this eerie, translucent sphere is created by fierce winds from a superhot star 40 times the size of our sun. Moving at nearly 4.5 million miles per hour, stellar winds whip the cloud of gas around the star into a near-perfect bubble, which stands out from the rest of the more stationary gas in this emission nebula.

Located 7,100 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cassiopeia, the bubble is about 6 light-years in diameter and glows pink because of the red, hot gas that surrounds it. The first clear picture of the Bubble Nebula was taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope in 1997, and this new image was captured in July by the South Common Observatory in Britain.

via Giant Star Blows a Glowing Space Bubble | Wired Science | Wired.com.

Red Rocks on Mars Aren’t Just Rust

Image: Scientists say Mars should look black like the planet on the right, but may have turned red through a mechanical grinding process.
NASA/ESA/Hubble Team.

Scientists have a new explanation for what makes the Red Planet so red.

Recent experiments show that regular sand, when combined with black Martian basalt, takes on a reddish hue as it’s crushed into dust, whether or not water or oxygen is present. Researchers from Aarhus University in Denmark claim that Mars’ red dust could have formed without the water that current hypotheses hold once covered the planet.

“Mars should really look blackish between its white polar caps, because most of the rocks at mid-latitudes are basalt,” said physicist Jonathan Merrison in a press release. “For decades we assumed that the reddish regions on Mars are related to the water-rich early history of the planet and that, at least in some areas, water-bearing, heavily oxidized iron minerals are present.”

But when Merrison and his team mixed sand with a mineral called magnetite, found in Martian basalt, they found that mechanical stimulation alone produced a fine red dust. To simulate sand transport on Mars, the scientists tumbled pure quartz in a hermetically sealed flask for seven months, flipping each flask 10 million times. By the end of the experiment, 10 percent of the sand had turned to dust, and it became redder and redder with the addition of magnetite….

Although the scientists don’t understand how the black mineral converts into the red one, they think it’s due to a chemical reaction with the eroded sand. Because the experiment works not only in air, but also in a dry carbon dioxide atmosphere like the one on Mars, the researchers say simple grinding is a plausible explanation for how Mars got its striking color.

via Red Rocks on Mars Aren’t Just Rust | Wired Science | Wired.com.

Burglar leaves his Facebook page on victim’s computer

The popular online social networking site Facebook helped lead to an alleged burglar’s arrest after he stopped check his account on the victim’s computer, but forgot to log out before leaving the home with two diamond rings.

Jonathan G. Parker, 19, of Fort Loudoun, Pa., was arraigned Tuesday one count of felony daytime burglary.

According to court records, Deputy P.D. Ware of the Berkeley County Sheriff’s Department responded on Aug. 28 to the victim’s home after she reported the burglary.

She told police that someone had broken into her home through a bedroom window.

There were open cabinets in her garage, and other signs of a burglar.

The victim later noticed that the intruder also used her computer to check his Facebook status, and his account was still open when she checked the computer.

The victim later noticed that she was missing two diamond rings from her dresser in the same room as her computer.

The two rings were worth more than $3,500, reports indicate.

During the investigation, a friend of the victim told her that he knew where Parker was staying, in the same area as the victim’s house.

Police then went to the home and spoke with a friend of Parker’s.

The man said Parker had stopped by his home occasionally, but he said the man didn’t live there.

He also said that the night before the burglary, Parker asked him if he wanted to help break into the victim’s home but he refused.

As of Tuesday evening, Parker remained in custody at the Eastern Regional Jail on $10,000 bail.

If convicted he faces one to 10 years in prison.

via Burglar leaves his Facebook page on victim’s computer – journal-news.net | News, sports, jobs, community information for Martinsburg – The Journal.

Listeria L-forms: Discovery Of An Unusual Form Of Bacterial Life

Zurich researchers have discovered a new life form of Listeria monocytogenes, an opportunistic pathogen responsible for serious food poisoning. These bacteria can reproduce and proliferate as so-called L-forms. The methods to detect these bacteria should now be adapted.

via Listeria L-forms: Discovery Of An Unusual Form Of Bacterial Life.

For over 100 years, it was known that bacteria may lose their cell wall and can still survive. However, it was believed that this phenomenon was merely an artefact and that bacteria without cell walls do not remain viable. Recent research of a group headed by ETH Zurich Professor Martin J. Loessner, which has just been published in Molecular Microbiology, shows that bacteria without a cell wall can be a stable form of bacterial life. Astonishingly, not only can Listeria survive without a cell wall, they are even able to reproduce and proliferate.

From cheese to the brain

Listeria (Listeria monocytogenes) are pathogens causing dangerous and often fatal cases of food-borne infections, and are frequently found in milk products such as vacherin soft cheese. The bacteria invade the human body through the epithelial cells of the intestine and spread from cell to cell., which renders them invisible to the immune system. Listeria can cross both the blood-brain barrier and the placenta barrier. Having reached the brain, they cause severe inflammation of the brain, which can be fatal. Listeria can also endanger fetuses and pregnant women.

Membrane instead of a cell wall

Listeria cells normally appear as small rods. If they shed their cell wall, e.g. through contact with certain antibiotics such as penicillin, they become spherical and enlarge greatly. These cell wall deficient cells are surrounded by a single membrane only. As an intermediate stage between this L-form and the rod-shaped parental cells, there is an intermediate stage from which the bacteria can rebuild their cell wall. However, once Listeria has reached the complete L-form status, there may be no way back.

The change from the normal form to the L-form is accompanied by many changes in cell metabolism and gene activity. Almost 280 of the genes of normal and L-form Listeria showed differing activity. While genes responsible for stress regulation were activated in the L-forms, genes for metabolism and energy balance were strongly repressed. The researchers interpret this as the bacterial response and active adaptation to its new lifestyle. Loessner says “L-form Listeria really have a very stressful life.”

“Culturing” the L-forms of bacteria is not easy. They need to be “bred” in a liquid medium and do not normally form colonies, so plating on a petri dish is not possible. Although L-form Listeria cells are capable of reproducing themselves, this can take time: formation of a visible colony within tubes containing a soft medium takes at least six days, compared to 16 to 20 hours for normal cells.

Morgue Royal North Shore Hospital body

SECURITY at one of Sydney’s biggest hospitals is so lax that anyone can walk into the morgue and claim a body without showing identification, prompting fears that corpses could be wrongly removed or defiled.

Undertakers have blasted Royal North Shore Hospital for its cavalier attitude to security, saying it showed management had ”integrity and moral issues”.

The hospital was the only one in Sydney where it was possible for members of the public to enter the mortuary’s freezer, which stores up to 10 bodies, and ”help themselves”, the secretary of the Funeral Industry Association, Graham Stewart, said yesterday.

He said undertakers were in fear that the wrong body could be buried or cremated before hospital staff had checked the paperwork, a particular concern for Jews or Muslims, who must usually be buried within 24 hours of death, or on days when two people with the same surname were in the morgue.

”It’s been going on for years and it’s appalling, but the health department told us not to complain to the hospital because they could make things worse for us,” Mr Stewart said.

At other hospitals, undertakers were required to submit detailed paperwork at the medical records office before being escorted to the mortuary by a porter and monitored by a morgue attendant while they removed the body.

”Not at Royal North Shore,” the proprietor of Mannings Funerals, John Manning, said yesterday.

”Anyone can walk in there, pick up a body without any paperwork and nobody would be any the wiser.”

via Morgue Royal North Shore Hospital body.

Dolmen with petroglyphs found near Villupuram

A big dolmen with four petroglyphs that portray men with tridents and a wheel with spokes has been found at Kollur, near Tirukoilur, 35 km from Villupuram in Tamil Nadu.

The discovery was made by K.T. Gandhirajan, who specialises in art history, when he led a team to that area. Petroglyphs are engravings made with a tool. What is special about the latest find is that while two men have been shown having tridents in their hands, a third is brandishing unidentified weapons. Unusually, these figures have been chiselled on the dolmen’s capstone — that is roof-slab. While the pre-historic artist has provided a geometrical pattern to the two men with tridents and other weapons, he has chiselled the third man, with an ornament on his chest, in a free-flowing manner.

This is the second time that a dolmen with petroglyphs has been found in Tamil Nadu. The earlier discovery in the Nilgiris district was also made by Mr. Gandhirajan. But it was a circular dolmen with a petroglyph on the slab wall.

“The three figures belong to different periods. But the two men holding tridents are chronologically close to each other,” Mr. Gandhirajan said. He estimated that while the dolmen itself was 2,500 years old, the petroglyphs might be about 2000 years old. The tridents could have been hunting or fishing weapons. Their depiction showed that the engravings belonged to the Iron Age (circa 1000 B.C. to 300 B.C.). The engraving of a wheel was significant because the men who erected the dolmen had the knowledge of wheels.

Six more dolmens were found nearby, on the banks of a lake at Kollur. In addition, three dolmens were situated on the bed of the lake which was built at a later period. The site had been discovered earlier, but not the petroglyphs. The team that visited the site on September 13 comprised G. Chandrasekaran, retired principal of the Government College of Fine Arts, Chennai, and K. Natarajan and D. Ramesh, both academicians.

Dolmens are normally box-like structures made of granite slabs and a roof slab.

The entrance slab sometimes has a perfectly round porthole. Dolmens are found where there are no natural caverns. While in many places, they were erected over cist-burials, dolmens have also been found without cist-burials. Mr. Gandhirajan argued that it was not necessary that the dolmens be erected over cist-burials only; they had been found on rocky mounds.

Dolmens could have been used as shelters by tribals during rains or winter. Sometimes, dolmens had paintings of red ochre or white kaolin.

“Hundreds of megalithic dolmens were once found in Tamil Nadu.

via Dolmen with petroglyphs found near Villupuram.

Bulgarian Archaeologist Finds Unique Golden Chariot from Ancient Thrace

An exhibition displaying an absolutely unique golden decoration of a chariot from Ancient Thrace was opened Wednesday in the Mall of Sofia, in the downtown of the Bulgarian capital.

The Thracian chariot in question was technically in fact found in 1976 near the village of Karanovo but no one had realized its existence.

Only at the beginning of 2009, archaeologist Veselin Ignatov, who is the head of the history museum in the town of Nova Zagora, Southeast Bulgaria, and a specialist on Thracian chariots, actually discovered it as he was inspecting earlier finds stored in the museum basement.

X-ray test showed that a corroded metal plate actually contains remains of a chariot – including an absolutely unique decorative plaque made of gold alloy which decorated a Thracian chariot dated back to the 2 century AD.

It is both the decoration and the gold-copper alloy that make the chariot on display in downtown Sofia without any analogy among similar finds from ancient times.

The decorative plaque is 52 cm long and 12 cm wide, and 0,3 cm thick. It was placed on the lower back part of the chariot, which was actually a luxury passenger car rather than a war chariot. It pictures what appears to be an ancient building, most likely a temple.

Other decorations on the chariot include a bust of Heracles (Hercules), and two heads of Medusa, the mythical gorgon monster.

via Bulgarian Archaeologist Finds Unique Golden Chariot from Ancient Thrace.

How elephants ‘talk’ to each other through the ground

The American Physical Society (APS), in the latest podcast of ‘Life Lines’, has explained how elephant vocalizations travel through the ground for great distances, and how other elephants can understand them, just as they understand acoustic sound, which travels through the air.

Research that led to the development of the content of the podcast was done by Dr Caitlin O’Connell-Rodwell, who is the author of ‘The Elephant’s Secret Sense’.

Early in her research, Dr. O’Connell-Rodwell noticed behavior that indicates elephants are listening to acoustic (airborne) sounds by putting their ears out and orienting toward the sound’s source.

At other times, she also noticed a more puzzling behavior: Several elephants would freeze simultaneously, sometimes in mid-stride, and would press their front feet into the ground.

They might also roll a foot forward so that only their toes touched the ground. At other times, they would lift a front leg.

The behavior reminded the researcher of the behavior she saw in insects that communicate seismically.

She began a series of experiments that eventually found that:

Low-frequency elephant vocalizations, which are below the threshold of human hearing, travel through the ground in the same waveform as they do in the air.

The ground vocalization can travel faster or more slowly than acoustic sound, depending on soil conditions, but has the potential of travelling further as there is no outer limit to how far sounds can travel through the earth.

via How elephants ‘talk’ to each other through the ground.