Worrying About Who Gets Back First

A new hope for Obama NASA plan?, Orlando Sentinel

"The most heated exchange came when U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Virginia, asked Bolden which country -- the United States or China -- would send humans to the moon next. Bolden started to respond by saying it didn't matter -- because the U.S. already has been there -- when Wolf cut him off. "Well it does to me," he snapped. "It does to me, and I think it matters, with all respect, to a lot of Americans." Bolden then said he thought NASA would "get back first" with Obama's plan. "I think we stand a pretty good chance of getting to the moon much quicker than we would have with the Constellation program," he said, stressing the plan's focus on developing new space technologies."

School Abortion – FOXNews (blog)


KOMO News
School Abortion
FOXNews (blog)
The girl attends Ballard High School in Seattle which has a teen health clinic inside. The clinic is run by Swedish Medical Center and administered by the ...
Mother furious after in-school clinic sets up daughter's abortionSeattle Post Intelligencer
Mother says Ballard High School health clinic facilitated abortionMy Ballard (blog)
The 15-Year-Old Was Reportedly Taken During School Hours in a Taxi to get an ...ABC News
KHQ Right Now -American Thinker (blog) -KXLY Spokane
all 20 news articles »

LifestyleHealthTime to hit the gym! Women need to work out for an hour to … – New York Daily News


Los Angeles Times
LifestyleHealthTime to hit the gym! Women need to work out for an hour to ...
New York Daily News
In fact, Harvard Medical School's 13-year study of 34079 middle-aged women found that the only women who kept from packing on additional pounds were those ...
How much do you need to work out?Washington Post (blog)
Exercise regularly, age better: StudiesCalgary Herald
Slim women need hour a day of sport to stay slim: studyAFP
UPI.com -USA Today
all 580 news articles »

The Periodic Table of Science Blogging | Bad Astronomy

This is a clever: the Periodic Table of Science Bloggers!

periodic_bloggersDavid Bradley at Sciencebase took the periodic table of elements and associated each element symbol with a science blog. I’ve read quite a few of them, and they’re pretty good — though I wonder about using Jack of Kent; it’s a great blog (he has been terrific about explaining the Simon Singh libel case), but it’s about legal issues, not science ones! Still, lots of good blogs there.

Of course, being the egomaniacal monster that I am, my first thought was, "Hey, I wonder what he used for barium?", since my encyclopedic knowledge of the elements informs me that barium’s symbol is, haha, Ba. And guess what?

Hey, wait a sec! I got robbed.


Gates Goes Nuclear: Billionaire Backs Fledgling Mini-Reactor Technology | 80beats

Bill_GatesLet’s give Bill Gates some credit: Retiring from Microsoft with all the free time and money in the world, Gates could have launched any number of Montgomery Burns-ian schemes for world domination. Instead, the multi-billionaire went the philanthropist route, becoming one of DISCOVER’s 10 most influential people in science through the health work his foundation funds. But a tinkerer is never done tinkering: In the last year Gates has patented an anti-hurricane device, given a few million dollars to fund geoengineering research, and then this week went public with his newest project: small-scale nuclear power.

A Gates-backed start-up company called TerraPower in talks with Toshiba to develop traveling-wave reactors (TWRs), which are designed to use depleted uranium as fuel and thought to hold the promise of running up to 100 years without refueling [FoxNews.com]. TWRs, which scientists have been playing with on and off for decades, need enriched uranium to get going, but are advantageous because they can use normal or even depleted uranium once the fission reaction is underway (and depleted uranium is something the United States has in great quantity). The technique requires bombarding uranium with a neutron to convert it to an unstable form of the element, which decays into neptunium and then fissile plutonium.

Toshiba’s already been working on mini reactors that run for about 30-40 years, and they believe that about 80% of the technology used in those can be used in the traveling-wave reactors [DVICE]. One of the challenges, though, is that if you’re that efficient at burning fuel, you need materials that can withstand that many years of constant radiation. TerraPower has completed the conceptual designs for both small units that produce electricity in the hundreds of megawatts, and a gigawatt-sized reactors that could power a city. But that’s the drawing board. In other words, this is very early days. And as with any new energy technology, expectations that energy supplies will be transformed in the near future should … take a rest [Financial Times].

Related Content:
DISCOVER: The 10 Most Influential People in Science
80beats: Bill Gates Patents a Device Aimed at Halting Hurricanes
80beats: With $4.5 Million in Pocket Change, Bill Gates Funds Geoengineering Research
Bad Astronomy: Bill Gates Gives $10 Billion for Vaccines!

Image: Archive of the Chancellery of the President of the Republic of Poland


Center for Inquiry Conference in Los Angeles, October 2010 | The Intersection

The Council for Secular Humanism is proud to announce its 30th anniversary subscribers' conference. "Setting the Agenda: Secular Humanism's Next 30 Years" will be held October 7 - 10, 2010, at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles, California. Scheduled speakers include Richard Dawkins, who will accept a very special award (to be announced); authors Sam Harris and Robert Wright, who will dialogue on humanist stances toward faith; and a glittering roster of speakers, including James Randi, P. Z. Myers, Eugenie Scott, Paul Kurtz, Lawrence Kruass, Chris Mooney, Jennifer Michael Hecht, Victor Stenger, Shadia Drury, Mark Johnson, Barry Kosmin, Ibn Warraq, and many more. Sounds like a rumble. Details here....


Texas Tech to offer quicker degrees to family docs – Houston Chronicle

Texas Tech to offer quicker degrees to family docs
Houston Chronicle
The three years of medical school will cost about $75000. After getting their degrees, doctors will spend three years in residency with a family practice.
Texas Tech School of Medicine announces three-year medical degreeMyWestTexas.com
Texas Tech announces 3-year medical schoolConnectAmarillo.com powered by KVII
Fast-track program at HSC accreditedThe Daily Toreador (registration)
LubbockOnline.com -News On 6
all 18 news articles »

Heart health: Cutting saturated fat alone doesn’t cut it – CNN


Private MD
Heart health: Cutting saturated fat alone doesn't cut it
CNN
... the co-director of the Program in Cardiovascular Epidemiology at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, in Boston, Massachusetts. ...
Study Suggests Polyunsaturated Fat Lowers Heart Disease RiskTopNews United States
'Good fat' cuts heart risk by a fifth, study showsBBC News
Polyunsaturated Fats Really May Lower Heart RiskBusinessWeek
Eat, Drink and Be (blog) -Best Syndication -eFitnessNow
all 56 news articles »

National Standards for US Schools

First, let me say that I am posting only to rant and froth at the mouth, NOT to start a political discussion. Please don't derail this thread with politics.

The other day, for about the twenty-ninth time since I've been on the earth, the government decided our schools suck and instituted a

Barnes-Jewish teams with NFL on retiree care – Bizjournals.com

Barnes-Jewish teams with NFL on retiree care
Bizjournals.com
The St. Louis hospital is one of only five medical centers across the country selected for the program. Each center will provide retired players with a team ...
Wash. U./Barnes-Jewish picked as NFL neurological centerSt. Louis Post-Dispatch (blog)
League Moves to Add Relevance to Week 17 GamesNew York Times (blog)
NFL and alumni set up neurological planNewsOK.com
The Canadian Press -UPI.com
all 81 news articles »