Mind Soup

ENERGY DIMENSION:   We have learned much about our bodies through old wives’ tales handed down from our moms and grandmothers and even in school, but not all of it is correct. Here we look at 10 misconceptions that might surprise you. 1. Warts can be caught from other animals like toads Human warts are caused by a virus that affects only humans, the human pappiloma virus. They cannot be caught by animals with warts and certainly not by toads whose bumps are not warts but glands. 2. Sugar makes children hyperactive False! Twelve controlled, double blind trials have shown that there is absolutely no connection between children’s behavior and their sugar intake. One thing was found, namely that parents rate their child’s behavior as more hyper when they thought they had been given a sugary drink. “The studies included sugar from sweets, chocolate and natural sources. Even in studies of those who were considered “sensitive” to sugar, children did not behave differently after eati...

Illustration of a Human Mitochondria LIVE SCIENCE : A maternal ancestor to all living humans called mitochondrial Eve likely lived about 200,000 years ago, at roughly the same time anatomically modern humans are believed to have emerged, a new review study confirms. The results are based on analyses of mitochondrial DNA. Found in the energy-producing centers of cells, mitochondrial DNA is only passed down the maternal line, and can be traced back to one woman. However, this doesn't mean she was the first modern woman, rather it indicates that only her descendants survive to the present day. "There is always some other female that predated mitochondrial Eve, whose DNA didn't make it up to modernity," said Marek Kimmel, a professor of statistics at Rice University. "So the age of the mitochondrial Eve is always less than the age of the true, first female modern human." A molecular clock While most of an organism's DNA is contained in the nucl...

Map of the Bermuda Triangle SALEM NEWS : Oceanographic surveyors of the sea floor in the area of the Bermuda Triangle and the North Sea region between continental Europe and Great Britain have discovered significant quantities of methane hydrates and older eruption sites. According to two research scientists the mystery of vanished ships and airplanes in the region dubbed "The Bermuda Triangle" has been solved. Step aside outer space aliens, time anomalies, submerged giant Atlantean pyramids and bizarre meteorological phenomena ... the "Triangle" simply suffers from an acute case of gas. Natural gas—the kind that heats ovens and boils water—specifically methane, is the culprit behind the mysterious disappearances and loss of water and air craft. The evidence for this astounding new insight into a mystery that's bedeviled the world is laid out in a research paper published in the American Journal of Physics. Professor Joseph Monaghan researched the h...

DAILY RECORD : A blast of violent space weather is due to hit the Earth today following a massive explosion on the Sun. It is likely to spark spectacular displays of the northern lights. Scientists witnessed a huge flare above a giant sunspot the size of our planet, linked to an even larger eruption across the surface of the Sun. By chance, the explosion faced directly towards Earth, sending a solar tsunami racing 93million miles across space. Experts estimate the wave of supercharged gas will reach us today when it will buffet the natural magnetic shield protecting Earth.

SWNS :  Petrol-head Gurcharn Sahota charges a staggering £7,200 for Britain ’s most expensive car wash which he does – from his PARENTS’ GARAGE. Car-nut Gurcharn, 30, has a string of celebrity clients and takes up to 250 HOURS to clean each motor. He has cleaned hundreds of dream machines including a Lamborghini Gallardo (pictured), Bugatti Veyron and an orange McLaren F1 GTR worth £5 million. Since he started the business five years ago he has travelled the world with his hi-tech kit which includes a microscope, 100 cleaning fluids and £8,200 car wax. Gurcharn charges customers up to £7,200 for a wash which includes polishing and buffing every inch of the car inside and out – FIVE times. He even uses a computerised microscope – normally used by forensic scientists – to examine the body work for the minutest scratch not even visible to the naked eye. Gurcharn, who drives an iconic MK1 Volkswagen Golf GTi, started his passion for cleaning by washing his neighbours’ cars...

REUTERS : Squirting insulin up the noses of patients with early forms of Alzheimer's disease showed signs of improving their memory, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday. Patients who got the treatment for four months showed improvements in tests of memory recall that lasted for two months. "We believe our results are very promising and they warrant future trials," said Dr. Suzanne Craft of the VA Puget Sound Health Care System and the University of Washington in Seattle , who presented her findings at a meeting of the Alzheimer's Association in Honolulu. Alzheimer's disease is a fatal and incurable deterioration of the brain that affects 26 million people globally. It is the most common form of dementia . Several studies have suggested that people with Alzheimer's have reduced levels of insulin in the brain, even in the earliest stages. Insulin is important for communication between brain cells and is needed for brain function. ...

As if we need further confirmation. Last month was the hottest June ever recorded worldwide and the fourth consecutive month that the combined global land and sea temperature records have been broken, according to the US government’s climate data centre. The figures released last night by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) suggest that 2010 is now on course to be the warmest year since records began in 1880. The trend to a warmer world is now incontrovertible. According to NOAA, June was the 304th consecutive month with a combined global land and surface temperature above the 20th-century average. The last month with below-average temperatures was February 1985. Each of the 10 warmest average global temperatures recorded since 1880 have occurred in the last 15 years with the previous warmest first half of a year in 1998. { via }

METRO : It’s an age-old puzzle that’s stumped generations of scientists. But now they believe they have cracked the conundrum of what came first: the chicken or the egg. British researchers say the chicken must have come first as the formation of eggs is only possible thanks to a protein found in the chicken’s ovaries. ‘It had long been suspected that the egg came first but now we have the scientific proof that shows that in fact the chicken came first,’ said Dr Colin Freeman, from Sheffield University , who worked with counterparts at Warwick University. ‘The protein had been identified before and it was linked to egg formation but by examining it closely we have been able to see how it controls the process,’ he added. The protein – called ovocledidin-17 (OC-17) – acts as a catalyst to speed up the development of the shell. Scientists used a super computer called HECToR, based in Edinburgh , to ‘zoom in’ on the formation of an egg. It showed OC-17 was crucial in kick-start...

The  turritopsis nutricula  species of jellyfish may be the only animal in the world to have truly discovered the fountain of youth. Why I am particularly interested about this? Well, partly because I am majoring in biology and have taken a whole course about lower invertebrates such as jellyfish and other slimy animals, but the huge part is because of the huge capability this animal presents to the scientific world! If scientists could discover the mechanism of this reversion of cells, this can advance the medical field tremendously, possibly by regenerating failing organ cells such as liver cells, heart cells or even brain cells. Here's the original post from the Mother Nature Network   (check this article about the animals with the longest life span, very interesting) , via Maurice Salem . Since it is capable of cycling from a mature adult stage to an immature polyp stage and back again, there may be no natural limit to its life span. Scient...

Dear readers, I'm sure you have noticed that a few days ago, Mind Soup have welcomed a new contributing blogger, Daisy. This is to officially announce that she is not going anywhere anytime soon. ;) Daisy is an aspiring scientist, an activist and a personal friend. She has also dabbled in journalism for quite some time now. You might also notice that she has a striking resemblance to  Morticia Addams  from the Addams Family , except for the hair. (or maybe not?) I'm sure you will be entertained and interested by her numerous posts on Mind Soup. Daisy, on behalf of the Mind Soup team, I would like to welcome you to the team :)

Scientists at Stanford University are inching closer to a cure for noise induced hearing loss. Stereocilia, or the tiny hairs inside our ears, are an integral part of the hearing system. But overexposure to noise - such as experienced in music concerts or blasting tunes from an iPod - can permanently damage them, degrading a person's hearing over time. Researchers at Stanford, however, have hit a breakthrough in growing hair-like cells that function just like those in our ears. This could mean solutions for damaged hearing. Gizmag writes,  "[W]e’re born with 30,000 [stereocilia] per ear, but once they die off or get damaged, they’re gone for good. Stefan Heller, a professor of otolaryngology (ear, nose and throat) at Stanford University, wants to change that. To that end, he recently succeeded in creating mouse hair cells in a petri dish. Could an end to deafness be far behind?" How Hairs In Our Ears Help Us Hear From the National Institute of Deafness and other Comm...

London, England (CNN) -- Obsessive, overenthusiastic, fanatical -- call them what you will. They used to be the exception rather than the norm. But these days, devoted fan followings are cropping up with increasing frequency. The latest embodiment of the die-hard fans that have emerged: "Avatards," the loyal followers of James Cameron's wildly popular 3D science fiction film "Avatar." Since the blockbuster epic hit the cinema screen across the globe last month, countless forums, Web sites and wikis devoted to all things "Avatar" have popped up. Enthusiastic fans can go to "Learn Na'vi" to study the language spoken on the mythical world of Pandora. On fan sites like "Naviblue," fans discuss everything from their bordering-on-obsessive relationship with the film to feelings of despondence caused by the fact that Pandora is not real. On fan site ""Avatar Forums," one forum member, Neytiri, offers advice on...

Step away from the television... TV is not your friend. In fact, according to a new study, it's your mortal enemy. Researchers have discovered that every hour per day spent watching television increases your chance of dying from heart disease by one-fifth. We all know a sedentary lifestyle can lead to disastrous health problems, but this new study shows even the most physically fit are at risk for heart disease when they spend a good amount of time watching TV. "Even if someone has a healthy body weight, sitting for long periods of time still has an unhealthy influence on their blood sugar and blood fats," says Professor David Dunstan, the study's lead researcher. Australian scientists, lead by Prof. Dunstan, looked at about 9,000 people over the course of six years, grouping them into categories depending on how much television they watched. The group that watched the most (four or more hours a day) were 80% more likely to develop heart disease and die from ...

The following is an actual question given on a University chemistry final exam. The answer by one student was so “profound” that the professor shared it with colleagues via the Internet, which is why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well. Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)? Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs using Boyle’s Law that gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed or some variant. One student, however, wrote the following: First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let’s look at the different religions that exist in the world today. Most of these religions state that, if you are not a member of their religi...

Millions of people suffering from malaria now have new hope after British scientists unlocked the genetic map of the plant used to cure the disease. Scientists from the University of York have confidently predicted they will have high-yielding anti-malaria crops available for wide spread plantation in developing countries within two years. The discovery of the genetic map of the medicinal herb Artemisia annua has been hailed as a significant breakthrough that could save countless lives. Researchers said the new plants they will breed will be given to poor farmers who can use them to grow a cash crop that could help build up fragile economies. The research has been funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Malaria kills at least one million people every year even though it can be prevented and treated.The most effective drugs to treat the disease are Artemisinin Combination Therapies.More funding has become available to deliver these treatments which are expected to reac...

The sun is reduced to a ring of gold against the black sky as the Moon slips between it and Earth. This solar eclipse yesterday lasted for 11 minutes and eight seconds, setting a record that will not be beaten until December 23, 3043. A Chinese couple watches the solar eclipse over Zhengzhou, in the country's central Henan province The skies over Hongdao, China, where the spectacular 'ring of fire' could be seen.  The eclipse was annular, meaning the Moon blocked most of the Sun's middle This image show a total solar eclipse which passed over Europe and the Middle East, and into India.  The Moon's umbra can be clearly seen as a black disc, approximately 63 miles across Such events, which only blot out the middle of the Sun, are known as annular eclipses. They occur about 66 times a century and can only be viewed in the narrow band on the Earth’s surface below their path. Yesterday’s light show began in Africa before crossing the Indian Ocea...

WASHINGTON – The Hubble Space Telescope has captured the earliest image yet of the universe — just 600 million years after the Big Bang, when the universe was just a toddler. Scientists released the photo Tuesday at a meeting of the American Astronomical Society. It's the most complete picture of the early universe so far, showing galaxies with stars that are already hundreds of millions of years old, along with the unmistakable primordial signs of the first cluster of stars. These young galaxies haven't yet formed their familiar spiral or elliptical shapes and are much smaller and quite blue in color. That's mostly because at this stage, they don't contain many heavy metals, said Garth Illingworth, a University of California, Santa Cruz, astronomy professor who was among those releasing the photo. "We're seeing very small galaxies that are seeds of the great galaxies today," Illingworth said in a news conference. Until NASA's Hubble telescope...

01-02-2010 can be read the same way in both directions. One math geek's really got its number. Professor Aziz Inan has a passion for palindromes. There will be 12 dates this century  that can be read in two directions; today's is the second. (December 31, 2009) Professor Aziz Inan has a passion for palindromes. There will be 12 dates this century that can be read in two directions; today's is the second. (December 31, 2009) Some people are into cars. Some people dig the ocean. Aziz Inan, a professor of electrical engineering at the University of Portland in Oregon, loves numbers. "I can relate to them," Inan said. "Each number has its own personality." With this adoration in mind, consider today, Jan. 2, 2010. The day is a palindromic date, meaning the number can be read the same way in either direction: 01-02-2010. There will be 12 palindromic days this century, Inan said, and today is the second. The first was 10-02-2001. (His complete ...

  (CNN) -- It happens only once in a blue moon -- and scientists say a blue moon is exactly what we'll see in the skies this New Year's Eve. Don't expect an azure glow over our lunar satellite, however. The term "blue moon" simply refers to the second full moon in a calendar month, something that hasn't happened on a New Year's Eve for nearly 20 years, NASA says. "December 1990 ended with a blue moon, and many New Year's Eve parties were themed by the event," said Professor Philip Hiscock of the department of folklore at Memorial University of Newfoundland, in Canada. "It was a lot of fun." Most months have just one full moon, because the 29.5-day cycle of the moon matches up pretty well with the length of calendar months. Occasionally, there will be two full moons in a month, something that happens about every 2½ years, NASA says. But a blue moon on December 31 is rare. It is possible for the moon to have a cerulean hue...