Fish jump into picture of evolutionary land invasion

The time-elapsed image above, taken by researchers at Northern Arizona University, shows the mosquitofish’s ability to move outside of water with apparent skill and purpose. The study suggests that vertebrates may have invaded land more frequently than previously thought.

Research sometimes means looking for one thing and finding another. Such was the case when biology professor Alice Gibb and her research team at Northern Arizona University witnessed a small amphibious fish, the mangrove rivulus, jump with apparent skill and purpose out of a small net and back into the water.

This was no random flop, like you might see from a trout that’s just been landed. The rivulus seemed to know what it was doing.

They hadn’t expected to see that behavior, even from a fish known to spend time out of the water. So before long, what began as a study on the evolution of feeding behavior was shifted to a study of how fish behave when stranded on land. And considering what is implied by the truism “like a fish out of water,” the results came as another surprise.

Some fully aquatic fishes, as the author’s video clips show, also can jump effectively on land even without specialized anatomical attributes. This has significant implications for evolutionary biology, Gibb said, because the finding implies that “the invasion of the land by vertebrates may have occurred much more frequently than has been previously thought.”

The study is summarized in a paper, “Like a Fish out of Water: Terrestrial Jumping by Fully Aquatic Fishes,” that appears online in the JEZ A: Ecological Genetics and Physiology. …

via Fish jump into picture of evolutionary land invasion.

Removal of restrictions can decrease music piracy

Contrary to the traditional views of the music industry, removal of digital rights management (DRM) restrictions can actually decrease piracy, according to new research from Rice University and Duke University.

Marketing professors Dinah Vernik of Rice and Devavrat Purohit and Preyas Desai of Duke used analytical modeling to examine how piracy is influenced by the presence or absence of DRM restrictions. They found that while these restrictions make piracy more costly and difficult, the restrictions also have a negative impact on legal users who have no intention of doing anything illegal.

Their findings, which will appear in the November-December issue of Marketing Science, add to the ongoing debate about technology that limits usage of digital content.

Because a DRM-restricted product will only be purchased by a legal user, …”only the legal users pay the price and suffer from the restrictions,” the study said. “Illegal users are not affected because the pirated product does not have DRM restrictions.”

“In many cases, DRM restrictions prevent legal users from doing something as normal as making backup copies of their music,” Vernik said. “Because of these inconveniences, some consumers choose to pirate.”

The research challenges conventional wisdom that removal of DRM restrictions increases piracy levels; the study shows that piracy can actually decrease when a company allows restriction-free downloads.

“Removal of these restrictions makes the product more convenient to use and intensifies competition with the traditional format (CDs), which has no DRM restrictions,” Vernik said. “This increased competition results in decreased prices for both downloadable and CD music and makes it more likely that consumers will move from stealing music to buying legal downloads.” …

The research also revealed that copyright owners don’t necessarily benefit from a lower amount of piracy. “Decreased piracy doesn’t guarantee increased profits,” Purohit said. “In fact, our analysis demonstrates that under some conditions, one can observe lower levels of piracy and lower profits.” …

via Removal of restrictions can decrease music piracy.

Physicists localize 3-D matter waves for first time

The impact of disorder on waves depends strongly on their energy in three dimensions. The high-energy red wave can freely propagate outward through the disordered green laser in the experiment, but the low-energy blue wave is trapped, or localized, by reflections from the disorder.

Liz Ahlberg – University of Illinois physicists have experimentally demonstrated for the first time how three-dimensional conduction is affected by the defects that plague materials. Understanding these effects is important for many electronics applications.

Led by physics professor Brian DeMarco, the researchers achieved complete localization of quantum matter waves in three dimensions, first theorized roughly half a century ago. The group published its findings in the Oct. 7 issue of the journal Science.

Defects in materials are inevitable, but their effects are poorly understood. Understanding how disorder in a material affects waves traveling through it has implications for many applications, including ultrasonic waves in medical imaging, lasers for imaging and sensing, and electron waves for electronics and superconductors.

“The physics behind disorder is fundamental to understanding the impact of unavoidable material imperfections on these kinds of applications,” DeMarco said.

Scientists have long theorized, but never observed, that strong disorder causing interference on all sides can trap a matter wave in one place, a phenomenon known as Anderson localization.

According to DeMarco, this is analogous to a trumpeter playing in a concert hall filled with randomly placed barriers that reflect sound waves. Instead of traveling in all directions, the sound stays at its source, never propagating outward because of destructive interference.

“The result? Perfect silence everywhere in the concert hall. The trumpeter blows into his instrument, but the sound never leaves the trumpet,” DeMarco said. “That’s exactly the case in our experiment, although we use quantum matter waves instead of sound, and the barriers are created using a speckled green laser beam.”

via Physicists localize 3-D matter waves for first time | News Bureau | University of Illinois.

Kansas City UFO: Object was ‘hovering over the highway’

New witnesses continue to file reports with MUFON as the Missouri office investigates. The photo was submitted by a witness to what appears now to be the same event – Case # 32355.

Another witness to the October 4, 2011, Kansas City, MO, triangle UFO sighting came forward October 5, 2011, who reports being just east of earlier witness reports – at the intersection of routes 470 and 40, according to testimony from the Mutual UFO Network (MUFON) witness reporting database.

Several witnesses have already reported who were near the I-70 intersection with Route 435.

Missouri MUFON is currently investigating these reports. Case updates will be available here immediately with any related news.

The new witness is a “family of four” who was driving home at 8 p.m. on October 4, when the object first came into view.

“We saw this object that had shape of stealth bomber that had green and white lights hovering over the highway,” the reporting witness stated. “At first I told my husband and children that I thought it was a blimp, but as we got closer it was doing weird maneuvers.”

The family did a maneuver of their own in the hopes of getting a better look at it.

“We turned around to get closer, and by the time we got close enough it shot if like a rocket.”

The witness wants to know what she saw.

“There was another object in sky that it flew over and the light on it was a white, very bright light. I then called my father – retired navy – to ask him if stealth bombers hover and have green and white lights – and he said ‘no.’ He said that it might be a Harrin. So I looked it up and it didn’t look like it either. So what was it that I saw?”

via Kansas City UFO: Object was ‘hovering over the highway’ – National ufo | Examiner.com.

Attack of the giant sky bug?

14 year old hunter wins fight with mountain lion attack using pocket knife

GREG OLSON – A 14-year-old Pike County deer hunter told authorities he was attacked by a mountain lion this weekend, using a pocketknife to fend off the attack.

The boy was taken by his father to Illini Community Hospital in Pittsfield, where he was treated, according to Illinois Department of Natural Resources spokesman Chris McCloud.

Jeremiah Dice was bow-hunting on his family’s property when he says a mountain lion crossed his path, according to a KHQA-TV story.

He told the television station that the mountain lion attacked him three times before he was able to injure it with a knife from his pocket. Dice was able to escape and run home with minor injuries thanks to his jacket and hat that protected him from most of the lion’s blows.

“As he landed on me, my head hit the ground and I grabbed him by the throat,” Dice told the Hannibal, Mo., station. “His mouth was open. He was trying to bite me. He used his paw to tear at my jacket and the other at my face.”

McCloud said he was not aware of any other mountain lion reports in Pike County.

Conservation police are investigating the attack.

Mountain lions — also called cougars, panthers, pumas, catamounts and other names — were hunted into extinction in most Eastern and Midwestern states during the 1800s and early 1900s.

via Pike hunter reports mountain lion attack | pike, lion, hunter – Jacksonville Illinois News and Information Jacksonville Journal Courier.

Beautiful creatures. Too bad we have nearly wiped them out. Here is what to do if you encounter a mountain lion:

If confronted: Never run. Never turn your back on the lion. Never bend or crouch. Look the lion straight in the eye. Make loud, firm noises.  You may even show your teeth or snarl.  Make yourself look big! Lift up your jacket. If you have a child, without bending down, place the child on your shoulders to look bigger.

You may even throw the child at the lion, if the child has a firearm loaded and ready to shoot and can do so while screaming and flying through the air. (Practice this often with live amo.) If the child throwing does not deter the lion, quickly wet yourself, then without bending down, defecate into your hand and fling the poo at the lion while screaming, “Xeeeenooooo!”. As the lion eats your head, try to gouge out an eye before you die.

Disclaimer: I have never fought a lion.

Hint: Only  the first part of these recommendations are correct. Do NOT throw a child at lion, as this will make you look smaller to the lion. In fact, pile up as many children on you as high as you can and keep making loud, firm noises: “XE!” “NO!” “XE!” “NO!” Like that.

Apple’s Siri is Apple’s buttocks in Japan

By: Chris Matyszczyk 

When I first heard that Apple had delivered a new, intelligent, and very personal assistant to everyone who buys an iPhone 4S, one question gripped me: Why had the company named her after Tom Cruise’s daughter? Was this a neat Hollywood homage?

Then I paid attention a little more and realized she was not called Suri, but Siri.

I am told, though, that most of Japan also paid attention and realized she was not called Suri, but Buttocks.

So many people have sent me the cheeky information that when you say “Siri” in Japanese it means “ass” that I hardly know whom to credit as being first.

Let’s say MSNBC’s post was the first to usher me to helplessness.

Naturally, friends, colleagues and spiritual advisers have all decided to bottom-feed on this issue. One suggested that Apple should rename the feature something more scientific– like Uranus.

Another merely muttered: “You’re talking into your what?”

Not for a moment do I republish their thoughts as the apogee of wit, merely to reflect that the idea of the Japanese talking rumpward seems to be amusing quite a swath of the world.

Twitter, naturally, is bummed out about this vital topic.

Yet Japan isn’t the only country where Siri has a difficult connotation. For Gizmodo reports that in Georgia “siri” is a fine, colloquial term for “penis.” In English, the most accurate translation appears to be the “hen’s husband” term for the male member.

While the locals in Georgia might find this a little bit of a siri-up, perhaps they will be more concerned this morning that famed action man Vladimir Putin is reportedly keen on re-creating something that sounds mightily like the Soviet Union.

In essence, brand names do sometimes have odd connotations. Many thought “iPad” a little too sanitary. My own favorite was the light bulb manufacturer, Osram– which, in Polish, means “I will defecate all over you/it”.

In watching, though, Apple’s new iPhone 4S ad (embottomed here), some might decide that Siri herself does, in fact, sound a little Japanese. …

via Apple’s Siri is Apple’s buttocks in Japan | Technically Incorrect – CNET News.

Bin Laden death: ‘CIA doctor’ accused of treason

Dr. Shakeel Afridi’s appointment at Agency Surgeon surprised many in his department. – link

A Pakistani commission investigating the US raid that killed Osama Bin Laden says a doctor accused of helping the CIA should be tried for high treason.

Dr Shakil Afridi is accused of running a CIA-sponsored fake vaccine programme in Abbottabad, where Bin Laden was killed, to try to get DNA samples.

He was arrested shortly after the 2 May US raid that killed the al-Qaeda chief.

The commission has been interviewing intelligence officials and on Wednesday spoke to Bin Laden family members.

Pakistan, which was deeply embarrassed by the raid, has described the covert US special forces operation as a violation of its sovereignty.

A government commission, headed by a former Supreme Court judge, has been charged with discovering how the US military was able to carry out the raid deep within Pakistan without being detected.

It is also investigating how Bin Laden was able to hide in Abbottabad, a garrison town, for several years. …

via BBC News – Bin Laden death: ‘CIA doctor’ accused of treason.

If there is a fake vaccine program there, how do we know there isn’t one here? What are we suppose to believe? Governments just seem to make up stories to embarrass each other.

Car eaten on road by mysterious water monster (photo)

A CAR was left stranded in a gaping hole caused by a burst water main on the A320 between Woking and Chertsey on Wednesday morning.

The large 12in pipe erupted at about 5am, flooding the road and causing a section beside the McLaren headquarters to collapse.

An eyewitness said a female driver had got out of her car after hearing a noise, when the road gave way and took her vehicle with it. Police said she was unhurt though.

Officers were called to the scene shortly afterwards and the road was then closed at around 7am.

The water was turned off by 8.30am but the road remained shut on Wednesday lunchtime because of the substantial hole in the southbound carriageway.

Gordon Foat, who lives near Martyrs Lane, saw the stricken silver Vauxhall Meriva wedged into the gap.

He said: “There’s a car which has been absorbed into the road, it just went in.

“The road’s had it, they are going to have to dig the whole road up.

“Apparently a woman was driving along and heard a noise so she got out of her car to check it, and that’s when it happened.” …

via Burst water main leaves gaping hole in A320 – News – getsurrey.

The Witch Doctors’ Gift: Potential New Drugs From A Cup Of Tea

Cyclotides are small disulfide-rich proteins that have the unusual feature of a cyclic backbone (hence the name cyclo – peptides). They contain six conserved cystine residues that are arranged in a cystine knot topology in which two disulfide bonds and their connecting backbone segments form an embedded ring in the structure that is penetrated by a third disulfide bond, as shown [left]. Cyclotides have a range of interesting biological activities including anti-HIV and neurotensin inhibition, anti-microbial activity and insecticidal activity. They are found in a variety of tropical plants from the Rubiaceae and Violaceae families. – cyclotide.com

A physician on a medical relief mission to Africa sees pregnant women sip a medicinal tea prepared by local witch doctors when the time for birth arrives. Made from the leaves of a plant called “kalata-kalata,” the tea speeds labor and delivery. Scientists analyze the plant and discover a remarkable new substance. The research puts them on course for discovery of potential new drugs for diseases that affect millions of people worldwide.

That truth-is-stranger-than-fiction scenario is the topic of the latest episode in the 2011 edition of a popular video series from the American Chemical Society (ACS), the world’s largest scientific society. Titled Prized Science: How the Science Behind ACS Awards Impacts Your Life, the videos are available without charge at the Prized Science website* and on DVD.

ACS encourages educators, schools, museums, science centers, news organizations and others to embed links to Prized Science on their websites. The videos discuss scientific research in non-technical language for general audiences. New episodes in the series, which focuses on ACS’ 2011 award recipients, will be issued periodically in the months ahead.

“Science awards shine light on individuals who have made impressive achievements in research,” noted ACS President Nancy B. Jackson, Ph.D. “Often, the focus is on the recipients, with the public not fully grasping how the award-winning research improves the everyday lives of people around the world. …

“New Drugs – From a Cup of Tea” features the research of David Craik, Ph.D., winner of the 2011 ACS Ralph F. Hirschmann Award in Peptide Chemistry. Peptides are chains of amino acids, the building blocks of proteins. Craik is a professor at the University of Queensland in Australia, and the video describes his research, which promises to turn kalata-like proteins, called cyclotides, into new drugs for treating health problems, such as antibiotic-resistant bacteria and even AIDS, which affect millions of people worldwide. Proteins already number among the world’s most important medicines. Insulin, for instance, is a protein. Many other proteins could become life-saving medicines. But there’s a problem with proteins and smaller chunks of proteins called peptides. They cannot be taken by mouth because the body breaks them apart during digestion, just like the protein in meat or soy. The video explains how cyclotides have a strong internal architecture that keeps them active when taken by mouth. /

via Potential New Drugs From A Cup Of Tea – The Witch Doctors’ Gift.

And of course the “Witch Doctor” gets all the profits and gives the healing formula away to everyone at no cost.

Marilyn Monroe statue protects people from the rain

It has been panned as one of the world’s worst public art eyesores, but from Chicago’s enormous Marilyn Monroe statue is a community service – protecting tourists from the rain.

The statue, which captures the iconic moment when the movie star bashfully held her dress down as a gust of wind billows the fabric around her was recently photographed as a safe haven for those looking to avoid a Chicago downpour.

The group is seen huddled around Monroe’s enviable legs and under her flowing dress as raindrops fall around the Windy City’s Pioneer Court.

via The only reason to keep the ugly Marilyn Monroe statue? She protects from the rain | Mail Online.