Laura Gilfillan's Blog - Posts Tagged "science"
Watch out Captain Kirk
Okay, Captain Kirk, here's another danger you've got to watch out for while you're wandering around the cosmos. Here's an article from Curiosity about magnetars.
Magnetars are one of the most extreme and mysterious objects in space. They're surprisingly small, they're incredibly dense, and, like their name suggests, they pack one heck of a magnetic pull.
At the final stage of a star's life, it explodes into a supernova. As it collapses in on itself, it outshines all of its neighbors before fading slowly away. If the living star was big enough, it leaves over a neutron star: a star so dense that, although it can often be the diameter of a small city, a teaspoon of its matter weighs at least a billion tons. Meanwhile, they spin fast—really fast. Hundreds of times per second fast. All this density equates to a really powerful magnetic field—about a trillion times more powerful than Earth's. But magnetars? Scientists aren't sure why, but they're an especially magnetic form of neutron star. Their magnetic fields measure at about 1,000 trillion times that of Earth.
Scientists have been on the search for magnetars since 1979, when a shock of gamma rays (later identified as coming from magnetar SGR 0525-66) pulsed through the solar system, resulting in space equipment disruptions and atmospheric abnormalities. In the decades since, fewer than 25 neutron stars out of about 2,000 across the galaxy have been dubbed magnetars, though a handful of other candidates are pending confirmation. From Earth's standpoint, that's a good thing. Just over a decade ago, in 2004, effects from an explosion, or "starquake," of SGR 1806-20, (50,000 light years away), was powerful enough to impact the Earth. It damaged and disabled satellites, and even partially ionized the planet's upper atmosphere.
Read more about magnetars
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Let's Talk to the Animals
Who hasn't ever wished they could talk with animals? What if they already have their own language, and what if we could learn it?
curiosity.com
Will We Ever Speak To Animals In Their Own Language?What if you could eavesdrop on the conversations of songbirds or politely introduce yourself to a dolphin? With recent scientific advances, a future like that might not be too far off.
An Elephant Never Splits An Infinitive
In 2017, researchers introduced the world to an animal that's particular about its grammar: a small bird called the Japanese tit. In the same way humans convey meaning through word order ("Attack an enemy" means something different than "An enemy attack"), these birds put calls in a specific sequence to communicate with one another.
Researchers gathered a variety of the birds' own calls and played them back to the flock. As Giorgia Guglielmi writes in Science Magazine, "When a predator threatens the flock, Japanese tits produce something called a 'mobbing call,' with the sequence ABC-D. By itself, the ABC part of the call means 'danger.' But the D part of the call — similar to the 'recruitment call' of a close relative, the willow tit — attracts flock members when there's something to share, such as food. When the two parts are produced together, Japanese tits flock together to mob the intruder."
When researchers played the ABC-D call for the birds, they turned their heads and approached the loudspeaker. But when the sequence was reversed to D-ABC, the birds didn't react. Something similar happens with the Carolina Chickadee, which is a good indication that when it comes to birdsong, syntax matters.
There's at least one animal you can talk to — kind of. Elephant biologist Joyce Pool and a team at the the nonprofit ElephantVoices has...
curiosity.com
Will We Ever Speak To Animals In Their Own Language?What if you could eavesdrop on the conversations of songbirds or politely introduce yourself to a dolphin? With recent scientific advances, a future like that might not be too far off.
An Elephant Never Splits An Infinitive
In 2017, researchers introduced the world to an animal that's particular about its grammar: a small bird called the Japanese tit. In the same way humans convey meaning through word order ("Attack an enemy" means something different than "An enemy attack"), these birds put calls in a specific sequence to communicate with one another.
Researchers gathered a variety of the birds' own calls and played them back to the flock. As Giorgia Guglielmi writes in Science Magazine, "When a predator threatens the flock, Japanese tits produce something called a 'mobbing call,' with the sequence ABC-D. By itself, the ABC part of the call means 'danger.' But the D part of the call — similar to the 'recruitment call' of a close relative, the willow tit — attracts flock members when there's something to share, such as food. When the two parts are produced together, Japanese tits flock together to mob the intruder."
When researchers played the ABC-D call for the birds, they turned their heads and approached the loudspeaker. But when the sequence was reversed to D-ABC, the birds didn't react. Something similar happens with the Carolina Chickadee, which is a good indication that when it comes to birdsong, syntax matters.
There's at least one animal you can talk to — kind of. Elephant biologist Joyce Pool and a team at the the nonprofit ElephantVoices has...
Diamond Encrusted Planet, revised
I read an article in the paper the other day about blue diamonds, which are very rare. They’ve discovered that they are formed deeper in the earth than other diamonds. Also, a month or so ago, I read about a study where the scientists concluded that there are probably vast amounts of diamonds deep within the Earth’s crust. They think there are probably billions of them down there. What if they are all blue, since they are so deep down? Or maybe some other color? What if we had a way to get them? How much would we still love diamonds if they weren’t so rare anymore? I think it is fascinating to think we might be living on a diamond encrusted planet.View more on Laura Gilfillan's website
