Daily Archives: July 20, 2017

UFO LATEST: Truth about ‘alien mothership’ filmed ‘tracking … – Express.co.uk

Posted: July 20, 2017 at 2:48 am

Footage from the ISS livestream, uploaded to YouTube, shows a massive hazy object come into view in the background away from the space station.

Commentators have described it as first appearing as a line of orange lights, before it begins to take on a larger form.

As the clip comes to the end, the lights appear to dim back into space.

The video was released by brothers Blake and Brett Cousins who run YouTube channel thirdphaseofmoon yesterday.

The pair showed an interview with a UFO expert in an effort to identify the mysterious anomaly.

Nasa*YouTube

In the video the expert says: "First, what I was looking at is I dont know exactly what I was looking at.

In the very beginning, you see these orange dots around it and by the end of it the entire thing almost shrinks up a little bit.

Almost as if its a giant mothership for all we know.

There have already been more than 40,000 views of the video.

One viewer said: Looks like the Battlestar Galactica just jumped into orbit.

NASA

1 of 14

ISS Nasa live cam cuts after 'suddenly locking on to mystery glowing UFO'

In the very beginning, you see these orange dots around it and by the end of it the entire thing almost shrinks up a little bit. Almost as if its a giant mothership for all we know.

UFO expert

Another said: Its an interstellar mother ship, watching what NASA is doing, as NASA have lied since the first encounter with UFO.

But a sceptical third said: To me it looks like the ISS filmed a storm in the upper atmosphere.

Thirdphaseofmoon has made it onto a number of UFO website and YouTube channel blacklists by more sceptical investigators, amid claims they use hoax and misrepresented footage.

The brothers deny this and claim to be legitimate researchers.

UFO chasers have reported seeing scores of UFOs on the livestream this year but they have turned out to be nothing more than ice, space debris, or lens flares which is when light refracts inside the camera lens and then is projected on to the still or video image.

Express.co.uk showed the video to Scott Brando, who runs debunking website ufoofinterest.org, who said it was just reflected light coming from the ISS itself, so there was no UFO and nothing was actually there.

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Space station project seeks to crystallize the means to counteract nerve poisons – Space Daily

Posted: at 2:48 am

The microgravity conditions of the International Space Station (ISS) may hold the key to improving our understanding of how to combat toxic nerve agents such as sarin and VX. That is the hope of Countermeasures Against Chemical Threats (CounterACT) project that is part of an initiative at the National Institutes of Health aimed at developing improved antidotes for chemical agents.

"With increasing worldwide concern about the use of chemical weapons, there is significant interest in developing better counteragents," said David A. Jett, Ph.D., director of the CounterACT program, National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), a part of NIH.

Organophosphates (OPs), a family of chemicals that includes several pesticides as well as sarin and VX nerve agents, block the activity of the enzyme acetylcholinesterase (AChE). This enzyme is critical for allowing muscles to relax after they have been stimulated by the nervous system. When the activity of AChE is blocked (for example, by OPs), muscles cannot relax, leading to paralysis and eventually death.

Developing antidotes to this type of poisoning requires detailed knowledge about the structure of the AChE enzyme. Until now, the forces of gravity on Earth have posed a challenge to this area of research. That's where traveling into space comes in.

In June of this year, samples of the human AChE enzyme were sent to the International Space Station U.S. Laboratory by a team of CounterACT scientists led by Andrey Kovalevsky, Ph.D., Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Zoran Radic, Ph.D., University of California, San Diego. Using these samples, astronauts are currently growing large crystals of pure enzyme of a size that cannot be formed on Earth due to interference from gravity.

"By taking advantage of the microgravity conditions of the International Space Station, we hope to grow better, more uniform crystals that we are unable to grow on Earth," said Dr. Kovalevsky.

Once the crystals are grown to a large enough size, they will be returned to Earth and analyzed by a sophisticated imaging method called neutron diffraction that can provide an atomic-level view of the enzyme.

"Using this technique, we will be able to get a closer look at how the enzyme interacts with pesticides and nerve agents and learn about how the bond between the two can be chemically reversed," said Dr. Radic. "This method would not work on the smaller enzyme crystals that can be grown here."

Antidotes to OP exposure reactivate AChE by directly breaking its chemical bond with the OP. However, the speed at which the countermeasures available today are able to do this is too slow to be fully effective. This project will help researchers to develop antidotes that break the AChE-OP bond more quickly and that can also be delivered orally, which is another key to dealing with large-scale exposure to nerve poisons.

"Developing better countermeasures against these sorts of nerve agents is a major thrust of our overall program," said Dr. Jett. "This project is the kind of cutting-edge science we envisioned when we established the CounterACT program."

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How Moon Bases and Lunar Colonies Work (Infographic)

Posted: at 2:47 am

Humans could set up robot-constructed mining outposts at the moon's poles.

An outpost on the Earths moon has been a staple of science fiction since the 20th century. One of the earliest practical proposals was the U.S. Armys 1959 design for a nuclear powered fortress, built to establish a military presence on the moon before the Soviet Union could do the same.

A 1961 U.S. Air Force plan called for a 21-man underground lunar base, to be built by 1968.

Current arguments for establishing a lunar colony include these potential uses:

Resource mining (oxygen, rocket fuel, construction materials) Energy (solar power, helium 3 mining for nuclear fusion) Astronomical observations from the moon's far side Tourism

Sophisticated robots could prepare the landing site prior to the arrival of astronauts. 3D-printed structures could be formed from the lunar soil itself. [How to Build a Lunar Colony (Photos)]

A moon base must support its crew, either with supplies launched from Earth or by mining the resources ofthe moon itself.

On Earth, the daily life-support requirements for one person are:

Oxygen: 1.85 lbs (0.84 kg) Drinking water: 2.64 gallons (10 liters) Dried food: 3.9 lbs (1.77 kg) Water for food: 1.06 gallons (4 liters)

In space however, the water requirements are lower:

Oxygen: 1.85 lbs (0.84 kg) Drinking water: 0.43 gallons (1.6 liters) Dried food: 3.9 lbs (1.77 kg) Water for food: 0.21 gallons (0.8 liters)

The basic necessities for human life air and water could be derived from the lunar soil. Building materials, rocket fuel and other necessities could also be manufactured. These materials could be used by the astronauts on the moon or shot into space electromagnetically by a "mass driver."

Poll: Where Should Humans Build the 1st Space Colony?

A lunar mass driver is a miles-long electromagnetic rail gun. Packets would be accelerated to lunar escape velocity and catapulted to space colonies for capture and utilization.

One prime location for a moon base would be in the permanently shadowed deep craters near the moon's poles. These very cold locations harbor vast quantities of water ice, which could be harvested relatively easily.

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Elon Musk Calls for Moon Base – Space.com

Posted: at 2:47 am

Elon Musk (left) talks to NASA International Space Station (ISS) program manager Kirk Shireman on July 19, 2017, at the ISS Research and Development conference in Washington, D.C.

Elon Musk may be focused primarily on Mars, but he'd also like to see a human outpost on a world much closer to home.

"To really get the public real fired up, I think we've got to have a base on the moon," the billionaire founder and CEO of SpaceX said today (July 19) at the 2017 International Space Station Research and Development (ISSR&D) conference in Washington, D.C.

"Having some permanent presence on another heavenly body, which would be the kind of moon base, and then getting people to Mars and beyond that's the continuance of the dream of Apollo that I think people are really looking for," Musk told NASA ISS program manager Kirk Shireman, who interviewed him onstage at the conference. [Moon Base Visions: How to Build a Lunar Colony (Photos)]

Musk and SpaceX are working to make the latter part of that vision a reality within the next 50 years or so. Last September, at the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) meeting in Mexico, the entrepreneur unveiled plans for a reusable rocket-spaceship combo called the Interplanetary Transport System. The ITS would help colonize Mars and, potentially, allow humanity to explore more distant worlds, such as the Jupiter moon Europa and the Saturn satellite Enceladus.

Musk has been relatively quiet about the ITS since then, but he said he plans to give an update about the architecture at the next IAC conference, which will be held this September in Adelaide, Australia. And he teased an ITS tweak that SpaceX has been working on.

Downsizing the ITS spaceship a bit the originally unveiled version would carry at least 100 people and using it for some profit-generating "Earth-orbit activity" could help make Mars colonization economically feasible, Musk said at the ISSR&D conference today.

"That's one of the key elements in the new architecture," Musk said. "It's similar to what was [unveiled] at IAC, but it's a little bit smaller still big. I think this one's got a shot at being real on the economic front. You know, that's the trick."

Musk also said today that another one of his ventures, The Boring Company, could aid in Mars colonization as well. The Boring Company's main goal is to construct tunnel networks beneath (and, eventually, between) traffic-choked cities such as Los Angeles, enabling speedier travel.

But advanced tunneling technology will also be in high demand on Mars, Musk said, citing the likely need to mine large amounts of ice and other natural resources. And Red Planet colonists may want to live underground, at least part of the time, to shield themselves from the relatively high radiation fluxes encountered on the Martian surface, he added.

"You can build a tremendous amount underground with the right boring technology on Mars, so I do think there's some overlap in that technology-development arena," Musk said.

But Earth-optimized tunneling machines won't do the job on Mars, he stressed.

"The Earth ones are really heavy. Like, really heavy," Musk said. "You're not worried about weight for an Earth tunneling machine; actually, you want one that's nice and heavy. But a Mars one,you'd have to redesign it to be superlight that's a tricky one and then just take into account the different conditions on Mars and everything else."

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McCaskey grad writes new book on CRISPR and genome engineering – LancasterOnline

Posted: at 2:47 am

Before Sam Sternberg was part of the scientific breakthrough of the century, he was one of the winners of Lancaster Countys science and engineering fair.

CRISPR can be explained as a find-and-replace tool, Sternberg said in a Common Hour talk at Frankin & Marshall College last year. It can find misspelled sequences of DNA that cause genetic mutations and replace them with the right sequences.

Sternberg did his doctoral research in a laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley, where Doudna made this important discovery. Since then, researchers have been fighting in court over the patent for genetic engineering with CRISPR.

After Sternberg finished his graduate work, he focused on co-writing the book about the CRISPRs discovery to bring the story to an audience beyond the science community.

Doudnas memoir is partly an attempt to sustain her voice in the debate over Crisprs practical and less-practical uses and partly an effort to secure her legacy, Bloomberg writes.

Some reviewers say they would have liked more discussion on the ethics of genetic engineering, especially on genes that are inheritable.

Doudna and Sternberg predict that within a generation there will be little left untouched by CRISPR, says a review from Science." As such, its impossible not to wonder if the motivation behind the book is to stake Doudnas claims on the technology or if, perhaps, it is meant to serve as a preemptive mea culpa for unleashing a technology that will irrevocably alter life on Earth.

There are many compelling reasons for why this is a worthy contribution for any booklist, but for Berkeley the justification is even richer. UC Berkeley has been ground zero for this entire technology, with contributions from others around the world. Secondly, the ramifications of this technology are so widespread that only a campus with broad excellence in all areas is adequate to engage the range of implications that this technology offers. UC Berkeley Library

Though the authors note that science involves both competition and collaboration, they avoid discussion of the myriad conflicts that exist in this exciting new fieldan absence that makes the rosy picture presented in this otherwise excellent book just a bit too unbelievable. Publishers Weekly

The larger purpose of A Crack in Creation, clearly, is to show that Doudna is the true hero of CRISPR. And ultimately, despite the book's flaws, I'm convinced. Nominators and the Nobel Committee will need to read this book. But CRISPR binge-watchers like me still await a truly satisfying account one that is insightful, candid and contextualized. Nature

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DNA test confirms teen missing since 1976 was John Wayne Gacy victim – USA TODAY

Posted: at 2:46 am

On Wednesday, a 16 year old boy who went missing from his home more than 40 years ago in Minnesota, has been identified by Chicago police as a victim of the serial killer John Wayne Gacy. USA TODAY

This 1978 file photo shows serial killer John Wayne Gacy.(Photo: AP)

CHICAGO A St. Paul, Minn. teen who went missing more than 40 years ago has been identified as a victim of serial killer John Wayne Gacy, authorities announced Wednesday.

DNA samplesfrom the remains of a body found in the crawl space of the notorious killer match those ofJames "Jimmie"Haakenson, Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart said. The sheriffsaid the 16-year-old boy who went missing in August 1976is one of seven victims of Gacy who authorities have long been seeking to identify.

Gacy tortured, assaulted and murdered 33 men and boys, many who he lured to his home by impersonating a police officer or promising them construction work. Most of the victims were found hidden in his homeon the city's Northwest Side after hewas caught in 1978.

"He was a young man who wanted to go out on his own to a bigger city," Dart said of Haakenson. "He was in touch with his mom...we believe hours before he was killed."

Authorities for years have struggled to identify several of Gacy's victims, who were killed long before the advent of DNA testing.

Haakenson's mother, who died in 2005, had visited the sheriff's department in 1979 to inquire about whether her son, who was known as Jimmie, might beone of Gacy's unidentified victims. She had last heard from him on Aug. 5, 1976, after he had called to tell her he had gone to Chicago.

She did not have dental records, limiting the detectives' abilities at the timeto ascertain if her son's body was among the unidentified remains,Dart said.

In 2011, Dart, whose jurisdiction includes Chicago, announced that he was reopening the investigation into the deaths of eight unidentified victims of Gacy who were found stuffed in the crawl space of his home or elsewhere on his property.

The sheriff asked family members whose missing loved ones fit the profile of Gacy's victims to contact his detectives, and asked many to submit DNA samples.

The identity of one of the original eight unidentified victims, 19-year-old William George Bundy, was confirmed through DNA testing in late 2011, just months after Dart launched the Gacy inquiry, but the sheriff's officehad no more positive hits until now.

Gacy inquiry helps sheriff identify 1979 murder victim

Still, Dart persisted oncalling on families and friends of young men who went missing during the years Gacy preyed in the Chicago area to contact his office. His office has submitted DNA samples from the relatives of 57 missing men and boys whose loved ones went missing around the time Gacy was on his killing spree.

In March of this year, the sheriff's department was contacted by a nephew of Haakenson, who stumbled upon a Sheriff's Department web site that explained the effort to try to identify the missing. Soon after, Haakenson's brother and sister submitted DNA that the University of Northern Texas Center for Human Identification used to test against the unidentified victims remains.

"The nephew never met him but felt very compelled to find out about (what happened) to his uncle," Dart said.

DNA testing has helped authorities identify one of seven unidentified victims of serial killer John Wayne Gacy. James Haakenson was 16 when he went missing more than 40 years ago. His family members only learned this week he was one of the notorious serial killer's victims.(Photo: Cook County Sheriff's Department)

Dart said the Haakenson's corpse appeared to have been stacked in the crawl space of Gacy's homeunderneaththe body of Rick Johnston, a high school student who went missing after attending a concert in August 1976at the city's Aragon Ballroom. That was right around the same time Haakenson last had contact with his mother, Dart said.

A third body, one of six victims who have not yet been identified, was lying underneath Haakenson's remains, the sheriff said.

Gacy was executed in 1994.

Follow USA TODAY Chicago correspondentAamer Madhani on Twitter:@AamerISmad

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DNA Testing Suggests Dogs Needed No Convincing to Befriend Humans – Gizmodo

Posted: at 2:46 am

Dogs have loved us for thousands of years, despite humanitys many flaws and foibles. New research suggests dogs were domesticated from wolves just oncethats all it might have taken for puppers and people to form an everlasting alliance.

The study, which was published online yesterday in Nature Communications, analyzed the genomes of two ancient German doggosone 7,000 years-old and the other 4,700 years-old. The researchers compared their dog DNA data to the genome of a 4,800 year old dog from Ireland that other scientists had studied in 2016, and to modern dog genomes. In that study, published last year in Science, researchers put forth a dual origin idea that dogs were domesticated from wolves on two separate occasions, in Europe and Asia. But in this recent study, researchers wrote their ancient doggos predominantly share[d] ancestry with modern European dogs. In other words, there might have actually been a single origin, although the precise location where dogs were first domesticated is still somewhat of a mystery.

We came to the conclusion that our data consisting of prehistoric three Neolithic genomes and DNA from thousands of modern dogs from across the world supported only a single domestication event from a group of wolves somewhere in Eurasia sometime between 20,000 to 40,000 years ago, co-author Krishna Veeramah, an assistant professor of ecology and evolution at Stony Brook University, told Gizmodo. In addition, most of the dogs people keep as pets today are likely genetically the descendants of the dogs that lived amongst the first European farmers 7,000 years ago, and perhaps even as far back as 14,000 years ago when people were still practicing a hunter-gatherer lifestyle.

Dogs were the first animal to be domesticated by humans. Anyone who owns a cat can tell you that felines were definitely domesticated long afterward. While this new study wont end the argument over how many times dogs were domesticated, it does offer a compelling, simple solution.

One the face of it you might think, why is it important that there was one, two, three or even four domestication events? Veeramah explained. But if youre trying to find out how and why it occurs, whether it was one or more is important. Humans and wolves have likely lived in the same region for maybe 40,000 years. So if the process of domestication only occurred once, this tells us it was likely very hard to do.

Humanity is constantly evolving, and has reinvented and embarrassed itself so many ways over the course of thousands of years. But in this ever-shifting nebula of chaos we call life, at least one thing remains true: the dogs are good.

[Nature]

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Apparently, Most of Your DNA is Garbage – Men’s Health

Posted: at 2:46 am


Men's Health
Apparently, Most of Your DNA is Garbage
Men's Health
Anyone have somewhat fond memories of that day in high school biology when you got to re-create DNA using marshmallows and toothpicks? Whether or not you can remember the names of the different parts (or even that DNA actually stands for ...

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Saucy dealings; Madonna’s DNA not for sale; Dr. Phil’s big money – SFGate

Posted: at 2:46 am

Chronicle Staff and News Services

Photo: Frank Wiese, Associated Press

Rapper Tupac Shakur was killed in 1996.

Rapper Tupac Shakur was killed in 1996.

Dr. Phil is making lots and lots of money.

Dr. Phil is making lots and lots of money.

Saucy dealings; Madonnas DNA not for sale; Dr. Phils big money

Number of the day

$4.2 billion

Thats how much U.S. spice maker McCormick & Co. paid for the food business of Reckitt Benckiser, the maker of such items as Frenchs mustard and Franks RedHot sauce. The combined group is expected to have annual sales of around $5 billion. In an unrelated condiment development, Heinz recognized National Hot Dog Day and the reluctance of Chicagoans to put ketchup on a hot dog by offering Chicago Dog Sauce in a limited-edition bottle. It looks an awful lot like, uh, ketchup.

No, you cant buy Madonnas DNA

A New York judge has stopped an impending auction of Madonnas personal items, including a love letter from ex-boyfriend Tupac Shakur, a pair of worn panties and a hairbrush containing her hair. The Material Girl sought an emergency court order saying she was shocked at the planned online auction by Gotta Have It Collectibles, and said a former friend is behind the sale. Its outrageous and grossly offensive her DNA could be auctioned, she said.

But Dr. Phil could

have won the bidding

Speaking of wealthy entertainers, Forbes has come out with its annual list of the worlds top-earning TV personalities. Phil McGraw leads the list with $79 million, followed, in order, by Ellen DeGeneres, Jerry Seinfeld, Gordon Ramsay and Ryan Seacrest. The earnings include income from additional activities such as producing, non-TV performances, endorsements and merchandising.

Compiled from staff and news services. See more items and links at http://www.sfgate.com. Twitter: @techchronicle

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To Jasmine As Long As He Can: Terrified OfRasheeda’s Reaction – Hollywood Life

Posted: at 2:46 am

L&HH star Kirk Frost is hoping he can save his marriage with Rasheeda by waiting as long as possible to reveal his DNA results for Jasmine Washingtons baby. Get the EXCLUSIVE details here!

Is he the father?! Kirk Frost, 48, is fighting for his marriage with wife Rasheeda, 35,and is not ready to hand over his DNA results that will claim if he is or isnt the father to Jasmine Washingtons baby. Kirk is burying his head in the sand and hiding from the inevitable, a source EXCLUSIVELY told HollywoodLife.com. Right now hes so wrapped up in trying to get Rasheeda back, the last thing he wants to do is confirm to her and the world that he had a baby by another woman. Hes putting off handing over the results as long as he can. Its not clear how long Kirk is planning on avoiding the issue but hes going to have to face it someday. It doesnt make any sense because theres no way to run from this forever, but Kirk doesnt seem to think thats the case, the source continued. Hes got this crazy idea that he can still find a way to dodge this bullet and save his marriage. Hes living in total denial but thats where his head is at. See Kirks shocking text messages during his alleged affair with Jasmine here!

Kirk married Rasheeda back in 1999 and the couple have two children together. News of his possible infidelity came as a shock to many when Jasmine filed court papers in Jan. 2017 demanding he pay child support. The paternity test was soon requested and everyones been on edge just waiting to see if Kirk really is the father of Kannon Mekhi Washington who was born in 2016. Rasheeda was understandably heartbroken when she found out about her husbands relationship with Jasmine and the possibility that the baby might be his just increases the pain. However, she has admitted on L&HH that if the baby is Kirks she would allow it to get to know her family. Now, thats selfless!

Despite Rasheedas patience with Kirk up to this point, the way things ended on the most recent finale of the show proves that it may not continue to be all sunshine and roses for the couple. The highly anticipated DNA results never happened and it leads many to speculate that Kirk and his past will continue to haunt him until it ultimately ends his bond with Rasheeda. It looks like only time will tell with this situation but we hope the answers come soon!

HollywoodLifers, what do you think about Kirk holding back on the DNA results? Tell us here!

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