sciencenote:

Their achievement, detailed in this week’s advance online issue of the journal Nature, involved attaching a fluorescent protein to the biological clocks of the bacteria, synchronizing the clocks of the thousands of bacteria within a colony, then synchronizing thousands of the blinking bacterial colonies to glow on and off in unison. A little bit of art with a lot more bioengineering, the flashing bacterial signs are not only a visual display of how researchers in the new field of synthetic biology can engineer living cells like machines, but will likely lead to some real-life applications. Using the same method to create the flashing signs, the researchers engineered a simple bacterial sensor capable of detecting low levels of arsenic. In this biological sensor, decreases in the frequency of the oscillations of the cells’ blinking pattern indicate the presence and amount of the arsenic poison. (via Living ‘neon signs’ composed of millions of glowing bacteria)

the-star-stuff:

Melting Glaciers Mean Double Trouble for Water Supplies

New research shows that as ice disappears, overall evaporation speeds up.

Imaged Above: Glaciers like those on Vulture Peak in Montana’s Glacier National Park are receding around the world, putting critical water supplies at risk. Photograph by Michael Melford, National Geographic

Mountain glaciers long have been known to be in retreat as the planet warms. But the process is occurring even more rapidly than previously believed, scientists said earlier this month in San Francisco at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union.

For example, said Garry Clarke, professor emeritus of glaciology at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, the massive glaciers of Canada’s Saint Elias region, now comprised of nearly 98 cubic miles of ice (453 cubic kilometers), are likely to be cut in half by 2100, even under middle-of-the-road climate-change scenarios.

“[And] that’s the good news,” Clarke said.

In parts of the Canadian Rockies, he said, today’s glaciers will all but disappear completely, while others will shrink to remnants just 5 to 20 percent of their current size.

“We think that we will be witness over the next century mainly to the disappearance of the glaciers of western North America,” he said.

expose-the-light:

New wonder-drug could give us all super-memory

Read more

neiture:

Data from the Mars Express spacecraft was used to create this extraordinary image of Tharsis Tholus, an extinct volcano on the Red Planet. The volcano towers 8km above the surrounding terrain | Photograph: Esa

(Source: ecocides)

It’s one of those days I wish you were still around. 

(Source: struckbystars)

enchantedlovedreams:

In the end you’ll see who’s fake, who’s true and who would risk it all just for you.

(Source: every-timeushine-ill-shineforu)

Like a boss.