Variations of a blue pigment were developed at Oregon State University. Blue is sometimes not an easy color to make. Blue pigments of the past have often been expensive (ultramarine blue was made from the gemstone lapis lazuli, ground up), poisonous (cobalt blue is a possible carcinogen and Prussian blue, another well-known pigment, can leach [...]
Archive for November, 2009
By Happy Accident, Chemists Produce a New Blue
Posted in Physical sciences on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Psychological Therapy 32 Times More Cost Effective at Increasing Happiness Than Money
Posted in Law, Living, tagged Psychological therapy on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Research by the University of Warwick and the University of Manchester finds that psychological therapy could be 32 times more cost effective at making you happy than simply obtaining more money. The research has obvious implications for large compensation awards in law courts but also has wider implications for general public health. Chris Boyce of [...]
Meet Hobbie-J, the smartest rat in the world
Posted in Health, tagged Dementia, Hobbie-J on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
The success of Hobbie-J, which is named after a Chinese cartoon character, brings new hope for future dementia patients A rat is impressing American scientists with her extraordinary intellect. Hobbie-J has been dubbed the smartest rat in the world after its NR2B gene, which controls memory, was boosted as an embryo. The rodent can remember [...]
Who Knew I Was Not the Father?
Posted in Law, Living, tagged DNA on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Mike L. has remained a father to a daughter that wasn’t really “his.” I. It was in July 2007 when Mike L. asked the Pennsylvania courts to declare that he was no longer the father of his daughter. For four years, Mike had known that the girl he had rocked to sleep and danced with [...]
He Can’t Take Another Bow
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
An icon of a White House that is coming to seem amateurish. This week, two points in an emerging pointillist picture of a White House leaking support—not the support of voters, though polls there show steady decline, but in two core constituencies, Washington’s Democratic-journalistic establishment, and what might still be called the foreign-policy establishment. From [...]
Why Obama Isn’t Changing Washington
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
There is no way he can grow the government without attracting more lobbyists and more political acrimony. One insight distinguished Barack Obama from the other presidential candidates last year. While he lacked experience or a special grasp of issues, Mr. Obama said he uniquely understood what ails Washington, and what was causing the endless squabbling [...]
Voter Anger Is Building Over Deficits
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Politics on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
The generic poll shows a 16-point swing to the GOP over last year. After engineering an unprecedented spending surge for nearly a year, President Barack Obama now wants to signal that he takes deficits seriously. So this week the White House announced that it is considering creating a commission to figure how to fix the [...]
Exploring a Low-Acid Diet for Bone Health
Posted in Health on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
The science of osteoporosis and its resultant fractures has long been plagued by some vexing observations. Why, for example, are osteoporotic fractures relatively rare in Asian countries like Japan, where people live as long or longer than Americans and consume almost no calcium-rich dairy products? Why, in Western countries that consume the most dairy foods, [...]
It’s a new species. No it isn’t. Yes it is. No it isn’t. Yes it is…
Posted in Natural sciences, tagged Flores on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
An artist’s impression of the 3ft female hobbit, Homo floresiensis, whose remains were found in a cave on the Indonesian island of Flores. When her miniature skull and tiny skeleton were revealed publicly for the first time in 2004, scientists expressed their amazement that such a small species of human could have existed on the [...]
What not to wear in court
Posted in Law, Weird cases on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
“You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth,” the playwright Henrik Ibsen wrote. That principle, however, does not apply to crusading lawyers. A federal court in New York recently ruled that lawyer Todd Bank does not have a constitutional right to stand up in court [...]
Liberty, Equality, Gastronomy: Paris via a 19th-Century Guide
Posted in Living, tagged Gastronomy, Paris on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Au Rocher de Cancale, at its present location on Rue Montorgueil since 1846. A marvelous painting of a gourmand at his table hangs in the Musée Carnavalet in Paris — a portly, pink-faced figure happily gorging on a regal casserole, with a bottle of wine at one elbow and a luscious-looking soufflé at the other. [...]
Bringing the Buzz Back to the Café
Posted in Living, tagged Coffeehouses on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Once they plotted revolutions, now they’re typing blogs. Today’s cafe society is a weak decaf. The coffeehouse may just be mankind’s greatest invention. It certainly is the most collective one: In the classic, which is to say Viennese, form, the coffeehouse is perhaps the finest collaboration between Europe, Asia and Africa. It is almost as [...]
A crime against fashion
Posted in Law, Weird cases on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Communities in America get tough on sagging trousers When defence lawyer Carol Bickerstaff told a judge in a recent case, “Your honour, we now have the fashion police,” she was not being metaphorical. She was referring to the situation of her client, Julius Hart, 17, who had been arrested by police and put in the [...]
Poland to Ban Communist Symbols
Posted in History, Human rights, Law, Politics, tagged Poland on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Vestiges of ‘Genocidal System’ Poland is considering criminalizing its communist past. Reforming Poland’s hate-crime legislation may mean criminalizing communism. An amendment to the criminal code awaiting the president’s signature would ban a broad category of communist symbols. Left-wing politicians say the law does more to violate human rights than protect them. Poland is on the [...]
How Hummingbirds Get Their Nectar With Tiny ‘Straws’
Posted in Natural sciences, tagged Hummingbird on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
It is harder to suck liquid through a thin straw than a wider one because of viscosity. Yet a hummingbird is able extract nectar from a flower by wrapping its tongue into a hummingbird-size straw. How? The answer is that the hummingbird is taking advantage of the forces of surface tension, the same forces that [...]
French First Lady to Act in Allen Film
Posted in Arts and Entertainment, tagged Carla Bruni, Woody Allen on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
France’s first lady said she has accepted a proposal from U.S. film director Woody Allen to act in his next movie. Carla Bruni has agreed to star in Woody Allen’s next movie. “I don’t know for what role, but I said yes,” Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, a model-turned-singer and the wife of President Nicolas Sarkozy, told French [...]
Early American Original
Posted in Arts and Entertainment, tagged Charles Wilson Peale, The Staircase Group on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Charles Willson Peale’s revolutionary ‘Staircase Group’ Originally titled “Portrait of Raphaelle Peale and Titian Ramsay Peale,” the so-called “Staircase Group” by Charles Willson Peale (1741-1827) is arguably the first major original painting in American art. Other significant portraits and history paintings preceded it, but they were invariably indebted to the compositions and conventions of English [...]
Seeking justice
Posted in Law, Politics, tagged India, Mumbai, Pakistan on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
India and Pakistan Pakistan charges seven over the Mumbai terrorist attack. Ties with India may improve ALMOST a year to the day after a spectacular three-day assault by Pakistani terrorists on the Indian city of Mumbai, in which at least 170 people were killed, a court in Pakistan has charged seven men with organising it. [...]
See you in Denmark
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Energy and Environment, tagged Copenhagen on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Climate-change talks America and China announce targets for carbon emissions to take to Copenhagen IN THE optimistic view, Barack Obama has given a jolt of energy to the Copenhagen climate talks. On Wednesday November 25th the White House announced that he will appear during the first week of negotiations with a specific American promise: to [...]
Feeling in the dark
Posted in Computers, tagged Blindness on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Computer mice for the blind A tactile mouse helps blind people to use the internet COMPUTERS have become such an integral part of life, in the rich world at least, that even social networking is done online. The blind, however, are often excluded from such interactions. Now a system has been developed to make it [...]
The right call on climate
Posted in Editorials and opinion, Energy and Environment on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
President Obama has improved the chance of a concrete response from other countries. AFTER months of speculation, President Obama announced on Wednesday that he will travel to Copenhagen to attend an international climate-change conference scheduled for Dec. 7-18. More important is that he also decided to take with him an American emissions-reduction target. The United [...]
The gift of not giving
Posted in Economy and business, Editorials and opinion, tagged Christmas on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Solid proof that Uncle Ralph wasted his money Another huge, value-destroying hurricane is about to slam America, destroying billions of dollars of value. Another Katrina? No, another Christmas. This voluntary December calamity is explained in a darkly amusing little book that is about the size of an iPhone. “Scroogenomics: Why You Shouldn’t Buy Presents for [...]
Obama’s skeptic in chief
Posted in Conflicts and wars, Editorials and opinion, Politics, tagged Afghanistan on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
With President Obama finally ready to announce his decision about Afghanistan, it’s a good time to examine the role played by Vice President Biden, who emerged during the policy review as the administration’s in-house skeptic — the “questioner in chief,” as one insider puts it. Biden has been the point man in challenging some premises [...]
The Turkey Day Trot, Explained
Posted in Living, tagged Running on November 26, 2009 | Comments Off
Every Thanksgiving, I get the urge to chase something. Like a dog after a bird. Or a Neanderthal in search of prey. It’s very primitive, I admit, and harder still to say with a straight face. But just before the big feast, I feel the need for biped speed over a moldering carpet of leaves. [...]
Today in History – November 25
Posted in This day in history, tagged November 25 on November 25, 2009 | Comments Off
Today is Wednesday, Nov. 25, the 329th day of 2009. There are 36 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History On Nov. 25, 1783, the British evacuated New York, their last military position in the United States during the Revolutionary War. On this date In 1120, William the Aetheling, duke of Normandy, was [...]
Food, Kin and Tension at Thanksgiving
Posted in Living, tagged Thanksgiving on November 25, 2009 | Comments Off
For Thanksgiving dinner, what side dish would you prefer to accompany your turkey — a serving of well-marinated conflict over how much or how little you eat, or some nice, fresh criticism of your cooking skills? As families gather around the country this week to celebrate Thanksgiving, many of them are bracing for the intense [...]
Discovering Life in Vegetative Patients
Posted in Health, tagged Rom Houben on November 25, 2009 | Comments Off
‘My Second Birth’ For over 20 years, doctors thought Rom Houben was brain dead. But then, neurologist Steven Laureys discovered that the Belgian was very much awake. Experts say that up to 40 percent of those thought to be in a persistent vegetative state are, in fact, quite conscious. For half of his life Rom [...]
If Odysseus Had GPS
Posted in Living, tagged GPS on November 25, 2009 | Comments Off
When Robinson Crusoe was stranded on a tropical island he did pretty well for himself, all things considered. But to the rest of the world he was as good as dead. Daniel Defoe’s novel, masquerading as a memoir, came out in 1719, a time when voyages were dangerous and people could easily be lost to [...]
