Cool Stuff, News Stuff

A Biology News Browser; Green Porno; Naked Mole-Rats and Chili Pepper; 3D from 2D; New View of Middle Earth Stuff

From Science Buzz:

A great biology teaching resource can be found at biologybrowser.org. Both the Biology Browser home page and their search engine are subdivided into:

- organism (animals, plants, viruses)
- subjects (biodiversity, botany, genetics)
- geography (Africa, Asia, North America)

To experiment, I entered the term "turtle" in the search box which resulted in 369 hits (the MN DNR web page entry, Turtles of Minnesota was #6).

Green Porno:

[hat tip: Bug Girl]

Naked mole-rats bear chili pepper heat from PhysOrg.com

Pity the tiny naked mole-rat. The buck-toothed, sausage-like rodent lives by the hundreds in packed, oxygen-starved burrows some six feet under ground. It is even cold-blooded -- which, as far as we know, is unique among mammals. You can feel their pain. But, they can't feel ours.

[...]

Stanford considers " the problem of estimating detailed 3-d structure from a single still image of an unstructured environment. Our goal is to create 3-d models which are both quantitatively accurate as well as visually pleasing."

Earth's Getting 'Soft' In The Middle, Geologists Note

A new study suggests that material in part of the lower mantle has unusual electronic characteristics that make sound propagate more slowly, suggesting that the material there is softer than previously thought. The results call into question the traditional techniques for understanding this region of the planet.

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