• It’s arachna-Bowie! A rare, hairy, and yellow spider has been named after the master of Ziggy Stardust himself. It’s new title: Heteropoda davidbowie.
• Today’s flabbergast: If Fruit Loops are a healthy food, our derriere is a color television set.
• Swimmers of Amity Island, beware—great white sharks have been tagged up in New England (hear that, Robert Shaw?).
• It was only a matter of time: Porn hits Twitter.
• Meanwhile, Boulder, CO is being taken over by ladybugs.
• Bangladeshi newspapers get punked, bigtime (and for once, it wasn’t even deliberate).
•Worst excuse ever for underage sex? Or best?
• Do science raps ever get old? The answer: no. Maybe this one about the swine flu will, er, go viral.
• Sure, some people are more vertically challenged than others, but height actually varies very little among humans, compared to other species… and scientists still aren’t sure why.
• Is global warming forestalling an ice age?
• A hair-brained idea? Gel does wonders for your coif, and now it may be able to fix your brain, too.
• Do you sue Yahoo? This woman tried to but was unsuccessful; she didn’t like the links that a search of her own name brought up.
• Bottoms up! An unsuspecting man found a decaying frog inside his can of soda. No word yet on whether the animal croaked before or after it somehow slipped into the beverage…or what stage of drinking the soda the dude was in when he discovered the critter.
Related Content:
Discoblog: Robot Model Struts the Catwalk in Japan
Science Not Fiction: Hungry Robots. What Could Go Wrong?
Discoblog: New Humanoid Robot Shows More Emotion Than Some Humans
• Back away from the game controller: Venezuela is laying out a plan for a new law that would ban violent video games in an effort to cut back on rampant crime in the country, even though studies have been unable to prove a link between gaming and violent behavior.
• Because walking, trams, and moving walkways are so last millennium, business travelers at London’s Healthrow Airport will soon be able to hitch a ride on driverless podcars. The battery-powered, robotic cars constitute the first personalized rapid transit system that lets riders control their destination.
•In a meaty ode to the food web site This is Why You’re Fat, here are 10 structures made entirely out of meat. Feats of engineering, no doubt.
• How one scientist hopes to turn chicken embryos into dinosaurs. Not only is it scientifically implausible, but it seems like there was a movie based on a similar idea—and it didn’t turn out well (for the humans, that is).
• Can red help you score? It seems red doesn’t just make women more attractive to men; it can also help make sports teams more victorious.
• And finally, infinitely adorable otters holding hands… er, paws?
Related Content:
Discoblog: Robot Model Struts the Catwalk in Japan
Science Not Fiction: Hungry Robots. What Could Go Wrong?
Discoblog: New Humanoid Robot Shows More Emotion Than Some Humans
• Will wearable kidneys spell the end of dialysis forever? And do they come in pink?
• At last! A scientific explanation for why you get chills down your spine during that Jimmy Page solo.
• The animal kingdom’s most gruesome weapon: The Spanish ribbed newt “pushes out its ribs until they pierce through its body, exposing a row of bones that act like poisonous barbs.”
• If we can put a man on the moon, we can put a video ad in a print magazine.
• Ok, so maybe the human dissections of the early 1900s were a bit gruesome—but at least they didn’t use stolen dogs.
• What movies are the ISS residents watching in space? Hint: It ain’t all The Right Stuff.
• Bizarre condition of the day: phantosmia, where you smell something and can’t stop smelling it, sometimes for months.
• Thank goodness we’re doing something productive in space: A satellite is tracking and improving French wine harvests.
• The Romantics managed to mesh science and poetry. Any hope for the rest of us?
• Technology can be sexist; news at 11.
• Is the double-secret hangover cure really…asparagus?
• The bees are dying of some mysterious illness! Oh wait, no they’re not! Instead,they’re being attacked by Rasberry crazy ants. (Yes, we said Rasberry crazy ants.) It’s like Alien v. Predator, except in Houston.
•PopSci, answering life’s existential science questions. Like “Why does Coke taste different out of a glass bottle than a plastic one?”
• True “out of body experiences” one step closer with virtual reality. It’s not quite Total Recall yet, but it’s getting close.
• A new lifelike doll on the market in Spain will breast feed from its “mother.” Cue the raging debate over child psychology.
• I’m sorry I didn’t call you back—a pelican swallowed my cell phone! I swear!
• Google Earth pic captures a “gate to Heaven.” Where’s it located? Brooklyn, ‘natch.
• And finally, we bring you: PandaCam.
• Robots are fighting fires in London, and thereby sparing humans from the dangers of blazes started by explosive industrial gas.
• Meanwhile, researchers are looking to pizza parlors for techniques to help them come up with a way to make robots more dexterous.
• He shoots, he scores! Check out this video of a soccer-playing robot. What’s next—World Cup, Robot Edition?
• Batter up! Make way for the robo-pitcher.
Related Content:
Discoblog: Robot Model Struts the Catwalk in Japan
Science Not Fiction: Hungry Robots. What Could Go Wrong?
Discoblog: New Humanoid Robot Shows More Emotion Than Some Humans
DISCOVER: 20 Things You Didn’t Know About Robots
DISCOVER: When Robots Live Among Us
• First it was toilets in space. Then spacesuits. Then the LHC (well, it was already broken—but now it’s even more broken). Leading one to conclude: The science is broke! Fix It!
• Earthquakes not only move us, they move islands too. (More news for Joe Barton.)
• So yeah, the 40th anniversary of the moon landing happened. But what human achievements will top it? Here’s 5 ideas.
• Cool tech video of the day: a Canon 5D shutter in slooow motion.
• Looking to hit the beach in Texas? Beware the basketball-sized blobs of oil.
• Also, we are official fans of this blog. As should be anyone who cares about science.
• The kelp best known as an ingredient in miso soup has invaded the San Francisco Bay, worrying environmentalists because of the risk it could pose to the area’s delicate ecosystem. Just when you thought it was safe to go in the water…
• One small step for man, one giant leap for Twitterkind! Nature News is twittering the Apollo 11 mission in real-time as it happened 40 years ago.
• If you’ve ever yearned for the chance to re-make Star Wars: New Hope, here’s your chance: The Web site Star Wars: Uncut is crowd-sourcing the movie, offering 472 15-second clips of the film to re-make.
• The Toronto International Film Festival will commence with a documentary of Charles Darwin, brought to you by movie stars and real-life couple Paul Bettany and Jennifer Connelly, who star as Darwin and his wife, respectively.
• And finally, check out this video of, well, the world’s fastest everything…clapper, cup stacker, sprinter. We got tired just watching it.
• Tires made with orange oil instead of petroleum are in the making! Perhaps they’ll exude a light citrus scent on the highway.
• A badger intoxicated from a binge on overripe (and therefore alcoholic) cherries disrupted traffic in Berlin when he parked himself in the middle of the road. Apparently the little guy got pretty belligerent, too: “Having failed to scare the animal away, officers eventually chased it from the road with a broom,” according to Reuters.
• The owners of a runaway dog are pretty pissed off. They’re following the canine’s example in the hopes of bringing the pup back: Spraying their own urine around their neighborhood. Let’s hope they don’t try using, er, option number two.
• The zoo-against-zoo fight in Germany over celebrity polar bear Knut is finally settled…to the tune of $600,000.
• Cell phones: They’re not just for talking anymore, and some of the pictures people take with them are surprisingly high-quality. Check out these awesome cell phone pics sent in by readers to the New York Times.
