I’m back from vacation and will put up a few more “dump” posts with all the links I’ve accumulated, and then something a little different. I’m going to ditch the numbering system, and probably change up things a bit more. Stay Tuned.
This is an old story, but I’d love somebody out there to update with a summary of what else we’ve found on Mars since we found water Ice.

from the Mars Phoenix Lander’s Twitter at 5:15 p.m.: “Are you ready to celebrate? Well, get ready: We have ICE!!!!! Yes, ICE, *WATER ICE* on Mars! w00t!!! Best day ever!!” It was just two days ago that media outlets were reporting that there were no signs of water yet.

Then nine minutes after that: “Whoohoo! Was keeping my eye on some chunks of bright stuff & they disappeared! Sublimated! So it can’t be salt, it’s ice.”

[From LAist: Water Ice Found on Mars]

CTDL may be on hiatus in a week or two while I’m on vacation, though I might back-log a bunch of posts for my 2 readers. I think I’ll be dropping the numbered system soon and re-designing the site.
This is not very sciencey but educational, or at least thought provoking. I like the idea of putting ALL the housing casts under the same category, utilities and mortgage are both going to the same “thing” so it makes sense to group them together.

When I was designing the structure of my categories, the first change I had to make was to get rid of a top-level category for insurance. Instead, I put insurance expenses where they belong: auto insurance under transportation, health insurance under medical, and homeowner/renter insurance under housing.

I also eliminated a top-level category for utilities. I put the power bill under housing. (I’d put heat, water, garbage, sewer, etc. there too, but those items are included in the rent where I live right now.) I put the cell phone and internet charges in a new top-level category for communications, and put postage there as well.

[From Refactor your budget categories | Wise Bread]

Originally found on Boing Boing, this is an interesting evolutionary trait to use UV light to woo the prey into the webs.

The crosses, zigzags, and spirals woven by some spiders have long puzzled web watchers. But those seemingly superfluous decorations may be traps that use light to lure prey, a new study of Australian spiders finds

[From "Artistic" Spiders Trap Prey With Light, Study Finds]

Fascinating how things/traits/behaviors we can’t see with our naked eye are still being discovered. I know it often times feels (to me) like all the “big” discoveries have been made, all the important technological advances done, but our knowledge is still so incomplete.

Nothing to add to this, except I hope I have these genes.

A third of the population have genes that could help them in the fight against heart disease, say scientists.
A study of 147,000 patients suggests that certain types of the CETP gene might increase the levels of so-called “good” cholesterol.
UK and Dutch research, published in the Journal of the American Heart Association, found a 5% cut in heart attacks for those with the key types.
A UK geneticist said it could point to drugs which help many more people.

[From BBC NEWS | Health | Cholesterol genes 'protect heart']

Boing Boing Gadgets has great run down of “perfect” gadgets, ones that can’t really be improved on in largely significant ways. As a Unix dork I only take marginal offense at the comment below about keyboard layouts.

The Keyboard

Forget about Dvorak for a moment: no one’s talking about keyboard layouts here. There’s a surprising number of tattooing patterns for the flat protrusions of the modern keyboard… some better for different countries, some better for Unix dorks.

But isn’t that, in itself, some sort of wonderful commentary on the conceptual purity of the keyboard? That the only bickering going on is in the way alphanumeric keys are arranged… but not the base technology of the device?

[From Top X: 10 Perfectly Pure Gadgets - Boing Boing Gadgets]

Macworld has a nice (not reliant on Mac) primer on buying DSLR lenses.

If you purchased your digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) as part of a kit, you already have a basic lens that takes pretty good pictures. However, part of the attraction of this type of camera is that you can switch out lenses to get the best shot in any situation. From powerful zooms that get you up close to high-speed lenses that specialize in low-light settings, you have plenty of options for your second lens. While some lenses may go for more than you spent on your camera, you don’t have to pay a lot to get a great lens. The real question is: how do you find the right one for your needs?

[From Macworld | How to buy a camera lens]

Interesting bit of diary from the latest Mars mission. If you’re into reading a robotic interplanetary lander’s diary

Nasa’s Phoenix lander touched down on Mars at the end of May for a mission planned to last three months.
The robotic lab is investigating the region’s climate and geology and could determine whether the planet was capable of supporting life.

[From BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Phoenix diary: Mission to Mars]

Yet again I had a huge backlog of links even after the last post, so I’m putting together even more of them into a smorgasbord of interesting articles. Enjoy!

“Her methods probably are finer, but our conclusions are very similar.”
He also criticised the emphasis placed by the McGill University researcher on the “low” figure of 350kg, when her analysis suggests the rodent’s body mass could have been as great as 1,534kg, or one-and-a-half tonnes.

[From BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Biggest rodent 'shrinks in size']

UK researchers have pinpointed a protein on immune cells which they hope will help them harness the body’s defences to attack a tumour.
A vaccine designed to “home in” on the protein would deliver a message to the immune system to attack the invading cancer, they said.

[From BBC NEWS | Health | Cancer vaccine target pinpointed]

Experts are to investigate whether magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanners can damage health.
The Health Protection Agency (HPA) study is likely to focus mainly on the impact on health workers who regularly operate the machines.

[From BBC NEWS | Health | Study into health impact of MRI]

More than half of the world’s ocean-going sharks are at risk of extinction, a new analysis concludes.
Specialists with IUCN (formerly the World Conservation Union) found that 11 species are on the high-risk list, with five more showing signs of decline.
Sharks are particularly affected by over-fishing as they reproduce slowly.
The scientists are calling for global catch limits, an end to the practice of removing fins, and measures to minimise incidental catches (bycatch).

[From BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Sharks swim closer to extinction]

The WikiProfessional project (like Wikipedia, but for narrow and deep exploration of highly specialized domains) just launched with its first beta wiki: WikiProteins is a place where biologists can collectively annotate an enormous database of proteins, a database culled from the best open science journals in the field.

[From WikiProteins: a collaborative space for biologists to annotate proteins - Boing Boing]

The 380 million-year-old specimen has been preserved with an embryo still attached by its umbilical cord.
The find, reported in Nature, pushes back the emergence of this reproductive strategy by some 200 million years.
Until now, scientists thought creatures from these times were only able to develop their young inside eggs.

[From BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Fossil reveals oldest live birth]

Pile of excerpts and links from BBC articles I didn’t get around to making their own posts. Enjoy.

In January, the Brazilian government announced that the rate of deforestation in the Amazon jungle had soared in the last half of 2007, just months after officials had celebrated three years of steep falls.
It was an embarrassing admission for Brazil’s president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who had said his government’s efforts to control illegal logging and introduce better certification of land ownership were working.

[From BBC NEWS | Americas | Amazon's future in delicate balance]

The 2008 Bird Red List warns that long-term droughts and extreme weather puts additional stress on key habitats.
The assessment lists 1,226 species as threatened with extinction - one-in-eight of all bird species.
The list, reviewed every four years, is compiled by conservation charity BirdLife International.
“It is very hard to precisely attribute particular changes in specific species to climate change,” said Stuart Butchart, BirdLife’s global research and indicators co-ordinator.
“But there is now a whole suite of species that are clearly becoming threatened by extreme weather events and droughts.”
In the revised Red List, eight species have been added to the “critically endangered” category.

[From BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Climate 'accelerating bird loss']

Small-scale biomass power plants can have a greater environmental impact than other renewables, a study says.
UK researchers found that although the facilities offered carbon savings, they produced more pollutants per unit of electricity than larger biomass plants.
They suggested the way the feedstock was transported produced proportionally more pollutants than larger sites.
The findings challenged the view that such schemes offer an green alternative to grid-based electricity, they added.
Supporters of community biomass schemes say the power plants are sustainable because the fuel, such as wood chips, can be sourced from the local area.

[From BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Concern over small biomass option]

Scientists have long wondered why early primates inhabited forest canopies, given that climbing appears to consume more energy than walking.
US researchers studied primates climbing and walking on treadmills.
They say there was no difference in energy consumption for small primates, giving clues to how their ancestors entered the trees 65 million years ago.

[From BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Ancestors had leg-up to trees]

Between a quarter and a third of the world’s wildlife has been lost since 1970, according to data compiled by the Zoological Society of London.
Populations of land-based species fell by 25%, marine by 28% and freshwater by 29%, it says.
Humans are wiping out about 1% of all other species every year, and one of the “great extinction episodes” in the Earth’s history is under way, it says.
Pollution, farming and urban expansion, over-fishing and hunting are blamed.

[From BBC NEWS | UK | Wildlife populations 'plummeting']

This NYT article on global food wastage is timely — just as the food riots have begun to break out around the world — and shocking.

[From US wastes "27% of food available for consumption" - Boing Boing]

Astronomers have been able to capture and record the first moments when a massive star blows itself apart.
After decades of searching, researchers have used the world’s top telescopes to observe the remarkable event.
Previously, scientists had only been able to study these “supernovas” several days after the event.

[From BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Exploding star caught in the act]

Falafel wins every time. Interestingly enough this is largely the diet espoused by the Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy book which based most of its information on the harvard medical school nutritional findings. Note they talk about it as a Mediterranean diet, but it’s really just a healthy one.

Sticking to a diet which includes fruit, vegetables, fibre and healthier fats could protect against type two diabetes, a study suggests.
More than 14,000 Spanish volunteers were quizzed about eating habits, then checked over four years to see who developed the condition.
The results pointed to an 83% lower risk for those who followed the diet, the British Medical Journal reported.
But UK experts said the study was not conclusive.

[From BBC NEWS | Health | Med diet 'helps prevent diabetes']