Highest-flying bird put to test

1 July 2012 Last updated at 10:49 By Victoria Gill Science Reporter, BBC Nature, Salzburg, Austria

Bar-headed goose experiencing high altitude conditions in wind tunnel

Video footage of bar-headed geese in high altitude wind tunnel experiments has been released by researchers.

The flights were captured in super slow-motion by the University of British Columbia.

During "test flights", birds wear masks they are trained to wear as goslings, which provide them with oxygen levels that simulate high altitude.

The masks also collect gas that the birds breathe out, measuring how much precious oxygen they use in flight.

Continue reading the main story

?Start Quote

I want to uncover the mechanism that allows these incredible physical feats to be accomplished?

End Quote Dr Jessica Meir University of British Columbia

BBC Nature spoke to lead researcher Dr Jessica Meir at the Society for Experimental Biology's annual meeting in Salzburg.

Dr Meir explained that a great deal of research into the "remarkable geese" revealed how the birds are specially adapted to fly at extremely high altitude.

Their blood, for example, can carry far more oxygen to their muscles than other birds.

But while most studies have focused on the birds while they are at rest, Dr Meir wanted to create a "picture of oxygen delivery while the bird is flying".

Fortunately for her, the university's engineering department has a wind tunnel wide enough for a goose - with a wingspan of more than 1.5m - to fly in.

Tracking studies have recorded the birds at heights of 6,000m (just under 20,000 feet) - something they need to achieve in order to complete their migration through the Himalayas.

Continue reading the main story

Other high altitude wildlife

• Yunnan snub-nosed monkeys - see the bizarre-looking primate that lives at the highest altitudes of any primate other than humans.
• Jumping spider - watch the Himalayan jumping spider hunting at 6,700m above sea level.
• Ancient bristlecones - see the world's oldest trees that have survived 5,000 years of harsh, high altitude conditions.

But, in order to find out just how high the birds could fly, Dr Meir and her colleagues recreated the oxygen and nitrogen levels that the birds would receive at 6,000m and at 9,000m above sea level. This is approximately 10% oxygen and 7% oxygen respectively.

At 7% oxygen, the birds are experiencing the conditions required to fly over the summit of Mount Everest.

Dr Meir told BBC Nature that she was interested in the physiology that allowed animals to cope in extreme environments and "do amazing things".

"I want to uncover the mechanism that allows these incredible physical feats to be accomplished," she said.

"We already know they fly at up to 6,000m, where the oxygen levels are half what they are at sea level.

"And they're not only able to function, they're able to fly, which is an incredibly expensive way of moving around; it takes 10-20 times more oxygen than when they're resting."

Dr Meir also hopes that understanding how bar-headed geese cope and perform at such low oxygen levels will help inform research into human respiratory problems.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/18641726

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How to stay sane on a ship in the middle of the ocean

The Knorr is a big ship as far as research vessels go ? but there?s still no getting around the fact that you?re in a little metal box in the middle of the ocean with 47 other people for a month. Add to that the fact that most people are doing highly repetitive experiments all day (and I do mean all day, people get up at 5 am and work until 11 pm) and you?ve got a recipe for madness.

For the first week or so, everyone was calm and collected. They got up, they did the CTD casts, they worked, filtered, sequenced and experimented. There was chatter and laughter, but it always came in between long periods of intense science-doing late into the night. But the times, they are a changin?, and people are starting to loosen up (or perhaps go nuts, I don?t know).

As we hovered around the mid point of the cruise, you could see people starting to mentally count the days before they head home. Without a big bloom of Ehux, people were concentrating their samples and trudging about the lab doing their experiments. You could feel the nagging frustration, the exhaustion of long days and the disappointment of not finding a bloom.

So last night, when someone nearly shouted, ?The water is FULL of Ehux!? everyone was pretty excited. Turns out, we?d hit a bloom, and everyone crowded into the tiny microscope room to take a look at these teensy little dots.

It was just what everyone needed to keep them going for the next few days. But if an Ehux bloom isn?t enough for you, here?s a handy dandy guide to staying sane on the ship:

1. Write poetry / sing

One of the things that scientists do is filter. They filter a lot. Pretty much all day. That?s because seawater is full of phytoplankton, but it?s also full of all sorts of other stuff too. To separate the goodies from the gunk, they run the water through filters that catch their precious biomass. But filtering itself is, well, boring. You pour water into a cup, and wait for it to run through the filter. Then you do it again. And again. And again. How do you stay sane while filtering? Write a poem! One of the scientists here, Daniella Schatz, wrote a Dr. Seuss style poem about filtering.

Another scientist here, Rachel, sings to her filters little songs she makes up on the spot.

2. Take naps / bask

This is what Peter Lee calls ?steel beach.? It?s the very back of the ship and it?s somewhat protected from the cold northern wind that generally moves across the ship. For a while, if you found the right spot, you could get a really good, sunny nap in. Or a game of backgammon.

Even if you don?t nap, steel beach is a great place to hangout and gaze out onto the ocean. As Daniella says, ?There are three things you can watch forever: fire, water, and other people working.? Steel beach has two of those three!

3. Exercise

This is the gym on board. It?s no Manhattan fitness club, but it gets the job done, and it?s been keeping me sane for the past week. I haven?t mastered the treadmill on board. (Have you ever tried running while on a rocking ship? Let me tell you, it is not easy).? I do use the spinning bike (stuck underneath the stairs) and the weight machine though. It?s not going to get me into marathon shape, but it will keep me from running up and down the main lab. For now at least.

4. Read

Everyone here seems to be reading. I just finished Witches on the Road Tonight and a book from the library here called The Fabulous Fibonacci Numbers. I?m half way through Tiger?s Wife and Emperor of all Maladies. Liti is reading Chocolat. Anton is reading Something?s Alive on the Titanic.

5. Play jokes on one another

The crew likes to try and convince us of things that aren?t true. Someone told Cherel that the stairs near the kitchen were up only. Another person told Jacob that a blinking buoy was a giant squid, communicating with the boat. Someone else added out chief scientist, Kay Bidle (who sports an intense beard) to a game of ?Professor or Hobo.?

6. Games

I have a confession to make. I don?t really know any card games. It?s always kind of embarrassing, when everyone wants to play something and I?m the only one who has no idea how to play. But I?ve learned several already here ? backgammon, cribbage, rummy, some game called French Tarot (okay, I confess, I still have no idea how to play that one).

7. What else should we do? Got any ideas to pass the time? We?re (okay maybe just I?m) always looking for things to do.

?

During this trip, I?ll be answering your questions about the science, this ship, and life onboard. Want to know how we search for plankton, why we?re here, or what the food is like? Just ask me! And if you?re wondering how I got here, check out the groups that made this adventure possible: Mind Open Media and COSEE NOW.

Previously in this series:

All Aboard: how you can be a part of our research blog
You wanted to know: what are these phytoplankton?
You wanted to know: what am I bringing to sea?
Greetings from Ponta Delgada! We set sail tomorrow.
Steaming North: how the scientists are trying to find plankton
The superstar sensor: what is a CTD?
Status Update: Day 3 at the Cyclonic Eddy
You wanted to know: what is this virus that infects the phytoplankton (Part One)
You wanted to know: what is this virus that infects the phytoplankton (Part Two)
Plankton hunting: Part art, Part science
You wanted to know: what?s the food like on board?
Wildlife watch!
Jumborizing: a brief history of the R/V Knorr
On the importance of names. Or, ?are we at the hump or the hole??
Arts and crafts day on the Knorr
On the importance of names, part two. What?s the difference between a boat and a ship?

Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=f5041d2c60672948dfe7de209da7f9e5

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MasterCard and T-Mobile to bring NFC payments to Europe in Q3 (video)

Poland and Germany could be the next two countries to get smartphone payments, powered by MasterCard and Deutsche Telekom. The SIM-based NFC solution will utilize the US bank's ClickandBuy service for processing and will be available to T-Mobile customers, rolling out to Poland in Q3 of this year and Germany in 2013. This latest partnership comes on the heels of Vodafone's pairing with Visa, which is also said to be making a push for the German market. What remains to be seen is whether or not there is in fact a demand for mobile payments -- the technology has yet to take off in the US, despite an influx of funding and infrastructure from MasterCard and Google. NFC is no doubt the future of cashless transactions, but it likely remains a few years away from hitting the mainstream, with compatible devices still limited, on both the customer and retail fronts. Hit up the links below for a closer look at DT's push to conquer the European market, one NFC-equipped SIM card at a time. Then jump past the break for a quick intro, compliments of Deutsche Telekom CEO Rene Obermann and MasterCard CEO Ajay Banga (the two seemingly random gentlemen that you may have noticed above as well).

Continue reading MasterCard and T-Mobile to bring NFC payments to Europe in Q3 (video)

MasterCard and T-Mobile to bring NFC payments to Europe in Q3 (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 02 Jul 2012 09:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink TechCrunch  |  Deutsche Telekom  | Email this | Comments

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Eastern US storms leave 2 dead, 2M without power

Deveon Brown (center) waits in a temporary shelter at the Boonsboro Volunteer Fire and Rescue Co. Inc. in Bedford County, Va., Friday June 29, 2012. Brown and other extended family members are visiting from Norfolk and have been staying at Eagle Eyrie nearby. A wave of violent storms sweeping through the mid-Atlantic following a day of record-setting heat in Washington, D.C., has knocked out power to nearly 2 million people. The storms converged Friday night on Washington, D.C., Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. West Virginia Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin declared a state of emergency after more than 500,000 customers in 27 counties were left without electricity. (AP PHOTO/Photo by Parker Michels-Boyce, The News & Advance)

Deveon Brown (center) waits in a temporary shelter at the Boonsboro Volunteer Fire and Rescue Co. Inc. in Bedford County, Va., Friday June 29, 2012. Brown and other extended family members are visiting from Norfolk and have been staying at Eagle Eyrie nearby. A wave of violent storms sweeping through the mid-Atlantic following a day of record-setting heat in Washington, D.C., has knocked out power to nearly 2 million people. The storms converged Friday night on Washington, D.C., Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. West Virginia Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin declared a state of emergency after more than 500,000 customers in 27 counties were left without electricity. (AP PHOTO/Photo by Parker Michels-Boyce, The News & Advance)

A passing storm brought a halt to rides Friday, June 29, 2012 at the 26th annual Italian-American Festival being held this weekend at the Stark County Fairgrounds in Canton, Ohio. A wave of violent storms sweeping through the mid-Atlantic following a day of record-setting heat in Washington, D.C., has knocked out power to nearly 2 million people. The storms converged Friday night on Washington, D.C., Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. West Virginia Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin declared a state of emergency after more than 500,000 customers in 27 counties were left without electricity. (AP Photo/The Repository, Bob Rossiter)

An OhioHealth billboard was mangled from Friday afternoon's severe storm, June 29, 2012. A wave of violent storms sweeping through the mid-Atlantic following a day of record-setting heat in Washington, D.C., has knocked out power to nearly 2 million people. The storms converged Friday night on Washington, D.C., Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia. West Virginia Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin declared a state of emergency after more than 500,000 customers in 27 counties were left without electricity. (The Columbus Dispatch /Eamon Queeney)

Violent evening storms following a day of triple-digit temperatures wiped out power to more than 2 million people across the eastern United States and caused two fatalities in Virginia ? including a 90-year-old woman asleep in bed when a tree slammed into her home, a police spokeswoman said Saturday.

Widespread power outages were reported from Indiana to New Jersey, with the bulk of the service interruptions concentrated on Washington, D.C., and the surrounding areas. Earlier Friday, the nation's capital reached 104 degrees ? topping a record of 101 set in 1934.

More than 20 elderly residents at an apartment home in Indianapolis were displaced when the facility lost power due to a downed tree. Most were bused to a Red Cross facility to spend the night, and others who depend on oxygen assistance were given other accommodations, the fire department said.

The storms, sometimes packing 70 mph winds, toppled three tractor trailers on Interstate 75 near Findlay, Ohio.

Fallen trees were blamed on both deaths in Springfield, Va.

Besides the 90-year-old woman, who authorities didn't identify pending notification of kin, a man driving his car was pronounced dead at the scene. Authorities identified him as Khiet Nguyen, 27, of Burke, Va.

In addition, a park police officer was injured by an uprooted tree in the northern Virginia county, and an 18-year-old man was struck by a power line, Jennings said. He was in stable condition after receiving CPR, she said.

"Our officers and firefighters are out there with power saws, trying to clear the streets," Jennings said.

West Virginia Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin declared a state of emergency after more than 500,000 customers in 27 counties were left without electricity.

At least four utility poles fell on a road in Columbus, Ohio, making it too dangerous for people in four cars to get out, police said. One person was taken to a hospital.

As of 1 a.m. Saturday, Pepco was reporting 406,000 outages in the District of Columbia and Montgomery and Prince George's counties, Md.

"We have more than half our system down," said Pepco spokeswoman Myra Oppel. "This is definitely going to be a multi-day outage."

Amtrak suspended its service from Washington, D.C., to Philadelphia due to the storms, at least until mid-morning.

In the Washington, D.C., area, the Metrorail subway trains were returned to their endpoints due to the storms and related damage, officials said.

"It has had a widespread effect on the region," Metro spokesman Dan Stessel said early Saturday. He said about 17 train stations were operating on backup power due to local power outages, but that he didn't anticipate service being disrupted on Saturday.

___

Associated Press writer Norman Gomlak in Atlanta and Rebecca Miller in Philadelphia contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/386c25518f464186bf7a2ac026580ce7/Article_2012-06-30-Summer%20Storms/id-41dc23ff781847ba81ab1f3e94ad3fac

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Judge delays numbering of California ballot measures

SACRAMENTO ? A judge here Friday stopped the state from assigning the order in which propositions will appear on the November ballot while he considers a lawsuit filed by the proponent of one such measure.

Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Timothy M. Frawley issued the temporary restraining order against Secretary of State Debra Bowen, who determines the proposition numbers, after hearing from attorneys representing initiative proponent Molly Munger. Munger is backing a November tax measure that competes with Gov. Jerry Brown's tax measure.

She alleges that Democratic lawmakers and county election officials violated state law in efforts to boost Brown's proposal. With her lawsuit, Munger sought to prevent Bowen from placing the governor's initiative above hers on the ballot, and her attorneys argued that the judge's order was necessary to prevent "irreparable harm" to her measure.

The judge agreed and scheduled a hearing to evaluate the merits of her case July 9.

Brown's campaign downplayed the judge's action.

"We're pleased the court put this on a fast-track and confident it will be resolved quickly so we can move forward," Dan Newman, a spokesman for the governor's initiative campaign, said in a statement.

The stakes were made clear Friday by courtroom attendance. The audience included a top aide to Assembly Speaker John A. P?rez (D-Los Angeles), Brown's campaign operatives and opponents of both tax measures.

Munger's legal team maintains that Democrats in the Legislature acted illegally to move Brown's measure toward the top of the fall ballot this week by changing state election law. The legislation, introduced Monday, passed without a committee hearing and signed by Brown on Wednesday, states that constitutional amendments ? like the governor's tax proposal ? should appear ahead of other initiatives on the ballot.

"The Legislature and the governor took extraordinary steps to change the rules in the middle of the game," said Grant Davis-Denny, Munger's attorney.

Democrats, who hold wide majorities in both houses of the Legislature, passed the measure as part of the package of budget bills approved this week, which allows the law to take effect immediately. Most bills do not become law until the January following their signature by the governor.

"This bill ? was in no way, shape or form related to the budget," Munger's complaint states. The lawmakers' move was an "abuse of the political process and legislative power."

Senate leader Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) said the bill was simply a "clarification" of existing law, and Brown's measure deserved to be at the top of the ballot because its fate would have important consequences for the state.

The lawsuit also alleges that election workers in Los Angeles and Alameda counties "failed to comply with their statutory duties" by tallying petitions for Brown's campaign before Munger's, even though the governor's petitions were submitted after hers.

Frawley's order granted Munger's attorneys permission to depose election officials in the two counties.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Ross C. Moody, representing the secretary of state, argued that delaying the numbering of the initiatives would wreak havoc on ballot printing, which involves translating election information into various languages.

"The more you slow it down and the more you tinker with it," he said, the more there was "the possibility of errors in the process."

Munger's attorneys used a series of charts and graphs to argue that the legal proceedings would not jeopardize the state's traditional election calendar.

A secretary of state spokeswoman, Nicole Winger, said Bowen would follow whatever the court ultimately decides, asking only "that the judge issue a ruling as soon as possible so that our staff can continue with the many preelection duties that are dependent on the decision."

michael.mishak@latimes.com

anthony.york@latimes.com

Source: http://www.latimes.com/news/la-me-ballot-munger-20120630,0,6237250.story?track=rss

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Battle plan: Apple vs. Microsoft vs. Google

1 day

Devin Coldewey

In the last few weeks,?the tech industry's?biggest players have shown off their newest software and hardware, all aiming to make big moves before the end of the year. Apple has iOS 6 and the new MacBook Pros, Microsoft unveiled the new Surface and is preparing Windows 8 for launch, and Google has shown off the new version of Android and entered the tablet game.

It should be much more exciting than last year. What did 2011 have? A spec bump on the iPhone and iPad, a slow warming to the Windows Phone ecosystem, and the?lackluster launches of a social network and (failed)?desktop platform?by Google. By comparison, 2012 should be a battle royale.

(Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and NBC Universal, but that doesn't grant reporters privileged access to Microsoft products and services, nor does it influence their opinion of them.)

Let's look at what each company has in store:

Apple
Big changes are afoot this year: a truly new iPhone is expected, sure, but June's announcements already telegraphed their intentions: a return to the high end, and freezing out Google.

After aggressively pricing almost all their hardware via partnerships and ruthless negotiation with manufacturers, Apple has managed to push its products down from luxury to the mainstream. The iPhone is now considered a standard device, and the MacBook Air, once incredibly overpriced, is now setting the bar for PC laptops.

This has given Apple the market share to start selling extremely expensive things again, starting with the Retina?MacBook Pro. Soon there will likely be a 13-inch version as well, and they will both sell like hotcakes?? even at around $2,000 per unit. The cheapest new iPhone will probably still cost $200 to consumers, but only because Verizon and AT&T will have no choice but to subsidize it.

iOS 6 is on its way as well, and it's evident that Apple is using its mobile platform as both carrot and stick. Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, and more are getting the red carpet treatment, integrated right into the OS. But Google is getting the cold shoulder as Apple moves to its own maps and tries to get users to ask Siri instead of Google.

What could go wrong? If Google's?Android OS?was more mature and more evenly upgraded (that is, less "fragmented"), it?could pose a threat to Apple's near-monopoly in the hugely profitable paid-apps ecosystem. And Apple is still lagging behind in cloud services, losing out on many fronts ? including?file sharing and storage, streaming media,?email and Web apps ??to Google, Microsoft, and smaller companies. Apple can only keep you attached to their services if those services are competitive, and the competition is moving faster than they are. And be honest: iOS and OS X are both starting to look a bit old.

Microsoft
The year?2012 will be looked on as a watershed moment in the company's history: Windows 8 is the biggest change ever made to the world's most popular OS, and opinions are in no way unanimous on the new look and feel. But Microsoft hopes to build on their success in the living room and make Windows and Xbox an ecosystem families and friends can live in, not just a set of isolated products.

The Surface tablet is Microsoft's way of telling the world that it's ready to move on from the?desktops and laptops that put the company where it is today. And Windows Phone 8 is Microsoft learning from its mobile OS?mistakes and saying "this time for real." The next Xbox isn't ready, but you'd better believe it's being conceived as the third piece in this puzzle.

Connecting the TV, PC and mobile (the so-called "three screens" strategy) has ever been a hope of Microsoft's, but it's not until now that the company's had the presence on the TV, the credibility on mobile, and the audacity to actually change what constitutes a PC. This year and the next will be a crucible for the company as it is forced to abandon traditions and partners, but if it's going to remain a force in consumer tech, these are necessary steps.

Plenty could go awry, though, and if one piece fails, the others are weakened. Windows 8 could fail to gain traction as a replacement for Windows 7, to which many millions of people and companies have only recently switched. Leaving behind 10 or 20 years of applications and hardware isn't something small businesses and casual computer users are likely to do.

Similarly, Windows Phone 8 will have a lot to prove when it debuts, first because the platform may have lost the support of many early adopters by not fully?upgrading devices currently running Windows Phone 7 and 7.5, and second because Microsoft may simply not have the superstar hardware that will be needed to take consumers' eyes off the next iPhone.

Google
The challenge Google will be facing is presenting a single aspect to the consumer. There are 10 different versions of Android out there by 10 different manufacturers, all getting updates at the whim of the carriers.?Meanwhile, the?Chrome browser?is coming out for iPad, and yet Google is making its own laptop OS and its own?Android tablets, and trying to one-up Facebook with a proprietary social network,?too? Every corner of the tech world seems to have a different Google, focused on a different task. Android 4.1 is the company's way of roping everything back together.

With one OS for tablets and phones, a plea to developers and partners to get on board, and a new tablet that sets a high bar for a budget product, Google is trying to unify a core brand after its initial meteoric rise and sprawl.

Another goal seems to be having one big Google that looks more or less the same wherever you go, and from whichever device you use. Chrome syncs tabs between devices, sure, but ultimately what Google wants is for you to think of Google as a place, not a set of services and websites. One place that you can view from multiple windows?? your phone, your TV, your PC and, at some point, your vision overlay device, such as Google Glass.

In order for that to happen, though, Google has to make its world look, act and respond in a similar way no matter where you are. No small task when there are huge differences in interface, connectivity and screen size. Not to mention hardware partners like Samsung and HTC putting custom interfaces all over the place. (Those overlays are probably not going to survive for much longer, by the way.)

Unfortunately for Google, too much of this is out of the company's control. The very nature of open systems like Android prevents Google from yielding to this kind of unifying influence, and companies may (as Amazon did) simply take what they want and tell Google to go fly a kite. So Google needs cooperation from its friends in turning its patchwork systems and platforms into a single powerful, useful and affordable one.

What will happen?
How it will likely play out is this: Google and Microsoft will both take a hit as they regroup and put their weight behind their new unifying efforts. This will be because they have to build up brand and trust over again.

Meanwhile Apple will continue to dominate in hardware, selling iOS and OS X devices by the million, but even its most dedicated customers must acknowledge that both operating systems aren't as fresh as they used to be.

So while it'll be another year of big sales for Apple, you'll see a creeping discontent with its software offerings. A full overhaul will be due ? maybe even overdue ? by June of next year, when Apple again gathers its global cadre of developers. But by that time, who knows? Maybe Google and Microsoft will have gotten their acts together, and the sparks of their own reinventions will be catching fire.

Source: http://www.technolog.msnbc.msn.com/technology/technolog/battle-plan-apple-vs-microsoft-vs-google-854664

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nunudeen: Also, university students who still get rid of their gum by sticking it to everything?That's disgusting. If you do this, you are disgusting.

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