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Nigel

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-34857022

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Infection with a species of parasitic worm increases the fertility of women, say scientists.

A study of 986 indigenous women in Bolivia indicated a lifetime of Ascaris lumbricoides, a type of roundworm, infection led to an extra two children.

Researchers, writing in the journal Science, suggest the worm is altering the immune system to make it easier to become pregnant.

Experts said the findings could lead to "novel fertility enhancing drugs".

 

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Intern/Journo moron (Science Editor!!): "Cosmologist’s tweet appears to confirm rumours of discovery that could ‘open a new window on the universe’"

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/jan/12/gravitation-waves-signal-rumoured-science

 

Editor/Journo with cranial bloodflow: Argh... wtf "Caution is needed over claims that gravitational waves have been found. It could be a fake to test the detectors and scientists involved – it has been before"

http://www.theguardian.com/science/across-the-universe/2016/jan/12/gravitational-wave-detection-could-be-a-false-alarm

Edited by villakram
Herr Limpid ;)
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The theory, that's been around for a while, that there's a new 9th planet beyond Pluto (which obviously got demoted from 9th planet a decade ago), seems to have gained some credence this week, and there's now a push to get as many people as possible looking for it...

I wonder what the name would be? Who's the next Roman deity in line? Or do we go new age?

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3 hours ago, Chindie said:

The theory, that's been around for a while, that there's a new 9th planet beyond Pluto (which obviously got demoted from 9th planet a decade ago), seems to have gained some credence this week, and there's now a push to get as many people as possible looking for it...

I wonder what the name would be? Who's the next Roman deity in line? Or do we go new age?

Fido or Lassie ?

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Scientists at the Max Planck Institute in Germany have successfully conducted a revolutionary nuclear fusion experiment. Using their experimental reactor, the Wendelstein 7-X (W7X) stellarator, they have managed to sustain a hydrogen plasma – a key step on the path to creating workable nuclear fusion. The German chancellor Angela Merkel, who herself has a doctorate in physics, switched on the device at 2:35 p.m. GMT (9:35 a.m. EST).

IFL Science!

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It can safely hold super heated plasma clouds at 100 million degrees because magnets are cool no matter how hot it gets. But they haven't settled for regular cool magnets, those are super cooled magnets. Science, bitch!

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On 1/21/2016 at 03:51, Chindie said:

The theory, that's been around for a while, that there's a new 9th planet beyond Pluto (which obviously got demoted from 9th planet a decade ago), seems to have gained some credence this week, and there's now a push to get as many people as possible looking for it...

I wonder what the name would be? Who's the next Roman deity in line? Or do we go new age?

It's a couple of weeks now and no obvious issues have cropped up with respect to their analysis and the possibility of a ninth planet. I suspect that more objects will or not be discovered in the next few yrs which could strengthen our confidence in this model. In terms of directly detecting said planet, things are summarized really well by the folks at xkcd

"This comic is about Planet Nine, a possible Neptune-sized planet far beyond the farthest planet, Neptune. Astronomers Mike Brown and Konstantin Batygin published a paper on 2016-01-20, only two days before the release of this comic."

https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/1633:_Possible_Undiscovered_Planets

 

 

 

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On 1/12/2016 at 13:39, villakram said:

Intern/Journo moron (Science Editor!!): "Cosmologist’s tweet appears to confirm rumours of discovery that could ‘open a new window on the universe’"

http://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/jan/12/gravitation-waves-signal-rumoured-science

 

Editor/Journo with cranial bloodflow: Argh... wtf "Caution is needed over claims that gravitational waves have been found. It could be a fake to test the detectors and scientists involved – it has been before"

http://www.theguardian.com/science/across-the-universe/2016/jan/12/gravitational-wave-detection-could-be-a-false-alarm

So further to this.

It appears that the LIGO team have directly observed the gravitational wave signal from a pair of merging black holes. To be announced on Thur 10:30 EST... nobel prize wining science. Not currently clear how much info. this will have regarding testing GR right now, but exciting times!

 

 

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On 9 February 2016 at 21:21, villakram said:

So further to this.

It appears that the LIGO team have directly observed the gravitational wave signal from a pair of merging black holes. To be announced on Thur 10:30 EST... nobel prize wining science. Not currently clear how much info. this will have regarding testing GR right now, but exciting times!

 

 

They just announced it.  I have have no idea what any of it means but it sounds like a massive deal.  It's quite heartwarming to see the scientists behind it and just how incredibly happy and proud they are (sounds ghey, I know).  Seemed like a real stab in the dark and it's ended up working.  This may sound stupid but I wonder whether it's possible to detect other life from this?

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8 minutes ago, sharkyvilla said:

This may sound stupid but I wonder whether it's possible to detect other life from this?

Not anything we'd recognise as life. We'd be looking for artificial patterns in collisions of black holes. Or creatures massive enough to cause them by their nature - ie creatures with the mass of a black hole.

But who knows? I guess the next milestone will be for us to create gravity waves. I don't think there's even a wild hypothesis for doing that yet. We would probably need to be approaching a Kardashev Type II civilization to condense enough energy.

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1 minute ago, limpid said:

Not anything we'd recognise as life. We'd be looking for artificial patterns in collisions of black holes. Or creatures massive enough to cause them by their nature - ie creatures with the mass of a black hole.

But who knows? I guess the next milestone will be for us to create gravity waves. I don't think there's even a wild hypothesis for doing that yet. We would probably need to be approaching a Kardashev Type II civilization to condense enough energy.

Or... Orrrrr we could get Lisa Rielly and James Corden to run at each other, really, really fast. :)

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2 hours ago, sharkyvilla said:

They just announced it.  I have have no idea what any of it means but it sounds like a massive deal.  It's quite heartwarming to see the scientists behind it and just how incredibly happy and proud they are (sounds ghey, I know).  Seemed like a real stab in the dark and it's ended up working.  This may sound stupid but I wonder whether it's possible to detect other life from this?

I mentioned a small bit of it once before in another thread but from my limited understanding Einstein basically proved that Newton was wrong  ....  Einstein's theory had already been proven to be correct beyond any reason (I think ) but theses waves sorta double confirm that he was correct beyond any reason ....

 

What it all actually means though is beyond me  ... but there is a great video here

 

 

 

Quote

A team of physicists who can now count themselves as astronomers announced on Thursday that they had heard and recorded the sound of two black holes colliding a billion light-years away, a fleeting chirp that fulfilled the last prophecy of Einstein’s general theory of relativity

Edited by tonyh29
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