Summer 2007
A Focus on Science and Creativity
“In the News” Vol. 1

I read at the Discover Magazine website that there's a place in Japan where they heat up large amounts of garbage with a torch able to produce ten thousand degree plasma flame almost the same as the sun. In turn they extract Syn gas to run generator turbines, as well as filter out toxins to todays EPA standards and separate metals for other uses. They process up to 220 tons of municipal waste a day. A company named Geoplasma is building a 425 million dollar plant in Florida near a landfill where they plan on powering 36,000 homes using the daily garbage there and some landfill garbage. This system seems to make sense of turning mass back into energy.

The SFChronicle reports another system will soon be used in San Francisco where they want to replace disposable plastic shopping bags with compostable stronger better bags made from the starches in corn and potatoes. They cost the same as the ones their using now so the transition should go smooth.


From the Reuters/Hollywood Reporter, the Virtual World "Second Life" to have live virtual concerts. This could be a new venue for helping bands sell more music as they perform in their avatars via a 3D multiple user world.

Sony just introduced a flexible color video screen at one hundredth of an inch thick. Still in its small stages but able to be worn or used as wallpaper this new tech gives Sony a new edge in TV's.

NewScientist.com reports that DARPA requests,"soft, flexible, mobile objects that can identify and maneuver through openings smaller than their static structural dimensions". Such devices are known as chembots or squeezebots. They are similar to the liquid bot substrate making the T1000 android from the first Terminator movie.

At Denmarks' Copenhagen University, physicists propose that nerves transmit signals with sound, not electricity. Other experiments found no thermodynamic heat pattern from electricity. A special kind of sound pulse called a soliton can propogate without losing strength along our nerve membrane which is made of a material similar to olive oil. It can change from liquid to solid through temperature changes. Anisthetics work by freezing and propagating the solitons.

Reuters reports researchers in Denmark are attempting to grow pork meat in a laboratory with the aim of feeding millions without the need to raise and slaughter animals. Researchers first isolate muscle stem cells which can grow and multiply into muscle cells. Then they stimulate the cells to develop by giving them nutrients and exercise with electric current to build bulk. They can only make thin layers of pork now. Nasa scientists are also trying to do this in hopes we can grow meat in space.

Canada.coms Edmonton Journal reports the Canadian Space Agency and 13 other organizations are planning a space exploration and colonization project. In mining the moon they may produce liquid oxygen rocket propellant, which might be more economical to make in space than to deliver from Earth. Mining may also yield titanium for building light weight strong metal projects, and helium-3, which could run fusion reactors in the near future. Within this vision space tourism will play a big part too.

If you can't wait for a space tour, general admission tickets to the Kennedy Space Center's Visitors Complex are about $40 each. What most people don't know is there is a space shuttle simulator with rumbling seats and great sounds and sights putting your imagination to work as you pilot yourself to a scenic surrounding

ScienceNews.org reports evidence suggests a comet exploded above North America from the Carolinas to California and as far north as Alberta Canada, abruptly ending the ice age 12,900 years ago as well a some prehistoric peoples. The rain of exploded molten pieces broke the ice sheet covering Canada as well as started massive forest fires across the US. Fresh water rushed the Atlantic and a 1,200 year cold spell began.

Space.com reports REM (rapid eye mount) telescope at the European Space Organization's La Silla Observatory in Chile, spotted a star exploding sending particles 200 times the size of earth to nearly light speed.

Livescience.com reports a way to turn waste heat into sound then into electricity. When a cylinder shaped resonator that can fit in the palm of your hand is filled with metal, wool, plastic plates or glass fibers and waste heat from a nuclear reactor or a laptop computer goes through one end, one sound frequency will come out the other end through a piezoelectric device squeezing the sound creating a steady electrical voltage able to charge a battery or run a cooling fan.

Natural Lemon Remedies
1. Using a lemon to sanitize a cutting board or
2. sprinkle some on fruits and vegetables to stop them from browning like apples, pears, and avocado.
3. You can even hold a skewered half a lemon over an open flame or an electric stove till the peel turns a golden brown then mix the juice with a teaspoon of honey and swallow to relieve a sore throat.

Famous quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson,” yet, within the limits of human education and agency, we may say great men exist that there may be greater men. The destiny of organized nature is amelioration, and who can tell its limits? It is for man to tame the chaos; on every side, whilst he lives, to scatter the seeds of science and of song, that climate, corn, animals, men, may be milder, and the germs of love and benefit may be multiplied."

Transition toward smart choices is one of the hardest parts. It’s happening slowly everyday. Some car manufacturers are focusing more on hybrid technology, chain supermarkets are carrying more organics, less pollutive flat screen monitors are more standard, energy companies buy back renewable energy and the Internet reaches and teaches others how one is doing something better. Let’s talk more about improving and creating the good we need with the science we have to make it more known and helpful to all for a better tomorrow.