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Showing posts with label SCIENCE. Show all posts

Sunday, August 25, 2013

Science: Girls with Secret Labs!

It's not just Dexter with a secret lab at home!!!

Turns out, this whole time, there have been two girls who could kinda pass as Dee Dee with secret labs in their homes. Okay, maybe not secret. 16 year old Evie Sobczack has a laboratory in her garage where she's been tinkering with a device for extracting algae byproduct for alternative fuel. As if one chick with an at-home lab wasn't already cool enough, 17 year old Sara Volz has a lab in her room under her loft-bed! With it she's been developing a process for increasing the amount of output from algae grown for biofuel. Both are blondish, both are teens, both have their own laboratories at home, they live across the country from each other, and are legitimately innovating!

Introooducing... Eviiieeee Sobczack! Evie has developed a totally new chemical-free way to extract oils from algae and turn them into biofuel. OH, and it's 20% more betterer (*cough* efficient) than current known methods!! BOOM. The device she invented won first place at the Intel INTERNATIONAL (not just national) Science and Engineering Fair. She started the project in 8th grade (I was so stupid in 8th grade *facepalm*) designing her own bioreactor, cellulose blaster, and other equipment that she needed to make her award winning device.

Ladies and Gents, 16 yr old Evie Sobczack of Florida

via Inhabitat

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, 17yr old Sara Volz made a biofuel lab under her bed to work on a method for identifying which algae are most productive. She successfully invented a way to do this and thereby increase the productivity of the algae for biofuel by honing in on algae producing the most oils and eliminating the poor performers. Her innovation led her to win the $100,000 winning prize from the Intel Science Talent Search. Unlike Sara, the only dedication I had at 17 was to eating brownies, not sleeping with the same light cycles that the algae in my bedroom lab required. I tip my hat to her!

So cute with her sciency stuff!!

Sara Volz, 17yrs old, of Colorado

via CoExist

I'm very excited about algae as an energy resource now. Don't be surprised if I write a post all about it sometime; I was tempted to go on about it here and now!!! My better judgement is telling me to pace myself.

Needless to say, these girls are an inspiration and provide us with some hope for the future and for our dire green energy needs.

Bangorang!
Heather
The Incredible Dork

Friday, June 28, 2013

Mouse cloned from a drop of blood!

Science has never ceased to amaze me.

For the first time, Scientists cloned a mouse from a single drop of blood. Unlike other cloning experiments, this clone lived a normal lifespan and was even able to give birth (many other clones have been infertile).

Why a mouse? Well mice are used in many scientific studies and many human ailments such as cancer and substance abuse. Since with this method, the donor does not need to be euthanized, it can be used to create “invaluable strains of mice” for use in laboratories. Mice are just one example, but this method can be used to create all sorts of animals, from milk producing cows, to even Woolly Mammoths and Sabre-Tooth Tigers.

The process is called somatic cell nuclear transfer which involved transferring the nucleus from an adult cell, which can be obtain from blood, into an unfertilized egg, basically replacing the egg’s nucleus with the adult one.

Of course, this new advancement doesn’t come without its usual backlash. We are all familiar with the controversy surrounding stem cell research for use in humans and with the idea of being able to bring back long extinct species with this type of cloning or creating animals for a specific purpose (farm work, lab research), it brings with it a whole new set of issues.

Via BBC

Friday, April 5, 2013

Parallel Universes Explained!

We've seen the idea of parallel universes time and time again. We hear about it in comic books, movies, books, television, but what is the science behind it?

Alright, well without having to be some sort of physicist or having to dedicate an hour watching something on the Discovery Channel, here is an explanation you can understand:

So play around with that and try not to give yourself a brain cramp.

Tuesday, January 22, 2013

Want to have a Caveman-Baby?

Ladies, would you like a chance at being the mom of a Neanderthal? Professor George Church of Harvard University says that all he needs is "...an adventurous female human."

Professor Church says that he has extracted enough DNA from fossils to reconstruct the DNA of the extinct human species. Neanderthals are believed to have gone extinct about 33,000 years ago.

"We can clone all kinds of mammals, so it's very likely that we could clone a human," he says in an interview with Der Spiegel, a German magazine. "Why shouldn't we be able to do so?" [I'm pretty sure I've already seen this happen on a SyFy channel Saturday night movie and it didn't turn out well]

While the technology for cloning does exist, many countries have already banned human cloning.

Via The Telegraph (UK)

Some famous caveman kids:

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Want to go to Mars?

Do you have what it takes to be among the first people to live on the red planet? A Dutch start-up, MARS-ONE plans to start sending over colonists in 2022 with additional screws being sent every 2 years. YOU CAN BE ONE OF THEM!

According to their site, applicants do not need to be medical doctors, pilots or geologists. While education, skills, and real world experience will most likely play a part in the selection process, their base requirements are that applicants are "18 years of age, have a deep sense of purpose, willingness to build and maintain healthy relationships, the capacity for self-reflection and ability to trust." All skills required for life on Mars will be learned during training. Each candidate will undergo a minimum of eight years of training before stepping foot on Mars.

If you were one of the kids at sleep away camp that cried at night because you were homesick, do not apply. MARS-ONE is only issuing one way tickets. Colonists are expected to live out the rest of their lives on Mars. This fact along with the 8 years of training should weed-out would be astronauts from living out fantasies of traipsing around on Barsoom (Edgar Rice Burroughs reference).

For more details on becoming a Mars colonist, check out MARS-ONE's website.

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Recent Posts

Science: Girls with Secret Labs!

Mouse cloned from a drop of blood!

Parallel Universes Explained!

Want to have a Caveman-Baby?

Want to go to Mars?