Ten migrants die in shipwreck off Libya: Italian navy
Rome (AFP) June 14, 2014 -
Italian sailors have recovered 10 bodies of migrants after a rubber dinghy sank off the Libyan coast, Italy's navy said Saturday.
Thirty-nine migrants were rescued after the vessel sank Friday some 40 nautical miles from the Libyan coast, the navy said, adding that the search for survivors continued on Saturday.
The boat was thought to have been carrying around 90 people.
A frigate a ...
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New York's High Line fetes fifth birthday
New York (AFP) June 13, 2014 -
New York's High Line - a public park built on elevated former train tracks - is celebrating its fifth birthday, with officials claiming it attracts more tourists than the Statue of Liberty.
Inspired by the "Coulee verte" in Paris, the urban promenade snakes nearly 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometers) along Manhattan's West Side, providing stunning views of the skyline and Hudson River.
Stretchin ...
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Obama renews climate change push
Irvine, United States (AFP) June 14, 2014 -
President Barack Obama renewed his campaign to curb carbon emissions Saturday, saying the debate over climate change is over.
Obama, who made the battle against climate change a core promise of his 2008 election campaign, has been stymied at the federal level by opposition from lawmakers.
Congress "is full of folks who stubbornly and automatically reject the scientific evidence," Obama t ...
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Kerry issues urgent call to save oceans
Washington (AFP) June 16, 2014 -
US Secretary of State John Kerry sounded the alarm Monday on the perils facing the world's oceans, calling for a global strategy to save the planet's life-giving seas.
"Let's develop a plan" to combat over-fishing, climate change and pollution, Kerry urged as he opened a two-day conference in Washington bringing together world leaders, scientists and industry captains.
"We as human being ...
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Malawi's prized chambo fish faces extinction
Mangochi, Malawi (AFP) June 13, 2014 -
In the decade that fisherman Edward Njeleza has been trawling the deep, clear waters of Lake Malawi in Africa's Great Rift Valley, he has seen his once abundant catch shrink by 90 percent.
Now he spends most days on the shore searching for pods and a special type of grass he uses to make necklaces, key rings and bracelets to supplement his income.
In the past, he and his nine fishing m ...
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Sea Shepherd battles to stop Faroes' dolphin 'grind'
Amsterdam (AFP) June 13, 2014 -
Hundreds of Sea Shepherd activists are heading for the Faroe Islands for an unprecedented campaign against a traditional dolphin hunt that they call "an obsolete massacre," the conservation group said Friday.
Relays of volunteers will patrol the ocean and beaches of the remote North Atlantic archipelago, an autonomous country within Denmark, from mid-June to October to try to block the killi ...
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Malaysian navy foils pirate attack in South China Sea
Kuala Lumpur (AFP) June 15, 2014 -
Malaysia's navy has fought off a pirate attack on a tanker off its east coast in the South China Sea, the International Maritime Bureau said Sunday.
The Malaysian force was assisted by the Indonesian and Singaporean navies in fending off the attack late Saturday, said Noel Choong, head of the IMB's Kuala Lumpur-based Piracy Reporting Centre.
The pirates fled the Singapore-managed tanker ...
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China official blasted for blaming lead poisoning on pencils
Beijing (AFP) June 16, 2014 -
A Chinese government official who blamed lead poisoning in more than 300 children on the possible chewing of school pencils was excoriated in state-run media and ridiculed online Monday.
Lead levels as high as three times national standards were found in the blood of children in a village in the central province of Hunan, with the contamination blamed on pollution from a local chemical plant ...
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US hosts talks to save oceans under 'siege'
Washington (AFP) June 15, 2014 -
US Secretary of State John Kerry launches an unprecedented global effort Monday to save the world's oceans under siege from overfishing, climate change and pollution.
Heads of government and state as well as ministers from some 80 countries will gather with researchers and experts from the fishing, plastics and farming industries for the two-day conference aiming to find ways to protect the ...
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US hosts talks to save oceans under 'siege'
Washington (AFP) June 15, 2014 -
US Secretary of State John Kerry launches an unprecedented global effort Monday to save the world's oceans under siege from overfishing, climate change and pollution.
Heads of government and state as well as ministers from some 80 countries will gather with researchers and experts from the fishing, plastics and farming industries for the two-day conference aiming to find ways to protect the ...
more
US hosts talks to save oceans under 'siege'
Washington (AFP) June 15, 2014 -
US Secretary of State John Kerry launches an unprecedented global effort Monday to save the world's oceans under siege from overfishing, climate change and pollution.
Heads of government and state as well as ministers from some 80 countries will gather with researchers and experts from the fishing, plastics and farming industries for the two-day conference aiming to find ways to protect the ...
more
Funky ferroelectric properties probed with X-rays
Washington DC (SPX) Jun 12, 2014 -
Ferroelectric materials like barium titanate, a ceramic used in capacitors, are essential to many electronic devices. Typical ferroelectric materials develop features called domain walls with unusual properties - such as lines of electrical conduction completely different from the surrounding material. These properties are technologically useful but poorly understood.
Now an international ...
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Active particles may enhance phase separation
Mainz, Germany (SPX) Jun 16, 2014 -
Systems containing self-propelling particles, such as bacteria or artificial colloidal particles, are always out of equilibrium but may show interesting transitions between different states, reminiscent of phase transitions in equilibrium.
However, application of analytical and computational methodologies from equilibrium statistical mechanics is questionable to study properties of such ac ...
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DNA-Linked Nanoparticles Form Switchable "Thin Films" on a Liquid Surface
Upton NY (SPX) Jun 12, 2014 -
Scientists seeking ways to engineer the assembly of tiny particles measuring just billionths of a meter have achieved a new first-the formation of a single layer of nanoparticles on a liquid surface where the properties of the layer can be easily switched. Understanding the assembly of such nanostructured thin films could lead to the design of new kinds of filters or membranes with a variable me ...
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Contextuality puts the 'magic' in quantum computing
Toronto, Canada (SPX) Jun 16, 2014 -
A new theoretical advance explains where the power of quantum computation comes from, and will help researchers design and build better computers and algorithms. The strange properties of quantum mechanics give quantum computers the potential to perform some computations exponentially faster than conventional computers. But where the extra power comes from - and how best to take advantage of it ...
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Researchers find weird magic ingredient for quantum computing
Waterloo, Canada (SPX) Jun 16, 2014 -
A form of quantum weirdness is a key ingredient for building quantum computers according to new research from a team at the University of Waterloo's Institute for Quantum Computing (IQC). In a new study published in the journal Nature, researchers have shown that a weird aspect of quantum theory called contextuality is a necessary resource to achieve the so-called magic required for universal qu ...
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Magnetic cooling enables efficient, 'green' refrigeration
Washington DC (SPX) Jun 12, 2014 -
Magnetic cooling is a promising new refrigeration technology boasting several advantages - ranging from lower energy consumption to eliminating the use of hazardous fluids - that combine to make it a much more environmentally friendly option than today's standard fluid-compression form of refrigeration.
One novel magnetic cooling approach, developed by a team of Canadian-Bulgarian research ...
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Manipulating and Detecting Ultrahigh Frequency Sound Waves
Berkeley CA (SPX) Jun 16, 2014 -
An advance has been achieved towards next generation ultrasonic imaging with potentially 1,000 times higher resolution than today's medical ultrasounds. Researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)'s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) have demonstrated a technique for producing, detecting and controlling ultrahigh frequency sound waves at the nanometer scale.
Thro ...
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Week Begins With Spacesuit Checks Before Thursday Spacewalk
Houston TX (SPX) Jun 17, 2014 -
The International Space Station's six residents were preparing for Thursday's spacewalk while continuing more science and maintenance aboard the orbital laboratory.
Cosmonauts Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Artemyev began Monday morning setting up their Russian Orlan spacesuits. NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman assisted the duo installing U.S. lights and television cameras on the suits. The cosmo ...
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Hydrothermal Vents Could Explain Chemical Precursors to Life
By Michael Schirber for Astrobiology Magazine -
Moffett Field CA (SPX) Jun 17, 2014
Roy Price first heard about the hydrothermal vents in New Caledonia's Bay of Prony a decade ago. Being a scuba diver and a geologist, he was fascinated by the pictures of a 38-meter-high calcite "chimney" that had precipitated out of the highly-alkaline vent fluid.
His attraction to this South Pacific site intensified over the years, as it was later rev ...
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Messenger Spots Giant Space Weather Effects at Mercury
Greenbelt MD (SPX) Jun 17, 2014 -
The solar wind of particles streaming off the sun helps drive flows and swirls in space as complicated as any terrestrial weather pattern. Scientists have now spotted at planet Mercury, for the first time, a classic space weather event called a hot flow anomaly, or HFA, which has previously been spotted at Earth, Venus, Saturn and Mars.
"Planets have a bow shock the same way a supersonic j ...
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Coffee for cosmonauts! First 'ISSpresso' machine to arrive in space
Moscow (Voice of Russia) Jun 17, 2014 -
The International Space Station is set to welcome the first coffee machine in space in November. Until now, sleepy astronauts have been surviving only on dry powdered pouch-based products. The coffee machine, called the ISSpresso, is a joint project developed by Italian coffee company Argotec and the Italian Space Agency.
"We have been thinking about taking espresso into space for some tim ...
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US expects to continue partnership with Russia on ISS after 2020
Moscow (Voice of Russia) Jun 17, 2014 -
Roskosmos has received a request from NASA for extension of the ISS' usage until 2024, TASS reports. The actual agreement on the International Space Station (ISS) will be enforeced until 2020.
The US hopes for cooperation with Russia under the ISS program after 2020 said ISS flight Program Manager at NASA Sean Fuller.
"We have built up a wonderful orbital laboratory and hope that it' ...
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Discovery of Earth's Northernmost Perennial Spring
Boulder CO (SPX) Jun 17, 2014 -
A Canadian team lead by Stephen Grasby reports the discovery of the highest latitude perennial spring known in the world. This high-volume spring demonstrates that deep groundwater circulation through the cryosphere occurs, and can form gullies in a region of extreme low temperatures and with morphology remarkably similar to those on Mars.
The 2009 discovery raises many new questions becau ...
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Webb's Fully Integrated 'Heart' Lowered into the Chamber
Greenbelt, MD (SPX) Jun 17, 2014 -
Engineer Jack Marshall held his breath. The "heart" of the James Webb Space Telescope hung from a cable 30 feet in the air as it was lowered slowly into the massive thermal vacuum chamber at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
This "heart" of Webb is called the ISIM or Integrated Science Instrument Module, which along with its thermal vacuum test frame and supporting ...
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